1977-07-04

ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Mr. Dan McKenzie (Winnipeg South Centre):: Mr. Speaker,
1 rise on a matter of urgent and pressing necessity under the provisions of Standing Order 43. In view of press reports that an official of the Department of National Revenue has confirmed that the costs of forms of prostitution are subject to tax write-offs under section 18 of the Income Tax Act as a business expense, and taking into consideration that those who take advantage of this tax break are deriving pleasure at other taxpayers' expense, I should like to move, seconded by the hon. member for Leeds (Mr. Cossitt):
That this House directs the Ministers of Finance and National Revenue to launch an immediate investigation into reports that section 18 of the Income Tax Act is being used to write off the costs of pleasures obtained at massage parlours and houses of ill repute as business expenses and that should this be the case, the government should not allow these items to be used for tax write-offs.


Mr. Speaker:: Presentation of such a motion for debate can be done only with the unanimous consent of the House, pursuant to Standing Order 43. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: No.


URBAN AFFAIRS
Mr. Tom Cossitt (Leeds):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a matter of pressing necessity arising from last week's official opening in Regina of two senior citizens' housing projects where the federal authority was not officially represented by the members of parliament for the area from Regina East or Regina-Lake Centre, but instead by Mr. Tony Merchant on the invitation of his sister, Mrs. Otto Lang. 1 move, seconded by the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre (Mr. McKenzie):
That this House deplores the failure of the government to invite the elected representatives of the people and requests an explanation from the responsible minister, the Minister of State for Urban Affairs, that in future the federal authority be represented at such events by the elected representatives from the areas concerned, regardless of their political affiliation; and finally the House
reminds the Minister of Transport and Mrs. Lang that, at least, as yet, they do not constitute the parliament of Canada, despite any wishful thinking that they may entertain.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: Pursuant to Standing Order 43, presentation of such a motion for debate can be done only with the unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


PRESENCE IN GALLERY OF FIRST DOMINION CARILLONNEUR, PROFESSOR PERCIVAL PRICE
Mr. Speaker:: 1 wonder if I might ask hon. members to join me in marking the presence of a very distinguished visitor in our gallery. On July 1, 1927 the magnificent carillon in the Peace Tower was dedicated and a recital was offered by the first dominion carillonneur, Professor F. Percival Price, who occupied that position from 1927 to 1939. Professor Price was with us last Friday, July 1, as a guest of parliament to celebrate this fiftieth anniversary and to hear the excellent recital of the present carillonneur, Mr. Gordon Slater, who is also present in the gallery. I wonder if hon. members would want to join with me in signalling the presence of this very distinguished gentleman.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Mr. Walter Baker (Grenville-Carleton):: Mr. Speaker, 1 should like to address a question to the Secretary of State, if I may, which concerns what I have to call double talk that we have heard over the last little while from the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State on national unity. On Saturday, the right hon. gentleman reportedly said the following: that he intends to leave the constitutional testing before the courts of

July 4, 1977
Oral Questions
Bill 1 up to private citizens; and that he has no inclination to either reserve or disallow Bill 1. It would seem from all of this that what the Prime Minister intends to do is absolutely nothing with respect to Bill No. 1.


An hon. Member:: Typical.


Walter David Baker: If this is not true, what action is the government prepared to take in the event that Bill No. 1 goes through unchanged in violation of one of the fundamental principles of the white paper on language presented by the Secretary of State, namely, that Canadian citizens have a right to educate their children in the language of their choice?


Hon. John Roberts (Secretary of State):: To put it simply, the government of Quebec has indicated that there may be changes in Bill No. 1. That bill is now before the legislature, I understand, and therefore it would be premature to take any further action in regard to it until we know what the final position is to be.


Walter David Baker: I am concerned about whether the government will ever take any position no matter what the government of Quebec decides. I base this view on a statement made by the Prime Minister three years ago in response to Bill 22 when he said "I would accept a unilingual French Quebec". Presumably, underneath all the double talk and electioneering, the Secretary of State is saying the same thing today. Will the hon. gentleman tell the House what measures, if any, he intends to take to protect the English language minority in Quebec which has every right to the federal government's championship as do the language minorities outside the province.


John (Moody) Roberts: It is the purpose and preoccupation of the federal government that the context within Canada for the survival and flourishing of the French language and culture should be favourable but as I have made clear on every occasion, the federal government does not believe that the English minority in Quebec should be denied access to English-speaking schools.


Walter David Baker: That is a statement similar to the one made in the white paper on language. How does the government intend to enforce that right?


John (Moody) Roberts: It is, of course, the case that this statement was made in the white paper on official languages which was endorsed by the hon. gentleman's leader. It is clear that that white paper was an exhortation to the province to accept the principle of free choice.


Walter David Baker: No answer!


Mr. Chretien:: No question!


CONSERVATION-HOME INSULATION PROGRAM-NAMES OF PROVINCES AGREEING TO CO-OPERATE
Mr. T. C. Douglas (Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources. It relates to the statement he made last week concerning the government's home insulation program, details of which are exceedingly scanty. In view of the fact that the estimated cost of insulating an average home is $900 and the amount the government proposes to pay is $350, leaving $550 to be paid by the occupant of the house, which will be one of the major obstacles to making this program effective, I want to ask the minister which provinces have agreed to institute loans for the purpose of home insulation. Also may I ask him whether, if provinces do not co-operate in the plan, does this mean that in those particular provinces not even a $350 taxable grant will be available to the residents of that province?


Hon. Alastair Gillespie (Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources):: Perhaps I should make it clear at the outset that when he talks about the costs of reinsulating a house-the hon. member used such figures as $850 to $950-he is talking about an insulation job which would be done by a contractor. If an individual were to do it himself, it could be done for a great deal less. I believe that $250 to $350 should cover substantially all of the insulation material associated with such reinsulation.
As to the question about the provinces which have indicated they are prepared to add loans, to superimpose loans, or to associate loans with our grant program, that is presently under negotiation with a number of provinces. Ontario is a good example. The province made an announcement about this during the election campaign, but the actual details of that announcement, how their loan program might work, had not been worked out then and I am not sure whether they have been worked out yet. The province of British Columbia did have a loan program which was administered by its public utilities commission. I believe the province of Manitoba had a loan program, and other provinces have been considering it, but this is part of the discussion which will take place between now and the September 1 deadline for the introduction of the program.


CONSERVATION-HOME INSULATION PROGRAM-POSSIBILITY OF MAKING EFFECTIVE DATE RETROACTIVE
Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: In
view of the fact that the program does not come into effect until September 1 and since the program can be most effective if work can be done during the summer months, has the minister given any consideration to making the date retroactive so that any individuals who choose, and qualify otherwise, to insulate their homes during the summer months, even if they have to wait until after September 1 to be paid, can do so under the plan, or would the minister be prepared to adjust the
July 4, 1977

plan to do that so that as many people as possible can start insulation at present?


Alastair William Gillespie: We did consider that particular suggestion but it was ruled out when a very close examination was made of the administrative complexities that such retroactivity would introduce. We also feel that a period between now and September 1 is a good period for those who would not qualify in the first round. As the hon. member knows, the program will be made available to those who own or occupy houses which are the oldest 20 per cent of the housing stock in the country, and that will take a little bit more than a year to complete. I am sure there are many other Canadians who will want to take advantage of insulation supplies to insulate their houses without the benefit of the loan program because of the savings involved. I would recommend that those persons purchase their insulation during this two month period.


CONSERVATION-HOME INSULATION PROGRAM-POSSIBILITY OF INCLUDING TENANTS IN PROGRAM
Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: In
view of the fact that there is nothing in this program to assist renters in insulating their residences, as is shown by the program which the government has been carrying on in Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia where 40 per cent of the residences were occupied by tenants but 97 per cent of the grants went to homeowners, has the minister any program within this policy by which those who are in rented accommodation, and who need to reduce their energy costs just as much as homeowners, could be assured of assistance?


Alastair William Gillespie: We do anticipate that this will be possible, that renters will be able to take advantage of this program one way or another. We have been criticized in some quarters for trying to intrude into provincial jurisdiction. We have been trying to point out to the provinces, on the other hand, that unless certain actions are taken by them with respect to the landlord and tenants act or with respect to certain rent control practices, there will not be an incentive for the owner to reinsulate his house and therefore provide the benefit to the tenant. That is a very important part of the program as far as we are concerned and we hope the provinces will take the necessary measures to qualify.


AIR CANADA
Mr. F. Oberle (Prince George-Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Transport. Is he in a position today to make a statement to the House on the very unfortunate incident which occurred at the Ottawa airport? A number of native persons were removed from an Air Canada aircraft
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for the alleged reason that those people were of native ancestry. Serious charges of discrimination have been levelled against the airline. Is the minister prepared to make a statement in that regard?


Hon. Otto E. Lang (Minister of Transport):: Mr. Speaker, Air Canada has clearly indicated that the ancestry of the group had nothing to do with the fact that there was an overbooking, and certain people, therefore, could not be carried. Air Canada tried to make arrangements which were suitable to ensure that those people were taken care of in the interim and then put on alternate flights, but the incident had nothing to do with any particular background of the group.


Frank Oberle: Mr. Speaker, 1 wonder if the minister could tell the House why people who had already assumed their seats on the aircraft, people who had confirmed reservations, were removed in this sorry situation and why people who had not yet boarded the aircraft were not told that the aircraft was overbooked.


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, as far as I know at the present time it was part of the routine procedure for dealing with overbooking, but I will be glad to look into that further to see whether there were any special circumstances.


Frank Oberle: It being apparent that the native persons involved through their national association are seeking redress in the courts by way of charges of discrimination, has the minister sought the advice of the Department of Justice as how the airline will behave in court with respect to this matter?


Otto Emil Lang: The Department of Justice would not ordinarily be involved.


AIR TRANSPORT
Mr.  R. Gordon L. Fairweather@Fundy-Royal: Mr. Speaker, the minister used the phrase "routine procedure". I hope he does not mean that overbooking is routine, because those of us who travel know that that has become all too prevalent a practice. Would the minister agree that the problem is serious and that something should be done to prevent an airline from overbooking, which in itself is an offence under law?


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, there is a serious problem in trying to have airlines move at capacity while still allowing people to reserve and cancel without notice at no charge to themselves. I have raised this matter with the airline, and I hope that Air Canada and other airlines will seriously consider the possibility of charging for an absolute reservation, a bumpable reservation and the like in order to make sure that people know what it is they are buying.

July 4, 1977
Oral Questions AIR CANADA


REMOVAL OF NATIVES FROM AIRCRAFT-SUGGESTED INVESTIGATION BY MINISTER OF LABOUR
Mr. Lincoln M. Alexander (Hamilton West):: Mr. Speaker, in light of the very serious consequences of this action by Air Canada, in light of the fact that cries of discrimination and racism have been raised, given the fact that within the Department of Labour the Minister of Labour has the proper mechanism whereby he can investigate this type of charge and keeping in mind that we do not like these in-house investigations by which Air Canada can whitewash the whole thing, would the Minister of Transport now take it upon himself to discuss this matter with the Minister of Labour in order to see whether the Department of Labour can follow up this matter? Would the minister take that under advisement?


Otto Emil Lang: Yes, Mr. Speaker.


INQUIRY OF THE MINISTRY
Hon. George Hees (Prince Edward-Hastings):: Mr. Speaker, 1 have a question for the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce. Would the minister set at rest the rumours and speculations which abound today in the press, radio and television and advise the House whether he intends to continue to try to pull the country out of the simply frightful economic mess the government has got it into, or does he intend to switch his allegiance and his energies to another political arena in the future?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Mr. Paproski:: Yes or no?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member for Ottawa-Carleton.


URBAN AFFAIRS
Mrs. Jean E. Pigott (Ottawa-Carleton):: Mr. Speaker, may 1 address a question to the Minister of State for Urban Affairs. The major employers in most Canadian cities pay business taxes to the local municipality. In Ottawa the federal government is by far the largest employer and owns close to 40 per cent of the land, yet it does not pay business taxes at the same rate as other major industries. Can the minister explain the existence of a possible $18 million in non-paid taxes this year in the Regional Municipality of Ottawa-Carleton?


Hon. Andre Ouellet (Minister of State for Urban Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member should know that some Crown corporations pay certain amounts of money to municipalities in lieu of taxes.


Jean Elizabeth Pigott: A supplementary question. I think there should be measures that the minister could consider to alleviate the situation whereby the average tax in Ottawa this year was $693, in Gloucester $990, in Toronto $597 and Hamilton $596. This shows the incredible pressure we are under in this area and I should like to know what the minister is going to do about it?
[ Translation]


André Ouellet: Mr. Speaker, when the Canadian government paid for the National Arts Centre, every Ottawa citizen was very proud of it, and I think that if one adds up all the expenditures made by the federal government for the city of Ottawa, one realizes that the people in Ottawa benefit substantially from the presence of the federal government in this city.


Jean Elizabeth Pigott: I find that very difficult to accept, Mr. Speaker. Never mind what is happening to the city of Ottawa, what is going to happen in Hull when 15,000 public servants move there? Is Hull going to have the same burden as Ottawa of non-paid taxes? What is going to happen to Hull?


PUBLIC SERVICE
Mr. J. P. Nowlan (Annapolis Valley):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the President of the Treasury Board. Is the minister aware of the decision of the Canadian Labour Relations Board which has split a national bargaining unit of the CBC along linguistic, cultural and sociological lines? As minister responsible for public unions, can he tell the House what the government intends to do about this very divisive decision which allows fragmentation of national bargaining units along racial lines and which if allowed to go unchallenged will become an invidious precedent for other elements within the Canadian Union of Public Employees?


Hon. Robert K. Andras (President of the Treasury Board):: Mr. Speaker, I will take the hon. member's comments by way of a representation and give them full consideration but I am not in a position to give a definitive answer today.
July 4, 1977


CANADIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION
John Patrick (Pat) Nowlan: Mr. Speaker, may I put my supplementary question to the Secretary of State. At this time in our nation's history when we are trying to pull this country together and keep it together, can the minister tell us, as minister responsible for the CBC, why the CBC did not intervene in the hearing before the CLRB and give its statement on the efficacy of national bargaining units rather than having units fragmented along linguistic and racial lines which opens up a whole new Pandora's box?


John (Moody) Roberts: Mr. Speaker, my answer would have to be similar to that given by the President of the Treasury Board: 1 will take the hon. member's representation into consideration and make inquiries of the CBC. I shall try to get him the information as quickly as possible.


John Patrick (Pat) Nowlan: A final supplementary question, Mr. Speaker.
I appreciate in part the answers of the hon. ministers and I would have put the following question to the Prime Minister had he been in the House today. The national unity debate is to start tomorrow and I do not know if the Secretary of State intends to participate. In view of the green paper on linguistic policy and minority rights, if the minister does intend to participate in the debate I wonder if he could give the answer at that time because it will obviously be a little more involved than is allowed within the parameters of the question period?


John (Moody) Roberts: Mr. Speaker, I would hope that if I catch Your Honour's eye, and if hon. members wish to hear me, that 1 will be able to speak in the debate and give some sort of response to the hon. member.


CONSUMER AFFAIRS
Mr. Heward Grafftey (Brome-Missisquoi):: Mr. Speaker, my question for the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs concerns the government's food strategy that he announced jointly with the Minister of Agriculture some days ago in the House. In light of the fact that an understanding of the processing, distribution and retail sectors will be essential to the formulation of any successful food policy, has the minister and his department set up an intensive and comprehensive study of this matter?


Hon. A. C. Abbott (Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, I simply reply that, as the hon. member says, these are key areas in the system. I had several discussions with officials of my department, both before and after
Oral Questions
the announcement of the food strategy, and we are planning a number of studies in the areas the hon. member mentioned.


William Heward Grafftey: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Since one out of four jobs in Canada depends directly or indirectly on the food industry and agriculture; since the president of one of Canada's largest food processing companies has stated that his company's next capital investment will be made in the United States because economic conditions in this country are poor; and as 16 of 17 processing plants in the Niagara Peninsula closed down between 1965 and the present, does the minister not believe that more intensive studies must be undertaken of the food distribution and processing industries so that we may maintain the remaining jobs in that industry in Canada, and a healthy economic climate?


Anthony Chisholm Abbott: Mr. Speaker, I acknowledge at once that this industry is probably the most basic and vital of the whole economy, inasmuch as our consumers spend between 20 cents and 25 cents out of every dollar on food. Therefore I agree that in this area we must develop studies as rapidly as possible.


FINANCE
Mr. F. A. Philbrook (Halton):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance. Are significant measures being taken to satisfy the very real concerns of the Canadian Life Underwriters Association and the public in general regarding tax legislation on life insurance benefits payable to widows, orphans and other survivors of policy holders, as introduced in the last federal budget?


Hon. Donald S. Macdonald (Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, I invite the hon. gentleman to read the bill now before the House.


An hon. Member:: You are reaching into the grave.


POST OFFICE
Mr. John Rodriguez (Nickel Belt):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Postmaster General. Since negotiations between the Post Office Department and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers have broken down; since this breakdown in the negotiations was caused by the Post Office Department's attempt to interfere in dealings between the membership of CUPW and its leadership, can the minister tell the House if he has instructed his officials to permit CUPW leaders access to means of communication to inform their membership of negotiations both during and outside working hours?

July 4, 1977
Oral Questions


Hon.   J.-J. Blais@Postmaster General: Mr. Speaker, there has never been any interference with the possibility of the union communicating with its workers relating to any subject matter, including the negotiations. I take strong exception to the hon. gentleman's allegation that the cessation of negotiations was caused by the Post Office Department. The cessation was directly unilateral on the part of CUPW, whose members stormed out of the negotiation sessions, for the alleged reason of making application to the PSSRB, which has now been adjourned to September. The Public Service Staff Relations Board indicated that there is nothing in the application to prevent CUPW from returning to the negotiating table. Evidently they are not ready to do that, and their reasoning is completely unknown to me.


BREAKDOWN OF NEGOTIATIONS WITH UNION-PROPOSED REFERENCE TO COMMITTEE
John R. Rodriguez: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Since the Postal Union has documented many cases of the Post Office's interference in union activities, interferences such as refusing to allow union publications to be posted and distributed to the membership; and since postal workers had actually documented cases of the Post Office's issuing conflicting bulletins to union members, can the minister tell the House whether-


An hon. Member:: Look who's talking.


John R. Rodriguez: Just be quiet.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


John R. Rodriguez: -can the minister tell the House whether he is now prepared to have a parliamentary committee look at the impasse which has occurred between CUPW and the Post Office Department?


Hon.   J.-J. Blais@Postmaster General: Mr. Speaker, the facts are quite to the contrary. CUPW has had seven sessions before the Public Service Staff Relations Board and has been invited to catalogue those particular allegations or those particular-


John R. Rodriguez: Answer the question.


Mr. Blais:: -cases which the hon. member has alleged. But the union has been unable to do that, because there are no such cases, Mr. Speaker. The Post Office Department has always been most interested in having instant and increasing communication between the workers and the Post Office Department. The hon. gentleman should check his facts.


John R. Rodriguez: Answer the question.


William Heward Grafftey: We want Bryce.


Jean-Jacques Blais: If the hon. member will read the transcript of the proceedings before the Public Service Staff Relations Board he will see that the allegations he advances are completely groundless.


John R. Rodriguez: A final supplementary question, Mr. Speaker.


Some hon. Members:: Resign, resign.


John R. Rodriguez: Since the Postmaster General is substituting bluster for fact, is he prepared, since he did not answer the question I asked and he is so confident the facts are on his side, to submit the impasse to a parliamentary committee for investigation?


Jean-Jacques Blais: Mr. Speaker, I answered a similar question on Thursday, asked by the hon. member for Brandon-Souris. I wish the hon. gentleman had been here to listen to the reply.


John R. Rodriguez: I was.


Jean-Jacques Blais: Perhaps he should read Hansard of that day.


ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE
Mr. Bill Clarke (Vancouver Quadra):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Acting Minister of Justice. It concerns the denial of basic human rights to one James Kennedy who has been held in a maximum security institution in Vancouver for over five weeks without charge, on the strength, as the Minister of Manpower and Immigration said on Thursday, of reasonable grounds for believing he is somebody else. I ask the Acting Minister of Justice, is this the sort of treatment it is this government's policy to mete out to any landed immigrant? In other words, can anyone be locked up in this manner without charges being laid?


Steve Eugene Paproski: Is there no acting minister who can stand up and reply?


William Hillary (Bill) Clarke: Apparently there is no Acting Minister of Justice.


GOVERNMENT ADMINISTRATION
Mr. Donald W. Munro (Esquimalt-Saanich):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the President of the Treasury Board. Reports circulated recently say that the Canadian International Agency, CIDA, has obtained a new deal whereby it will be able to spend funds without referring all cases to Treasury Board. Bearing in mind the terms of the Financial Administration Act, can the minister say under what authority these new arrangements were made and if they were entered into to compensate for the lapsing fund arrangement under which CIDA benefited heretofore?
July 4, 1977


Robert Knight Andras: Mr. Speaker, I understand that the new administrative processes applying to certain C1DA expenditures are totally within the Financial Administration Act and indeed there was, as a parallel consideration, the elimination of the ability or authority of CIDA to carry forward lapsing funds, for a cumulative effect. That was, in my opinion and the opinion of others, an impossible situation which should not be allowed to continue. These arrangements were not trade-offs, in that sense. They were part of the general reorganization of the structure or process.


GUIDELINES FOR ACCOUNTABILITY OF CANADIAN
Donald W. Munro: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary question concerns the terms and conditions set forth in the guidelines Treasury Board drew up for CIDA to follow. Is the minister satisfied that CIDA should be both judge and jury with respect to its compliance with these guidelines? In these conditions, what sort of accountability to Parliament and the Auditor General are we going to see after the fact, after CIDA has spent the money? Is the minister satisfied that this procedure will be okay?


Robert Knight Andras: Yes, Mr. Speaker. I doubt whether an elaboration on that matter is possible in a short answer given during the question period. I will be glad to inform the hon. member in much more detail how this process will work and why I feel reassured that there will be sufficient follow-up and respect for parliamentary authority.


FISHERIES
Mr. Lloyd R. Crouse (South Shore):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Fisheries and the Environment. Since eastern Canadian premiers and New England governors have agreed on the need for a joint commission to manage fish stocks in the disputed Georges Bank-Gulf of Maine area, an agreement which would take into consideration the historic co-operation of both countries' fishermen on the rich fishing grounds, will the minister say when this joint management proposal will be regularized? Second, will the minister indicate what progress is being made to determine the precise boundary between Canada and the United States?


Hon. Romeo LeBlanc (Minister of Fisheries):: Mr. Speaker, the possibility of a joint management plan was advanced by our officials some months ago. In fact, we felt that separating the boundary question from the stocks which tend to move back and forth would simplify matters. This suggestion was not accepted by the United States authorities at that time. It
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may be, however, that the difficulty of arriving at easy solutions for fish stocks that do move around will appear to recommend this approach. Certainly we like that proposal.


Lloyd Roseville Crouse: In view of the valuable scallop, lobster and groundfish resource, will the minister consider making a proposal to his United States counterpart that the fisheries quotas on this bank be restricted only to American and Canadian fishermen, at least until such time as our deep sea fisheries stocks are restored above the sustainable level?


Roméo LeBlanc: Mr. Speaker, given the fact that both countries have declared a 200 mile limit, it was felt that a joint management scheme could be the recommended approach. I might say in answer to the previous question that the boundaries matter has now entered a new phase of discussion between Canada and the United States. We should see some very serious negotiations going on in the next few months.


BANK OF CANADA
Mr. Sinclair Stevens (York-Simcoe):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance. I have given him notice of the question. Can the minister indicate if he has at long last found out from officials at the Bank of Canada what exactly will be the final cost of the Bank of Canada building now being built on the south side of Wellington Street?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Yes, Mr. Speaker. Just before coming into the House I received a statement from the Governor of the Bank of Canada. 1 will be glad to send it over to the hon. member.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Mr. Speaker, I am sure many members of the House would be very interested in the overall figure for the cost of this building.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Can the minister now indicate the total figure, including all furniture, architects' fees, vaults and so on for the building? While giving us that, will he indicate when he last had a figure with respect to the total cost of this building.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, with regard to the last question, subject to correction, I think it was my predecessor who last responded to a parliamentary question in this regard. 1 have the document here. The Governor has explained the situation on three pages. I would be glad to pass it over to the opposition.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Mr. Speaker, the minister has indicated he has the document in his hands. Will he be good enough to table it for the benefit of all members of this House?

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Oral Questions


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, I will be glad to table it. It is not in both official languages. If the House would be prepared to receive it on that basis, I would be prepared to lay it on the table.


Mr. Speaker:: The tabling of such a document at this time would require the unanimous consent of this House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


Mr. Darling:: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Postmaster General. He has been playing musical chairs. He has been here, there and everywhere. He may now be behind the curtain. Possibly Your Honour could see me in a moment or two.


GOVERNMENT ADMINISTRATION
Thomas Charles Cossitt: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Acting Prime Minister. Is it now government policy to permit the wives of cabinet ministers, such as Mrs. Otto Lang, to invite their relatives to officially represent the federal government at the opening of senior citizens housing projects or for that matter at any other federal projects? Will the government change this procedure to permit such functions to be performed by the federally elected representatives of this House, regardless of political affiliation?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, it is always a very good thing to have diversity in the representation. I find it most edifying that some women are willing to support their husbands in politics.


REASON WIFE OF MINISTER OF TRANSPORT ASSIGNED TO INVITE PERSONS TO OPEN HOUSING PROJECT
Thomas Charles Cossitt: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary question is directed to the Minister of Transport. Will the minister advise whether the Minister of State for Urban Affairs, who is responsible for arranging federal participation at official openings of senior citizens' projects, requested him or any of his staff to deal with this particular occasion that I have mentioned? More specifically, can he clear up just how his wife was assigned to usurp parliamentary and federal government authority?


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, I will have to check to see what route the requests in fact did follow. I want to tell the hon. member that the federal government was indeed very well represented by a member of

the legislature from that area who performed his part very well. Tony Merchant did his usual good job in ensuring federal input into housing projects, which is not often recognized in other circumstances.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


HOUSING
Mr. Jack Marshall (Humber-St. George's-St. Barbe):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of State for Urban Affairs. It has to do with the $1.4 billion insulation program. How does the minister reconcile that $1.4 billion has been allotted to provide $350 grants when the Residential Rehabilitation Assistance program provides grants of up to $3,750 on loans for low-income families? It provides more than insulation. Why is more money not being extended to this program which would suit so many more people in Canada?


André Ouellet: Mr. Speaker, I did not quite understand the series of figures quoted by the hon. member. I will check his question and answer in detail tomorrow.


HARBOURS
Hon. Robert L. Stanfield (Halifax):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Transport about the often discussed second container pier for Halifax. The minister told me a few months ago he was not convinced that its time had come. Is the minister still of that opinion or is he now prepared to agree that it is urgently necessary for the development of that port?


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, 1 believe in reflecting back I said its time was coming and we would see when it had arrived. We have not yet made the decision of approving the additional money for a federal contribution, but I am still convinced that the time will come.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Mr. Speaker, I wish to ask the minister whether there is any connection between the ardour with which the federal ministers seem to be working to get Cast to return all its operations to Montreal and the coolness of the minister toward the Port of Halifax?


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, it seems that the press reports indicate that the ardour does not rest with the federal ministers. Cast's return is in fact logical because that is where it
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ought to be. Obviously, we have not been playing a particularly active role in ensuring that. We have been doing our usual job of trying to make sure that transportation in Canada develops according to the best advantage to all of Canada.


GOVERNMENT ADMINISTRATION
Mr. Don Mazankowski (Vegreville):: Mr. Speaker, 1 wish to direct a question to the President of the Treasury Board. There are reports which indicate that a good portion of the money which has been set aside for supplementary estimates has already been committed. Is the minister still optimistic about living within the level of forecast expenditures, as outlined in the 1977-78 fiscal year tabling of estimates? If not, can he indicate to the House any revised projections and, if so, when those projections will be coming forth?


Robert Knight Andras: Mr. Speaker, it is a tight fiscal framework with not sizeable reserves compared to previous years. Barring unforeseen eventualities, certain external happenings that could take place, as we indicated on previous occasions, we hope to meet our announced objectives and spending ceilings. I am still very optimistic we will stay within them.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Is the minister saying that he is fully optimistic that he is going to be able to live within the so-called 7 per cent increase in federal government expenditures for this fiscal year?


Robert Knight Andras: Mr. Speaker, it is not going to happen without a lot of effort. It will be difficult to sustain the restraint during that period of time, but yes, I am optimistic that we will accomplish it.


POST OFFICE
Stan Darling: Mr. Speaker, I see the mailman has returned, so may I direct a question to the Postmaster General. Will the minister explain in detail how far his department will extend the abolition of cancellations which state the name of the post office where the letter is mailed, replacing this with unidentifiable numbers? The minister led me to believe that this would be restricted to metropolitan areas such as Toronto and Montreal.


Hon.   J.-J. Blais@Postmaster General: No, Mr. Speaker, I cannot recall having said that it would be restricted to the metropolitan areas of Toronto and Montreal. I indicated that
Oral Questions
we would restrict it as much as possible. I share the hon. gentleman's distaste for numbers replacing names. However, when we are dealing with a concentration of services in major area postal plants, we have to identify the postal plants and sometimes it is impossible to give the name of one over the name of the neighbouring area. That creates more squabbles than using the postal code itself.


REASON FOR LARGE CROWD VISITING MAIN POST OFFICE IN OTTAWA
Stan Darling: Mr. Speaker, I am well aware of that but I am hoping that it will be restricted to those larger centres. My supplementary question is this. Could the minister inform the House of the reason for the overflow crowd visiting the main post office in Ottawa on July 1? Was it curiosity to see that monstrosity, or did most of them go there to pick up their mail which they could not get any other way?


Hon.   J.-J. Blais@Postmaster General: Mr. Speaker, 1 can see the hon. gentleman's tongue sticking out of his cheek. I am sure the hon. gentleman is very pleased, along with me, at the interest which the Canadian public is showing in the postal service and its mechanization. As he knows from having visited the Ottawa station, it is a very good one, very attractive. It is centrally located and we plan on having more open houses in order to familiarize the greatest number of Canadians possible with our postal services.


REQUEST FOR INVESTIGATION OF USE OF DRUGS BY ATHLETES
Mr. Otto Jelinek (High Park-Humber Valley):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of State (Fitness and Amateur Sport) and is further to a motion put last week. Realizing that the minister's concerns are more with amateur sports than with professional sports, and rightly so, but remembering the precedent setting legislation of the Minister of National Health and Welfare which interfered with professional football, would the minister advise the House whether or not she is aware that excessive and damaging amounts of drugs are distributed regularly by sports team managements to athletes, setting a dangerous precedent to our youth, a practice that prompted a director of the Canadian Foundation on Alcohol and Drug Dependencies to issue warnings to several CFL clubs, only to be fired for doing his job; and if she is not aware of this situation, could she undertake to initiate an investigation into the general extensive use of drugs in sports in Canada?


Hon. Iona Campagnolo (Minister of State (Fitness and Amateur Sport)):: Mr. Speaker, I feel that the hon. member has made a rather blanket statement, and in his broad net he may have captured some people in this country of whom we are rather proud. If he has any specific information dealing

July 4, 1977
Oral Questions
with specific detail which 1 understand he has been informed of, I would be pleased to receive it and on that basis I will consult with my colleague the Minister of National Health and Welfare.


ALLEGED FIRING OF MR. McNICHOLL FOR WARNING TEAM MANAGERS ABOUT ENCOURAGING PLAYERS TO USE DRUGS
[Stage Direction]
Mir. Otto Jelinek (High Park-Humber Valley): May I
thank the minister of state for her answer and she can be assured that 1 will pass forward to her my information. May 1 direct my supplementary question to the Minister of National Health and Welfare. In view of the fact that Mr. Andre McNicholl was fired as the director of the Canadian Foundation on Alcohol and Drug Dependencies for warning the management of two CFL teams, namely the Ottawa Rough Riders and the Toronto Argonauts, for encouraging their players to use excessively damaging drugs and stimulants prior to their games, would the minister undertake to look into this matter and take steps to have Mr. McNicholl reinstated in his former position?
Hon. Marc Lalonde (Minister of National Health and Welfare):: Well, Mr. Speaker, obviously I could not force any private organization in this country to reinstate somebody in a former position; but with regard to the particular allegations made by the hon. member, 1 will look into them. I am not aware of them at this time.


COMMUNICATIONS
Mr. Bob Brisco (Kootenay West):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Communications. In light of the recently announced decision of the CRTC to refuse to renew the licence for the Arrow Lakes Television Society and other TV co-operative societies to carry channel 4 Spokane, I would ask the Minister of Communications whether she condones this type of interference in the citizen's freedom of choice, and whether she could advise the House if her department or the CRTC have plans similarly to curtail the freedom of citizens of Canada and other communities in Kootenay West presently receiving U.S. channels?
t Translation]


Hon. Jeanne Sauve (Minister of Communications):: Mr. Speaker, the freedom of citizens is very well protected right now by the regulating process of the CRTC.


Robert Hylton Brisco: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. In light of the fact that the legal division of the CRTC has ruled

that any co-operative society which is broadcasting on air instead of on cable American TV channels is, in effect, broadcasting a program without Canadian content, and in light of the fact that their licences will not be renewed this fall because they are broadcasting on air, will the minister explain why this is so when other societies can do the same thing off air?


Jeanne Sauvé: Mr. Speaker, I do not know the details of that decision by the CRTC, but I feel that it concerns the need to protect against undue competition those who hold licences to operate a station. However, I will examine the hon. member's question in full detail, but I must remind him that 1 am not in the habit of getting involved in the decisions by the CRTC.


CANADA-UNITED STATES AUTO PACT-STEPS TO ENSURE ADDITIONAL BENEFITS TO CANADA
Hon.   Herb. Gray@Windsor West: Mr. Speaker, 1 have a question for the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce. Has the minister met as yet with the automobile manufacturers to discuss with them the findings of the recently tabled Arthur report? I understand that such a meeting was to take place recently. If so, has the minister obtained commitments from them to increase their capital investment, research and development and purchases of automobile parts in Canada to levels more commensurate with sales of their automobiles in this country, as I think should be done? If so, what are those commitments? If that is not the case, what steps are the government taking to ensure that there will be suitable levels of benefits in these areas to add to those benefits which the auto pact has already brought to Canada in other areas of the automotive industry?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I had the opportunity to have a long conversation with all the automobile manufacturers last week, and we discussed the problem. We found that the auto pact has been very advantageous for Canada in the last 12 years. However, there is room for improvements, particularly in the investments to be made in Canada. The manufacturers have thus agreed to meet with department officials for a review of their mid-term investment plans, and we will then take decisions which will hopefully be in the best interests of that industry and Canada.

July 4, 1977_______________________


TRANSPORT
Mr. Stanley Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, may 1 direct a question to the Minister of Transport regarding the report of Dr. Noel Hall on railway pension plans in Canada, about which the government has done little except to refer the matter to railway management and the unions. In view of the fact that any action that management and unions might take will not do anything for Canadian National and Canadian Pacific railway workers already retired, and in view of the fact that these pensioners have had no escalation of their pensions at all in 1977, will the minister put pressure on both Canadian National and Canadian Pacific to bring in escalation of the pensions of their retired workers this year?


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, I am not sure that 1 accept the hon. member's suggestion that this could not be the subject of bargaining between the parties. However, my colleague the Minister of Labour is looking at the further action which the government ought to take and will be bringing forward proposals in due course.


Stanley Howard Knowles: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. In view of the fact that many of these pensioners are actually dying off before anything is done, which makes it urgent to do something for the senior pensioners of all our railways, will the government take a special look at the problems of railway workers already retired?


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, we certainly are very sympathetic to that, but I hope that the hon. member would not take pressure off the unions and management for dealing with it as well in their bargaining.


Steve Eugene Paproski: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege. It is with great pride, speaking on behalf of Canadians of Slavic descent, that I rise on a point of privilege to pay tribute to the magnificent and moving performance by the Shumka Dancers of Edmonton in the Canada Day celebrations viewed by millions of Canadians from coast to coast and filling us with the sense of the oneness of this great nation.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I wonder if the hon. member for Edmonton Centre (Mr. Paproski) really expects me to hear from someone on behalf of every group which took part in that three-hour show. 1 am sure there are other hon. members who would want to do so. I do not mean to be disrespectful, and I understand the sentiment behind every regional or ethnic group which participated in those celebrations, but if I extended to one member an opportunity to go on at some length in respect of one group, I would have to extend the same opportunity to every member. I think that would be an extension of a question of privilege.
Oral Questions


William Hillary (Bill) Clarke: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege. I understand it is not necessary for the ministry to answer questions at all, and I also understand there are times and instances which require ministers to be absent from the House. However, I refer to order in council, P.C. 1976-2303 of September 20, 1976, which names as acting ministers of justice, in the absence of the minister himself, the present Solicitor General (Mr. Fox), who was not present in the House today, and the present Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (Mr. Allmand), a former solicitor general, who was also not in the House today. It involves very seriously the ability of ordinary members to carry out the duties which have been entrusted to them.
We had no response of any kind from a parliamentary secretary, and the Acting Prime Minister, whoever he was today, failed to intervene to indicate whether there was any acting minister of justice or not. In fact, there were 20 members of cabinet sitting there today, including the Acting Prime Minister, and they sat mute and let this question fall on the floor, while a Canadian resident who is here on a Canadian visa has remained in jail for over five weeks now without a charge and without a public hearing.


Frank Oberle: Mr. Speaker, I rise on the same question of privilege. As Your Honour knows, this House has been preoccupied for the last three or four weeks with a series of very pressing questions relating to the responsibilities of the Minister of Justice (Mr. Basford) and the Solicitor General (Mr. Fox). The Minister of Justice was absent today, as were those ministers who carry his responsibilities in his absence, the present Solicitor General and the present Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (Mr. Allmand).
Two weeks ago I laid before the Solicitor General information which is very critical and, in his words, affects the safety and lives of certain people I named to him. Having regard to the matter I raised in this House over the last three or four weeks, the matter relating to the break-in of L'Agence de Presse Libre du Quebec, in Montreal, particularly the second break-in which we wanted to raise questions about today, and the matter in Vancouver where an immigrant has been locked up for over five weeks in unusual custody-shackled when he is taken outside-without a charge, without an application for extradition from any other country, and without a charge against this person from any other country, I cannot believe that these gentlemen are not absent by design. The Leader of the Opposition-


Some hon. Members:: Where is he?


Steve Eugene Paproski: He is in Verdun.


Frank Oberle: -has required these gentlemen to announce an inquiry into one or all of these very serious matters. With these members absent there is no way this House can function. There is no way members on this side can fulfil the obligations they have to raise these matters, and get satisfactory answers as long as this kind of behaviour continues. I am sitting here with information, which is very critical. 1 have the names of

July 4, 1977
Business of the House
persons alleged to have committed very serious crimes. Two weeks ago I asked the Solicitor General to give me guidance as to what I should do with this information. Today I wanted to ask him how much longer he expects me to sit on this information, having myself been threatened from an unknown source. This matter should be referred to an appropriate committee of the House and we should expect some kind of ruling from Your Honour.


Mr. Fairweather:: Mr. Speaker, I am in a bit of a dilemma because of the ruling Your Honour made concerning the question of privilege proposed by the hon. member for Edmonton Centre (Mr. Paproski). I was not going to speak about any of the particular groups, but as a member of parliament I wanted to say something about those who are not usually heralded in events like this. I am referring to the technicians, artisans, painters, electricians and the staff of this House who had to go through considerable extra trouble because of the events of July 1. Perhaps we could recall those people when we reflect upon the events of July 1. Despite ourselves, many of us had quite a good time on Canada Day.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Fundy-Royal (Mr. Fairweather) will realize that under no circumstances would I permit him to do that.


BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Mr. Goodale:: Mr. Speaker, in relation to the debate which the House will be taking up tomorrow and the next day in connection with national unity, there have been discussions involving both sides of the House about ways in which we might be able to accommodate as many members as possible who may want to speak in that debate. There have been indications that a great many members of this House will be anxious to take part in that discussion. We are exploring a number of ways in which they might be accommodated to the greatest extent possible.
At this stage we have obtained initial agreement as to the limitation of speeches during the course of that debate. I understand there is disposition in the House to make a House order directing that the first round of speeches be the normal 40 minutes in length, but that speeches after the first round be limited to 20 minutes in length.


Walter David Baker: Mr. Speaker, yes, that is so, I understand, from speaking with my friend, that the first speaker for the government will be the right hon. member in whose name the motion stands, the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau). I wish to inform the House that the first speaker for Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition will be the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Clark). The agreement applies to those two, the leader of the New Democratic Party (Mr. Broadbent) and

the first spokesman for the Social Credit Party. I have indicated that order of speaking for my friend, and I want to thank him and say that we agree with the limitation of 40 minutes for the four I have mentioned, and 20 minutes for speakers thereafter in the debate.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, we agree with the proposal that speeches in the national unity debate, after the first round, should be limited to 20 minutes. I am also happy to confirm the statement just made, that the opening speaker for the New Democratic Party will be our leader, the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broad-bent).
[ Translation]


Mr. Gauthier (Roberval):: Mr. Speaker, we have agreed on this: 40 minutes for each party leaders, and 20 minutes for other members.


Mr. Speaker:: Agreed, and so ordered.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS

[Stage Direction]
[ English |

[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)
Ralph Goodale: Mr. Speaker, the following questions will be answered today: 1,408, 2,173, 2,226, 2,262 and 2,397.


Mr. Schumacher: 1.	Was a decision made by the Department of National Defence to issue safari-style uniforms to all branches of the Cadet movement and, if so (a) on what date (b) by whom?
2.	Were members of the Cadet movement consulted in regard to the change and, if so (a) what are their names, ranks and locations (b) on what date (c) in what location did such consultation take place?
3.	What is the physical and dollar value description of the existing stock of older-style uniforms?
4.	What is the value of the existing stock of the safari-style uniform and how many are on order at the present time?
5.	Has any opposition to the change been received by the Department and, if so (a) in what nature (b) by whom?
6.	How many of the safari-style suits have been issued and what was the total cost to date?


Hon. Barney Danson (Minister of National Defence):: 1.
During the past two years there have been a continuing series of discussions between the Cadet Associations and the Department of National Defence concerning clothing for the Cadet Leagues. Following these discussions, the Minister of National
July 4, 1977

Defence, on 20 January 1977, announced that cadets would all be supplied with the bush jacket-style green uniform. The three leagues were given the opportunity to submit recommendations for modifications and additions to the new cadet uniforms to provide each cadet organization with distinctive item of dress.
2.	Yes, on two occasions, (i) (a) Mr. W. J. Hodge, General Manager, Navy League of Canada. Mr. W. J. Brown, General Manager, Army Cadet League of Canada. Mr. A. MacDonald, Executive Director, Air Cadet League of Canada, (b) 30 Jan. 1974. (c) National Defence Headquarters, (ii) (a) Mr. J. E. Koyl, National President, Navy League of Canada. BGen E. G. Eakins, President, Army Cadet League of Canada. Mr. D. H. Arnett, President, Air Cadet League of Canada, (b) 6 Dec. 1974. (c) National Defence Headquarters.
3.	$3,078,000-consisting of the residue of stocks used for issue to the Navy, Army and Air Force prior to integration. It is not in complete size ranges and consists mostly of adult sizes.
4.	Seventy-eight thousand six hundred sets are being procured plus 30,000 sets of summer camp clothing for a total program cost of $7.6 million. 42 per cent of the total order has been delivered with a value of $3.2 million.
5.	Yes. (a) By letter, (b) The Navy League of Canada and the Air Cadet League of Canada.
6.	Eighteen thousand six hundred ninety-nine sets (less raincoats, sweaters and badges) issued to female Army and Air Cadets with a value of approximately $ 1.04 million.


Mr. Stevens: As of December 31 (a) 1968 (b) 1976, what was the number of federal employees engaged to investigate immigrants arriving in Canada?


Ralph Goodale: In so far as the Department of Manpower and Immigration is concerned: Persons involved in interviewing applicants abroad as of December 31 (a) 185 (b) 179. Persons carrying out interviews at the points of entry in Canada of December 31 (a) 672 (b) 966 permanent and 32 casuals.
In so far as the Royal Canadian Mounted Police is concerned: the Royal Canadian Mounted Police do not investigate immigrants arriving in Canada per se. They, however, do engage in the security screening of prospective immigrants prior to the landing of the individuals concerned as a routine part of the immigration procedure. They also conduct investigations in relation to immigrants who are in Canada. These latter investigations are specifically in relation to immigrants who are, or are suspected to be, in Canada illegally.
Order Paper Questions
cuso/suco


Mr. Herbert: 1.	In each of the past five years, how much has been contributed by the Canadian International Development Agency to the Service universitaire cana-dien outre-mer?
2.	In each year, what percentage of the budget of SUCO was contributed by CIDA?


Mr. Fernand E. Leblanc (Parliamentary Secretary to Secretary of State for External Affairs):: 1. CIDA contributes to the corporate-entity CUSO/SUCO and not separately to the Anglophone section (CUSO) or the Francophone section (SUCO). Over the past five years the contributions to CUSO/ SUCO were as follows:	1972-73, $6,700,000;	1973-74,
$7,300,000; 1974-75, $7,308,900; 1975-76, $8,376,000; 197677, $9,100,000. The CIDA contribution was allocated internally by the CUSO/SUCO Board of Directors as follows:
	CUSO	SUCO
1972-73	60.0 per cent	40.0 per cent1973-74	66.9 per cent	33.1 per cent1974-75	69.5 per cent	30.5 per cent1975-76	68.2 per cent	31.8 per cent1976-77	68.7 per cent	31.3 per cent2.	As allocated internally by the CUSO/SUCO Board of Directors, CIDA's contribution to the total operations of SUCO was as follows: 1972-73, 46.8 per cent; 1973-74, 55.5 per cent; 1974-75, 57.6 per cent; 1975-76, 41.3 per cent; 1976-77, 40.4 per cent.


Mr. Bawden: 1.	Are postal areas or depots, in the Calgary South Area, to be served by group boxes and, if so (a) which ones (b) what are the distances between the location of the boxes and the households?
2.	Was there a delay in the shipment of group boxes and, if so, for what reason?
3.	Will any contractual penalty be incurred by the supplier of the group boxes for non-delivery or late delivery and, if so, of what nature?
4.	What are the operational functions required before such boxes can be made operational?
5.	What is the name and location of the supplier of boxes?
6.	Will the group boxes, installed in or near new developments in the Calgary South area, be replaced by letter carrier walks and, if so, on what date?
7.	In the Calgary South area, what is the time delay in the (a) recognition that a new development requires group boxes and when orders are placed with the supplier (b) placing of orders for the delivery of such boxes and the installation near the respective new development?


Hon.   J.-J. Blais@Postmaster General: 1. Yes. (a) Woodlands, Canyon Meadows, Oak Ridge, Braeside and Pumphill subdivisions, (b) Generally not exceeding two to three blocks.
2.	There was no delay in the shipment of group boxes by the supplier.
3.	No, due to the fact that the supplier adhered to all terms and conditions of the contract. Shipments of boxes commenced two weeks prior to scheduled delivery on contract.

July 4, 1977
Order Paper Questions
4.	Painting, numbering and locating them on suitable sites.
5.	Rousseau Metal Inc., P.O. Box 490, Saint-Jean-Port-Joli, Quebec GOR 3G0.
6.	Constraint limits on manpower growth preclude us from extending letter carrier routes to these areas at the present time.
7.	(a) Recognition of the requirements of group boxes in new developments is a continuing process, and orders for boxes are made a year ahead, (b) Delivery of boxes from existing stock and installations would take approximately three weeks.


Mr. Isabelle: How many former Members of Parliament are presently receiving pensions from the House of Commons and, in each case, what (a) is his/her name (b) was the number of years of service (c) is the annual amount received?


Mr. Bob Kaplan (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Finance):: As of March 31, 1976, 230 annual allowances were being paid to former members of parliament. Of these, 88 have become payable since the establishment of the new plan in 1970. (a) See the answer to question No. 2,191 given on May 2, 1977. (b) The average number of years of service on which these 88 pensions are based is 11.75. (c) The average annual allowance is $7,212.64.


Ralph Goodale: Mr. Speaker, if questions Nos. 1,781 and 2,210 could be made orders for returns, these returns would be tabled immediately.


Walter David Baker: I wonder why these questions are being made orders for returns, rather than being answered in the normal way. Is it so they will not appear in Hansardl


Ralph Goodale: As hon. members can tell from the bulky documents I am holding in my hand, the reason is obviously the lengthy nature of the answer in each case.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it agreed that these questions be made orders for returns?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.
[ Text]


Mr. McKenzie: 1.	By province and territory, and for the whole of Canada, for each fiscal year 1966 to 1976, what amount of money was (a) contributed to the Canada Pension Plan Account (b) paid from the Canada Pension Plan Account to beneficiaries 
(c) expended, on a pro rata basis, from the Canada Pension Plan Account on administration of the (i) Account (ii) Canada Pension Plan Investment Fund (d) invested by the Canada Pension Plan Investment Fund in provincial securities?
2.	For the same years, with regard to the amount of money contributed to the Canada Pension Plan Account that is greater than the amount disbursed to beneficiaries and on administration, what proportion (a) of the excess of contributions less disbursements, was invested in securities of a province (b) was not invested and to what use was it put?
3.	For the same years, by province and territory and for Canada, how many separate issues of federal and provincial securities have been purchased by the Canada Pension Plan Investment Fund and, in each case (a) what is the date of issue'(b) what is the rate of interest (c) what are its terms (d) on what dates are interest payments due (e) what are its repayment provisions?
4.	With respect to the payment of interest and the repayment of the principal amount, are all issues of securities in good standing?
5.	Does the government or any provincial government finance the payment of interest on any securities outstanding, with the issue of new securities and, if so, which governments?
6.	Is there a point at which it would be financially inadvisable to allow a government to finance either payments of interest or repayments of principal by issuing new securities and, if so, to what indicators would the administrator of the Plan refer in establishing this point?
Return tabled.


Mr. Cossitt: 1.	Did the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources issue a document numbered 2860-0 and marked "confidential" on April 26, 1976, signed by Mr. R. P. St. John on the subject of "Security Clearance Required for Employment" and, if so, was the document circulated to Assistant Deputy Ministers, Directors General, Directors and Senior Advisors?
2.	Did the document state in part that "a basic security clearance of 'confidential' is therefore required in the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources, even in circumstances where the person concerned does not have access to classified material" and, if so (a) what are the reasons justifying such a move (b) is this part of a new departmental or government policy to investigate more closely the private lives of public servants and what are the reasons for doing this?
3.	(a) How many employees of the Department have been fingerprinted in connection with this security programme (b) on what date did the programme begin and on whose instructions?
4.	(a) What is the total number of departmental employees originally scheduled to be fingerprinted (b) has the number been changed and, if so, what is the present figure?
5.	Did the memo by Mr. St. John state that Assistant Deputy Ministers, Directors General and Directors require security clearance of "top secret" and that their Deputies require security clearance of "secret" and, if so, what are the names and job designations of those who (a) have (b) have not completed the security clearance forms?
6.	What are the names and job designations of all such persons who have been (a) fingerprinted (b) originally ordered to be fingerprinted (c) remaining to be fingerprinted?
Return tabled.


Mr. Speaker:: Shall the remaining questions be allowed to stand?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.
July 4, 1977



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


Hon. Bud Cullen (Minister of Manpower and Immigration) moved: that Bill C-27, to establish the Department of Employment and Immigration, the Canada Employment and Immigration Commission and the Canada Employment and Immigration Advisory Council, to amend the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971, and to amend certain other statutes in consequences thereof, be read the third time and passed.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: I rise on a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Knowing the way in which the hon. member for Nickel Belt (Mr. Rodriguez) often takes the opportunity afforded him by the rules as being the first to speak on this side, 1 just want to let Your Honour know that under Standing Order 31 I intend to speak on behalf of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition, thereby circumventing the hon. member.


Mr. Speaker:: I would indicate to the hon. member for Hamilton West (Mr. Alexander) that the proper time to raise this very interesting point is at the conclusion of the minister's speech, not at the beginning of it.


Jack Sydney George (Bud) Cullen: Mr. Speaker, many long and intensive hours have been devoted by members of this House to the detailed consideration of Bill C-27 both during the hearings of the standing committee and at the report stage. Now that we have arrived at third reading, it seems to me appropriate to set the main provisions of Bill C-27 in perspective. I also think it desirable to take this opportunity of setting the record straight on errors and misrepresentations which have been made about the bill.
The first objective of the bill is to improve the quality of the employment related services of the federal government to Canadians. This is reflected in our proposal to integrate the Unemployment Insurance Commission with the Department of Manpower and Immigration. Undoubtedly, this will help to ensure better access to such services, better identification of needs and a better delivery system through integrated, personalized services in one location under a unified management. The amendments will also provide an improved framework for the achievement of a better balance between service and control in the administration of the unemployment insurance program, and the commission will be reviewing all existing service and control measures with a view to improving them both and achieving an optimum balance between the two. The integration of the two organizations will also promote the development of more pertinent and more coherent employment and income protection policies and programs. In this latter respect, 1 think our proposal to extend the commission form of management, which ensures adequate participation of the
Employment and Immigration
private sector, both labour and management, to the entire spectrum of employment services is particularly fitting.
The second, and complementary, objective of Bill C-27 is to streamline and improve the unemployment insurance program in order to make it more responsive to present economic circumstances. One area of such improvement will be the unemployment insurance benefit structure, which will be simplified and more equitable. It will also be better adapted to regional economic conditions, particularly as a result of the amendment 1 have made to add additional regional extended benefit entitlement in regions of high unemployment. Similarly, the variable entrance requirement will make the unemployment insurance program more sensitive to regional differences. We have been told that a variable entrance requirement is a major departure from the previous so-called concept of equality of access to the program and that it will balkanize the country and threaten its unity. When the NDP opposes the variable entrance requirement, they ignore the fact that workers living in areas of high unemployment face greater difficulties not only in finding employment but also in holding on to jobs. This is indicated in the statistics we have already circulated together with my statement on April 26 showing the higher proportion of short-term attachments in regions of higher unemployment. Among the murky misrepresentations made by members of the NDP on the variable entrance requirement there was one ray of light that came from the hon. member from Brant (Mr. Blackburn). He supported the notion that the entrance requirement could be increased when unemployment decreases. This is, of course, precisely what the variable entrance requirement does.
The representations made by the hon. member for Nickel Belt (Mr. Rodriguez) on the variable entrance requirement have been distinguished more by their verbosity than by their accuracy. The most outstanding example is the reference he made both during the committee and the report stage to the brief submitted by the Canadian Mining Association. In quoting from the association's brief, he stopped just short of quoting a sentence in the brief which is in full support of the government's position. I think it is essential that the position of the Canadian Mining Association be put on record. The omitted sentence reads as follows:
We believe, therefore, that the 10 to 14 week variable entrance requirement proposed by the minister on April 26th to your committee is appropriate and equitable under existing circumstances.
This is not an isolated example of distortions. The hon. member for Nickel Belt made a statement during the report stage that when he visited the St. John's Canada Manpower centre in Newfoundland, there were only two jobs listed on the job board. This is not so. The manager of the CMC advises that on that day he had upward of 50 jobs listed. Apparently the hon. member visited the office early in the morning and looked at one job board reserved for new jobs listed that day. Other job boards contained listings of dozens of other jobs. In view of these inaccuracies, Mr. Speaker, one wonders at all other statements by the hon. member.

July 4, 1977
Employment and Immigration
The major objective of the unemployment insurance amendments in bill C-27 was not to cut costs. It was to achieve a better allocation of resources. As I stated on second reading, the evidence we have accumulated points to the fact that unemployment insurance is not the most effective way of helping to resolve the problems of those with a short-term attachment to the labour force. This was one of the reasons we substantially increased the funds available in our employment strategy to fund alternative measures, such as direct job creation, training and counselling. It was not, as spokesmen for the NDP have alleged, that we felt that the short term attachments were "ripping off the system".
This brings us to the third general objective of the bill, which is the provision for developmental uses of the UI funds. These are positive steps we propose to take to help reduce unemployment. In the area of training, we will rationalize and simplify the income maintenance arrangements for unemployment insurance claimants taking Manpower training programs. It is well established that suitably designed training programs increase earning capacity and longer term employability. Moreover, the new arrangement will liberate additional funds for training. Yet the NDP by opposing the provision, would deny these advantages to Canadian workers, notwithstanding representations I have received from at least one NDP member that additional training is urgently needed by the unemployed in his constituency.
As I indicated in my remarks at the report stage, the government is fully sensitive to the fact that the use of unemployment insurance funds for work sharing and job creation represents a new departure. I have also indicated our sensitivity to the potential problems involved and to the concerns expressed by representatives of management and labour. Nevertheless, these new approaches seem worth trying since they potentially represent a more positive and creative use of income maintenance funds. The government recognizes that work sharing will not be viable unless both labour and management in particular establishments are prepared to try it out.
I repeat the assurances I have already given to the House, that the provisions relating to work sharing will not be implemented unless such support is forthcoming.
At this point I think it is also essential that the record be set straight on our concept of work sharing. It has never been envisaged as a general way of solving the problems of an over-all shortage of jobs. Rather, it would be designed as a way of helping particular establishments facing temporary economic difficulties to share work for specified periods rather than laying off part of their work force entirely.
I also repeat my assurance that we will undertake further intensive discussions with the new advisory council on the use of unemployment insurance funds in job creation projects. 1 am hopeful that exploration of the problems and how they may best be solved will lead to the conclusion that we should, in fact, proceed on a pilot project basis to determine the extent to

which the advantages we see in these ideas can be achieved in practice.
The amendments contained in Bill C-27 have been made as a result of a long period of investigation, discussion and debate. I am confident that the integration of the Unemployment Insurance Commission and the Department of Manpower and Immigration, and the revisions of the unemployment insurance program constitute a sound basis for providing better employment services to Canadian workers and employers. I have already mentioned the need to achieve a better balance between service and control in the administration of the unemployment insurance program, which will be promoted with this bill. During the discussions in committee and in the House I have been struck by the frequent references made by many members on the need to provide better service.
In this connection it should be recalled that in the years immediately following the introduction of the new legislation in 1971, the commission's first concern was to improve service. As progress was made in that direction, parallel steps were taken to improve control measures. The commission's continuing responsibility for ensuring the integrity of the unemployment insurance program by maintaining adequate control is doubly important since the commission is the steward not only of public funds but also of premium contributions made directly by the private sector. I am not satisfied that we have yet achieved an optimum balance between service and control. 1 do agree, of course, that there are clear limitations on the extent to which control measures can be pursued. Financial considerations and public acceptance are two key factors which determine the parameters of control measures. At the same time, the integrity of the unemployment insurance program is essential to the program's acceptance by the public.
As I indicated earlier, many representations have been made to me and to the department both from inside the House and from agencies outside. 1 have read and have had summarized very carefully all the briefs presented to the committee, many of which contained excellent recommendations. In some instances, however, these recommendations ran counter to others. For example, in some instances the 10-week to 14-week period was considered too short, and in others up to 26 weeks a year was recommended. So one has to arrive at an appropriate balance in the circumstances, given the fact that this program can only be made to work if it maintains its credibility. That had to be the guiding force in reaching the decisions that we have made in the department. I thank the House for its attention.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: Mr. Speaker,
I find myself in an interesting position. The minister indicated that we have spent long hours on Bill C-27 and that we have heard many witnesses by way of petition or in person. I would bring to Your Honour's attention such groups as the Railway Association, the Employers' Council of British Columbia, the United Auto Workers, the Canadian Construction Association, the Canadian Manufacturers' Association, the Canada Labour Council, and the National Anti-Poverty Association. All of these organizations, as well as others, had the required
July 4, 1977

expertise which they brought before the standing committee, which enabled us to come to some rational conclusions in clause by clause consideration of the bill. I believe 1 can stand here and express to them, on behalf of my colleagues on both sides of the House, very warm thanks for a job well done in a very complicated and sensitive matter because, as we have been reminded on several occasions, of the one million unemployed.
The minister has indicated the three objectives of the bill. The first is to improve the quality of unemployment insurance, and in this regard he mentioned the merger of the Department of Manpower and the Unemployment Insurance Commission. We all know where that idea stems from: it comes from the official opposition. But we are not seeking credit, Mr. Speaker. 1 notice that the minister made no mention of this whatsoever. But we are used to giving the governing party our ideas. They take them and give us no credit for them.
This merger will improve the quality of the service, and now the left hand will know what the right hand is doing. As my good friend, the hon. member for Victoria (Mr. McKinnon) said, we in the official opposition have been, on several occasions, a policy bank for the party which is supposed to be governing the country. But we do not mind; this is part of our responsibility which we accept and exercise willingly.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: We do this in preparation to taking over after the next election. That will be my last statement which can go unrefuted. Then the minister spoke about a balance between service and control. When we talk about balancing service and control, we are thinking about equity and justice, because all too often we as members of parliament are made aware of the harassment by and heavy-handed approach of benefit control officers. You are well aware of this, Mr. Speaker, coming from your riding. In your hallowed position you are made aware of the problems resulting from the heavy-handed approach of benefit control officers.
So we must move in and, with the influence we have, try to convince the minister that the Unemployment Insurance Commission should not use methods of harassment, be overzealous or heavy-handed. I hope this is what the minister has been talking about. This is certainly what I would be talking about if I were sitting in his place. However, I had better stop there. 1 have already made my statement in that regard and the minister knows what I am talking about. We are talking about equity and justice when we refer to the balance between service and control.
The third objective the minister spoke about was to relate unemployment insurance programs to economic realities. What does that mean? It simply means that we now have a variable approach to unemployment insurance. Once again I noted that the minister, with his usual charity, singled out the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Breau). He said that as a result of that hon. member's input the minister is now providing for further extended unemployment insurance benefits. The hon. gentleman even looked across at me and said that the
Employment and Immigration
official opposition in their wisdom and expertise brought forward a solution which he adopted holus-bolus, that is, the variable entrance requirements. We are not seeking any credit for it whatsoever, because as the hon. member for Victoria said, this party is a policy bank for the party that is supposed to be governing.
This is what we are talking about in terms of unemployment insurance programs being in step with economic reality. I will not dwell any longer on variable entrance requirements: we know what this means. It will mean, now, that people on unemployment insurance for the next three years will be able to acquire benefits depending on the rate of unemployment. There will be a change in entrance requirements in accordance with the rate of unemployment from 10 to 14 weeks, inclusive. This is a step in the right direction. As 1 understand it, it will last for three years, subject to the approval of parliament. After the three-year period there will be a requirement for a 14-week eligibility period.
The third objective was the developmental use of funds. There were many comments on the first objective and vigou-rous comments on the second, and on the third objective we ran into a considerable amount of flak. We on this side of the House were certainly concerned about the job training aspect, we were more concerned about the job creation aspect, and when it came to work sharing there was a traumatic atmosphere. This idea was one which both management and labour were very reluctant to accept: they made no bones about that whatsoever. The minister is right with regard to the developmental use of unemployment insurance funds; we have moved away from what 1 thought was the original intent behind unemployment insurance. 1 would like to quote from the minister's remarks as reported in Hansard for June 23, at page 7068, just to show how far we have taken this bill. This is what the minister stated:
The original purpose of UI was to provide income protection to unemployed workers while they searched for suitable employment. This undoubtedly remains a fundamentally important purpose of the program. At the same time we all know that there have been dramatic changes in the economy, the labour market, and society, with the result that, for certain workers, immediate job prospects are poor. In these cases the provision of income maintenance by itself is not the most effective approach to the solution of their problems nor, indeed, to the problems of the labour market.
At one time unemployment insurance was protection for unemployed workers, but now we have moved to another area. Remember when it was just for an involuntary lay-off? We have brought in the pregnancy aspect and sickness aspect, and now we are bringing in developmental use of unemployment insurance funds. We are far away from the pre-1971 days.
One thing the minister did not touch upon-and I think it is of such significant importance that it should be touched upon now-is the fact that no matter how much we tinker with this bill, we will always have a problem with unemployment insurance as long as we continue not to create meaningful, long-lasting jobs. The Minister of Manpower and Immigration (Mr. Cullen) is a nice guy from the class of '68, but he is going to run into flak. This government is not aware of what being

July 4, 1977
Employment and Immigration
unemployed means-and we have one million unemployed. Premier Ed Schreyer indicated that he wanted to speak with the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau). He suggested that the first ministers get together because we have a national crisis of catastrophic proportions. He indicated that he wanted to meet with the Prime Minister and the other premiers to devise required schemes and plans to get this country moving on job creation. The other day Mr. Darcy McKeough-


John R. Rodriguez: Oh, oh!


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: I will not get carried away. I know where that voice came from. I know who said "Oh, oh", but I will not be led astray.


John R. Rodriguez: A retreaded Liberal.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: Mr. McKeough said that we are going to have problems with job creation. He said this is extremely important in his province and in other provinces because of the spill-off. The minister can pat himself on the back and say that he has three objectives, and all that kind of nonsense. I accept that; it is great stuff. But why has he not told us what he is going to do for the one million unemployed? We are losing something like $17 million a day-billions in lost productivity and millions in lost revenue in terms of taxation. Has my good friend the minister thought about that? As usual, he ignores that. He is complacent. 1 do not say he does not care, but the fact of the matter is that he does not know what is going on.
By itself, this unemployment insurance bill will not remove the awful stigma of slow growth, high unemployment and no productivity. We should listen to Ed Schreyer. I am no socialist, but when Premier Schreyer wants a meeting, there should be a meeting. The Prime Minister told me today that the Manpower ministers should first get involved, and that after they look into the matter he might decide whether the first ministers should get involved. That is a lot of nonsense. Let the first ministers meet now. Let them say that they agree on purpose, on determination, and on the fact that we must solve this problem. In my view, the priorities are wrong. We need more than just tinkering and playing around with the Unemployment Insurance Act. We need a government which is dedicated to full employment and wants to direct itself to the creation of full employment. There should be a job for every man and woman who wants to work. That should be the policy. I chastise the minister-not too harshly-for ignoring that very basic principle. That is part of his responsibility. He did not even talk about employment except to say that one objective is the developmental use of unemployment insurance funds regarding job creation.
Many concerns were registered concerning training, job creation and the work sharing aspect of this bill. The minister indicated that he realizes there is some concern about job creation. We should determine what we have been doing in terms of training. We should have a complete assessment so that we can see whether we have been successful. I hope the minister will look at what we have done. Are we just training people to rejoin the unemployment rolls? That seems to be the

conclusion reached by a number of people-experts, at that. So I hope when the minister considers the funds which are used for job training, he will make a complete, analytical study of what has happened in the past regarding job training so we do not make the same mistakes again.
There was some concern about job creation and using developmental funds, or at least what are called developmental funds but which are really going to unemployment insurance funds. 1 think the minister is concerned because he does not know how this will work. This is also the concern of management and labour; they do not know how it will work, either. We proposed an amendment which would have allowed the minister a year to analyse this scheme of his and to see how it would work and whether it is a proper approach. The minister did not want that amendment, so it was not passed.
On the other hand, when it came to job creation, my socialist friends voted against the job creation aspect of this bill. They are the ones who always stand up in this House and tell the Canadian people they feel it is necessary that the government create jobs. That is the same bunch-and I call them hypocrites-which voted against the job creation aspect. I cannot understand it. But they will have to answer for that, whether they come from the Atlantic provinces or anywhere else. I see a good friend, whose name 1 will not mention, who is very concerned about Atlantic Canada. 1 do not know how he is going to explain that his party voted against job creation. He can give me a shout and I will do my best to help him, as 1 have in the past with other hon. members.


Mr. Hogan:: Forty-one jobs under Canada Works in my constituency.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: In connection with job creation I want to quote the minister, as recorded in Hansard for June 23, at page 7069, as follows:
In these circumstances it is my view that section 38 in clause 41 should be retained in the bill. I do, however, give my unequivocal assurance that I would not proceed with implementation until there have been further opportunities for discussion.
That is very important: he is not going to implement this until there have been further opportunities for discussion. He went on:
Specifically, I would propose to refer the question to the newly established advisory council to permit a fuller exchange of views than we have yet been able to have. I would also give my assurance that, if it is clear that no labour or management support for experimentation is forthcoming, these provisions will not be implemented.
1 accept the minister's statement that he is going to meet with the new advisory council to get further advice. There is a catch, however, in what he said here today compared with what he said on June 23. He only referred to the advisory council today, but on June 23 he said:
-if it is clear that no labour or management support for experimentation is forthcoming, these provisions will not be implemented.
I want the minister to recall that. We had some problem with respect to putting U1C funds to developmental uses, but
July 4, 1977

being realistic and not hypocritical, unlike the socialists to my left, we told the minister we would go along with that. The minister said he will not do it until he has had further discussion with the advisory council and with labour and management.
The work sharing proposal causes us some concern, as well. Papers prepared on the results of experiments in Italy, France and Germany suggest that work sharing is not a good thing and that labour and management in those countries do not want it. Mr. Speaker, 1 wish the socialists to my left would not bother me. 1 am trying to make a responsible speech.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Order, please. The hon. member for Hamilton West (Mr. Alexander) has the floor.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: 1 do not want to become partisan. 1 do not want to have anything to do with these people. They want to pretend to the workers that free rides are available. But, Mr. Speaker, there are no free rides. It is just socialist philosophy that you get everything for nothing. We will have an answer for that in the next election. Some notes on work sharing prepared by my brilliant research assistant revealed some very interesting findings. Both labour and management felt that section 37 could result in disruptive intrusion into the collective bargaining process, and they were uncomfortable with the participation of government in such arrangements. Both business and labour worried about the criteria used to determine which businesses would be eligible. They feared that the work sharing program might be used to artificially bolster inefficient plants. This view was registered with us by all those whose names 1 referred to in my earlier remarks.
It was found there simply was not enough information fully to support the concept as outlined in section 37. In fact, specifically the Canadian Federation of Independent Businessmen, the Canadian Labour Congress, the Canadian Manufacturers' Association, and the Canadian Construction Association pointed out that the experience of the West German government in work sharing was not, to their knowledge, successful. This is the program on which Canadian pilot projects will be based. Along these lines, the Canadian Federation of Independent Businessmen told us of the experience of some of their members who found that when they tried the short work week, people preferred to work 40 hours or be laid off.
The creation of inefficiency was a common worry of both business and labour, as was the question of handling fringe benefits. I think they were really concerned about the unwarranted intrusion into the collective bargaining process by the federal government. Both sectors found that unacceptable. We tried to delete the work sharing provision after listening to the advice of labour and management in the standing committee. They said that even with using UIC funds for developmental work sharing schemes, experience had shown they would not work.
I must give credit to hon. friends to my left, because they were opposed to work sharing as well. The minister insisted that it go ahead, however. I want his statement on record so
Employment and Immigration
that we can compare what he said today with what he said on June 23, because I caught him out on one statement with respect to job creation. On June 23 he spoke of consultation with the advisory council as well as with management and labour, but today he spoke only of the advisory council and forgot, maybe conveniently, what he had said about labour and management. The record shows what he said on June 23 about work sharing, as reported at page 7069 of Hansard:
In these circumstances I think it is essential to pursue discussions more widely and fully with management and labour to determine whether there is a basis upon which to proceed before we jettison what may be potentially a very good idea.
He did not say "is a good idea"; he said "may be a good idea". Apparently he was not sure whether it was a good idea or not. Maybe that was a slip, and I will not take advantage of it. He went on to say:
I give my assurance to the House that, if this provision is retained, I will not authorize its implementation until I am satisfied that there is a willingness on the part of management and labour groups to participate. On this basis it is my recommendation that hon. members of this House support the provisions in Bill C-27 for work sharing.
With respect to motion No. 18 proposed by the hon. member for Hamilton West and with respect to the evaluation of job creation, that motion would require an evaluation to be tabled within one year of proclamation of Bill C-27. Let me emphasize that it is our clear intention to undertake evaluations of all the developmental uses of unemployment insurance funds, including the job creation proposal. I would certainly be prepared to table in parliament the findings of such evaluations.
That is a general, catch-all statement. In other words, there will be no work sharing unless labour and management agree; no job creation unless the advisory council approves as well as labour and management. The minister cannot meet with the advisory council until the bill is passed, however. It is already July 4, so I hope his officials have been holding discussions since June 23, because there is no doubt the bill will pass. I am not saying the government will ram it through, but they have the power to see that it passes. I am not going to name any names, but those who know what the bill is all about, even more than the minister or myself, will surely contact labour and management to find out what is going to happen with respect to these proposals.
I could go on and on, Mr. Speaker. I want to register some concern about whether the regulations regarding the 54 regions which affect the variable qualifying period will be based on place of work or on residence. This matter becomes very complicated. 1 should like to read from the minutes of the Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration of June 14, where the following exchange took place as reported at page 35:59.


John R. Rodriguez: Did we clear up this question of the claimant, where he resides and where he works? Will his benefit be payable on his domicile or on where he works? Have we cleared that up?


Mr.   Manion@: It is the place of residence.


John R. Rodriguez: On the place of residence.


Jack Sydney George (Bud) Cullen: We are going to try that. That will be in the initial phase. We will check that to see how it works. Everything is geared for that, so that will be the way the plan will be implemented.

July 4, 1977
Employment and Immigration


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: Is there a possibility of us having the reasoning behind the choice of place of residence as opposed to place of work? I will tell you there are many people very concerned about that. I missed the meeting where this was discussed. I believe it was last Wednesday. Have you really looked into this thing, the pros and cons, in a very definitive way that could be released to the members of the committee?


Mr.   Manion@: There was a fairly extensive statement given on this. We looked at both options. There were several reasons for choosing place of residence. One was that the present administration of the UI Act is based largely on place of residence rather than place of work. It was felt that both claimants and the administration would be more familiar with this. There were administration complexities in adopting a place of work definition.
There are also some work incentives attached to the place of residence option.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: Is there not anything good about the other approach, the place of work?


Mr.   Manion@: Yes, there are advantages of that as well, but they were felt not to be sufficient to outweigh the advantages of the place of residence option.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: Can we know some of them?


Mr.   Manion@: The major one is the negative one, a concern that a place of residence option could give rise to people moving to areas where they would be subject to more advantageous terms. For this reason it is felt desirable to have the provision covered by a regulation so that if evidence of abuses occur it will be possible to switch. But if there is no abuse of the place of residence provision, there are some very substantial advantages to it, as I indicated.
As the House can see, members of my party were concerned about the effect of the 10 to 14 week flexible period on the 54 regions of the country, for this reason: people could move from one region of the country to another in order to take advantage of more generous benefits. Benefit levels will be determined by way of regulation, and although we do not favour the making of many regulations, in this case one must accept their limited use. 1 continue quoting the exchange in committee:


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: So we are going to monitor this by way of regulation.


Mr.   Manion@: We are going to apply it by way of regulation, but it will be monitored very closely by the commission in its adjudication process. If there is evidence that individuals have moved from areas where the unemployment rate is low to areas where it is high in order to secure additional advantages, it might be necessary then to switch to a place of work.
I put that exchange on record to let the people of Canada know that it may be difficult to decide the basis of benefit levels. However, most Canadians want the act to operate fairly and justly. They do not want people to rip off the unemployment insurance fund. People are concerned because unemployment insurance will cost the public and the private sector approximately $4 billion a year. Unless I am mistaken, unemployment insurance in 1971 cost us around $1 billion. Clearly, the growth in expenditure has been astronomical. That is why I am pleased to note the government realizes it will need to monitor the fund.
On the other hand, we do not want the government to be heavy-handed with those who have worked for years and must suddenly apply for benefits. We do not want to see benefit control officers hitting them over the head, as it were, with a sledge-hammer. We, on my side of the House, have always opposed that approach. My socialist friends in this House will say that we want to tighten the act. Mr. Speaker, it is not a question of tightening it. We want an act which takes into account the realities of life. We still believe in the work ethic. We want a bill which will foster the work ethic. At the same time, we want it applied compassionately.

Various aspects of this bill will come into effect at different times. I do not think the minister dealt with this, unless I am mistaken. Part I has to do with the creation of the department of employment and immigration, and the Canada and employment immigration commission, and part II with the creation of the Canada employment and immigration advisory council. Part I relates to the new department, and part II to the new advisory council. These two parts of the bill will come into effect immediately after royal assent. 1 hope the minister will tell me if I am wrong, for it is important for the people of Canada to know the facts about the bill. It contains several important changes regarding flexible benefit periods affecting 54 regions.
The minister gave the hon. member for Gloucester credit for raising the matter of the three-phased benefit. 1 give him no credit in that regard. At one time we had a five-phased benefit period. The benefit periods are to be reduced to three, an initial benefit phase, a labour force extended phase, and a regional extended phase. Previously, we had an initial benefit phase, a re-established initial phase, a labour force extended phase, a nationally extended phase and, finally, a regionally extended phase. As I say, we are reducing the benefit phases from five to three.
The minister told us this aspect of the bill will come into effect six weeks after royal assent. If I am wrong, I hope the minister will correct me. I understand, from information the deputy minister gave me, that one of the most important parts of the bill concerning the 10 to 14-week, inclusive, variable entrance requirements will come into effect on December 4, 1977. The minister did not blink. Perhaps he does not know. I hope he will stand up and say whether I am right or wrong. This bill is most important and complex and I want the minister to say whether I am right or wrong, because I remember what happened in the case of senior citizens. Their entitlement was cut off. We did not cut them off; the minister did. Let us not forget that, Mr. Speaker.
1 mention this to let the people of Canada know with what kind of minister they are dealing. He said, in so many words, by introducing Bill C-69, that senior citizens had no right to work after age 65. That is an intolerable situation which we did not accept then, do not accept now, and will not accept in future. As long as you are healthy and want to work, you should be entitled to work. Our senior citizens who built this country should be given the right to work, to pay premiums and to receive benefits.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: When I said that, the minister did not even blink. That shows how callous and hard he is. He did not even smile when I made an impassioned plea. I do not know what the government will do. We hear they will go to the people in the fall. I hope they do not. Why should they go to the people? I am speaking to the bill, Mr. Speaker, although you may not think I am. I am not speaking about an election, though it may appear that I am. The government may go to the people in the fall, perhaps on the issue of UIC, and bootleg in an argument
July 4, 1977

saying they need a mandate. But they have a majority now. I hope they do not have the cheek-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Order, please. Would the hon. member please return to Bill C-27.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: Yes, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Hnatyshyn:: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member was speaking about cynicism and cheekiness, which both relate to this bill.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: If they have the cheek to call an election costing some $40 million, the Canadian people will crucify them. They will say they want a mandate. A mandate to do *what? The Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) has brought this country to its knees. He has destroyed the country. Instead of bringing about national unity, he has brought about national disunity. I will say no more about that.


An hon. Member:: Get back to the bill.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: I will return to it. I do not know which riding the hon. member represents. He is not important, but his riding is. We are going to fix him in the next election.


An hon. Member:: He represents Laval.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: He will qualify for benefits after the next election.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: Mr. Speaker, I was saying the variable entrance provisions will come into force on December 4, 1977. I will come to my last point. I have gone on for quite some time, but this is a very important bill. 1 will give the socialists their opportunity so that they can scream about eight weeks and all that. That is their concern. However, I hope they will be more responsible with this bill than they have been in the past.
The other important matter is the 54 regions. This is involved with the variable entrance requirements. This is where I get confused. It states this provision will come into effect in the summer of 1978. I do not know how that works, if you have the variable entrance requirements effective December 4. Maybe I took it down in error. How can you have 54 regions not involved until the summer of 1978?
That, Mr. Speaker, is my contribution. We are not going to filibuster this bill, hold it up and be repetitious, with speech after speech, like some people. We believe that all the arguments have been made by labour, management and concerned members of parliament who brought to this House previsouly, to the standing committee, and again to the House their concerns. I have placed most of our concerns on the table, the good things about the bill and the bad things. Hopefully, we can wind it down in due course, because, as I have said, we had a very exhaustive examination of the bill and the amendments during report stage. I hope hon. members will realize that
Employment and Immigration
there is no sense trying to filibuster this bill, as has been done in the past.


John R. Rodriguez: Mr. Speaker, I listened to the minister defend this monstrosity of a bill, C-27. I then listened to "Puff the Magic Dragon", the hon. member for Hamilton West (Mr. Alexander), who almost broke his wrist trying to pat himself on the back for this monstrosity. It was unbelieveabie. I look forward to the time when we will have television in this House. The people of Canada will see that there is no difference between the two major parties in the House of Commons.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Order, please. I suggest that the hon. member for Nickel Belt (Mr. Rodriguez) get back to the terms of Bill C-27.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John R. Rodriguez: Bill C-27 is an example of legislation which the official opposition ought to be examining with a critical eye. They should not be taking pleasure in saying that they pushed the government into something, that they recommended such and such, that they said this and they said that, and the minister listened to them. 1 thought the hon. member was praying: all he was saying was "I", "I", "I", "I", "I". I suspect with the movement from that side to the government side, the hon. member for Hamilton West may move over very quickly. The hon. member even made a plea that there be no election this fall. He actually pleaded with the government not to call an election. Maybe he is afraid of something; I do not know.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: He is afraid you will be defeated.


John R. Rodriguez: We on this side of the House have taken a critical look at the bill as well as the whole question of employment and unemployment in Canada. We believe the bill should be used to focus and zero in on the government's inability and hardness of heart with regard to coming to grips with the most serious problem facing Canada, the whole matter of employment opportunities. We have written to the minister. We do not object to regional rates of unemployment with regard to participating in the Unemployment Insurance Act. If the minister were to propose an unemployment rate of 3 per cent or 4 per cent, there would be no difficulty on this side. Also, he would find no difficulty if we were to set the premiums based on the rate of unemployment in the area in which a person lives. It is not right to try to sell people on the universality of a plan and then say to them later that it is not a universal plan after all, that participation in the plan depends on the rate of unemployment in the area in which one lives.
Members on this side have written to the minister in a very responsible fashion. I must make the distinction and say "the NDP", since the dragon made that distinction. We in the NDP have written to the minister. We told the minister that the way in which the present Manpower training programs are operated is inadequate. People are being trained for jobs that do not exist. When we visited Newfoundland to look at the unemployment situation in Atlantic Canada, we found that
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Employment and Immigration
hairdressers were being produced by the thousand, but no hairdressing jobs were available. In my area we produce stationary engineers so stationary that they are stationary for miles because there are no jobs for them to station. If that is the kind of planning that goes on, and the kind of training programs that are being established, we want no part of it.
In the minister's own constituency there are 800 work permits for certain occupations, yet he says we do not have them in this country and they are not prepared to move. What are we doing? Are we training people with the skills that are needed? The Manpower training programs have never impressed me. They are designed to do one thing to package people, to pigeon hole them off the unemployment rolls. The government does not want them reflected in the unemployment rolls. That is primarily the purpose of this goverment's program. I have never been impressed with this government's creativity and far-reaching view with regard to training. If this money is being put into that kind of training program, we will never accept it.
We have written to the minister, making constructive suggestions as we in the NDP always do. We always take a positive approach. We tried to point out to the minister how to improve the administration of manpower, immigration and unemployment insurance programs over which he has responsibility. The minister told about the great wonders that will flow from putting Humpty Dumpty together again. It was almost deja vu, reading some of the speeches when the split was made in 1971. Exactly the same reasons given for making the split are now being given for putting them back together. We were told then, and are being told now, that there will be better administration, and the people of Canada who pay the premiums will be better served. A regional meeting was held in Toronto. It broke up early. As far as the regional offices are concerned, they had no idea how they were going to put Humpty Dumpty together again. That is a very serious problem. Eeeeh!


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Let's see what Hansard does with that.


Mr. Ellis:: Would you repeat that for Hansard?


John R. Rodriguez: Hansard only records words, not sounds.


John Raymond Ellis: All they ever get from you is sounds.


John R. Rodriguez: It was a squeaking sound. We in the NDP are not opposed to putting the employment offices and the Unemployment Insurance together. But there are going to be very serious administrative problems. The top bureaucracy is insensitive to those at the bottom. That is why we have suggested to the minister that there must be communication between those at the top end of the bureaucracy and those at the bottom who have responsibility for putting this scheme together and administering it. Certainly we do not propose the joining of those two departments.

We look upon Bill C-27 not as just tampering with the Unemployment Insurance Act. We think there is more at stake than the amendments the minister is proposing to the Unemployment Insurance Act. This whole debate is really on the subject of employment for Canadians. I recall the heady days of 1968 when there was a federal election. The Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) was running for his first term as prime minister of the country. Although there were not many promises, there were two things that he said he was concerned about and would work to try to achieve. One was national unity; the other was the elimination of regional disparities.
We can now, with some experience, observe the success of the Prime Minister's efforts on both these fronts. In 1968 the unemployment rate in this country was around 3 per cent. In 1971 it rose to 6.4 per cent. That was the first year of the great fight against inflation. The Prime Minister said that he did not care if unemployment rose to 6 per cent, he was going to defeat inflation. 1 think his words were that he was going to wrestle inflation to the ground.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: No, that was later.


John R. Rodriguez: I understand that was later. At any rate, he did not care if unemployment rose to 6 per cent, he was going to defeat inflation. In 1974 the unemployment rate dropped to 5.4 per cent. The rate at the present time is somewhere around 8 per cent. That is the StatsCan figure and does not include hidden unemployment. StatsCan changed the method of calculating the unemployment rate in this country and in one month cut the unemployment rate in Newfoundland by half; but 8 per cent unemployment in terms of numbers means that about one million people in Canada are unemployed.
The working class people of this country have been used to fight inflation. The government did not care what the unemployment rate was; it used the working class of this country as the scapegoat in defeating inflation. But it seems to me we have not defeated inflation today. If the present rate is projected to the end of the year, we still have double-digit inflation. You notice, Mr. Speaker, how consistently the government uses the unemployed as the scapegoat. Never does it accept responsibility for maladministration of the economy. The government always finds a scapegoat, and the scapegoat as recently as a year and a half ago was the workers of this country. They were blamed for causing inflation because their wage increases were too high and productivity was too low. Therefore, to defeat this psychology of inflation the government had to bring in a controls program. Again it had to find a scapegoat, and now hon. members opposite are all smelling of roses.
The government brought in the controls program which was advocated by colleagues to my right. The hon. member for Halifax (Mr. Stanfield) took credit for it, but he is a little more modest than the hon. member for Hamilton West. As I envisage the next election, it will be run along the lines of the governing party wanting to keep controls, and the Conservative party wanting to lift controls. That is the kind of juxtapo-
July 4, 1977

sition that I have in mind for the next federal election. As the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) says, it will be Tweedledum and Tweedledee. The government has failed on both counts. We still have high unemployment in this country, and we also have high inflation.
What is the word that we get from the corporate sector of this country? Again we look for a scapegoat. What is the message they are putting across? They say unemployment insurance is one of the prime factors for productivity being down; that after all, we are paying people after only eight weeks' employment and that is a drain on the economy. The Canadian Manufacturers' Association told the committee that we had the most generous unemployment insurance program in the world. 1 point out that we also have one of the highest unemployment rates among the industrialized nations of the world. Among the OECD countries we have the highest rate of unemployment of 15 to 25-year olds, something the government should be ashamed of. According to the Canadian Manufacturers' Association, the program is a disincentive.
Then the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, which represented small business, said that the program was a rip-off. The Employers' Association of British Columbia also told the committee that the program is a rip-off. The Association of Small Businessmen, headed by the famous-or infamous, depending on your view-John Bulloch, also told the committee that the program was a disincentive, a red rooster.


John Raymond Ellis: He did not say that at all; he just said unemployment is very high.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Order. The hon. member for Nickel Belt (Mr. Rodriguez) has the floor.


John R. Rodriguez: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. 1 welcome the interjection of the hon. member for Hastings (Mr. Ellis) and trust he will get up and make a speech at some point in this debate. I am interested in his comments, and somewhere along the line I am sure I will be able to comment upon them.
The Construction Association of Canada also appeared before the committee and said the program was a rip-off, that the Unemployment Insurance Act is too generous and the participating time too short. All of the groups I have referred to appeared before the committee. Then the minister admitted to me in committee, "Yes, it is a disincentive program; there is no question at all about that". I cannot imagine what goes on on the other side of the House. The government changes one minister, puts a new minister in his place, and suddenly things change. Let me read to the House the comments of the Minister of Manpower and Immigration's predecessor, the President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Andras), in committee on May 28, 1975. Let us not forget, Mr. Speaker, that the whole basis for Bill C-27 is a comprehensive review of the unemployment insurance program which was made between January and June of 1974. This is what the minister had to say:
I think it is a bit of a red herring myself. I think there are other areas that have to be tidied up in the act that are far more significant than that favourite whipping-boy of the short-term work claimant.
Employment and Immigration A little later on he said:
The incidence of disentitlement or disqualification, as an effect of failure to meet one's obligations under the act, is lower amongst the group with a minor attachment to the work force as their proportion of the total claims load than those with a long-term attachment to the work force.
After only a year in his job, the present minister discovered that this was a disincentive program. The previous minister was in office for certainly longer than six months and, based on surveys, he had that statement to make. Perhaps he was getting bad advice from the top bureaucrats in his department, because if he felt that the program was a disincentive, that people were taking the program to the cleaners, he should have spoken up and been honest with the committee. One has to assume that he was being honest when he said that. We have to look, also, at what other groups are saying besides the Canadian Manufacturers' Association and the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, as the hon. member for Hastings has pointed out. I should like to refer to the latest report of the Economic Council of Canada which reads in part:
We believe that most Canadians affected by unemployment are well served by the unemployment insurance system and use it honestly-
It would of course be possible to try to eliminate abuses by cutting certain categories of claimants or the duration of benefits, or by extending the period of work, before claimants could become eligible for benefits. But such recommendations could prove harmful to persons most exposed to periodic and genuinely involuntary unemployment.
The minister referred to my comments regarding the Canadian Mining Association brief, a copy of which 1 received from the clerk of the standing committee. 1 should like to read from page 5 of that brief as follows:
The association condemns the abuses which some unemployment insurance claimants have made of the eight-week qualifying period. It is also aware that this period is shorter than that found in all other foreign jurisdictions, while the maximum level of benefits and the time during which they can be drawn are in excess of those found elsewhere. Nevertheless, with close to one million Canadians unemployed, and with most projections, including those issued by the government and its agencies, indicating the situation may worsen, the time is simply inappropriate from almost every perspective to seek a substantial extension, which we would urge in better times, to the eight-week qualifying period.
That is what is in my copy of that brief, and that is the end of the paragraph. I have never found myself in agreement with the Canadian Mining Association. The association indicated that the government ought to spend its time creating and going about doing things in the economy which will spin off the jobs that are necessary for our people. At this particular time in our history the government is coming in with changes to the Unemployment Insurance Act which will create grievous harm for many sectors of the country, especially people who receive lower incomes. There is a high correlation between the minimum attachment, those who are minor claimants, the length of time they collect benefits, and the regions from which they come. You will see the highest correlation between those who are minor claimants and those parts of our country which have the most aggravated unemployment rates.
1 should like to refer to those who were eight-weekers and then went to collect unemployment insurance. In 1976 they collected 21.22 weeks, which is the average for Canada. The

July 4, 1977
Employment and Immigration
eight-week wonder in Newfoundland collected 31.15 weeks of benefits. In Prince Edward Island it was 28.37 weeks. In Nova Scotia it was 19.1 weeks. In New Brunswick it was 30.44 weeks. In Quebec it was 23.85 weeks. In Ontario it was 15.1 weeks. In Manitoba it was 12.2 weeks. In Saskatchewan it was 11.04 weeks. In Alberta it was 10.53 weeks. In British Columbia it was 18.42 weeks. As we go through the nine-weekers right down to the 20 plus weekers, we find this correlation is evident. Where you have a high unemployment rate in the country, you find people have a shorter attachment period to the work force, which reinforces the New Democratic Party's position. Changes at this particular time can only aggravate an already serious unemployment situation in the country.
What was the basis for bringing in the changes contained in Bill C-27? What led them to do this? The previous minister, now President of the Treasury Board, indicated a year ago that he did not go along with this prevalent attitude. I have the suspicion that there is an election in the offing and the government party will have to go to the corporate sector for donations. They will have to show the corporate sector that they are prepared to be tough. One of the issues the corporate sector has brought to the attention of the government is the minor attachment period and the length of benefits.
When the minister first brought in the bill, it changed from 8 weeks to 12 weeks. There was to be no regional unemployment rate. Therefore, he dropped that bombshell on his caucus and all the Liberal party backbenchers from Atlantic Canada got up and said, "You cannot do this; the NDP is going to make flak in the area''. There was a lot of scurrying around, like mice in the pantry, and they arrived at this position of superimposing 54 regions on the country. We have a complicated Unemployment Insurance Act as it is. We recognize the difficulties in the administration of that act. God knows, that particular administration has received enough letters from me. When I took a look at the proposal, I discovered my riding would be region 21. Within region 21 there is a community, Killarney, which is 52 miles from the city of Sudbury, the industrial centre. In the wintertime the unemployment rate is 60 per cent. Because of the high industrial sectors in Sault Ste. Marie and Sudbury, the regional unemployment rate is 7.1 per cent. They will need anywhere from 12 weeks to 14 weeks to qualify for benefits.
The superimposing of the 54 regions will create hardships for small communities. When citizens of these small communities become unemployed, the program is administered in a very unfair way, as the minister is aware from the evidence given at the committee hearings. We know the difficulties, yet he proposes 54 regions. I do not think he understands the difficulties which will be encountered and the red tape involved for unfortunate Canadians who become unemployed. What was the rationale? The rationale was the comprehensive review of the unemployment insurance program in Canada. This is the rationale which was prepared between January and June of 1974. It was prepared after personal interviews with unemployed folk and upon what they called in-house data. Well, it

was in-house, outhouse, backhouse, round-the-house, all sorts of data, much of which was highly erroneous.
Take a look at some of the statements made in part "B" of this comprehensive review. It says: "Canada has the fastest growing labour force of any industrialized western economy." Statistics are given from 1961 to 1975, but there are no accompanying international statistics with which to compare the figures. The document states, further: "The labour force is characterized by a high degree of mobility". The basis for that statement is the statistics for separation in one year, 1974, and changes of address in 1971. What a marvellous, up-to-date piece of research upon which to base a measure like Bill C-27 which the Conservative party has the audacity to support! Here is another statement in the document: "High wage increases have exceeded productivity increases." What is advanced as proof of that assertion? A comparison of wage increases in Canada and the United States in one year, 1974. Yet on the basis of such a comparison the minister is telling us, like the blind leading the blind, what a wonderful proposal we have before us.
I now call attention to another statement in the same document where there is reference to the reluctance of Canadians to work at traditional wage levels. What is the proof? A comparison of federal minimum wages in Canada and in the United States in one year, 1974. Then there is a section on what they call the relationship between job vacancies and unemployment. Again, the figures are for one year, 1974. They have the gall to say there were 92,000 full-time vacancies in 1974, compared with 525,000 unemployed. We are given no information about the nature of those employment opportunities. Another interesting section is called "Profile of claims- study and comments". The first heading is "Separations from employment, January to June, 1974" and beneath it: "One in five quits voluntarily and should be watched."
What is the value of that statement, Mr. Speaker? Unemployment in 1974 was the lowest for five years. It was a boom time, when lay-offs were few and jobs were easily found. It was the year when unemployment took a dip to 5.4 per cent. Even expanding the scope of the study for a full year would have given a more accurate picture, because unemployment dropped from 5.5 per cent in January to 4.9 per cent in June. Then it arose again in December to 6.1 per cent. In the same study, under the heading "Profile of claimants", a comparison is made between 8 to 11-weekers and those unemployed after 12 weeks. The figures used reflect only the situation in 1973 and 1974. What are the characteristics in years of high unemployment, like 1971? The figures which accompany the heading "Claimants listed by dependency, age and sex" are taken from only one year, 1974, and again no comparison is possible with a year of high unemployment. In relation to the duration of claims, once again the only figures were taken from 1973 and 1974 to support findings which go into ridiculous detail on the basis of such a small sample.
July 4, 1977

Then we come to a section on "Exhaustees and post-claim behaviour". Here we find a statement that "63 per cent were able to find work within six months of exhausting their claim; this high percentage may indicate a work disincentive in the case of some claimants." So out of a possible six years of operation, only one month was used, April, 1973. This study covered 2,649 people who exhausted their claims that month. They were surveyed six months later to determine whether they had found jobs. The unemployment rate in April, 1973, was 5.4 per cent. In October it was 5.8 per cent. In March, 1977, it was 8.1 per cent, adjusted. What relevance can a job search at a time of easy employment have at the present time when we are experiencing such a much higher unemployment rate?
Further on we find that in connection with the entry on part-time workers, 1,146 people were studied in August, 1974-a very small sample indeed when one is talking about close to a million people receiving unemployment insurance benefits at any one time. But they surveyed 1,146, in August, and August is the time when work possibilities are affected by student employment. Bear in mind, too, that 1974 was a year of relatively high employment, as I have already said.
I turn now to section "D" of this comprehensive review. They must have spent a bundle putting this together, with its flow charts, bloc graphs, etc. Part "D" is "The alternative approach to profile of claimants", and there is a subheading beneath it, "Relative claim rates and cost ratios". The size of the sample is not given. It was taken from one small, special labour force survey dated March, 1975-10 per cent of the sample of 1973 and 1974 files. No comparison was made with figures for earlier or later years.
Then comes a section called "Work disincentives", section "E". This section consists of summaries of seven studies on the effect of the 1971 act. The two studies which are given most space in the review concluded that the 1971 UIC changes had a negligible impact on the unemployment rate. One of those studies indicated that the benefit rate had the most powerful effect on voluntary unemployment. This conclusion is weakened by the fact that the author assumed that all unemployment is voluntary. The other studies done for the Economic Council and for Treasury Board have been judged to contain serious methodological deficiencies.
Consider other sections and the years to which the studies relate. Distribution of total benefits by provinces, 1973. Distribution of total benefits by occupation, 1972, the year after the new act came into being. Distribution of total benefits by industry, 1973. Total revenues by income class, 1973. Under "1" there is a section "Public perceptions of unemployment insurance". There was a survey done in 1975, they said; but, here again, the sample size is not specified and the questions asked are not indicated in the study. The study then considers the benefit structure and increased entrance requirements. This is section "K" of the survey. It describes the three-phase structure and estimates the financial impact of increased entrance requirements and puts forward arguments against
Employment and Immigration
increased entrance requirements as listed. This, Mr. Speaker, is the basis of Bill C-27.
The Conservative members gleefully grabbed at it and said, "This is what we have been asking for". They should be ashamed of themselves. They have reneged on their responsibility as the official opposition of the House, without properly investigating, debating and looking into the legislation that has been brought forward by this government. They do not even recognize when they are being used politically, they are so politically naive. The whole approach to Bill C-27 is, "We said it first. That is what we wanted. We have pushed the government in this direction". The minister, smiling like a Cheshire cat, says, "Come into the trap, buddies. We've got you where we want you".
All they find to criticize is job sharing. What do they pick on? The thing that all groups coming before the committee agreed upon. My, my, what a consensus party it is on my right! The one thing over which they cannot get into hot water is opposition to the work sharing program. We on this side of the House have said to the minister, "Yes, there are times when you can make changes to the Unemployment Insurance Act, but you have to base them on the most up to date information and statistics you can get".
1 have tried to point out that this survey, this so-called comprehensive review, is neither comprehensive nor a review. It is a rationale for a decision that has been made which has a political basis. I do not know what infighting is going on in the department. It is not for me to know; it is only for me to speculate about. All I can say is that it is our position on this side of the House that legislation based on information such as this-I have read all the stuff into the record; I have read the review of the Atlantic region, which is outdated-cannot be good.
We in our party have said that we do not object to changes being made to the act, we do not object to tightening up the Unemployment Insurance Act, but before you do it you must concentrate on creating employment opportunities. That is where your first priority should lie. You should not give the impression to the public that you are tough and that you are really getting down to those who are using unemployment insurance as a disincentive, because you are fooling the Canadian public that you are doing something constructive with respect to unemployment insurance and you are sucking in the Tories.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Order, please. I regret to interrupt the hon. member, but the time allotted to him has expired. He may continue with unanimous consent. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.

July 4, 1977
Employment and Immigration



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 40, to inform the Eiouse that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Humber-St. George's-St. Barbe (Mr. Marshall)-Energy-Suggestion housing ministry make loans for home insulation as conservation measure; the hon. member for Saskatoon-Biggar (Mr. Hnatyshyn)-Administration of Justice-Use of writs of assistance-Request for report on study.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Cullen that Bill C-27, to establish a Department of Employment and Immigration, the Canada Employment and Immigration Commission and the Canada Employment and Immigration Advisory Council, to amend the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971 and to amend certain other statutes in consequence thereof, be read the third time and do pass.
Mr. Charles-Eugene Dionne (Kamouraska):: Mr. Speaker, I should have liked to find something satisfactory in the amendments to Bill C-27. Unfortunately those amendments are minor ones and most of them were absolutely necessary as a result of mistakes made in the other legislation. In addition, there is absolutely nothing altering the procedure to establish the insurability of employment. At the present time, unemployed Canadians not only have to experience some difficulties with badly drafted legislation and the reactions of various officials as to their eligibility for unemployment insurance benefits, but they have to accept the decisions of income tax officials who determine the insurability of their job. Let us imagine what goes on. I had to tackle such problems and there are still many which remain unsolved.
Through its investigators the Unemployment Insurance Commission decides whether a job is insurable or not, but it does not make the decision. Quite often they pay benefits for a number of months, even for six months, and then the matter is referred to the income tax people who decide whether the job is insurable or not. After the income tax people have rendered their decision, it takes months and years to be able to go before the Federal Court and defend the position of these unem-
[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner).]
ployed. Then it is easy to see that there is no common sense in approving such a piece of legislation.
I have in hand a few notes concerning the piece of legislation which we are debating, to establish a Department of Employment and Immigration, the Canada Employment and Immigration Commission and the Canada Employment and Immigration Advisory Council, to amend the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971 and to amend certain other statutes in consequence thereof. This is a strange combination of commissioners, officials, advisors who have apparently the responsibility to redefine the tasks and to redirect the objectives to increase employment for the Canadian people. I wish the best of luck to all those who will have responsibilities in these administrative functions, even if this hotchpotch of redefining, of amalgamating is seemingly organized to create a model of confusion 1977, a new style which will perhaps outweigh the confusion reported in history about the attempts to build the Babel Tower. The Department of Transport has already made a demonstration of confusion as far as air traffic control is concerned.
His colleague, the Minister of Manpower and Immigration may entertain the ambition to achieve the same goal on earth, in spite of the variety of factors to be taken into account: a department, a commission, a council, a reorganization of already existing institutions. Let us try and consider the operation of this new department while wishing the planners all possible success.
All that must be based on the most active and the best cooperation of the whole team while assuming it is capable of such cooperation. We already know a team of civil servants who practice cooperation advantageously for the fund. We all know that in the area of income tax, for instance, all kinds of taxes, this team gives us regular demonstrations of cooperation to the extent that even the people find it sometimes a little exaggerated. This laudable propensity to cooperate should be oriented in the field of real advantages, to find for the unemployed the best ways to use their services in order to contribute in their capacity to the production of goods useful to society.
The administrators responsible for that reorganization probably hold several diplomas, perhaps even doctorates, but I shall nevertheless offer advice on the cooperation which must exist between the employees of manpower centres and the Unemployment Insurance Commission. That kind of retraining will require cooperation courses, in order to meet the need to reconcile individual and collective interests. We must take into consideration that those two groups of employees have worked separately for many years. Their managers thought at that time that it was better that way. According to the new plans, they will have to decide together. Let us hope that the situation of the unemployed worker will be better understood.
A real job creation program should be based on the recognition that all forms of socially useful activity deserve to be recognized and remunerated. This would enable us to reach almost everybody except those who are disabled or too old.

July 4, 1977
This could include the mother of a family, for bringing up children in a period of transition is a socially valid occupation. And yet, this occupation is deemed as useful and valid only when the children of other people are involved. Taking care of other people's children, whether as a keeper, a day care attendant or a foster parent may be a source of income. Taking care of one's own children is not considered an employment. This occupation does not therefore entail the right to share in our society's wealth. Cooking meals for strangers is called working in a restaurant, but the cooking of a mother who is preparing meals for her own children is not considered as a job. We are not yet used to the idea that a person may be working without necessarily getting paid for it. We often hear the government talk about guaranteed income, but it shies away from all likely means which might make it possible.
This bill introduces the new notion of sharing work. The government states that the unemployed will not be compelled to accept jobs for which they are not suited, but it is the commission which will define the jobs which it feels is suitable for them. That is a lot of discretion! Because we know already its definition of the word "suitable" and the way it is applied when the unemployed are looking for jobs which are not available, we can foresee what sort of decisions the commission will come down with. Whether a person is young or old, with or without any experience of the labour market, being unemployed is never reassuring. The climate of fear and anxiety which prevails in periods of high unemployment is the result of a great many factors, the most significant of which is certainly financial insecurity. Although Social Crediters are often blamed for talking often about money, ask any unemployed person if it is not money which he is lacking.
The main concern for an unemployed man is to know whether he will be able to provide proper food, clothes and housing for his family. He is also concerned that perhaps he might not be able to cope with problems that could rise suddenly like illness, accidents and so on. With decreased income, he has to meet the same needs as when he had a job, taking into account that there might be delays in the delivery of cheques issued by the Unemployment Insurance Commission. That has happened often, as many of us know. Payments on accounts will remain the same during the unemployment period and, what is more, credit is more difficult to get during that time.
Whatever we say, the many applications to be made to find a job are not pleasant. It should not be left to any employer to take advantage of the situation of an unemployed man to have him do jobs in conditions and at rates that others would refuse. For instance, when forced to give reasonable wages to an experienced worker, the employer would find it profitable to lay-off this older employee to hire a younger one for lower wages. We must consider the fact that this sometimes occurs.
There are also employers who regularly renew their staff because of bad or hazardous conditions. An unemployed man must not be forced to take any job. Generally speaking, an unemployed man who has preferences and requirements about a job finds it hard to get one and moreover he may not qualify
Employment and Immigration
for benefits if he ever indicates his requirements or preferences to the Unemployment Insurance Commission or the Canada Manpower Centre.
Nevertheless, it is not only up to the Unemployment Insurance Commission to determine whether a job is appropriate or not. The civil servants are not the ones who will do the work, it is the unemployed man. Within a reasonable delay, an unemployed man may require the same job he was performing before, as well as the same salary and the same working conditions.
The commission decides on that reasonable delay which cannot be extended more than sixteen weeks in the case of skilled workers and three weeks for general labourers. I repeat that the commission and manpower centres must be aware that consideration is to be given to some factors when establishing working conditions for an employee. It should be remembered that they are dealing with a human being, not a machine, and that the employee can expect security and stability in his employment. He wants his place of work to be well organized and managed. It is only reasonable that he be treated fairly.
He would also like to be informed on the financial situation of the enterprise, so that he could count on an equitable salary. Those are fundamental realities for a human being. Many officials obviously do not consider these factors when it comes to compelling someone to look for a job.
Another factor is very important, and indispensable: the civil servant should be pleasant. Some of them really have a strange attitude. Not all, of course. Someone acts and others react, as if the common tie was not composed of individual assets grouped together, and as if wanting to reform society authorized one to be unpleasant towards its components.
However, I want to point out that the Unemployment Insurance Act has already helped out Canadian workers considerably, as it surely will in the future, provided the errors in the text of some sections are corrected and some planners cease to envisage, in their sick minds, the possibility of full employment at a time when automation is replacing a high percentage of workers in almost every field of productivity. Terms have been sought to qualify various categories of unemployed but that does not improve the lot of the citizen who has no income and no job. While our youth is being encouraged to get degrees, technicians are inventing machines that will create unemployment for our graduates when they leave college.
In a statement on March 15, 1977, the Canadian Council on Social Development was mentioning that many young people are too discouraged to look for a job. When determining the situation of unemployment, Statistics Canada adopts the criterion "actively seeking work" and therefore underestimates the problem. That estimation excludes a great many young people who need and want a job without actively looking for one. According to the 1971 census, 187,000 people from 15 to 19 and 350,000 between 20 and 24 were not included in the official manpower list of employed or unemployed persons nor in that of part or full time school attendance. Many young people have jobs without any qualifications, with poor wages

July 4, 1977
Employment and Immigration
and a limited future outlook. In 1975, 54,000 young Canadians were working half time, not because they chose to do so but for lack of full-time employment.
Surveys made by the Manpower and Immigration Department in 1973-74 showed that a high percentage of young workers, almost three-quarters of those aged 16 to 19 were holding a position with no promotion opportunities, but wished to get one. In the light of these statistics, the board of governors of an organization representing the whole population of Canada criticized the deliberate lack of policies of the federal, provincial and municipal governments with respect to this problem and the general attitude of the population which varies from indifference to apathy and accusations against the young people themselves. The council recognizes that the issue of unemployment among young people is part of the bigger problem of unemployment and underemployment and cannot be dealt with separately. However its seriousness and chronic nature as well as the long term disastrous effects it could have if nothing is done make it a very critical issue from an economic, political and social point of view and we should not forget this.
A detailed analysis of this bill leads us to conclude that the aim of this program is to provide an opportunity for students to get some form of experience and training they will be able to use in the future. The aim itself is quite laudable, but we have to wonder how the government is going to improve the situation if it does not take immediately the necessary steps to ensure some continuity and permanency to this program. It is sometimes difficult to understand the attitude of the government which seems to direct its legislation on unemployment by hiring figures jugglers who do their best to reduce the unemployment benefits by using various means of computing that do not reflect the exact facts concerning unemployment in Canada and above all do not take into account the difficulties encountered by unemployed people who cannot find jobs even though commission officials force them to follow complex procedures based on regulations established by imaginative but unrealistic technocrats. There is no need to have a university degree to know that it is almost impossible to find jobs when the unemployment rate is between 8 to 25 per cent in some areas. All government jugglers should orient their efforts toward job creation instead of doing calculations to reduce unemployment benefits.
On April 14, 1977, the Montreal newpaper La Presse reported the number of unemployed in Canada was dangerously approaching the catastrophic level of one million. Time has come for the government to use every means at its disposal to create jobs and allow those thousands of discouraged unemployed people to get organized to earn a good living honourably. Many suggestions have been submitted to the attention of the government to create long term employment. Some have suggested launching a housing program for the elderly; in rural districts, why not such a home in every parish instead of only one by region so as to use the necessary money to help the disabled, the blind and all those who are physically hand-
[Mr. Dionne (Kamouraska).)
icapped whom we are prone to forget too easily. A great number of practical activities could be created in the field of forest protection and that would contribute to create thousands of jobs during periods when that activity is most needed. It should be possible under shared cost programs to organize reforestation activities to reclaim abandoned farm lands.
Many public buildings could be built-post offices, refrigerated warehouses and how many repairs would have to be made to wharves in several areas! Many wharves on the south shore are drifting away while provincial and federal authorities quarrel about who is going to maintain them and under what terms. I have before me an article published in the local newspaper on Wednesday, June 1, 1977, mentioning that the rate of unemployment reaches 33 per cent in Kamouraska West, and also in another paper, Le Machiniste canadien, of June 1977, under the heading "A big lie", one can read, and I quote:
We have all heard it said that the unemployed are simply lazy people who want to live at the expense of society and the taxpayers. It is a misleading attitude, even if it shared by as influent an organization as the Canadian Manufacturers Association. The reason people are unemployed in this country is quite simply that there are no jobs for them. Government figures prove it.
Statistics Canada published last month a survey showing that in the first quarter of this year there were only 35,400 full time jobs available in all this country and for all classes of jobs. That agency revealed at about the same time that the number of unemployed had "officially" reached 914,000 in April. So there was a gap of 816,600 between the number of unemployed and the number of jobs available ...
And you have Unemployment Insurance Commission officers telling people: Look for jobs!
Even if we admit that there are lazy people, 10,000 and even 100,000, there are still a lot of people who want to work and do not have anything to do. So it is the majority of Canadian unemployed who want to work.
At present, as I suggested at the beginning of my remarks, there is no way a bill like this can be supported. We see from the way it is written how social welfare is increasingly becoming the form of assistance for unemployed workers. Unemployment insurance having changed-not always for the better-so as to deprive an increasingly greater number of unemployed of their benefits by extending the qualification period and shortening the number of weeks of coverage, tens of thousands of unemployed will no longer be eligible for unemployment insurance and will probably go on social welfare.
This clearly discriminatory and disloyal strategy of the federal government will massively affect the population of eastern Canada, Quebec and the Maritime provinces. The compensatory job creation program is still insufficient and insignificant in relation to the considerable savings that the federal government is achieving on the backs of the provinces. The central government is gradually and shamefully transferring its responsibilities for fighting unemployment to the provinces. This transfer of the unemployed maintenance burden is the result of many investigations, but it is still unfavourable to the unemployed.
Among all the lengthy reports that contain all kinds of statistics, I have not seen one about the many cases of unemployed who were not given their benefits because of administrative foul-ups resulting from a badly-made law whose vari-
July 4, 1977

ous sections were re-arranged and written by highly paid technocrats who know nothing about the needs of the unemployed. The high officials, who are never unemployed, use their authority according to theoretical studies of economic mechanisms without taking sufficiently into account the human factors that should be the most important. Oh yes! There has been a lot of publicity about a few cases of fraud. 1 recognize that there can be some claimants who occasionally break the law, but 1 can also prove that, in most cases, it is because of mistakes due to the complexity of the act and the regulations, especially in the case of income earned early during an employment period.
The delay on the part of the commission in sending its weekly reports is one of the main reasons. It is rather easy to see for anyone even remotely aware of the various means by which the law and its regulations are applied. 1 do not understand why people can be inclined to support a bill that will inevitably continue to create a lot of problems in our regions, particularly in those where unemployment is the highest, but of course I guess this is too complicated. However, it seems to me that it would be easy to draft certain texts of law that would be understandable by the people who are unemployed. All these people have not attended university and they have to deal with bills which they do not understand. Besides, there are a lot of civil servants who do not understand them either.
1 remember having put a question to the committee on two clauses of Bill C-229, asking what was meant there. 1 was then answered that it was just legal talk, that those things were written just in case someone would take this issue to the superior court. Then inevitably, if they draft laws such as the one before us, how will it be possible for workers who have to deal with the various problems of unemployment ever to get a little understanding. The Unemployment Insurance Commission has paid out millions of dollars to the unemployed in the course of 1975 and 1976 because there was a lot of unemployment. I still think that the government should rather get itself moving to create jobs. In fact, such efforts are done on a very small scale. Nevertheless, 1 still wish to thank those who contributed in fostering employment in the riding of Kamou-raska with projects under the Local Initiatives Program, or Young Canada Works, Canada Works programs but 1 must say, it is not sufficient in the present situation. We must have other big work schemes. There are a lot of tasks which should be undertaken. 1 have mentioned before certain projects which could be launched, whereby people would get jobs that would earn them an income which at least would allow them to live and sustain their family. I must say that this is the only way of solving the unemployment problem.
It just will not help to give some technocrats and other civil servants very high salaries, which, as I was mentioning before range between $20,000, $25,000, $30,000 and $40,000 a year just to play with the texts of laws which are too complicated. The result of that situation is that you only end up making them more complicated while nothing gets solved. And what are we preparing by doing that, gentlemen of the government? We are just paving the way for revolt. It is sad to say it but if
Employment and Immigration
we do not react by helping workers, we will have to bear the consequences of that inaction.


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


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, in our view, one of the most grievous shortcomings of the present government is its failure to recognize the very real seriousness of unemployment in Canada. That failure is demonstrated by the fact that it has scarcely looked at what could be done to solve unemployment. Instead, it has come forward with an amending bill which will make unemployment insurance more difficult for the unemployed to receive.
I hope I do not sound like someone giving a lecture based on past experience, instead of someone making a speech in the House of Commons, but I remind older members of the House, the ones of my generation-there are quite a few-that this country went through an unemployment experience in the 1930s which was indeed tragic. I know it seems that we can have more persons unemployed today than we had in the 1930s and yet not be faced with the almost rebellious and revolutionary situation we faced in that decade. I think one of the reasons is that, after the experience of the 1930s, we won in parliament a good deal of social legislation the result of which is that even in times of unemployment there is money of some sort in the pockets of most people.
That was not the case in the decade of the 1930s. When persons were unemployed then, many of them did not handle any money month after month. They collected vouchers which entitled them to food hand-outs or meals in a soup kitchen. The went to work in my city of Winnipeg in the woodyard. They went out to dig the Grassmere ditch. They were sent to River Heights, to pick dandelions off the grass, in return for which they collected vouchers for food.


John R. Rodriguez: Dandelions make good wine.


Stanley Howard Knowles: That was not so
well known in those days; certainly that was not the purpose. The memories of some members of this House of those days are vivid. Younger members who do not recollect those days, or whose parents did not describe those days to them when they were children, would do well to read a book written within the last decade by James H. Gray, entitled "The Winter Years". That book effectively "tells it as it was".
That tragic decade was brought to an end by the outbreak of World War II. The combination of the unemployment of the 1930s and the following World War led, in the end, to a good deal of social legislation which ameliorated conditions, and still does today. But, Mr. Speaker, we delude ourselves, and this is where the present government is mistaken, if we assume that because there are not unemployed riding the boxcars, because there are not soup kitchens, because there are not riots in places like Regina, because there are not marches on
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Ottawa, the problem is not as serious today as it was then. I contend that present unemployment insidiously is doing untold damage to the fibre of our people and untold damage to the morale and unity of our country. I argue that the government ought to tackle unemployment seriously; it should not just make it more difficult for the unemployed to collect unemployment insurance benefits, which is all Bill C-27 does.
My recollections of the 1930s were reinforced by an experience which the hon. member for Winnipeg North (Mr. Orli-kow) and I underwent a short time ago. Taking advantage of June 24 being a holiday in Quebec and hence a holiday for the House of Commons, we set up a one-day hearing in our city, Winnipeg, inviting persons, organizations and groups to come before us and tell us about unemployment as they know it. We announced-I suppose that is why so many came-that neither one of us would make a speech.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: You must have had a mammoth crowd.


Steve Eugene Paproski: Yes, it must have filled a telephone booth.


Stanley Howard Knowles: We had quite a crowd. We made it clear we were there to listen. We heard from about 16 or 18 delegations during the day. Our sessions were held in one of the rooms of the University of Winnipeg in my constituency. Of the delegations we heard, only one actually suggested that there was no unemployment problem. It was the nurses' delegation, representging the Manitoba Association of Registered Nurses. When I said that, since I spend a good deal of time in Ontario to carry out my duties as a member of parliament, I had heard about nurses being unemployed in that province, the answer was, yes, the association knew that. I was told some hospitals in this province had been closed, which was one of the reasons Ontario nurses were moving out there.


John R. Rodriguez: The hospitals were closed by a Tory government.


Stanley Howard Knowles: But that was the only delegation saying there was no unemployment problem. We heard from various trade unions and varous groups and organizations. But what impressed me most, and 1 discussed it with my hon. friend for Winnipeg North, who will be along later this evening-if he makes the same speech I am making, that does not mean there has been collaboration between us- was the case made to us on behalf of young people. It was made in particular on behalf of two different kinds or groups of young people. On the one hand we had representatives of students of the University of Winnipeg and the University of Manitoba who told us of surveys they had made showing that a substantial number of graduates of last year and the year before had not yet found work. The plaintive case they made to us was that it was damaging and demoralizing for young persons to go to university with the thought of ultimately being able to make a special contribution to society, only to find, on coming out, that there is no place for them.

1 will spell out a bit just how the day ran. We had one university group in the morning, and another in the afternoon. In that way, they did not hear each other. However, both university groups had the same story. They were wondering what was ahead for them and for this country, when there are no jobs for many of those we put through university, with all the years of study and sacrifice that they make. The other group of young people represented at those sessions held in Winnipeg on June 24 was from areas like my own of Winnipeg North Centre and Winnipeg North where many do not get to university. They get through elementary school and high school at best. For them, too, there are no jobs.
We had social workers there, pleading with us to bring to parliament the message that these young people are not just discouraged because there are no jobs, but they are finding their way in increasing number into institutions of various kinds. I remember, in particular, one sister from one of these organizations pleading with us to realize what the unemployment situation is doing to the very lives, character and future of the young people of this country.
I lived and worked through the 1930s. I could not write the book that James H. Gray wrote, but I can certainly tell the story of those days. Some of us came into politics because of what we went through in the thirties. I say what is happening today is worse. In the thirties, the economy had ground to a halt. There were things that could be done to get us out of that. However, if we do not get out of this, if we go on causing young people, whether they are of the upper levels who can get to university, or the levels that do not get there, to find that there is nothing for them to do, God help us in the years and decades that lie ahead.
This is a problem of great seriousness. I see no evidence that the government across the way appreciates that seriousness at all. I said a while ago that in my view unemployment is not only damaging the fibre of our people as individuals, but it is doing great disservice to the morale and unity of this country.
1 hope, Mr. Speaker, that you will not think I am getting into tomorrow's debate. That will come. I am talking about unemployment and unemployment insurance.
One of the major reasons there are stresses and strains in the Canadian confederation is the economic conditions. When unemployment is as high as it has been for a long time in the province of Quebec, one cannot blame the people of Quebec for wanting a shake-up, wanting something new. When unemployment is high in the other parts of Canada, the people in those parts look for someone to blame. The tendency has been around for a long while to blame the other group, the other racial division. That has been exaggerated because of the unemployment that is. there. If we really want to save our country tomorrow, we must do more than our dedication to a national and united country. Let us not indulge in platitudes and speeches, thinking that the language issue is the only issue. The fundamental issues that disturb the people of this country are the social and economic bread and butter issues. I do not
July 4, 1977

see any evidence of the government realizing the seriousness of the situation.
1 plead as strongly as I can with the government to realize that this is not something that is passing just in 1976, 1977 or 1978. It is not something that is so much less worse than unemployment in the thirties that we do not need to worry about it. The future of life in Canada, the future of our country, can depend very largely on whether we can find socially useful and productive employment for all the people of this country.
My friend, the hon. member for Hamilton West (Mr. Alexander), in the better part of his speech had a good deal to say, with which I thoroughly agree, about the loss that we suffer every day that nothing is done about unemployment. He cited the millions of dollars that we lose every day, not just in terms of the money that is being paid out in unemployment insurance but in terms of the production that is not produced. This country still needs housing on a massive scale. This country still needs urban renewal in all the cities of Canada. This country still needs modern and efficient transportation systems across the country and in our urban centres. These things call for employment in excess of the numbers that are unemployed today. For the government to sit there and try to run the country, when it cannot find a way to put together people and resources to produce those things that are needed, is a sham, and that government ought not to be sitting there today.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Stanley Howard Knowles: 1 plead for serious consideration of the most effective answer to unemployment which, in the simplest terms, is employment. In the simplest terms, it is to put the country to work producing those things that our people need.
Hon. members are quite used to hearing my voice concerning all aspects of pension matters. One of the things that I plead for is the possibility of earlier retirement. 1 do not ask that it be made compulsory, not in the least. However, I firmly believe that if pensions such as old age security and the Canada Pension Plan were made available on a voluntary basis at age 60 instead of age 65, many of our workers would take advantage of that opportunity. There are many jobs where one does not want to quit. I am an example of one who does not want to quit.


John R. Rodriguez: What about the Senate?


Stanley Howard Knowles: Forget that. That is not work. It is one thing, at my age of 69, to enjoy being in parliament. It is another thing, at age 50, 55, 58 or 60, to go day after day into the rolling mills, railway shops, mines, textile factories, packing plants or forests and do backbreaking work. On occasion I talk to workers at the shop gates. They put many things to me, but the thing that is spoken to me most about is earlier retirement so that they can escape from the rat race and have a chance to live.
Employment and Immigration
All power to those who have the kind of job where they can stay on, but I suggest that it would be a practical, positive solution for a goodly number of our unemployed if earlier retirement were made possible. But can we get these people across the way to take a look at this proposition? No. They say we are trying to force people to retire, instead of making it voluntary. They say that the country cannot afford something for those between 60 and 65 because there are others below 60 who are having a hard time. Granted there are these kinds of problems, but is the government examining them? No. Its answer to unemployment is to make unemployment insurance more difficult to get. Hon. members opposite say they are responsible. They say they are the government of the country and that they are running it. They are running it into the ground.
A while ago my hon. friend from Kamouraska referred to the guaranteed annual income-something else that we on this side of the House are proclaiming-and suggested it was one way to answer unemployment, that it was a real way of sharing available work, and that it was a form of security. But can we get the government to examine this? No. It has to be discussed with the provinces, says the government; the provinces do not want it, and so on. These so-and-so's across the way are presiding over a country rich in natural resources, rich in real wealth, rich in people who are prepared to work. Yet they cannot somehow put things together so that goods can be produced to provide a guaranteed income for all our people, to provide for voluntary retirement, and to provide for the production of those things which our people need.


Steve Eugene Paproski: They would like an election, Stanley. That is all they think about.


Stanley Howard Knowles: My hon. friend says that what those across the way want is an election. The only reason they want an election is that they think that can put them back in office for another three or four years.
I have already mentioned my age, Mr. Speaker, which simply tells you how many years 1 have had to endure this country under a Liberal government, the kind that keeps fooling us about what they are going to do, from Mackenzie King on down, and never really coming to grips with the problems and issues that face us. 1 submit that we never had a better example of that than we have today. Here is this tremendous social problem, the tragedy of unemployment which is hitting our people, yet the Minister of Manpower and Immigration (Mr. Cullen) brings in Bill C-27, the only effect of which is to make it more difficult for unemployed people to collect unemployment insurance. It makes it more difficult in a number of ways. The most serious way of all, of course, is that it increases the number of weeks which a person has to be attached to the labour market in order to collect unemployment insurance, at a time when in some parts of the country it is difficult to get any attachment at all. The government has also built up a complicated mass of machinery for running the program which is bound to take first prize for the impossible.
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Employment and Immigration How the government has any moral right to stay in office, Mr. Speaker, 1 simply do not understand. This is why I stand here today pleading with the House, and particularly with the government, to take this issue seriously. This is not something which is simply passing. It is not just the experience of the 1930's on a lesser scale. It is a tragic thing which is doing damage to the character and the fibre of our people. It is doing damage to the morale and the unity of our country. I feel very strongly that something better than this bill should be brought in.
In the meantime we have the bill in front of us. I know it has been debated at length at second reading, in the standing committee and at the report stage, but it still has in it these provisions which make it so difficult for unemployed persons to collect their unemployment insurance. There are a number of clauses in the bill that ought to be reconsidered by the standing committee, though even that is not enough. No matter how good an unemployment insurance bill is brought in, it would not be enough. We need other things too, such as production, employment-a whole host of pieces of social legislation. But at least we ought to reconsider this change from an eight week attachment to 14, with a sliding scale and all the complications.
Therefore, Mr. Speaker, because I believe we should still review this whole bill, and because in particular I think the bill should be sent back to committee for a reconsideration of the attachment clauses, which make it more difficult to qualify for unemployment insurance, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Cape Breton-East Richmond (Mr. Hogan):
That the motion be amended by deleting all the words after the word "That", and by substituting therefor the following words:
"Bill C-27 be not now read a third time, but that it be referred back to the Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration for the purpose of reconsidering clauses 29 and 30 thereof."


Mr. Cyril Symes (Sault Ste. Marie):: Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the amendment just proposed by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) to Bill C-27, which deals with amendments to the Unemployment Insurance Act. We in the New Democratic Party have fought this bill in the House and in committee because we believe it does a serious injustice to the one million unemployed Canadians.
The bill is a sham in terms of government seriousness regarding the plight of the unemployed. It is an attempt by this cruel and heartless Liberal government to make the unemployed of Canada the scapegoat for the government's own economic failings. No responsible member of parliament elected by his constituents to stand up for their rights, whether they be employed or unemployed, can support this iniquitous legislation which fails to address itself to the nature of our unemployment and to the reason why the people of Canada who want work cannot find it. Rather than assist them in their hour of need, this will only discriminate against them.
If the amendments in this bill are passed, we are going to throw an extra quarter of a million, perhaps even one third of a million, Canadians off the unemployment rolls. This bill will lengthen the qualifying period for a person to become eligible

for unemployment insurance. In view of the unemployment rate of 8 per cent and the lack of job creating policies on the part of this Liberal government, the situation can only get worse. As people become unemployed the government has the nerve and callousness to disqualify them from receiving benefits which they have contributed to over the years.
We hear from the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) that what is at issue here is leadership in this country. I ask the Prime Minister and his Liberal supporters: where is the leadership in creating jobs and reducing unemployment in the kind of approach we see before us in this bill? Instead of attacking the number one problem of unemployment, this bill attacks the unemployed, and we in this party will not stand for it.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Reginald Cyril Symes: The minister tries to do the double shuffle by appearing to be active in trying to change this bill and attacking the problem of unemployment. He said that there are a number of Canadians today who are not really serious about working, that these people move in and out of the work force on a temporary basis, that these people really do not need the extra money, that these are not long term attachments to the work force and therefore are artificially pushing up the unemployment rate and proving to be a drain on unemployment insurance funds. That is the type of rationale behind this bill, that unemployment is really not that bad. To prove it, the government wants to disqualify a number of people from receiving unemployment benefits. 1 reject that kind of argument.
In the past I have risen to try to bring forward statistics from government agencies which refute the claim that people who work eight weeks and draw unemployment insurance are really only minor attachments who are not serious about long term employment. When we look at the problem of the unemployed today and try to analyse who the unemployed are, we receive very revealing facts and figures. Of the one million unemployed in Canada, the shocking fact is that 48 per cent of those people are under the age of 25 years. In other words, the future generation, those we have supposedly educated and trained and will rely on to keep the country going in our old age, make up approximately half of our unemployed. This has got to be a serious problem, not only from the viewpoint of over-all statistics. What is this doing to the future of this country? It is disillusioning the people we will be relying on to keep this country great.
One of the reasons I left the teaching profession to enter politics was what 1 saw happening to some of the senior students I taught. These students had great potential to go on to post-secondary education, but they were not going on to universities or community colleges for job training because they saw some of their friends, who had gone on to university, graduating and not being able to find jobs commensurate with their training and, in some cases, not being able to find jobs at all. At that time I felt if that situation were allowed to continue and grow worse we would be building a generation in
July 4, 1977

this country who were becoming disillusioned about the system and the manner in which the government was operating. In the five years since I have been here, I have seen that situation worsen under the economic policies of this Liberal government.
When the young become disillusioned and when the whole concept of work becomes a foreign one, because people cannot find jobs, then the country is in serious trouble. Yet the government cannot seem to recognize that young people today do not want to go to university and their parents and they themselves do not want to spend hundreds and thousands of dollars getting that kind of training, only to find there are no jobs available when they graduate.
What kind of response do we see? Instead of a commitment to reduce unemployment and to provide jobs for these young people, under the callous leadership of the Prime Minister we hear the government saying to the young people: "Well, you can leave the country". That is the type of response we receive to the problem of unemployment for the young and, in an even worse sense, it is found in this bill.
Because of high unemployment, young people today have not had a chance to contribute for eight weeks in order to qualify for unemployment insurance should they be laid off, which in all probability will happen as long as this government is in power, and that qualifying period is going to be increased to anywhere from 10 weeks to 14 weeks.
All we receive from the federal Liberals are token responses to the problem of unemployment. We get Opportunities For Youth Programs and Local Initiatives Programs. Those programs only provide temporary part-time work at minimum wages, and thus fail. Then the government comes up with new names such as Canada Works and Young Canada Works, which also will only provide temporary make-work projects.
Another response of the government is to create the myth that 6 per cent or 7 per cent unemployment is natural in this country and not serious, as women and young people make up a large proportion of the unemployed. It also tinkers with the unemployment insurance system to make it appear that the government is trying to do something. Another more insidious method is to tell the public that it has to live with high unemployment in Canada, which is somehow indigenous to our country and that the problem is too big to solve. In this bill, that is recognized by the action of disqualifying people, who want to work, from receiving benefits when through no fault of their own they become unemployed.
1 reject the underlying philosophy, exhibited in this bill, that nothing of any real substance can be done about unemployment. Other industrialized countries in the western world, such as France, Japan, Britain, Sweden and Germany, between the years 1962 and 1973, had an average unemployment rate of 1.8 per cent. During that same period of time Canada had an average unemployment rate of 5.1 per cent. I have to ask myself why it is that other countries can do something about the high rate of unemployment but under the Liberal government Canada cannot. I reject the argument that nothing can be done, except to tinker with unemployment insurance or to
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implement temporary make-work programs such as Canada Works.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Reginald Cyril Symes: Other countries can do it. Surely there is enough competence in this country to do it, but obviously it is not going to be found on the government benches. The government says we cannot afford the cost of full employment programs. I say we cannot afford the cost of high unemployment which amounts to billions of dollars in lost goods, services, taxes, and unemployment insurance payments.
The major problem affecting national unity is unemployment. Look at any of the surveys carried out in Quebec and you will find that the major concern of Quebecers is unemployment and the failure of the federal government to show a meaningful presence in the economy by creating jobs. No wonder the Quebecers are disillusioned with the federal system when they see that the government has consistently allowed unemployment in the province to be higher in Quebec, comparably, over the years than in other provinces.
If we were to reduce unemployment by 350,000 we would add more than $6 billion to the gross national product, a sum equal to the cost of five Olympic games. I am arguing that we must create jobs rather than engage in the kind of nonsense we see in the bill before us. The government should be addressing itself to changing the structure of our economy to one which perpetually creates high unemployment. If other countries can bring down their unemployment rates by restructuring their economy, we can do so.
We shall never solve the unemployment problem as long as we continue to be dependent upon the export of raw materials as opposed to processing and manufacturing here. I come from a region in Northern Ontario where we are blessed with large supplies of raw materials. But I see what is happening. We are digging out our minerals and chopping down our trees and exporting the raw materials to other countries. As we do so, we export jobs, because the jobs are where the material is refined and processed. As long as we allow this to continue we shall remain hewers of wood and drawers of water. If the government were serious about restructuring this aspect of the economy, we could create jobs here at home. Instead, the government allows foreign-owned companies to buy up our minerals and forest products and export them to other countries so that the parent corporations can enjoy the benefits of manufacturing the finished goods.
Is it any wonder that today, because of the policy followed by successive Liberal governments, 60 per cent of our manufacturing industry is foreign-owned, and that over 95 per cent of our oil industry is foreign-owned? When foreign direction exists to such an extent is it any wonder we should continue to export our resources and, in the process, to export jobs ? Is it any wonder that when there are economic problems affecting parent companies in the United States the first lay-offs should affect Canadian subsidiaries? Is it any wonder that virtually

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no research and development is being done in Canada, with the result that our own research scientists and university graduates cannot find jobs here? Until we tackle the issue of foreign ownership we shall not be able to restructure the economy in such a way as to reduce the exporting of our raw materials, and jobs with them.
Instead of tackling unemployment by ending programs which have created it, such as the anti-inflation program, the government insists on continuing them. The anti-inflation program has taken hundreds of millions out of the pockets of wage-earners. Is it any wonder that we find ourselves in a situation in which factories have to reduce production because fewer people are buying goods? Is it any wonder that factories today are operating at only 83 per cent of capacity, or that they should be forced to lay off employees, with the result that unemployment worsens? We contended when the government introduced the anti-inflation program that it would only increase unemployment. Today this is apparent, but the program goes on nevertheless. What is the response? It is to tinker with the unemployment insurance system, making it worse, to give the appearance that the government is trying to do something about unemployment.
Supporters of this bill are failing to recognize that the number one problem facing this country is the shortage of jobs. We in this party will continue to oppose these amendments because they make it even more difficult for the unemployed to survive. If these people are disqualified their only resource is to starve in the streets or get assistance from municipal welfare, throwing an increased burden upon municipal governments which have the least ability to raise funds.
We want to see changes in the unemployment insurance program but, more important, we want to see increased employment opportunities.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Order. It being six o'clock the House stands adjourned until 8 p.m.
At six o'clock the House took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The House resumed at 8 p.m.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Does the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Gillespie) have the unanimous consent of the House to revert to motions to table some documents?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.
[Mr. Symes.J



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Alastair William Gillespie: Mr. Speaker, I want to table, under the provisions of Standing Order 41(2), in both official languages, volume 1, "Reasons for Decision, Northern Pipelines," issued by the National Energy Board, and the technical supporting volumes 2 and 3 under the same name dealing with the technical, economic, financial, social, and environmental questions to which the National Energy Board addressed itself.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Cullen that Bill C-27, to establish a Department of Employment and Immigration, the Canada Employment and Immigration Commission and the Canada Employment and Immigration Advisory Council, to amend the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971 and to amend certain other statutes in consequence thereof, be read the third time and do pass.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Order, please. At six o'clock the hon. member for Sault Ste. Marie (Mr. Symes) had the floor.


Reginald Cyril Symes: Mr. Speaker, before we adjourned for the dinner hour I was addressing myself to the amendments before us in Bill C-27 to amend the Unemployment Insurance Act, and I was developing the argument that the government, rather than addressing itself to the fundamental and pressing problem of unemployment, preferred to tinker with the unemployment insurance system.
I was trying to outline why 1 rejected many of the arguments the government was putting forward to justify these changes to the Unemployment Insurance Act which will affect the unemployed at a time in our country's history when they are least able to defend themselves, at a time when our unemployment is as high as 8 per cent, and the projections are that it will be higher. I was pointing out that, rather than tinkering with the system, we need some fundamental changes in the structure of our economy to get away from always developing and exporting raw materials instead of processing them here in Canada, and that we should end the anti-inflation program which has created higher unemployment through
July 4, 1977

lowering demand in the economy by rolling back workers' wages.
1 also want to stress that the government should be taking initiatives in the public sector that have some meaning in terms of job creation, that it should be undertaking some projects which meet direct human needs which the country is facing at this time. 1 can think of programs that we implemented back in 1972 when we had a lower unemployment rate and yet the government, because it was a minority parliament, found the money to institute needed capital projects for municipalities. I think of the construction of sewer and water mains, roads, transport facilities, and aid to institutions such as hospitals. These are areas in which there is a genuine need today to provide services and amenities, and yet we still have one million Canadians unemployed and a government that prefers to tax workers with higher unemployment insurance premiums rather than commit itself to some of these effective capital works projects that provided people with work in the past and provided the general public with needed services.
At a time when there is one million unemployed, the government cannot tell me that it has no precedent on which to base some kind of job creation program. 1 am not talking about the namby-pamby Canada Works projects that it keeps coming up with, or some of the provisions in the bill that we discussed earlier, such as work sharings to which the hon. member for Nickel Belt (Mr. Rodriguez) referred. At a time when the majority of Canadians do not have adequate shelter, the government should be doing something about high unemployment by instituting a housing program of some substance. To inject more funds into that would return to the federal Treasury funds ten-fold over as workers got back to work and carried their fair share of paying taxes and spending on goods and services. A housing program that would be meaningful is needed desperately, and it would provide jobs. We also know there are many homes needing repairs and renovations. We know that government assistance in urban renewal is needed. Municipalities have been begging the government not to cut back on urban programs but to maintain adequate funding and, indeed, to increase funding in that area. Yet we get a negative response.
I cannot allow the Minister of Manpower and Immigration (Mr. Cullen) to say that there are not ways to create jobs through the public sector. We know of instances in the past where there have been programs to develop parks, environmental clean-up programs and energy conservation programs, and programs like that could be undertaken now to a much greater degree than the phony and hollow program the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Gillespie) announced recently. Programs for community services would not only provide services but also jobs.
The hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) mentioned the idea of voluntary retirement at age 60. This would make new jobs available for people in the work
Employment and Immigration
force. Let us not accept the argument that unemployment is such a big problem that it escapes solution.
I pointed out that Canada has the worst unemployment record in the industrialized world. Through imaginative programs in the public and private sectors other countries have been able to reduce unemployment significantly. I categorically reject the negative thinking and the bankruptcy of ideas that the federal Liberals have imposed upon this country and upon the one million unemployed. That is not economic leadership, that is a rejection of the fundamental idea that a government has a responsibility to the people to create and maintain a sound economy.
We in the New Democratic Party feel that this bill would discriminate against the unemployed in the areas of the country where it is virtually impossible to find long-term work. It is no accident that in Atlantic Canada, Quebec, and northern Ontario there is a lack of long-term jobs. That lack exists because of the nature of the regional economies of those areas.
I have been to Atlantic Canada; I come from northern Ontario, and I know what I am talking about. The figures show that in these regions those who can find temporary work are seasonally employed people. In Atlantic Canada, for instance, they work in fish plants for certain amounts of time when those plants are operating, or in some of the woodland operations, or in service industries. In areas like that where the economies are chronically weak, no matter how people try, they cannot find long-term work.
What does this bill do? It raises the qualifying period from eight weeks of employment before a person becomes eligible for unemployment insurance if he becomes unemployed to anywhere from ten to 14 weeks. We have pointed out that that kind of modification will throw anywhere from a quarter of a million to a third of a million people off the unemployment insurance roll and will force them on to municipal welfare rolls because, contrary to what the minister says, these are not people who are just marginally attached to the work force and who really do not need to work. These are young people looking for their first jobs or for jobs to finance higher education. They are women who have been forced to go out to work to supplement their family income because of the government's failure to keep down rising costs. They are people who have to work because their families depend on their incomes, and for the government to disqualify those young people, those women and those unskilled workers, when we have high unemployment, is cruel, heartless, and totally unjustified.
On the average in the Atlantic provinces and in Quebec, excluding the city of Montreal, we find that the requirement before one can become eligible for unemployment insurance benefits will be about ten weeks of employment. In Ontario it will range anywhere from 13 to 14 weeks. In my part of the province, northern Ontario, I suspect it will be about 13. On the prairies it will be about 14 weeks, and in B.C. 10 or 11 weeks. The hon. member for Nickel Belt pointed out that when the government institutes these 54 regions with their varying periods of qualification, there will be a bureaucratic nightmare. We already have problems with the Unemployment

July 4, 1977
Employment and Immigration
Insurance Act as it is. When we divide the country into 54 regions, we will run into problems with people moving from one region to another.
I predict that this minister will have to hire more civil servants to make the already overgrown bureaucracy in his department even fatter. Worse than that, we will have an unjustified application of this act because we know that even within a region there will be differences. In Sault Ste. Marie there may be an unemployment rate of 7 per cent, but in the town of Blind River just a few miles away there might be unemployment rates of anywhere from 14 per cent to 20 per cent. There are regions like that all across Canada. People in towns which have chronic high unemployment are going to be caught by this increased qualifying period, and they will not be able to find jobs. They will be thrown off the unemployment insurance rolls and forced on to city welfare rolls.
This is a bad piece of legislation. It does not attack the fundamental problem of unemployment. Indeed, it attacks the unemployed. I know the minister likes to present the argument that the people who are going to be affected most are young people and housewives, those who really do not need to work, according to the minister. However, his own statistics gathered by his department and by Statistics Canada prove the contrary, that people who are eight to 11-weekers, those who can find only temporary work, are not the majority of those who are claiming unemployment insurance benefits. The minister tries to make the public think that this is a great number of people and that these are the groups who are draining the unemployment insurance fund, milking it and cheating it. That is just not so.
When we look at the statistics on the operation of the unemployment insurance system we find, for example, that in the first five months of 1976 those who worked eight to 11 weeks made up only 15 per cent of all the beneficiaries of unemployment insurance. That is not the great majority. The minister says that even if the figure is only 15 per cent, those people are not serious about working. He says they are in and out of the labour force trying to make a fast buck, and then drawing benefits.
In the first five months of 1976 63.8 per cent of all eight to 11-weekers in the work force were in Quebec and in the Atlantic provinces, areas with low job vacancy levels and histories of only seasonal work. They are not just housewives and young people. Many of them are adult males and heads of households who have to depend on unemployment insurance to keep bread on the table for their families because they can find jobs lasting only eight to 11 weeks, seasonal work. They have to depend on unemployment insurance benefits because of the government's mismanagement of the economy.
If that is not enough to convince the minister, we find that more men than women will be affected by this change in the Unemployment Insurance Act. To the argument raised by the Conservatives that the main beneficiaries of the eight-week attachment period were women and young people, riot serious

participants in the work force, the former minister said at the Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration, on May 28, 1975, as recorded at the bottom of page 19:18:
I think it is a bit of a red herring myself. I think there are other areas that have to be tidied up in the act that are far more significant than that favourite whipping boy of the short-term-work claimant.
Earlier, speaking of the eight-week attachment period, he said:
The incidence of disentitlement or disqualification, as an effect of failure to meet one's obligation under the act, is lower amongst the group with a minor attachment (eight weeks) to the work force as their proportion of the total claims load than those with a long-term attachment to the work force.
I refer to the following figures again only because I know the minister has a hard time understanding them. In June, 1976, only 12'/2 per cent of unemployment insurance recipients were under 20 years of age; adult women made up 41.7 per cent of recipients, and adult men, 45.8 per cent.
Moreover, let no one accept the phony argument that of the women who collected unemployment insurance benefits, there were some who did not need to work to support the family. A study of unemployment in the years 1971 and 1973 found that unemployed wives tended to come from families with low incomes-women who had to work to meet the family bills, the higher food costs, higher clothing costs and higher energy costs.
This party argues that the proposed changes in the Unemployment Insurance Act to increase the qualifying period will hit hardest the young people and women who need to supplement the family income; they will hit hardest at areas of chronically high unemployment such as Atlantic Canada and Quebec and will not help the unemployed, as the minister likes to claim, by saving money that could be directed into other programs. The changes would just take money away from the unemployed in one area to help the unemployed in another and, in our opinion, that is no way to tackle this crucial problem.
I have tried to outline ways the government could act to create jobs. I have tried to show how this act will be discriminatory. It will hurt the unemployed, especially in regions where people cannot find long-term work. For these reasons this party will fight the bill to the end and try to convince the minister that this is not the approach he should take. He should be creating jobs, not attacking the unemployed.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Andrew Hogan: Mr. Speaker, when the Minister of Manpower and Immigration (Mr. Cullen) gave notice of changes to this act in December, 1976, the Minister of Labour for the province of Nova Scotia was quoted on the front page of the Halifax Chronicle-Herald as saying that such a move at this time could impose serious economic hardships in Nova Scotia. He said that the timing was wrong, that many people who wanted jobs could not get them, that the real unemployment figures were soaring and not just because people did not want to work. He also said that the provincial social services department would have to pick up
July 4, 1977

the slack for many jobless people left without UIC payments under the proposed changes. He is a Liberal, but was advancing an argument that this party has used in this House and which was repeated this afternoon in the speech of the hon. member for Nickel Belt (Mr. Rodriguez).
We find it incredible that at a time of the highest unemployment since the depression, this government attacks unemployment by proposing a change in the eligibility for benefits, thus indirectly attacking the unemployed who need help the most.
Members from northeastern New Brunswick where 25 per cent to 30 per cent unemployment is normal, from Cape Breton as 1 am where 20 per cent to 25 per cent unemployment is normal, or from Newfoundland where most areas except St. John's are equally affected, are all appalled that at this time, when this nation has such high unemployment, the government would be so heartless and cruel as to offer these changes as a means of alleviating the problems which affect the poor and the low income groups.
This afternoon the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) described the depression and its effects upon the people. Although he did not argue that unemployment is felt as severely now as then, he said that in many ways the effect could be worse because if unemployment amongst the younger generation keeps increasing we will in effect be sitting on a tinder box. We are alarmed at the composition of the unemployed in this nation and the growing unemployment amongst young people-the minister had the nerve to refer to them as kids-young adults graduating from high school ready to enter university, vocational or technical schools at a time when all these institutions are increasing their fees. Both parents need to work to meet the increased cost of living, and the consumer price index is rising to a higher level than was anticipated by the Anti-Inflation Board even four months ago.
The path we are following could easily lead us to doubledigit inflation by next new year yet all the government offers at this time to low income people is a proposal to tighten eligibility for unemployment insurance benefits.
The reason there is so much unemployment in Canada today is basically because there has been less than 5 per cent growth in the gross national product for three years in a row. 1 know the minister and his cohorts who draft the changes to the Unemployment Insurance Act do not like to hear us quote the Economic Council of Canada. The basic reason is that we had 3.2 per cent growth in 1974; the rate went up .6 per cent in 1975, was 4.6 per cent in 1976, and right now, according to first quarter figures and the report of the Conference Board, we shall be lucky if we see a growth rate of 4 per cent, a rate which will not even absorb new entrants to the labour force. Therefore one must conclude that unless we can keep young people in school longer or use gimmicks to keep them out of the labour force, unemployment this winter will be between 8.5 per cent and 9 per cent. The ones hardest hit will be young adults, and married women who must work to supplement the family income.
Employment and Immigration
The minister and hon. members opposite who spoke put forward a naive philosophy in support of this bill. Mr. Speaker, the proposed changes in eligibility will affect kids and housewives they say, but I say these are young adults and housewives who must work. If the head of a household earns $25,000 or more, there is no need for the wife or married partner to have a secondary attachment, or marginal attachment as the minister calls it, to the labour force. That family can maintain a decent standard of living. But if the head of the house is making less than $20,000 per year, the married partner must work in order to maintain a decent standard of living. Some call that materialistic. When our middle or upper classes want to improve or maintain their high standard of living, we do not say they are materialistic; therefore why should we accuse people earning between $12,000 and $14,000 a year of being materialistic if they want to aspire to a decent standard of living?


John R. Rodriguez: Right on.


Andrew Hogan: And I say nothing of the 20 per cent of Canadian families who live on a measly $6,000 or $7,000 a year.


An hon. Member:: The working poor.


Andrew Hogan: Yes, the working poor and the poor. This bill neglects them. Instead of changing the act, the government should change its policy, to provide jobs in this country.
The growth figures I mentioned previously show that at least 2 per cent or 3 per cent of Canadian unemployment is due to deficiency of growth, or what economists call deficiency of aggregate demand. In plain words that means there is too much unused factory capacity in this country. We underutilize our manufacturing sector and underutilize our human beings, as one can readily see from official unemployment figures. Those figures say nothing of the hidden unemployed. There may be between 200,000 and 400,000 more unemployed than our official figures show, depending on whose figures you accept. Our statistical unemployment figures do not reflect accurately our underutilization of human beings. Mr. Speaker, underutilized human beings and underutilized economic capacity are the main reasons for much of our unemployment.
When the Minister of Finance (Mr. Macdonald) brought down his budget recently he said implicitly something the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) had said explicitly, namely, that our people are trying to take too much out of the economy. He tried to recite the classical formula of inflation, too much money chasing to few goods. He used a monetarist argument which bears little relationship to our economy which suffers from the underutilization of human beings and factory capacity. Mr. Speaker, if it were a fact that Canadians are taking too much out of the economy, our factories would work at 100 per cent and unemployment rates would be in the vicinity of 4 per cent or 5 per cent. But that is not the case. Our unemployment rates are in the 8 per cent to 8.3 per cent region and, if the projections of the Conference Board based

July 4, 1977
Employment and Immigration
on first quarter figures are correct, this winter unemployment could go up to 9.0 per cent.
The minister, and the hon. member for Hamilton West (Mr. Alexander), have suggested that we oppose job creation. That is nonsense. If the government had listened to my party's leader at the time of the last budget it would have cut taxes for this country's low income people, increased demand, and put our factories back to work. Instead of doing that, the Minister of Finance, on the advice of Mr. Bouey, Governor of the Bank of Canada, adopted the sort of policies Mr. Simon, United States Secretary of the Treasury under President Ford, adopted to fight inflation.
The government is trying to cure inflation by creating more unemployment, and the sad part of it is that it is not curing inflation, because it is getting worse. My authority for saying this is the projection of first quarters figures to which I referred earlier. Mr. Speaker, we must tackle both inflation and unemployment. You cannot argue simplistically that cutting income tax for lower income groups would so increase aggregate demand as to push inflation up. The government still thinks that too much money is chasing too few goods, and will not cut taxes for lower income people. On the other hand upper income groups already avail themselves of many tax loopholes, and if you increase their incomes you merely enable them to increase their personal savings. The people in the upper income levels are already increasing their savings, but the people lower down on the scale are not. We need to correct this.


Mr. Breau:: That is the government's policy.


Andrew Hogan: Of course it is the government's policy, but it is wrong.


Herb Breau: The hon. member is stating the government's policy.


John R. Rodriguez: Listen. He said it is wrong.


Andrew Hogan: I say the government should have decreased taxes for people at the lower end of the income scale. This would have stimulated demand and decreased unemployment. But the government chose not to do this. It should have acted to bring interest rates down. It chose not to do this because it is imbued with the notion that our inflation is a result of too much money chasing too few goods. When will the government get it into its head that its policies lead to the underutilization of human beings, as measured by our unemployment figures, official and hidden, and the underutilization of manufacturing capacity?
The government would not have increased inflation if it had cut taxes for lower income people. In the face of slack demand prices would not have risen. As it is, some powerful corporations could well push prices up in future; and such inflation could be termed cost-push inflation, which must be tackled by other means.


Herb Breau: Like wage and price controls.
(Mr. Hogan.]


Andrew Hogan: Which have worked beautifully, I suppose.


Herb Breau: And controls on big unions.


Andrew Hogan: You are controlling costs beautifully.


Herb Breau: Are we controlling the big unions?


Reginald Cyril Symes: You are taking the money out of the pockets of workers.


Herb Breau: Yes, workers making $10 an hour and more.


Andrew Hogan: Do you want to make a speech?


Mr. Orlikow:: He hasn't got the guts now, after what he said.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Order, please. Will the hon. member please address the Chair? He has been recognized, to allow him to make a speech.


Andrew Hogan: Mr. Speaker, the government's policies have led to a deficiency of aggregate demand and deficiency of growth, and are causing a great deal of hardship. At the same time, they are not tackling the structural problems of the Atlantic region, and other regions, including Ontario and Quebec. When will the government get the message that you cannot continue to protect with high tariffs that are the highest in the western world, about 30 per cent? They were started under Sir John A. Macdonald in 1879 and have continued until 1977. Now the government is finding that this is beginning to catch up to workers in the textile industry and other areas.
The government kept postponing the adjustments that had to be made. Plants did not modernize in Quebec and Ontario. We are paying for it with higher costs. It is now necessary to have import quotas in order to keep the unemployment rate in Ontario and Quebec from going sky high. There are other forms of protective measures as well.
The structures in the Atlantic region must be examined. DREE policies are not doing the job. 1 raised this with the representatives of the Economic Council of Canada when they appeared before the DREE meeting. There must be new types of institutions to co-ordinate better the funds for development going from the federal government to the provincial governments in order that there will be an actual increase in per capita earned income in the Atlantic region, instead of maintaining per capita income as the criterion by which we should be judging growth in the Atlantic region. You cannot judge growth in the Atlantic region in that way. You cannot argue on a per capita income basis as proof of development.
There must be more than just transfers in terms of unemployment insurance into these areas. There must be jobs. The people there must be allowed to make a productive contribution to the Canadian economy. We must close the gap of earned income per capita. However, the government does not
July 4, 1977

think along those lines. It only suggests that possibly new institutional arrangements will be needed.
No one pretends that in a federal state where there is a division between the federal and provincial levels of government and the child of provincial governments, the municipal governments, that it is easy to do these things.
We have to get at the root of the problem rather than by just making transfer payments into the Atlantic region, whether through baby bonus grants, unemployment insurance grants or what have you. That is really only a band-aid approach. That might sound too socialist to some people; what do they offer alternatively?


Robert Phillip Kaplan: That's nuts.


Andrew Hogan: You listen and I will tell you.


Robert Phillip Kaplan: It just doesn't add up.


Andrew Hogan: The hon. member for York Centre (Mr. Kaplan) should know that growth in the major metropolitan areas is buttressed by DREE at the expense of employment in the outlying areas. That is a situation in every province, starting from Newfoundland through to Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and into Quebec, Montreal and possibly Quebec City, where the large areas are supplemented by DREE. 1 know this is so in the Atlantic region. There is recently an attempt to change this, but it is not a serious attempt.
This is contributing to the over-all unemployment situation in Canada. This failure of government policy to create more growth is causing the cyclical high unemployment that we have at the present time. It is failing to correct regional disparities with serious efforts to increase earned income per capita in areas such as the Atlantic region and Quebec.
Several members have raised this point. I want to emphasize it once more. A very serious problem exists for the young people of this country. I am not talking about kids, but about people who have finished grade 12. We do not have grade 13 in my area. These people would like to go to vocational or technical schools and on to other forms of higher education.
These young people cannot get jobs because there is not enough money in Young Canada Works. The minister stated with regard to job creation that we do not need to worry about the effects of the change of eligibility for unemployment insurance. He stated that with the changes he is now introducing the Canada Works grants to these areas will offset any loss. I wish to quote some figures for the benefit of the minister.
For the first quarter net benefit period of 1976 for Glace Bay, these was $1,744 million in unemployment insurance. By 1977 that increased to $2.18 million. In Sydney it was $4.21 million for the first quarter of 1976, and $5.02 million for the first quarter of 1977. I have not referred to areas such as Port Hawkesbury and Inverness in the constituency of the hon. member for Cape Breton Highlands-Canso (Mr. MacEachen), but the situation is the same there.
Employment and Immigration
Active claimants for unemployment insurance for the first quarter of 1976 averaged 76 units of people. In Glace Bay last year there were 2,112, and for the first quarter of this year 2,260. Last year in Sydney there were 4,935, and 5,300 this year. This indicates a complete failure of the government's programs to create jobs in these areas. Why would they want to put more unemployment insurance money into those areas than money to create jobs? This is what the government has been doing with its LIP project, the son of LIP, Canada Works, and the son of OFY, Young Canada Works.
The minister solemnly stated in this House that Canada Works was different from LIP because it would create permanent jobs for 50 to 52 weeks of the year. It is true there is a difference between Canada Works and LIP in that there are two stages of Canada Works as opposed to one stage in LIP.
1 took down the figures the minister quoted. I found that the allocation to Cape Breton for the first part of the LIP grant was $349,000 for my constituency, $382,000 for the constituency of the hon. member for Cape Breton-The Sydneys (Mr. Muir), and $347,000 for the constituency of the hon. member for Cape Breton Highlands-Canso.


Herb Breau: There should be more there.


Andrew Hogan: If you want to offer patronage like you do, that is fine. In any event, that is not much money when you consider there were 14,445 persons on active claims at UIC offices throughout Cape Breton Island in February of this year. The total labour force for the Island was about 48,000. That means one in four was drawing unemployment insurance benefits and not contributing to the economy.
What is most discouraging is the fact that this does not even take into account all of the young people entering the labour markets who cannot find jobs and are not eligible for unemployment insurance benefits. This money does not even begin to tackle the problem of unemployment in that area. My allotment provided the equivalent of 43 jobs for one year, and the other constituencies will get the equivalent of 41 and 47 jobs for one year. This is terribly discouraging, especially in an area with a housing problem which is some 70 years old.
Houses in mining areas, for example, desperately need repairs, to say nothing of the need for at least one new coal mine in these times of increasing oil prices. So far as the housing problem is concerned, I wrote to the Minister of State for Urban Affairs (Mr. Ouellet) and he sent me back information about increases for all of Nova Scotia. In my letter to him I said this:
When the Hon. Barney Danson was head of your present department, he went to Cape Breton for a special meeting and personally told me that he was shocked at some of the housing that he had seen.
I have been trying to get the Cape Breton Development Corporation and CMHC involved in a special program for the mining communities are often left a legacy of old (about 70 years and over) company housing which I have often referred to as proletarian housing. They lack basements and many of them that are now owned by coal mine pensioners and/or their widows are going down the hill fast and are creating blighted areas in various sections of the mining towns.

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Employment and Immigration
In fact, Mr. Speaker, incipient slum areas are being created. Continuing:
Enclosed is a recent copy of a letter which I sent to Mr. Matheson, who is presently the head of Devco. I cannot see why CMHC and Devco cannot get together to offer these pensioners and widows a special rehabilitation package. It would save a large problem for the future as I see it and would create jobs that are badly needed there now.
This is particularly so in light of the unemployment insurance figures to which I have referred.
A five to ten year plan would not be that expensive. I, personally, would like to see an experiment on this type of rehabilitation carried out over a five year period, with the worst homes being chosen.
Even though the pensioners are generally below $6,000 in family income, I would expect that they would have to make some contributions because I don't want such a program to be looked on as just welfare. Some of them may be capable of putting some sweat equity in but in any case they should be required to make some financial sacrifice in return for this effort.
Devco officials have, in the past, not considered this as a part of their obligation under the Cape Breton Development Act as I see it, though they are in the housing field to some extent already by holding an equity in Reeves Modular Homes (for the building of new homes). This is worth while but is totally beyond the ability of the pensioners and/or their widows to pay.
I wish you would seriously discuss this matter with Mr. Curran, CMHC manager in Sydney and with Mr. Matheson of Devco to see if we cannot get something started in the mining towns of Cape Breton.
The present NIP and RRAP programs are too slow and cumbersome to meet this need in an efficient way. In fact, I would go so far as to say, as I have in the attached letter, that for some of the mining areas of Cape Breton, and I am sure it would hold in other places that have an old stock of company houses, that having an area declared a NIP one before you can get RRAP funding, is putting the cart before the horse. The dominant need in such areas of old housing stock is home repair and neighbourhood improvement should follow, giving the people decent shelter.
I realize that you have all of Canada to think about but a slavish universal clinging to any federal program is one of the things that can get any federal state into difficulties. This is but one example of how this is happening in Canada today.
As I have said, there is more unemployment insurance being paid in my area than is required to provide short-term and medium-term jobs, such as constructing decent homes for the people over the next 20 years. This would create jobs in the construction industry and would have a multiplier effect on the economy as well as reducing unemployment in the area by perhaps 2 or 3 per cent.
I disagree with the hon. member for Hamilton West. The reason I am still opposing this change in eligibility is that we are not getting the guarantees which are shown in the first phase. Why should we leave people subject to the whim of government when we know that instead of spending money on unemployment insurance the government could spend it on creating jobs even for the short term? I suggest there is something seriously wrong with the co-ordination which should exist between the various departments. The finance department is, of course, talking outmoded economics. It is of the view that the prime cause of inflation in this country is too much money chasing too few goods-a demand-pull inflation. That is not why we have an inflationary spiral in Canada.
We can improve the cyclical unemployment picture by stimulating the economy. I hope there will be a budget this fall which will cut taxes for low income groups and reduce their mortgage rates by one or 2 per cent. At the moment there is a

moratorium on public housing in Nova Scotia because CMHC and the province cannot get together. As a result people are being pushed off into slum housing. The government is paying as much unemployment insurance in some of these areas as it is in some places in Newfoundland, and this is why the government should make a special effort to create jobs instead. In so doing it would be helping national as well as regional policy.


Mr. Eudore Allard (Rimouski):: Mr. Speaker, frankly it makes me somewhat uneasy and perhaps somewhat embarrassed to talk about unemployment in a country as beautiful and as big as Canada, a country which is enormously wealthy and young and which has incredible potential. It is truly sad to talk about unemployment when there are underdeveloped and poor countries which envy us our wealth. They must think we are stupid not to find the answer to stimulate our economy and correct the present situation.
Mr. Speaker, unemployment can be considered a waste of human resources. Statistics Canada has given a rather dark picture of work possibilities for Canadians in 1976 and 1977. According to these reports from economists, Mr. Speaker, stagnation threatens several regions of our country and the social and economic effects of such a situation can no longer be ignored. Indeed, I have received in the last few weeks many copies of a petition asking for the withdrawal of the bill now under consideration, Bill C-27. Up to this time, approximately
6,000	people have signed this petition which reads as follows:
I, the undersigned, am opposed to the bill introduced by Minister Bud Cullen and denounce it as being unrealistic, misleading, discriminatory, catastrophic and reactionary, and demand instead the implementation of effective programs to fight against seasonal unemployment.
Mr. Speaker, it is true that the bill introduced in the House by the Minister of Manpower and Immigration (Mr. Cullen) on December 10 of last year contains some amendments which are important for all workers and unemployed in the country, especially in eastern Quebec and the Maritime provinces. Bill C-27 stipulates that from now on a claimant will need to have worked at least 12 weeks to be entitled to unemployment insurance, instead of eight, as the present legislation provides. Moreover, claimants having worked fewer than 25 weeks will of course be entitled only to an initial benefit period and will lose the right to benefits during the following periods: an extension period according to the period of unemployment, an extension period according to the national unemployment level, an extension period according to the regional level of unemployment, an extension period according to the gap between the national and regional levels of unemployment.
In any case, Mr. Speaker, our courageous workers are going to lose some benefits because of this bill as is indicated in the following data, an illustration which will give us an eloquent but rather frightening idea of what is going to happen, if this bill is passed. The eight-week working period, according to the present law, entitles one to 44 weeks of benefits. Under the new law, not a single week. Ten worked weeks entitles one to 44 weeks of benefits under the present law. But with the new
July 4, 1977

law, naught. Twelve worked weeks entitles one to 44 weeks of benefits, but under the new law, 12 weeks only. And so on and so forth, Mr. Speaker. As has been said before, the bill pretends to be realistic, and of course, it is the case as it is brought forward at a time when all our economists foresee an important slackening in our economic activities and a sharp rise in our unemployment level for 1977.
Misleading, because in the presentation of the budget they minimized the savings that the commission is going to make by insisting on the job creation programs without first ensuring that these very programs will affect the same unemployed people that are affected by the cutback. One can in fact foresee that the Canada Works Program will not really affect seasonal workers in the Gaspe peninsula, in northern New Brunswick, the fishermen and the people who work in the seasonal hotel industry and so on. It is discriminatory because it eliminates completely from the benefit of unemployment insurance all seasonal workers, married women, students who hold a summer job, yet do not qualify for the 12 weeks of employment even though they still have to pay their contributions to the unemployment insurance fund. This measure is catastrophic from an economic standpoint for the lower St. Lawrence region, the Gaspe region, northern New Brunswick and probably all the regions affected during those months when unemployment is at its highest level and the unemployment insurance will make savings of several millions of dollars through those cutbacks and that on the backs of the workers. It is a reactionary measure from a social standpoint because it will substantially increase the number of people on welfare given the absence of efficient programs to fight seasonal unemployment in the lower St. Lawrence and the Gaspe region.
Mr. Speaker, the present government insists on the fact that it has had to give priority to the fight against inflation even if that fight was going to contribute in a painful soaring of unemployment in Canada, an increase such as we have not known since the thirties. In fact, in my humble opinion, that is quite ridiculous, as I said previously, in such a vast and rich country as ours where so many things should be done whereby we could employ all the present unemployed people and still another million individuals. We would not even have enough people to fill the positions required to accomplish all the tasks which we should carry out in this country, such as building houses for middle income workers and senior citizens, such as constructing roads, improving the landscape, cleaning up all beaches, and what else. Mr. Speaker, it is not because there is no work to be done that we have unemployment, it is because the financial system does not meet the need of society in 1977.
Let us take as an example the shoe industry situation. In the last 12 months, 21 shoe manufacturing plants went out of business in Canada, which resulted in the loss of 2,500 jobs when we are now experiencing, as 1 was saying a moment ago, the highest unemployment rate in 37 years. Yet, what is the government doing to correct this situation? Nothing at all. They are making studies, they are studying and studying.
Employment and Immigration
Besides, when questions are asked, the answer is that the matter is under study. In other words, while fighting inflation, the federal government slowed down the economy which resulted in a very high unemployment rate, particularly in Quebec, even though inflation in this province has not been the main problem since 1967. Quite the opposite, the main problem is undoubtedly the economic revival and job creation.
In this context, it can easily be understood why an ex-minister of the Liberal government could say: "If we do not succeed in decreasing the unemployment rate, the number of revolutionaries will increase, and Quebec will not have enough police officers to control the number of people revolted by the present system." Mr. Speaker, official opposition members are probably right when they say that the action proposed by the government to fight unemployment does not give the expected results. Here is a study entitled: Data on unemployment 1960-1971. That review enables us to analyze the comparative unemployment situation in 1960, 1965 and 1970. Here is the average annual unemployment rate for each of Canada's five regions. In the Atlantic area, the rate was 7.6 per cent of total labour in 1970, 7.4 in 1965 and 10.7 per cent in 1960, under a Progressive Conservative government. In the Quebec region, the rate was 7.9 per cent in 1970, 5.4 per cent in 1966 and 9.1 per cent in 1960. This means that unemployment was higher in Quebec under the Progressive Conservatives in 1960. In Ontario, the trend is similar. A 4.3 per cent rate in 1970, 5.4 per cent in 1960. In the Prairies, 4.4 per cent in 1970, and 4.2 per cent in 1960.
In British Columbia, the rate was 7.6 per cent in 1970 as compared to 8.5 per cent in 1960, which was under the Conservatives. With such a poor unemployment performance,
I suggest the opposition parties are in no position to give lessons, and they should be the last ones to criticize the government for not solving unemployment.
Seasonally adjusted statistics for January 1953 to December 1971 provide the following unemployment data for the periods from 1959 to 1962, under a Conservative government, and 1968 to 1971 under the Liberals. Well, Mr. Speaker, I think 1 have quoted enough figures. I simply wished to emphasize that political parties, whether Liberal or Conservative, have no magic wand to stop unemployment and control inflation.
We in the Social Credit Party of Canada believe we possess this magic wand and even if other members have often made a mockery of us, the fact remains that if they have a better alternative, I wish these gentlemen of older parties would give us some indication about it, so that we can work on it. I suggest that up to now, only the Social Credit Party of Canada has seemed in a position to do something or advocated a policy likely to fight inflation while solving the unemployment problem. I can see some members opposite or on my far right smiling. Their smile is meaningless and apparently they are satisfied with the present situation and the distressing plight of almost 700,000 Canadians who are almost always unemployed. This does not seem to affect them.
We in the Social Credit Party of Canada want to ensure the economic freedom and security of each and every Canadian

July 4, 1977
Employment and Immigration
and for this purpose, we are proposing to the Canadian people to implement a system which is said to be a new one whereas I believe it has been experimented in several places, where it was quickly removed as were those who were administering it. One can say that the mover of this alternative comes from England and wrote a volume on the Social Credit philosophy in 1916. For many people, social credit is a monetary reform plan. This is obvious! This is why in these days when money or credit is scarce, the monetary reform they are advocating is so popular.
The Social Credit Party of Canada is more than that. It is a social credit and a philosophical policy, that is to say that social credit is a philosophy rather than a policy. However, whenever a problem arises at home, it cannot be solved outside the door. Therefore, this is why in the political field it is important to attempt to put everything in order. The expectations of the Social Credit philosophy can be defined as an association or the power of human beings living in society to achieve the desired results in order to meet their needs.
So, Mr. Speaker, the way things are going, it is obvious that the traditional parties are helpless. All they can do is try to put people to sleep with all sorts of nonsense and let the skunk grow, as I said not too long ago in one of my speeches. You get used to the smell and to the idea that nothing can be done about it and that it must be suffered until the skunk dies by itself.
In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, I simply want to say to the government that it is now faced with a sizeable challenge and that I think it should consider creating immediately more jobs, particularly jobs suited to the needs of the people, the working people and which would have the effect of allowing those people to regain their pride and dignity lost through idleness, and at the same time they could make their contribution to the unification and the harmony of a beautiful and great country. I dare believe that those few words will have the effect of making the Minister of Manpower and Immigration (Mr. Cullen) think and that he will withdraw this bill, at least for the moment, because if it were passed as it is that would have terrible effects on the working class and all the people in my area and in northern New Brunswick.


David Orlikow: Mr. Speaker, I rise to join my colleagues in opposing the measure before us. We have opposed this bill from the beginning because we have never believed, nor do we believe now, that the reason unemployment insurance benefits cost the taxpayers so much is because there are large numbers of people who do not want to work and are living off the system. We believe the reason there is more unemployment today than there has ever been since the end of the Second World War, or even since the great depression, is not because people are suddenly unwilling to work but because the economic policies of the government have helped to create unemployment and made it more difficult for people to find jobs.
I find it interesting that the major opposition to this bill has, from the beginning, come from members of the New Demo-
[Mr. Allard.)
cratic Party. I find it interesting that from among the 16 members of parliament who belong to the NDP only two, the hon. member for Cape Breton-East Richmond (Mr. Hogan) and the hon. member for Northwest Territories (Mr. Firth), represent constituencies which have very large numbers of unemployed. My constituency has so few unemployed that the amount of money available under Canada Works and Young Canada Works is the minimum allowed for that type of program.
When the bill was before us last March stories appeared in the newspapers that Liberal members from the maritimes would vote against the government and bring about its defeat because the bill was so bad. Let me quote from the Globe and Mail of March 21, 1977-1 wish the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Breau) would listen to some of the things he said back in March and compare them with his silence today, rather than sit talking to the minister as he is doing now. The report in the Globe and Mail reads:
Herbert Breau, Liberal member for Gloucester, said the group was concerned about worsening unemployment in the country, especially in the maritimes.
Then the article goes on to give the figures. I am not surprised the hon. member was concerned because, according to the Canadian Press:
The Atlantic provinces were the hardest hit, with unemployment rates of 15.1 per cent in Newfoundland, 13 per cent in New Brunswick, 11 per cent in Nova Scotia and 9 per cent in Prince Edward Island.
The story continued:
Mr. Breau said in an interview, "We may or may not vote against it, but we have communicated our serious concerns to Prime Minister Trudeau, Manpower Minister Bud Cullen and the four maritime ministers."
"We will wait for a definite answer from Bud Cullen before making a decision to vote for or against the bill when it comes before the House."
"My constituency has one of the highest unemployment rates in the country- as high as 30 per cent now-and these provisions will make the situation worse. I have to consider the welfare of my constituents."
Well, Mr. Speaker, the hon. member has been conspicuous by his silence in this debate. Yet nothing has really changed. Nothing has been done by the minister which will be effective in helping the unemployed in the hon. member's constituency.
On March 19, 1977, a couple of days earlier, the Toronto Star carried a news story under a big headline "Trudeau Faces Revolt by MPs over Jobs Bill". The first paragraph read:
The Trudeau government faces a backbench rebellion if it insists on pushing through a bill to make it even tougher for jobless Canadians to get unemployment insurance benefits.
The report continued:
The government could fall if Newfoundland MP David Rooney gets the four other Atlantic Liberals he says are also opposed to the bill to join him in voting against it. The five, he says, have agreed that the bill is unacceptable to them in its present form.
Rooney says he is so disgusted by the harmful effects of Bill C-27 that he is prepared to risk Liberal defeat to down the measure, and already he has the support of enough colleagues to bring down the government.
Later in the story they quoted the hon. member for Bonavis-ta-Trinity (Mr. Rooney) as follows:
July 4, 1977

"The cabinet would have got the bill through by now if it hadn't been for us holding up our support", said Rooney. "We've been under tremendous pressure to give in. But if I voted for that bill I'd be a martyr to my party and a traitor to my constituents.
"Most Canadians think of the jobless as a minority-and often a lazy one. In my district, I believe they're a tragic majority, and a bitterly disappointed group of people who want to work. There just aren't any jobs for them."
Has there been a sudden upswing? Are there suddenly thousands of jobs in the Maritime provinces? Of course there are not, and there are no prospects. The government's own service-there have been official press releases and those we have been able to hear about because somebody in the government service has felt they were so important that the information must be disseminated to the public whether or not the public likes it-tells us that unemployment this year will be at least 8 per cent and closer to 9 per cent, and prospects for 1978 are even worse than for 1977.
But of course the hon. member for Gloucester, and I suppose the hon. member for Bonavista-Trinity, will say, "But the bill is quite different than it was back in March. We forced the government to change things". As a matter of fact while my colleague, the hon. member for Cape Breton-East Richmond, was talking, the hon. member for Gloucester, who was so opposed to the bill back in March, was interjecting. He was not getting up to speak in support of the bill and of course not saying those things publicly which supposedly he was saying privately back in March. He was not saying anything.


Herb Breau: Read my speech on second reading.


David Orlikow: Yes, I know the kind of thing you were saying. What has happened? How many changes have there been to make the hon. member accept the bill? Let us look at these changes.


Herb Breau: Changes amounting to five weeks.


David Orlikow: The hon. member can speak later if he wishes. What are the changes which have made this bill acceptable to him? The changes would have Canadians work a minimum of between ten and 14 weeks in a year to collect insurance, depending on the unemployment rate in their area.
When the hon. member for Gloucester and other members were opposing the bill back in March, it proposed increasing the required minimum work period from the present eight weeks to 12 weeks. Under the minister's compromise proposal, Canada would be carved into 54 employment areas, those used by Statistics Canada in its monthly unemployment survey, to calculate the number of weeks a person would have to work to claim unemployment insurance benefits.
1 said at the beginning of my speech that in the city that 1 represent there is not the kind of unemployment that exists in the Maritimes or in Quebec, whose members, at least Liberal members, have been singularly quiet about unemployment despite the fact that they have a 10 per cent rate of unemployment.
One thing I do know from listening to people who have problems in terms of unemployment, from listening to people
Employment and Immigration
who came ten days ago to tell the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) and myself about how unemployment was affecting them, is that there is a universal feeling that the Department of Manpower and Immigration and the UIC do not react very quickly, very sympathetically, and very effectively to problems such as unemployment. I do not have the faith which the hon. member for Gloucester seems to have in this proposal for 54 different regions, each one having a different requirement period.


Herb Breau: I would like to ask the hon. member a question, with his permission, and I think he is giving it. Is the hon. member aware that the proposal in Bill C-27 which was the most harmful to high unemployment areas such as mine and the maritimes in general was not the eight to 12 weeks provision but the change in the benefit structure that would have caused people with a minor attachment to the labour force to lose three months of benefits? That benefit structure has now been changed so that the effect on the minor attachment claimant is not three months less but the same as it was in the original program. Is the hon. member aware that the most important change to the people with minor attachment to the work force is that they will now receive 44 weeks of benefits?


David Orlikow: Mr. Speaker, I hope you will not deduct the time of that long so-called question from my time. I will answer the hon. member. If he had waited a couple of minutes I would have gone over precisely that change.
Under the minister's compromise proposal, as I said, Canada will be cut up into 54 regions. I say that that will be a bureaucratic nightmare. It may give employment to some of the economists and statisticians who have been graduating from Canadian universities and cannot find jobs, but certainly it will not help the unemployed, and there is no one who should know it better than those hon. members who come from high unemployment areas, such as the hon. member for Gloucester.
Before I get away from the original proposal of the 12 week work period required for qualification to the present ten to 14 weeks, I want to remind the hon. member for Gloucester, and some of his constituents I hope, that under the proposal which he is supporting the variable period will be re-examined after it has been in place for a while and the qualifying period will increase to a uniform 14 weeks across the country after three years, unless it is specifically extended by parliament. In view of the record of this country under both Liberal and Conservative governments of being unable to lessen regional disparities, in view of the fact that the people of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and eastern Quebec continue to be far behind the areas of high employment in Ontario, B.C. and Alberta in terms of wages, and in view of the hon. member accepting the idea that three years from now a person will have to work 14 weeks to qualify for unemployment insurance benefits, I say that the hon. member for Gloucester has sold out his constituents.


Herb Breau: I will be here in three years.

July 4, 1977
Employment and Immigration


David Orlikow: Part of the reason you will be here is that they may not know.


Herb Breau: You don't expect to have much influence in three years.


David Orlikow: If the hon. member does not have more influence in three years than he has this year, things will continue to be bad for his constituents.


Herb Breau: You never know; the NDP might be in power in three years.


David Orlikow: This provision is changed to allow claimants up to 32 weeks of regional extended benefits. The bill as originally introduced called for a maximum of 20 weeks. Regional extended benefits are also calculated on the rate of unemployment in a given region. What this means is that the bill as it is now changed is not worse than it was before. What good does that do for the people of New Brunswick? What the hon. member is doing when he accepts that kind of proposal is to accept the fact that the people of New Brunswick will continue to be plagued by high unemployment as they have been through all these years of Liberal government. That is the situation, and I say that Liberal and Conservative members of parliament from the maritimes, and Liberal members from Quebec, particularly that part of Quebec east of Montreal, have not represented the best interests of their constituents by supporting this bill, even as it is amended.
Some ten days ago the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre and 1 spent a day hearing representations from some of our constituents about the employment situation as it affects themselves and people they represent. As I said at the beginning of my speech, ours is not a high unemployment area, and yet as I listened to the representations made to us I could not help but be reminded of the years before World War II. It is true that the situation is not exactly comparable to what it was in the 1930's. It is true that people are not actually going hungry these days, because we have unemployment insurance benefits, welfare, and old age pensions. However, there are people who are unemployed, even in areas with relatively low rates of unemployment. The unemployed are no longer the poor, the uneducated, and the native people. What we have now is the kind of unemployment we have had for a number of years, but added to it we have unemployment among some of the best educated and highly trained people this country has even seen.
I want to put on the record some of the representations which were made to us. The president of the Building Trades Council, Leo Desilets, appeared before us, and I am going to try to summarize what he said. He said that unemployment in Winnipeg is the worst it has been since 1961. He believes that 1978 will be worse than 1977. He said there is little in the way of projects on the planning boards to be started. Usually projects in the construction industry begin in the spring. This year very few were started. Mr. Desilets represents about

15,000	workers normally, but he pointed out to us that federal, provincial and municipal governments have shelved a number of projects, because along with the anti-inflation legislation came a call from the federal government to municipal and provincial governments that they, together with the federal government, should show restraint, and restraint means that projects which had been planned and announced are not being proceeded with. The hon. member for Gloucester interjected a little while ago and referred to $10 an hour workers who are unemployed, as if it is a disgrace to get $10 an hour.


Herb Breau: I did not say that.


David Orlikow: That is how it sounded. If the hon. member did not mean that, I am happy he did not mean that because I do not think a person is living particularly high off the hog these days at $10 an hour, particularly construction workers, who are lucky if they work eight months of the year.


Herb Breau: 1 did not say that.


David Orlikow: I thought I heard it.


Herb Breau: I was talking about income, not unemployment.


David Orlikow: Mr. Don Posnick, a representative of the United Steel Workers of America, reported to us what has happened to members of his union in the last six months. They are organized, and they bargain for 32 plants in the area. The situation for those workers is grim. Usually when there was a lay-off in one plant, Mr. Posnick told us that the union was able to direct laid off workers to another plant. This year that is not possible. Co-operative Implement is down from 1,000 workers last year to under 500 now. The reason it has that many working is that the company is operating on a four-day work week. The Manitoba Rolling Mills at Selkirk laid off between 250 and 275 workers because of automation, and another 100 would have been laid off except that the union negotiated an earlier retirement plan which permitted long service employees to retire. They are down to 400 employees from the usual 700.
Allied Farm Equipment is down 50 per cent, from 200 workers to 100. Joy Manufacturing is down from 140 to 68, and that company is working a four-day week. Dominion Bridge is in the constituency of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre. For years Dominion Bridge had a permanent sign asking skilled workers to apply for work. Jobs were available. Today that sign is down, and 125 people have been laid off. Manitoba Bridge closed for seven weeks in January of 1977. A total of 1,000 steel workers have been laid off. These are workers in the over 50 age group, and unless they were highly skilled, they were laid off. Mr. Posnick suggests that many of them will never get work again. Dominion Bridge has laid off 125 workers. People with 18 year's seniority were laid off for five weeks. Mr. Posnick said that many members of his union will exhaust their unemployment insurance benefits before they will find another job. Steel workers are not the only ones who find it difficult.
July 4, 1977

The president of this year's graduating class from the educational faculty of the University of Manitoba appeared before us. Ele told us that he surveyed 648 members of this year's graduating class. Over 60 per cent of them responded, and anyone who has conducted any kind of survey knows that that is a very large response. In June of this year, last month, when most school divisions had hired for next September, 56 per cent of those graduates who responded had not found a job either in Manitoba or outside that province, and 25 per cent of those who responded did not expect to get jobs this fall. That is the situation for the graduating class in the faculty of education. We are talking about a group of students who spent four years at university. That cost the people of Canada tens of thousands of dollars.
The Economic Council of Canada, the Department of Manpower and Immigration, and every other agency which was supposedly studying the needs of this country were urging young people to stay in school, to go to technical-vocational schools, to community colleges or to universities. We know that all the surveys which have been done show that a person with a university education earns a much higher income and has a much better ability to earn than people who have not gone to university. People who have gone to community colleges are able to earn a great deal more than those who have not. The young people of this country responded to those appeals. They went to universities and community colleges. Today they are coming out of those institutions, and there are no jobs.
The president of the graduating class of the school of social work at the University of Manitoba was unable to come to see us because she was ill, but I spoke to her and she told me that the job situation for graduating students at the school of social work is, to say the least, grim. She says that 50 per cent to 60 per cent of this year's graduating class have not been able to find permanent work.
I am glad that the Minister of Manpower and Immigration (Mr. Cullen) is in his seat. The president of the graduating class of the school of social work told me that the Canada Manpower office in Winnipeg has a terrible attitude toward students. The minister shrugs at what I say. I am just quoting what the president of the graduating class of the school of social work said. If the minister likes, 1 will be happy to give him her telephone number so he can find out whether I am quoting correctly. She said that the Canada Manpower office in Winnipeg has a terrible attitude, as though it were the fault of the students graduating in social work that there are no jobs. There are no jobs, not because there is no need for social work but because the federal government itself, and it has convinced all provincial governments, preaches restraint. What restraint means is fewer services, and that is achieved by helping fewer people. The needs are great but we are told to show restraint-to cure inflation on the backs of the unemployed. That is what we are doing.
Employment and Immigration
One of the most moving presentations I have ever heard in my political life was made by Sister MacNamara, the Director of Rossbrook House Inc. in Winnipeg, and I should like to quote from her brief. She referred to the fact that we have
900,000	potential members of the work force who cannot obtain jobs. She also referred to the fact that the ranks of the unemployed include skilled, semi-skilled, and professional personnel. She said:
Though the unemployment picture cuts across all age groups, the problem is especially acute among younger workers and those who are entering the work force for the first time.
These facts would be bad enough if they stated the worst of the situation, but the fact remains that the unemployment statistics conceal as much as they reveal. Statistics indicating rates of 7 per cent or 8 per cent never reflect the actual situation in areas of chronic, long-term unemployment, such as the inner cores of major cities. Whole groups are excluded from the statistics, status Indians and young workers being conspicuous among those who simply do not count in the eyes of statisticians. Few reserves boast unemployment rates of 7 per cent or 8 per cent. The actual figures would be closer to 40, 50 or 100 per cent. But reserves are never included in the statistics.
Of course that is true. That is how the unemployment rate is kept lower by probably half to 1 per cent than it actually is. She continued:
Similarly, school drop-outs, willing to work but with few marketable skills, have never been able to obtain a foothold in the work force and therefore are not counted in the unemployment statistics.
The result is that the unemployment statistics are seriously defective in terms of accurately documenting prevailing conditions, and the statistics are most conspicuously wrong when documenting those groups where unemployment is a traditional problem.
For the young worker, the unskilled or the marginally equipped, the jobs that exist are short-term. The lay-off syndrome dominates, with consequent damage to the morale of workers whose working lives are lived in six-week intervals.
This is a dedicated woman who works seven days a week.


John R. Rodriguez: Not like the minister.


David Orlikow: The hon. member says, "Not like the minister." Some of her most caustic remarks referred to agencies whose staff work five days a week, from nine till five daily, who are not available in the evening, on Saturdays or Sundays when they are needed.
She continued:
In Winnipeg's core area, young people aged 15 to 25 constitute a group of chronically unemployed.
Unemployment is just one more problem in an area conspicuous for its social dilemmas. But unemployment among the young is an especially serious matter. Truancy in the district runs at approximately 30 per cent beginning in the primary grades.
I must say that is probably the most shocking part of the brief. I know the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre was as shocked as I to learn that youngsters in grade three are persistently staying away from school.
She went on:
High school attendance is virtually unknown.


Mr. MacFarlane:: What is she; a teacher?


David Orlikow: She is a social worker; she is not a politician.

July 4, 1977
Employment and Immigration


Angus (Gus) MacFarlane: That is her problem; she does not have any work.


Stanley Howard Knowles: This is not a joke; this is serious.


David Orlikow: The hon. member on the government side says, "That is her problem." This is someone dedicated to working with people who are not able to make it in our society, and the government whip says "It is her problem." Mr. Speaker, when youngsters in grade three, presumably eight or nine years of age, are not attending school, perhaps because they do not have shoes, or only have one parent who is out working-


Angus (Gus) MacFarlane: Now you are giving reasons. It sounded as if she had all the answers.


David Orlikow: I never said she had any answers. All I did was try to relate to members of the House who want to listen-which I doubt the government whip wants to do-what that person said. If I thought the situation she described was unique to Winnipeg I would not bring it up here.
The same situation exists to a smaller or greater degree, however, in Toronto and Montreal. It is worse in Kenora which has a much higher native population, and it is probably worse in Thunder Bay; it is bad in Vancouver and Regina as well. I say we have not faced the problem; we have not looked at what we are going to do, not just about full employment but about the 10 per cent or 15 per cent who never make it. What are we going to do to break this poverty cycle, the cycle of alcoholism and all the problems so prevalent in this country? Government members do not want to listen to that. They would like to ignore it.


Herb Breau: We are listening.


David Orlikow: I am glad the hon. member for Gloucester is finally listening.


Herb Breau: When you talk sense.


David Orlikow: I say we are facing a crisis. I appeal to members of all parties to face that crisis. Getting tough with the unemployed and cutting back on unemployment insurance is the worst way to try to deal with the problem, not the best way.
Let me put on the record what Sister MacNamara said. After referring to high school attendance in the inner core of the city, which is represented in part by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre and in part by myself, as being virtually unknown, she continued:
The police report that 38 per cent of all their calls come from the inner city, and the annual report of the police department for 1976 records a 24 per cent increase in juvenile crime, with the greatest increase occurring in the age group under fourteen.
The end result of all this is reflected in the average age of the local penal institutions, Headingley Gaol and Stony Mountain. In both the average age is in the early twenties.

The young resident of the core area, enjoying few of the assets that other young people take for granted, has no hope of bettering his situation or reversing the pattern of an unhappy past unless he can in some way become economically independent at a fairly early age. Thus unemployment for him takes on a virtually tragic aspect. It deprives him of the opportunity he needs, while reinforcing negative behaviour patterns that will further jeopardize his hopes for a stable, productive future.
Comparing the LIP grants of other years to the Canada Works Program of this year she said:
One source of hope has been found in short-term federal grants. This year LIP was phased out to make way for Canada Works. Advance publicity for Canada Works indicated that grants would be available on a 12-month basis, with funding worth up to $180,000 per project. Such news was more than welcome, and the enthusiasm in various non-profit groups was exceeded only by the despair that set in when only two grants were given in Winnipeg North Centre with a total value of $100,000.
The net effect of the Canada Works program in Winnipeg North Centre is that a constituency receiving $965,000 under the last LIP in 1976-77 has thus far received only $100,000 under the first round of Canada Works grants. What will happen on the next round, with applications due late in August and funding due to start in November, remains a matter of conjecture at this point.
I will not quote other parts of the brief which have little to do with the federal government or its agencies. She painted a black picture in a city which has relatively little unemployment when compared with unemployment in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick or eastern Quebec.
How does the government propose to cure unemployment? The budget proposed virtually nothing; it put virtually nothing in the pot, so to speak, to cure unemployment. This year less will be made available by way of grants under Canada Works than was made available last year under LIP, or other programs. But more are unemployed than were unemployed one year ago, and according to predictions more will be unemployed in 1978 than are already unemployed in 1977. Therefore, we say this is no time to cut back unemployment insurance benefits. This is not the time to make the act tougher.
Let me put on record how much provinces will lose if this bill passes, and 1 hope the hon. 'member for Gloucester is listening. If this bill passes, the estimated cuts in unemployment benefit payments in Newfoundland will be between $24 million and $28 million, or between 13 per cent and 15 per cent. In Prince Edward Island the cuts will amount to between $4 million and $5 million, or between 12 per cent and 15 per cent. In Nova Scotia the cuts will be between $9 million and $11 million, or between 6 per cent and 8 per cent. In New Brunswick-I hope the hon. member for Gloucester is listening-the cuts will amount to between $19 million and $22 million-


Herb Breau: Before the amendments, you mean.


David Orlikow: No. I am speaking of how much less the provinces will get under this plan, compared with what they would have got under the old plan.


Herb Breau: The hon. member had better check his figures.


David Orlikow: The cut in New Brunswick will be between 11 per cent and 13 per cent. In Quebec the cut will be between
July 4, 1977

$93 million and $109 million, or between 8 per cent and 9 per cent. The Ontario cuts will be between $85 million and $101 million, or between 9 per cent and 11 per cent. In Manitoba the figure is between $7 million and $8 million, or between 10 per cent and 11 per cent. The Saskatchewan figure is between $8 million and $10 million, or between 10 per cent or 12 per cent.


Herb Breau: Before the amendment.


David Orlikow: The Alberta figure is between $7 million and $8 million.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Order, please. I regret to interrupt the hon. member whose allotted time has expired. He may continue if he has the unanimous consent of the House. Has the hon. member unanimous consent to continue?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


Mr. Arnold Peters (Timiskaming):: Mr. Speaker, surely the hon. member for Gloucester should have agreed to the hon. member's continuing to put figures on the record, because his list of figures is incomplete and makes conditions in the province of the hon. member opposite look bad. And 1 think he is prepared to support the bill.


Herb Breau: How do you know that?


William Arnold Peters: I don't know that. Perhaps the hon. member does not care one way or the other, but 1 do not know.
When making his third reading speech and telling the House that the employment and unemployment responsibilities of the department are once more to be put under one roof, as it were,
I think the minister said many of the things I had said when the two functions of the department were separated. At one time the two functions of the department were carried on under one roof. You entered the room and asked for a job. If you could not get a job, you went to the other side of the room to collect your benefits. That was a sensible arrangement, and I am glad that the minister, after all these years, has decided to amalgamate under one roof those two functions of the department.
I am surprised that the minister should agree to assume his new responsibilities on top of his existing responsibilities. He is an amiable minister, but I suggest he needs help in overseeing the operations of his extensive department.
Members of the Conservative party in particular have said we must change the Unemployment Insurance Act in order to curb abuses of unemployment insurance. It has also been suggested that abuses are especially prevalent among those whose periods of attachment to the labour force have been of short duration. The previous minister commissioned a study in this area and concluded, after examining the evidence, that charges concerning abuses are not correct. However, the present minister has seen fit to bow to pressure and, if the proposed changes come into effect, a large number of people
Adjournment Debate
will be taken off the unemployment insurance rolls. We are not heartless in this country. We like to look after the unfortunate.
May I call it ten o'clock, Mr. Speaker?


BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Will the acting government House leader please tell the House what government business we shall consider between 11 o'clock a.m. and one o'clock p.m. tomorrow?


Jack Sydney George (Bud) Cullen: Mr. Speaker, according to my information we will continue consideration of this bill tomorrow morning, between 11 o'clock a.m. and one o'clock p.m.


William Arnold Peters: And the next day, and the next.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION

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

Jack Marshall: Mr. Speaker, the question I raise this evening is the one I directed to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Gillespie) on May 27. It related to the Residential Rehabilitation Assistance Program, which has now been brought into better focus by the announcement which the minister made, together with his colleague, the Minister of State for Urban Affairs (Mr. Ouellet), concerning a $1.4 billion insulation program. Mr. Speaker, nobody suggests that the $1.4 billion insulation program will not be of benefit to some people in Canada. The ministers announced, with the greatest of fanfare, grants of up to $350 to cover two thirds of the cost of purchasing insulation materials for attics, walls, basement walls and floors over unheated spaces, for owners or tenants of self-contained homes, whether detached, semi-detached or row housing.
Really, the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources is not aware or completely overlooks the fact that there is already in existence the Residential Rehabilitation Assistance Program which provides grants up to $3,750 for the same purposes. It is a much better program because it goes much further in providing storm windows, siding, plumbing and heating systems, and many other home improvements such as the installation of foundations and basements in addition to insulation, which is most important.

July 4, 1977
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Adjournment Debate
RRAP provides for loans, of up to $10,000 to low income earners of $6,000 or less. They can have $3,750 forgiven. It further provides that for every $1,000 over $6,000 income they lose $250 of the grant. The loans are repayable in up to 20 years, adjusted to family income. The highest payment is around $80 per month.
This is the program that the people of Canada want, particularly those on low income, in order to insulate their homes. However, insulation is no good by itself. Let me quote some figures to support that statement.
Statistics Canada indicates that 898,000 Canadians earned under $3,000 a year, 729,000 earned between $3,000 and $5,000, and 880,000 earned between $5,000 and $7,000 a year. It has been proved that most of those people own their own homes. However, because of the high cost of living, they cannot keep them up. Most have only space heaters, no basements, and many have holes in the walls. How far would $350 go to provide insulation for which they have little or no use?
A good portion of the $1.4 billion should be directed to those in the low income brackets under the Residential Rehabilitation Assistance Plan. That program has been in existence since 1973. The parliamentary secretary knows how many times I have asked here in the House of Commons about where the extra funds are. It is a good program, the best they ever produced, but there are not enough funds. However, they can find $1.4 billion to provide two thirds of the cost of insulation, when for the hundreds of thousands of home owners in the category I referred to the $350 will go nowhere.
I have a beautiful little pamphlet here. I could send it to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources and the Minister of State for Urban Affairs. It invites people to participate in the program and get a free grant.
When 1 look at the homes in Newfoundland, and the situation must be the same across Canada, those on low income cannot afford to repair their homes. They are already spending a fortune on fuel, something they cannot afford.
The minister should take a realistic look at these programs and compare them. No one objects to the $350 grant. However, those earning $6,000 or less require much more. There are also those who cannot work but still own their homes. There is no hope of them insulating their homes in order to conserve energy and save a little money.
I say to the minister and the parliamentary secretary that they should look at the value of the RRAP program and put a portion of that $1.4 billion where it will do some good. They will save more than the $50 million they expect to save under the insulation program and save it for those who need it, the poverty stricken in this country.


Mr. Jean-Robert Gauthier (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of State for Urban Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, let me begin by saying that I very much appreciate the strong support of and the comments made by the hon. member for Humber-

St. George's-St. Barbe (Mr. Marshall). The RRAP program, as he knows very well, operates mainly in areas which, in consultation with the provinces and municipalities, have been designated so-called NIP areas, neighbourhood improvement areas, or in special rural areas of 2,500 people or less. The RRAP program is a fantastic program. It has great contributions to make to our existing neighbourhoods and will no doubt receive increased funding over the years. As the hon. member knows, in the last three years we have gone from $10 million to $107 million this year, which I think is a substantial increase considering the budgetary restraints under which we operate at this time.
The other program to which the hon. member referred is the insulation refit program, which is a completely different approach from the RRAP program, as he knows. The insulation refit program addresses itself to all Canadians and has a schedule fixed according to age of housing and areas of priority which are set according to criteria which have been well explained by the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Gillespie) and by the Minister of State for Urban Affairs (Mr. Ouellet).
In responding to the hon. member I should like to tell him that we shall continue to work in trying to better develop programs like the RRAP program. I am hopeful and confident that the insulation refit program will have just as much success as the RRAP program, and I am sure that a year from now he will be back here telling us how great this program is.


ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE-USE OF WRITS OF ASSISTANCE-REQUEST FOR REPORT ON STUDY
Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, 1 rise to bring forward a matter which I last raised on March 16, 1977, and on previous occasions, primarily with the Minister of Justice (Mr. Basford), relating to writs of assistance and the decision of the Federal Court which severely criticized the granting of writs of assistance in connection with the enforcement of the Customs Act and other federal statutes.
I purposely let this matter lie for as long as I have to allow the Minister of Justice, whom I took at his word at the time, to have an opportunity of making the fullest possible investigation, in consultation with the Law Reform Commmission and officials of his department, regarding the continuation of the provisions which allow these writs of assistance to be granted. In effect they are unlimited and unspecified as to time and as to the powers which are available in regard to entering and obtaining evidence.
At the time I raised this matter on March 16 the Minister of Justice indicated to me that he was in fact reviewing the question; he said he was conducting a fundamental review of whether and to what extent writs of assistance should be continued in our law. 1 am sorry to see that neither the Minister of Justice nor his parliamentary secretary is here tonight. I am regretfully coming to the conclusion that the Minister of Justice, in regard to some of these important decisions relating to the civil liberties of Canadian citizens,
July 4, 1977

tends to fence on questions and to answer them in a general way by saying the matter is under review. Then he simply does nothing about them. I think that on a matter of such great importance the Canadian people require some indication from the minister at this time of what position he is taking with respect to the provisions which allow the issuance of writs of assistance.
It has been pointed out, both editorially and in the House by myself and my colleagues, that writs of assistance and the powers available thereunder in Canada are unparallelled in any other jurisdiction. I suggest it has been long argued by those concerned with the administration of criminal justice in this country that it is unfortunate that no statutory considerations are set out for obtaining writs of assistance. The lack of judicial discretion when issuing these writs, and the corresponding lack of criteria upon which they ought to issue, should be compared with the provisions relating generally to search warrants. For example, in Re United Distillers Ltd. (1946), 88 C.C.C. 338, C. J. Ferris, of the British Columbia Supreme Court, stated at page 341:
The law seems to be well established that in granting a warrant to search, the information before the magistrate must be of such a nature as to permit him to grant the warrant judicially.
At page 344 of the same report, he continues:
1 find that the warrant to search was issued without there being contained in the information sufficient material to entitle the Justice of the Peace acting in a judicial capacity to issue the warrant.
This judgment was quoted with approval in Schumiatcher v. A. G. of Sask. and Salterio, J. P. (1960), 33 W.W.R. 132. The case law has generally held that the issuing of a search warrant is not a mere ministerial act, but a judicial act and that the judge must exercise a judicial discretion. For example, in Rex v. Moore (1922), 63 D.L.R. 472, the court stated:
Clearly what the statute requires is not merely that the constable is to have information which justifies him in making an oath that he has reasonable ground for belief, and that the magistrate himself should be satisfied by information on the oath of an officer that there is (in fact and in truth) reasonable ground for belief upon which the magistrate, in his discretion, may grant a warrant.. .
There is a very substantial difference between the use of writs of assistance in Canada and their use in England. In the English cases the court always has the alternative of either granting or refusing the writ of assistance. In any case it is a very rare occurrence that a writ of assistance will be issued in England, and for the most part the writ is issued for the purpose of recovering possession of and preserving chattels.
In Canada writs of assistance are far more serious matters for they are not considered merely as remedial, but rather are used to enforce criminal and quasi-criminal legislation-all the more reason that these writs ought only to be issued at the discretion of the presiding judge on the basis of explicit criteria which ought to be carefully scrutinized by the court.
Adjournment Debate
I should like to quote from the book of E.C.S. Wade and G. Godfrey Phillips, entitled "Constitutional Law" at pages 366 and 367, which reads as follows:
The principle that a plea of the public interest does not justify a wrongful act was established by the eighteenth century cases known as the General Warrant Cases. The practice of issuing general warrants to arrest unspecified persons and to search property is said to have originated with the Court of Star Chamber. It is obviously a powerful weapon to assist an embarrassed executive to obtain material upon which to formulate changes against persons suspected of hostility toward the government. At a later stage the practice was authorized by the Licensing Act, 1662, for use by a secretary of state to prevent publication of unlicensed material, and such warrants continued after the lapse of that act in 1695. The General Warrant Cases arose out of the attempt of George Ill's government to stifle the political activities of John Wilkes and the publication known as the North Briton. Even at a later date the severity of the law against seditious publications was maintained largely by executive action, but the cases decided once and for all the illegality of general warrants and thus deprived the executive of a formidable instrument of oppression.
Writs of assistance were also an issue at the time of the American revolution and they have not been legal in the United States since that time. I appeal to the Minister of Justice to come forward and tell this House, and the country, what position the government intends to take with respect to-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Order. I regret to inform the hon. member that his allotted time has expired.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: Mr. Speaker, first I must apologize for the Minister of Justice (Mr. Basford) not being in the House tonight. He is out west. He is aware of the interest the hon. member for Saskatoon-Biggar (Mr. Hnaty-shyn) has shown in this matter. If my reading of the material is correct, he has raised this matter on several occasions, both inside and outside the House.
On March 16, 1977, the Minister of Justice told the hon. member for Saskatoon-Biggar that he was conducting a fundamental review of whether, and to what extent, these writs of assistance should be continued in our law. I am informed by the Minister of Justice that the review will also deal with the courts' discretion in granting these writs, and the accountability of police action taken under the writs.
I have been advised also that the review will examine the necessity of the writs in terms of each of the various acts that allow for their use, that is, the Customs Act, the Excise Act, the Narcotic Control Act and the Food and Drugs Act. The Department of Justice review will be completed very, very shortly.
As the hon. member has mentioned, the Law Reform Commission is also studying these questions in connection with its ongoing work on police powers of search and seizure.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):: Order, please. The motion to adjourn the House is now deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly, this House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 11 a.m.
Motion agreed to and the House adjourned at 10.17 p.m.

Tuesday, July 5, 1977