1978-10-27

ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Mr. Joe Clark (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, I rise, under the provisions of Standing Order 43, to seek the unanimous consent of the House to introduce a motion on a matter of urgent and pressing necessity.
In light of events yesterday before the McDonald royal commission, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Perth-Wilmot (Mr. Jarvis):
That the government make available to the McDonald commission all documents and other relevant material in its possession and instruct its counsel not to block or object to the production thereof so as to enable the McDonald commission to fulfil its mandate.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: The presentation of such a motion requires the unanimous consent of the House, in conformity with Standing Order 43. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


PUBLIC DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL RELEVANT TO MCDONALD COMMISSION-MOTION UNDER S.O. 43
Mr. Stuart Leggatt (New Westminster):: Mr. Speaker, this is, in fact, something of a similar motion. In view of the motion by counsel for the government at the McDonald inquiry yesterday to block introduction of some 14 pieces of correspondence, and government counsel's further refusal to even permit perusal by the commission of some four documents, I would move, seconded by the hon. member for Broadview (Mr. Rae):
That this House directs the Minister of Justice to instruct counsel for the government at the McDonald inquiry to withdraw objection to production of all material and documents and, further, to withdraw argument against public disclosure of all material relevant to the inquiry.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: Standing Order 43 requires the unanimous consent of the House for the presentation at this time of such a motion. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


FINANCE
Mr. Ray Hnatyshyn (Saskatoon-Biggar):: Mr. Speaker, I rise, under the provisions of Standing Order 43, on a matter of urgent and pressing necessity. All Canadians are gratified that postal service has resumed. However, the length of the latest stoppage in postal service has caused a serious shortage of cash for many businessmen which will take some time to overcome. Therefore, I move, seconded by the hon. member for St. Boniface (Mr. Hare):
That the government waive the October 31 deadline for the remission of the federal sales tax to the federal treasury for 15 days in order to ease the burden being felt by many Canadian businessmen in the wake of the postal strike.


Mr. Speaker:: The presentation of such a motion for debate at this time would require the unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


LABOUR RELATIONS
Mr. Jacques Lavoie (Hochelaga):: Mr. Speaker, under the provisions of Standing Order 43, I ask for the unanimous consent of the House to introduce a motion dealing with an important matter of pressing necessity.
In view of the fact that for several years, the Canadian public have put up with the after-effects of numerous strikes in public and semi-public sectors as the result of the legitimate claims of workers, considering also that the mechanisms that have been set up are more or less efficient, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Mercier (Mr. Boulanger):

October 27, 1978
That a permanent labour tribunal for conflicts arising in public and semi-public sectors be set up by the minister concerned.


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


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE
Mr. Andy Hogan (Cape Breton-East Richmond):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a matter of urgent and pressing necessity under the provisions of Standing Order 43. We all know that the Unemployment Insurance Commission is in the process of asking some 15,000 Canadians, including 5,000 Nova Scotians, to pay back $4.3 million due to a mistake of one of its employees. Since up to this date all such recipients have not yet been notified, and since UIC officials admit that so far they have not received any repayment, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Sault Ste. Marie (Mr. Symes):
[DOT] (U12)
That the UIC cancel these overpayments immediately, given the serious economic straits we are in and given the fact that such an error would have been caught by a properly operating internal auditing system within the UIC itself.


Mr. Speaker:: Presentation of such a motion requires the unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


REQUESTED COMMITTEE STUDY OF OVERPAYMENTS UNDER PROGRAM-MOTION UNDER S.O. 43
Mr. Jake Epp (Provencher):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a matter of urgent and pressing necessity under the provisions of Standing Order 43. In view of the findings of the Auditor General as contained in the annual report of the Department of Employment and Immigration tabled in this House that there has been an estimated $142 million in overpayments to UI recipients, and in view of the fact that the commission failed to act on the recommendations of the Auditor General in 1976, where he identified $95 million in overpayments, I move, seconded by the hon. member for St. John's East (Mr. McGrath):
That the public accounts committee be struck immediately and, further, that the 1977-78 annual report of the Department of Employment and Immigration be referred to the Standing Committee on Public Accounts.


Mr. Speaker:: The introduction of such a motion for debate at this time would require unanimous consent. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


URBAN AFFAIRS
Mrs. Jean E. Pigott (Ottawa-Carleton):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a matter of urgent and pressing necessity under Standing Order 43, arising out of a Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation press release that AHOP defaults are up by 300 per cent over 1977 and now account for 53 per cent of the defaulted mortgages insured by CMHC.
I move, seconded by the hon. member for Selkirk (Mr. Whiteway):
That in light of this grave situation, the Minister of State for Urban Affairs be asked to make a statement to the House on how his proposed graduated payment mortgage plan based on high incomes and appreciation equity will work, and what plan Central Mortgage and Housing management has to fill these hundreds of vacant houses.


Mr. Speaker:: Presentation of such a motion for debate requires unanimous consent. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Prime Minister. As the Prime Minister will know, yesterday counsel for the government tried to withhold from the McDonald royal commission certain government documents. The Prime Minister will also recall that on October 25 of this year he said, as reported at page 450 of Hansard:
-we would produce and have produced every document asked for.
I would like to ask the Prime Minister, is that still the position of the government, and will the government instruct its counsel to make available to the McDonald royal commission all government documents, all documents in the possession of the government, relevant to the inquiry of the McDonald commission.
October 27, 1978


Right Hon. P. E. Trudeau (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, as I am informed, what happened yesterday before the commission is that counsel for former commissioner Higgitt asked for the production of documents without any notice either to the government or to the commission itself. Naturally, both the commission and ourselves think that this is a procedure which should be corrected.
I repeat my assurance that we will co-operate by making all documents available to the commission. We will, further, co-operate in making public any documents which the commission wants to make public and which are any evidence of wrongdoing. But in order to co-operate, we have to know what is asked for and we must have notice of what documents are to be produced, so that we can consider their classification and consider their declassification if the commission so requires.
It was just a matter of the government and the commission having been caught by surprise with documents that they did not know were going to be asked for. I think that it proves once again the unfairness, in terms of due process of law, of proceeding in this way in public without complete co-operation on the procedures to be followed.


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, I am sure that it was simply by inadvertence, but I think the Prime Minister declined or neglected to answer my question as to whether or not there will be an instruction to counsel to make available the particular documents in question. I would like him to clarify that, and elaborate on the significance of the phrase he used when he said that the government would want to consider the classification of the documents that would be made available to the McDonald royal commission.
Does that mean there are, in the possession of the government, government documents which have a classification that in the view of the government makes it improper or impossible for the government to make those documents available to the McDonald royal commission? In other words, are there some documents that this government will not make available to the McDonald royal commission?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, certainly not documents that it would be improper to show to them. As I said the other day, the government does not attempt to absolve itself of its responsibility for the protection of secret documents and Privy Council secrets. I have said that when the commission feels that such documents which are covered by the necessities of secrecy should be published, and that they show evidence of some wrongdoing, we will undertake to declassify them.
I cannot say in advance that we will declassify all documents in every circumstance and permit them to be made public. We will do so when they show evidence of wrongdoing, in the judgment of the commission, and when in the judgment of the commission it is important to make these documents public. The Leader of the Opposition will realize that probably even the McDonald commission will not want to make all docu-
Oral Questions
ments public, any more than any other royal commission of inquiry into matters of secrecy and intelligence.


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, there is perhaps confusion here between the question of the production of documents and the question of publication of documents. I want to come to the question of publication later. I want to be absolutely clear, here, on the question of production of documents.
Is it the position of the government that the government will make available to the McDonald royal commission every single document, regardless of classification, which might in any way be relevant to the inquiry of the McDonald commission? I am not speaking here of publication-that is another question-I am speaking of production. Is there going to be any limitation at all upon the documents that the Government of Canada will make available to this commission?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I am informed that the commission has had access to all these documents. Therefore, it is not a question of not showing them to the commission. The commission has had access to the RCMP files, and presumably knows about these documents. The debate yesterday was about whether they should be produced at that particular stage.


Charles Joseph Clark: A final supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. The Prime Minister and I have a slightly different views of what went on yesterday before the commission. For the record, and in very unequivocal terms, I should like to have from the Prime Minister a categorical assurance that every document that is relevant to the McDonald royal commission that is a government document, or is in possession of the government, will be made available to the McDonald royal commission and that no question of classification will stand as a bar to the production by the government of relevant material to that commission.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I think that undertaking can be given in a general way. I cannot say in advance that all cabinet minutes can, or should, be put before the royal commission without the government asking itself if this has to be done. If the royal commission makes a case for access to cabinet committee minutes as is the case with the documents which were asked to be produced yesterday, my answer is yes. I saw the cabinet committee minute just five minutes before I came to the House. Certainly, the government would have no objection to producing that cabinet committee minute.
I do not think the discussion in cabinet of every and all subjects should be available to any outsiders of cabinet. I think this is a clear doctrine of cabinet secrecy, and it will be preserved.


INDEMNIFICATION OF COURT COSTS OF MEMBERS OF FORCE
Mr. Bill Jarvis (Perth-Wilmot):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to pursue the uncertainty that seems to have been created. I think it is important, in addressing my question through you to the Solicitor General, to clear up something that happened last

October 27, 1978
Oral Questions
Wednesday, when the Solicitor General told me that to the best of his knowledge there was no government policy that would permit the indemnification or protection of RCMP officers who, acting through the tacit or expressed approval of their superiors, might have transgressed the law.
There has now been made public, as the Solicitor General knows, clear and detailed documentary evidence that such a policy existed, at least within the force, as long ago as 1970.
My question to the Solicitor General is, has he conferred with any of his five or four predecessors in office: if it is not within his knowledge, has he conferred with his predecessors to determine whether it was within their knowledge during their respective terms of office? If so, have they confirmed, or denied, knowledge of this policy? If they have confirmed having knowledge, could he tell us when they became aware of that policy of protection and indemnification?


Hon.   J.-J. Blais@Solicitor General: Mr. Speaker, 1 stand by what I said on Wednesday, that there is no information that has come to me from either interviews with my predecessors or with officials who have been in place since the early part of the 1970s indicating that there was any knowledge within the government of a policy within the RCMP as described by the hon. gentleman.


William Herbert Jarvis: Mr. Speaker, I am sorry the Solicitor General will not tell me if he has consulted with and asked the specific question of his predecessors. I would think it would be incumbent upon him to do so. The Solicitor General is aware, from the documentary evidence, that the protection and indemnification policies resulted from prolonged consultation among the highest-ranking officers in the force, being exactly the same officers who were consulting weekly with this series of solicitors general: the very same officers.
In view of these circumstances, can the Solicitor General offer the House any reasonable explanation whatsoever as to how a policy so important, so fundamental to the operation of the force for which the Solicitor General is responsible, could be in effect as long as eight years without any of this series of solicitors general being aware of it?


Mr. Blais:: Mr. Speaker, the hon. gentleman fully recognizes that the matter is one that is presently being studied by the McDonald inquiry in terms of its being internal RCMP policy. That matter, of course, is now subject to direct examination of former commissioner Higgitt and potential cross-examination in the near future.
As I have indicated before, it is not my intention now, relating to matters before the commission, to start commenting on either the direct examination or cross-examination that may be adduced. In terms of what was government policy, my statement is categorical, that to the best of my knowledge there has not been any policy of this government indicating that there was condonation or, indeed, acceptance of illegal activity on the part of the RCMP.


PRODUCTION OF GOVERNMENT DOCUMENTS TO MCDONALD COMMISSION
Mr. Edward Broadbent (Oshawa-Whitby):: Mr. Speaker, I ask the Prime Minister a question relating to his earlier answers. Since the documents in question at the inquiry yesterday were requested to corroborate Mr. Higgitt's allegations or claims that certain ministers of the Crown knew of certain illegal or inappropriate activities, and since government counsel, on instruction from the government, objected to the introduction of these documents not simply at this time but in general, in part on the grounds that some of the documents were not appropriately in the hands of the RCMP in the first place, I ask the Prime Minister if he would reconsider his earlier answer.
Why did the government instruct its counsel to block the presentation of these documents, which could be used in a fair-minded way to either confirm or deny Mr. Higgitt's allegations, for submission either for public assessment or simply for consideration in camera by the commission?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I have not given any such instruction and I do not know of any such instructions regarding the particular documents produced yesterday. There is a general policy, which I have tried to explain in this House, which applies generally to the government's attitude before the commission.
I cannot comment on the hearing that went on yesterday, because I did not read what they said. As I say, I was informed five minutes before coming into this House about a certain cabinet minute. I was asked if I would permit its declassification and I said, "Sure": if the commission wants to declassify this particular one, I see no reason not to. That will remain my policy and it is the policy of the government.
[DOT] (U27)
Whether the lawyers yesterday were acting on specific instructions in that case, or on my general instructions-ones I have just stated-I do not know. But my information is that it must have been, in this particular case, that they objected because they had not been notified of what documents would be produced. The commission itself was not notified, and it was sprung on the commission.
Once again I appeal to the House and I appeal to the Canadian public to keep the due process of law in mind. One party has a lawyer making some allegations in front of the court. If the opposition is interested in having the truth come out, let us see what the lawyers for the other side will say; let us see what the documents will eventually say, if they are produced; and if they are not produced, let us find out why. But let us not draw the conclusion that the government is trying to hide a document which it did not know would be produced until, apparently, the moment it was produced yesterday. That is all that is being asked for, due process and fairness, and not just jumping to conclusions because a lawyer for one party has suggested that something be adduced in evidence without the other side hearing about it.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!
October 27, 1978


John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, unfortunately, the reasonable note of the Prime Minister's answer does not accord with the facts. Counsel fo* the government said before the commission yesterday-and I quote him as he is quoted in the press-that he was instructed, presumably by the government, presumably by the Minister of Justice or someone representing the government: he is quoted as having said:
I am instructed to tell you that the RCMP is not an authorized possessor of the documents. The government objects to them even being shown to the witness-
I say to the Prime Minister, that is counsel acting on behalf of the government telling the commission that he has been instructed so to act. 1 do not think there is much doubt about that, and I find it a little strange that the Prime Minister would not be briefed on this fundamental matter until five minutes before the question period.
I would like to ask the Prime Minister, in this context, going back to the question of the Leader of the Opposition earlier, whether the Prime Minister is now saying that he will be the final arbiter in deciding which documents are appropriate for the commission to see. He is saying it will be for the cabinet to decide what is relevant for the commission to see.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I do not know from what report the hon. member is reading. 1 do know, because I was so informed a few minutes ago, that a particular series of documents-four, I believe-were sprung on the commission yesterday and sprung on the government by the lawyer on one side. I am told that the McDonald commission itself expressed annoyance at this way of proceeding, precisely because when something happens in this way, of course, it makes the headlines and raises indignation across the country and from the opposition benches. This is not the way we think things should proceed.
Once again, I do not know from what report the Leader of the NDP is reading, but if my information is correct, that this information was sprung on counsel for the commission and counsel for the government, then obviously there could not be an instruction relating to those documents which had been given to counsel. They had no instructions; they were caught by surprise and they said, "Okay, what other documents do you want? Let us look at them. The government has always co-operated, shown them to the commission and co-operated when necessary and declassified them. Presumably we will do that in the future. But let us know if you want a document to be produced, and let us know if you want us to declassify it, so that then we can get instructions from the government."
This seems a perfectly normal attitude to be taken by counsel for the government, when the government is responsible for protecting the confidentiality of documents.


John Edward Broadbent: I say, with respect, that the Prime Minister did not answer the crucial question-the question I put to him two days ago, too-about the government's attitude with regard to allowing the commission to determine what it should see, rather than having the government decide.
Oral Questions
The Prime Minister made the case two days ago in this House-he referred to this question today-that certain conversations or discussions in cabinet are confidential and that he would not, as a principle, reveal such documents to the commission if he thought it was none of their business. But what is at stake here is the credibility and integrity of the government itself.
Would the Prime Minister not agree that it is absolutely essential that the commission should have the right to acquire and have access to any conversations which took place in cabinet which might indicate, for example, that ministers had knowledge of wrongdoing? Would he not agree that ultimately it should be the commission, and not the government, which makes that decision?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I repeat, if any document can convey knowledge or implication of wrongdoing by the government, we shall co-operate in any way if the commission wants to make it public. To use the expression used by the Minister of Justice, we shall bend over backwards to declassify those documents. But we shall not let the RCMP, the commission, the opposition or the country, have access to all cabinet minutes. We are not going to open all the cabinet minutes for the commission to look into to find out all the discussions which have gone on in cabinet, with the possibility that they are going to find some illegality. Indeed, Mr. Speaker, confidentiality of discussions in cabinet is the most basic principle of cabinet government. It is also based on common sense, which I understand the new member over there has not yet had time to familiarize himself with.
This is the principle I stand by. Any former prime minister would stand by that principle, and I believe any future prime minister would do so. The only alternative is not to have cabinet minutes. If there is not to be free discussion in cabinet, then there should be either no cabinet or no record of its discussions.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!

[ Translation]


FEDERAL-PROVINCIAL CONFERENCES
[Stage Direction]
INQUIRY WHETHER MPs WILL BE INVITED TO ATTEND FIRST MINISTERS' CONFERENCE
Mr. Adrien Lambert (Bellechasse):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to direct a question to the right hon. Prime Minister.
Since a federal-provincial conference has been scheduled for next week, would the Prime Minister inform the House whether hon. members may attend this conference as observers or whether the sittings will be held in camera? If observers are invited among members of the House, will we have to submit a list of our delegates to the Prime Minister or will there be a special invitation to that effect?

October 27, 1978
Oral Questions


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, this is an open conference, the press will be represented and television cameras will be there. The size of the hall, of course, imposes a certain limitation on the number of persons who may attend but I have written to all parties represented in the House to send one or several representatives to the conference. We will not be able to admit all members from both sides of the House but every party will have at least one representative and several in some cases depending on the number of members representing parties in the House.


ROYAL CANADIAN MOUNTED POLICE
Mr. Erik Nielsen (Yukon):: Mr. Speaker, my question will be directed to the Minister of Justice, but I think there are two very important facts which should be clarified here. First, the example of cabinet minutes cited by the Prime Minister is a red herring, because the documents to whose production government counsel objected yesterday were correspondence, documents emanating from the office of the commissioner of the RCMP when he was commissioner. Second, it is not one party which attempted-


Some hon. Members:: Order.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. Does the hon. member have a question to put?


Erik Nielsen: It is not one party which attempted to produce these documents, but-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. Will the hon. member put his question.


Erik Nielsen: Since counsel for the RCMP, and not only for ex-commissioner Higgit, was the lawyer who attempted to produce these documents, how can the government take the position they were sprung on the commission? This was counsel for a body of policemen for whom the Solicitor General is responsible, and presumably he knows the instructions that are given to that counsel. How can the government take that position? Presumably he knows of the instructions given to that counsel. How can he take that position?


Hon. Otto E. Lang (Minister of Transport and Minister of Justice):: It is very clear from what counsel said to the commission that that was the case, because the possibility of introducing these documents in evidence was not a matter of prior knowledge as far as counsel for the commission is concerned and, indeed, as far as counsel for the government is concerned. At that point, counsel said they would request instructions in connection with an argument about these documents. That was the procedure which the commission itself had foreseen would be taken and, obviously, counsel for the government wanted instructions at that time.


Erik Nielsen: Counsel for the RCMP, then, should get together with counsel for the government. They were both working for the same client.


Some hon. Members:: Collusion.


Erik Nielsen: Perhaps I could address my supplementary to the Minister of Justice on the basis of an answer he gave in the House on October 24 when he said, "The material in our possession is available to the commission. That is our position, a position we shall continue to take before the commission." Then he went on to say, "Once these productions are made-"


Some hon. Members:: Question.


Erik Nielsen: "-decisions will be taken by the commission." Can the Minister of Justice tell me how the commission can make a decision with respect to what documents to examine in camera, and what documents not to examine in camera, if the government will not even show the commission the documents upon which they have to take a decision?


Otto Emil Lang: Obviously, that will not be the position the government will take. Counsel for the government wanted instructions in connection with these documents before being in a position to discuss them. Therefore, they have sought further instructions.
I find it most extraordinary that the hon. member for Yukon should be surprised by the fact that there are a number of lawyers acting on behalf of the government and the RCMP and, in due course, of various ministers and former ministers who may be before the commission. Somehow he regards all these lawyers as though they were one unit. Obviously, the reason for having all these lawyers is so that all the interests can be represented and all the normal, legal and ethical approaches applied. Therefore, the lawyers do not all know, automatically, what every other lawyer knows, though in the usual way of courtesy we would expect some notice about what is sought to be introduced so that the normal seeking of instructions can take place.


PUBLIC SERVICE
Mr. Lloyd Francis (Ottawa West):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the President of the Treasury Board. Is the government prepared to allocate funds for the retraining of public servants whose positions have been declared redundant?


Hon. Robert K. Andras (President of the Treasury Board):: Both relocation and retraining assistance will be made available where required and where it will help upgrade or provide a new skill for the person whose job is declared redundant.
October 27, 1978


ROYAL CANADIAN MOUNTED POLICE
Mr. Eldon M. Woolliams (Calgary North):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Prime Minister in light of the response of the Minister of Justice when he said that all that is involved here is notice of production, which the government did not receive. To the best of his knowledge, were any instructions given by himself or by any of the ministers to object to their admissibility merely on the ground that no notice of production had been given?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I do not know of any instruction being given in that direction, but it seems to me a common sense attitude for a lawyer to say, "Look, you want to publish some secret documents and show them to the commission. If you want us to declassify them in some way, let us know and we can seek instructions." It is very simple.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: A supplementary to the Minister of Justice. Sometimes honesty, particularly in this place, flows from the element of surprise. I appreciate that the Prime Minister has narrowed the issue. Is that the narrow issue? Were instructions issued to object to the admissibility of those documents before the commission on those grounds, and on those grounds alone?
N2)


Otto Emil Lang: No, Mr. Speaker, that was not the basis on which counsel were objecting. They were not objecting to admission so much as they were objecting to not having had time to obtain instructions. When the lawyers were faced with a situation which had not been contemplated, I think it is obvious that they wanted some chance to obtain instructions. They will now be doing that. As a result, by the appropriate point in time when the commission reconvenes, I have no doubt that all this fuss and uproar over the fact of lack of notice having caused surprise on the part of counsel will be behind us, and the commission again will be about the ordinary business of doing its job quite clearly unimpeded by any action on the part of government or its counsel.


FISHERIES
Mr. Alex Patterson (Fraser Valley East):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Fisheries and the Environment. In view of the fact that two meetings have been held by commercial fishermen for testing the unfair and inadequate openings of the Fraser River between the Pattullo and Mission bridges, can he indicate what steps are being taken to rectify the injustice being done to fishermen in this area compared with those below the Pattullo bridge, or downstream?
Oral Questions


Hon. Romeo LeBlanc (Minister of Fisheries and the Environment):: Mr. Speaker, I do not think it is a matter of justice or injustice. It is a matter of conservation. Because of particular water conditions, fish moving into the normal spawning grounds and streams had difficulty doing so. For that reason, we had to impose stricter measures. I understand meetings have taken place and the issue is now resolved. In fact, I believe fishermen have been able to fish during the current week.


Alexander Bell Patterson: Mr. Speaker, as the last opening was made without effective notice, will the minister ensure that sufficient lead-time is allowed to enable these fishermen to take full advantage of what are fewer and shorter openings in that area?


Roméo LeBlanc: Mr. Speaker, I will certainly look into this suggestion.


ROYAL CANADIAN MOUNTED POLICE
Mr. G. W. Baldwin (Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary question is for the Prime Minister and it concerns the first issue raised. The McDonald commission was set up for the purpose of settling and dealing with public disquiet on the question of RCMP security activities. Given the fact that public wrangling over secrecy or disclosure of documents particularly taking place before the McDonald commission is likely to destroy, or certainly impair, the effectiveness of the commission to undertake its responsibilities, will the Prime Minister follow the example set in the decisions of the highest courts in the United States and the United Kingdom and, in a more humble way, by the recommendations of the joint committee dealing with the question of information in using the words, "accepting the fact that it is not a proper role of a minister to make the final decision as to whether a requested document is covered by one of the exemptions"?
Even if it means the examination of documents in secret, will he make an unequivocal statement to the country indicating that the McDonald commission will be entitled to the final right to decide on the question of publication?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, this is returning to a series of questions asked of the Minister of Transport and Minister of Justice and myself last week and earlier this week. Our answers are the same.

October 27, 1978
Oral Questions
[ Translation]


FINANCE
Mr. Roch La Salle (Joliette):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Finance. Yesterday, according to a study tabled by the Quebec government, it was claimed that the budgetary cutbacks will represent a loss of 18,000 jobs in the province of Quebec alone. I should think that before announcing those cutbacks the Minister of Finance had also made an assessment of their consequences. In the public interest, will he give the House the assurance that the assessments he made on the consequences of those cutbacks will be made public to allow Canadians to see both sides of the coin?


Hon. Jean Chretien (Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, in August we announced that a reorganization of public finances in Canada would create a better environment for economic growth. I doubt that the study tabled by Mr. Landry yesterday is really sound. For him to say that Quebec will ask for compensation because we want to manage the country properly is, to my mind, rather ridiculous; he too had to make certain cuts at some point or other, some people lost their jobs and others had to go on unemployment insurance but we did not, at that time ask the Quebec government for compensation.


Roch La Salle: Mr. Speaker, I imagine the Minister of Finance had assessments made. I think that in the public interest the minister should let us know the results of the assessments of the consequences of budgetary cutbacks and, given the fact that we have heard about the possibility that the savings resulting from those cutbacks might be used in job creation programs, I would ask the minister whether he will soon be in a position to tell the House about the special job creation program that will be implemented with those savings.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I would refer the hon. member to the statements made by my colleague the Minister of Employment and Immigration in August and to other statements we have made. We have reorganized our job creation programs to a considerable extent. This winter we will spend much more money than we ever have in recent years and we also have brought changes in the social field. These changes are now before the House, more specifically the increase in old age pensions and improvements in the family allowance system. That is the program we had announced: streamlining the public administration, a shift toward job creation, job creation programs and better social programs.
[Mr. Trudeau.)


LABOUR RELATIONS
Jacques Lavoie: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Labour. Considering that conflicts do arise at times in the public and quasi-public sectors, as occurred in the Post Office, can the Minister of Labour tell the House whether he intends to amend the legislation in order to encourage and to force the parties concerned to negotiate before collective contracts expire?


Hon. Andr6 Ouellet (Acting Minister of Labour):: Mr. Speaker, this is an excellent suggestion, and I shall be pleased to consider it thoroughly, but 1 must tell the hon. member that, at this stage, the government does not intend to amend the legislation. The hon. member's suggestion most certainly deserves thoughtful consideration.


ROYAL CANADIAN MOUNTED POLICE
Stuart Malcolm Leggatt: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Prime Minister: it follows the answer he gave to the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby. In terms of the McDonald inquiry, have Mr. Justice McDonald and his commissioners had the opportunity of reviewing all cabinet minutes, documents and correspondence over the period under study by the commission, or has the procedure been that the government simply has supplied those documents which it believed to be relevant to the inquiry?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, the obvious answer is that I do not know. I know the McDonald commission was given everything it asked for, and I know we have supplied things it has not asked for to make sure it looked into this matter in depth. Presumably, it has not read everything over the period of the several years covered by the commission. I suppose it would take years to do that. I honestly do not know if it has done that. I know it has been given everything it has asked for, and it will be given everything it asks for; and, I repeat, even more than that. I am told that in many cases the officials said, "You do not know about this particular thing; take a look at this file; it might interest you".


Stuart Malcolm Leggatt: The Prime Minister has told us that the commission has been given everything it asked for. That presupposes the commission knows what it wants or, in other words, knows what questions to ask in order to receive the material.
October 27, 1978

Can the Prime Minister at least give the Elouse an undertaking to provide to the commission sufficient staff so that all minutes, correspondence and proceedings of cabinet meetings which occurred over that period can be made available to the commission, so that the commission, can determine what is relevant to its inquiry and come to a fair conclusion? Will the Prime Minister give us that undertaking?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I am sure the hon. member means well, but if he reflects a little he will realize that his request is not really reasonable. It is not realistic for any royal commission to want to hire aides to go through everything which has passed through the hands of governments, ministers and officials over a period of years. That is why the commission is proceeding differently; it is proceeding by interrogating senior and junior RCMP officers, officials and ministers. The commission is asking them questions which, hopefully, will lead it to acts which are questioned. If some of them are illegal, the commission will take the next step.
If the commission suspects, from what someone says, that there may have been an illegal act, it will want to know about a document which would support or deny such suspicion. Then it will ask for its production. I repeat, we have never refused to produce documents which have been asked for so that the commission could look at them; nor will we. The question of publication is something else again, but in terms of access we will co-operate.


John Edward Broadbent: You didn't yesterday.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: The Leader of the New Democratic Party has a supplementary question. Perhaps you could recognize him, Mr. Speaker.


CENTRAL MORTGAGE AND HOUSING CORPORATION
Jean Elizabeth Pigott: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Minister of State for Urban Affairs. Can the minister make a report to the House on the progress of the RCMP investigations into York Place, in Hamilton, and when will charges be laid?


Harvie Andre: Mr. Speaker, I am a little confused by the hon. member's question. The matter dealt with in her question clearly does not come under my responsibility. I do not think I am responsible for the RCMP. I am surprised by the kinds of questions raised by the hon. member, because since the House resumed I have noticed that she has been very quick to rise under Standing Order 43 to bring forward allegations-


Some hon. Members:: Order.
Oral Questions


Jean Elizabeth Pigott: Mr. Speaker, I apologize. My question deals with a Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation project, and that is why I asked the Minister of State for Urban Affairs.
May I ask the Solicitor General about the progress of the RCMP investigation into the Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation project at York Place, and when will charges be laid?


Hon.   J.-J. Blais@Solicitor General: Mr. Speaker, the investigation is ongoing.


HEALTH AND WELFARE
Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Minister of National Health and Welfare: it relates to the ever-growing use of social insurance numbers, which the minister will recall were originally put into place to be used for social service programs.
Can the minister tell the House what the policy is regarding the extension of the use of social insurance numbers in a variety of ways to become glorified identification cards and numbers? Is it the policy of the government to encourage the use of social insurance numbers in that way?


Hon. Monique Begin (Minister of National Health and Welfare):: Mr. Speaker, that question is very bizarre.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Monique Bégin: The social insurance number was invented and implemented years ago, before the hon. member and I were in this House. It is with surprise that the vast majority of hon. members listen to senior members of this House who are against social insurance numbers. Most Canadians do not understand why one would not be in favour of the social insurance number.
It is quite in order that in the future social insurance numbers will be used more and more. More computers are being used in every department, whether provincial or federal.


An hon. Member:: Nineteen eighty-four is here.


Monique Bégin: I simply do not understand the paranoia which is behind the hon. member's question.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, the only thing which is bizarre is the fact that an undertaking was given by the Deputy Prime Minister when he was responsible for the introduction of the social insurance number's program to the effect that it would be limited to social service programs.
Under those circumstances, and in view of the fact that the minister wants to look back, I remind her of the undertaking given, and ask her whether she is now saying that the govern-

October 27, 1978
Oral Questions
ment is encouraging provincial, municipal and private concerns to make further use of this number for identification purposes.


Monique Bégin: Mr. Speaker, I want to answer in a common sense way, and I hope the hon. member will understand. I am responsible in this House for $14 billion per year which is spent by the provinces and by us. I do not want to see people cheating even to the extent of one penny. I do not know the hon. member's definition of social services, but it is a very large and vulnerable field and one bad example or abuse in that field should not be a reason to penalize all the other people in need in this country. I do not want any loss of control, and that is my policy.


AGRICULTURE
Mr. Eymard Corbin (Madawaska-Victoria):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Minister of Agriculture, I would like to put my question to the Acting Minister of Agriculture. I would like to know whether a final determination has been arrived at with respect to payments to Elite and Foundation seed potato growers under the program announced in July. I ask this in view of apparent confusion within the potato industry at this time.
If the answer is no, will those growers in Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick who received advance payments in May and June be required to reimburse the federal government?


Hon. Daniel J. MacDonald (Acting Minister of Agriculture):: Mr. Speaker, the Agricultural Stabilization Board is now reviewing the situation, and Elite and Foundation growers could be included under the plan. The hon. member asked about paying back interim payments which were made to all producers upon receipt of an application filled out by them. This was paid to all producers so that they could get assistance in putting in their crops. With their applications they also signed a document saying that if they were not eligible for the full payment they could be required to make a partial repayment. However, this has not been established in any way. I know the Minister of Agriculture is looking at this matter very closely and I think things will work out very well.
 * *


MOVEMENT THROUGH THUNDER BAY
Mr. Jack Murta (Lisgar):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to direct a question to the minister responsible for the Canadian Wheat Board. The Wheat Board has indicated that grain sale commitments still to be met through Thunder Bay are in the neighbourhood of four million tons and that even if the system

was operating at its maximum, which is based on a Five-day week-and there are approximately seven to nine weeks left before freeze-up-the total amount of grain which could be expected to be exported through Thunder Bay is between 1.5 million tons and two million tons. Will any sales through Thunder Bay have to be cancelled or deferred in this shipping season?
Hon. Otto E. Lang (Minister of Transport and Minister of
Justice): Mr. Speaker, the Canadian Wheat Board had a very full sales program, including about as much as the board thought could be put through Thunder Bay and the eastern part of the system during the season. The strike of even fairly short duration will obviously have caused some new problems. Lake shipping may be a limitation, although even without that strike lack of supplies at Thunder Bay might have become a problem because of the low level of stocks. That will not now be a problem and what remains is to assess how close to original targets the Wheat Board can come.
I think the board will take the precaution of discussing with its various customers what reasonably can be deferred slightly in order to avoid a critical situation, and I am sure that is going on at the present time. I do not think the over-all volume involved need be very great, but clearly we have to look at all the alternatives, including whether any addition to the time the Seaway can operate is possible, or whether operations can be undertaken on a seven-day week or around the clock. If these alternatives are not already being used in regard to any part of the bottleneck, we will have to see what we can do in order to catch up.


Jack Burnett Murta: Mr. Speaker, I take it from the minister's answer that there certainly is a very real possibility of either losing sales or having sales deferred, I suppose, until next spring or even into the new crop year.
My supplementary question is in the area of what we can do in the time left, the seven to nine-week period of operation of our terminals and the grain fleet. Is the government looking very seriously at operating the loading aspect on a seven-day week basis, including weekends, so that we may maximize to the fullest extent the handling of loads; and could he be more specific by indicating what, in fact, the government is asking the industry to do now and in the immediate few weeks that are left?


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, there are some constraints and some reasons why it is not easy to just automatically move from five to seven days a week, and those include some of the labour difficulties and some of the collective bargaining agreements that are in place. I did indicate in my previous answer to the hon. member that obviously we will be looking at each of these possible solutions and, I said, particularly in the area where bottlenecks occur. In other words, if it is a limitation on lake shipping that is the problem, and not the cleaning of grain at Thunder Bay, then we will not solve our problem by cleaning more grain at Thunder Bay. We will only solve it if
October 27, 1978

we can turn around lake shipping more quickly, get it back and have more loads and more trips by lake shipping during the remaining time.
That is what we are doing: we are identifying the bottlenecks, then identifying the difficulties which may lie in the way of moving toward the solution, like the seven-day week operation, and we will then try to solve those problems.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS

[Stage Direction]
[ Translation]

Hon. Jean Chr6tien (Minister of Finance) moved: for leave to introduce Bill S-2 (from the Senate) to implement an agreement between Canada and Malaysia and conventions between Canada and Spain, Canada and Liberia, Canada and Austria and Canada and Italy for the avoidance of double taxation with respect to income tax.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.


QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER
[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)
Mr. Yvon Pinard (Parliamentary Secretary to President of Privy Council):: Mr. Speaker, the following questions will be answered today: 47 and 174.


Mr. Orlikow: 1.	For the Fiscal year 1976-77, what contracts for professional services were let for studies, surveys and analyses into (a) present or future policies, programmes or information analysis and their efficiency and effectiveness (b) the examination of the administration or internal operation of the Canadian Inter-governmental Conference Secretariat?
2.	How much was committed on each contract and to whom?


Yvon Pinard: 1. None.
2. Not applicable.


Mr. Cossitt: 1. With reference to the answer to Question No. 48 of the Third Session of the 30th Parliament which stated in part, that the Minister of Agriculture addressed a Liberal Party meeting in Brighton, Ontario, on April 6, 1977, is it government policy to permit honourary colonels to use Department of National Defence
Old Age Security Act
aircraft and specifically will the Prime Minister confirm or otherwise that the Minister of Agriculture was enunciating such a policy by declaring "I use Department of National Defence planes quite a bit because I am an honourary colonel"?
2. With further reference to the answer to Question No. 48 of the Third Session of the 30th Parliament stating in part: "Honourary colonels may travel by service aircraft to attend official duty functions related to Canadian Forces activities", was the Minister of Agriculture performing an official duty function related to Canadian Armed Forces activities when he addressed the Liberal meeting in Brighton, Ontario, on April 6, 1977?


Yvon Pinard: See reply to question No. 48, third session, thirtieth parliament, answered October 10, 1978.


Yvon Pinard: Mr. Speaker, if question No. 30 could be made an order for return, this return would be tabled immediately.


Mr. Orlikow: 1.	For the Fiscal year 1976-77, what contracts for professional services were let for studies, surveys and analyses into (a) present or future policies, programmes or information analysis and their efficiency and effectiveness (b) the examination of the administration or internal operation of the Department of Finance?
2.	How much was committed on each contract and to whom?
Return tabled.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House that question No. 30 shall be deemed to have been made an order for return, and that return tabled forthwith?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Mr. Speaker:: The two questions enumerated by the parliamentary secretary have been answered. Shall the remaining questions be allowed to stand?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed, from Thursday, October 26, consideration of the motion of Miss Begin that Bill C-5, to amend the
[Stage Direction]
October 27, 1978
Old Age Security Act
Old Age Security Act, be read the second time and referred to the Standing Committee on Health, Welfare and Social Affairs.
Mr. Herb Breau (Gloucester):: Mr. Speaker, when the clock reached ten last night I was just about-


Mr. Paproski:: To get into the bill.


Herb Breau: -I was just about to give another example of how phony and hypocritical the Conservative position is on the whole question of improving social programs in Canada, and on taking a larger share of the economic pie to help those who are disadvantaged in the country.


Charles Joseph Clark: Such as by equalization.


Herb Breau: Yes. I am glad now that the hon. member for Rocky Mountain, the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Clark), brings up the question of equalization because I was coming to that, and I was coming to the position which seemed to be enunciated by the hon. member for Halifax (Mr. Stanfield) yesterday during the question period regarding equalization. I suppose the hon. member for Rocky Mountain, the Leader of the Opposition, takes the same position on equalization as the premier for New Brunswick, his friend, Dick Hatfield.


An hon. Member:: The re-elected premier.


Herb Breau: The re-elected premier with 300 votes in his own constituency and the loss of three seats; that kind of re-elected premier.


An hon. Member:: How many votes did you get in the leadership nomination?


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


An hon. Member:: This is a fifth place speech.


Herb Breau: The position of the premier of New Brunswick, I suppose, is the same as the position of the Leader of the Opposition and of the hon. member for Halifax, that we should not touch equalization, but should allow it to increase as it is increasing now. Does he know what the result of that would be? Has he looked at what the result of that would be? The result of that would be that Ontario would be a recipient of equalization next year, if not this fiscal year. The position of the Tory party is that Ontario is a have-not province and should receive equalization payments. If we leave equalization untouched, that is what would happen.
What we want to do with transfer payments to the provinces is establish special job-creating programs to bring about development in the provinces, rather than supporting provincial bureaucracies. We want to have programs like the two we had this summer under the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Cullen) and the Minister of Fisheries and the Environment (Mr. LeBlanc). That latter program was started when my colleague, the hon. member for Westmorland-Kent, now the Minister of Fisheries and the Environment, was the
[Mr. Speaker.)
Minister of State (Fisheries) and Minister of Environment. That program was a special job-creation program in the forestry sector, in order to make sure we have reforestation programs, and use the diversion of funds of the federal government in the provinces, not to help Premier Hatfield buy himself a plane, but rather to help people such as those of New Brunswick find jobs.
The concept of equalization held by the Tories is that because the premier of Alberta and the premier of Ontario have jets, the premiers of other provinces should also have private planes. That is their concept of equalization.
We want to use federal spending power to help people find jobs. We want to create jobs and to help in the development of the provinces, and that is what the people want. I am very happy the Leader of the Opposition has brought up the question of equalization. I am still waiting to hear their position on equalization because, like everything else, they try to be on both sides of the fence. There is no Tory position either on the part of that party here, the federal party, or the provincial parties. You cannot find any cohesion or logic in this party, or in the Tory administrations in the provinces either.


An hon. Member:: What about the Liberal party in the provinces?


Herb Breau: I hear an hon. member talking about the Liberal party in the provinces. I would like to tell him that the Liberal party and the people in the province of New Brunswick have just decided to put together again a strong Liberal coalition, and that they told the Tory administration of that province what they think of that kind of government, and that is what is going to happen across the country.
1 said yesterday evening that it was very typical of the Tory party yesterday in question period, and in the debate last night, to be phony and hypocritical. The hon. member for St. John's East (Mr. McGrath)-I hope that he is going to speak in this debate-typifies the hypocrisy of the Tory party. I am not saying that he is a hypocrite. He is sincere and probably fighting in his own party to convince the bankers from Bay Street, the member for Don Valley (Mr. Gillies), the member for York-Simcoe (Mr. Stevens), the oil industry people from Calgary and the others in that party, to come to their senses.
A year and a half ago, Mr. Speaker, this government brought a bill into the House to change the UIC. The member for St. John's West (Mr. Crosbie), who had just come to the House at that time, got up and said that "we, the Tories from the Atlantic provinces, are going to filibuster this bill, stop it from going through because it is terrible for the people in Newfoundland and the Atlantic provinces." Then we had a vote on that bill on second reading and, of course, we, the Liberal members from the Atlantic provinces, had conversations with the minister, and with the help of the NDP the vote was forced.


*



October 27, 1978


Mr. Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre):: Who forced the vote?


Herb Breau: The NDP. They helped us once again to bring out the hypocrisy of the Tory party. Not one Atlantic Tory MP came into the House and voted on that bill.
This summer the government brought out another proposal to modify the UIC. At the time I was fishing in the Gulf of St. Lawrence with a group of fishermen. The statement of the hon. member for St. John's East, the social affairs critic for that party, was to the effect that the proposals were terrible and that they were going to hurt the people in the Atlantic provinces. He felt that they were cruel and terrible proposals. I thought to myself at the time that he is being his own sincere self again, but let us see if the Tory party has changed. Just 20 minutes later a statement came on the air from the real power in the Tory party, the member for York-Simcoe, who said that the government should have been tougher, that the regulations should be more stringent, that the UIC program is too generous, and that the government is being wasteful.
I do not believe that the Tory party has ever said clearly what it feels the UIC program should be, but I do remember some members saying that a potential recipient should be 25 weeks in the work force before he or she is eligible for UIC benefits-or was it 20 weeks? What is it? Is it 20 weeks, 12, 8, or 40 weeks? I would like the member for St. John's East to get up and tell us what is the Tory position on UIC. What would their policy do to the women in Newfoundland, New Brunswick, and in my constituency, who are between the ages of 60 to 64-a concern of the member for Kingston and the Islands (Miss MacDonald), another example of Tory hypocrisy-who work in the fish plants for ten or 12 weeks of the year.
What would the Tory position on UIC do to the poor people in this country if it were adopted, if they have any concrete position at all? Some people say sometimes that the UIC is wasteful, that it is terrible that with ten weeks of work an individual can get 44 weeks of UIC benefits. The member for St. John's East will be telling us, because we are talking-


Mr. McGrath:: Mr. Speaker, I hesitate to interrupt the hon. member. I would like him to continue in the same vein even though he is not speaking in relevance to the bill. All I would like, sir, is an assurance from you that the rest of us will be given the same latitude later on today.


Herb Breau: Mr. Speaker, I would like to have a lot more latitude. I would like the Tory party to tell us if they have a position on anything. Last night we heard the member for Kingston and the Islands tell the House how terrible we were to the poor women between the ages 60 to 64. What would the Tory party do with the poor people of this country aged 60 to 64, whether they are women or men? What would they do about poverty in this country at any age? What would the result be of a Tory economic policy, social policy, UIC policy, cultural policy, or anything? The result would be more depri-
Old Age Security Act
vation because we hear from that party all the time that we spend too much of the G.N.P. on social benefits.
We hear from the Tory party continuously that in the ten years of this government, and the five years before that, it has spent too much on the reallocation of resources, medicare or hospitalization. This is the phoniness and hypocrisy of the Tory party, because they know that these programs are necessary and humane. The program of income redistribution, which the Leader of the Opposition was ridiculing the other day when the Minister of Finance (Mr. Chretien) brought it up, is something on which this party must decide whether they are for or against it.
I challenge any member of the Tory party to a debate under proper circumstances to prove to me that the social security programs brought about by Liberal governments in the last 25 to 30 years have not been a factor in the high growth and productivity of this country.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Herb Breau: In spite of the fact that this country had the smallest work force of any of the major industrialized countries in the world between 1945 and 1975, we had the best productivity record because our workers were producing more. That is because we have medicare, workmen's compensation, and hospitalization, so that when people are ill they can be treated and go back to work.
I said last night that at least the NDP were honest in this debate and that they were speaking out of conviction. However, the member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent) said just recently in this House that there has been more inequality in Canada in the last ten years. I do not think he knows what he is talking about or that he can read, to say something like that. Again, I challenge that statement because one can prove that whether you are talking about people, from a demographic point of view, about the regions of the country, about the economy or in any way, inequality has been combated and reduced in this country. We have more equity and justice in the reallocation of the resources of this country to the poor people than we have ever had.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Read the speeches of the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Miss Begin).


Herb Breau: I read all her speeches, and I read all the speeches of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) also because he does not say what the member for Oshawa-Whitby says. I suggest to the member for Winnipeg North Centre that he brief his leader so that he does not get up in the House and make the kind of irresponsible statement that there is more inequality in this country than there was ten years ago.
Let us look at the facts. I have a quote from the Ottawa Citizen, September 1, 1978, written by Mr. Don McGillivray, a man who is not a friend of the government but at least he knows what the facts are. He says:
542

October 27, 1978
Old Age Security Act
In 1970, the highest average incomes were reported by self-employed doctors and the lowest by pensioners. In that year, the average doctor made $34,757, more than ten times the $3,455 annual income of the average pensioner.
In 1976, the year on which Revenue Canada has just reported, doctors were still at the top of the totem pole but pensioners had risen one space up the pole, leaving fishermen as the lowest income earners.
But the space between the top and the bottom had been sharply reduced. The income of the average self-employed physician had risen about 42 per cent to $49,310. But the income of the lowest recorded category had jumped 193 per cent to $10,144.


Stanley Howard Knowles: That is a terrible
gap-


Herb Breau: I agree with the hon. member from the NDP. That is why I think the NDP is honest on this issue. I am trying to use them to show and help me prove how hypocritical that bunch is over there.


Mr. Nystrom:: Why do you not join us?


Herb Breau: Mr. Speaker, that is a very interesting invitation, that I should join the NDP. I am not sure I would want to be a member of the NDP. I should like the hon. member for Yorkton-Melville (Mr. Nystrom) to telephone the Premier of Saskatchewan-I am sure his relationship with him is good enough that he could call him on the telephone-and say, "Mr. Blakeney, have you agreed with the federal government that in this bill we are going to give $20 more per household to people receiving GIS? Have you agreed, Mr. Blakeney, that you will not increase low income housing rents? Have you agreed, Mr. Blakeney, that you will not cut people off from welfare? Have you agreed, Mr. Blakeney, that you will not take away that $20 per family?"


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Herb Breau: In New Brunswick, as we saw last Monday, it does not take long for a politician to be brought to his senses. I was trained in that kind of political action. I would not want to be a member of a party that would attempt to erase inequalities in this country and then not guarantee to the Government of Canada that as with the family allowances a couple of years back, as with the very generous and just housing programs for our low income people, that provincial government administrations, even the NDP, would not take that away from welfare recipients.
The hon. member for Yorkton-Melville says no. I will take his word for it as I know he is an honest man. I know when he gets Premier Blakeney on the telephone and says, "Allan, are you doing this?" He is then going to say, "I am not going to work for you any more."
I should like to illustrate one more point, Mr. Speaker. In her speech yesterday the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands said that on May 3, 1978, she put a motion and the government voted against it because the motion said that government policies were inequitable. First of all, Mr. Speaker, we never voted against that motion because the Tory party did not think that social security programs were important

enough to make it a voting non-confidence motion. It was just one of those motions under Standing Order 58(11) where they did not ask the House of Commons to vote. Apparently the hon. member does not know the difference between Standing Order 58(11) and Standing Order 58(10). It was not a nonconfidence motion at all. We never voted against that motion. The Tory party obviously would not want to test the confidence of the House of Commons on spending more for social programs, because there are probably enough members of that party with the sense to know and appreciate that governments need to take an ever-increasing role in society. We live in a period where governments should do more for people.
I want to come back to this article written by Mr. McGilliv-ray, Mr. Speaker. It is a beautiful one for the NDP to recall. I challenge the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby in the proper context-probably the budget debate-on that score. I have analysed a lot of this and I will prove to what extent this government has done something to reduce the inequities in this country. It is true that if you take the highest and the lowest there is a gap-too wide a gap. What that party does not say is that more people went up than came down.
The article continues as follows:
Edward Schreyer, when he was premier of Manitoba-


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Who is the Manitoba Liberal leader?


Herb Breau: When I read this, I would think Mr. Schreyer is probably a Liberal. He cannot be an NDP because he disagrees with his leader. Let me begin the quote again:
Edward Schreyer, when he was premier of Manitoba, caused quite a stir by saying that the top income classes should not get more than two and a half times the income of the average industrial workers.
But in 1976, the average doctor was getting just 3.7 times the income of the average employee (or 3.2 times after federal taxes were paid) compared to the 5.4 times of 1970.
That is 3.7 compared to 5.4 in only six years, Mr. Speaker. The rest of the article is not important.
There are not only widows or widowers between the ages of 60 and 64 who are poor in this country; there are not only people between the ages of 60 and 64. There are people 14 years of age who are poor in this country, people who are 18 years of age who are poor in this country, people who are 40, people who are 50, trying to put their children through university, and they are poor. 1 hear people like the Leader of the Opposition talk about this and the hon. member for York-Simcoe. Of course the hon. member for St. John's East never says that because he knows better, but he does not have enough influence in his party to shut them up. That is the problem. That is the difference between this party and that party. There are enough in this party who can say no to the people from Bay Street and to the right wing forces in the country who claim that you should slash everything, have tax cuts for the rich, have mortgage interest deductions for the rich and never mind if the poor have a mortgage or a house because that is not important-there are enough of those on this side of the House.
October 27, 1978

In the last 15 years we have proved that we stand up for what is right and it does not matter what the bankers say.
I am told that the minister for social services for Saskatchewan is in the gallery, so the hon. member for Yorkton-Melville will not have to call Premier Blakeney after all. He can ask the minister.


An hon. Member:: He is a good guy.


Herb Breau: He should be a Liberal if he is a good guy.


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, I wonder if my good friend from New Brunswick would answer just one question.


Herb Breau: Mr. Speaker, I will answer questions from the hon. member for Yorkton-Melville at the end of my speech.
When they talk about poverty and about reducing inequalities in the country, they should not be phony and put motions like the one the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands offered on May 3, 1978.
If the Tory party want to say that they want to fight poverty; if the Tory party want to say that they want to help the poor people between ages 60 and 64, whether widows or widowers; if they want to say they want to help people 45 years of age, 18 years of age, single, married, whether they have seven or eight children, then they just have to shut up the hon. member for York-Simcoe, the hon. member for Don Valley, the hon. member for Calgary South (Mr. Bawden), and the hon. member for Calgary Centre (Mr. Andre) who keep on saying that the Liberal party in this country has reallocated too many resources to the regions in this country and to deprived people in this country.
If one looks at the facts-any version of the facts-one can see that the greatest increase in government expenditures of the federal government has been in transfer payments. The biggest increase, the biggest share of the NDP-the biggest share of the GNP-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Herb Breau: The biggest share of the g.n.p. has been in transfer payments. What are transfer payments for? Medicare, equalization, more universality in education-that is an ideal that we will probably never reach, but it is still something one works toward-Canada Assistance Plan, old age security-that is not for the provinces-but transfer payments to the provinces. Those are the areas where the thrust of federal government expenditure has been for the last 15 years. Then there is DREE, housing for low income people-


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Grants to Imperial Oil.


Herb Breau: The hon. member for Yorkton-Melville does not like it when the Government of Canada answers to the forces of western Canada who say, "We want to develop more oil; we want to do more for oil exploration." Therefore we have a very
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good tax system which provides incentive for that. Again, he disagrees with the premier of Saskatchewan who wants more incentives for oil exploration.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Herb Breau: There is one deep and profound difference in the House of Commons and in the country. I agree there is a deep disagreement. On the one hand the Tory party has expressed that by saying we are reallocating too many resources of the federal government. On the other hand there is the other group who say that we should do more. It is productive to help poor people, it is productive to make sure that people have good medical treatment-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Ethier):: Order, please. The hon. member for Provencher (Mr. Epp).


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: Mr. Speaker, it is my intention, like the hon. member who preceded me, to speak on Bill C-5, but I have to correct the record on a number of counts. Last night when the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Breau) spoke I rose and asked the Chair to direct the hon. member to return to the subject of Bill C-5, and today he has simply proceeded as he did last night.
There are a number of items which must be straightened out because they cannot be left unchallenged on the record. It was a similar speech to the one given by the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) not very long ago. I am the type of person who likes to analyse why people do what they do, and the only interpretation I can come to with respect to the Prime Minister and the hon. member for Gloucester is that they are worried. The hon. member was literally lashing out at everyone and anyone in an attempt to gain some political benefit.
However, I would like to point out to the hon. member, in the event he has not heard, that the Liberal party did not win in New Brunswick on Monday last.


An hon. Member:: Three seats.


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: Last night, and again today he spoke as though it had been the Liberals who had won.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: The hon. member also says the Hatfield government of New Brunswick lost three seats. May I ask him, with the most respect I can muster, how many seats did the Prime Minister lose on October 16?


An hon. Member:: Five.


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: How many did he lose?


Monique Bégin: Is that relevant?


An hon. Member:: Get on with the bill.


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: Mr. Speaker, I will get on with the bill if I am given half a chance. I am saying to you, sir, that after the latitude you gave to the hon. member for Gloucester it should
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be pointed out that, in the event he has not heard, it was New Brunswick returned a Conservative government led by Premier Hatfield for the third time. This was a first in history for that province, a third consecutive win.
There is another point that must be mentioned to the hon. member, again in the event he has not heard,-"Yes, he did run for the provincial Liberal leadership, and yes, he came last". This makes me wonder if he is trying to vent his spleen on this floor at the frustrations he has. If the hon. member wishes to point out anything further, the seat that was lost in his area was in his own hometown because the Liberals could not get their act together.


Herb Breau: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Would the hon. member permit a question? He does not have his facts right.


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: Mr. Speaker, of course I would permit a question on the same terms as he permitted it. He said, "After my speech".
There is one further point, the most serious one, which must be corrected on the record. The hon. member for Gloucester attempted, in his speech, to give the impression that questions raised by the hon. member for Halifax (Mr. Stanfield) and the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Clark) indicate that we are opposed to equalization payments.
What must be stated very clearly is that the policy of this party, enunciated by the Leader of the Opposition time after time, is that not only are we committed to equalization payments but in fact that the principle of equalization would be enshrined in a constitution of Canada brought forward by our government in conjunction and with the co-operation of the provinces. That is the issue, Mr. Speaker. This government has unilaterally refused to accept that principle. So when the member gets up to talk about equalization, 1 suggest to him that he get his facts straight.
The hon. member also likes to mention what the former premier of Manitoba said about the Liberals. I know how desperate they are in that province; in fact they asked him to run for the Liberals. We are well aware of that. But even he saw the handwriting on the wall. He preferred to stay in opposition rather than risk running with the Liberals, so much so that just yesterday in the new riding of Winnipeg-Birch Hill the Liberals have no candidate. This coming Monday the candidate for Winnipeg-St. James, who has defended the leader of the Liberal party in Manitoba many times in court and in other places, is coming before the provincial executive to check whether he should resign his position. I simply say to the hon. member that before mentioning things here as facts, check them first, please.
After Mr. Schreyer was defeated as premier following the policies that he brought in and the economic mess that resulted, what did he do? I find this one of the most hilarious things going. He joined the market economy! He started a business and became a businessman. I wish him good luck. I hope he makes it.

Returning to Bill C-5, it has been stated quite clearly that this party is in favour of this bill. Basically what Bill C-5 will do is increase the per family guaranteed income supplement by $20 per month. I think all of us in this House could say that this is not enough, but I do not know if that is really the issue we are debating today. The fact of the matter is that we cannot spend more due to economic mismanagement. I say that again. The reason it has not been increased is because of the economic mismanagement of this government and the colossal waste this government has brought into the public economic affairs of Canada. I intend to give you examples of that.
I used to sit with the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Miss Begin) on committees of the House and I know she has a social conscience. She cannot convince me in any way that she is satisfied with Bill C-5, but it is the best she could get. Let us not have people getting up on that side of the House and saying that the $20 is as great as they are trying to make it out to be. It is the best you could do under the economic circumstances.
This bill will result in a public expenditure of $290 million in the calendar year 1979. The minister made an interesting statement yesterday. She said these $290 millions would be spent without additional cost to the Treasury. If that is the case, I take it that the only manner in which she can meet that payment is to make cuts in some other areas within her budget or the budget of other departments. 1 have looked at the budget cuts in her department and I think the hon. member for Gloucester should be very careful that the government, because of the economic restraints, will make cuts in that region as well, since it is impossible to cut back without either increasing the deficit or reducing the expenditures in some other area.
What I find interesting is this matter of the spouse's allowance. It has been extended for six months after the death of the pensionable spouse. Surely, putting all political biases aside, the hon. member for Gloucester did not think that the motion put forward by the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands (Miss MacDonald) back in March, which would have extended the payment to Canadians to 65, was hypocritical because, despite his rhetoric and bombast, he should be very careful with such an analysis on that count. It is my firm conviction that the minister would have extended the spouse's allowance to age 65 if she had found the resources. The amount of money this will cost seems to vary, depending on which economic factors you take, between $8 million and $12 million.
I want to put into perspective why the minister could not extend the spouse's allowance to age 65. Just yesterday we had a revelation from the Auditor General that in the Unemployment Insurance Commission there were overpayments in the order of $142 million. The minister indicated that the Unemployment Insurance Commission had, on their own initiative, found $65 million to $68 million. Last year the Auditor



October 27, 1978


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: 
Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: The minister did in the House yesterday.
The other factor is immigration. The government, by its own statistics, argues that in order to change the demographic distribution, that is, the age patterns of Canada's population, by the year 2001, we would have to have immigration in the order of 200,000 to 300,000 in order to change dramatically the aging population syndrome. The point is that this party came out with a clear policy stating that, in view of the additional number of young Canadians coming into the labour force and the additional number of women entering the labour force, up to the mid-1980s our immigration should be in the order of 100,000. We said that immigration then, at that time, resulted in about 50,000 so the net increase would be in the order of 50,000 per annum. I find it interesting, after the annual report has been tabled by the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Cullen), and despite the criticism we received that that figure was too low, that that is the exact figure the department is now projecting for next year. As a matter of fact it is projecting that figure to the 1980s for the very reason we gave at the time.
I know there were a number of members on the other side of the House, including the Minister of National Health and Welfare, who said that figure was too low. I remember sitting in committee with her when she was arguing that immigration levels per year should be in the order of 200,000 to 250,000. Since she left the committee to become a minister, there have been some dramatic changes in thinking on the government's part. It is now in the area of 100,000. So the maximum population figure expected by the department by the turn of the century is more of the order of 26 million or 27 million, and if one allows any leeway for the exactitude of the size for demography I think we can look at a 28 million population as a maximum present assumption. So I believe the factor of 10 per cent should be evaluated by the department as well as the effect it has on the thesis the minister put forward yesterday.

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This brings me to the point I am trying to make in my intervention this morning. We all realize there will be an increase in number of Canadians who are known as senior citizens. I deplore the fact that these people have been used political pawns. I hope this bill is not another attempt to buy the vote of the senior citizens.


Some hon. Members:: Oh!


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: I say that very openly. I say that because I think everyone in this House recognizes and accepts the fact that those who are senior citizens today did not have the earning power of the present generation. But they were the builders of this country, so they deserve attention which will allow them to live in dignity. I hope that everything we do to assist senior citizens is done on the basis of their right rather than on the basis of charity. This is the point which has to be stressed.


An hon. Member:: That's it.


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: 1 am glad members on the government side acknowledge that principle.
As I said earlier, I am sure the minister would have wished to re-examine the amount of money available to senior citizens if it were not for the restraint program. Underlying this concept is an attitude which is developing and which I believe should be placed on record. It is this. While all of us recognize that senior citizens have a right to a basic pension and that those who do not possess any means should be entitled to benefit under the guaranteed income supplement, what is emerging from these programs is a division of the senior citizens into two classes. I am not talking about those who have the economic means to take care of themselves. I am talking about senior citizens who get the pension and the guaranteed income supplement, all the benefits available from federal and provincial governments. What frequently happens is that people who receive full supplementation qualify for ancilliary benefits from a provincial government.
What has happened is this. There are pensioners who get the basic old age pension and others who get none, or only part, of the supplement, either because they have paid into the Canada Pension Plan or because they were frugal during the years when they earned very low wages. But they had that mentality. Now they feel that because of those savings they are being penalized. They argue that pensioners who were frugal and who are in many ways no better off financially than those who are receiving the full old age pension and the guaranteed income supplement along with the provincial benefits, which vary from province to province depending on particular programs-I realize this is a difficult concept to explain and assess but what I hear from senior citizens in my riding office and elsewhere is to this effect-they are not saying people should not get the supplement, but they do question the penalty which is imposed on them in respect of extra income. While I believe there should be a maximum at which this should be triggered, I seriously question the concept that the person who has a small bank account and who wishes to retain that account and get interest from bonds or whatever, should

immediately lose approximately 50 cents of supplement for every dollar of income. One can justify it if one looks at this matter strictly in terms of a socialist policy, but if one looks at it in terms of fairness, remembering that these people have built up the country, it does not seem so equitable.
I suggest to the Minister of National Health and Welfare that we should re-examine this question of whether the triggering of the loss of supplementary benefits should take place as soon as there are earnings.
Let me give an example-I might stress that it is only an example. A senior citizen receives $400 or $500 of interest per year from bonds or from a bank account. If that is the only other income received, should he or she be penalized the full amount by way of a reduction of supplement?
Mr. Speaker, may I call it one o'clock?
At one o'clock the House took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The House resumed at 2 p.m.
Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: Mr. Speaker, I will be concluding my remarks in very short order. I mentioned earlier that we are supporting Bill C-5. The bill contains two amendments. One is to increase the guaranteed income supplement by a maximum of $20 per household. The second is to extend the spouse's allowance to six months beyond the death of the pensionable spouse.
It should be clearly understood that larger increases were not in the offing because of the government's mismanagement of the financial affairs of this country. I gave examples earlier. According to the Auditor General's reports of last year and this year, there has been waste in the Unemployment Insurance Commission, and if that kind of waste could eventually be eliminated there would be moneys available for Canada's senior citizens.
I also said earlier that I hope all hon. members will approach the question of pensions as if it were a right rather than charity. Too often increases in pensions are viewed by people in public life as gifts to Canada's senior citizens, when in fact they are earned through contributions to this country prior to old age.
As the lunch hour approached I was trying to make the point that as Canada's population ages, in other words, as the dependency factor for those over 65 increases numerically, we must re-examine what we are doing regarding the basis of guaranteed income supplement payments. Old age security eligibility has been changed. There is a residency requirement for those who were under the age of 18 at the time of change. For every year a person between the ages of 18 and 65 lived in Canada, or was abroad in an accepted capacity of foreign endeavour, such as employment with CIDA, to a maximum of 40 years, that person would get the basic old age pension at age 65. There is no argument there. What I was speaking about was this: the gap between what the person who receives
October 27, 1978

the old age security pension and the maximum guaranteed income supplement and what the person who gets the old age security pension and some supplement but does not get more supplement because of certain earnings, is not wide enough.
I do not want to take away from those who need money under the guaranteed income supplement, but what is happening as we look at Canada's senior citizens is that individuals who have small bank accounts bonds, some holdings, or a small amount of earnings, are penalized. For every dollar of income they lose 50 cents of supplement.
I have been saying to the government for some time that old age pensioners should be able to earn a certain amount before the supplement is affected, because what is happening is that we are developing a philosophy whereby people are not saving for retirement because they feel they will be penalized. It flows from that philosophy that as all of us approach old age, the thought is that government "will take care of us." The reason we have seen an acceleration of this thought process is that senior citizens who have been independent, who built this country and who gathered for themselves a little nest egg for their old age, suddenly feel vulnerable because of inflation. They just cannot keep up. The expenses senior citizens are required to meet are not at all in keeping with the amount of money they have put aside for their old age. Constantly we remove some of the dignity which is rightfully theirs.
Far too often senior citizens have come to my office and said. "I have a little savings, I have helped build the country, and now I am being penalized." I am not saying that this should be open-ended, that they could earn any amount of money and qualify for a supplement. If that were the case, obviously the entire concept of supplement would be defeated. But let us not penalize those frugal Canadians who are now senior citizens and have some small savings. We should not penalize them to the point where incentives are taken away from those who will be senior citizens in the next few years. That brings out another dimension, the concept of guaranteed annual income.
Only a few years ago the concept of guaranteed annual income had much more political acceptability than it does today. An experiment known as MINCOME has been conducted in Manitoba. A guaranteed annual income was put into place in a specific area of that province. The program cost approximately $17 million. It was a co-operative enterprise between the federal government and the former government of Manitoba. The program ended before the provincial election took place. Perhaps the hon. member for Dauphin (Mr. Ritchie) could speak more completely on this since the program was put into place in his area.
The people on MINCOME were taking away the incentive of people who were earning a marginal amount of money and, with a little bit of government help, would have been independent. They were better off receiving a government cheque, so they decided to go on MINCOME. Even if the financial resources were there, much more study is necessary before I
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could accept the concept of guaranteed annual income, particularly in view of the experience in Manitoba.
As a spokesman for my party stated yesterday, we are supporting this bill with the reservation that we are unhappy the amounts are not more in keeping with the actual expenses of senior citizens. Obviously they cannot do that because of the government's mishandling of the economy. In the longer term, I should like to see a much more detailed study of the effect government payments, such as the guaranteed income supplement, have on the independence of senior citizens. I hope the minister and her officials take my suggestions seriously. This group of Canadians is an ever-growing one, and demography indicates that this will continue to be the case. It behooves all of us to take a look at some of these developments before they occur, rather than attempt to take care of them after they are upon us. With those words, I want to say that I will support Bill C-5 at the time it comes up for division.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Herb Breau: Earlier the hon. member for Provencher (Mr. Epp) indicated that he would be happy to answer a question after he completed his speech. I wonder if he would do so now.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Ethier):: Will the hon. member accept a question?


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: Yes, Mr. Speaker.


Herb Breau: Referring to the facts about New Brunswick and my home town, I should like to inform the hon. member that we won the seat with an increased Liberal majority of 40 per cent. In northeastern and eastern New Brunswick, we defeated two Acadian ministers who were in the Tory party.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Ethier):: Order, please. The hon. member's question is not relevant to the bill before the House.


Herb Breau: It is relevant to the bill.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Ethier):: I suggest the hon. member poses a question which is relevant to the bill.


Herb Breau: Mr. Speaker, my question is relevant because the hon. member referred to transfer payments, social programs and equalization. Because of increased revenues to the provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan resulting from oil production and increased prices of oil, does the hon. member realize, if equalization payments were left untouched, that Ontario would be one of the recipients of equalization payments next year? If so, does he think that is a tenable situation and a good federal-provincial relationship? Does he think it is fair?


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: Mr. Speaker, I find it rather humorous that the hon. member is trying to ferret in another one of his views. All of us who have studied the situation know that if the present equalization grants were to remain, next year Ontario could become a recipient. The point which my party has mentioned, time after time, is that we would underwrite equalization in

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the constitution after agreement with the provinces. That is something which the Liberal party has refused to do. It was an issue in the election. I am sorry the hon. member is so touchy, but I want to commiserate with him as he gropes with the difficulty of trying to save his own backside and retain his seat.
[ Translation]


Mr. Raymond Savard (Verdun):: Mr. Speaker, I am glad of this opportunity to participate in the debate on Bill C-5 to amend the Old Age Security Act.
After the Speech from the Throne, I said I was deeply moved to see our government responding to the needs of the sectors of our population where people most need our help. It is important that our old age policy reflect this intense desire of senior citizens to keep the full status of citizens, to keep being considered as human beings in the fullest acceptation of the words.
Those who have withdrawn from the labour market without benefiting from a policy of economic growth are finding themselves in a very difficult material situation because of the increase in the over-all prosperity and the resulting rise in the standard of living. Consequently, we should try to adjust incomes to the increased prosperity. I congratulate the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Miss Begin) for her obvious interest in improving our social laws. We all know how concerned she is for the lot of small earners in Canada and she has once again proven it.
The government is often asked to do something about the deplorable situation in which older people find themselves but today, Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to see that the government I represent is going to help senior citizens by proposing amendments to Bill C-5 to extend the allocation for a period of six months after the death of the pensioner and provide an increase of $20 a month for those who receive a supplement to give the surviving spouse a period in which to adjust. That will result in an additional outlay of $89 million for Quebec in 1979 but we should remember that money will be going back into the economy. Mr. Speaker, an old age policy should first reflect a deep concern for the dignity of older people and also help them maintain their personal independence to the fullest extent possible from a physical, mental and social standpoint.
The measures all hon. members of this House are being asked to pass are extremely urgent. When you think, Mr. Speaker, that in 1961 in Canada 1,400,000 senior citizens were left on their own because the members of their families were unable to take them into their home. The same goes for the province of Quebec where in 1961 740,575 older persons, or 53.7 per cent, lived with a member of their family, either spouses or unmarried children. In Canada, 89,028 older persons lived with people who are not related to them. This is due to a number of factors, namely the lack of sufficient financial resources. I believe we are all aware of it and should care more for our senior citizens' plight since there are now a large

number of older people because of a high birth rate in the years prior to 1930.
Mr. Speaker, according to the final report tabled by the Special Committee on Aging in 1966, the elderly population in Canada is rapidly increasing. Based on a 65 arbitrary age, the number of senior citizens was 1.5 million in 1966. It has increased five times since then, which points to a three million figure around the years 1991. Those trends seem economically alarming, and they are matter for concern. Senior citizens are the only ones in the total population not to fully share in the general prosperity, yet they are entitled to more than those who have not contributed as children and teenagers.
The great majority of our senior citizens earned low salaries throughout their lives, they lived through the great depression and its insecure environment, they had little or no leisure, and they now are far from the affluence that would minimize the vital importance of money, because money is a factor in freedom and self-dependency. One of my constituents told me: "I was, I am and I will always be what I have always been". He wants to express his views with all his strength and energy. No doubt we are all aware of the gap in private pensions between men and women. The enormous gap between men and women as concerns pension plans is due partly to the fact that 60 per cent of women workers are employed in support services or in business where the level of unionization is very low.
There is another important factor: many employers have deliberately taken action to exclude women from their pension plans. Some of these actions are very subtle, such as the development of pensions plans restricted to employees whose wages exceed a certain level which very few women can hope to achieve or pension plans restricted to certain categories of employment where there are very few women. Other employers have been brutally frank. In its report on private pension plans in Canada in 1974, Statistics Canada shows that, at that time, 400 pension plans were reserved exclusively for men and provided explicitly that women were not eligible. Of the 400 employers involved, 47 had implemented a separate plan for their female employees, 93 had a plan exclusively for male managers and 270 others were in the transportation or the construction field where very few women are employed.
Another way to restrict female participation is to set different minimum and maximum ages of eligibility for the plans. According to Statistics Canada, in 1974, 1,400 plans had different minimum ages of eligibility for men and women, the usual requirement being 21 for men and 25 for women. Moreover, 1,200 plans provided for different maximum ages, retirement being usually set at 60 for women and at 65 for men. Employment is not a major income source for most senior citizens, but it remains a major element in the life of approximately 10 per cent of women aged between 65 and 70. Some of them are career women, mostly single, who choose to postpone their retirement, but most are women who need the money and must work part-time for very small wages.
October 27, 1978

During the throne speech debate, I talked a lot about the situation of older people. Therefore, 1 do not want to go on too long on the subject, but since it concerns me deeply, I did not want to miss the opportunity to show my approval during the debate on Bill C-5. I am convinced that all hon. members will support the amendment moved by the government, which increases the amount of the guaranteed income supplement by $20 for single pensioners and $10 for married pensioners whose spouse also receives a pension and which will be implemented on January 1, 1979.


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Mr. Speaker, I wish to take just a few minutes to participate in this debate on a bill that will make two changes, one to increase the old age supplement by $20 a month, and the other to extend the spouse's allowance for six months after the older spouse dies.
Let me begin by repeating, really, the words of the Elouse leader of this party, the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles), who commended the minister for moving in a progressive direction. I just wish all the ministers of the cabinet were as progressive as the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Miss Begin). It is unfortunate that a very conservative influence is now showing up in that cabinet with the hon. member for Crowfoot (Mr. Horner), the Minister of Transport and Minister of Justice (Mr. Lang), and the Minister of Finance (Mr. Chretien), who are offering her all kinds of static when she wants to move in a progressive direction. I think that is a very unfortunate thing.
One of the things this parliament can be proud of, and which has happened in the last few years, is the progress we have made in the area of social legislation, such as family allowances, old age pensions, medicare, hospitalization, and things like that.
It struck me as being rather humorous this morning when listening to the hon. member from New Brunswick who was talking about how the Liberal party introduced medicare and hospitalization in this country. My seat mate, the hon. member for Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands (Mr. Douglas), sits here and chuckles. I am sure that hon. member from New Brunswick did not really want to take the credit for medicare away from that hon. member whose government it was that initiated the plan in the first place.
I was very amused by some of the statements made by that hon. member from New Brunswick. I am not criticizing him, but I am just reminded of something that happened in my childhood days when there was a big doctors' strike in Saskatchewan. The hon. member suggested that the Conservative party said hospitalization was too expensive. I am sure it did. 1 remember that the Liberal party in Saskatchewan always used to say that hospitalization was too expensive. They said medicare was too expensive. The Liberal party which we always had in Saskatchewan always said that medicare was too expensive. We had a committee in Saskatchewan called the "Keep Our Doctors", or "KOD" committee, and that commit-
Old Age Security Act
tee continually fought against the medicare plan, particularly back in 1961.
As you know, medicare is a plan that primarily benefits two groups, people with young children, and our senior citizens. It is very humorous, but I think very pleasing and very positive, to note that the Liberal party is now doing a complete turnabout in being very proud of that medicare plan it fought so hard against in our province just a short time ago.
I want to point out this afternoon, when talking about increasing our old age supplement in order to help the elderly, that in the last few years we have come a significant distance in helping the low-income people of our country. What concerns me is that we have not by any means come far enough. We have not redistributed income in Canada in the way I think we must. The gap is still much too wide between the poor and the rich. My hon. friend from New Brunswick, and my friend from Montreal, both agree with that statement. We have to go a lot further. I know the Minister of National Health and Welfare wants to go a lot further in redistributing income in this country.
The concern I have is that in the last few months, particularly since August 1 when the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) was converted in Bonn, and sort of reinforced in Morocco, we have heard about huge cutbacks in government spending amounting to around $2.4 billion. The Prime Minister, in suggesting these cutbacks, I think was looking over his right shoulder. He was looking at the Conservative party and what it has been advocating, in general that government is too big and should be cut back, and government is spending too much money. They have suggested we should have more free enterprise in government, and so on.
I am concerned that the Prime Minister has listened to the conservative forces in our country. When you have cutbacks such as these, where do they cut back? They cut back on the Farm Credit Corporation, housing, and areas like that. We need to build houses for the people of this country to live in, as well as to provide jobs. I know the member for New Brunswick was concerned about these things earlier today. But they did not ground the Minister of Transport (Mr. Lang). As a friend of mine once said, if they had grounded the Minister of Transport for a year we could have kept the weather office in Saskatchewan open for three years. They did not pull the plug in the Prime Minister's pool or fire many senior mandarins or bureaucrats in the government. They laid off a few people, but in the main it has been people on the low income side, a few secretaries and clerks, people like that.
Because of those cutbacks, the Minister of National Health and Welfare has to fight hammer and tongs for a small increase for the senior citizens. I think this is dead wrong. A big issue in the election campaign which is coming up is going to be the whole area of whether the government should be cutting back and taking the meat axe to all departments in this country.
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I can only look at what I know best, and that is the prairie provinces. There is the example of Saskatchewan's sister province, Manitoba. I remember Sterling Lyon, the Conservative leader there, when he campaigned against Ed Schreyer and said that the government was too big and had to be cut-"we can't stand the government doing all those things and interfering in people's lives". Mr. Lyon kept his promise. He is a good Tory and an honest one, and he cut back. The unemployment insurance statistics came out about three weeks ago and you can guess where the largest increase in unemployment has been in the last year. It was in the province of Manitoba where the rate went up by between 30 and 35 per cent last month over a year ago.
A large amount of that increase is due to the fact that the Tory government in Manitoba has cut back so radically on its spending, on funding programs for native people, on helping ordinary low income people and on funding to municipalities. We have the former mayor of Toronto here, and I am sure that he is concerned about this trend in the Conservative party being that, I gather, he is a good left wing progressive Tory.
The mayors, reeves and councillors were concerned about electing a Tory government in the Saskatchewan election campaign because they promised all these cutbacks on local government. I am sure that people in the House will be shocked when they learn what Sterling Lyon has done. We know that the inflation rate last year was 7V4 per cent to 8 per cent and that operating funds for hospitals in Manitoba were cut back to 2.9 per cent last year. As a result of that cutback, 1 am sure that their health care is deteriorating and that a good many people have to be laid off. This almost makes Frank Moores in Newfoundland look good. The cutbacks in municipalities meant that many programs had to be cancelled and people laid off.
I am concerned about this most recent trend in our country of governments cutting back on spending. There is an alternative to what this government should be doing, and that is economic planning and resource planning for all people. Instead, however, we have conservative forces that want to attack the most vulnerable, the little people, the old people, family allowances, people on unemployment insurance and the like.
I have commended the Minister of National Health and Welfare for trying to help with pensions, medicare, and so on. We should be looking at what different political parties offer for old people. I could go over a long list of what is happening in the province of Saskatchewan where the old age pension is supplemented by a provincial pension plan. I can also look at medicare.
I was very happy when the Liberal party came around to introducing medicare and hospitalization in Canada. I am sure that if the Tories were in power even they by now would have done the same thing. But what do Tory governments do to medicare plans in this country? In my province we do not have any medicare, hospitalization premiums, deterrent fees or utilization fees.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Careful.


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: I know that the member for Saskatoon-Big-gar (Mr. Hnatyshyn) is very proud, as I am, of the plan.
But what does big, wealthy, Ontario do when it comes to medicare? For a family of four in Ontario, the medicare premium is $456 per year. If it were not for the opposition, the NDP and the Liberal party in Queen's Park, that premium would be higher than $456; it would be over $528 for a family of four. In Ontario the government collects more money from medicare premiums than it does from resource revenues. Even in oil-rich Alberta, with the billions of dollars of oil money that they have, the medicare premium there for a family of four is $196 a year. And to top that off, Alberta has all kinds of special fees and utilization charges that they put on people when they are sick. For example, they still charge $4 a day for each day after 120 days for level three and level four care in nursing homes.
They have the same thing in Manitoba where they just brought in a special deterrent fee of $7.50 a day on extended care patients. They are talking about bringing back medicare premiums in that province. All of this is because the party in power is of the belief that people should pay as they go, that government is too big and that we have to cut back.
This is something that cannot be overlooked in a debate like this because, if you are going to cut back on government spending, it is not the grants to big companies, the tax breaks to companies like Imperial Oil and so on, that are cut back; it is the money which goes out to the small people such as the old age pensioners.
As a wise old man in my riding once said during an election campaign, "The Liberal party may cut your throat, but the Conservative party will cut it deeper." I think that he is right when it comes to the social plans of the party.
I would like the Conservatives to get up in this House and to tell me exactly where they stand with regard to old age pensions, where they stand when it comes to cost sharing programs with provincial governments, to upgrade the care and incomes of the ordinary people, when it comes to medicare, hospitalization, unemployment insurance, and family allowances. I think that they have had it both ways for too long. That party has been asking for all kinds of cutbacks, but suddenly when people in the arts appeared on Parliament Hill yesterday, there was a Conservative spokesman saying to them, "God, this government has cut back too far," and that was the member for Egmont (Mr. MacDonald). When it comes to agriculture, they always have my friend, the member for Elgin (Mr. Wise), sympathizing with farmers and saying, "Well, I don't understand why they cut back by 8 per cent, and cut back on some of these terrific programs." When it comes to social programs such as unemployment insurance, we always have one of the two Bobbsey Twins from Newfoundland, namely, the member for St. John's East (Mr. McGrath), getting up and saying, "My gosh, they have cut back too far; they are going to hurt people down in Newfoundland." When it comes to the public servants where they want to cut back drastically, they have the newly elected member for Ottawa
October 27, 1978

Centre (Mr. de Cotret) saying, "Oh, no, I'll make representations to them; I'll make sure that they don't cut back."
One of the issues in a debate like this when we are talking about increases in the old age pensions is whether or not the members of this House are really committed to helping the old people. As the member for Winnipeg North Centre said, a $20 increase is a good increase, but it does not go far enough. We must keep the pressure on the treasury benches to increase the old age pension for those who need it.
Every time I go out among the old people in this country I find that a lot of them are living on the poverty line, not getting enough money to buy the nutritious foods they need, and in big cities particularly a lot of them cannot afford decent housing. It should not be forgotten that these are the people who built this country, the people whose sweat, toil and blood made Canada what it is. I think we owe them more than a small pittance in their old age pension cheque.
The second point I want to make is that we agree with the increase in the old age supplement and with the extension of six months for the spouse's allowance when the elder spouse dies. These are good measures. The spouse's allowance did not exist until a few years ago and, while it helps a lot of people, it still discriminates against single people between ages 60 and 65 who cannot work, and against spinsters, widows, and others. When I go knocking at doors in my riding, many people will say to me, "My neighbour can get the spouse's allowance-in other words, a pension; why can't I get it?"
Even if we pass this bill today, what happens to the spouses who were there yesterday and whose husband or wife passed away? And what happens when the six months are up? The old man is still dead. In 98 per cent of cases the survivor is the wife. She gets an extra six months of grace, but what happens then? Is she to go to the welfare office? The spouse's allowance has created a lot hardships, Mr. Speaker.
I know of a case in the city of Melville where the husband was ten years older than the wife. He had been a small farmer who retired to the city and bought a small house with the proceeds of his farm. All of a sudden he died of a heart attack, although he had not been sick a day in his life. His wife had turned 60 and had qualified for the spouse's allowance. She called my office to know what to do, and it was one of the saddest things I have ever witnessed to see her cry. She had lost her pension, her spouse's allowance, and she did not have any savings. All the money from the farm had gone to buy the house in the city. She was too proud to ask for welfare, but at age 60 she had no training or skills to offer. All her life her work had been on the farm and raising a family. I had to advise her to do the only thing possible and apply for social assistance. That is not easy for someone with the tremendous pride she had in the work she had put into our country and into raising a family. The hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre says it happens to some 200 women every month, and I am sure the story I have told could be repeated by every member of the House.
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I know if the Minister of National Health and Welfare were the minister of finance-and according to yesterday's Hansard, I know she wants to be-she would not be the scrooge the present minister is. We would not then have such discrimination against these old people.
My friend from New Brunswick says the minister is not a villain. I would be interested in knowing who the villain is. Is it the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce? I know he changed horses, but he is still riding the same old nag. If it is not the Minister of Finance, I would be interested to know who the scrooge is across the way.
Our party has said for years that the old age pension age should be brought down progressively from 65 to 60 for those people no longer in the labour market. If that were done we would not be discriminating against people on the spouse's allowance who have lost their partners, and we would not discriminate against single people between ages 60 and 65, people who have been widowed and people in that general age group who need help through no fault of their own. I know that many people say that it is too much, that government has grown too big, that government cannot afford that. Still, we can afford that kind of money for empty buildings, and the kind of money for cabinet ministers to fly around in executive aircraft. We can provide that kind of money for tax concessions for big companies, so why is there not enough for the old people between ages 60 and 65 to provide them with their daily bread? The people who would get this money would spend it on consumer items and thus stimulate the economy and provide the jobs that are needed.
I know the Minister of National Health and Welfare is going in the face of many people on the rather conservative side of our society who say that pensions are too big, that indexing should not continue, and that the money should be spent in other places. I happen to disagree with that. I think we need a real stimulus for the economy, and the way to do this is to work from the bottom and put the spending power in the hands of the little people. They spend money on things like shoes, shelter, food, things that stimulate the economy and provide the badly needed jobs.
For these reasons, Mr. Speaker, I should like to encourage the House to pass this bill and regard it as another step toward making life more decent and humane for our older people. They are the real pioneers of Canada; they wanted a country that was strong, that was united, that had equality between people and between regions.


Mr. Ross Milne (Peel-Dufferin-Simcoe):: Mr. Speaker, it is not my intention to delay this bill going to committee where I hope it will receive speedy passage, but I should like to offer a couple of brief comments. First of all, I want not only to congratulate the government but more specifically the minister. Previous speakers have made the point that the public mood today favours retrenchment and that spending on social issues is not a priority, so it makes me proud to be a member of the Liberal party because the social conscience of the party, which has been its foundation, is still there.
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October 27, 1978
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It seems to me that the announcement made by the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) in August, the subsequent announcements by ministers, and the decisions outlined in the throne speech on which we are moving now, the reordering of priorities, and finding the money to help those who need it the most, are most commendable things. This should make it easier to do the things that we know need to be done. We should be sure that those who need help the most are being accommodated.
I should also like to congratulate the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles). As I told him before the question period today, he always makes good speeches but I thought the one he made last night while I was in the House was excellent. I was also attracted by the comment made by his colleague, the hon. member for New Westminster (Mr. Leggatt) the other day. He said that surely the debate in this House should resolve around ideas and not personalities. I thought the debate last night and most of today has been productive from that viewpoint.
As an aside, Mr. Speaker, I recall the first time I spoke in this House when it convened just after the 1974 election. At that time I commented that members of my family were related to the first woman to sit in the House of Commons, Agnes MacPhail. Some times I get some of the old Hansard and read some of her speeches although I regret I do not have more time for this. I say jokingly to the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre that he has given that kind of speech so many times that I sometimes wondered if he was not using some of her earlier speeches as a text. It indicates how slow social progress really is. It indicates why it needs so many people to be committed to it to keep making demands, because many of the issues the hon. member talked about many years ago in this House are the kinds of legislative action we are taking at this time.
I would also like to join with my colleague, the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Breau), in saying to the official opposition that I think this is a moment of truth for them. Many speakers have commented on exactly where they stand respecting some of the social issues, preaching for government restraint and a cutback in programs. But the minute that there is a change they go out and champion everyone who is affected by it. I think this just brings out the tremendous division in their party, between members who come from slower growth areas who are supportive of this kind of legislation, and those who for political reasons, say a very different thing.
The position that members have been taking in the House on some of this legislation has been stated, but I would raise the point of what I think is more serious, and that is what some of them say outside the House. The difficulties that we have in advancing social legislation as a result of some of the very, in my opinion, deplorable positions that certain of them have taken, in terms of trying to convince Canadian people that governments are too socialistic or that we have destroyed the work ethic, and the kind of social objectives I am sure all

members on this side support, are not in the best interests of the country.
Last night when the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre was speaking, he mentioned that he well remembers living through some of the depression years and how elderly people were looked after during that period of time. I am not nearly as old as the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre, but having been raised in rural Ontario it is not impossible for me to think back to the days when elderly people had a most difficult time. In the neighbourhood where I came from, people by today's standards would be long retired and would be receiving not only old age assistance but also the supplement. Presumably they would be living at a reasonable standard. However, not that many years ago these people were almost totally dependent on the generosity of their families, and lived in accommodation that was not the best. They had very limited opportunity to travel to occupy their minds, and at such time as the farm or other enterprise was taken over, their only occupation was to sort of vegetate. I think Canada has come a long way since then in terms of social legislation.
I am glad to see that we are moving on this bill. It seems to me the present generation of senior citizens deserve support and help almost more than any other generation. If one recalls, senior citizens of today lived through the depression. They were the ones who gave up a lot of economic opportunity to help the war effort, and they have not had available to them any of the programs that people who are middle aged or younger have had. They may not have had the opportunity to prepare for their older years as much as some of us have had.
1 am also pleased that we are dealing with this bill at the present time because it gives us an opportunity to show that we do stand for this. I have been concerned, along with other members who have spoken earlier, about the attack on pensions, and the indexing provision in pensions. It is always interesting to note that the people who attack these things, generally speaking are well off and have very little to fear if there is any change in the indexing procedure or any change in the level of pensions. It is good to see that the government is committed to do that, and to increase further those rights.
I want to state, as other members have, that the next move will need to be to look at the spouse's allowance. It seems to me there is agreement on all sides of the House, at least from the speeches I have heard so far on this bill, C-5, that there would be little trouble in advancing that. I think I am correct if I say the cost of providing the spouse's allowance for those people between the ages of 60 and 65 who would qualify would be in the order of $600 million a year, which is some considerable amount. I would hope that in terms of reviewing government expenditures and the validity of government programs etc., before too long the money could be found, money that is being spent in other areas, and redirected to this area. In my opinion, it is a just and necessary social aspect on which we should move.
My purpose in rising was to make one point, and I would like to do that now. Perhaps I could suggest to the minister than when continuing to review the problem of the spouse's
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allowance some thought be given to a proposal I have been wondering about for some time.
Many women have come to see me, some were not even 60 years of age, but many of them have been receiving the spouse's allowance. Some women have come to see me whose husbands have died, and who have been left a home but very little money, and in some cases a small mortgage. I think members on all sides of the House would agree that it is a good social point to try to encourage senior citizens to live in their homes as long as it is possible for them to do that, and as long as they prepare food and look after themselves ably, and perhaps with the help of friends and neighbours. I am sure other members have had the same difficulty with representations, trying to find alternate accommodation, and there is never enough. The difficulty, of course, is that in many instances seniors cannot afford to maintain a home. It may well be that they have a home worth $60,000 to $80,000. They may be asked to pay $1,000 in municipal taxes. Some municipalities in various provinces have given relief on the tax aspect. With the upkeep of the home and payment of taxes, senior citizens have very little money left over.
It seems to me people in that position are in similar circumstances to farmers. They have worked hard all of their lives to get rid of a mortgage so that with the equity they will have some protection for their older years. I believe the hon. member for Yorkton-Melville (Mr. Nystrom) made the point about farmers working hard during their lives, and selling their farms. In my community the process was for them to move into town. That was a way for them to withdraw the equity that they had worked hard for, and hopefully they had money left over after the sale of the farm to live reasonably well.
People who have worked hard and have a house in an urban area have great difficulty in withdrawing equity, and in still being able to maintain their house. I have often wondered why Central Mortgage and Housing or the private mortgage sector did not look at the possibility of negative mortgages. I am suggesting to the minister that she might want to look at this in the over-all review as a next step. If a widow is living in a house with some $60,000 to $80,000 equity in it, that person could withdraw from it, say, $10,000 to $20,000 in equity. There would be no repayment schedule on that, and at the time the person either died or had to go into a nursing home for care, or for whatever reason dispose of the house,-or at some stage the estate did,-that accumulated mortgage against the property would then be due and owing.
As far as I can see this would not cost any money. It would seem to me to be just as profitable a proposition as are standard mortgages. Perhaps this could be a role for the private sector, and for Central Mortgage and Housing to guarantee that type of mortgage. To thebest of my knowledge this has never been done. It is done in terms of certain provinces and municipalities which recognize the fact that municipal taxes are onerous for senior citizens. They set the taxes aside until a person dies. This money is then collected from the sale of the property. Perhaps this would be a way to enable seniors to live in their homes many years longer than
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they can afford to do now, simply because although they may have equity in their property they may not have the cash reserves or the income to maintain that house. We might allow them to withdraw some equity in the property, with no repayment schedule, and accumulate the interest payments against it. Then on the disposition of the house, either by the estate or by the owner moving to some other facility, that amount would be due and owing in a lump sum. I wonder if there is any validity to that. I put it forward to the ministers who are concerned about this when they next look at social assistance programs.


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Speaker, this is a very important bill before the House. I am glad to see that it is being treated in a much more tranquil and, shall I say, serious atmosphere than when my friend, the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Breau) had the floor. That is only right because this is a most serious bill, one which requires the serious attention of the House.
It is our intention, Mr. Speaker, as my colleagues have indicated, to support the bill and get on with it because of its importance to a large segment of our population. I congratulate the minister for bringing in the bill. I know what a difficult time she has in that cabinet over there. 1 know, for example, she has to compete constantly with her colleagues, the President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Andras), the Minister of Public Works (Mr. Buchanan), and all these other hon. gentlemen who make the minister's life really quite miserable.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


James Aloysius McGrath: We can certainly understand and sympathize with the minister.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Monique Bégin: I love my job and I do not need sympathy.


Jean Elizabeth Pigott: It's not your job, it's your colleagues.


James Aloysius McGrath: The extent of her success is somewhat of a disappointment. She will not, and indeed she cannot, explain why she was unable to persuade her colleagues to go all the way with respect to the spouse's allowance. How can she possibly justify the spouse's allowance for a period of only six months? She talked last night about these unfortunate women being able to take advantage of the six months' period to readjust by settling their estates, and what have you. The fact of the matter is that a woman who is in a position where she has to subject herself to a means test in order to qualify for the spouse's allowance obviously, by definition, has no estate. She has nowhere else to turn, she has no one to fall back on. That is a fact.
We have a bill before us which we will support. Half a loaf is better than none. We have a bill before us which will provide a continuation of this payment for six months after the death of usually the elder spouse. What happens then? What hap-

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Old Age Security Act
pens then is that that unfortunate person, usually a woman, will receive a letter from the minister to this effect:
We have learned with regret of the death of your husband. Please accept our sincere sympathy. We have to inform you that since you are a widow, you are no longer eligible to receive the spouse's allowance.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Some sympathy!


James Aloysius McGrath: Some minister. I really sympathize with the minister because I know that deep down inside she finds this just as repugnant as I do, and she knows as well as I do that the people who receive that note from the minister, these unfortunate people, will usually have to swallow their pride under difficult circumstances, submit themselves to another means test and fall back on the provincial welfare agencies.
I am sorry that my friend, the hon. member for Peel-Duffer-in-Simcoe (Mr. Milne) brought in the question of costs, because surely you cannot put a price on this kind of thing. Surely the country owes this to its senior citizens, a country as affluent as Canada. The minister could have gone all the way and she would have received the support of everyone in the House and everyone in the country if she had made provision in that bill to provide for the spouse's allowance until that person was eligible for the old age pension. But she did not do it.
Indeed, it raises the much broader question-and this is a question which is quite appropriate with respect to the present incumbent in the portfolio of national health and welfare-of the Canada Pension Plan with respect to housewives. This is a subject which I know is very close to the minister's heart because she was, among other things in her distinguished career, the secretary of the Royal Commission on the Status of Women. In its report, one of the principal recommendations of the commission was that housewives, the homemaking spouse, if you like, be permitted to qualify for benefits under the Canada Pension Plan.


Monique Bégin: No, we recommended a study.


James Aloysius McGrath: 
James Aloysius McGrath: I know whereof I speak, Mr. Speaker.


Monique Bégin: Mr. Speaker, may I rise on a point of order. May I ask the hon. member a question?


James Aloysius McGrath: I do not mind being interrupted, Mr. Speaker, by such a charming lady. I will be glad to entertain a question from the minister when I conclude my remarks.
I do not want to misrepresent the minister. If she said that the commission proposed that this matter be studied or looked into, I will accept that, but the end result is the same. Obviously the commission felt seriously and strongly about this question of the injustice that was being perpetrated on a large, voiceless element in our society, and those are the people who take their responsibility seriously to the point where they believe that their place is in the home to provide a healthy

environment for the raising of children which, in my view, is probably the most honourable and one of the most important things a person can do.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


James Aloysius McGrath: But you know, Mr. Speaker, in this society of ours where roles are changing, where inflation has taken its toll-and this is a sad commentary on what is happening to us-it has become more and more essential for women who would normally want to stay at home to enter the work force. When you realize that what they have facing them in terms of retirement benefits, of which they have none, in terms of that awful letter which they will get from the Minister of National Health and Welfare six months after the death of their husbands, then you can understand the terrible conflict that must take place between a woman's natural instinct to remain at home and the quite natural instinct to get into the work force and not only help to provide for the family and offset the consequences of inflation but, quite frankly, to provide for her own retirement.
I hope the day will come when we can have a Canada Pension Plan that is actuarially sound to the point where this will be possible. My leader and my party are dedicated to this end. One of the first things we will do is to put the fund on a sound actuarial basis; and the second thing we will do is to make provisions within the Canada Pension Plan so that housewives, or the homemaking spouses, can qualify for Canada Pension Plan benefits.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


James Aloysius McGrath: My colleagues, the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands (Miss MacDonald) and the hon. member for Brome-Missisquoi (Mr. Grafftey), dealt with this at great length last evening and I will not dwell on it further.
The other important provision in the bill before us deals with an increase in the guaranteed income supplement, which is a very important part of the old age security system in this country.
While 1 commend the minister and welcome this measure, I say to her that we have to look beyond the provision of an additional sum through the GIS and consider the plight of older people in its entirety. This is a serious question and a sad one. Indeed, I think it is a blot on the face of Canada that this country, built up by those who are now senior citizens, cannot adequately provide for those people in their old age. I say "adequately". Obviously we do make provision for them under various programs but the fact remains that many of the senior citizens of this country are living in poverty. Many were not financially prepared for retirement, some because they never saved for the future, others because their incomes were never sufficient to allow them to accumulate savings, and still others because they experienced financial tragedies during their more active years. The consequence is that many of them are forced to live below the poverty line. The fact is that 48 per cent of
October 27, 1978

the unattached people living below the poverty line are aged between 65 and 69. Those who are 70 and older represent 61.7 per cent.
There are those who say that indexation should be done away with. But in this area indexation is not, in itself, adequate, as is recognized by the bill before us increasing the amount of the GIS. Indexation is based upon the consumer price index, and I think we should examine that index to determine exactly how relevant it is to the plight of older people. I am sure the minister will agree with me that it is not an accurate or adequate measure of the position in which older people find themselves in dealing with inflation.
We feel that the consumer price index should take much greater account of components such as food, shelter and health care. I am not talking about sirloin steaks, or of food eaten outside the home. It seems to me that given the expertise which exists within Statistics Canada and within the government itself, we should be able to devise an accurate measurement of the impact of inflation upon older citizens. While there are those who might question the indexation of pensions where members of parliament or others are affected, I think there would be very few in this country who would argue against the concept of protecting senior citizens against inflation. If support of that kind is forthcoming, a heavy burden is placed upon the government to make sure that the measurement of inflation is as accurate as possible.
I submit to the minister that in present circumstances indexation based on the consumer price index is far from adequate. For example, using 1970 as a base year and $100 as the base rate, the cost of food as of September, 1978, was $211, shelter, $176.50, and health care, $168. I should like to see the consumer price index or a special price index take these factors into account. Let them deal specifically with indexation of family allowances and old age pension; in other words, the impact of inflation on low income earners in Canada. Of course, when we speak about low income earners, obviously the lowest incomes are those of older citizens who have to depend upon old age assistance as their only means of support.
There is general support for this bill and I want to get on with it. I want the House to get on with it as does the minister. We do not waste time on it because we all agree with this bill. Nevertheless, there are a few things that have to be said. 1 do not mean to inject an unduly partisan note but questions have been asked by the hon. member for Peel-Dufferin-Simcoe, by the hon. member for Yorkton-Melville (Mr. Nystrom) and by the hon. member for Gloucester. You know, Mr. Speaker, they behaved as though we were the ones proposing this bill and they were attacking it. They wanted to know where we stood on certain areas of social concern. We stand four-square for social justice with respect to old age pensioners, with respect to low income earners, and I would tell the hon. member over there, who like his friend from Yorkton-Melville, is trying to corner the market on compassion for low income earners and the plight of the unemployed-


Herb Breau: Tell us about the UIC.
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James Aloysius McGrath: Let me tell the hon. member that long before he and his colleagues within the Liberal caucus of the Atlantic provinces were able to screw up enough courage to challenge the government on what it was doing with unemployment insurance and the impact its proposals would have on the Atlantic provinces, I made an official statement on behalf of my party. I did so on September 1, 1978. That was a full two or three weeks before we heard from the hon. member for Gloucester or from the hon. member for Grand Falls-White Bay-Labrador (Mr. Rompkey). They did not work up enough courage to speak to caucus-


Herb Breau: Would the hon. member permit a question?


James Aloysius McGrath: Yes, Mr. Speaker, after I finish my speech. We set out our position on September 1, 1978, with respect to proposals put forth at that time by the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Cullen) outlining the impact the government's proposals with respect to UIC would have on the eastern provinces and Quebec. I do not often quote my own statements, but for the benefit of the hon. member, whose great qualities and talents seem to have escaped his Liberal colleagues in New Brunswick because they turned him down for the leadership, and who campaigned in New Brunswick for three or four weeks in the provincial election-obviously he missed out there because they came second-I said the government's proposals to change unemployment insurance and put into effect a new employment strategy was a kick in the gut to unemployed and seasonal workers in the five eastern provinces. I went on-and this was an official communique on behalf of my party-to draw attention to the impact this measure would have on seasonal workers in Canada and especially seasonal workers in the four Atlantic provinces and Quebec.
This statement was made a full three weeks before we heard from the hon. member for Gloucester, and I would tell him as he sits smugly in his place-and I have great respect for him that when unemployment insurance changes last came before the House it was this party, and my hon. friend from Hamilton West (Mr. Alexander) and myself speaking on its behalf, which brought in the provision whereby the seasonal factor with respect to qualifying for benefits and the benefit period was taken into account and incorporated in the legislation.
The hon. member is not usually as inaccurate as he was today, so I will just mark that up to the trauma he has just been through not only in the New Brunswick elections where the Liberals lost out badly because of the position his colleagues took on equalization payments, but also because of the trauma he went through when he tried so hard, but unsuccessfully, to win the leadership of his party in New Brunswick.
Where do we stand? The hon. member for Yorkton-Melville wants to know where we stand. We stand four-square in support of income support for low-income families. We support without equivocation the concept of family allowances. We support without equivocation the concept of medicare. We support the concept of unemployment insurance. We do not

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support gross mismanagement of the unemployment insurance fund by this government. What happens when the Auditor General identifies $142 million in overpayments? Apart altogether from the impact it has on the Canadian people, what is the end result of that kind of mismanagement? It means a tightening up, and when there is a tightening up, all too often the innocent have to suffer.
The people who are legitimately unemployed and who are legitimately drawing unemployment insurance benefits find it much more difficult to qualify for benefits because of the growing mismanagement of this government and especially of the Minister of Employment and Immigration. We do not support that kind of mismanagement because it is obviously counter-productive to the philosophy behind the unemployment insurance fund. The hon. member for Gloucester knows that better than I do.
I could go on to our position on the Canada Pension Plan and on equalization. Where does the hon. member for Gloucester stand on equalization? It would be interesting to know that. He talked about it today, but he did not take a position. Having just been through an election which cost his party dearly because of the stand taken by the President of the Treasury Board with respect to equalization-and he knows it-I would like him to know where we as a party stand. We stand, and I quote from the Kingston statement which was the result of a meeting between the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Clark), the next prime minister of Canada, and four of the premiers of this country, as follows:
We strongly endorse the principle of equalization and wish to strengthen it. No citizen should be deprived of fair opportunity or essential public services because of regional disparity. In any changed constitution, this basic Canadian principle should be fully and formally protected.
Does the hon. member support that statement? Can the hon. member stand in his place and say that he unequivocally supports that statement?


Herb Breau: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The hon. member is asking me if I would like to make a categorical statement, and if the House agrees, I can make that statement now.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Ethier):: It certainly would require the agreement of the House.


James Aloysius McGrath: Notwithstanding the rather substantial temptation of watching the hon. member swallow himself, I will resist and let him make his statement after I am finished speaking. I would like to see him reconcile what he is about to say with what he said when he participated in this debate earlier today.
Regardless of the economic situation we are in as a consequence of mismanagement and as a consequence of what has been going on in the government for the past ten years, I do not think as a compassionate people we can afford for a moment to lose sight of the plight of the poor and deprived in this country. Standing out above all others are those people in this country who, through no fault of their own, have no pension income, no private means, nothing to fall back on. I
[Mr. McGrath.)
hope the day is not too far distant when we will no longer have an old age pensioner in this country who is deprived because of lack of income, whether pension income or any other kind of income support. We hope that day is not too far away.
I know the minister is a compassionate person. She has a big heart, but I know she has big problems when she has to deal with this cabinet and with some of the people opposite who feel that they have the divine right to power and that they have all the answers. I say with regret that I cannot for the life of me- and neither can many of the women of this country who will be deprived by this legislation-understand why this minister would incorporate in this bill a mean, inhuman provision which would cut off the spouse's allowance six months after the death of the elder spouse. That makes no sense whatsoever.
The minister talks about injustice. Let us deal with each injustice one at a time. Let us deal with the plight of the surviving spouse who has no pension income, and let us deal with the plight of single women. Single elderly women constitute a blot on the conscience and the face of this country. We know the plight of single elderly women. The minister knows it better than I, so let us go after these problems. Let the minister not sit there shaking her head, because she knows full well that she has to be accountable for what she does not only to her caucus but ultimately to the people of Canada.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!
[ Translation]


Monique Bégin: I rise on a point of order, Mr. Speaker. The hon. member has been kind enough to allow me to ask him a question.

The hon. member said he would entertain my question at the end of his speech. Knowing full well that social change is a slow process and that there is never enough money for old people in need in Canada, I would like the hon. member to clarify a point he started to make but did not finish in his speech. The total bill for pensions in Canada right now is $4.8 billion. With this bill we are adding approximately $300 million to that. How much more would the Conservative party like to spend on pensions in Canada? The hon. member spoke about realignment of priorities. We have never heard of any signe de piastre, as we say in French, or any dollar value attached to that. Of what is he talking? I would like to know.


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Speaker, very simply, we would put no price on the correction of an injustice, and obviously the termination of the spouse's allowance six months after the death of the elder spouse is an injustice. That is our position. We are prepared to defend that position either inside the House or outside the House. Let the minister try to defend hers.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Herb Breau: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The hon. member for St. John's East (Mr. McGrath) was kind enough
October 27, 1978

to say that he would entertain a question from me. I wonder if the Elouse would agree to allow me to put a question to him?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Ethier):: Agreement would be required. Does the Elouse agree?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Herb Breau: Before I put my question I would like to say that my position on equalization has always been very clear. I support the program of equalization. I support the intention of the government to include the principle of equalization in a new constitution. I believe that the program of equalization-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Ethier):: Order, please. I recognized the hon. member so that he could pose a question. Would he get on with the question, please.


Herb Breau: I am sorry, Mr. Speaker, but I thought the Elouse had agreed a while ago that I could answer the hon. member. If not, I will make my statement later on. I want to ask the hon. member two questions with regard to the UIC and how it affects low income people. On the same day in September of 1978 that the hon. member made a statement about UIC, or the day after, the financial critic of his party, the hon. member for York-Simcoe (Mr. Stevens), also made a statement. Would the hon. member for St. John's East care to quote the statement made by his colleague?
Second, in April of 1977 the House voted on the second reading stage of Bill C-27. If the hon. member and his colleagues from the Atlantic provinces were concerned about that bill, why did he, the hon. member for Egmont (Mr. MacDonald), the then member for Fundy Royal, Mr. Fair-weather, and the then member for Humber-St. George's-St. Barbe, now Senator Marshall, not show up for the vote?


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Speaker, I suggest the hon. member should ask these gentlemen just exactly why they were not here. But I submit the question he put, reflecting on the absence of members who have been in the House for a vote for ten years, is not worthy of him-what about others who were absent.


Mr.   Chas. L. Caccia@Davenport: Mr. Speaker, at the start of the intervention by the hon. member for St. John's East (Mr. McGrath), he stated that this bill requires the serious attention of the House. In fact, he emphasized the word "serious". We share that view on this side of the House. That is why we have been looking at the inconsistencies of the official opposition on matters concerning spending, as displayed in debates relating to this bill and others.
There are two dangers in this debate. The first one is for a party in the House to set double standards. The Tories have walked into the trap of setting double standards. They have demonstrated this attitude to those who have followed the debates over the years, as well as many people in the galleries who attend debates more than once in a while. On social issues in particular, members of the official opposition have said one
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thing in the east and another in the west. They have said one thing in Newfoundland and another in Ontario. For example, their financial critic said that they would cut public spending, yet their social policy critic urged for more public spending. Surely one must question whether there is consistency in the minds of hon. members opposite. This is the reason the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Breau) made his speech. He brought to the attention of hon. members of the official opposition the shortcomings and gaps in their positions.
The other danger in this debate is that one could look at this bill in isolation instead of considering it as one further step along the road leading to the goal of better social security for Canadians. I suppose it is fair to look at it in isolation, but in doing so the Tories have walked into another trap, that is, looking backward rather than at the advancement and progress represented by the bill.
Yesterday and today we have seen a sequence of Tory speakers who have said that this bill does not go far enough, yet they end their speeches by saying that they support it. This bill is one of many Liberal bills passed by parliament which have established a fine foundation for social security. We have come a significant distance over the last few decades. This was emphasized by the hon. member for Yorkton-Melville (Mr. Nystrom). Canadians have told us that they support government expenditures for better pension programs. Perhaps I would not include in this group the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, the Canadian Construction Association or the Canadian Manufacturers' Association. Workers or employees in factories engaged in assembly line work, construction, mining, heavy work or tedious factory work, tell us about their dream and hope of being given the option of retiring with a pension at an earlier age than the present one, possibly 60, as is the practice in other countries. Also, they tell us about their willingness to pay higher taxes if those increased taxes go into a pension fund designed to provide pensions at age 60 for those who want them.
The first group of people who will benefit by this kind of approach would be those who are recipients of the spouse's allowance. This group consists mostly of women who have been dependent upon their husbands most of their lives. Their dependency is real. When they lose their spouses, the widows can either apply for social assistance, which many simply do not want to do, or seek employment to support themselves, which is not easy. In many cases it results in women seeking jobs for the first time in many, many years. I am convinced the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Miss Begin) is to be congratulated.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Caccia:: She has managed to produce this bill in 1978, a year which will definitely go down in history as not an easy one. Also she produced an approach to family allowance which will benefit mothers across Canada. Because of her humanistic attitude, she deserves the support of all parties in the House, particularly the Tories.

October 27, 1978
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People in my riding have indicated that the Tories are "the plague of the nation". I must admit 1 do not try very hard to change their minds. It would be much easier for me to answer these people if the hon. member for Simcoe North (Mr. Rynard) and the hon. member for Don Valley (Mr. Gillies) indicated where their colleagues collectively stood on old age pension policies. Where does the hon. member for Don Valley stand on this matter? What about the hon. member for Simcoe North? What is the stand of the hon. member for Calgary Centre (Mr. Andre) who was in the chamber earlier? What about the hon. member for Grenville-Carleton (Mr. Baker) who has just left? What about the hon. member for Calgary North (Mr. Woolliams) who is an influential frontbencher? What about the hon. member for Ottawa-Carleton (Mrs. Pigott) who was also here earlier? What are their positions on this bill? What is their general approach to old age pensions?
I see there are only three Progressive Conservative members in the House at the moment, so 1 will not continue questioning the missing ones in this particular regard. We should like to hear from the silent ones, those who have not spoken on this bill. When it comes to financial and economic matters, they tell us public spending should be cut. I would welcome a positive stand on their part. That would provide me with an opportunity to return to my riding and say, "Your are wrong, Tories are not the plague of the nation".
Also I would be able to tell them the Conservative stand on social policies and pensions. Where are they on this matter? Let us see whether the Tories can rise to the occasion and remove this clear impression of a double standard, a double standard set by their spokesmen and particularly their financial critics. The gap between their financial critics and their social critics is not only widening, it is increasing as the months go by.
In addition, Mr. Speaker, let us see some participation on the part of Progressive Conservative members that will bring an end to misrepresentations and devious interpretations of what the minister has said in the past. An example of what I mean can be found in what was said last night by the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands (Miss MacDonald). I do not think it was worthy of her to have introduced certain elements of interpretations that are far from being accurate.
In conclusion, the fact is that this bill represents one further step along the road of reaching a desirable goal, that of giving Canadians a fine social security program which includes a fine program of old age pensions. This bill represents one step in that direction and has to be looked at in context with what we have done socially and what can be done within the financial means available.
If the official opposition feels that more should be done, then let its members give us a clear signal as to where they stand in this House and out beyond the walls of this building among the Canadian public. If there is unity within this House, and if there is a political will, surely more can be achieved. In this sense I must recognize that the NDP has at

least been consistent in this regard. They support public spending and they have been crystal clear on this matter. Of course, what they are doing is just copying us.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Charles L. Caccia: Otherwise we would not have introduced all these measures, including hospital insurance, medicare, the Canada Pension Plan, pensions and family allowances over the past 25 or more years.


Mr. Douglas (Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands):: When did the Liberal party bring in hospital insurance?


Charles L. Caccia: We have the very fine example of Saskatchewan, and I recognize that. It is very good that it was done that way. But you know, we did it nationally across the nation.


An hon. Member:: No, you didn't.


Charles L. Caccia: We sure did-medicare.


An hon. Member:: The Conservatives did it in 1958.


Charles L. Caccia: No, it was done in 1957, and it was based on legislation and proposals made by the Liberal government of that time.


An hon. Member:: That's just not good enough, Charles.


Charles L. Caccia: If the people really feel seriously about the subject of greater pensions, then there has to be a unanimity of intention, and that unanimity of intention has to come from the party in this House which fulfils the role of the loyal opposition. As long as that party is unable to demonstrate a united will and cannot speak with one voice, of course, we will not be able to make as much progress as we would like to make.


Mr. Donald W. Munro (Esquimalt-Saanich):: Mr. Speaker, I rise with sad feelings to join in this debate. The speaker who has just sat down, the hon. member for Davenport (Mr. Caccia), devoted his entire time to an election speech, castigating-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Donald W. Munro: He is obviously in very deep trouble or he would not carry on the way he has.


An hon. Member:: He sure is. There won't be a Grit who will survive in Toronto.


Donald W. Munro: I would like first of all to remind members of this chamber of a motion put before this House earlier this year. It was quoted last night but it deserves repeating, particularly in view of the distortions which have entered this debate, starting with those of the hon. member for Peel-Dufferin-Simcoe (Mr. Milne) and continued by the hon. member for Davenport. In a matter of this importance and of such concern to the Canadian citizen, I find that to be beneath
October 27, 1978

contempt. Let me read this resolution put forward by a party of which I have the honour-


An hon. Member:: Of which you are a member.


Donald W. Munro: A party of which I am proud to be a member. The resolution read as follows, Mr. Speaker:
That, in the opinion of this House, the social policy of the government contains severe inequities for elderly Canadians, and in particular the House considers the practice of terminating the spouse's allowance after the death of the older marriage partner to be cruel and unjust.
The members who are now saying that this party has no social policy for the elderly voted against that resolution.


An hon. Member:: There was no vote.


Donald W. Munro: If I may continue, Mr. Speaker-


An hon. Member:: There was no vote. Stick to the facts.


Donald W. Munro: Last August the leader of my party published a statement relating to this very area, and I take pride in reading from it. I am going to be selective as it is a two and a half page statement, but there are important aspects dealing directly with what we are talking about today. These are the words of the statement underlined by the leader of my party.
The Progressive Conservative party is very much aware of the difficulties faced by the aging in our society. Although everyone in Canada has felt the impact of the rapid increase in the cost of living, our aging, and others on low or fixed incomes, have been hardest hit by inflation. My party believes that for too long these important groups have been the innocent victims of the present federal administration's inability to provide the economic and social leadership which this country needs. We deplore the attitude of neglect which the Liberal government has shown for Canada's senior citizens.
Let me say right now that I am glad we are beginning to remove that difficulty.


An hon. Member:: Who said that?


Donald W. Munro: That was said by the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Clark).


Mr. Baker (Grenville-Carleton):: The next prime minister of Canada.


Donald W. Munro: Later in the same statement we find the following, and these are some of the principles governing the policy to which I subscribe and which were enunciated by the leader of my party:
Those who wish to continue working beyond age 65 should be allowed to do so, and we would act in those areas where the federal government has the jurisdiction to eliminate compulsory retirement.
In other words, we believe in preserving dignity. Some members here are working beyond 65. We have lots to offer, so why shouldn't we? That is one principle, and I am going to come back to this in the course of my remarks. The next principle is:
Old Age Security Act
Recognizing that the components of the consumer price index may not necessarily reflect the major expenditures of senior citizens-food, light, heat, etc.-we would review cost increases in these major expenditures to ensure that the Old Age Security and Canada Pension Plans are at least adequately indexed to meet these increases.
A further one:
The provisions of the Old Age Security Spouses Allowance would be changed-
And there has been a change here in this legislation, I am glad to say.
-so that a person receiving spouse's allowance would not lose that allowance should the older spouse die.
The last quotation I would make from that statement is: Canada is a country of unparalleled promise and potential.
That, I hope, is something that we in this chamber all believe.
Our senior citizens still have much to contribute in the way of experience and energy.
Here, we are harking back to that earlier principle.
The Progressive Conservative party is aware of this potential, and as the government we would provide the necessary support and encouragement to make it a reality. Those are the principles, the foundations, on which our policy vis-a-vis the elderly, is built.
I think that the deprecation which has gone on here this afternoon-part of which I heard and part of which I was unable to hear because I was attending a meeting of young political leaders from Europe upstairs-is most unfortunate. Part of the argument that has been launched in this direction is that there seems to be, in the eyes of those on the other side-and I can single one member out in particular-a notion that the Progressive Conservative party is talking out of both sides of its mouth.
The one thing which this government lacks is an ability to understand where to place its priorities, which programs to finance, and there are many one could single out. The cuts which have been made recently are in the most extraordinary areas. They must have been made on high profile projects in order to draw the attention and put the idea across that they are really out to impose restraint. Nonsense. There are lot more places where expenditures could be cut.


An hon. Member:: Where?


Donald W. Munro: The Auditor General has just told us of one. I will give the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Cullen) credit, in his capacity as the minister responsible for reporting to this House on behalf of that department, for arranging that there be examinations of some of the frauds which have been perpetrated against it. That is fine and there ought to be more such because $142 million went undetected.
I wonder if any of the hon. members present heard the report this morning over the radio issued by the Fraser Institute of British Columbia. I looked for the account in the papers, but it had not obviously reached them in time for printing. I heard distinctly over the radio that the Fraser

October 27, 1978
Old Age Security Act
Institute, having examined the unemployment insurance situation in this country, reached the conclusion that 90 per cent of the funds expended in UI benefits were expended in either a wasteful way or to those who were unentitled to them. I do not know what their definition of "unentitled" is. I would not have put the figure that high, but I do feel that this $4.5 billion, shall we say, as large as the fund administered by the minister sponsoring this bill, has not all gone on an insurance scheme. I hark back to the meaning of the word "insurance". That is why it was established, but that is not the way it is being used, and that is waste.
There are other areas as well. I can think of the perennial redecorating of ministerial offices. It is only one thing, but when you have 30 ministers it soon adds up. There is also the annual purchase of new vehicles.


An hon. Member:: Pettiness.


Donald W. Munro: It may be pettiness, but if you add 100,000 petty things together you get a great big whacking sum of money. Another example is the Langevin block. I worked in it and thought it was a perfectly good place to work, but the government thought it had to be gutted. We do not know how many millions of dollars had to be spent on that. Moreover, that building was not big enough, and the big increases in personnel in the PMO or the PCO, whichever is there, caused them to overflow into the Blackburn building and the digging of a tunnel between the two buildings. Waste in government such as I have mentioned must be stopped, and could easily have been stopped long ago and diverted to looking after the elderly.
That is where this party stands. I will not bother giving more examples because I think that there is something fundamentally important in this bill and I do want to comment on it.
Reference was made in my leader's resume of the stand that we take toward the elderly about the construction of the cost of living index. I cannot remember exactly, but I am sure that the minister can tell me when there was an adjustment to the guaranteed income supplement. The government proposes in this measure, which I support, to increase that by $20 a month with respect to a single pensioner and $10 a month with respect to a married pensioner whose spouse is also a pensioner. If I knew what year the last GIS additions were made, I would be able to determine from some material which 1 obtained from the library just before I came into the chamber what the cost of living index was at that time, and I would compare it with what it is now. That is only one aspect of it, but obviously there has been a great increase in the cost of living since the guaranteed income supplement was set.
There now is an adjustment being made, a catch up for those who have been left behind, those who have no voice or pressure group to speak for them except those compassionate members of this House. I would have liked to think that more members on the government side, instead of indulging in politics, would have indulged in some compassion. Those are their spokesmen before this parliament, and those are the ones who support this bill.

The other aspect is the consumer price index which, I believe, is to be changed in the weighting which was designed on the basis of a target group devised in 1967. I believe that the November consumer price index which is to be issued on November 24 will have a different system, perhaps a different target group and a different weighting system.
The present consumer price index is improperly devised for the elderly. I would like to quote three or four elements of the 100 per cent package. Food is 24.8 per cent of that package; health and personal care 4.51 per cent; recreation, education and reading 6.89 per cent; and tobacco and alcohol 5.96 per cent. The mere enumeration of those headings and the weighting which is attributed to them is sufficient indication, I suggest, that this consumer price index is not targeted on the people about whom we are now speaking.
I have made the case in this House before, Mr. Speaker, and I will make it again, that there ought to be a special consumer price index for the elderly. The whole pattern of their purchases is different from that of people in the labour market who have an income and prospects of increasing that income from month to month and year to year. When people are backed down to a fixed income, except for measures such as this they alter that pattern. Transportation is shown as 15.18 per cent, but how many people over 70 spend 15 per cent of their expenditure package on transportation? Those who can go out are either taken out by relatives and friends or they take a bus, and that is not going to consume 15 per cent of their expenditures.
There should be an adjustment in the area of health, personal care and housing. Housing involves heating, according to my recollection of the breakdown of each of these categories. By the time people have retired they may own their house and the carrying charges thus may not be as great as for people in the work force. But the heating charge is a portion of the expenditure pattern, and for the elderly I suggest it is much higher than is attributed in the statistics.
I think improvements could be made in the statistics, and, indeed, I think Statistics Canada should devote more of its efforts to devising an appropriate form of consumer price index which could be applied to the matters under consideration today.
In the last three or four months we have heard a great deal about our falling dollar. The last quotation I had showed it below 85 cents. I have heard there is a great deal to be said for a low dollar because it is helpful to the export market. There is no question about that, of course. In fact, we are selling our patrimony cheap on contracts that have still to run out. We are selling our coal and iron in semi-refined form. It is coming back on wheels and we are paying the import price. Those who convert that coal and iron into automobiles buy it cheap and sell it back to us dear. This applies to food as well.
Hon. members will recall that each year on March 21, I manage to get into that "thawing out" part of the country, which is Ottawa, daffodils for all members of the House and
October 27, 1978

the other place. They are the product of a milder climate and are simply a symbol of the earlier season on the west coast where our vegetables and fruit mature earlier. That area is in competition with vegetables and fruit from further south that have matured even earlier, however. They are in abundance just as our fruits and vegetables are coming in. On more than one occasion I have made the plea to the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce (Mr. Horner) and his predecessors that we ought to have some preferential seasonal and regional tariff adjustments.


Mr. Railton:: You have them.


Donald W. Munro: In Niagara they are fine, but not on the west coast. That is another problem, Mr. Speaker; this government does not know the west coast is there. They have a few members from out there but they have no influence.


Samuel Victor Railton: We have a duty right now.


Donald W. Munro: In the Niagara peninsula.


Samuel Victor Railton: And in British Columbia.


Donald W. Munro: Apples, raspberries, strawberries, lettuce, tomatoes-I could name a whole range of foods which we have to import on a cheap dollar and which are costing a lot of money while our own growers are being driven out of business.


Samuel Victor Railton: A point of order, Mr. Speaker. I have to correct that statement because it was mentioned in the House that everything was sold by our own growers.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Ethier):: Order, please.


Samuel Victor Railton: The whole crop was sold this year.


Donald W. Munro: I will partially accept that explanation. The point is that we are losing our producers of food and we are importing at a cost of another 17, 18, 19, or 20 cents on the dollar from California or Florida. Our elderly people have to pay these prices.
Another aspect of this bill that I should like to mention briefly is the absence of any comment on or any rectification of section 12 of the Old Age Security Act which deals with the guaranteed income supplement and the earning capacity of the elderly. As my leader mentioned in his summary of the stand we take on old age security, we believe that the elderly should still be able to contribute and work in the work force, if they wish, either full-time or part-time, and the level of earnings should not have an adverse effect on the guaranteed income supplement.
We hear a lot about the universality of social programs from this government, but someone introduced a means test with the guaranteed income supplement. I think that possibly that was the correct thing to do but we should not be sanctimonious about it. Let us recognize that the guaranteed income supplement presupposes a means test, and let us accept it. I think
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there ought to have been some further comment. Obviously, an amendment cannot be moved on second reading, and I suspect it would be ruled out of order if it were proposed from the opposition benches, which would permit an elderly person on guaranteed income supplement to increase the amount of earnings without the guaranteed income supplement being reduced.
I am glad Mr. Speaker, that the measures in the bill are there, but I regret that there is provision for a penalty for extra earnings because that prevents pensioners from asserting themselves and continuing to make a contribution to society. I feel that the bill deserves our support, Mr. Speaker, and we intend to give it.


Alexandre Cyr: Mr. Speaker, I am very glad to take part in the debate on second reading of Bill C-5, an act to amend the Old Age Security Act. First of all I want to congratulate the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Miss Begin) for her statement in the House. This is not the first time, Mr. Speaker, that we on the government side say that more needs to be done for retired people and pensioners in Canada, especially since we feel the ravages of inflation. This legislation on old age security concerns people who receive the annual guaranteed income supplement and will qualify for a monthly increase of $20 starting on January 1. Other provisions in the legislation provide for the continued payment of the spouse's allowance for a period of six months after the death of the pensionable spouse.
Mr. Speaker, that measure by the Liberal government of Canada is welcomed by senior citizens in the electoral riding of Gaspe which I represent in the House. Most Gaspesians as well as most Canadians who receive the old age security pension and the income supplement still live in their own homes. Even though not the ideal solution to resolve every problem, this extra $20 a month for a couple will be of great help to pay school taxes, municipal rates and heating fuel.
In October, 1978, the old age security pension for an unattached person is $164.74 a month plus a supplement of $115.55, that is a total amount of $280.39. For a couple, the monthly old age security pension is $329.48 plus a guaranteed supplement of $205.22, a total allowance of $534.70 a month. In January 1979, that couple will receive an extra $20 each month, that is $554.70, while the unattached person will get $300.39.
Mr. Speaker, Canada and Sweden are the countries which have the best social programs for senior citizens. As I have said on many occasions, Canada has the best social programs in the world and Canadians are aware of the fact. For senior citizens in small municipalities with fewer than 2,500 residents the government has set up the Residential Rehabilitation Assistance Program-RRAP for short. Hundreds of Canadian

October 27, 1978
Old Age Security Act
couples have already taken advantage of that program and I must add, Mr. Speaker that such a program should not be abolished for a good while.
The insulation program for senior citizen housing is another example of social legislation to help needy older people. Mr. Speaker, I listened last night to the speeches of the hon. member for Brome-Missisquoi (Mr. Grafftey) and the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands (Miss MacDonald). They could not say one thing to show that this government had passed good legislation and implemented effective programs to help older people in Canada. However, they are happy enough that the senior citizens clubs in their constituency can benefit from the New Horizons program and that this government assists in building meeting and recreation facilities for senior citizens through the Canada Works program. Those are revolutionary programs and it is unfortunate that the opposition cannot recognize it occasionally. However, I applaud the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) who said the following in his speech yesterday:
So, M:. Speaker, even though as a member of the opposition I am supposed to get up and condemn any minister for what was said at the beginning of a speech,
I have to say that to me it was a delight to sit here this afternoon and hear the minister speak with pride about our pension legislation, to make it clear that it is here to stay, that things like indexing have to continue and that we have to continue to make other improvements for our older people.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Hear, hear!


Alexandre Cyr: I therefore thank the hon. member.
I can find nothing constructive in the speech by the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands (Miss MacDonald). She likes to criticize, but she can suggest nothing to improve the situation of Canadians. She only wants to criticize. She believes that the government should do more for senior citizens, but her leader and her party are always saying that the government spends too much and should reduce its expenditures.
Everyone will recall that the Leader of the Opposition announced that a Progressive Conservative government would freeze hiring in the public service and reduce by 60,000 the number of jobs in the public service. In view of these proposals and his belief that we need to reduce our budget by several billion dollars a year, where will the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands find the money to give a pension to all Canadians between 60 and 65? The minister said yesterday that she would be in favour of giving a pension to people between 60 and 65 but that would cost the government $630 million a year. And we know that the Government of Canada gives over $1 billion a year to the provinces to cover 50 per cent of all social pensions paid by those provinces.
Mr. Speaker, it is not a shame for people between 60 and 65 to apply to their province for social assistance, on the contrary. The hon. member for Kingston and the Islands (Miss MacDonald) says the federal government should pay a pension to people between 60 and 65 but did she consult the provinces to

be able to say that the federal government should get involved in that field of responsibility? If the government of Canada were to pass a law saying that all people over 60 are the responsibility of the government of Canada and should be paid pensions, we would see the provincial ministers start crying that it is scandalous, and during the debate on the bills in this House or the question period we would see members of the opposition cry their heads off, saying: Why did the Trudeau government interfere again in a provincial jurisdiction
Having said that, Mr. Speaker, I would like to see the proposed amendments to the legislation giving $20 to a couple or $20 to an unattached individual as of January 1 passed by the House in the near future. And I would be remiss if I did not congratulate the minister again for having introduced this bill in the House to improve the lot of older needy Canadians, and I say to the minister: Keep up your good work, the House is behind you.


Walter David Baker: Mr. Speaker, 1 had the privilege of listening from my sick bed to the speech that the minister made yesterday, which I watched at home on television. Let me say at the outset that I was quite impressed by the very impartial and non-partisan way in which she presented the case for this bill.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Walter David Baker: I congratulate her for that. I congratulate her as well for bringing the matter forward because, as has been indicated by other speakers in this debate, the principles in this bill are supported by the official opposition.
I will not speak very long, Mr. Speaker, because it is the intention of the official opposition to allow this bill to proceed through second reading and to the committee where its background can be examined. But I want to say at the outset that we support the bill, the effect of which is to increase the amount of the guaranteed income supplement by $20 for a single pensioner and $10 for a married pensioner whose spouse is also a pensioner, and to extend the spouse's allowance for six months after the death of the pensionable spouse. That principle is supportable, if not on moral grounds, which I think it is, then on statistical grounds.
Statistics relating to senior citizens in Canada are rather alarming as a result of inflation which has come about by reason of the policies of this government. Inflation is an extremely serious thing for senior citizens. Dealing with the value of the dollar in 1968 in terms of food for senior citizens, that dollar is only worth 43.4 cents; in terms of housing, it is worth today only 48.7 cents; in respect of clothing, it is worth 64.1 cents; in respect of transportation, it is worth only 53.7 cents; in terms of health and personal care, it is worth 53 cents; in terms of recreation and reading, it is worth 58.2 cents.

October 27, 1978

As Canadians generally have suffered from inflation, 1 think the impact of that phenomenon on our society-for which the government must take considerable blame-rests heavily on the shoulders, on the pocketbooks and on the peace of mind of our senior citizens. So when the hon. member for Davenport (Mr. Caccia), a few moments ago in this debate, asked where the hon. member for Grenville-Carleton stood, let me say to him, through you, sir, that the member for Grenville-Carleton supports this bill. Like the members of his party, he believes that the job of the government is to help the disadvantaged to the extent that society can reasonably help the disadvantaged, just as it is the job of government in a society like ours to create an atmosphere where those who are not so disadvantaged can use their initiative and their entrepreneurial skills and take the risks to help build this country.
The question was asked of me where we stand. I put it to the hon. member that that is where we stand and, in terms of the senior citizens in this country, our party does not take second place to any other party in terms of its support of their betterment and their welfare.
But there is one thing that the hon. member for Davenport said which rather disturbed me. He said that it was his party which brought in the hospitalization scheme for Canadians, that his party proposed a hospitalization scheme in 1957, just before they were defeated. Let me point out that there was a little catch to it, and that is that the scheme had to be approved by the provinces having the majority of the population in the country.
The right hon. member for Prince Albert (Mr. Diefenbaker) called it for what it was, a fraud and a swindle, and pledged that if the Conservative government was put in office in 1957 those conditions would be removed, which they were. So the hospitalization scheme that we have today in this country has as its basis that which was proposed by the right hon. member for Prince Albert when he beat the Liberal government in 1957.
I think one problem that arose-I do not want to fall into that trap-is that this debate has not followed the example given by the Minister of National Health and Welfare. A little trading game has been played, a little political game on the backs of the senior citizens. But I will say to the hon. member for Davenport that he is wrong in what he said. 1 felt I had to rise to correct his statement.
Quite frankly, I wish we would follow the request made by the hon. member for St. John's East (Mr. McGrath) and extend the spouse's allowance all the way, as had been advocated before. I assume from what the minister said that if the country could afford it, it could be done. What she said to me is that she has consulted with her colleagues but because of the restraint program which is in effect, it cannot be done.
I do not think there is any person in the House of Commons who would not want to see this program extended if it could be, and 1 assume that that kind of investigation was made and the extension of that program was turned down. I would be terribly shocked if it were turned down in order to be advanced perhaps next spring, just in advance of a general election. 1
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think that would be the height of hypocrisy and I live in the hope that we will not play that kind of action game with senior citizens or any other group in Canada. I think we have to be honest about that.
I rise for a second reason and that is with respect to a remark made by the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Breau) about the equalization payments and the attitude of the hon. member for Halifax (Mr. Stanfield). As I heard the hon. member for Gloucester, he was saying that the hon. member for Halifax, the former leader of this party and former premier of Nova Scotia, took a stand the other day against equalization payments when he asked a question in the House. I heard that question from my sick bed at home and I heard the answer, and I must say that if that was the conclusion reached by the hon. member for Gloucester, then he needs his hearing fixed. I would commend to the Minister of National Health and Welfare that she invite the hon. member for Gloucester to go down to her department and have his ears examined, if not his head, with respect to that position.
I feel I have to say this because I come from central Canada. It is very easy for members from eastern Canada, from New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland, to support the concept of equalization payments, but it is sometimes hard in Ontario to support that concept. However, I support it and I am somewhat concerned when I hear that kind of misconstruction placed on the question put by the hon. member for Halifax by the hon. member for Gloucester.
I have no problem supporting the equalization principle, nor does the federal Conservative party, nor does the Conservative party in the province of Ontario. This has always been the case. That is the reason we are here as a nation. The concept of equalization is so important to us in Canada that our party has taken the view, against the advice of some constitutional tinkerers, that we should have that principle enshrined in the constitution of our country. I say that knowing that there are some on the other side of the House who would like to say that as the mother and father of every social program in Canada they are also the mother and father of the equalization system in this country. Well, they are not. It is axiomatic that it is necessary in terms of our confederation, and it is supported generally.
The hon. member for St. John's East referred to the Kingston document which was the result of a meeting of all the then premiers of Canada who happened to be Progressive Conservatives. That number has been augmented to such a degree by the bringing in of Mr. Buchanan of Nova Scotia and Mr. Lyon of Manitoba-we almost had Angus MacLean by one seat in Prince Edward Island-and Mr. Hatfield has been returned, that the next meeting of premiers will almost be a meeting of Convervatives; we wait only one event, and that is the installation of the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Clark) as the Prime Minister of Canada. That is coming. Our system needs flush-

October 27, 1978
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ing out now and again and can certainly stand a flushing out now.
Our approach to federal-provincial relations goes far beyond equalization. There is the whole question of tariffs and transportation policy, a host of areas which have been left relatively unexplored, except as to user-pay, in terms of the welfare of the whole country. I thought I would make those things clear.
The hon. member for Gloucester also mentioned that it had been the policy of our party to allocate too many resources to help the poor people. 1 listened to him say that this morning. The Progressive Conservative party has never taken that position. What it has said is that we must begin paying more than lip service to developing a larger economic pie, because if we fail to do so we shall experience great difficulty in supporting economic programs to help the disadvantaged. It is in that area the emphasis must lie over the next few years.
This does involve the cutting back of government. It does involve giving up some programs which I for one, as a member of parliament, would dearly like to see. I represent the people in the national capital area. One of the issues in this House has been the question of grants in lieu of taxes. The mayor of Ottawa has said it is worth $150 a household because the government is not carrying its weight with respect to grants in lieu of taxes in the city. I would love to have the luxury of being able to say that the government can give that $150 a household, but I cannot honestly support that now, much as I support the principle. What is worse, the reason I cannot advocate it is not because something has happened in the world. It is not because there has been a change somewhere in the country-ours is still a rich country with large resources. It is that something that has happened to the government which has wasted those resources and opportunities over ten years so that this inequity cannot be rectified.
When the hon. member for Ottawa West (Mr. Francis) asks the government whether it will accede to changing the grants in lieu of taxes this year and rectifying the situation, the hon. member is engaging in window dressing because he knows that the policies of the party he has supported since he has been here have brought about an economic situation which makes it impossible for him to get his wish and impossible for me to get mine. It also makes it impossible for a lot of members of the House to have a great many of the programs they dearly want for their constituents.
That is the tragedy of the last ten years. It is not restraint, it is what led up to it. The attitude of government in the last ten years has been that we had a bottomless pit, that they could dig into it and continue to dig into it and there was no tomorrow. They did this in spite of warnings from the Economic Council and its predecessor, from every responsible organization in Canada, that there was a bottom to the pit and that the government's spending habit had to stop. Now we find ourselves in a position where, indeed, it has to stop.


Mr. Watson:: What about the four billion in mortgage payments?


Walter David Baker: The hon. member mentions the mortgage payments. Somehow or other we must begin to create an atmosphere of incentive in order that we can build again. Mr. Speaker, this government spills almost as much as it spends. The hon. member for Laprairie (Mr. Watson) mentioned the mortgage program. He says to us that it is too rich for Canada.


Ian Watson: Four billion dollars.


Walter David Baker: He dearly wishes he had brought in the mortgage program and the property tax deduction proposal himself because it is an imaginative program. But that is not the important thing about his intervention. It is this. While the government were saying that Canadians were too rich to deserve a tax break, that the home owners, 60 per cent of whom make less than $18,000, were the filthy rich and could not be helped, they were entering into and defending a deal for four office complexes in the Ottawa region under lease-back arrangements, the results of which were going to cost the government $179 million more than would have been the case had they gone the more conventional route. And this is not an assertion by me, it is an assertion by a Senate committee, headed by Liberals including Liberal Senator Everett and Senator Giguere, a committee which condemned the government for its flagrant squandering of public money, money which might be used to help constituents in Laprairie.


Donald W. Munro: That's the pity.


Walter David Baker: As my hon. friend says, that's the pity. We have come to the point at which one of the central institutions for the public good in Canada, CMHC, is being examined by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and rumors are that charges will be laid. That is maladministration. That is waste. That is some kind of wrongheadedness. But that is what we have come to. We have come to the position at which, with respect to Les Terrasses de la Chaudiere, the Minister of State for Urban Affairs (Mr. Ouellet) at the opening defended the indefensible and said it was an excellent transaction for the government. Robert Campeau stood on his hind legs and grinned into the television cameras and said this was a good deal for Campeau and a good deal for the federal government. He was only half right.


An hon. Member:: What about the bill?


Walter David Baker: I will tell hon. members how this relates to the bill. There is not another member of parliament who would wish more than I that the $179 million which was wasted on Les Terrasses de la Chaudiere, the money spent on things which are going to be found out in the investigation of York Place, the glass monstrosity of the Bank of Canada which will cost us millions and which is a monument to the architect rather than to good sense, and the $210 million blown on the unemployment insurance program, could go to the objectives spoken about so eloquently by the Minister
October 27, 1978

of National Health and Welfare (Miss Begin) when I heard her speak yesterday.
That is the tragedy of all this. We speak of what we have done about redistributing income in Canada. From 1968 to 1978 the budget in Canada has grown from $10 billion to almost $50 billion, and yet the proportion of Canadian families below the poverty line is just about the same as it was in 1968. We have not succeeded in redistributing income successfully at all. Perhaps it is because we have concentrated so much on redistribution and not on developing the economic pie upon which redistribution could be based and on which a change in it could be based.
That is why I feel sorry about the situation our country is in today. I do not pretend to be any more compassionate than any other member of this House, nor do I take second place to any other member. But I wonder when the day is going to come when we are going to be asked to support proper social programs, and when we will have a government which has a real commitment to restraint and to priorizing in terms of where our country is going, so that we will not waste as we have, so that we will not dissipate the riches we have, so that we can give our children and our children's children some opportunities, so that we can do something about unemployment which now stands so high and so that we can do something for senior citizens who, when they speak to me about the benefits of this bill, as good as they are, say, "Mr. Baker, that still does not get me out of the problem in which I find myself'. They tell me that they are worried about their future and still feel insecure.
We support this bill. The minister tried to say that I was insecure about my future. That is not in my hands. I am talking about the senior citizens who have spoken to me. They still say that, as commendable as these steps are-I commend the minister for taking these steps, and this party intends to support the bill and allow it to go to committee today-the government ought not to break its arm patting itself on the back. It has our support with respect to every worth while program. It has the support of all sides of the House. We just wish that in terms of the management of the business of the country the government would give us an equal dose of common sense. The Canadian people are sick and tired of waste and of seeing large tax increases month after month and then finding themselves further and further behind. When we put this bill through today, perhaps the government will bend its efforts to get to the root of many other problems. We will support appropriate social programs in Canada.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Ethier):: May I point out to hon. members that if I recognize the Minister of National Health and Welfare at this point, she will close the debate. The hon. member for Hillsborough (Mr. Macquarrie).


Mr. Macquarrie:: Mr. Speaker, could I say-[DOT]
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Yvon Pinard: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Ethier):: The Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Privy Council on a point of order.


Yvon Pinard: Mr. Speaker, you thought the minister was about to rise and because of that you pointed out that in so doing she would close the debate. The hon. member on my left was trying to be recognized at the same time, and I believe you did not see him inadvertently. According to tradition, hon. members are allowed to rise alternately, and one hon. member was trying to be recognized who should have been allowed to speak.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Ethier):: That is precisely what happened. While warning the minister, I noticed the hon. member for Hillsborough (Mr. Macquarrie). But I believe I had been given the name of the hon. member for York East (Mr. Collenette).


Mr. D. M. Collenette (Parliamentary Secretary to Postmaster General):: Mr. Speaker, I am sorry there was confusion this afternoon regarding this bill, and I am sorry that the hon. member for Grenville-Carleton (Mr. Baker) went on for so long and denied hon. members on this side of an opportunity to reply. The hon. member was well within his time, but he showed the type of advantage which is taken.


Walter David Baker: That is not fair.


David Michael Collenette: Hon. members are certainly not gentlemanly in that respect.


Walter David Baker: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I shortened my remarks, but let me just say, so that my friends will feel much better, that we on this side are prepared to extend the hours of this House, if the government is agreeable, in order that the hon. member for Hillsborough (Mr. Macquarrie) and any other member can speak, on the assumption that this bill will go to committee today.


David Michael Collenette: Mr. Speaker, I have never seen the hon. member for Grenville-Carleton as unctuous as he was today, and it is certainly a sight to behold.
I strongly support this bill and, had I the time, I would have liked to go on at length and talk about the reasons why I am a great supporter of the universality of the old age pension program. I would have liked to talk about my experiences while growing up in Great Britain after the war when many millions of people were left alone and destitute. Many lost children and other relatives in the war, and the protection afforded by the state through the old age pension program was one means whereby people could maintain their dignity and their standard of living. I base my remarks on a great philosophical tradition in terms of support of old age pensions. One

October 27, 1978
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must remember that it was the Liberal party of Great Britain which was the originator of the social security program in that country, and it was the Liberal party in this country which brought in old age pensions and other social legislation.
I support the bill, but I would like it to go somewhat further. I would like to see the $20 which is to go to people on the guaranteed income supplement extended to everyone who receives old age pensions. About 20 per cent of the people of my constituency are senior citizens. Many of them live in their own homes or in rental accommodation. Most of them do not live in housing for senior citizens supplied by the state, in this case the Metropolitan Toronto Housing Authority.
Housing for senior citizens in metropolitan Toronto is probably second to none anywhere in the country. Metropolitan Toronto has a good program. There are good housing units there, but not everyone chooses to live in senior citizen accommodation. Thousands of people prefer to stay in their own homes or in apartments. That encourages a sense of independence and non-reliance on the state or other people. I think it is beneficial to the state that many people do remain in their own homes. The party opposite is always conscious of dollars and cents, and I suggest that by encouraging people to stay in their own homes or in rental accommodation we encourage a saving to the state because federal and provincial governments build senior citizen housing.
However, there is one problem with senior citizens who wish to stay in their own homes, and that is that with increasing inflation and especially increasing property taxes people are being driven out.
I should like to explore an avenue which is related to something brought up recently by the Conservative party in the by-elections. As the hon. member for Grenville-Carleton said, the Conservative party is concerned about social security and the state of our old people. In the by-election campaign, that party introduced a scheme of mortgage deductibility. Yesterday the hon. member for Brome-Missisquoi (Mr. Graff-tey) castigated the Liberal party and referred to this scheme which makes the Conservative party the sheriff of Nottingham of today-those people who plunder the poor to give to the rich. That party would be well advised not to think of mortgage deductibility for upper middle income Canadians, but of course that is the vote they are after. They should consider a scheme whereby senior citizens would receive some form of tax credit to assist them in remaining in their own homes, a tax credit related to their property taxes.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


David Michael Collenette: The government of Ontario has such a scheme. It is a good one, but it does not go far enough. There is no reason why this scheme should not be extended right across the country. I am not a tax expert so I will not go into any great detail.
When the Minister of Finance (Mr. Chretien) brings down his budget in a few weeks, I urge him to take into account the

plight of people who although they may have a few thousand dollars in the bank, live in their own homes or rental accommodation but are being squeezed out of their homes and losing their sense of independence. Perhaps many people want to move into senior citizens' accommodation and nursing homes, but the majority would like to stay where they belong, where they lived all their lives, to encourage this sense of independence.
Such a tax credit scheme to aid senior citizens would be supported in the House. Certainly it is a progressive scheme; it is a Liberal one. It does not go along with the charade of a scheme introduced by hon. members opposite. Their scheme is punitive and would give undue benefit to those who least need help.
As 1 said earlier, the increase of $20 a month should be applied right across the board. In fact, if it can be afforded this year, it should be doubled.
Further to what the hon. member for Davenport (Mr. Caccia) said, the old age security system should be available to anyone after age 60.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Hear, hear!


David Michael Collenette: The hon. member for Esquimalt-Saanich (Mr. Munro) indicated that there are people who want to continue working. They should have that right to continue or choose whether they want to receive the benefits of old age security. Even though many people know it is their due, they do not like to admit, at the ages of 65, 66 or 67, that perhaps their usefulness to society is over. I can understand that. If they want to continue working, they should be encouraged to do so.
But there are many others who would appreciate pension benefits at age 60. I am referring to people who worked in labour intensive industries with their bare hands. For example, a mine worker at Inco, a worker at a uranium mine, a fisherman, forest worker, outdoor worker or a construction worker perhaps does the work of two people in his lifetime because of the physical toll taken by his jobs. With all the technological advances and the relative wealth of society in 1978, it is a crime that these people do not have the option of receiving the old age pension at 60 when they start to wear out, if you will. I recognize the plight of the government in terms of expenditure, yet I would like to see these programs go further.
The hon. member for Davenport alluded to the theme of the duplicity of the Conservative party. The Conservatives in metropolitan Toronto are preaching restraint. They are the Sterling Lyons of Ontario. The hon. member for St. John's East (Mr. McGrath) and other members from the maritimes have a genuine concern for the plight of the less favoured regions of Canada. They come to the House and attempt to come to grips with statements made by their colleagues elsewhere. I feel sorry for them and their party because they will never resolve these differences; their positions are so rigid.

Over the years the government has succeeded in coming to terms with the less favoured regions of the country by assisting them. This has been achieved by people in the wealthy provinces, like myself and other members from Ontario, such as the hon. member for Welland (Mr. Railton), the hon. member for Bruce-Grey (Mr. Douglas), the hon. member for Davenport, and the hon. Secretary of State (Mr. Roberts). We are not faced with the same problems of the hon. member for Grenville-Carleton when defending equalization in Ontario. We were the ones who pushed it through. Perhaps the Conservative party has some difficulty with this problem, but the Liberals do not suffer embarrassment by helping those Canadians who need help the most.
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The Acting Speaker (Mr. Ethier):: Is the House ready for the question?


Some hon. Members:: Question.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the second time and referred to the Standing Committee on Health, Welfare and Social Affairs.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Ethier):: It being after five o'clock, this House stands adjourned until Monday at 11 a.m., pursuant to Standing Order 2(1).
At 5 p.m. the House adjourned, without question put, pursuant to Standing Order.

Monday, October 30, 1978