1977-03-14

ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Mr. Heward Grafftey (Brome-Missisquoi):: Mr. Speaker, I rise under the provisions of Standing Order 43 on a matter of urgent and pressing necessity. I move, seconded by the hon. member for St. John's East (Mr. McGrath):
That this House indicates to all Canadians its concern to promote the recognition of Canada's destiny by commending to all Members of Parliament.. .

... organization Engagement canadien which announced today in Ottawa . ..

... their plans to promote in perpetuity the expression of Canadian identity in co-operation with all other groups which may grow up from time to time with special interests in the same ideal.


Mr. Speaker:: Pursuant to the Standing Order, to be presented for debate in the House such a motion must have the unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


AGRICULTURE
Mr. Lome Nystrom (Yorkton-Melville):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a matter of urgent and pressing necessity under the provisions of Standing Order 43. The introduction into Canada of imitation cheese is now a real possibility and is being considered seriously by some companies, and since it could seriously threaten the income of industrial milk producers, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Brant (Mr. Blackburn):
That the government undertake comprehensive studies on the possibility of disastrous economic effects on the already hard hit industrial milk producers and the possible nutritional effects of imitation cheese on Canadians.


Mr. Speaker:: Pursuant to Standing Order 43 such a motion cannot be presented for debate without the unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


SOCIAL SECURITY
Mr. Eudore Allard (Rimouski):: Mr. Speaker, I rise under the provisions of Standing Order 43 on a matter of urgency and importance.
In view of the great number of people between 60 and 65 who are facing serious problems of survival, particularly in the case of pensioners' widows, and considering that it has become urgent to apply a new policy in this field, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Roberval (Mr. Gauthier):
That this House implement as soon as possible the recommendation of the Federation de l'age d'or du Quebec, a copy of which has been sent to the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Lalonde), to the effect that a person of 60, who has the misfortune of losing her pensioner spouse, could draw two-thirds of their aggregate pensions, until she is 65, when she can draw her full old age pension.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The presentation of such a motion pursuant to Standing Order 43 requires the unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


Mr. Speaker:: As there is not unanimous consent, the motion cannot be put.


TRANSPORTATION
Mr. Raymond Dupont (Sainte-Marie):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to the provisions of Standing Order 43, I request the unanimous consent of the House to move a motion concerning a matter of urgent and pressing necessity.
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March 14, 1977
Unemployment Insurance
In view of the proposed move of the Cast North America Company Ltd. from Montreal to Halifax, of the undesirable implications such a decision might have on the economy of the port of Montreal, and in view also of the fact that this company's departure would lead to an increase in the surtax on tonnage from $2.94 to $4.10, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Labelle (Mr. Dupras):
That the Minister of Transport (Mr. Lang) make a statement on motions on that subject so that the House be perfectly well informed of the implications of such a departure on the port of Montreal.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The House has heard the motion of the hon. member. Pursuant to the provisions of Standing Order 43, the motion requires the unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Yes.


Mr. Speaker:: Since the House gives unanimous consent, I shall put the motion. Seconded by the hon. member for Labelle (Mr. Dupras), the hon. member for Sainte-Marie (Mr. Dupont) moves:
That the Minister of Transport (Mr. Lang) make a statement on motions on that subject, so that the House be perfectly well informed of the implications of such a departure on the port of Montreal.
Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the said motion?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Presentation of such motion pursuant to Standing Order 43 requires the unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


An hon. Member:: No.


UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE
Mr. Derek Blackburn (Brant):: Mr. Speaker, I rise under the provisions of Standing Order 43 on a matter of urgent and pressing necessity, namely the operation of the benefit control system within the Unemployment Insurance Commission. In view of the fact that numerous allegations have been made that "non-cheaters" are being systematically cut off from unemployment insurance benefits-a serious charge at any time but even more so at a time when we are facing record high unemployment rates and dangerously low job vacancy rates-I move, seconded by the hon. member for Northwest Territories (Mr. Firth):

That this House instructs the minister to initiate an investigation into the operation of the benefit control system of the Unemployment Insurance Commission and to report back to the House within three weeks the results of this investigation.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Pursuant to Standing Order 43 presentation of such a motion for debate requires the unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: No.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Mr. John C. Crosbie (St. John's West):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources. The Leader of the Opposition has suggested a national inquiry into all aspects of the development of nuclear energy in Canada. At first the minister suggested that the Porter Commission in Ontario would be sufficient but he has now indicated in correspondence that such an inquiry might be undertaken by the Standing Committee on National Resources and Public Works. In light of the fact that this Committee has no real resources to conduct such an inquiry in terms of personnel, finances and subpoena powers, and in light of the experience of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts in a more restricted matter concerning sales of CANDU units abroad, would the minister agree to a royal commission inquiry with full powers of subpoena, adequate staff and finances to undertake this task?


Hon. Alastair Gillespie (Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources):: Mr. Speaker, I made it very clear in my reply to the hon. Leader of the Opposition, a copy of which I would be prepared to make public as he made his letter to me public, that I have never been against an inquiry into this area. Indeed, I think it is very important that there be a full and open public discussion about the whole question of nuclear energy, its resources and its benefits. The Porter Commission in Ontario is dealing with many aspects of the question of nuclear energy. I believe that the Standing Committee on National Resources and Public Works could well spend a good deal of its time examining the nuclear options under the reference it presently has. I told the Leader of the Opposition that my officials and I would be pleased to co-operate.


John Carnell Crosbie: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. The minister is suggesting that the Standing Committee on National Resources and Public Works can undertake this job. Would the minister not agree that it is very likely that committee would be no more effective than the Public Accounts Committee is when it is investigating the more restricted matter of the
March 14, 1977

sale of these units? Would the minister promise active co-operation with all government departments and agencies rather than the mere lip service that the Public Accounts Committee has received in its inquiries?


Alastair William Gillespie: Mr. Speaker, I have already indicated my support and the offer of my co-operation and that of my department.


ROYAL CANADIAN MOUNTED POLICE
John Carnell Crosbie: Mr. Speaker, I have a final supplementary question for the Solicitor General. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police were asked by the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources to ascertain if enough information was available for an RCMP investigation into the payment of agency fees by AECL with respect to the sale of certain nuclear reactors. It is our understanding that the RCMP has completed that investigation and its report is now in the hands of the Solicitor General. Will the Solicitor General advise the House if he has received a report and if the report will be made public, or if there will be further investigations or charges laid as a result of the RCMP investigation into this matter?


Hon. Francis Fox (Solicitor General):: Mr. Speaker, I have not been advised by the RCMP that the inquiry is finished. Actually, I have been advised to the contrary, that the investigation is not quite complete, and as yet I have no report in my hand.


POSSIBILITY OF SELLING SECOND CANDU REACTOR TO SOUTH KOREA-GOVERNMENT POSITION
Mr. Bill Clarke (Vancouver Quadra):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a supplementary question to the Acting Prime Minister? Since the Chairman of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, Ross Campbell, told the Public Accounts Committee that AECL has entered into an agreement with Shaul Eisenberg covering a possible second reactor sale to South Korea, and since the Korean government has now ordered that future purchases of reactors are to be made under competitive bids, and has stated that no bid has been received from AECL even though the Korean Electric Company is shopping for two more reactors and interest has been expressed by France, Britain, Italy, Switzerland and the United States, I would ask the Acting Prime Minister if the government is serious about its intention to sell another reactor to South Korea?


Alastair William Gillespie: Mr. Speaker, I do not believe there have been any
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negotiations up to this time with respect to another reactor. If the government of Korea or the Korean Electric Company were interested in purchasing a second CANDU reactor we would, of course, be interested in discussing this with them.


William Hillary (Bill) Clarke: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. According to Canada's representative in these matters, the government has entered into a contract with an agent. My question, if I can repeat it, is this: is it the government's intention to carry on with the sale?


Alastair William Gillespie: Mr. Speaker, it certainly is our intention to carry on with the sale, to complete the contract already entered into.


UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE
Derek Nigel Ernest Blackburn: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Manpower and Immigration. Last Monday, the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby asked the minister to explain why unemployment insurance pay-outs for 1976 were down from the 1975 pay-out level even though unemployment increased in 1976. The minister said he was puzzled by this anomaly and would try to find an answer. Has he found the answer?


Hon. Jack Cullen (Minister of Manpower and Immigration):: Mr. Speaker, when quoting figures last week we referred to the number of claims received, not allowed. Under Bill C-69 an individual 65 years old or over cannot claim UI. That had a depressing effect on the Figure. The number of people allowed benefits was down only slightly. The increase in payments went from about $3.1 billion to $3.4 billion. It seems that the average duration of payments was longer, particularly in areas of worsening economic conditions. The average duration in 1976 was about 18.4 weeks, as compared with about 17.9 weeks in 1975.


Derek Nigel Ernest Blackburn: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Last week the minister said in the House that, with respect to the benefit control system, "the only people who are suffering hardship are those who are actually cheating." Since the minister has been sent letters from metro Toronto legal aid centres pointing out that large numbers of non-cheaters are being cut off benefits, will the minister investigate the operation of the benefit control system and report his findings to the House in a statement on motions?


Jack Sydney George (Bud) Cullen: Mr. Speaker, I think that those suffering were in fact cheaters, that is, those who were working and drawing unemployment insurance at the same time. But there are other individuals who have failed to indicate that they are looking for work. I would not suggested that they are cheating. When they have indicated that they have made a legitimate job search, they are reinstated automatically.

March 14, 1977
Oral Questions


PUBLICATION OF STANDARDS USED BY BENEFIT CONTROL OFFICERS IN ASSESSING ELIGIBILITY OF CLAIMANTS
Derek Nigel Ernest Blackburn: A final supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. As the Unemployment Insurance Commission, in assessing the eligibility of persons to receive benefits, uses arbitrary standards which vary from province to province and city to city, and as these standards are not made known to those applying for benefits, will the minister make public these standards, by tabling in this House copies of all guides and materials used by benefit control officers in assessing eligibility to receive UIC benefits?


Jack Sydney George (Bud) Cullen: Mr. Speaker, under one of the services provided by the Unemployment Insurance Commission, our interviewing officers indicate to individuals what job searches they should be conducting. Here, again, common sense is brought to bear. Since only a certain number of jobs may be available in a particular area, whereas in another area there may be far more numerous job opportunities, it is clear that conditions are going to vary. The standards are not set in any arbitrary way; they are established with a view to helping individuals in times of high unemployment obtain the benefit of interviews with manpower officers and available job opportunities. This is done in an attempt to help the unemployed, Mr. Speaker.


ALLEGATION BENEFIT CONTROL OFFICERS PROMOTED ON BASIS OF PRODUCTIVITY
Mr. Lincoln M. Alexander (Hamilton West):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to refer the minister once again to the article in the Toronto Star prepared by Olivia Ward. It indicated that there was a quota system and a heavy handed approach by the government with regard to unemployment insurance claimants. Is the minister aware of the fact that Roger Tardiff, who is his acting chief of the Ontario region, has indicated that benefit control staff are promoted and given raises according to their productivity records? Surely the minister knows we are not talking about ingots in a steel company. Will he now without any hesitation and with firm direction pass on to the benefit control officers that this type of program must cease forthwith?


Jack Sydney George (Bud) Cullen: Being a lawyer, as is the hon. member, I would first like to hear the other side of the story, to ascertain if Mr. Tardiff said that, given the other inaccuracies in the Olivia Ward article. Most assuredly that is not the basis on which anybody should be promoted, that is productivity, not policemen giving traffic tickets or individuals giving interviews.


REQUEST FOR INVESTIGATION OF ALLEGATIONS IN REPORT OF TORONTO &quot;STAR&quot; OF MARCH 5, 1977
Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: Mr. Speaker,
I hope the minister will contact his subordinate in order to look into the entire matter, particularly all of the issues which were raised in that article. In view of the fact that in-house investi-

gations are questionable, not satisfactory and are usually suspect, will the minister direct the unemployment insurance advisory committee to investigate and publicly report back on all the allegations in the Toronto Star of March 5, 1977? This is extremely important. His predecessor did this in the past and I hope the minister will move in a similar direction. Will he at the same time cause the said committee to investigate the reasons for and the extent of the increase in fraud affecting unemployment insurance? In other words, what is wrong with the act? Can the minister give us some assurance with respect to those steps?


Jack Sydney George (Bud) Cullen: As I said, Mr. Speaker, the article by Olivia Ward is fraught with errors, mistatements and incorrect information. I do not want to ask the advisory council to examine something that is obviously in error.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: I reject the minister's answer in this regard.


An hon. Member:: Oh, oh!


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: Just take your sweet time, dear friend. I indicated to the minister that in-house investigations are unsatisfactory, suspect and that we must have an independent inquiry with respect to this matter. He has set up a committee made up of labour, and there is the Minister of-what is your title, sir?-Industry, Trade and Commerce, and you are not doing a good job in that regard. Will the minister see to it that this committee is brought into play in order that we can have a fair investigation regarding this very serious charge? That is all I am asking.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Jack Sydney George (Bud) Cullen: The louder the voice, the louder the applause. We do conduct constant investigations in an endeavour to indicate whether we might improve upon the system. I do not think it appropriate that I should call in this particular advisory group when I am not satisfied with the accuracy of the reporting that was done. If there are legitimate complaints, this group needs no impetus from me to get moving.


AGRICULTURE
Eudore Allard: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Agriculture.
Could the minister advise the House whether his department intends to pay part of the costs of the program which his provincial counterpart has announced for next September, a program which will make it possible to have free milk distribution in schools and will likely develop in youngsters the habit of consuming dairy products?
March 14, 1977


Hon. E. F. Whelan (Minister of Agriculture):: Mr. Speaker, my department has no such intention at this time. As I said before, that is a social services program. The provincial governments are providing that in the schools in some instances at the present time.


INDUSTRIAL MILK-COMPARISON OF FEDERAL AND QUEBEC AID PROGRAMS
Eudore Allard: Mr. Speaker, in view of the fact that the Quebec government has certainly demonstrated more generosity towards farmers than the federal government through its recently announced stabilization policy of farm incomes, could the minister assure the House that Quebec will not be penalized because of that, as his provincial counterpart greatly fears? I am referring here to the fact that the Canadian government will reduce by 50 per cent its assistance to producers who join a provincial income stabilization scheme which proves more generous than that of the central government.


Eugene Whelan: Until now as the industrial milk producers of Quebec have been practically totally supported by the federal government, to suggest that the program announced by the provincial minister of agriculture in Quebec will be more generous than ours is just not factual.



EXTERNAL AFFAIRS


Mr. David MacDonald (Egmont):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Secretary of State for External Affairs. In view of the fact that the Canadian permanent representative at the UN Commission on Human Rights was authorized to pursue, in concert with other delegations, the establishment of an investigatory body to examine the whole range of violations of human rights alleged to have been committed in Uganda in recent years and that apparently, in a closed meeting of the Commission, it simply decided to keep the situation under review until 1978, can the minister tell us whether Canada agreed to this procedure, whether any votes were taken, whether Canada voted for that proposition and explain why we simply agreed to have the matter kept under review bearing in mind the serious situation which presently exists in Uganda?


Hon. Donald C. Jamieson (Secretary of State for External Affairs):: I do not know the source of the hon. member's information but I have to tell him he is better informed on this subject than I am at the moment.


Some hon. Members:: Oh!
Oral Questions


Donald Campbell Jamieson: I do not mind admitting it when an hon. member knows something I do not know. I have not heard anything about this officially. If the hon. member agrees, I will take his question as notice and get all the information for him.



POSSIBILITY OF DISCUSSING VIOLATIONS OF HUMAN RIGHTS BY UGANDA AT COMMONWEALTH CONFERENCE

David Samuel Horne MacDonald: I will be grateful to hear from the minister with respect to this situation because I know he himself felt strongly that this was one avenue worth pursuing by the Human Rights Commission.
In relation to the meetings which took place over the past weekend between the Prime Minister and the Prime Minister of Great Britain, may I ask whether or not further discussions took place on this matter either with respect to initiatives under the umbrella of the United Nations or, more particularly, along lines the minister himself referred to when he appeared before the Committee on External Affairs and National Defence and indicated he would recommend to the Prime Minister the placing of an item upon the agenda at the meeting of Commonwealth heads of government to take place later this year? Was there substantial agreement on this matter with the British Prime Minister and is there now a strong initiative to have this whole matter raised at that Commonwealth meeting?


Donald Campbell Jamieson: I think I can answer yes to the question in general without indicating that all those matters were discussed in precisely the form in which the hon. member has raised them. We did talk about Uganda and about the need to discuss these questions. I should say that a fair amount of the responsibility for the agenda rests with the Secretariat of the Commonwealth as opposed to any individual government. Therefore, while I have no doubt this subject will be discussed, I am not sure at the moment just what form the discussion will take or how it will get before the heads of government.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: I think it should be recognized that the recommendations of senior governments within the Commonwealth, such as our own and that of the United Kingdom, will very largely determine the shape of the agenda. It is important that Canadians be clear that the firm recommendation of our government and that of the United Kingdom is in favour of an agenda item with respect to this matter. It is not whether the Secretariat will be considering this or not but whether our government has gone on record as saying that from our point of view it is a requirement as an agenda item.


Donald Campbell Jamieson: Mr. Speaker, I obviously cannot speak on behalf of the Government of the United Kingdom, but as far as Canada is concerned I do not think there is any question at all but that we anticipate this matter will be discussed and will also, undoubtedly be discussed in the broader context of human rights in general. The subject of human rights will also probably be on the agenda as well as on the agenda of the summit meeting which is to be held shortly before the Com-

Oral Questions
monwealth meeting takes place. I repeat, however, that there is some question as to how exactly the agenda is to be formulated and at the moment we have not heard from the Secretary General as to what, for instance, other African countries may wish to do with regard to the discussion of the Ugandan question.



CANADIAN INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT AGENCY


Hon. George Hees (Prince Edward-Hastings):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Secretary of State for External Affairs. As I wrote to the minister on January 14, which is exactly two months ago today, regarding the refusal of our senior CIDA representative in Haiti to make it possible for a visiting member of parliament to see our $20 million CIDA project in that country, would the minister explain why, during the past two months, 1 have received no report regarding this inexcusable lack of courtesy and duty?


Donald Campbell Jamieson: Mr. Speaker, in answer to the first part of the question, namely the refusal to welcome a distinguished member of the House, I do not know for certain that that is the case, although I have every reason to take the hon. member's word for that. I would agree with him, however, that failure to reply in two months is inexcusable and I will make inquiries this afternoon to find out why he has not received that answer.


George Harris Hees: Mr. Speaker, first of all I should like to assure the minister that the facts are exactly as I outlined them to him in my detailed letter.
Would the minister not agree that permitting our CIDA representatives abroad not to explain such a lack of courtesy and duty indicates to them that this government condones this sort of thing and believes, as they seem to do, that members of parliament do not have the right and duty to see how the taxpayers' money is spent abroad on projects of this kind? If that is not the case, would the minister get on with the job immediately of getting that report into my hands?


Donald Campbell Jamieson: Mr. Speaker, the second question is a little redundant since I already said I would get on with it immediately, and I assure the hon. member he will have an answer very quickly.



NATIONAL DEFENCE


Mr. Dan McKenzie (Winnipeg South Centre):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Defence. On March 8 in a news release the minister stated that he would not be able to continue with the locating of the new Defence Research Centre in Winnipeg due to budgetary constraints, but the former minister of national defence, the hon. member for Winnipeg South, in a public statement on Friday stated:
It just is not correct to say the money is not available. It was approved by Treasury Board. I know because I got the money approved for that expenditure in the west at the same time as the funds were approved for the language college in Quebec.
I would like to ask the minister why there is delay in locating the centre in Winnipeg when funds have already been allocated by Treasury Board.


Hon. Barney Danson (Minister of National Defence):: Mr. Speaker, the same questions are being asked by my colleague, the distinguished Minister without Portfolio from Manitoba.


Some hon. Members:: Who is he?


Barnett Jerome Danson: The fact is that I, too, had those questions, in a period of time after the funds have been approved, as to why it had not gone ahead. There were difficulties in acquiring the land. I had given instructions to proceed with the acquisition of land to meet the options open and to make certain that decentralization was carried out in Winnipeg, and that the research and development efforts and the industrial efforts benefit Winnipeg in the best way for the longest terms, as I pointed out in committee.


A. Daniel McKenzie: The minister stated a number of times that he is having difficulties acquiring the land, but the former minister stated:
... it was also not correct to say that there were difficulties encountered in acquiring the land for a site in Winnipeg.
As the department has had the land purchase contract in its hands for almost three months now, can the minister tell us what difficulties he is experiencing, because he is getting the land at an absolute steal?


Barnett Jerome Danson: I would be delighted to, Mr. Speaker. It is not actual acquisition of the land that is the difficulty, although I gave that impression. This is not precisely correct. It was the closing of rights of way, the need to expropriate some properties or to avoid the expropriation of some properties, but mostly it had to do with civic regulations regarding the accesses and closing of accesses.



LOCATION OF DEFENCE RESEARCH CENTRE IN WINNIPEG AS PART OF DECENTRALIZATION PROGRAM

A. Daniel McKenzie: The former minister of national defence stated also in his public statement on Friday:
March 14, 1977

If the Liberal government does not go ahead with the Manitoba Defence Research establishment it will be clear evidence that it does not believe in its policy of decentralization ...
I should like to ask the minister whether the moving of the Defence Research Centre to Winnipeg will be part of the over-all decentralization policy of the government?


Barnett Jerome Danson: As
my colleague and I have discussed, decentralization still continues. We want to make certain that it is proper decentralization, the wise use of taxpayers' money, the longest-term benefits, the best benefit for the people of Winnipeg and for Manitoba.



EXTERNAL AFFAIRS


Right Hon. J. G. Diefenbaker (Prince Albert):: Mr. Speaker, my question is a supplementary one to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. In view of the questions that were asked a few moments ago by the hon. member for Egmont and also the hon. member for Prince Edward-Hastings, I would ask the minister whether or not he would return to the experience of the past in connection with international affairs when Mackenzie King, during the days of war, regularly set aside a couple of days for the discussion of international affairs. That course was followed by the St. Laurent government, by the Pearson government and by my government. The result was that the government heard the views of members of parliament.
Does he not think now is the appropriate time for the government to set aside a couple of days so that we can discuss such matters as the effrontery and diabolical cruelty of Amin as well as the question of the invasion of human rights by the U.S.S.R. and the Helsinki agreement to get the views of members of parliament on these questions? I ask him that in all sincerity because so far as the situation today is concerned foreign affairs have become the monopoly of Ivan Head, the Prime Minister and the minister, and the rest of us-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


John George Diefenbaker: -do not have any say in these matters and cannot make our views known in this connection.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Donald Campbell Jamieson: Mr. Speaker, I am surprised to see the hon. member for Egmont applauding those strong words of the right hon. member for Prince Albert. He knows I was before the committee of the House for three hours just last week and before the Senate committee also last week. In so far as discussing these matters in this chamber is concerned, I have no objection to that. I am not sure what the mechanism would be for bringing this subject before the House. Obviously, one is to have an opposition day devoted to external affairs. But if there is
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another technique, I would willingly discuss it with the House leader to see what can be done about it.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John George Diefenbaker: This is an alibi that has been used regularly by the present government. In the past, however, various governments wanted to know what the average member thought and it was the government that would set aside the two days. I am sure that irrespective of the tremendous intelligence of the three persons I named, members of parliament could contribute quite a lot at this time and, in particular, could let the world know what we think of having Amin appear at the Commonwealth conference.



CANADIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION


Mr. Cyril Symes (Sault Ste. Marie):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Secretary of State I should like to direct my question to the acting minister. Will the minister confirm to the House the report in the March 12 issue of the Globe and Mail that the broadcast of the CBC journalistic drama on the Syncrude project has been postponed indefinitely, allegedly because one of its key characters is currently premier of a province and therefore would add extra controversy to the current image of the CBC? If this is the case, will the minister assure the House that there was no communication between the CBC and federal cabinet members on the issue?


Mr. Jacques Guilbault (Parliamentary Secretary to Secretary of State):: Mr. Speaker, I will seek information about the hon. member's statement and report to him.



REQUEST FOR ASSURANCE NO COMMUNICATION BETWEEN CABINET AND CORPORATION ON CONTENT OF NEWS PROGRAMS

Reginald Cyril Symes: Would the parliamentary secretary also look into whether or not there has been any communication between the Secretary of State or his cabinet colleagues and the CBC on the content of news programming, apart from the allegations of separatist bias which have been already heard?


Jacques Guilbault: Mr. Speaker, I understand the hon. member's question.

Oral Questions



STUDY OF FOODS AND DRUGS CONSIDERED DANGEROUS-GOVERNMENT POSITION

William Heward Grafftey: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of National Health and Welfare. Now that tests on saccharin and allied products have been carried out by the food and drug administration, and now that they are to be taken from the market, will the minister inform the House if other foodstuffs and drugs are under similar study? There is great doubt about their safety, and if there is a comparison between these kinds of studies and the study carried out on saccharin, will the burden of proof be put on producers and the benefit of doubt be given to the consumers of this country? Will these products which are possibly under study-and we will find that out from the minister's answers-be withdrawn from the market before the final word is in?


Hon. Marc Lalonde (Minister of National Health and Welfare):: Mr. Speaker, under the Food and Drugs Act, whenever a new product is to be out on the market in compliance with this legislation, manufacturers must submit to the Health Protection Branch considerable evidence on the quality and value of this product from a health point of view. These regulations now exist and any new request to put a product on the market made by a manufacturer under the Food and Drugs Act shall comply with the extremely strict criteria provided by the law. At the present time, the manufacturer has to file evidence before the department will grant a licence for the distribution of these products.


William Heward Grafftey: Mr. Speaker, while everybody in the House applauds the minister's taking saccharin and allied products off the market, does the minister not feel that because of the debate going on it might have been more desirable to have withdrawn saccharin long ago, that a similar situation vis-a-vis studies could have applied to foodstuffs and other drugs now being tested, that the government should act sooner rather than later and that the benefit of the doubt should be given to the consumer?


Marc Lalonde: No, Mr. Speaker.



NATIONAL DEFENCE


Mr. Steven E. Paproski (Edmonton Centre):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Defence. The chief

of the defence staff stated in committee that moving the Canadian Airborne Regiment from Edmonton to Petawawa would make the force operationally less effective. Would the minister now reverse his decision on this less effective operation and leave the Canadian Airborne Regiment in Edmonton?


Barnett Jerome Danson: Mr. Speaker, I think the hon. member is taking words out of context. This move makes the force more operationally effective. There are to be some compromises made on the day-today operation, but in the over-all picture of the armed forces this makes them far more effective.



REMOVAL OF AIRBORNE REGIMENT FROM EDMONTON- REQUEST FOR DELAY TO CONSULT NEW CHIEF OF STAFF

Steve Eugene Paproski: Mr. Speaker, if the minister had been in the committee, he would have heard the chief of staff. However, would the minister at least wait and consult with the new chief of the defence staff when General Dextraze, that honourable and distinguished soldier, retires before executing this most expensive and political exercise?


Barnett Jerome Danson: Mr. Speaker, this move is not expensive, as the hon. member says; it is cost effective, and it is only political in the sense that it is in the best interests of all Canadians.
 * *



FINANCE


Mrs. Jean E. Pigott (Ottawa-Carleton):: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Minister of Finance. As the minister knows, municipalities are facing increasing budgetary difficulties, despite vigorous austerity measures. In view of the fact that another increase in municipal tax rates is probable and that this increase will be reflected in the consumer price index, what consideration has the minister given to the removal of all federal sales taxes applied to purchases by municipal governments for equipment to operate essential public services?


Hon. Donald S. Macdonald (Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, there are already a fair number of exemptions in the Excise Tax Act for acquisitions by municipal institutions; for example, transit authorities of municipalities. I would have to say that a substantial withdrawal of any part of the excise tax would involve the imposition of the same taxation somewhere else on other taxpayers. In that sense I am not anticipating a change in this regard, but I will take the question as a representation to be considered in budget preparation.


Jean Elizabeth Pigott: Mr. Speaker, I realize my predecessor in Ottawa-Carleton was able to remove the tax on water, but there having been representation by the Ontario Municipal Electric Association regarding federal sales tax on material
March 14, 1977

and equipment used for electrical distribution systems under the control of municipalities-and this would really do a great deal to help lower housing costs and lower the taxes paid by consumers of municipal services-would the minister address himself especially to the electrical supply area?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, I would be glad to consider that particular representation.



LABOUR CONDITIONS


Mr. Jake Epp (Provencher):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Minister of Labour I would like to direct my question to his parliamentary secretary. My question is with respect to the strike which is taking place at Griffin Steel in Transcona, Manitoba, and which has been going on for a number of months. The situation has turned into a very ugly confrontation between Winnipeg police and the strikers. I would like to ask the parliamentary secretary whether his minister's department is aware of the situation and whether it has tried to get the various parties together in the hope of ending the strike, especially in view of the fear of many Manitobans that if the strike continues Griffin could close and the production of rail car wheels would take place in another province.


Mr. Jacques Olivier (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Labour):: Mr. Speaker, with regard to the comments made by my colleague opposite, I must say that I have not yet received the reports relating to that matter; I will inquire and report to him as soon as possible.



ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE


Mr.  R. Gordon L. Fairweather@Fundy-Royal: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Solicitor General. Has the proposed young offenders act yet cleared Treasury Board, and if it has, when can we expect to see that long awaited bill?


Francis Fox: Mr. Speaker, we have gone through a very elaborate and very complex process of consultation to ensure that all points of view were known before we brought out the federal position. We would like once again to discuss it with the provinces. I would like to make the federal position known by the end of this month.
Oral Questions EXTERNAL AFFAIRS



CONFERENCE ON EDUCATION IN BRUSSELS-FEDERAL REPRESENTATION IN VIEW OF ALLEGED POSITION OF QUEBEC

Mr. Donald W. Munro (Fsquimalt-Saanich):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Prime Minister and because of the international implications of my question I would like to direct my question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. In light of the attitude said to have been adopted by the Quebec government with respect to an international conference on education in Brussels, what steps is the government planning to take to ensure an appropriate single federal presence at that conference?


Donald Campbell Jamieson: Mr. Speaker, like the hon. member, I have seen the comments of the spokesman for the government of the province of Quebec. I can only give the same response I gave during the weekend in answer to a news inquiry, namely, that we are continuing to schedule these conferences and the make-up of the delegations attending them in precisely the same way as we have in the past. No changes are being contemplated. I have not as yet heard official word from the government of the province of Quebec. It may have reached my department, but I understand the matter is still being discussed at that level.



WATER RESOURCES CONFERENCE IN BUENOS AIRES-REQUEST FOR FEDERAL REPRESENTATION

Donald W. Munro: Mr. Speaker, in light of the exactly opposite attitude adopted by the government of the province of Quebec with respect to another conference being held-I believe on water resources in Buenos Aires-what steps is the government taking to ensure again that there will be a single Canadian federal voice at that international conference?


Donald Campbell Jamieson: Mr. Speaker, I can answer with more precision with regard to the water conference because that issue has been resolved. Each province will have the same representation. It will be a federal delegation. The vice chairman of the delegation, as is frequently the case, will be Mr. Green, a minister from the province of Manitoba. In last minute negotiations we did agree that for those provinces which wish to do so their representation could be increased from one to two persons, but beyond that there has been no change. I gather the hon. member is asking about the province of Quebec. The province of Quebec or any other province wishing to have two representatives rather than one may have two. Beyond that there has been no change from what we have normally done at such international meetings.

March 14, 1977
Oral Questions NATIONAL DEFENCE



MINISTER'S STATEMENT ON EFFECTIVENESS OF ANTI-SUBMARINE FORCES-REQUEST FOR CLARIFICATION

Mr. Allan B. McKinnon (Victoria):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Defence. In an interview program on Thursday evening the minister averred that our anti-submarine forces in the Atlantic are capable of finding and destroying nuclear armed submarines to an extent that would nullify the submarine-launched second-strike capability of an enemy. As these remarks are at variance with every knowledgeable military observer or expert that I know of, can the minister inform the House what grounds he has for making such statements which, if they came from someone other than the Minister of National Defence, would simply be considered uninformed nonsense?


Barnett Jerome Danson: Mr. Speaker, I think the hon. member added something that was not in that broadcast at all and that was to nullify the strength and strike capability. I was only commenting on the capability of our anti-submarine forces to seek out and destroy nuclear submarines. That is not a fool proof system; it is not 100 per cent and I think I pointed that out in that television broadcast as well.


Allan Bruce McKinnon: Perhaps I could give my reference for the statement I have made in the form of a question. The transcript of The Watson Report contains the following exchange:
Watson: All right. Now if that is true and we have suddenly made the Russian second-strike capacity not invulnerable, that is, it is vulnerable to our defence...
Danson: Surely it is.
Further, when Mr. Watson asked if we were destroying submarines-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member put forward a very interesting challenge but hardly a question.



AGRICULTURE


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Agriculture. As he noted in the House on Friday, cheese consumption rose by 15 per cent in the last year and the expanded cheese industry in this country may now be threatened by imitation cheese coming from the United States, for which at least one company is lobbying. Would the minister consider making a study on the economic impact this would have on the dairy industry if indeed imitation cheese were brought into Canada?


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker,
I am sure if it were allowed into Canada it would have an
(Mr. Jamieson.]
effect on the sales of good cheese in some instances. We intend to counteract any program such as this by entering into an advertising agreement, which has already been done, with the dairy processors who have agreed to pay for part of the advertising to sell industrial dairy products, mainly cheese products, in Canada.


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: A supplementary question. Just so that I am clear, Mr. Speaker, am I to understand that the minister will not undertake an economic impact study on the effect that imitation cheese will have on the income of dairy farmers? Will the minister undertake that type of study on behalf of dairy farmers in this country?


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker, even without having a study we know that if imitation cheese products take the market away from cheese producers in Canada you are going to have an economic effect on them. You do not have to be an economist to figure that out. All you have to be is a farmer and you would understand that this could be a possibility. I think we have to understand that the cheese products we are producing in Canada are superior to nearly any cheese products in the world. The very fact that we have increased our share of the market by 15 per cent last year shows that any imitation product will have a tough time competing with us.



FINANCE


Mr. Jack Murta (Lisgar):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance because I do not think the Minister of Agriculture would be able to give me a proper answer. Since agriculture organizations, provincial governments and commodity groups are literally frightened to death that agriculture could be forgotten in the upcoming GATT negotiations, I should like to ask the Minister of Finance if he could inform the House when the government position on agriculture will be put forward to the various commodity groups and provincial governments across Canada? Will there be meaningful consultation on tariffs and non-tariff measures when the Canadian position is put forward because at the present time the position is really cloudy and nobody understands exactly what the government is prepared to do?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, as the hon. gentleman says, the question of agriculture has not been at the forefront of the Geneva round of discussions, principally because of a stalemate in position between the United States and the European Economic Community. We would anticipate that with a renewed effort at the MTM negotiations that the question of agriculture would be assuming more prominence. From a Canadian standpoint we would expect within a matter of a very few weeks to have an important element of this, namely, the tariff board report on fresh fruits and vegetables, available for consideration by the
March 14, 1977

agricultural community and of the organizations the hon. member has mentioned and to have the opportunity of consultation in this regard. I can assure the hon. gentleman that the Minister of Agriculture has impressed upon me the importance of consultation with associations as well as provincial governments in this regard. We will, as in the industrial sector, make every effort to make certain that the viewpoint affecting Canadians will be taken into account at these negotiations.

[ Translation]



MANPOWER


Mr. C. A. Gauthier (Roberval):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Manpower and Immigration.
In the riding of Roberval, the selection committee has just completed a first selection of the Canada Works projects, and hardly 10 per cent of the applications could be considered because of the small funds available. Given the 30 per cent unemployment rate in the area, according to the manpower centre data, can the Minister tell the House whether additional funds will be made available for the unemployed so that all the projects presently submitted could be approved, and can he tell when?


Jack Sydney George (Bud) Cullen: Mr. Speaker, I have received the hon. member's representations.



NATIONAL PARKS


Mr. Frank Hamilton (Swift Current-Maple Creek):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. As the agreement between Saskatchewan and Canada regarding the Grassland National Park expires this month, can the minister indicate whether this park will be "go" or "no go"? The land owners involved have been waiting for years and are suffering the hardship of being unable to plan ahead.


Hon. Warren Allmand (Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development):: Mr. Speaker, I have been carrying on negotiations with the government of Saskatchewan. As a matter of fact I was to meet the Saskatchewan minister last week but the meeting had to be cancelled and we are looking for another date. As far as we are concerned we would like to go ahead as soon as possible.
Oral Questions MANPOWER



MINISTER'S VIEW OF WORK-SHARING SCHEMES USED IN EUROPE

Mr. Arnold Malone (Battle River):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Manpower and Immigration. Last Thursday in a speech delivered to the Retail Council of Canada the minister made a statement about work-sharing schemes to the effect that "the idea has been successfully used in a number of European countries." I wonder if the minister could tell the House to which countries he was referring, which studies and by whom that have led him to the conclusion that these programs were successful?


Jack Sydney George (Bud) Cullen: Mr. Speaker, I indicated in that address that there had been some successes and some failures, and that is why we had received some negative representations from the chamber of commerce, the Canadian Manufacturer's Association and the CLC. I was making a pitch for what I believe to be an innovative and excellent program. It won the approbation of United States authorities and that particular speech has been written into the congressional record by Senator Hubert Humphrey. I think we can discuss the details at committee-yes, I expect we will, hon. member for Hamilton West.



DUMPING OF RADIOACTIVE WASTE-POSITION OF ONTARIO ON SITES IN HASTINGS COUNTY AND MADOC AREA

Mr. J. R. Ellis (Hastings):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources. On Friday last the minister's Ontario counterpart visited him. Before that time he made it clear he was not about to have nuclear waste dumped in Hastings County in the Madoc area. Can the minister tell the House whether he agrees with that and if he is prepared to say publicly that no waste will be dumped in that particular area.


Alastair William Gillespie: Mr. Speaker, I think there is a lot of confusion and ignorance about this whole question. For the benefit of the hon. member perhaps I should point out that Ontario Hydro and AECL, many months ago, formed a joint task force with the knowledge of the Ontario government and the federal government which asked the Geological Survey of Canada to look at potential permanent, geologically stable sites for the disposal of waste which is of course being created by the reactors owned and operated by Ontario Hydro. It was against that kind of context of joint operation that the minister and I discussed the whole future of a managed waste disposal facility for Ontario Hydro in the province of Ontario in the years to come, and the position the minister took was that there should not be any drilling. I told him that the decision had already been taken by me that there would not be any drilling this summer.

March 14, 1977
Commonwealth Day



LABOUR RELATIONS


Raymond Dupont: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Labour.
Can the minister tell the House what progress has been made in negotiations between opposing employers and employees in the Quebec milling industry conflict?


Joseph Mario Jacques Olivier: Mr. Speaker, a meeting is scheduled for the two parties tomorrow morning. Under section 195 of Labour Code Part V, we have appointed a mediator, Mr. Doucet, who a month ago managed to bring the two parties together; we hope they will soon reach a settlement.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, I should like to draw to the attention of hon. members the presence in the gallery today of their Excellencies the High Commissioners of Commonwealth countries. They have been your special guests, Mr. Speaker, in your capacity as this year's president of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association at a luncheon to mark Commonwealth Day.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


RECOGNITION OF FACT COMMONWEALTH COUNTRIES SIMULTANEOUSLY OBSERVING COMMONWEALTH DAY
Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, it is my privilege to rise on behalf of the government on this second Monday in March in recognition of the fact that today is Commonwealth Day. This year, for the first time, the 36 members of the Commonwealth around the world are observing Commonwealth Day simultaneously. This is, therefore, a day on which some 900 million people on five continents, who speak different languages, who have diverse cultures, who belong to different races, will take special note of their Commonwealth ties.
There are no superpowers in the Commonwealth; there is no primus inter pares-and that is one of its assets. Rather, it is an association of equal sovereign states which have voluntarily decided to come together and talk and work with each other in an atmosphere of mutual respect and understanding. In a world where negotiations among nations are too often a dia-

logue of the deaf, the Commonwealth provides a forum in which each member can express its views and be assured that its views will be heard. The Commonwealth promotes co-operation in place of discord, consultation in place of ignorance, and consensus in place of disharmony. Last year the Commonwealth was pleased to welcome a new member, the Seychelles which, like Canada and Mauritius, is a bilingual country and which, like Canada and Mauritius, is a full-fledged member of both the Commonwealth and "la francophonie".
We believe the Commonwealth provides an important avenue of attack on several world problems. Secretary General Ramphal recently pointed out:
The Commonwealth has one-fourth of the world's people, but it has nearly one-half of the world's poor.
Of the poorest of the poor, those with incomes of less than $200 per annum, nearly three of every four live within the Commonwealth. This suggest the immensity of the task before us and it suggests that now, more than ever before, we must use the Commonwealth to attack the problems of poverty, inequality and degradation.
The Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) is very much looking forward to the Commonwealth heads of government meeting in London, in June, and to a further strengthening of the close contacts with our Commonwealth partners tht we have enjoyed in the past. This year that meeting will follow closely the celebrations of the silver jubilee of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth who occupies the important role of head of the Commonwealth. In London we anticipate a strengthening of resolve to find ways of ensuring that each human being is able to live free from fear and want.
Mr. Speaker, this is Commonwealth Day; it is a day of education and a day on which I wish to underline the great value which Canada attaches to its Commonwealth association.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Walter Baker (Grenville-Carleton):: Mr. Speaker, in the presence of the auspicious company in our gallery, I join the Acting Prime Minister in this parliamentary observance of Commonwealth Day. It should not be lost on us that this year, for the first time, Commonwealth Day is being observed by 36 nations of the Commonwealth at the same time. That, at the very least, demonstrates how small our world has become, how much the actions of nations can affect other nations, and the truth that we can no longer turn our backs on the world when it suits us.
The statistics are astronomical: 900 million people, five continents; one-half of the world's population; three out of four of the poorest of the poor in the world live in the Commonwealth; the diversity of culture, language and race-all this is testimony to the sweeping potentiality of the Commonwealth as an instrument of understanding and for improving the human condition. For those reasons and others we should all view Canada's membership as membership in a precious association to be fostered and strengthened.
March 14, 1977

While all nations have their own national problems and priorities, only the blind among us would advocate that we should turn our backs on people for whom destitution, illiteracy and lack of economic opportunity are a way of life. If the Commonwealth were merely to expose those problems, it would do a useful service; but I believe history demonstrates that it has far greater potential.
The Commonwealth, moreover, can provide us with a window to the third world which we and others not of that world would otherwise lack. Mr. Speaker, it serves as an example to all in this country and outside that our differences need not always stand in the way of reasonable dialogue. Perhaps its greatest strength for the resolution of mankind's problems is the fact that despite diversity there is a voluntary agreement to meet and to talk. While the dialogue to some may be ongoing and perhaps endless, I suggest that the solution to all problems in this world begins with dialogue.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Walter David Baker: There are differences among member nations with regard to the parliamentary system, the importance of the right of dissent and, indeed, the value of human life. The views of many nations are separated in terms of democratic development, but such differences should not deter us from the effort to lessen their impact. Tragic events of recent days indicate that even within the Commonwealth there can be countries in which little value is placed on human life, on love and respect for humanity. There should be a firm recommendation by Canada to the secretariat of the Commonwealth that the whole Ugandan question and the activities of Idi Amin should be put on the agenda of that meeting in London.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Walter David Baker: I think in this way Commonwealth countries can become the spokesmen for all nations of the world which value human life and dignity. The Commonwealth has been in existence for some time. It has been evolving. However, it is still an experiment-an experiment of adaptation and change. It is an experiment which we support. Therefore, I commend the minister for his statement and I am proud to speak on my party's behalf on Commonwealth Day.


Mr. Andrew Brewin (Greenwood):: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join the Acting Prime Minister and the spokesman of the Official Opposition in welcoming Commonwealth Day. The Commonwealth is quite an unusual and remarkable institution. It has no parallel in history. Many books have been written about it, and much said about it. You will be pleased to hear, Mr. Speaker, that I do not intend to make my remarks on the subject at all lengthy because we are profoundly aware of the Commonwealth and we in this country believe in it.
There are certain common institutions which unite us in the Commonwealth. There is the rule of law. With, I have to admit, an unfortunate exception, the rule of law does govern
Order Paper Questions
the peoples of the Commonwealth. We do in fact, although with differences, enjoy democratic institutions. We have genuine good will to each other based upon our common traditions. We are able to talk to each other despite the very great differences between our countries. However, all is not sweetness and light.
I am glad that the Acting Prime Minister read the message from Secretary-General Ramphal who pointed out that the Commonwealth has one-fourth of the world's people but it has nearly one-half of the world's poor. Of the poorest of the poor, those with incomes of less than $200 per annum, nearly three out of every four live within the Commonwealth. This means that if we wish to take the Commonwealth seriously and if we wish to show our sincerity, we must do something more than we have done as a developed country to help in the attack. I quote from the Acting Prime Minister's statement: "We must use the Commonwealth to attack the problems of poverty, inequality and degradation". If we do that seriously and meaningfully, we will have made the institution of the Commonwealth a boon not only to ourselves but to mankind.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles-Arthur Gauthier: Mr. Speaker, I am a bit
surprised by the statement of the minister, but I do realize this is Commonwealth Day. Like my colleagues, I want to the express my best wishes to Canada and all other countries that have for years belonged to the Commonwealth.
What struck me most in the Acting Prime Minister's statement was his wish that all groups feel free within the Commonwealth. I trust those are not words only and hope wholeheartedly that it is a fact for instance, when we speak of the rights of man. Today, we talk of human rights, of the individual's rights, but we often see that those rights are not respected by those who clamor the most about the respect of human rights. I hope the two principles, the freedom of the individual and the rights of man, will become a fact, that we will quit talking about the principles and practice them instead. Those are the wishes I express on the occasion of Commonwealth Day.


QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER
[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)
Mr. Ralph E. Goodale (Parliamentary Secretary to President of the Privy Council):: Mr. Speaker, I ask that all questions be allowed to stand today.


Mr. Speaker:: Is that agreed?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.

March 14, 1977
Immigration Act BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


Walter David Baker: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order while the parliamentary secretary to the government House leader is in the chamber. There was some imprecision on what the government business might be for tomorrow. I wonder if the parliamentary secretary is in a position to tell us that now, or will he perhaps do it later in the day?


Ralph Goodale: Mr. Speaker, I will attempt to provide that information later in the day, if that is agreeable to the hon. member.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from Friday, March 11, consideration of the motion of Mr. Cullen that Bill C-24, respecting immigration to Canada, be read the second time and referred to the Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration.
Arnold John Malone: Mr. Speaker, on Friday last when I called it four o'clock I was going through a two-point analysis as to my perception of immigration in this country. The fundamental base I had laid is that this country, and no country, really, has the legitimate cause to have an immigration policy that in any way is based on a racist policy. That, of course, should stand without argument. The two points I was particularly trying to put forward were that there is a myth in this land that Canada somehow has the potential to feed within its borders many more people than is really possible. The other point I had been trying to make and to document with statistics and fact is that Canada will much better serve the third world, not by importing people into this country but, rather by the export of science and technology. It is on that latter theme that I wish to continue. I quote from Scientific American of September, 1976, an article by Jennings:
Since 1967 the annual expenditure on rice research and related activities by CIAT, the Colombian government and the Colombian Rice Federation never exceeded $1 million. In Colombia alone and in one year alone, 1974, the added production resulting from the introduction of the new technology was valued at $230 million. That is a splendid return on any investment.
Our best hope is in teaching the poor nations to help themselves. I wish to quote from "The Development of Agriculture in Developing Countries", by W. David Hooper:
If the people of the poor countries are to be fed, the food will have to come from their soil, their resources and their farm economies. The surplus production of a few exporting countries can serve on occasion to buffer the impact of bad weather or other calamities, natural or man-made, but there should be no illusion that the world's food security can be ensured by abundant harvests from the fields of Kansas and Saskatchewan, Argentina and New South Wales.

The conscientious person should find relief in the fact that poorer nations, given the proper guidance and incentives, have been quick to adapt to more modern methods of agriculture. I again quote from David Hooper:
The significance of the "green revolution" derives not so much from its numerical impact on food output as from its demonstration of what is involved in the modernizing of traditional agricultures. The widespread, rapid adoption of high-yielding varieties of wheat and rice gave proof that peasant farmers were not slow or stubbornly resistant to change.
As further proof I offer the following quotation:
Within four years of the first widespread release of the seed of new high-yielding wheat varieties in South Asia those varieties occupied practically all the land suited to their cultivation. In response to yield differences of 200 to 300 per cent over traditional plant varieties, and with the important incentive of grain prices that made high-yield farming extremely profitable, the Asian peasant proved to be as innovative as any in the world.
Today, the world's agricultural land area is almost all in production. Any further increase in food supplies must come from improved technology. There are few new agricultural frontiers left to be conquered. To demonstrate this proposition I should like to read excerpts from a book by Lester R. Brown entitled "By Bread Alone".
From the beginning of agriculture until about 1950, most of the year to year increases in world food output came from expansion of the area under cultivation. Since 1950, however, the major increases-probably four-fifths of the current gains in output-are attributable to intensification of cultivation on existing land area.
Today, the increase in food output that can be produced with an additional ton of fertilizer or gallon of fuel is far higher in the developing countries than in the industrial countries. Since fertilizers are already used very heavily in the agriculturally advanced nations of Europe, in Japan and the United States, an additional pound of fertilizer applied in these nations may return no more than five additional pounds of grain. But in countries such as India, Indonesia or Brazil, another pound of fertilizer can yield at least ten additional pounds of grain. It is unfortunate and ironic that, when world fertilizer shortages emerged in 1973, the more advanced nations acted to restrict their fertilizer exports to the poor nations where the fertilizer could have produced much more food.
Further, Lester Brown points out:
The first domesticated cow probably yielded no more than 600 pounds of milk per year, barely enough to support a calf to the point at which it could forage for itself. In India, milk production remains at about that level today. By contrast, in 1973 the average milk cow in the United States yielded over 10,000 pounds of milk annually. The world record is held by a cow in the state of Washington, Skagvale Graceful Hattie, which recently produced more than 44,000 pounds of milk in a single year-55 quarts daily-thus outperforming its early ancestors by more than 70 to one.
Likewise, we should note:
The first domesticated hens did not lay more than about 15 eggs, or one clutch, per year. In 1973 the average American hen produced 228 eggs. For some time, U.S. hens held world egg-laying titles but a few years ago an industrious Japanese hen set a new record by laying 365 eggs in 365 days.
If we turn to the Scientific American of September, 1976, we find there an article entitled "The Amplification of Agricultural Production" in which Peter R. Jennings states:
The central element in the endeavour to improve yield is the breeding of new varieties of crop plants. A first imperative is the development of varieties which produce abundantly when grown in dense plantings and supplied with fertilizer, water and pesticides. The plants can also be given other desirable properties such as resistance to diseases and to insects, and tolerance of a wide range of climate, soil and other environmental factors. In principle, every heritable characteristic of the plant is subject to the will of the plant breeder.

Research into plant breeding has greatly increased the world's capacity to produce protein for human consumption, first by selecting and breeding for increased yield and, second, by selecting and breeding for varieties which contain a higher percentage of protein. To quote Mr. Jennings again:
For example, more than 30,000 kinds of rice have been collected. The multitude of existing varieties is of incalculable value today.
To further establish this point I should like to quote from a paper by Dixon Thompson called "The Preservation of Agricultural Land", published on April 20,1975:
If Canada is one of the four or five major food exporting countries-although we do import a lot of food, including meat, butter, fruit and vegetables-it is because we still have a relatively small population. Even if we are able to increase agricultural productivity, consuming more non-renewable resources in the process, we shall eventually lose the ability to produce a surplus for export, because of population growth.
What Mr. Thompson is pointing out here is simply this: as long as the "have" countries import large populations they are placed at a disadvantage to the extent that they are unable to export the technology which would secure the greatest advances in alleviating the critical food situation existing around the world. There is, then, a need to retain a relatively small but highly educated and motivated Canadian population. I quote from an interim report in connection with a National Research Council study on world food and nutrition published in 1975:
Annual increases of between 3 and 4 per cent in food consumption in developing countries depend upon parallel increases in their own production. Acreages are unlikely to increase more than 1 per cent per year-roughly the recent level-and may well increase less. The cost and other difficulties of bringing new land into production coupled with the geographic separation of most of the unfarmed arable land from the concentrations of population strongly inhibit opening new acreages.
Thus, the key to adequate feeding of future generations in the hunger prone areas of the world is very substantial farm yield increases-about 2.5 per cent per year, on the average, sustained over the coming decades. In some poor areas experiencing rapid population growth with few or no land reserves, yields may need to rise even to between 3 and 5 per cent per year. During the 1960s the over-all yield increase in the developing countries was 1.9 per cent and it was higher at the end of that period, but recent events suggest that this momentum will be hard to sustain. A strong research basis is indispensable to sustaining the required yield increases in developing countries.
Mr. Speaker, that statement simply confirms that those who believe Canada should have an open immigration policy because the world is hungry are people shrouded in myth. This is also the view of the Science Council of Canada. I quote the following from the council's report No. 25 entitled "Population, Technology and Resources", dated July, 1976:
Canada cannot through immigration policies contribute materially to the solution of problems created by exploding populations in other parts of the world. Such problems can be better treated through economic and technical assistance from the developed world than through large-scale migration.
Further weight to this contention is given by a report of the National Academy of Science which concluded, in 1975:
A model for such enterprise was provided by the work of the Rockefeller Foundation ... and also by the Ford Foundation in the development of high-yielding strains of cereal grains. Another is the research conducted by the population council in the improvement of birth control techniques and their adaptation to conditions in the underdeveloped countries, work initiated at a time when the United States government and public were not prepared to
Immigration Act
support such undertakings. These are outstanding examples of what we should do on a large scale in many other fields.
An overview of some of the agricultural success stories around the world should convince Canadians that our role is not to import the poor under a policy of open immigration but, rather, to assist the poor to accomplish the task of feeding themselves, and this we should do by exporting the research and technology which are so badly needed. Let me read a quotation from "Lives in Peril" put out by the Food and Agriculture Organization, the World Health Organization and UNICEF:
An important advance has been the introduction of high-yielding varieties of maize, rice and wheat. New varieties now becoming available signal the success of modern plant breeding. As a result of more easy and rapid genetic manipulation the essential characters of plants capable of standing the rigors of the climate have been combined with those of plants which give yields comparable to the ones achieved in advanced agricultural areas. High-yielding varieties have been instrumental in converting Mexico from an importer to an exporter of maize and wheat and they explain the dramatic change in the Philippines which now exports rice after having imported it for decades. In 1967-68 marked increases in cereal production occurred in some developing countries in all regions but they are most noteworthy in Brazil, maize; India, wheat, rice, maize sorghum; Iraq, wheat, rice, barley; Kenya, maize, wheat, sorghum; Pakistan, wheat, rice, sorghum; and Turkey, wheat.
Recent developments in poultry have been nothing short of revolutionary. While hens in most tropical countries still average about 30 to 40 small eggs per year rates of more than 200 medium-sized eggs have been achieved. Food requirements have also reduced to about two kilograms per dozen eggs, if efficient layers are properly cared for, from as much as one kilogram for one egg in primitive conditions. In India, for example, egg production doubled in the period 1961 to 1968 from five to ten eggs per head of population. The government aims to increase this further to 15 eggs per head of population by 1974 when some 84 million birds should be producing about 9,000 million eggs per year.
I concur wholeheartedly in the following sentiments contained in a report presented to the Joint Senate-House of Commons Committee on Immigration. It reads:
It is sometimes stated that because of its vast area Canada should have a number of times the present population. That is both stupid and impossible. Without any further immigration Canada's population is expected to double within 25 to 40 years. If that occurs, this country is not likely to retain food self-sufficiency and the present type and quality of diet without considerable increase in the percentage of disposable income required for food. Immigration will accentuate that trend and will have the effect of increasing the real relative cost of food here.
Those who want open immigration are short-term humanitarians. The more honest hope for a better world must rely on the dispersal of education, scientific knowledge and the desire to motivate others to help themselves. That is the principal reason North America has been an economic success in terms of agriculture and self-sufficiency in food.
Now I should like to quote from a report of a seminar held at the University of Guelph on February 28, 1974, entitled, "The Food Producing Potential of Canada's Land Resources". It reads:
In the United States, by 1955, the social return to the investment in hybrid corn research from 1910 to that date was at least 700 per cent. Since the main benefits from hybrid corn production have been reaped during the recent 20 years, the over-all dividend of the past 65 years investment in that research is clearly amongst the best returns obtained from any publicly supported endeavour.

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What we see then is that this country and other countries in the world have a tremendous obligation to export research, technology and education. However, a policy of open immigration is not one that we can adopt in this country and assume that in the long term it will be humanitarian. I should like to quote from the Science Council of Canada's report No. 25 entitled "Population, Technology and Resources", July, 1976:
As for immigration, neither end of the spectrum is credible. Neither a completely closed nor a wide-open door seems reasonable. In no way, of course, could Canada ever solve the world problem of overpopulation. Even if we maximized immigration and allowed our population to soar to 100 million people over the next 25 years we would have absorbed only one years's world population growth at current fertility rates.
Increased immigration will, however, threaten Canada's present ability to feed ourselves and restrict our potential for helping others to become self-sufficient. I should like to quote from a paper entitled "Implications of Continued Immigration on the Future of Canada":
Population in Canada is increasing faster than yields per acre. Therefore:
1.	Increasingly inferior land will be farmed.
2.	That will increase the relative cost of food.
3.	In addition, population increase keeps taking the higher quality land out of agricultural production. That, too, will increase relative food costs.
An increased rate of immigration ultimately means that Canada as a nation will be the loser. Moreover, the world at large will also be the loser because one of the nations that has the potential to assist the Third World will restrict its capabilities to help from a position of strength. I should now like to quote as follows from an anti-immigration submission presented to the Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Commons on Immigration:
In the United States the president's commission on population in the American future after exceedingly careful, wide-ranging discussion and research, concluded that for the United States, in terms of quality of life and living, there will be, on balance, more adverse effects than benefits from further increase in the population of that country. Ninety per cent of Canadians live with a population density as high or higher than the average population density of the United States. Without repugnant regulations to prevent it, the greatest increase in Canada's population will take place in the now heavily populated areas of this country, thereby making the American conclusion valid and applicable here.
I return to the fundamental question: Who will save the world when all nations are overpopulated? That is what we as members of parliament should address ourselves to on this very important question. The submission goes on to read:
It is generally acknowledged that the world is now overpopulated. More than half the world's people live in countries whose governments encourage or assist their citizens to limit their family size. It is recognized that overpopulation decreases the quality of life and living, usually entailing restrictive limitations and opportunities for individuals to develop their inherent potentials. It is also axiomatic that increase in population results in reduction of individual freedoms; it is impossible to have more people without more rules and regulations.
I should like to make reference to a paper entitled "Immigration Increases Food Costs" and read part of it as follows:
Canada does not have large areas of undeveloped land of good quality suitable for arable agriculture. Therefore, immigration will increasingly necessitate development of inferior land for arable agriculture. Moreover immigration will inevitably result in urban expansion because Canada's major cities are generally in areas where the quality of agricultural land is superior. Urban growth constantly encroaches on good agricultural land which is permanently removed from production.

To continue with this line of argument I should like to refer to the Science Council of Canada's report No. 25 entitled "Population, Technology and Resources" and quote from page 67 of that report of July, 1976:
The reasons that have led the council to recommend slow population growth include the following:
1.	Canada as a whole, and especially the industrial heartland of Ontario and Quebec, face quite severe difficulties in meeting their short-term energy requirements, especially oil and gas, and will probably have trouble meeting their energy needs for many years to come.
2.	The population around cities, especially around Toronto and Hamilton, is spreading on to the very small amount of good agricultural land and suitable climate that is available in Canada. Reversing this trend will require careful land use planning and rigid control of agricultural land, plus economic incentives for farmers to ensure that land is protected and is actually used for growing food.
3.	Metropolitan centres can, and should, absorb further population through in-building without extending their boundaries, in order to minimize the occupation of good agricultural land, transportation and other costs.
4.	Even with effective land use control, Canada will have to use food more carefully if it is to maintain its position as a major food exporter.
I would like to quote from the same source as follows:
Three-quarters of Canada's population is urban. But more significantly, 55 per cent of the population are metropolitan dwellers living in continuous built-up areas with populations of 100,000 and more. If the existing trends continue, almost all of our population increase over the next 40 years is expected to occur in these metropolitan areas.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Order, please. I regret to inform the hon. member that his allotted time has expired. He may continue, however, with unanimous consent. Does the hon. member have unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Arnold John Malone: I would like to thank hon. members for allowing me to extend my comments. The report continues:
Most experts believe that by the end of the century, 90 per cent of all Canadians will be living in urban areas and that metropolitan areas will grow rapidly at least until 1985. In the year 2001 over 32 per cent of our population is expected to be living in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver; these urban regions will have increased their combined population by at least three million.
Second-level cities with populations between 400,000 and one million (Calgary, Edmonton, Hamilton, Ottawa-Hull, Quebec and Winnipeg) are expected to grow proportionately more rapidly with several of them doubling in size within 30 years.
Much of our past immigration policy inflicted injustice and hardship on developing countries. I would like to quote from an anti-immigration submission presented to the joint committee on immigration:
Since any continued immigration will be highly selective, it will necessarily mean that we will be continuing to practice the brain drain with the selfish advantage of this country and at the expense of the countries of origin of the immigrants. Those immigrants accepted by Canada are predominantly among the most talented and valuable people in the countries of their origins; those countries are usually so desperately short of such highly qualified citizens that their loss through emigration hampers development in the countries which reared and educated them.
In conclusion, I would like to point out that this country is operating with a number of myths. One of the myths is that Canada is a large food-producing nation. In part that is true, but the real truth is that Canada is a net importer of food
March 14, 1977

rather than a net exporter, in dollar terms. The second myth is that Canada has a large amount of agricultural land. The more than five billion acres of land in this country contains only 12 million acres of class-one and class-two soil. Much of that is rapidly being taken away because most of our cities are situated right in the middle of Canada's agricultural heartland.
The third myth is that the Third World cannot make significant improvement to the world food supply. This might be true if this country and other developed nations are willing to export research and technology. The way to feed a world of eight billion people by the year 2010 is not through immigration but, rather, by the export of research and technology. If we are to be truly humanitarian, we must work with facts and not myths.
I wanted to make three points in my speech. First, we have no right to take a position which is in any way racist, bigoted or biased. That should not be the prerogative of any nation anywhere in the world. On the other hand, we must recognize that a policy of allowing large numbers of people into our country will decrease our capacity to produce and export food. More importantly, when we do an analysis of "have" nations, "have-not" nations and world production of food, we note that over the last two decades almost all of the world's increase in food production has come about not by an increase in the number of acres but by an increase in the export of science and technology. We must ask a simple and fundamental question: who is going to save the world if all the wealthy nations become overcrowded and no one is left to export the science and technology which is so desperately needed to increase food production in the Third World?


Ralph Goodale: Mr. Speaker, for the benefit of the House I would like to respond to the question which was raised earlier by the Conservative House leader regarding the business of the House for the remainder of today and tomorrow. It is our intention to continue with the present debate on the immigration bill.


Mr. John Gilbert (Broadview):: Mr. Speaker, of all the ministerial portfolios, I consider the portfolio of manpower and immigration to be one of the most important. Immigration and manpower policies affect all of us, and therefore I consider it not only a duty but also a privilege to participate in this debate. Last Friday I met the minister just outside the parliamentary restaurant and advised him that I would be speaking today in this debate. He asked me to make sure that I said something nice about him and something good about the bill. I find it very easy to say something nice about the minister, but I find it rather difficult to say something good about the bill. I can say quite easily that the minister is a man of ability, integrity and compassion; there is no doubt about that.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Gilbert: I would like to review some of the qualities of other ministers who have held this portfolio. There have been five ministers in the last ten years. Senator Marchand was the
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minister back in 1966 and 1967. He brought forward a policy of non-discrimination in immigration. That was a tremendous advance. He also brought forward the visitor concept. That was another step forward. The visitor concept ran into difficulties, not because of the principle but because of its application which resulted in many illegal immigrants.
I would like to refresh the memories of hon. members about Bryce Mackasey. During the 1972 election there was a serious problem with regard to Ugandan immigrants. To give Mr. Mackasey full credit, through him the government encouraged Ugandan immigrants to come to Canada. That took a great deal of courage and strength. Right after the election the same minister closed the door to visitors because of troubles with illegal visitors. After Mr. Mackasey came the present President of Treasury Board (Mr. Andras). He was saddled with the problem of illegal immigrants and with the problem of Chilean refugees. He met both those problems head on. He did an excellent job of solving some of the problems respecting illegal immigrants and he certainly gave fair treatment to Chilean refugees.
When I look at the present minister I think of the problems he has and his approaches to those problems. We now have a very high unemployment rate. There are well over 800,000 people in Canada who are unemployed and there is lack of government policy to solve this serious problem. The minister's proposed UIC amendments strike at the heart of working people and do very little to help them. That is the government's approach to the unemployment problem.
I cannot fault the minister for his approach to immigration because he comes from a city which probably does not feel the same impact as cities like Montreal, Toronto, Winnipeg and Vancouver when it comes to immigration. I find that he has accepted a bill from his officials which I will call the bureaucrats' bill. I do not think it is the bill of the minister.
I thought the two main criticisms of the hon. member for Greenwood (Mr. Brewin) last Friday indicated the main thrust of the criticism of the New Democratic Party. He said, first, that by the absence of regulations-which have not been published-it is difficult, if not impossible, to study this problem and give it proper treatment. The second point made by the hon. member for Greenwood was that some of the provisions had been described by others as restrictive and discriminatory, even though I do not think they fall within those classes, and that they have encroached to a considerable degree upon the civil liberties of most Canadians. If the minister will read the speech of the hon. member for Greenwood he will see detailed criticism with regard to some of the encroachments on the civil liberties of Canadians.
I said the minister is a man of ability, integrity and compassion. But it takes more, Mr. Speaker. It takes courage, foresight and determination, the other qualities on which I want to dwell concerning the minister's bill. One cannot fault clause 3 of the bill which sets forth the objectives of Canada's immigration policy. How can we object to a policy which stresses

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family reunification, non-discrimination, concern for refugees and the promotion of Canadian economic social and cultural goals? If you read subparagraphs (a) to (j) of clause 3 you would swear you were reading the new Mosaic code brought down by Moses with regard to new immigrants to Canada.
In his speech the minister set forth his approach to the level of numbers and the requirement, in consultation with the provinces. In my respectful view, in determining immigration policy they had to be based on two main items: first, economic and social conditions and, second-and just as important- attitudes. With regard to the level of numbers, it is necessary they be predicated on economic growth, employment policies, housing policies and social services. If they are not, we will have an increase in the tensions and problems which have surfaced recently in the main cities across the country. I refer to attitudes toward other races and nationalities.
I should like to compliment the Parliamentary Secretary to the Solicitor General (Mr. Lee) on his speech of last Friday wherein he set forth a vivid and historical account of the treatment of the Chinese people in Canada. I hope all members of this House read the speech. I hope, too, that we are moving away from the times he related, back in 1885, and that we treat all races and nationalities on common ground at the present time. That is one of the main objectives set forth in the bill. As I listened to the hon. parliamentary secretary on Friday I could not help but think of the speaker who preceded him, the hon. member for Greenwood who is our party's critic on immigration matters. I could not help but think of the defence he put up for Japanese Canadians who were mistreated by the government back in 1944-45. If ever a person should be complimented, it is the hon. member for Greenwood for his contribution toward protecting the rights of those people who were mistreated by other Canadians. I think you would like to know, Mr. Speaker, that in the near future he will receive an honour from the Japanese people in Canada. As far as we are concerned, it is a well deserved honour.
When I speak about the problems of race and nationality, I must relate my experience in my own riding. In 1948, when I moved into the Broadview riding, it was 90 per cent Anglo-Saxon, with a small sprinkling of other nationalities. In 1977, it is only 40 per cent to 45 per cent Anglo-Saxon, with the balance made up of Greek and Macedonian as the second group, Chinese third, Italian fourth, and the balance a host of nationalities from different parts of the world.
It would be wrong to say we have not had our problems and difficulties in Broadview, but we have an attitude toward them and we accept the challenge. Last Saturday night I was an honoured guest at the Riverdale intercultural committee which held a multicultural spring festival at the Earl Grey senior public school. The committee is composed of representatives from different cultural associations in the riding and across the city, and at the festival the different cultures performed. Let me enumerate some of the groups that appeared: the native Indians commenced the program-and was it not proper that they should? Then we had the Koreans, Lithuanians, native Indians, Chinese, Pakistanis, Koreans again, East Indians,

Philippines, West Indians, and finished off with a great group called the Scottish. I could not help but feel that we were taking the right approach to the problems of race and nationality which confront us, and to fellowship and friendship, as a result of this cultural exchange. That is why I think it is so necessary to develop attitudes.
There is another group in our community, sponsored by LIP, called Harmony Canada. This is an Outreach project with the object of sensitizing the Riverdale community to Sikh culture. Dr. T. Singh visits different schools in the area to tell students about the different cultures. I think this is a valuable approach. May I say in passing that the churches in our area have been the springboard to meeting head-on the problem of race relations. I give full credit to reverend John Robson of Queen Street Presbyterian church for getting representatives of different groups together to find solutions to our problems.
I remember the hon. member for Hamilton West (Mr. Alexander) making his maiden speech in this House in 1968. He quoted a great slave worker who had said something like this:
Judge not a man by the colour of his skin, nor the way he loves or fights or sins, nor by the gods he serves nor by the vintage he drinks, but judge a man by the way he thinks.
I think that type of philosophy is one for which we must have regard in race relations. If we are compassionate in our economic and social approaches, we shall have no difficulty in setting immigration levels for Canada.
A few minutes ago I heard the hon. member for Battle River (Mr. Malone) speak about the intricate and sensitive problems of food production, about what would happen if too many people came to Canada, and how too many immigrants would create stresses within the economy. Mr. Speaker, the population of Canada, a country vast in extent, is some 23 million. We are rich in resources. The population of the United States is approximately 250 million people, or ten times our size. Yet Americans have been forerunners in technological development. They have met head-on the problems which a diversity of peoples and a large population create. It seems to me that if we take the proper approach, the threat of food shortages and racial disharmony will go away.
If the minister wants the new legislation to work successfully, I plead with him to institute a second amnesty program for illegal immigrants now in Canada. Our first amnesty or adjustment program was successful owing to the efforts of the President of Treasury Board. Why do I advocate a second amnesty program? Mr. Speaker, records indicate that there are in Canada between 400,000 and 500,000 illegal immigrants, and the expense of tracking them down is tremendous. For instance, in Toronto alone the RCMP detachment, under J. R. Nicholson, consists of 16 men. They, as well as many immigration officials, are engaged in tracking down illegal immigrants.
If we consider personnel in Montreal, Winnipeg, Vancouver and other large centres who are engaged in this activity it
March 14, 1977

should become obvious that the finding of illegal immigrants is a tremendously expensive undertaking. But the expense is not the real problem. Our illegal immigrants have to contend with a whole host of emotional, social and economic factors. I am sure the minister is aware of the article which appeared in the Toronto Star last December on the subject of illegal immigrants. I would quote part of the article written by Mr. Sydney Katz, an article which I commend to hon. members of the House and the minister. Mr. Katz wrote in part:
Every day last week, Victor Perez, 28, eagerly rifled through the newspapers and turned his radio on hourly to listen to the newscasts. He didn't want to miss even the smallest scrap of information about the new immigration bill introduced in the House of Commons by Minister of Immigration and Manpower, Bud Cullen.
Perez (not his real name) fervently prayed for revised immigration regulations that would mercifully end the hellish life that he and his wife, Isabella, had been leading for the past three years...
And how long can the illegals emotionally, socially and economically live with the uncertainty of always being only one knock on the door away from deportation?
Perez confesses that he's reached the end of his endurance. Because of the constant pressure, he suffers chronic fatigue. Isabella is plagued by "nervousness" and headaches. "To hell with it," he said recently. "I'm going to turn myself in and go home. We can't stand it any more".
We must deal with illegal immigrants on humanitarian and compassionate grounds. Mr. Katz talks of the damage being done to the children of illegal immigrants. His article went on to say this:
"It's a real tragedy," says Mendel Green, a Toronto lawyer who has handled many immigration cases. "Thousands of children are growing up without an education".
Instead of being in the classroom they accompany their mothers to their jobs-picking worms, or vegetables or fruit or doing housework. When this is impossible, the child may stay home alone all day.
Some suggest that illegal immigrants participate in criminal activities. I do not doubt that a small fraction do, but I am prepared to wager that 95 per cent of illegal immigrants are honest and hardworking people who left their countries to come to Canada for a better way of life for themselves and their children. Our approach to them must be humanitarian.
What would I do if I were minister of manpower and immigration? If I had any doubt about any second amnesty program I would ask the Standing Committee on Manpower and Immigration to meet with and call witnesses from the RCMP and the various organizations which deal with these people. They could testify quietly; perhaps their names should not be revealed. After all, we want the benefit of their opinions.
Clara Nickel, of the Bloor-Bathurst information centre, says some people become illegals quite unintentionally. She said, as reported in Mr. Katz' article:
I have seen articles in Portuguese newspapers which describe how easy it is to become a Canadian citizen. People believe it and end up in trouble over here.
The article went on to say:
Again efforts should be made to curb the activities of travel agents and phony immigration advisers who persuade foreign nationals-for purposes of private profit-
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I hope that the minister is persuaded, as I and the hon. member for Hamilton West, the Conservative spokesman, tried to point out, that the number one problem in the field of immigration is the illegal immigrant.


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: Hear, hear!


John Gilbert: I further suggest that the act will operate successfully only if applied with humanity and compassion. A second amnesty program would not only save money; it would save a repetition of old difficulties. The minister himself spoke of the new system of social insurance numbers which identifies persons who are not Canadian citizens of permanent residence and puts the onus on the employer to make sure that the person employed has a valid employment visa. I say that now we must exercise good judgment, common sense and humanity in dealing with the some 400,000 illegal immigrants in Canada. If the minister wants to make a valid contribution to Canada's immigration policy he must institute a second amnesty program. Such an approach would be farsighted and would go a long way to making this a better country in which all could live. Otherwise, this country will be saddled with the problem of illegal immigrants and the bill will be nothing but an exercise in bureaucracy.
I give the minister credit for correcting the inequities in the 1952 act dealing with prohibitions involving the mentally retarded, epileptics, and inmates of certain institutions. I recall a constituent of mine who came from Greece. He was on my doorstep week after week pleading with me to permit his son to come to Canada with his wife. They could not come because they had an epileptic child. After a great deal of effort I persuaded the present House leader that this family should come. I can still see the tears in that man's eyes when we got the news that the family was moving forward with the child. May I say that it operates on the family reunification principle. I thought it was great credit to the minister in permitting this youngster to come with his family. Therefore, this is a step in the right direction. We must, of course, realize that the success depends on the co-operation of the provincial and federal health departments. If the provincial departments find it imposes a very heavy financial burden, the minister of national health and welfare should give, and give generously, to meet the problem.
The hon. member for Greenwood set forth well last Friday our criticism concerning this provision; that is, the dependency on the decision of whether a person should come forward being completely dependent on a health officer. I hope we will be able to look at that question to see if we can expand that decision-making power so that we do not have any criticism as a result of this bill.
May I return to the main criticisms of the bill set forth by the critic of the New Democratic Party, the hon. member for Greenwood. He said in no uncertain terms that this bill lacks the regulations which will make the bill operative. The minister could have scored a real success if he had published them.

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We went through the question of regulation just a few months ago with regard to the borrowers and depositors protection act. We had the problem with regard to the criminal interest rates which exist. The Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Mr. Abbott) was given the opportunity to present the regulations with regard to these criminal rates, and he did not. They are having their difficulties in the committee, and they will have their difficulties when they come back. Before the bill is referred to the committee the minister should make available to all members the regulations relating to this bill. Otherwise, it will be impossible to deal with it in committee.
Need I remind you, Mr. Speaker, that the selection criteria are based on regulations under the old act. I agree there has to be a certain flexibility to it. I recall the position that we had in 1972 with regard to visitors. By the use of order in council and regulations, that was stopped. I recall the employment problem we had. Again, by regulation, that was stopped. The least the minister can do is to set forth the criteria.
The main emphasis with regard to selection criteria in the past has been education. The special joint committee on immigration policy went into the problem in depth as it travelled across the country. They saw the unfairness of this approach. The best we have from the minister at this moment is that he appears to be pleased with the approach taken by the special committee on immigration with regard to taking the emphasis off education and putting it on work experience, and also with regard to sending people to designated areas.
The selection criteria are the heart and soul of the immigration policy. Therefore, it is necessary that we study them in detail so that we may have an excellent bill. There are two clauses I want to draw to the attention of the minister. They worried the hon. member for Greenwood (Mr. Brown) and they give me double worry. Those clauses are contained on page 62 of the bill. Clause 115(n) reads:
-requiring any person or class of persons to report to an immigration officer before leaving Canada and prescribing the information to be provided and the manner in which such report shall be made to the immigration officer by any such person-
The explanatory note at the side reads:
S.	115(l)(n) may be used at some time in the future to provide for examination of outbound travellers if this step becomes necessary for the proper identification and control of illegal immigrants.
I hoped the minister would have dealt with this problem in his main speech, but he did not. It has raised fears in the minds of many of us with regard to the operation of these clauses. Is the minister talking about regulation with regard to visa permits? If he is, surely we should know the details concerning them. One can appreciate the wide power that would be given to immigration officials requiring any person or class of persons to report to an immigration officer and prescribing the essentials of information that must be given to him with regard to the report. I hope the minister will give us the full details with regard to this clause. Clause 115(o), which deals with the fingerprinting provision, reads:
The governor in council may make regulations [Mr. Gilbert. 1
(o) setting out the circumstances in which persons who seek admission or persons in Canada, other than Canadian citizens, may be required to be fingerprinted or photographed or otherwise identified-
This is so unusual to Canadian practice that it behooves all of us to study it in detail. I read with interest the minister's remarks with regard to this clause on fingerprinting. This is what he said:
Another less complex area, but about which some concern and misunderstanding have become evident, is the provision in the bill which can require persons other than Canadian citizens to be fingerprinted under certain circumstances. Many immigrant-receiving countries routinely require applicants for visas to be fingerprinted. We certainly do not intend to go that far.
Thank goodness! The minister continued:
Fingerprinting will be the exception rather than the rule, used only where there is doubt about a person's identity or his possible involvement in criminal activity. For persons in Canada we will fingerprint as a matter of routine only those who have been ordered removed from Canada. The two other situations in which we will require fingerprints are when a person is arrested under the Immigration Act, or when a visitor requests a change in or extension to his status, and in either case, the person is unable to satisfy the immigration officer of his identity. It will therefore be a rarity for a permanent resident to be fingerprinted. In all cases, when the fingerprints have served their immigration purpose, they will be disposed of under the normal file retirement program.
It is that last sentence with regard to fingerprints and photographs that really concerns me. The minister says they will be disposed of after they have been used by the immigration department. I would like to know from the minister whether these fingerprints and photographs will have been given to the RCMP or other police officials across the country. What happens with regard to those photographs and fingerprints concerning these people? It is all very well for the minister to say that when his department is finished with them, they will be disposed of. Can the minister tell us whether they will be destroyed by the RCMP, police officials or other judicial organizations across the country? This is a very crucial problem. This is why we would like the minister to make known the regulations concerning fingerprinting and photography. As the critic for the Conservative Party has said, this is another instance where the regulations have in the past not been clear. So it has been well said that this is legislation by regulation.
My time is running short, Mr. Speaker. My hon. friend from Greenwood has set forth the main concern of this party. May I, however, touch on a point with regard to prohibited classes and compliment the minister for clearing up difficulties in relation to the issue of moral turpitude as it concerns people with previous court convictions who have come to Canada. This area has always caused a great deal of worry to the people concerned and to counsel representing them.
One thing which does concern me is the clause having to do with terrorism, subversion and hijacking. The minister set forth his views in the speech he made. He referred to the reasons of security which removed such cases from the normal process of a full and fair hearing. I took part in the deliberations upon the temporary immigration security legislation which was passed a couple of years ago and which did not expire until the end of 1976. I appreciated the dilemma facing

the department at that time, as I do now. But the greatest test in a situation like this is, surely, the normal test, the test which has to be met day by day.
A few weeks ago a test was put before the minister by the professors at Queen's University. They intended to hold a symposium with regard to the critical situation in the third world, to assess the theories of development and their implications for public policy. They wanted to hear the views of Professor Andre Gunder Frank who holds opinions opposite to those normally held with regard to the treatment of third world countries, feeling they would then be able to see the total picture affecting these issues. I do not know Professor Frank's background, but it seems to me that if I were confronted with such a decision, if professors from a university contacted me asking that a person be allowed to express a diverging view with regard to policies concerning third world countries, I would have to be terribly persuaded that such a person should not be admitted before I would withhold permission.
In any event, the minister did not permit him to enter and he was prohibited from giving reasons for his refusal.
Is it any wonder, in these circumstances, that all of us have received a letter from Queen's University dated March 9, signed by various professors and setting forth their views with regard to the issue? This is what they say:
The case of Andre Gunder Frank is particularly significant in that it helps us to understand the workings of the new Immigration Act which is now before the Canadian House of Commons. The most striking aspect of the act is that it provides no procedures for review of the cases of persons refused entry to Canada on the grounds that they present a risk to national security. In the absence of provision for due process, the door opens wide to a series of possible abuses:
1.	There is no check on the accuracy of the information on which the decision is based.
2.	There is no check on bureaucracy's discretionary power. The act gives the bureaucracy and the executive the power to act unjustly.
3.	There is not even the possibility of an independent evaluation of the case by a neutral board judged competent to handle confidential material and acting outside of the political constraints imposed by the government in power.
4.	The applicants who are denied entry are given no reason for their exclusion nor the opportunity to clear their names.
All these abuses are compounded by the fact that the act permits the exclusion of applicants before they come into the country and thus they have no access to Canadian courts or any other form of due process.
I appreciate the minister's difficulty, but when I look at these facts, a department of sociology composed of professors at Queen's University inviting a person to speak on development policy, I would need to be, as I say, terribly persuaded that such a person was a national security risk before I would interfere with his visit. I am surprised the minister should have jumped so quickly to a conclusion with respect to this case. All this underlines the need to confer responsibility for these decisions to a committee composed of people who would be able to make an objective and impartial judgment.
In conclusion, may I say I find it difficult to support this bill because of the absence of regulations and the possibility of some infringement of civil liberties. As I said earlier, I hope the minister will bring these regulations before us. I hope, too,
Immigration Act
that he will announce a second amnesty program affecting illegal immigrants. I would then be able to say, without hesitation, that he is not only a man of integrity, ability and compassion, but also a man of courage, determination and conviction.


Mr. F. A. Philbrook (Halton):: Mr. Speaker, it is a privilege and a pleasure to speak on this new immigration bill, Bill C-24, and to follow that fine gentleman, the hon. member for Broadview (Mr. Gilbert). I noted with interest one point he made, though I was a little puzzled by it. It was his reference to a second amnesty. It sounded like a good idea, and certainly it is a humanitarian idea-which is typical of the hon. member-but I cannot help wondering whether there would not be some undesirable motivation built into it, whether the word might not go around the world that it is a little too easy to come here illegally or, in other words, an invitation to hide out in Hamilton-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Frank A. Philbrook: -in Canada.


Mr. Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre):: The truth came out.


Frank A. Philbrook: Without prejudice. In other words, for visitors to hide out in Canada and wait for the next amnesty. Perhaps the hon. member for Broadview might want to comment on that point at some time. It demonstrates what is true in this whole area, namely, that immigration in the last few years has become a very difficult subject for a country like Canada, if not for the whole world. Probably it was a relatively easy area for us to take care of until the last few years, Canada being a young country, something of a pioneer backwater for most of the world. We have a very inhospitable climate and our ties were recognized to be essentially with the British and the French. We are a country to which few people decided to come while they were busy going to other areas which have now become less popular or more restrictive.
One of the very important events that changed this was something that happened in late March of last year, and it did not receive all that much attention. It was of momentous importance for the world, and certainly for Canada; that is the fact that the world population for the first time reached four billion people. For the first time there were four billion living human beings on this earth, and they were crowded into certain areas; they were not evenly distributed. Any one of us who has seen the charts of the increase in world population will realize how startling those figures are. Throughout most of the history of mankind the figures followed almost a level course, a plateau, with just a small rise-and only in our time, only in living memory, has that changed. That line has taken off, and at the present time it is skyrocketing straight upwards; a frightening prospect, one that is matched by other things in science-by, for example, the growth of a bacterial colony. When it reaches a certain point in skyrocketing upwards, it suddenly degenerates and dies.

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Immigration Act
Some say this could be something worthwhile for us to think about; that could be a lesson to those of us who are alive today. Perhaps we are on a final course, although we hope that is not so. We are adding people to this earth at the rate of 70 million a year, which is three times the population of Canada, and by the end of this decade it is predicted that the population will reach from four billion to five billion within the lifetime of one childhood.
Canada, by contrast, as has been said this afternoon, is a big country with a small population of only 23 million people, with many people crowded in one area. It has almost four million square miles of territory-3.8 million to be exact-and a tremendous amount of opportunity. One would think, then- thinking very simplistically about this situation-that we might solve the problem simply by opening the immigration doors of Canada and letting the world flood in. That might make sense in some things like arithmetic. But there is a great deal more to it than that. On the other hand, there will be mounting pressure, which already exists for many reasons, for Canada to increase its immigration. The hon. member for Battle River (Mr. Malone) touched on that this afternoon, and I agree with him. I think he was on the right track. Certainly, Canada must have more immigration. Our immigration should be based on humanitarian reasons, such as letting in refugees, the reunification of families and so on. We must have people to fill the kind of jobs we will have in Canada in the future.
However, in spite of the fact that Canada is a big, open country, albeit with many parts that are unliveable, and there is mounting pressure to have people come here, the answer is not in immigration. The answer, by and large-even though our birth rate, ironically, is down to about zero-lies not in trying to solve the world's problems through immigration. This simply cannot be done, not even in the last country in the world with open spaces, namely, Canada. As the hon. member for Battle River said, the real answer-and I think we are all beginning to realize this for the first time-lies in technology, in applying science and technology to help those countries with the most trouble solve their problems in their own way. I concur with the hon. member heartily on that. Anyone who has travelled this world much, who has seen certain areas of Asia, Latin America and perhaps Africa, must be staggered by the population problems there. We know that if we open our door widely, it would not solve the problem. It would certainly make Canada unmanageable. Anyway, those people would not be able to come here, even with a massive immigration program. They simply could not afford to come here and I do not think we could mount such a program.
My family and I were staggered by what we saw during the seven years we were in India and Pakistan, as well as travelling in other parts of the world. The irony, when we got back and went into the birth control research field, was when we found that this country, with the least problems in the world, knew how to take care of its problems. We are well ahead in birth control and our population is not expanding very much. As a country with the least food problems in the world, we are probably the most able in food production.

The absolute reverse is true for countries most in need in this world, most in trouble. The birth control program, as successful as it has been here, has not been nearly as successful overseas. This is very frustrating. There is no time to go into the reasons-it is a wide subject. The same is true of food production. We can remember clearly the high hopes for the "green revolution" which was supposed to solve everything, but a few years later there was disillusionment. There was world drought, world shortage of fertilizer, and the "green revolution" was not successful. It depended on certain things to increase food production, in addition to the fact that many people in the most hungry parts of the world had the wrong understanding: they planted less instead of planting the same to provide more. These problems exist overseas-they do not exist for us so much-and yet we are going to face mounting pressure. It is a difficult decision for us at present, but I think it is one we can take with enlightenment, or enlightened self-interest as people say.
We are heading for a balanced policy and I think this bill will contribute to that end. We are trying to help the world with its problems and trying to maintain our way of life. We are trying to do the best we can with the immigration pressures which exist. There has been a great deal of change in Canada and in the world in the last few years, and therefore obviously we need new legislation.
This act goes back to 1952. A few changes were made in 1967 regarding selection. I think the most significant change that has been made in the time that some of us have been here in the last two or three years has been the one about not being able to apply to stay in Canada from within Canada. It is a very dramatic change. Probably we have all had a lot of experience with that, either with visitors or people with work permits applying to stay here, and we have had to refuse them. At first it can be a difficult thing to do, but I have found that by and large they have accepted it surprisingly well, and it looks as though it will be a workable part of our immigration policy.
There have been some worthwhile changes: for example, in the area of family reunification, which is an increasingly important humanitarian measure in which to try to bring families together. There is the matter of inadmissible classes, which has been touched on recently; the business of keeping out people with medical problems such as epilepsy, mental illness, the mentally retarded, socio-medical problems, moral turpitude, as the hon. member for Broadview said, homosexuality, and so on. In the last few years our ideas on this score have become more updated, more modern and more tolerant than they used to be. The matter of refugee status has been important in recent years as a result of civil wars, and so on. I think Canadians can hold their heads pretty high with regard to these things.
This bill did not just come out of the blue. It has been very well researched. In 1974 a green paper presented the basic ideas behind this bill. Then the joint committee travelled
March 14, 1977

across the country and heard Canadians in all parts, and now we have a fairly reasonable bill. I think the principles behind the bill have been generally accepted. It might reasonably have been expected in a country like Canada, which has many immigrants to start with, that there would be great apprehension and many objections voiced by many new Canadians that the bill closes the door, or that family members from overseas might not be allowed into Canada; but I have not noticed many objections along these lines from Italian, Portuguese or German people in my constituency. These people have been extremely intelligent and co-operative.
What does the bill offer? There are about ten major innovations. Although I will not touch on all of them, I would like to touch on a few. The bill offers explicit objectives which should provide some clear direction, some orientation and some philosophy as to what our immigration policy is all about. Simplifying the wording of the bill makes it easier to interpret. We can read it and understand the basis of all the provisions and details of the bill. We have a much better set of objectives, as limited as objectives can be.
Second, we must have a set of targets and ceilings. This is the kind of thing which in a country like Canada, with an immigration tradition, might bring about mixed feelings and some apprehension. These targets and ceilings begin to suggest the old word "quota" which is not held in very high favour in this country and never has been. Quotas suggest discrimination or favouritism of one kind of another. But of course that is not the idea. There will probably be some limitations as to the amount of immigration there will be during a given year, but the type of immigration will essentially be unchanged, except that it might be somewhat improved.
These limitations will apply to regular immigration movements affecting independent immigrants who come here searching for jobs which need to be filled, and they will apply to refugees. No matter what the world situation becomes, there obviously has to be some limit. But the most important thing is that there will be no limit with regard to bringing members of families into Canada. That is something upon which none of us can imagine Canada compromising.
What is the effect of these limits? As has been said, the bill will benefit both Canada and people coming to Canada as immigrants. The bill will help new people when they come here. It will help them cope with Canadian life. It will help them integrate smoothly without a great deal of effort and agony. It will also help Canada which has only so much economic and social ability to absorb many people in such a short period of time as a year. Third, this bill would bring about a system which would make immigration movement as objective and as fair as possible. It seems to me a very intelligent move to put less emphasis on education, on winning one's way into Canada and on writing an examination based on education. As Canada changes, it needs certain types of workers in certain locations. This bill will help people who are disadvantaged because of lack of education. Many parts of the world are not able to provide education to the extent that Canada is able to provide it. When people come to Canada, if
Immigration Act
they are not ruled out because of lack of education they will need to get along when they are here. Finding jobs is the most important thing, and if they can find employment in a certain area, so much the better.
The bill helps solve our demographic problems in terms of the distribution of people. The bill will help in developing the economies of certain local and rural areas, especially unpopulated or underpopulated areas, and with some luck there will be some relief of urban congestion. Urban congestion is a terrible trend which is afflicting Canada, like lemmings. Many are leaving rural areas and farms and going to cities where social and economic problems are piling up.
Fourth, this bill brings about a new commitment with regard to refugees. It is not just a commitment in spirit; the bill sets out exactly what we are going to do. I, for one, asked for that and I am pleased that the minister included that in the bill. The bill recognizes Canada's historical commitment to the universal declaration of human rights and the Helsinki accord; and, as the hon. member for Broadview mentioned, the business of ensuring Canada's freedom from the invasion of political terrorists and criminals who come here on mild and trumped-up pretences.
Fifth, federal-provincial relations is a very important matter. We are talking about that in many ways these days. We talk about federal-provincial conferences, decentralization and rationalization of responsibility. Hopefully, this bill will make a great deal of sense in terms of immigration. The bill will give the provinces much more say on the matter of their demography, on the matter of how many people there should be, where these people should come from and where they should be located. The bill is designed to deal adequately with the needs and opportunities of the provinces.
I will mention only one possible concern I have about federal-provincial relations, and that is the matter of provincial rights in immigration. Hopefully, this will be worked out in time; but what the current Quebec situation might do to Canada's reputation for fairness, openness and freedom is something which causes me concern. The current Quebec situation might cause feelings of conflict between the federal government and the provinces. For example, if a Quebec government should decide-and this could apply to any province; I just use Quebec as a current example-it would permit only truly Francophone immigrants, and if the federal government decided to challenge that, oppose it or even enforce its will, partly because of the reaction of other provinces, we might get a more serious situation than we have now. I look at this particular provision with some apprehension.
Finally, I would like to talk about some of the changes in the classes of immigrants. First, I would like to talk about the sponsored category and the reunification of immediate families. This is something which has had to be developed and refined in recent years because we have got into trouble over it. I will deal with that matter in a moment. Obviously, it makes good sense not to restrict the immigration of parents on the basis of age. It used to be that if someone who was a Canadian citizen or a landed immigrant wanted to bring their parents to
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Immigration Act
this country, the parents had to be age 65 or over. We have had experience that this has not always worked. People have come to our riding offices who had younger parents or brothers and sisters overseas who needed support, but they could not bring them here. This has been a terrible human problem which did not make any sense. It concerns parents mainly, but I have heard of people who wanted to bring their grandparents, and I suppose some grandparents would be young enough. Now, parents of any age can come. That is a step forward. It will be a relief to some new Canadians from all parts of the world.
I understand that the nominated category which was halfway between family and the regular type category will be eliminated. I consider that a good move. There will not now be a nominated category, but points will be given to people with close relatives in Canada. That is going to require some definition, too, but at least we are getting away from this business of family. How do you define "immediate family"? It is pretty obvious there can be no agreement whatsoever on the term "family", on terms like "parents", "brothers" or "cousins".
In countries like India and Pakistan, where I was privileged to spend many years, the feeling of universality and the religious feeling that these people have makes all of their countrymen their brothers. The line between the spiritual brother and blood brother or parent becomes very blurred. When they say, "So-and-so is my brother", they really mean it. It is very difficult to sort this out. When they come to Canada and say, "I should be allowed to bring in so-and-so because he is my parent", or, "my brother", that can be difficult, and in the past it has been. Hopefully, we can now define "immediate family", and there is merit in making some allowance for other relatives.
This will prevent the type of situation I was involved in in 1966 when I had to write to a constituent, Mr. James W. K. Cheung of Hornby, Ontario, concerning the immigration of his mother, Chow Mui Kwei. I wrote as follows:
-it was determined that she is unable to comply with the selection criteria applicable to nominated relatives ...
The immigration regulations provide for the sponsorship by a Canadian citizen or resident of his parents when they reach the age of sixty. Sponsored dependants are not obliged to comply with selection criteria and need only meet medical and background requirements. Your mother will be sixty in 1982 and, unfortunately, the only suggestion I can make is that you reapply for her at that time.
If there ever was a degrading type of letter that a member of parliament had to write, that is it. In effect, I told him to come back in 1982, not to bother us until then, and in the meantime to try to take care of his mother on the other side of the world. It is almost ridiculous.
In that connection, the relationship between this bill and Bill C-35 is an interesting piece of timing. Bill C-35 concerns the reciprocity of old age security benefits between this country and other countries. Most members have had communications from old people from overseas who want us to get the govern-
[Mr. Philbrook.J
ment to arrange this reciprocity so that when they come to Canada in their old age they may bring their benefits with them; but, even more, that those benefits may increase with inflation, with indexing, and so on, so that they do not lose out. It sounds like a very good idea, and once the bill is passed there will be this kind of arrangement for old people from other countries who come here, and for our own old people who go overseas. They will have these arrangements pretty quickly with the United States, Great Britain, Italy and France. Hopefully, we will soon be able to make arrangements with countries such as Germany, Greece, Portugal and others whose old people are already here. There are many advantages to this.
As someone pointed out, when the new immigration bill is passed, parents will be able to come to this country at any age. We will see parents coming here when they are in their fifties. Obviously, they will have trouble getting jobs-so what happens then? It is all right for us to work this out ahead of time and have the children agree to support them. But situations change, Mr. Speaker, and I think we can anticipate some pretty awkward and difficult situations if the older parents are here for a while and cannot get work, and then something happens in the family situation and their children do not feel they can support them any longer. I put this question to the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Lalonde) in committee, and he assured me that this possibility would be underlined before people ever came to Canada: they will be doubly and triply warned that they may encounter problems and that they must go through with their original plan to look after each other. I can still anticipate problems, however.
When the minister responsible for multiculturalism was in my riding last year speaking to the Famee Furlane club, an Italian club in Oakville, he told a little story. Many years ago, when this country first started, a British parliamentarian who was visiting said, "You have British people here now; you have Americans here now, and you want to bring Italian people and perhaps some others. What nationality will you be?" The man he was talking to, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, replied, "The nationality of this country will be freedom." I think that was a great, intuitive stroke of genius on the part of Laurier and it certainly reflects what is going on in this country today.
I, for one, fully support the multiculturalism program. It gives us the best of all worlds in an exchange of ideas and helps us develop tolerance and understanding. It is a very enriching experience, and I cannot think of any other country I would want to live in, for that reason. With the hospitality and warmth the ethnic groups bring, the Mardi Gras, Oktoberfest, Scottish dancing, life in Canada lacks very little. It leads in large measure to a more open immigration policy.
There is no question that immigration is decreasing these days, but it is a uniform drop, not a discriminatory one, in line with Canadian feeling. It involves all kinds of people in all areas of the world. To some extent, admittedly, it involves our economic picture and our links with the labour situation. To
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me, that seems only practical. However, with a little bit of luck and the grace of God, I think we can look forward-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Order please.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 40, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight are as follows: The hon. member for Simcoe North (Mr. Rynard)-Health-Proportion of care costs attributable to diseases related to alcohol and tobacco; the hon. member for Humber-St. Georges's-St. Barbe (Mr. Marshall)-Transport-Date of decision on program for highway construction in Atlantic region; the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre (Mr. McKenzie)-Transport- Recommendation of Dr. Hall on trusteeship of pension funds for railway employees.
It being five o'clock p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper, namely, notices of motions and public bills.


PRIVATE MEMBERS' MOTIONS
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Notice of motion No. 4, in the name of the hon. member for Ottawa-Vanier (Mr. Gauthier).


Some hon. Members:: Stand.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Stand at the request of the government. Notice of motion No. 15, in the name of the hon. member for High Park-Humber Valley (Mr. Jelinek).


Some hon. Members:: Stand.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Stand at the request of the government. Notice of motion No. 16, in the name of the hon. member for Scarborough West (Mr. Martin).


John Raymond Ellis: I rise on a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I think there has been general agreement, at the request of the government, to move to motion No. 1 in the name of the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants (Mr. McCleave).


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Is it agreed?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.
Changes in Standing Orders


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: It is agreed and so ordered.


SUGGESTED MODIFICATION OF STANDING ORDERS
[Stage Direction]
The House resumed, from Monday, November 1, 1976, consideration of the motion of Mr. McCleave:
That this House do modify its Standing Orders and practices to the end that it bring its affairs more closely into conformity with modern (that is, acceptable mid-20th century expectations), by
1.	Cutting by one-half the time limits for speeches where such time-limits are set forth in Standing Orders;
2.	Setting up a committee composed of members of all parties, and of members of the parliamentary press gallery-each component to number seven-which shall supervise the rules to govern the recording by instruments capable of radio broadcasting and of telecasting of the proceedings of this House and of any committee or other recognized entity thereof, and the public use thereof;
3.	Providing that the rules for the so-called late show, or adjournment debate, be altered to provide for the participation of five instead of three, and that the Speaker have absolute discretion to extend the time for reply by up to three minutes;
4.	Providing that no member of this chamber shall have to wait for recognition by the Chair for longer than three oral question periods if that member has risen in each of such three consecutive question periods, such question and recognition by the occupant of the Chair to be recognized upon the request of such member at the conclusion of the third such period;
5.	Providing that the government through its House leader may designate up to six measures per session for consideration and disposition by legislation where such proposals reflect these principles;
(a)	an amendment to existing legislation which shall incorporate not more than one major change, the final opinion in any dispute to be that of Mr. Speaker;
(b)	the government does not propose to amend such legislation in any other manner in that calendar year without unanimous consent;
(c)	the speeches by the mover and the designated replier for each party shall not exceed fifteen minutes, and by subsequent spokesmen of not more than five minutes;
6.	Setting at five the number of those who may oppose unanimous consent to any motion made in this chamber.
Mr. John M. Reid (Kenora-Rainy River):: Mr. Speaker, last November 1 when we were discussing this matter I was the last speaker. We had been discussing the possibility of having television in the House of Commons. Since that time the decision has been taken that we are to have television in the House of Commons. The House has set up a committee to consider the installation of television facilities and establish regulations and conditions under which pictures of this House are to be broadcast to the community. That part of the motion presented by the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants (Mr. McCleave) has been dealt with.
Although I am a member of the special committee considering television in the House and the way in which our proceedings are to be televised, I confess that I now harbour some reservations which I did not harbour when the original decision to televise was taken. That reservation, purely and simply,
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Changes in Standing Orders
relates to how the image transmitted by the television cameras of this House will appear to the audience outside the House. We have a stage in the House, if I may use that term, which is perfectly appropriate for the sort of debate which takes place in the House of Commons, but the question is whether it is appropriate to the kind of picture which the television cameras will show the audience outside the House. I think we shall need to do some experimenting.
1 am thankful that the House leader of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition took the initiative to propose an amendment to the government's motion, for his amendment would encourage the special committee to propose ideas and to propose experiments so that we may discover the best approach to this question. I proposed, as the result of the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Grenville-Carleton (Mr. Baker), that an initiative be taken to televise one of the more important events this spring on our parliamentary calendar. The event which immediately springs to mind is the budget. I suggest that it would be appropriate to invite the television cameras in to televise the budget proceedings.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Mercer Reid: Hon. members will recall the mess the House got into last time because the antiquated procedures we followed led to details of the budget being broadcast on television even before members of the House of Commons knew what was in the budget document. I think it would be useful if the Canadian people were to get the news at the same time as the House of Commons. It would be appropriate to invite the television cameras in so that the people in the communities could watch and listen to the speech of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Macdonald) and the replies of members of the opposition parties.
It would be appropriate, as well, if the Minister of Finance were to have 30 minutes only to present the hard facts of the budget, and if the leaders of the opposition parties or their financial critics were also to be allowed 30 minutes to present their reasoned criticisms. That would be a much more sensible and logical approach, preferable to the kind of helter-skelter activity taking place in the lobbies and outside the House when the budget speech is actually being delivered.
There would be no difficulty in dealing with the mechanics of the proposal, for at least the first hour of the budget presentation of the Minister of Finance is taken up with summing up the material contained in the budget papers which used to be published at least one week or so before the budget proper was brought down. If that material could be presented to the House one week or so in advance of the budget, the Minister of Finance would not have to spend so much of his time, of course, reviewing something already presented to us. He could spend his half-hour dealing with the realities and content of the budget and could give perhaps a much more detailed explanation of measures he intends to take. Therefore, I think we should take advantage of the initiative of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition and consent to
[Mr. Reid.)
the proposal to televise the forthcoming budget speech of the Minister of Finance.
Having said that, I direct attention to some of the other proposals of the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants. Frustrated, like the rest of us, by the way this place carries on its business, the hon. member wrote down five or six suggestions for improving the procedures of the House. I share his frustration with regard to the way in which we carry on our business. It is absolutely disgraceful that in the year 1977 we are carrying on, basically, as Sir John A. Macdonald carried on in 1867 in the first parliament of Canada. Basically we have made few changes; yet the world outside has changed substantially. What are we doing? We are doing exactly as those earlier parliamentarians would have done.
We have not considered the kind of society in which we live. It is a fast-moving society which takes for granted that something is done when an announcement is made. Because of our cumbersome procedures both in cabinet and in the House of Commons, action is often taken one year after the announcement. It is no wonder that members of the House, the House itself, our political system and our constitution are not taken as seriously as they ought to be. We are unable to deliver what we promise.
Much of the responsibility for the problems of the members of the House of Commons rests, it seems to me, squarely on the cabinet. It strikes me as completely unreasonable that the cabinet should take one year or more to reach a decision and, after presenting it to the House, expect the House to deal with it in a few weeks. That is an unreasonable assumption and an insult to all who sit there. Just because it has taken the cabinet so long to make a decision does not mean, necessarily, that it is the right decision or the only decision. The cabinet is often impatient with the House of Commons when it feels that cabinet decisions are being challenged. But is this not the place where such decisions ought to be challenged?
I suggest that one of the most important parliamentary reforms must be finding some way of changing our rules, changing them in a way which will be fair to cabinet, for it is the government of the country and ourselves, members of parliament, representing the people of the country. It strikes me that we can consider a number of things which make sense. First, we ought to have a calendar which makes sense. We must have a calendar which takes into account the amount of sitting time the government needs and the amount of legislation the government wishes to propose.
All of us have some idea of what is an appropriate legislative load for the House to carry and all of us, surely, have some understanding of the amount of time which we need in normal circumstances to process that legislative load. Nobody has any secrets from anybody else on that score. The matter is quite clear. However, the acceptance of that concept entails the cabinet's placing itself under the Standing Orders in a way which it does not now have to do. It means that all of us, as independent members, will be under the same kind of obligation. It means that we shall all be subjected to greater discipline in the planning and carrying out of that legislative
March 14, 1977

program. It means that we shall need to be given notice of legislation and even necessary background material to legislation it is proposed to debate in the House of Commons. The calendar, it seems to me, is an important item.
Second, once we accept the idea of the parliamentary calendar and the idea of the appropriate legislative load, it seems to me we must find some way to bring debate to an end. If we accept a limitation on the total time available to us and a limitation on the amount of legislation to be introduced, it seems to me that we should also accept some mechanism for assigning time available for the discussion of each of those legislative items. For the House of Commons this would mean giving a different priority to various items. At the moment we give priority to no item. At present an item is debated either until debate collapses or ends. Usually debate collapses. Really, we do not sharpen our knives, so to speak, and do not sharpen our minds. We go on debating ad nauseam.
For proof of my contention I invite hon. members to examine the reports of debates on any subject which has come before the House. You will find that debates which are limited are sharper and more effective than those in which there has been no time limit. As Samuel Johnson said, nothing sharpens a man's mind so much as the prospect of his being hanged tomorrow. I think the same sort of philosophy ought to apply to us. Items of great priority at present do not get the attention they deserve, whereas items of lower priority get more than they deserve. We do not distinguish between what is important and what is not. We are concerned only as to what we want to talk about at any given time.
I have often said that the most important reform we could make in the House of Commons is insisting that members talk to the subject under debate. But I am too much a realist, have been around here too long, to assume that that will ever come about. What we really require is to find some way for the House of Commons to set a time limit for the amount of time available to an item and then find some way to bring that knife-edge to bear.
There are a number of suggestions that have been proposed. One has been put forward by the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants. In fact, it is his first suggestion, and I quote:
Cutting by one-half the time limits for speeches where such time limits are set forth in Standing Orders.
That would have an effect. Another proposal one should look at is one that was discussed in the procedure committee. That is that there be another mechanism to allow debate to go beyond the normal ten o'clock adjournment when there is a requirement for it. In many cases hon. members know that a debate is coming to an end and that all that is needed is another half-hour or hour to bring it to a conclusion. Why do we not do that? The Standing Orders now make it almost impossible to permit that to happen. We should look at that Standing Order with a view to loosening it up so that we can bring these matters to a conclusion when the time is there- and most members know when the time is there.
Changes in Standing Orders
One other suggestion that the subcommittee on procedure of the Standing Committee on Procedure and Organization has brought forth is a modified version of the British closure rule whereby it would be Mr. Speaker's responsibility to take the test of the House and determine when a question ought to be put. That might be too cumbersome for some. For others it might be too sharp. I say that the present situation is unsatisfactory. Perhaps we should look at it in that way. Surely under such circumstances there would have to be discussions with the House leaders of the other parties. However, I am certain that with proper good will it could be arranged.
Some hon. members have not had the opportunity to sit in on the discussions of the House leaders. Normally there is a discussion as to how much time is really required for a particular piece of legislation. There is discussion as to the number of speeches that have to be made from each party. Normally you come up with an informal discussion as to what is really required. However, I have never known any of those discussions to be fulfilled.
There is not sufficient discipline within the parties. None of us really willingly submits to the whips, House leaders or party leaders on these items. Consequently, the debates tend to take off with a life of their own. It is not the parties, party leaders or House leaders who are in control; it is the individual members. Once these debates get going it becomes impossible to bring them under control. What happens is they either peter out or the government is forced to bring in rule 75C if there has been sufficient agitation. This is hardly a parliamentary way to proceed to deal with the problems we ourselves create. Obviously, there has to be a greater amount of discipline imposed upon us, either by our collective decision through the Chair or through unilateral action by the government. Of the two, I prefer the first. Many members obviously prefer the second or prefer to have debate by exhaustion.
The last point I want to make is that we have not shown any collective will to come to grips with the problems of procedure that we face. We are still unable to decide just what it is we want this place to do. We are still unable to decide what it is the House of Commons should be attempting to accomplish. If you are looking for debate on the facts of the matter, you very seldom get it in the House of Commons. You very often get it in committee of the whole on finance bills and, particularly, in committees. If you want to know what people think about particular pieces of legislation, you get a pretty fair job on that at the second reading stage.
There has to be some attempt to draw these straws together and put them into a coherent whole. While the parties are constituted the way they are, they will be unable to do so; they will be unable to focus their attention on these things. At some point the frustration of members will get sufficiently great that we may make some unwise decision, some unconsidered decision, attempting to bring it into line with what we see as the reality out there. I am one of those who is frustrated. I feel the House of Commons is terribly inefficient. We do not discuss the important things. For example, at some point we ought to have had a debate on the question of the Anti-Inflation

March 14, 1977
Changes in Standing Orders
Board-but we did not. We ought to have had a debate on the question of what is going on in Uganda. We have not had such a debate. As long as we proceed in using our time the way we do, talking the way we do without any particular focus, we will not get around to debating things that are important; we will continue to debate things that are in the past.
If you look at our legislation, the program before us, you will see that all of it has basically been announced before. All of it has been debated before in the press. One problem is that we have not been able to explore any kind of mechanism to bring these things before the House at the time announcements are made in a way that we can have a debate that is important. We get these things too late. It is our own fault. As soon as we decide we want to debate what is going on, we will make those changes.
In closing, I want to congratulate the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants for bringing this matter before us. I assure him that I share his frustration. I hope other members will share it also and will be moved to do something about it.


Hon. Marcel Lambert (Edmonton West):: Mr. Speaker, I look upon the remarks of the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River (Mr. Reid) as an expression of difference of opinion that can be expressed. In fact, the way the hon. member has expressed himself and the way I intend to express myself is a clear illustration of what this House is. The hon. member would have a legislative grist mill. That is what he has in mind: someone plans, allocates time and brings the debate to an end, regardless of the wish of the members. However, somebody is getting the priority in the planning. The hon. member's thinking on this would be vastly improved if he sat for five years or so on the opposition. There is quite a difference of approach in the question of rules. The hon. member talked of frustration. Perhaps he should participate in the debates more than he does.
While I differ from my colleague for Halifax-East Hants (Mr. McCleave) in some of the approaches he has taken, I think it is great to have this motion before us today even in its very shortened terms. I do not know why the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River does not really prod his House leader to bring forward motion No. 12 which is a referral of all the rules. I do not take as dark or despairing an attitude toward the rules and the way this House conducts its business. As I said, it is not a legislative grist mill. It is not an administrative body, but a deliberative body. Each member stands equally before Mr. Speaker with his colleagues.
To say you are automatically going to cut off everything is a denial of the right of people to be represented in parliament, the right that their member shall be their spokesman. I admit you cannot repeat the same ideas and arguments all the time. Surely, there are things that can be done to meet the total operation, make it more convenient and more to the taste of hon. members.
The hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River should be the last to say that the operations of this House are something like those in the nineteenth century. After all, he is one of the
(Mr. Reid ]
acolytes of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Macdonald) who when leader of the House was responsible for imposing the great portion of these rules; that is, the functioning rules of this House and the form of committee system that we have.
We are both members of the committee on procedure. He is the chairman of a subcommittee. I have chaired another, and the chief government whip has chaired a third. All three of us have been terribly frustrated by the fact that the caucuses on both sides seem to operate on the rule of the least common denominator-he who knows least about the rules but is prepared to yell the loudest carries most weight.
The reports of the subcommittees should have been proceeded with before now. Some of the recommendations were agreed to by both sides and there has been agreement from the caucuses to implement them. But there is a strange reluctance on the part of the government House leader to go forward even in this area, though to do so would cover a number of the points my hon. friend has raised; for example, with regard to expanding the adjournment debate and changing the hour from ten o'clock to six o'clock and utilizing the first portion of the dinner hour, putting on five speakers. Perhaps there would be about the same attendance, but there would at least, in my opinion, be better exposure and greater convenience for the Chair. Then we should have the possibility of carrying on our work after ten o'clock. I would say to the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River (Mr. Reid), "Talk to our counterparts in Britain and they will disabuse you within two minutes." They have a rule allowing for a 90-minute debate after ten o'clock. But there is not one of the members over there who has not complained, privately and publicly, about the hours during which the British parliament sits, sometimes until one o'clock or 1.30 in the morning.
There is no way this can continue. We have to consider our staff. They are human beings, too. They are not supposed to be turning out material like sausage meat out of a machine, or like sawdust out of a saw. They have to be as alert and as available as we are. And if you think you are going to have a member of parliament working until 1.30 in the morning and up on his feet ready to attend a committee meeting at 9.30 the next day, you have a surprise coming. Of course, no particular harm is done to those who do not come in anyway until noon, as some do.
For once the government whip was correct last year in contemplating changes in our committee structure. The committee system as it now stands is supported by some 80 or 90 members. When I say 90 I am being very generous; it is more like 80 members from all sides. You can exclude cabinet ministers and you can exclude some of the parliamentary secretaries. But for the rest the load is unevenly shared.
Mr. Speaker, I shall try to be a little more relevant than was the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River. He spoke about a legislative philosophy which I think was not too relevant to the motion put forward by my hon. friend. Consider television in this House. There are some great things which have to happen
March 14, 1977

first. There is the law of libel which has to be amended before it comes in, even for the budget. There are other measures, too, which need to be taken. There may be one blessing, it is true. It will help to end the practice into which so many have fallen, of reading speeches which they have either prepared, or not prepared, themselves.
There is nothing quite so unforgiving as a camera focusing upon a person who is doing a bad job of reading. For myself, I very rarely read even a quotation. My grammar is not polished and my sentences may often be disjointed. On the other hand, it is debate, and if hon. members would consider this place as being a chamber for debate, not a chamber for reading set speeches, we should all be better off. When a series of set speeches are made there is no meeting of minds on any particular subject. If I had come here this afternoon with a speech, I would have to scrap it entirely because I want to debate with the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River some of the things he had to say. That is what we should be doing. That is how we should be conducting our discussions.
I disagree entirely, though, with the idea that there should be a calendar or legislative timetable. It is all very well for government members to sit over there as if they have been inspired from on high and as if the administration had a corner on brains and a divine right to have all its legislation accepted. Television will not cure this. It is a question of communicating to the people of this country what is being said. I could give example after example when, as a result of determined debate by a number of people who did not share the views of the government with regard to a bill, it finally got out among the people and the people learned of what was happening and said, "The opposition is right, and the government is wrong".
How many times has my hon. friend from Crowfoot (Mr. Horner) stopped the government cold because he and others organized a debate? Take Bill C-83. Was it not on the basis of those speeches that the government finally agreed that the bill must have been wrong? If we accept this timetable, this legislative sausage machine which so many government members advocate, this chamber will become merely redundant. It is a question of a minister making an explanation: nobody on the government side speaks, because to do so would be to delay the bill-a speech or two from the opposition, and then the vote. Legislation would go through on a steamroller. That is not parliament. That is not the democratic form of government. Canada is a big country with regional differences, and if we have some problems now with regional differences I can assure you they will be multiplied many times over if we ever get this legislative steamroller that some people advocate.
I do not dispute that there should be a rule of closure. What we were considering in the Committee last year was an eminently fair type of closure under which Mr. Speaker would have responsibility. I believe-and I myself have occupied that Chair-that there is a place for Mr. Speaker beside that of being a mere timekeeper. He has the sense of the House.
Changes in Standing Orders
After a certain time, a member-this could be the chief whip or the parliamentary secretary-might wish to propose a motion for closure. He would have to sound out Mr. Speaker to ascertain whether he would accept it. If Mr. Speaker felt there were at least six members who had a real desire to speak, he would simply say, "No; only after the six have spoken will I accept the motion." The motion could then be put, but there would have to be more than just a bare majority; there would have to be, say, 100 members voting for the motion so that there could be full representation. This is a Draconian procedure, but I think the placing of it can be done; however, not at the instance of a minister of the Crown rising in his place, as is done now, and announcing that the debate shall be terminated after eight hours. The present rule 75(c) is totally wrong.
We can move the adjournment debate. We can also change the question period. I have some feelings about the question period. I believe we have totally deformed the idea. But if that is the way it is going to go, fine. Perhaps I am one of the awkward squad when it comes to that. There are many other things we could talk about within the amendment of our rules. We could have a totally new committee structure. I think our report stage on bills is one of our most awkward procedures.
I will conclude my remarks by saying that I welcome this opportunity to speak on this motion, and I make a plea to the government House leader to please bring forward motion No. 12 under the heading "Government Business." I think we can agree to a reasonable debate on it, and then let us get on with the job, instead of everybody complaining that the procedures of this House are archaic. Every member has the right to his own views on the rules. I cannot say that anyone should have preference over any other, but there is one thing that we must have, that is, when the task has been given to a group of people who are interested and knowledgeable, if they have general agreement then let us not have the least common denominator in the House act as a veto on the implementation of the recommendations for rule changes, even on an experimental basis. We could have been doing a lot of good work trying out some of these rules in private members' hour, as the chief government whip has proposed, or in the structure of committees as I have proposed, and in some better use of time as others in the committee have proposed. But we have stood absolutely still. All the good work that has been done has been relegated to the waste basket. However, it can be resurrected. Therefore I will ask the government whip and the government supporters to put some pressure on their House leader to get motion No. 12 before us. We will deal with it and proceed to effect some of the changes which I am sure most hon. members want.


Mr. Maurice Harquail (Restigouche):: Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased indeed to have this opportunity during private members' hour this afternoon to participate in the debate on the motion put forward by the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants (Mr. McCleave). First of all I wish to state that I agree entirely with what the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River (Mr. Reid) said when he spoke earlier. He is obviously one

Changes in Standing Orders
who has a great appreciation of the rules and procedures of the House and of their importance in ensuring that business moves smoothly through the House. I, also, am aware of the great importance of this subject, and this is why I am delighted to have the opportunity to participate in this debate.
The hon. member for Halifax-East Hants has made several recommendations in his motion, the first of which is to cut by one half the time limit for speeches as set forth in the standing orders. Obviously this is a very worthwhile recommendation, but one wonders whether members on all sides of the House could reach agreement on this. He recommended also the setting up of a committee composed of members of all parties and of members of the parliamentary press gallery to supervise information on proceedings which take place in the House. I believe that this is an area which should be tightened up. All too often in the past important announcements and statements affecting the House, which should have been made in the House, were unnecessarily delayed and in some instances were in the hands of the press prior to being announced in the House. I believe we should debate this subject and look closely at the procedure we are following so that members can retain their privileged position as representatives of the people who should be the first to hear official statements, and the first to see copies of official documents relating to this House.
I find it difficult, however, to agree with what the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert) said this afternoon on this motion. I was rather surprised to hear as experienced a member as the hon. member for Edmonton West who, as I understand it, is a former Speaker of the House and who has had many years of experience here, taking up the time of the House in private members' hour in such a negative way rather than coming forward with positive suggestions and recommendations, which I believe he might well have done, thus giving us the benefit of his experience. I believe that we should take the procedures of this House more seriously and more positively so as to ensure that they will be respected not only by all members of the House but by the community at large. Therefore, I was very disappointed that we did not have the benefit of some positive recommendations from the hon. member for Edmonton West when he spoke a few moments ago and had such an excellent opportunity to make them.
Another matter that should be explored, I believe, is greater discipline in the House. When motion No. 12 is brought before the House, considered, and eventually implemented, I hope that the matter of discipline will be debated, especially in view of what we have seen in recent months. One thing upon which there should be some deliberation and debate is the matter of discipline. Discipline is something which will be needed if the rules and regulations of parliamentary procedure are to work. If there is discipline the public will respect hon. members in their work here in the House. If we, as the representatives of the people, are to be true leaders of our communities and provinces in this House, we should have discipline, and that should show in our every word and deed. If that were the case there would be fewer difficulties and fewer delays, and the

respect of the public at large for the work we are trying to do here would grow.
I realize that this could be a topic for considerable discussion. I do not want to get off the topic of the rules of the House by belabouring the point about discipline, but if we could see the recommendations of the committee which to date has worked many hours, we could consider them, approve them, and perhaps adopt them, and we would then be able to enjoy the respect we all want.
On the matter of the so-called late show, the proceedings on the adjournment motion, I agree with the recommendation of the hon. member for Edmonton West that those proceedings should be held at a more reasonable time. Those proceedings are important, and rather than having a late show, perhaps the proceedings could be held from six o'clock to seven o'clock, or from one o'clock to two o'clock just prior to the question period. The committee should seriously consider this so that we might have a more reasonable time in which to give all hon. members an opportunity to express themselves and to participate in that particular order of the day.
The matter of closure was touched upon. No one likes closure. No one likes to see it used, but it is there for a very good reason. In past months it has proved its effectiveness, and I for one am convinced of its usefulness. It is obviously needed. If parties and members do not want to be reasonable and serious about a proposition which is put before them, and if they are hell bent, so to speak, on delaying the proceedings of the House, then it is proper for any government to invoke closure.
I join with the hon. member for Edmonton West, the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River, and all other hon. members who are sincerely interested in seeing a modern approach to the proceedings of this House taken as soon as possible, and I urge the earliest possible implementation of such an approach.


John Raymond Ellis: Mr. Speaker, as the seconder of this motion I want to comment only briefly because we are getting close to the end of private members' hour. I want to commend the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants (Mr. McCleave) for bringing the motion forward. I commend also the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River (Mr. Reid) whose contribution to the debate was exceptionally well put, well thought out, and added considerably to the ideas expressed in the motion.
The first suggestion of the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants is that the time for speeches be cut in half. I hope to lend some credence to that by sitting down after using half the time I might normally use before sitting down. Surely in a day of modern communications, of instant replays, and of 30 second ads there is a place for a brief speech by a member of parliament. Surely we can put before our colleagues in this House our thoughts on a particular piece of legislation briefly, even if we only say "I agree with Jones, I agree with Smith, I agree with Brown, and my addition to the debate is thus and
March 14, 1977

so," and sit down. That is probably the most important aspect of this motion. I have long felt that the 40 minute limit on speeches was too much.
Recently we were subjected to a speech lasting a couple of days, and I think that was to the detriment of the House. It was a very interesting ploy, it achieved a certain end, but I think there are other ways of achieving ends. I would like very much to see some rule changes in this regard.
There are three aspects of the hon. member's motion which I particularly want to support, and one has to do with the late show. The hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert) commented on this, and in keeping with what I suggested I am going to say that I support what he said. Perhaps those proceedings could be held at six o'clock, and perhaps the time could be extended so that at least five hon. members could participate. Certainly there may not be very many hon. members present for the late show, but there are not very many hon. members here at ten o'clock anyway. That would not change. Those who are interested could sit in, and we would not want to take very much time away from the ministers or parliamentary secretaries who respond.
The hon. member recommended setting at five the number of hon. members who may oppose unanimous consent. It seems to me that to have 264 representatives from all of Canada halted in their desire to do something by one single member who may have an attack of dysentery or migraine headache is entirely unreasonable. Five is perhaps not unreasonable. This measure would certainly lend some credence to the word "unanimous". I do not think unanimous has to mean all but one. I think allowing five to oppose would not be entirely unreasonable.
So that we can have a serious look at this motion-and since there is quite a bit of time remaining before the end of private members' hour-I am going to resume my seat and will support the motion.


Mr. Gus MacFarlane (Hamilton Mountain):: M. Speaker, I too wish to congratulate the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants (Mr. McCleave). He and I worked very hard on the sub-committee report on private members business. In that effort we had the counsel of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) and the hon. member for Lot-biniere (Mr. Fortin). We would have been happy to see more action taken as a result of some of the recommendations in that report.
I also want to congratulate the hon. member for Hastings (Mr. Ellis) for his honest recognition of the desire of people like the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River (Mr. Reid) to bring forward some good initiatives with regard to procedure and organization. I think the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert) has done this in his report which was brought forward in committee, but I feel it is a slight distortion to imply in any way that the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River was just talking about a sausage machine through which legislation would be processed. I think that it is rather unfair because that hon. member is honestly concerned with parlia-
Changes in Standing Orders
ment, with the right of members to speak, and with the fact that parliament should operate in a way that would allow all of us a fair say in what is occurring, and at the same time make up a schedule which all would adhere to and from which the public could expect performance. I think that is really what he was saying and he was not in any way implying that any government should have the kind of control which would merely order legislation through.
[DOT] (P50)
In fact I might say that the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River has quite often chastised people on this side of the House for attempting just to move legislation into a large barrel and push it through, rather than being certain that it is appropriate and that there is time enough to speak to it.
Another matter that concerns me is the reference to Motion No. 12 and that the government House leader should be bringing forward this motion. In his remarks the hon. member for Edmonton West said there should be a reasonable amount of debate. In the past when references were brought to the Standing Committee on Procedure and Organization it was agreed that we would not debate those motions; that the committee would come to agreement by having discussions and would bring forward a recommendation which had some chance of success, and at that time there would be an opportunity for all to debate the matter. But to debate before the matters come before us would seem to use unnecessary time. It is my understanding that it might be anywhere from three to four to five days.
I think the government House leader, being as responsible as anyone from Cape Breton is, would not want to interfere with normal legislation and stop to debate for three days whether we should send a certain reference to a committee to decide some matter of procedure. I think in all fairness we should remember that.
My concerns are somewhat different from those of other members. This may be because of my background in working with young people, in education, and possibly as a dean of students, and now as whip. I am terribly concerned about individual members. I think all people should have more concern about the members than their own special desire about how procedures should be organized in the House, or of their party and its special desires, or the government and its special desires. We should at this moment pay attention to what ordinary members of parliament-as all of us are regardless of where we sit, whether in the government, as ministers or as whips, basically we are all members of parliament-and we should be concerned about how each of us can best use our time here. We should have the opportunity to speak for our constituents.
It seems to me that if we cannot even come to an agreement, regardless of the initiatives which would help the government or give the opposition a better opportunity to look into estimates and things of that nature, all of which are terribly important-if we cannot even agree that there should be a way in private members' hour by which members can control that
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March 14, 1977
Changes in Standing Orders
hour, that it should not also be subject to the fact that possibly two House leaders might agree, or two whips, that something is going to happen-then it seems very wrong, Mr. Speaker, that government initiatives should have any control over private members' hour. There should be a moment in that private members' hour for private members. Yet we cannot agree on that because people want to tie that in with some agreement on what the government might want, or the opposition might want, or some other party might want.
I think we have to face up to time schedules. It seems to me that the press and the media should be made very aware of the fact that those of us who go home every Friday night do not go home for holidays but go home for work sessions, some of which are in the riding and some of which are in this parliament. Whips should be able to put on a card that members will be here from January 10 to January 24 in work session in parliament, and will be in their ridings from January 24 to February 2 at work sessions. We should be able to do that in a completely open way so that nobody says to a member in his riding, "Oh, you are on holiday from parliament." You certainly are not. You are visiting functions, you are meeting people, you are answering questions, you are acting somewhat as an ombudsman. We hear of countries like Sweden that have five ombudsmen. I maintain we have 264, or 318, or whatever the figure is going to be. Every member of parliament in this country acts as an ombudsman and requires time at home to do that.
One hon. member mentioned changing the hours, and particularly the time of the late show. But what about private members' hour? A lot of members who fly west or east like to try to get out on the first plane. If we sit until five o'clock they may just miss their plane by 20 minutes. If I go to Hamilton I either have to go at 5.15 or else go to Toronto and not get home until nine o'clock at night. If I leave at 5.15 I am in my riding at 6.10 and can attend a function that night, but because the House sits until five o'clock I cannot do that.
Maybe it would be better to have private members' hour from ten o'clock till 11 o'clock in the morning. That adjustment would have to be tied in with what we do in other procedures. That seems to be the hangup, that there is a negotiation. Maybe that is what the hon. member for Edmonton West was referring to when he spoke of the common denominator-if you get this then you have to get this; if you get that then you have to get that. No, I say. I say there is an opportunity for us to do something on procedure and we should be able to bring that motion forward without debate in this House and forward the reference to the Standing Committee on Procedure and Organization. They should come back with recommendations that are fair for all members and do not have such great reliance on the success of the government or of the opposition. Something should be done for private members at this moment; then I think we would find that members, House leaders, and people in the committee could probably go further into the committee stage and the allocation of time. If we cannot even do something for individual members of parliament to make things more reasonable for them, then I do not

see how we can ever tackle the really heavy problems of procedure.
From what I can hear on any side of the House and from the people who have spoken, I think we do want to do something on procedure. This is a moment in parliament when people say it is something we should do. We are a product of the times; let parliament be for our times. May I call it six o'clock, Mr. Speaker?
Some hon. Mlembers: Hear, hear!


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. It being six o'clock the hour appointed for the consideration of private members' business having expired, I do now leave the chair until eight o'clock tonight.
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. Cullen that Bill C-24, respecting immigration to Canada, be read the second time referred to the Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration.
Mr. J. R. Holmes (Lambton-Kent):: Mr. Speaker, at the outset let me say that it is a privilege to speak briefly on Bill C-24, this most important bill on immigration. I was particularly pleased to hear the previous speaker, the hon. member for Halton (Mr. Philbrook), terminate his comments by emphasizing the importance of family re-unification. I tell the hon. member, through you, Mr. Speaker, that I share his views.
Before being elected to this House in 1972, and even since that time, I have been aware of many instances showing that the present act does really not address itself to the important humanitarian matter of family re-unification. I suspect that my views about the importance of the family unit are shared by most members of the House, and those fortunate enough to experience the warmth and close ties of family will have no difficulty in appreciating the need for family re-unification measures.
Instead of attempting to consider all aspects of the immigration bill now being debated on second reading in a global context, I have decided that it would be useful to limit my comments to a few specific issues which have been raised, and

to some which have not been alluded to yet. One of the major complaints voiced by many speakers in this debate is that the bill does not contain most of the important provisions of the government's immigration policy. It is readily apparent that a good deal of the policy will be established by way of regulation and order in council. As the minister knows, I have objected to this method in the past and repeatedly emphasized the importance of knowing the regulations when we attempt to discuss in detail the merit of any particular piece of legislation. Having said that, I have no difficulty in recognizing that the government and the minister require flexibility in the administration of a piece of legislation. However, I find it inexcusable that the major, operative portion of legislation, which is embodied in regulations, is not available for members of the House of Commons to assess. The regulations should be available to hon. members if they are to understand the implications of the bill and the policies of the government.
I recall, both when I spoke on the Environmental Contaminants Act and on the bill relating to amendments to the Animal Contagious Diseases Act, that it was readily apparent to all hon. members that one could not discuss many aspects of the legislation before the House because of the absence of regulations. It should be noted that in many instances bills have been introduced in this House which contained clauses which did nothing more than enshrine in legislation previous regulations established without parliamentary debate. I suspect, unless the minister has a change of heart, that that may happen in this instance.
When the minister introduced this bill on March 10, he pointed out that clause 3 lays down in clear terms the basic objectives which the government considers should govern Canadian immigration policy now and in future. I think it is readily apparent that immigration objectives are useful in serving as a guideline for the interpretation of the act, but it must be emphasized that they are not enforceable by law. As the minister knows, future regulations may deviate substantially from the intent of the objectives as outlined in clause 3. I have no doubt that many of those objectives in the bill will be subject to examination during committee stage. I therefore anticipate that the minister will make available to us, and elaborate on, the innumerable regulations which it will be essential for us to know if we are to have a clear understanding of the government's immigration policy and the effect the bill will have on future immigration in Canada.
The hon. member for Provencher (Mr. Epp), in initiating the debate on behalf of our party, emphasized two important points. First, there is the necessity to develop a demographic policy which will ensure a future for all Canadians, a future in which not only economic opportunities exist but, equally, in which there is freedom, racial equality, and justice for everyone. Second, he correctly pointed out that the entire selection system by which immigrants come to Canada is not included in the bill. Earlier this afternoon the hon. member for Broadview (Mr. Gilbert) clearly pointed out the importance of the selection system, the necessity for each of us to understand it in depth and consider it in depth during the committee stage.
Immigration Act
It is obvious to me that those two factors are interdependent; and if Canadians are to understand clearly the government's immigration policy, if Canadians in future are to understand the manner in which a person may qualify for entry into Canada, I say it is evident that such details must be made available now to members of parliament, and indeed to all Canadians.
I want to limit my comments to three of the immigration objectives we find in the bill, namely, that portion that indicates Canadian immigration policy is to maintain and protect the health, safety and good order of Canadian society. The second deals with the facilitation of visitors into Canada for the purpose of fostering trade and commerce, tourism, cultural and scientific activities, and international understanding. Finally, there is the objective of promoting co-operation between the government of Canada and other levels of government and non-governmental agencies in Canada.
This does not imply that I intend to discuss each of these sections in detail. Obviously, for those who have studied the bill and the implications of each of the objectives, this would be impractical in the time frame allotted to us. Nor do I want to imply that the particular immigration objectives that I have referred to are more important than the other declared objectives within the bill. However, as I indicated somewhat earlier,
I felt it would be useful to discuss briefly three important problems which I feel are supportive evidence of the difficulties members of parliament are experiencing in understanding the bill without having adequate information and without knowledge of the regulations.
I was pleased to learn that the bill abolishes a number of provisions which, frankly, are archaic and unjust. As the minister knows, and quite rightly indicated in his speech in the House of Commons, the 1952 act barred epileptics, the mentally retarded, and those who had been inmates of mental institutions.
I can also understand the minister's reasoning to include a portion of the inadmissible classes which includes persons suffering from any disease, disorder, disability or other health impediment as a result of the nature, severity or duration of which, in the opinion of a medical officer, they are or are likely to be a danger to public health or public safety, where their admission would cause or reasonably be expected to cause excessive demands on health or social services. If I interpret this correctly, a medical officer is given the ultimate right to determine whether an excessive demand on the health and social services exists. I suggest to the minister, in all sincerity, that I feel somewhat uneasy that a medical officer would be given unlimited discretionary powers to make such a decision.
Those involved in the delivery of health care are well aware of the stigma that has been attached to many medical problems in the past which has given rise to discriminatory practices. Those of us who have been involved in the delivery of health care recognize that in many instances medical technology and therapeutic advances have enabled many individuals
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with medical problems to remain active and productive in our society.
For example, epilepsy has been mentioned by various speakers in this debate. I suggest it may well be used as a prototype for the problem I am discussing. It has been recognized that this group of individuals has been discriminated against for many years. We know that certain myths existed in the past regarding individuals with the problem of epilepsy. Fortunately, I am pleased to report, in many instances these myths are disappearing. In this regard I want to congratulate the minister for removing epilepsy from the inadmissible class.
Having said that, I could very quickly give other examples where we have a different perception of a medical problem today as compared to 20, 30 or 40 years ago. For example, our perception of tuberculosis as compared to 30 years ago is entirely different. It is viewed differently by the community at large.
The same could be said of conditions such as pernicious anemia which can now be treated. The patient is no different from the average man on the street who is presumed to be healthy. Other examples are diabetes, cardiovascular problems, many of our handicapped patients, thyroid problems, and many forms of cancer. The point I wish to make is that certain medical problems which may be considered inadmissible today, as epilepsy was in 1952, may appear archaic in the future with the advancement of medical technology.
It is not inconceivable that a medical officer in the future could deny admission to an immigrant on medical grounds and yet another medical officer could permit another individual with the same medical problem to enter Canada. This does not imply that one or the other medical officer is right or wrong. However, it does point out the difficulties of giving unlimited discretionary powers to a medical officer during an era where there are rapid changes in medical technology, and points out the need for an appeal procedure, advisory group, or some mechanism whereby such problems can be judged on the basis of recent medical data. If this occurs, there will be far less occurrence of the possibility of discrimination with respect to health or social problems.
During the debate of the bill dealing principally with Reader's Digest and Time magazines, the minister will recall I took exception to the Canadian content rule. Although I refrained from the use of the word "censorship", the so-called "Cullen Rule" was unquestionably one of editorial interference. During the debate I stressed a number of scientific journals and periodicals would be affected by the legislation, and emphasized the importance of maintaining an environment in which the free flow of scientific information would be permitted in the international community. That fundamental principle is once again expressed in the immigration objective dealing with the facilitation of visitors in Canada for the purpose of fostering trade and commerce, tourism, cultural and scientific activities, and international understanding.
The minister knows my concern for the free flow of information in the scientific community. Again it is readily apparent the regulations will determine the government's policy with

respect to this fundamental principle, and I hope the minister will take the opportunity to clarify the government's position during the standing committee hearings when this bill is being examined very carefully.
I wish to make a few brief comments regarding the immigration of medical personnel into Canada. Let me emphasize that the comments I make with respect to the medical profession should not be viewed in isolation but are readily identifiable in other disciplines.
The Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada in presenting their brief to the Special Joint Committee of Parliament on Immigration failed to address itself to the commonly held myth that the medical profession is a "closed shop" and determines the number of Canadians students admitted to medical schools.
Historically, Canada has benefited from the immigration of exceptionally talented physicians. They have played an important role in serving the public in varying capacities ranging from family physicians to leaders in the academic and research community. Interrelated with this policy of immigration is the simple economic fact that it has been less costly for the government to import undergraduate students than to train them. Today foreign medical graduates comprise about one half of all the specialists certified by the College, and the majority of these remain in Canada to practice their specialty.
There is, however, another side of the scenario as well as the economic implications. First, there is the moral question arising from the acceptance of a significant number of specialist physicians from developing countries where their professional skills are in demand. A case can be made that Canada has developed to the point at which we should be a net exporter of health services rather than importer of health services.
The second point raised by the College is that an open door policy encourages "reverse discrimination" under which it is possible for foreign medical graduates to enter our system while highly qualified Canadian students are denied entrance into Canadian medical schools because of the large number of applicants with superior scholastic records. The brief states:
Canada should move toward training sufficient undergraduate medical students to meet the needs of the country as a whole. We should look forward to being able to say to Canadian citizens: There are enough Canadian students to satisfy our needs; there are enough graduate programs to satisfy the requirements of these students if they all stay in Canada, and there are enough jobs for them all if they choose to stay here. Some will go to the United States, or to Britain or to other countries in Europe. We shall be able to accommodate some foreign medical graduates of a calibre equal to our own. There will continue to be movement across national borders.
The long term goal for Canada has been adequately outlined in the College's summary. Canada should be self-sufficient in physician manpower, maintaining a balance and ongoing emigration of specialist physicians, and adhering to the historical position that this country welcomes talented new citizens.
As I stated previously, the comments I have made with respect to the medical profession are relevant to other disciplines. Here again the regulations are critical and I do not see
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any evidence in the bill before us that the government, in formulating its policy, has addressed itself to this important consideration.
Finally, Mr. Speaker, I wish to comment on the government's intention, as part of its immigration objectives, to promote co-operation with other levels of government and non-government agencies in determining immigration policy. In this regard I wish to refer to the subject of offshore seasonal help. I can think of no more important issue in terms of co-operation with other governments, and, in particular, with non-government agencies. As the minister knows, it is one which plays a significant role in my part of the country where we have found it essential to utilize offshore help in a number of agricultural operations. As the hon. gentleman knows, I have corresponded with him regarding this matter and I can appreciate the position he takes-that before authorizing the entry of temporary foreign workers the government must be assured that present and future employment opportunities for Canadians are not affected.
It is my impression that the agricultural industry is, and has been, prepared to assist the government in formulating specific plans of action to use the available Canadian labour force. In this regard I believe that Manpower personnel in my area are cognizant of the need to provide permanent, reliable, seasonal workers for the various agricultural sectors. The ones involved principally in my region are farm producers and canneries. What does concern me, however, is that the minister and his officials do not appear to understand fully the practical problems experienced by the agricultural community in attempting to plan ahead for the season in the absence of an offshore seasonal immigration policy.
A major complaint expressed by many farmers concerns the worker turnover. It is not uncommon for individuals to be sent by Canada Manpower, to work for a relatively short period, and then, without notice, move on suddenly to another part of the country at the height of the harvest season. In such circumstances a farmer often has to turn to one of his neighbours for assistance, and it is apparent that any effort to share work crews at such a late date presents problems for the growers involved. I myself am aware of cases where the harvest has not been completed before the first frosts came.
Then again, it has been brought to my attention on numerous occasions that many of the workers sent to farmers have no interest in the crops they are asked to harvest. This is, understandably, reflected in the work they do. Students are an important component of the work force during the summer months but it should be noted that when school starts in September the grower is often left without help. In many instances a large proportion of his crop remains in the fields and he must depend upon inadequate or uncertain help to get it harvested.
Another point which has been emphasized is the advantage of having a complete, homogeneous crew at work in the fields at harvest time. One of the values of the Caribbean work crews is that the experience and expertise they have gained from previous visits is readily apparent on their return to the
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agricultural sector. In this regard it should be noted that any change in the ownership of the operation can result in the sudden disappearance of a homogeneous work crew. I can assure hon. members that a newly established grower not infrequently finds his difficulties of operation compounded as he is confronted with the prospect of no farm labour.
The brief presented by the Landscape Ontario Committee for the offshore workers program outlines very well the problems faced by the industry. I will quote a few paragraphs:
In Ontario, our busy season starts roughly April 1st. It is necessary to use seasonal labour from then until approximately November 15th. Seasonal labour is available from several sources, e.g.
(a)	local unemployed, through CMC
(b)	students, directly and through CMC
(c)	offshore workers
Source (a)-Local unemployed are, as a general rule, very unsatisfactory, for several reasons. In the main, unemployed people registered with CMC, are not agriculturally oriented. They have very seldom had any farm work experience. They are not used to working on the land, not used to the working conditions that prevail in early Spring, in particular. For example: the wet cold weather and the muddy fields. We have had with many other nurserymen, much experience trying to hire Canadian workers for the season. We order these people from time to time. If we interview and hire say 20 workers, after two weeks we are lucky if one is still working. This is one of our greatest problems with local or Canadian workers, that they are hired for the season, but do not stay more than a few days or weeks. After the summer they will, if they have managed to stay that long, automatically become a burden to the U.I.C.
The offshore workers we have are no burden to the Canadian economy. They pay in to the U.I.C. and C.P.P., but do not draw from it.
Source (b) Students: Most Ontario nurseries hire large numbers of students each summer. In general, there would be at least four to five times as many students as offshore workers. For example, one of the average size nurseries employs some 55 people on a regular basis, made up of men and women. They employ some 50 students during the summer and another 8-12 people on a part time basis, as the need requires or more accurately as they are available. They have employed some 14 off shore workers the past three years and find that the arrangement works out very well with the number of regular workers, students, and part time help they have.
Source (c) Offshore Workers: The off shore labour which we have had the past few years is qualified labour. They are fairly well educated, so they learn quickly, they are careful, cheerful, courteous and have high moral standards. They may not be the fastest, but they are steady and dependable, and are at work every day. For these reasons they fit in well to do those jobs which require a certain amount of skill, care and dependability. It has been impossible for us to hire someone in Canada to do these jobs, on a continuing basis (for at least one season). We are certain that agents of the local manpower offices, can attest to this situation.
As I indicated, the key problems as outlined by Landscape Ontario are not dissimilar to the experience of other farm sectors in the community. I want to add one additional caveat to what I have said, a caveat that is frequently overlooked in any discussion of offshore seasonal help. The view is frequently expressed that the program is simply for the benefit of the agricultural community, and what is often overlooked is that the Canadian consumer is directly affected by the activities of the agricultural community. I can assure you that a bumper crop is of little value to Canadians and is of little value to a country in need, a country that is starving, if it cannot be harvested. That is the critical point to be made: the crop must be harvested. In addition, it should not go unnoticed that as Canadians we have demonstrated a genuine concern in assist-

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ing developing countries. I can assure you, Mr. Speaker, that in any discussions that I have had with innumerable offshore workers, principally Caribbean workers in my area, the money they have earned in the Canadian context has assisted them greatly in improving their standard of living on their return to their country.
In conclusion, let me reiterate that I have not attempted to discuss the global picture of the immigration policy for Canada. However, by referring to three of the immigration objectives outlined in clause 3 of the bill I have attempted, by way of illustration, to point out the difficulties that members of parliament are having, and indeed Canadians are having, in assessing the immigration policy when the operative portion of the legislation, namely, the regulations and the orders in council, are not available for debate.
During the committee hearings I hope the minister will take the opportunity to answer some of the questions I have raised and the questions that many other members have raised and, more important, that he will supply sufficient detail with respect to the regulations so that all members of parliament can adequately assess, not only the immigration objectives but, more important, the government's immigration policy.
[ Translation]


Eudore Allard: Mr. Speaker, thank you for giving me the opportunity to take part in the debate on Bill C-24 dealing with immigration and refugees. As several members have already given a general picture of the situation I will limit myself to a few observations dealing mainly with refugees.
In 1969, Canada signed the United Nations convention on the status of refugees. At that time it took on certain legal obligations with respect to the status of refugees. The United Nations convention clearly provided that only people able to prove beyond any doubt their status of refugees are entitled to Canada's protection.
Clause 6(1} of the immigration bill provides that the refugee must meet the same requirements as an immigrant. However, this bill does not determine the special circumstances making him a refugee and somehow placing him in a quite different situation from that of an ordinary immigrant. In several cases, if not all, a refugee may well not meet the criteria normally applicable to an immigrant although his request to remain in this country is often more urgent than an immigrant's.
I think the bill should ensure that officials or those who will have to enforce this bill are able to make a clear distinction between the two types of people calling on the hospitality of this country, our democratic life, our sense of human values, as well as our desire to respect basic human rights to the highest extent possible.
Yes, those who urgently ask this country to receive them because human liberties are not or no longer being respected in their country of origin, and dare stand up in their country against those who want to maintain one line of thought from one party or one principle, should always receive a particular welcome from this country.

Through the years Canada has rejected all forms of extremism. It has looked for an original system based on the integrity of the elements making up our population. Whatever their orgin, the contribution of immigrants to the future of our country can be adverse only to the extent of our own weakness as regards our problems. A strong nation does not need legislation restricting immigration if the immigrant knows that he is accepted because he believes in the values of our country and its contribution to the full achievement of our country's expectations. But if he immigrates to teach political concepts threatening social harmony he will be treated as a subversive element. Canadian people have the most different and the most various origins. Our country became what it is presently owing to immigration.
In this context, Mr. Speaker, let us say that the immigrant coming to Canada wishes to start a new way of living. Our country should then recognize that it is an individual who, in his desire to start a new life, will contribute to the building of our country. We must in fact recognize that if all immigrants coming to our country wish to start a new life with more happiness, when they leave their own country it is often regretfully because of a change of political regime or because of the declared partisanship of their leaders.
The refugee immigrants who face those difficulties show human solidarity as they fight for freedom, for ideas as well as for human beings. They are also dynamic people whom we should consider as good elements for our country, all the more so because a man who is forced to emigrate does not come here to realize a long nurtured plan. For a simple reason of ethics we should consider them with more attention and better help them get established in our country after the difficult moments they lived in their country of origin. Canada should not be a restrictive land for some groups of immigrants, particularly those who come here to find freedom because in their country the right to freedom, to freedom of speech, is not recognized.
This is, Mr. Speaker, the few comments I had to make on Bill C-24 at this time.


Mr. Howard Johnston (Okanagan-Kootenay):: Mr. Speaker, the bill we are debating this evening has come before the House at the wrong time. When we were debating the citizenship bill at second reading over a year ago, I suggested that that bill should have waited until we settled our immigration policy, and having done that it would then have been in order to have brought forward the citizenship bill and debated it. 'However, for its own reasons the government has chosen to present these bills in the opposite order, so the citizenship bill is completed, and we now struggle with what is really the more basic and difficult task of establishing an immigration policy.
We have heard several speakers already in this debate, but I feel that in many ways we have not as yet grasped the nettle of immigration policy.
We have heard some interesting speeches. On Friday last the hon. member for Vancouver East (Mr. Lee), who is not
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with us tonight, told us the sad story of discrimination against Orientals who immigrated, or who wished to immigrate, during the period of time from prior to the turn of the century on into this century, and right up until the end of the Second World War. That is a sad story indeed, but one should remember that the reprehensible steps which were taken to bring about that discrimination were taken by Liberal governments under Liberal legislation.
The hon. member did not even mention the most appalling discrimination, the decision to remove Japanese people from the coast and to attempt to return them to Japan, whether they were born in Japan or in Canada. The surprising thing is that the hon. member for Vancouver East sits on the government side, and after his retracing that long and sad history one would wonder what would have brought him to the point where he would have offered to stand for that particular party. It seems to be one more example of the Canadian people being ready to forgive all that happens on the government side, and not just to forgive all but always to forgive all. There have been recent examples of that tendency. The very people whose policies bring us to the point our economic situation is now at, and who bring our national unity situation to the point it is now at, as well as the immigration situation, are the people who are hailed as the only people to save the country.
The immigration policies put forward have a number of very highly idealistic bases. There is much talk of demography and what our demographic policy should be. I think this is a euphemism for a much simpler question: how many people can we afford to bring into the country at any one time? I will admit that there are sad aspects to the question of population, and I will get around to some of those a bit later.
There is a question about enriching and strengthening the cultural and social fabric of Canada, taking into account the federal and bilingual character of Canada. What a contradiction that is! Part of the problem which arises is the problem of national unity which is confronting us very sharply at this time.
I do not know whether the demand to enter Canada has. fallen off at all. I suspect it has not because the situation in the rest of the world gets no better. However, I think people must be pausing now as they consider emigrating to Canada, and asking themselves whether there is some question as to whether the nation itself can exist much longer as one nation. One of the challenges to the country now is that a demand is made on the English-speaking part of the country to develop the same passion for national unity as that which is evidenced in the province of Quebec by those who argue that the country should be broken in two. It is rather difficult, in the face of federal government policy in a variety of areas, for the call of unity to be answered by the variety of peoples who constitute what is in a sense English-speaking Canada. We really must not be sanctimonious about the situation we have in Canada.
If one looks at "The Non-Official Language," the report of a study of Canadian multiculturalism handed down in 1975, there is a page which discusses generational differences in language and knowledge. This discusses mother tongue, and
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the report tells us that fluency decreases rapidly from generation to generation. This book is full of carefully prepared tables, but one table shows that 70.8 per cent of immigrants are fluent in their ethnic tongue. There are various reasons why not all immigrants of the first generation are fluent. Some come as small children, some come removed from their country of origin, but 70.8 per cent are fluent. When we consider the children of these immigrants, the second generation, 10.8 per cent are fluent. Of the third generation only .6 per cent are fluent. In subsequent generations none at all are considered fluent.
We find that in spite of the brave words about this nation being a mosaic of many peoples, about it being multicultural, that those are brave words only. There is a great illusion there. We cannot really hold ourselves up as being that much superior to the United States in the policies they have had, recognizing only one official language.
We have to be a little cautious about the promises we hold out to immigrants now compared to earlier years because they will be confronted with a choice of developing one of two languages, either English or French. I believe they will continue to face the same dilemma of immigration; that by the time the grandchildren are adults, there will be very little left of the original language and not too much of the culture. This is one of the "givens" of the situation, one of the unavoidable facts of immigration. I think we fool ourselves if we pretend otherwise. We fool ourselves even more if we pretend that by some process of federal spending, by some challenge to the people, we can reverse the situation to allow easily the retention of a geat variety of languages from generation to generation in this country.
We fool ourselves too if we pretend there is no bigotry, no prejudice in this country, and if we blind ourselves to the changes that have come about with bewildering speed in the last few years we make a mistake there as well. It seems to me that the patron saint of this country in recent times has not been Valentine but Archie Bunker, and through a variety of things that have been permissible in recent years we have made bigotry almost respectable. It does not surprise me that when a survey is made in metropolitan Toronto the results show a shocking level of bigotry amongst high school students. It does not surprise me to talk to a person about 20 years of age in British Columbia who says proudly, "I am bigoted," and that one then has to spend a long time with that person suggesting that there is nothing desirable about that, nothing that makes it respectable.
One realizes one is working against forces that have tended to educate and re-educate our young people, quite apart from the things done in our schools that have done it negatively. The jokes about immigrants in programs like "All In The Family" have led if anything to a rise in bigotry and prejudice rather than tolerance and understanding. I suspect that some of the people who initiated that sort of programming believed we had reached the stage of sophistication where it could be borne and

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the result would be humour and increased tolerance. Everything seems to point in the opposite direction, however.
I suggest we could look at the rise and fall of immigration levels through the theory of the "necessary break". The breaks used to be out of our hands. The first came in World War I when there had been a great wave of immigration; a world war halted that and permitted a breathing space. In clause 3(d) of the bill it is called adaptation. I think assimilation might be a less popular but more accurate word.
The great depression provided another break. During those years there was little hope-and little hope in coming to Canada, so again there was a slackening of immigration. For a period of years World War II made immigration impossible. Since the end of World War II, however, immigration has risen and fallen for some 30 years. This was acceptable in a boom period but it becomes difficult in an economic slowdown. We cannot wish upon ourselves another break that is out of our hands. We cannot bear the thought of World War III doing that. If that happens there will not be any nation left, and if we go into another great depression we will not have a nation either. I suspect we must ask if, as a nation, we should not seriously slow the rate of immigration. I realize that is a question that cannot be asked, and I accept entirely clauses such as 3(f), which reads as follows:
to ensure that any person who seeks admission to Canada on either a permanent or temporary basis is subject to standards of admission that do not discriminate on grounds of race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion or sex;
I must accept that. We cannot return to the time spoken of by the hon. member for Vancouver East when discrimination against certain groups was flagrant and blatant. Those days are gone.
One clause we can approve of is that which suggests the government of Canada should co-operate with other levels of government and with non-governmental agencies in easing the road to adaptation of immigrants. This is one of the great flaws in recent years; the federal government has set a policy for immigration and the municipal level has tended to pick up the load, particularly for schools. The load has fallen on the least powerful level of government, that with no sovereignty and no determination of the policy. It has been stuck with the bill and the efforts to make changes and pay for them in education and a variety of other aspects that a high level of immigration has brought about. This is where tension lies, where bigotries become exposed and feed on the fears that come about, particularly as we move into a period of economic decline.
I suspect there will always be adaptation; that we should almost insist upon. It is a great irony that we just passed the human rights bill a short time ago and yet we know that there are a great many cultures in the world that discriminate against women, for example. The very law that we passed is one that if we insist upon it, will run counter to the suggestion that there need be no cultural change or adaptation in this line. We ought to be careful that we do not become wildly inconsistent in our desire to seem to be tolerant and full of brotherhood.
The question of farm labour has already been raised. I think we should clearly understand the bill. If we believe in provisions such as clause 3 that practice will be a difficult one to continue. The thread which runs through all our debate on immigration is this: we must have these people, to do jobs Canadians will not do.
Is it not strange that a country which 100 years ago rejected aristocracy yet retained the monarchy-the notion of aristocracy running against the grain of the hardy, independent settlers of that time-should now seek to establish another kind of aristocracy? Apparently some Canadians are not to do some jobs; they are not to do the dirty, uncomfortable menial jobs. We are to bring in people from outside who, forced by economic pressures in their countries, will do those jobs for us. Is it not contradictory that we should think some jobs are beneath human dignity?
If some jobs are degrading, change them. Do what is necessary to make them fit for human beings to perform. Or, if the problem lies in our educational system and the people we are raising in this country, people who have no sense of loyalty or duty, we should tackle it from that side. But we are on a dangerous path if we think we can have two categories of citizens, one kind above doing any menial job, and another kind we constantly replenish or bring in from outside to do our dirty work. It is to our credit that, under our immigration policies, such numbers in this country are at a low level.
Contrast our situation with that of some nations of Europe who have brought in migrant labourers but have not provided for their social needs. If those labourers had been granted citizenship, those countries would have found it necessary to provide for their social needs. As it is they allow them to stay for one year, or three years, or whatever the period is, rather than accepting them into the community. We have chosen the more honourable route, but if we are not careful we shall depend more and more on bringing such workers into this country. We have already used this approach in agriculture and certain industries. Clearly, we shall need to consider carefully what is implied in sub-paragraph (f) of clause 3.
It seems to me, all the same, that we must have done something right in this country, for we have achieved over the years some levels of common justice, tolerance and decency; otherwise why would we continue to attract inquiries from the countries mentioned earlier? In 1974, 750,000 people inquired about coming to Canada. That suggests that our levels of freedom are not all that bad. We know that the cause partly is that virtually every other part of the world has closed its borders to immigrants and we remain one of the few* open countries. That is part of the reason for the pressure.
The hon. member for Vancouver East suggested that people from Asia had taken a chance on Canada. Mr. Speaker, I can draw on familiar experiences; my grandfather came from Sweden. He did not have much chance in Sweden, and anybody who has seen Troel's film, "The Immigrants", part one, will understand the conditions in which my grandparents lived

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in Scandinavia. They would know that there was no chance at all for those in Scandinavia.
Sometimes, after my grandfather had been in Canada for a while, he used to grow nostalgic, talk about the old land and say that things were not that bad over there. Whenever he talked this way my grandmother would remind him of exactly what it was like. She had known what it was to labour in the fields without owning the land and without any chance for a shift in social status as the years and generations went by. I suspect that this is still very much the case in many countries, and we, as a country, offer people in all parts of the world hope for a better life, hope for a system of government free and democratic.
May I now refer to a letter I received, in common with other hon. members, when the government brought out its green paper. The document to which I refer is a statement on immigration policy by a group of University of Toronto faculty. It is a distinguished group; there are at least 30 names signed on the back of the letter. There is a dean of theology of St. Michael's College, a professor of religious studies; there are people from the departments of political economy, mathematics, fine arts-the list of names is long. The letter was guaranteed to make a mere member of parliament curl up like a worm on a hot rock. Yes, there was a mass of academic distinction backing that letter. I think all hon. members received a copy of that letter of May, 1975.1 was critical of it.
As you will recall, the green paper was a hesitant document. It skirted around every issue and refrained from spelling anything out. It did not grasp any nettles; even so, this group of academics found a lot in it to attack. If I may quote, they said:
When official Canada speaks of regulating immigration, it seems always to mean preventing too much immigration. Though directly racial conditions on immigration were eliminated from law in 1967, recent practices and pronouncements express the official apprehension-especially toward the non-white or south-European applicant...
We reject the underlying assumption that 'those others out there' are to be dealt with as best profits the entrenched Canadian. The question should not be how many immigrants our existing social system can profitably accommodate, for our social system is changing. The people's concern must rather be to set a social and economic policy, and in that context to set a population policy and an immigration policy. The aim should be to serve human needs-of Canadian (including native Canadians) but also of prospective immigrants.
Freer access to Canada would not solve problems of population or poverty or repression elsewhere; but it would provide one further dimension of freedom; it would offer some hope.
And would the immigrants' gain be at the expense of the present wage-earning group? The government's attitude tends to encourage this notion. It is a notion which gives employers leverage to pit a favoured group of workers against a less favoured. We do not think such a division should be accepted. We doubt that white Canadians have a stake in the maintenance of a pool of lower-paid labour, either within our borders or abroad.
Immigrants do not threaten our culture, they enrich it. Their labour is an asset to our economy, not a burden. A policy of welcome is possible.
I replied, individually, to each of those academics and learned, from the few who replied to me, that many of them had not read the letter they purported to sign. It seems to me that there was room for a reply, that there was no need to cringe and no need for embarrassment. In my reply I commented first on the general woolliness of thought in the letter
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of the academics. I said that one can agree with the opening statement about the "wage of intolerance". That is true.
I question whether the Fathers of Confederation had really considered setting up Canada as a multiculture at that time. They did mention two official languages, but no more. I suspect that if they really wrestled with the problem of mul-ticulturalism they might have spelled that out a little more clearly, but they did not. I think it was a measure of tolerance that they did include two official languages, and we know the problems that have arisen from that decision. My letter continues;
To suggest that concern about immigration policy is a creation of government is simply false. " ... official Canada speaks... the official apprehension." The green paper was long-awaited. It comes finally as a delayed response to public concern, and, as you say, it is tentative. The government was pushed reluctantly into producing a green paper.
Who is the "entrenched Canadian" who can profit from "those others out there"? Those who speak to me about immigration have seen rights promised them in perpetuity stripped away (the British subject, for example).
We have had the culminating effect of this in the past few years with the declaration of the new Citizenship Act. Dismay is still striking hundreds of former British subjects, long time Canadian residents, when they realize they are not Canadian citizens. They are bewildered and dismayed. For anyone to describe those people now as entrenched is making a grave mistake.
They know that newly arrived immigrants have rights the native born do not have. This adds to the confusion because the immigrant can nominate and sponsor, but the Canadian bom cannot. There is no way I can apply to bring a citizen from some other land to this land and have that work. One finds that one has fewer freedoms in the land in which one was born. That is another source of confusion and dismay. I again quote from the letter:
They see Canadian citizenship going at a bargain rate-
That was written before Bill C-20 was passed, with the reduction from five to three years required to qualify. I takes the native born 18 years before he can vote. The immigrant waits three. I would not want to lower the voting age any more. In fact it probably works well at 18. There is, however, still that question there. I then said, and I quote:
Who can be or feel "entrenched" when as you correctly observe, "our social system is changing"?
If in your collective wisdom you know where "The people's concern must rather be"-then proceed to spell out the "social and economic policy", the "population policy", and "an immigration policy" that are imperative. Why that policy should be geared to the "prospective immigrants" I do not see. I know that no country elsewhere in the world is gearing its policies to benefit me should I decide to leave my native land. As the grandson of immigrants from Sweden I stubbornly insist that, should I decide to emigrate anywhere, the onus would properly be on me to make the necessary adjustments.
Your argument for "freer access" is couched in confusing rhetoric. Who can object to "one further dimension of freedom"? But, if the strains of freer immigration fracture this land, who then would benefit?
Finally, you must think again about your rhetorical question, "And would the immigrants' gain be at the expense of the present wage-earning group?" What makes you think that that is just a "notion" encouraged by the "government's attitude"? How can you explain it to the Vancouver wage-earning taxpayer

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Immigration Act
footing the bill to pay for special classes to teach immigrant children basic English? He sees it in actual dollars and cents on his tax statement. How will you exlain it as a "notion" to the Vernon, B.C., resident whose son is studying medicine in Guadalajara, Mexico-in Spanish!-because he cannot find a place in a Canadian medical school which has a disconcerting percentage of overseas students enrolled?
Confronted by the "wave of intolerance" that you correctly perceive you could do better than to fuel the fire. For the sake of all our immigrants old and new, for the sake of all our minorities, we need an immigration pause to permit the spirit of tolerance to grow again.


Mr. F. Oberle (Prince George-Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate immensely the opportunity to say a few words about the bill before us at the present time, Canada's new immigration bill. It is the first change in our immigration laws since 1952.
My colleagues encouraged me to speak on this matter because I could speak with experience. It is no secret to any of my colleagues that I am a new Canadian, like four million others who live in Canada at the present time.
I speak with reluctance, as well, because as a Canadian who was adopted by the people of this great land as one of their own, having come here as an adult at the age of 19, deep down I still have the feeling that I am in debt to this great land and this society. I have been in Canada for 26 years. I have been a Canadian for 21. I do not think that my debt to this land will ever be paid.
I will tell you in a few words, Mr. Speaker, what my feelings are. I came to Canada at the age of 19 from a country with an overdeveloped culture, and an overdeveloped sense of nationalism. At the time Canada represented a refuge. It represented all those things which caused me to consider leaving my homeland, my friends, mother, father, brother and sister. I felt cheated. It was like when one discovers his father and mother have been lying to him all his life about Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny.
In postwar Germany my whole world had tumbled in. I was old enough to make a commitment at the age of 12 when the war was finished. It was a commitment to something that I thought was great, unique, and worth while fighting for. One grew up a little faster in those days than one does today. My whole world tumbled in after I learned that I had been cheated out of a childhood and a teenage life, which one considers essential.
To me, Canada meant security and comfort. It replaced what I had lost in relation to a family, community and country, because all that was destroyed. I compare myself with people who come to our country today from the Third World. They have learned what it is like to starve. I did that during the last few years of the war. I learned to examine the thin line between humanity and bestiality. I learned that really only a mother has deep human instincts when things get tough. I rediscovered all those great human feelings in Canada.
To a youngster from Central Europe, reading some of the books and news releases, and seeing care parcels arrive, Canada was a land of unlimited possibilities, as was all of

North America, because the American people felt such strong ties to Central Europe-their hearts were bleeding because of what had happened to their relatives and friends. They were very charitable. I learned to appreciate those people, and it became an obsession; I never doubted but that this was the land in which I wanted to settle and bring up my family, a land where everybody is equal before the law and where the only credential, when applying for work, is the will to work and the determination to better oneself. Oh yes, I wanted to better myself and I wanted to work.
My Canadian dream was fulfilled beyond all my expectations. I can hardly imagine what I would have said if anyone had told me in 1951, when I arrived in Halifax on an Italian ship, that some day I would be sitting in this House of Commons taking part in a debate about immigration and about demographic strategy. I would have said; That is too much to expect. But I think I have earned the respect of a significant number of Canadians whom I represent here in the House of Commons, who have asked me to speak for them, and who have given me credit for what I have achieved, not only for myself and my family but for the community in which I live and the area in which I settled. And I did settle in one of the frontier areas, and I have no hang-up about the suggestion that more immigrants should do the same. Perhaps I adopted the right attitude. My wife came here two years after I did.
I wanted to be a Canadian as soon as possible. I felt I had nothing to go back to and I applied for citizenship after five years. Looking back, though, I realize I did not really become a Canadian until seven years later-the first time I could afford to go back to my homeland and visit my father and mother and my family. When I got back to Canada and stepped off the plane in Edmonton I knew, then, that I was a Canadian. I had not known until them. I could really assess the potential this great country holds for those who make a commitment to it. My spirit was set free here and I achieved all my goals, including some I had not even set.
Now, as I look at this bill and the changes in the legislation,
I begin to question whether the kind of freedom, the kind of achievement I was able to accomplish, would be possible for immigrants who come to our shores in the future. I must admit, of course, that today we must take account of the fact that over the last 25 years we have, in a sense, created a unique cultural identity and that we have, of course, the right and the responsibility to enrich and strengthen this cultural and social fabric. But how was this identity achieved, how did it evolve? We cannot overlook the fact that the identity, such as it is today, and the cultural basis, such as it is, have been established or achieved through the efforts of people who came mainly from Europe, people who enjoyed an ecumenical relationship in a religious sense, people who reflect a common denominator. Historically, the Anglo-Saxons came from Germany. It was two founding nations which laid the basis of the culture with which we identify today.
In each of the post-war periods people came here from war torn countries to find a new beginning, and most of them achieved their goals. Most of them became integrated into our
March 14, 1977

society. I can recall the days when four or five hundred people in Toronto would turn out for a social gathering run by the German club. Today one would have to look all over the city to find 40. They have all become integrated into the society we have established-and so they should have.
Today, things are changing. The fact is we have not managed well in an economic sense. In terms of the standard of living, we are not No. 3 any more in the world but No. 10 or No. 11. Our land is not as attractive to Europeans as it once was. We still find Europeans coming here, but they do so mainly to join members of their families who arrived here years ago.
The main flow of immigrants today is from Third World countries. These are people who possess entirely different social values, fundamentally different religions, fundamentally different behavioural attitudes toward society. Our immigration policies must, of course, be structured in an attempt to find a way to integrate these people into the system we have established. There will be discrimination, as there already has been, against these people. I should like to think I was never discriminated against. I know I was not. My commitment was always firm. Since I came here I have spoken English in the home because I wanted my children to be able to speak freely, without accent, while they attended school. I assimilated into the society as quickly as I could. But the people I am speaking about would find it much more difficult to do so. This bill will make it even more difficult for them because it contains some clauses which will be a serious affront to the freedom we enjoy in this country.
You cannot legislate against discrimination no matter how many immigration or human rights bills you bring before the House of Commons, particularly when you deliberately establish immigrant ghettos in areas of our land such as our cities or in the frontier areas. There will be restrictions against those new immigrants for no other reason than that they must work within the framework of our present social and cultural fabric. They will not have the same freedom that I have in making a contribution to the cultural evolution of this land. We have now set ourselves up as the demagogues who direct the further cultural revolution. We are doing this through the CBC and we are doing it by restricting foreign publications from coming into our country. These people will not be allowed to make the kind of contribution that I did.
I want to give an illustration and to cite an example of what I am saying. I can recall the time when I was working in a mine. There were no delicatessen stores there that we have everywhere today, and we were thirsty for a glass of wine with a meal. We wanted very much to go into a restaurant and enjoy a good meal with a glass of wine. It took a while for us to adjust to the fact that one had to spice one's meat in the restaurant with salt and pepper, because one does not do that where I come from in the Black Forest area. The meals there are spiced, and if you do not like the way the food is prepared in one restaurant, you go to another one. That adjustment was
Immigration Act
not too hard, but one had acquired a certain taste before coming to this country, and customs are hard to break.
I recall that there was nowhere I could buy, for instance, European sausage because there was a law in existence that any meat made into sausage had to be cooked. That ruled out all the fancy sausages that the Poles, the Germans, and the Ukrainians make which are made from smoked meat. I had some friends who were also from central Europe. They saved some money and set themselves up as businessmen. They set up a delicatessen store. They moved to Vancouver. They were able, they had determination, and they worked hard to change that particular law. Several of them became millionnaires in the delicatessen business when they started to make this fancy European sausage. A few years later one could enjoy a glass of wine with a meal in some of the better restaurants, and lo and behold in the last few years you are able to read on the label of your wine bottle the year the wine was made and whether the wine is from the Rhine, the Moselle or the great wine growing areas in France. So in a remote sense I have made a contribution to the evolution of our culture because it is now an in thing to go to a good restaurant and to eat a well spiced meal with a glass of wine.
What about these new immigrants who are now being asked to conform to what is here? What contribution will they be able to make? What contribution will they be allowed to add to our society? In my opinion the Immigration Act does not need to spell out that we should foster the development of a strong and viable economy and the prosperity of all regions of Canada. Apart from the great freedom we have enjoyed so far in this country, there is only one reason why immigrants come here, that is to be prosperous, to achieve a degree of prosperity for their families and themselves, and in so doing to contribute to the prosperity of our society as a whole. Indeed our economic welfare will depend on a prudent and imaginative immigration policy. If one considers that one out of six Canadians today was not born here, and that all but half a million of us who are not of native ancestry come from immigrant stock, it is not hard to imagine that a further increase in our industrial capacity and in our gross national product will depend on the number and types of immigrants which our country will attract in the future.
What about the freedom which once attracted people from all parts of the globe? This brings me to the great philosophical expression of what the main purpose of this new policy is. It reads:
It is to support the attainment of such demographic goals as may be established by the government of Canada from time to time in respect of the size, rate of growth, structure and geographic distribution of the Canadian population.
Here is another very serious restriction on the freedom that any future Canadians will enjoy. We will now have to rely on them to develop the frontier areas in the underdeveloped regions of our country. We have to rely on the immigration policy for regional development. I sympathize with the government, of course. Everything else has failed. Our Regional Development Incentives Act has not worked. Canadians want to go where they can achieve for themselves the best standard

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Immigration Act
of living, and that is in our cities. I look at other more advanced industrial nations and, if I may be allowed to make a comparison, if I look at West Germany, for instance, a country with 66 million people, I find that there are two cities in Canada that have a greater population than any city there.
Any attempt the government has made to decentralize our population, any previous attempt in demographic strategy, has failed. So we are now looking to the Immigration Act to develop our frontier areas. What will that mean? It will mean that if, as we have said, we wish to develop the potential of north eastern British Columbia, in which lies vast resources of energy, particularly coal, we will tell the Minister of Manpower and Immigration (Mr. Cullen), after consultation with the province and the Minister of Regional Economic Expansion (Mr. Lessard), that we need 12,000 coal miners for that area in British Columbia. He will then send his people all across the world to find 12,000 coal miners.
Of course there is no explanation for the fact that the Hindus and the Pakistanis are most likely to work in the saw mills. They will find work in north eastern British Columbia because there is a heavy demand for saw mill workers there in spite of the high unemployment figures. I suppose that the Italians and the Greeks will work in the mines-I do not know who will work in the coal mines. What we will be doing is establishing ethnic immigrant ghettos in these frontier areas in addition to the ghettos we have already established in our cities. That is a very serious affront to civil liberty, freedom of movement, and the cardinal principles of democracy and freedom which I and all Canadians have enjoyed so far.
There will now be conditions attached to immigration. Immigrants will have to conform to our social structure, and they will have to move into certain areas. But how long will they have to stay there? Will there be a date attached to it? Do they have to stay there two years? The region I come from was not developed by people who were forced to live there. Every day industries grow and corporations move into areas to take over from the small businessmen who developed them in the first place.
Corporate executives are transferred into Prince George, I suppose, as a penalty. They would much rather be in some head office in Toronto. Every minute of their time spent there is a nightmare for them. A person cannot wait until he has enough seniority in his company or within the civil service structure to move to Victoria, Vancouver, Ottawa or Toronto. He does not really contribute anything to that area because he does not even like it there, nor will immigrants who are forced to move to places like the Quintette mountains to develop a coal mine. Those immigrants will hate every minute of it, and they will be very anxious to see the day when they will be allowed to become full-fledged Canadians after perhaps three years, and when they can move out of the hell holes to which they have been sent.
This is a very serious matter, and in my judgment this bill will discriminate against people who will be offered refuge in
(Mr. Oberle.]
our country and who will be told when they come here that they will have almost equal rights except the right to vote in elections because they will not have equal rights. They will not have the kind of freedom previous immigrants have enjoyed.
I am more concerned about what the bill does not say then what it does. I would like to know more about the people who will make the regulations and the people who will consult with other governments and with other interested groups about the demographic strategy and about the placement of immigrants. I would like to know who will make a value judgment about a person's capability in our social structure, or a value judgment as to where in this country these people can make their contributions. Will we continue to have the kind of silliness and stupidity which were inherent in previous regulations when some peole came to our country to get the feel of it, discovered that they liked it, wanted to apply, and had to leave the country before they could apply? But before they left the country they had to hire a lawyer.
I and I am sure many of my colleagues-have several cases on file about people who had to see a lawyer with whom they made a deal to work on their behalf while they were gone.
I can think of one particular case which I am sure the minister remembers. I am thinking of the case of a Chilean family which was located in Prince George. They should have been allowed to stay here. They assimilated well into the Prince George scene. There were letters from service clubs, from individuals, and from the mayor saying that the man had a job. He was a refugee. He could not be sent back to his country, yet the committee, or whoever it was, ruled that he was not a refugee under the regulations established by the minister.
This family had to leave, but they were told not to worry. They were told that all they had to do was get out of the country, apply, and that they would be brought back in somehow. However, they did not trust the system very much, so they hired a lawyer to look after their interests. Three months later they came back. They had to travel all the way to Spain with all their children and come back, and now they are back in Prince George. The father is working at his old job now, and everything is as it should have been in the first place, except for the fact that for the next 25 years they will be paying a lawyer's bill, and they do not even know how much it is. The lawyer probably asked me and some of my colleagues to do all the dirty work, but he is the one who will be sending a bill. There is a price for those people to come to this country, and at this moment they do not even know what it is, but I intend to find out.
Who makes these silly regulations, and how do they fit into the fundamental principle which should be attached to the immigration policy of a country like Canada which espouses democratic principles and fundamental civil rights and liberties? I am disappointed that this bill does not add anything; it takes something away from the things which I thought made this country great.
Of course there are reasons for the bill, and I can understand them, but we have not been very skillful disguising the
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true intent. The government did not hear what it wanted to hear in the debate which was carried out across the country. The government was told about discrimination and about the need to close our borders to immigrants, so the government had to come up with something. The information did not come from the green paper. The government had to come up with something, and it really does not fit into our scene at all.
The multicultural dream was just a dream, because one of our founding cultures felt threatened by the fact that other cultures should find fulfilment in this society. I for one am not offended by the fact that I should attune to one of the founding cultures which made this country great. I felt that was a condition and a commitment which I had to make when I came here, but why put on this charade? Why say that our identity is one of many cultures? Why do we not spell it out as it is, and why are we not honest with people? Why does it always have to be the devious way? Why does the government always have to work behind people's backs? This bill spells out for the first time the objectives of Canadian immigration policy in philosophical terms, but it falls short of what most of us expected after the charade which was perpetrated by this government.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: Mr. Speaker, even with my short experience in the House of Commons I have no hesitation in stating that this is one of the most important pieces of legislation this august body will face in some time. Here we are after many years attempting to determine just what kind of immigration policy the country should have, keeping in mind our goals and what we would like to have in terms of a greater Canada.
I hear a lot about the founding races, and I know what that means, but I want to tell the House that in his wisdom my father, during the first world war, came to this country from St. Vincent, British West Indies, and my mother hailed from Jamaica, of the British West Indies at that time. They had a hell of a time when they came here, but what sticks out in my mind is that of all the countries to which they could have gone they picked this country.
As a result of the beautiful union which occurred when they arrived in this country of mine, I was pleased to be a first generation Canadian. When I listen to people throughout this land who indicate to me that because people such as I have just referrred to, my mother and father, had a different social background, that they could not integrate, could not face the problems of this country, could not make a concrete contribution, then I want to reflect back on my childhood and start punching. That is the way I used to bring about racial harmony.
When I hear this nonsense expressed by certain people who ought to know better, I thank God that my seatmate, the right hon. member for Prince Albert (Mr. Diefenbaker), requested that I seek election to this House of Commons.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!
Immigration Act


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: At one time a person of my particular hue, being a member of the visible minority-a black man or a black woman-was not accepted by any of the main line parties. Let us acknowledge history. They did not want you; they did not ask you; they thought you could not make a contribution.
I hear a lot about the Anglophone and the Francophone. Every now and again we have to sit back and look at who has done the hard work in this country in order to bring it to the position it is in now-people who took it upon themselves to say that all they wanted was an opportunity to work, and notwithstanding the horrendous attitudes that prevented them from getting ahead, they were prepared to come here in order to grasp opportunities and in order to help the country. That is the kind of stock I come from; that is the message I would continue to preach.
I wanted to be a member of the special joint committee on immigration. In the local newspapers of Ottawa, Vancouver, and all the big cities I read about attitudes that I knew existed. I wanted to find out their extent; I wanted to determine to what extent the country is multiracial and multicultural. Make no mistake, Mr. Speaker, at one time it was not multiracial or multicultural. It was strictly WASP. When I think of the changes over the years from the White Anglo Saxon Protestant attitude to one of multicultural and multiracial acceptance, I know that is what is making this nation great.
Do not let us downplay this multicultural and multiracial aspect. At one time no one would admit that is what this country is all about. But it is what this country is all about. It is a country of the beautiful mosaic; it is a country where the arms of compassion, of friendship, stretch around the entire world.
During the committee hearings, however, I saw the bigots; I saw the racists, black and white. I saw the WASPS. I saw the Western Guard. I saw them all in action.
I want to say that in my 55 years, knowing what went on in the past, seeing what is going on today, I know that the attitudes of these small groups here and there, whose vocal, poisoned, disruptive and dangerous philosophy of superiority is based on race, can only bring about division, hate, suspicion, fear, and violence. It is unfortunate that so much of that small vocal minority gets so much attention, and yet it should get that attention because I know; you know, Mr. Speaker; we all know that we cannot afford such attitudes, and it is my view that Canadians do not want them.
I appreciate the new attitude at the courts, Mr. Speaker. I will not spell that out, but it is said that racial attacks will be dealt with more harshly. Some people may say "I am English and white; should the same type of treatment not be meted out to the person who attacks me because I am English?" That is a foolish and irresponsible argument. When you are part of the visible minority you cannot hide. If you cannot get along because you are Francophone, all you have to do is become Anglophone and move anywhere in the world and you will be accepted if you so desire. If you are Anglophone and want to become Francophone, you can do it by learning the language

March 14, 1977
Adjournment Debate
and moving anywhere in the world. But, Mr. Speaker, when you are a member of the visible minority you cannot do that. You cannot change your name and you cannot hide. You cannot learn another language and hide. You are a member of the visible minority, and as such you stand out.
That is why I appreciate the courts moving in the direction they are today. It is about time. That is why I can appreciate the Ontario Human Rights Commission and the job it is trying to do, even though it may be questioned at times. It may be an impossible job, but it is attempting to bring about a proper attitude. That is why I can appreciate the honourable Roy McMurtry, Attorney General of Ontario. I am not singling him out because he is Conservative but because he seems to be one of the champions of those who feel the poisonous arrows of injustice. He is speaking out on their behalf.
That is why I can appreciate what the Minister of Justice (Mr. Basford) had to say on the introduction of the human rights legislation. Even though we have reservations with respect to that bill, at least we are moving in the direction where people who have long suffered and faced obstacles, and on occasion have surmounted those obstacles, can have hope and faith in government.
That is why I can appreciate the introduction of the antihate literature bill. Some people might say we are infringing on the right to freedom of speech. I can tell you, Mr. Speaker, freedom of speech can only go so far with me. When I find that freedom of speech affects a human being to the extent that the person believes himself or herself to be a second class citizen, and so becomes possessed of a feeling of uselessness, then I step in. That can be the end of freedom of speech. You can equate it to yelling fire in a theatre where there are hundreds of people but no fire. Freedom of speech goes just so far. Mr. Speaker, I am just getting started, but it is now ten o'clock.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION

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

Mr. P. B. Rynard (Simcoe North):: Mr. Speaker, as reported on page 1329 of Hansard for November 24 last, I asked the minister a question about rising health care costs. I wanted to know what percentage of those costs could be traced back to cigarette smoking and alcohol. The minister stated that he had actually cut health care expenditures by $42 million.

I am glad to note the presence of the minister this evening. I appreciate some of the things he has done in the health care field, but do not appreciate his cutting health care expenditures by $42 million and all that means. What does it mean, Mr. Speaker? It means that the provinces are to be deprived of millions of dollars. In the long run that surely means that the quality of the health care of the patient, the taxpayer of this country, will be lower. The taxpayer will suffer when we close down hospitals, when we close wings, when we take nurses off floors. Yes, the patient will suffer when we reduce the quality of health care.
The question remains, how real is that expenditure cut of $42 million, because over-all government expenditures are to rise by more than 15 per cent? Here the minister is cutting health care costs; and health care is one of our most important social fields.
I want to know two things, Mr. Speaker. I do not know how much the minister will save; I know that. I want to know what part of those health care costs were attributable to conditions related to cigarette smoking, and what part to the consumption of alcohol? Actually I want to know, in terms of health care costs, just how much cigarette smoking and alcohol consumption cost us.
The minister has been honest with us. Nobody actually knows the figure. A few statistics will show you that cancer of the lung leads in categories of cancer which kill men. The figures for women are slightly lower. This situation has developed over the last 40 years. Forty years ago cancer of the lung in women was rare.
A committee, headed by the hon. member for Hull (Mr. Isabelle), was set up to look into this question. We found that cigarette smoking was a common denominator not only in cancer but in emphysema, bronchitis, asthma, and allergies. Findings indicate that cancer deaths in Canada run at between
4,000	and 5,000 people per year, and another 10,000 to 12,000 deaths per year are attributable to emphysema, bronchitis, asthma, and allergies.
The minister stated that fewer people are smoking. He is probably right. I want to know how effective the anti-smoking campaign has been. For instance, do people still smoke in public places in hospitals and health centres? The minister may have taken a small step in the right direction. But he is intelligent and knows he can do better in this field.
I have been able to learn that 6,000 people, up to the age of 65-I am putting it in round figures-die from smoking-related diseases; 30,000 cases are treated by physicians in their offices, or in emergency rooms or hospital beds; and smoking-related diseases account for over 800,000 patient days in hospitals. If my figures are right, that involves an expenditure of about $80 million, a staggering figure. Can the minister not do something to cut this figure down?
There are no statistics available in Canada with regard to the alcohol problem, but United States figures show that between $25 billion and $27 billion a year is spent on treatment of alcohol-related diseases. Reducing this to Canadian
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figures, which are probably fairly accurate, it would come to about $2 billion. The minister knows that in France people drink alcoholic spirits from the time they are little kids because of their water supply. In that country 40 per cent of the hospital beds are occupied by alcoholics or those with alcohol-related problems. Properly studied and researched, why could this not be cut in two, or even eliminated?
Alcoholism and alcohol-related diseases rate next to cancer and cardiovascular disease as a cause of death and illness. Besides the suffering, financial strain, ruined social life, family life gone, and possibly having killed someone while drinking, the alcoholic may wind up on skid row.
Of those who use alcohol, 10 per cent have a problem. Five per cent are alcoholics and cannot handle the problem successfully.
Alcohol is part and parcel of our society. The cocktail route is part of the program. However, for 5 per cent of the people, it is a bumpy road to hell. Invariably the alcoholic ruins his home life.
I have seen a lot of sociability with alcohol, but I have seen the other side of the tracks as well and it is bad. We have treatment for the alcoholic. Alcoholics Anonymous, and medication help. However, if research could come up with the right antidote for alcoholism, and it were harmless in itself, lives would be saved as well as the miseries and the cost. Remember, with all the taxes the government collects, it is not a quarter of the cost in dollars, to say nothing about the human wreckage caused by alcoholism. What we need is more research, more warnings, and maybe a few more taxes to solve this problem.


Marc Lalonde: Mr. Speaker, obviously the hon. member will not expect me in three minutes to be able to answer all the questions he raised during his speech. I listened with great interest. As usual, the hon. member made a well researched contribution to our discussions.
With regard to the $42 million so called saving the hon. member referred to, as I mentioned in the House on November 24, this is a reduction in our expected expenditures under the shared cost programs. In fact our cost went up by 12 or 13 per cent. I do not have the exact figures now, but I suspect it would be around 15 per cent. What it meant was that, thanks to measures such as seat belt legislation in particular, and other measures, we have been able somehow to reduce the expected rate of growth in health costs.
As far as the figures he mentioned for smoking and drinking are concerned, obviously we are talking in broad figures. It is very, very difficult to arrive at hard figures. He is right that I referred to the figure of $2 billion, including indirect and related economic costs, for alcoholism in Canada. I mentioned that on November 24.
As far as smoking is concerned, we estimate the total in health and economic costs to be around $500 million in Canada. This is no doubt a very, very high cost. Fortunately we live in a society where we respect freedom of choice of
Adjournment Debate
individuals. The health danger can be fought through education and research, as the hon. member mentioned, rather than mere banning which has proven quite useless in the past. The causes are of many natures and kinds. The solutions will have to be multifaceted. What we need is a diverse approach to this very difficult problem.
I thank the hon. member for again bringing this matter to the attention of the House and the country. If we are to make any real progress in this field of smoking and drinking, citizens must be aware of the problem, particularly young citizens. Those growing up at the present time should be made aware of the real situation and the implications of it at a very early age.


TRANSPORT-DATE OF DECISION ON PROGRAM FOR HIGHWAY CONSTRUCTION IN ATLANTIC REGION
Mr. Jack Marshall (Humber-St. George's-St. Barbe):: Mr. Speaker, as reported at page 3803 of Hansard on March 9, I asked the Minister of Transport (Mr. Lang) whether a decision had been reached on the implementation and funding for a highway strengthening program in the Atlantic region. He indicated there was a small ray of hope, that they were getting closer to a decision. I hope that the parliamentary secretary will be able to tell me some definite dates and the amount of funding involved.
Tonight I want to try to impress upon the parliamentary secretary, and through him, the minister, the emergency situation which exists as a result of the almost complete deterioration of the trans-Canada highway in the province of Newfoundland, more particularly in western Newfoundland, which to my mind is the most heavily used and most deteriorated in the province. While I refer to that section of the highway as part of the trans-Canada Highway I do so with tongue in cheek, because to call it that is an insult not only to the engineers who designed it but to the people of Newfoundland who voted for Confederation on the strength of the promise that the highway would be one of the advantages they would receive; but instead they were taken, and taken for too long.
While time will not give me the opportunity to go back in history, I want to refer to a recent statement by the president of the CNR when he referred to the decline of rail passenger service. The trains, he said, have been losing business because of improved air services, and because it took nearly twice as long to cross the island by train as it did by automobile; CN sought to reverse the decline in passenger business by replacing trains with buses and the volume of passenger traffic had increased steadily ever since. He went on to say that the road cruiser service has the potential of being self-supporting since rates are set on the same basis as those of the other two bus operations in the Atlantic provinces. But he also went on to say that Canadian National's rail freight operation is now suffering increased erosion of traffic from highway operators and that its share of freight traffic into Newfoundland has dropped from 87 per cent in 1972 to 61 per cent in 1976.

March 14, 1977
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To my mind, this is hypocritical because what he is camouflaging is that the reason the railway's share of freight traffic has declined is because of the complete and utter failure of the company to compete and to upgrade its rail freight service. Mr. Bandeen is correct, however, in stating that in order to retain at least part of its share of traffic the CN has sought to take advantage of highway facilities which are available to its competitors. He goes on to say that CN Express intends to make greater use of truck operations in order to provide service equivalent to that of its competitors.
Not only has Canadian National failed to compete by allowing its freight and express services to deteriorate, but it is contributing to the deterioration of the highway because of its failure to take advantage of a monopoly service which it has enjoyed for so many years. In order to avoid straying from the purposes of my representation, if inded it has failed to live up to its responsibility, and looking to the problem as it exists, figures show that truck transport has increased in Newfoundland by some 95 per cent, and will continue growing beyond the ability of government to cope with a situation which could reach emergency proportions.
It is worth mentioning, too, that in spite of an excellent report in Volume C of the voluminous Trans-Newfoundland Corridor Studies we have only reached another stage at which a commission will be appointed to inquire into the transportation situation in Newfoundland. Mr. Speaker, there have been enough words expressed and bandied about with regard to the objective of a comprehensive, intermodal system of transportation in Canada. For some reason or other the government does not want to realize that the basis of any economy is a transportation system to provide infrastructure support for the potential resources of all sectors of the nation. This base is vital in the Atlantic region to allow our eastern region to contribute to the Canadian economy.
The part of our transport system to which I refer is a highway system which up to this point has been accorded only a passing interest. The implementation of a highway strengthening program is vital to that infrastructure support. A year ago today the province of Quebec received $90 million for such a program, and I can only hope that the government will see fit to construct through Quebec a highway to link up central and western Canada with Atlantic Canada for the benefit of all of Canada. I look to the parliamentary secretary to give me the good news, which should have been forthcoming long before now, on a highway strengthening program in the Atlantic region which would benefit the whole of Canada.


Mr. Marcel Roy (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Transport):: Mr. Speaker, first of all I want to thank the hon. member for the comments he made, but I would like to repeat to him the answer given by the minister on March 10 when he said, "We are closer to the day when the decision will be made". I want to assure the hon. member that now we are coming closer to the day when the decision will be made.
This question has been raised many times. I would like to refer the hon. member to the "late show" on February 22 concerning this situation.


And in order to demonstrate that the minister is interested in the problem of transport in the Atlantic area, I would refer the hon. member to the meeting which was held on last August 31 and which embodied the first discussion between the federal minister and the four premiers of the Atlantic provinces. On February 7 last, another meeting was held in Charlottetown for the premier of the Maritime provinces where Mr. James Morgan, minister of transportation and communications represented Premier Moores of Newfoundland. During that meeting, Mr. Lang reiterated the undertaking of the federal government vis-a-vis regional economic expansion. To this purpose, he has insisted upon the fact that a transport system should be used to achieve social and economic objectives at the national and regional levels and to provide an effective service across Canada.
The Maritime premiers and Mr. Morgan have stated that they are satisfied with the importance with which Mr. Lang claimed he considered the development of a transport system as an effective means of reaching the regional economic objectives. Everybody present at this meeting recognized the advisability of improving passenger services in the Atlantic provinces. According to a joint study carried out by the federal and provincial governments, a cheap way to improve passenger services in the area would consist in maintaining and improving only one transcontitionental service.
This study has further indicated the possibility of compensating the loss of passenger railway service in certain communities by improving both air and bus services. Mr. Lang, Mr. Morgan and the Maritime premiers have accepted the idea that the best way to improve passenger services would be through special financial assistance to improve air and bus services in the area. Changes in existing railway passenger services would occur only later on, for the demand is somewhat weak and the cost of subsidies is very high. It was also agreed that the report and findings should be submitted jointly to the Canadian Transport Commission which will hold hearings concerning the railway passenger services in the area.

I would like to assure the hon. member that, as I mentioned in my opening remarks, the announcement will be made, and the date for the announcement of this decision is closer.


TRANSPORT-RECOMMENDATION OF DR. HALL ON TRUSTEESHIP OF PENSION FUNDS FOR RAILWAY EMPLOYEES
A. Daniel McKenzie: Mr. Speaker, I and railroad pensioners all across Canada are hoping that the parliamentary secretary can inform us tonight when the government will be taking a stand on Dr. Noel Hall's report on railway pensions. I hope the parliamentary secretary can at least give us a partial answer tonight, as this problem has been with us for many years, and it is certainly time for some government action.
I asked a question on this matter of the Minister of Transport (Mr. Lang) on Friday, January 28, and it is reported at
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page 2494 of Hansard. It had to do with the fact that the Hall report on railway pensions had finally been published, and since it virtually threw the question of the improvement of railway pensions back to the companies and to the government, I asked the minister if he could tell us what steps the government was taking to try to improve railway pensions. My specific request was that the trusteeship of both CNR and CPR pension plans be placed in the hands of an independent trust company, as recommended by Dr. Hall, and the minister informed me at that time that the report was still under study.
Just last week I received a letter from the Canadian Railways Employees' Pension Association. The letter was in regard to Bill C-228, concerning CNR employees', pensioners' and beneficiaries' trust funds. Bill C-228 is a private member's bill which was presented by the Minister without Portfolio, the hon. member for St. Boniface (Mr. Guay). This private member's bill is a cruel hoax which tries to kid pensioners that a private member's bill will increase their pensions. That is a lot of nonsense. The letter states:
Bill C-228 is a private member's bill which received first reading on October 22, 1976. This bill, if enacted, would exempt Canadian National Railway Company from its legal obligation to pay into the CNR Pension Trust Funds the sums of money required annually in order to comply with the Pension Benefits Standards Act.
If Bill C-228 were enacted, many millions of dollars now being paid into the Pension Trust Funds by CNR each year could be deferred. That money would continue to be owed by CNR and an interest rate of 7V4 per cent per annum would be charged to CNR and credited to the pension funds as it became due each year. When the current interest rate for money is approximately 10 per cent, it is to be expected that CNR, if this bill were passed, would not pay any money into the pension trust funds probably for many years, and certainly not until interest rates came down to less than l'h per cent per annum.
We want action from the government in dealing with the Noel Hall report. The government has had the report since January 20, and it is time we heard something, and not by way of a private member's bill.
In addition, the letter goes on:
If CNR had paid their pension obligations from the beginning, as their employees have done, the pension trust funds might now be fully funded. If those funds had been properly invested, inflation and the indexing of pensions would likely not be the insurmountable problem they appear to be today.
Dr. Hall has recommended '... That the trusteeship of both CNR and CPR pension plans be removed from the hands of the Boards of Directors of the respective companies... '.
On behalf of Canadian Railways Employees' Pension Association, we recommend to you that, if and when Bill C-228 is called for second or third reading, you vote against it.
I will certainly be voting against it.
If a bill is introduced in the House to exempt CPR it should likewise be defeated.
We wish to remind you that eleven years ago the Pension Benefits Standards Act was passed by Parliament. It requires a reasonable degree of financial responsibility by all Canadian employers in the handling of pension trust funds. The pension contribution record of CNR does not warrant special consideration for that Company.
The time for financial sanity in the handling of these pension trust funds is long overdue.
A recent letter by Harold N. Campbell, who is the chairman of the Canadian Railways Employees' Pension Association stated the following:
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During the last six or seven years The Canadian Railways Employees Pension Association, London Area, have bombarded Federal Members of Parliament, the Management and union leaders with much of the morbid detail with little or no response.
One is certainly long overdue. We need some definite action from the government because hardships are mounting each day for these pensioners.
I should like to point out that only the Progressive Conservative Party had a policy paper on railway pensions in the 1974 election. The paper is being updated but it cannot be finalized until the government makes a decision about the Hall report. As the railway pension critic of this party I shall make a number of recommendations to my caucus. One is the need for a full review of the pension industry in Canada. I understand that the government is going to initiate an actuarial study of indexed pensions. I am also going to suggest the "heritage fund" concept in order to aid existing railway pensioners and survivors, and will recommend a partially indexed pension supported by matching employer-employee contributions. I will recommend placing the trusteeship of the C.N. pension plan in the hands of an independent trust company, and better representation for pensioners in the collective bargaining process.
In our 1974 policy position paper we called for the extension of the 2 per cent formula back to the first day of service. This, of course, would have to be done through the collective bargaining process.
In order to aid existing pensioners and survivors Dr. Hall suggests a "heritage fund" based on a 1 per cent levy of existing pay rolls shared equally by current employees and the companies to provide full adjustment for past increases in the cost of living.


Joseph Mario Jacques Olivier: As we all know, Mr. Speaker, the matter of railway pensioners is dear to the government and to the majority of hon. members. We all know that this is a very complex issue and within the three minutes alloted to me it would be extremely difficult to give all the details.
The Hall report contains 277 pages and was tabled and published on January 20, 1977 by the Minister of Labour (Mr. Munro).
The report deals at length with the Canadian railway pension plans. This is a matter both difficult and complex and it is exactly because of its technicalities that it was extremely difficult to have it translated into French, which explains the delay in publishing it. During his thorough inquiry, Dr. Hall considered a number of issues concerning railway pensions. The issue which seemed to him, in the course of this inquiry, as being the most urgent was the problems which face present pension plans in view of the effect of inflation.
Throughout his report, Dr. Hall clearly indicates that he feels he should avoid making recommendations when the parties to collective negotiations can deal with the matters or

March 14, 1977
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problems at hand within the scope of negotiating procedures. The matter of improving railway pension plans is one of the fields which Dr. Hall feels should fall to the parties to improve through both consultations and collective negotiations.
To help the parties deal with the very complex matter of knowing how to protect pensions against erosion of inflation, Dr. Hall made a number of evaluations providing various means of indexing the cost of living under railway pension plans. However, the choice of one or the other of those methods was left entirely up to the parties, that is the unions and the employers, who would take into account their general priorities in the field of pensions, and other fields, where possible. In the course of his study, Dr. Hall dealt at length with comparison of the railway pension plans with other plans.
The pension plans of the railway companies do compare favourably with the best, in both the public and private sectors. However, Dr. Hall does make a number of specific recommendations in an effort to have greater similarity between the provisions of the pension plans of the two large railway companies. And the government agrees with the hon. member that that is a desirable objective.
As far as the trust provisions were concerned, it was felt that railway plans were different from others. As a result of those conclusions and the concerns expressed by the unions about present trust provisions, Mr. Hall suggested that from now on the administration of the CN and CP pensions plans be entrusted to an independent trust company rather than to the board of directors of the respective companies. This is evidently a recommendation which will require careful consideration by the parties involved.
The railway companies and unions are considering the recommendations and problems raised by their implementation. Following that study, the parties will meet to review thoroughly the Hall recommendations. Department of Labour officials will be closely following the discussions between the parties in which the Minister of Labour will take part in due time.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: The motion to adjourn the House is now deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly, the House stands adjourned until tomorrow afternoon at two o'clock.
Motion agreed to and the House adjourned at 10.34 p.m.

Tuesday, March 15, 1977