1981-02-10

HOUSE OF COMMONS DEBATES


[Stage Direction]
30 Elizabeth II

[Stage Direction]
Published under authority of the Speaker of the House of Commons by the Queen's Printer for Canada
Available from Canadian Government Publishing Centre, Supply and Services Canada, Hull, Quebec, Canada K1A 0S9.
[Stage Direction]
Tuesday, February 10, 1981


Mr. Thomas Siddon (Richmond-South Delta):: Madam Speaker, I rise under the provisions of Standing Order 43 to propose a motion of urgent importance, as it relates to the keystone of opportunity for our young people. In view of the government's shameful decade of neglect toward scientific and technological research, which has seen a continual erosion of financial support for research laboratories and scientific training programs across Canada, and in light of the recent disgusting flip-flop by cabinet, which effectively scuttles the five-year plan of the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Scarborough East (Mr. Gilchrist):
That the government be required to reinstate immediately the NSERC five-year plan, which had been approved by the former Clark government, and to adopt corresponding long-term plans of funding for the medical and social sciences so that our scientific researchers may develop, with some assurance, their research interests here in Canada instead of packing up their bright ideas and heading to the United States or elsewhere.


Madam Speaker:: Is there unanimous consent for this motion?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


THE CONSTITUTION
Mr. Tom McMillan (Hillsborough):: Madam Speaker, I rise under the provisions of Standing Order 43. Because the minister responsible for the status of women has manipulated the postponement of the conference on women and the Constitution planned by the Advisory Council on the Status of Women so as to avoid embarrassing the government, women from across Canada have organized their own independent conference this coming weekend. I move, seconded by the hon. member for Malpeque (Mr. Gass):
That the House urge the minister responsible for the status of women to attend the weekend conference, humbly realizing that such conferences can be a learning experience even for him, and that if he is discharging his responsibilities properly, their discussions will not embarrass either him or his government colleagues.


Madam Speaker:: Is there unanimous consent for this motion?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


MEDICAL CARE ACT
Mr. Bill Blaikie (Winnipeg-Birds Hill):: Madam Speaker, I rise pursuant to Standing Order 43. Whereas the Medical Care Act states that each province's health care plan must provide for universal coverage, whereas the Ontario government does not seem to know, or otherwise refuses to admit, that between 15 per cent and 20 per cent of Ontarians are not covered, according to the figures available through research done by certain community health groups in Toronto, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Broadview-Greenwood (Mr. Rae):
That this House instruct the federal government to investigate how many people in Ontario are actually not covered by OHIP because of the inadequate and unfair premium system employed in Ontario which has led to the present situation in which it can truthfully be said that Ontario is not living up to its technical and moral obligations under the Medical Care Act and the Established Programs Financing Act.


Madam Speaker:: Is there unanimous consent for this motion?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


THE CONSTITUTION
Mr. Dan McKenzie (Winnipeg-Assiniboine):: Madam
Speaker, I rise under the provisions of Standing Order 43. Whereas the Leader of the New Democratic Party (Mr. COMMONS DEBATES
February 10, 1981
Broadbent) was quoted as saying on the weekend that whether or not the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) told the whole truth about his dealings with Westminster was irrelevant, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Moose Jaw (Mr. Neil):
That this House commend the Leader of the NDP for his unusually candid admission that in the decision-making process of the NDP, expediency rather than truth is the main criterion, and invite him to revoke the ill-advised decision he has made to ally his party with the Liberals on the Constitution by applying the biblical principle that "The truth shall make you free".


Madam Speaker:: Is there unanimous consent for this
motion?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


TRIBUTE TO MEMBERS OF CANADIAN DOWNHILL SKIING TEAM-MOTION UNDER S.O. 43
Mr. Irenee Pelletier (Sherbrooke):: Madam Speaker, under Standing Order 43, I request the unanimous consent of the House to present a motion dealing with an important and urgent matter.
As Canada has in the last few years made quite a name for itself in the field of downhill skiing, as the members of the Canadian ski team have contributed in no small measure to our unity and national pride, and as three of the most illustrious members of that team are present in the Speaker's gallery, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Parkdale-High Park (Mr. Flis):
That this House pay tribute to the members of the Canadian downhill ski team and congratulate them warmly for their determination, courage and
performance.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Madam Speaker:: I see the House is enthusiastic about the skiers; I thank hon. members for their enthusiasm.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
Mr. Ron Stewart (Simcoe South):: Madam Speaker, I rise under the provisions of Standing Order 43. Whereas the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) revealed last week in Brandon that, after 16 years as a Member of Parliament and 12 years as Prime Minister, he does not yet know the difference between
NATO and NORAD, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Haldimand-Norfolk (Mr. Bradley):
That the Prime Minister be enrolled in a special course for slow learners on the nature of Canada's treaty obligations.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


NATURAL RESOURCES
Mr. Vince Dantzer (Okanagan North):: Madam Speaker, I too rise under the provisions of Standing Order 43. In the aftermath of the signing of the multibillion dollar coal mining contracts in northeastern B.C., creating some 2,300 jobs and placing Canada in the top five of the world's coal exporting nations, and in view of the fact that these long awaited contracts will benefit not only the residents of British Columbia but will reflect on individual Canadians from sea to sea, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Surrey-White Rock-North Delta (Mr. Friesen):
That this House instruct the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources and the Minister of Finance to refrain from any attempt to nationalize and plunder the coal industry as they have the oil industry.


Madam Speaker:: Is there unanimous consent for this motion?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


PARLIAMENTARY AFFAIRS
Mr. Jim Fulton (Skeena):: Madam Speaker, I rise under the provisions of Standing Order 43. Whereas the voting record of this Thirty-second Parliament shows that the Tories have voted 19 times with the Liberals, while the NDP have voted only seven times with the Liberals, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles):
That the Tories admit they are in bed with the Liberals almost three times as often as the NDP and that Joe publicly formalize his secret organic union with Pierre.


AGRICULTURE
Mr.   Len. Gustafson@Assiniboia: Madam Speaker, I rise under the provisions of Standing Order 43. Due to the very confusing situation which exists under the herd maintenance program, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Moose Jaw (Mr. Neil):
February 10, 1981

That the government take immediate steps to stop this confusion and to cut administrative costs by paying producers on a straightforward plan, on established boundaries, based on a fixed sum, on a per annum basis, to all farmers within the boundaries.


Madam Speaker:: Is there unanimous consent for this motion?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


FORESTRY
Mr. F. Oberle (Prince George-Peace River):: Madam Speaker, I too rise under the provisions of Standing Order 43. Having regard to a report entitled Forest Research in Canada, which was commissioned and filed with the government in 1979, and which lists some startling conclusions and wide-ranging recommendations, and having regard to the fact that the report predicts the most serious consequences should the governments of the provinces and Ottawa fail not only to improve forest-related research efforts but as well to assure that the universities are sufficiently funded to produce scientists and engineers for the task, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Richmond-South Delta (Mr. Siddon):
That the report by Omond Solandt entitled Forest Research in Canada be tabled in the House and referred to the appropriate standing committee for study and that the minister be required to report on the action the government intends to take to implement the recommendations contained in the document.


Madam Speaker:: Is there unanimous consent for this motion?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Mr. Gordon Gilchrist (Scarborough East):: Madam Speaker, 1 welcome the Minister of State for Science and Technology back. We can now get to some of the really important questions of the day.
I would like to remind the minister of his highly touted press announcement of January 19 wherein he reaffirmed the government's commitment to increase spending on research and development to 1.5 per cent of gross national product by 1985. In the same breath he announced that the government's share
Oral Questions
would be reduced from 39 per cent to 33 per cent. Would the minister now explain to the House that he has failed to meet this commitment which he has been expressing for a year and that he has misled the House, the entire science community I might add, and the people of Canada by reversing this policy in the most important economic back-up structure the country could be involved in today?


Hon. John Roberts (Minister of State for Science and Technology and Minister of the Environment):: Madam Speaker, the hon. member is in error in thinking that I may have misled the House. The increase in expenditure in relation to science and technology over the past year is well on that track for achieving that 1.5 per cent Figure, which we had established. Indeed, I am confident that the estimates for next year will again show the kind of significant increases which are necessary for us to reach the objective we have established for 1985.
The hon. member refers to the decline in the percentage of government effort as a proportion of the over-all efforts within our economy directed toward research and development. It should be clear to all hon. members that what we are projecting is the participation by the federal government of one third in the over-all objective of 1.5 per cent. Although it is a decline in percentage, it is a decline over a much higher over-all figure and, indeed, it represents a very significant increase in effort on the part of the federal government.


James Gordon Gilchrist: Madam Speaker, on May 5, 1980, I asked the minister if he would be supporting the five-year plan for funding to NSERC, MRC and other councils. He assured me by saying:
I will do more than that; I will increase the funding considerably above the figures put forward by the Conservatives.
Would the minister now explain the reduction in NRC funding from 24 per cent to the 11 per cent or 12 per cent or 13 per cent rates of which I have just been advised rather peripherally?


John (Moody) Roberts: Madam Speaker, the hon. member referred to the granting councils in the first part of his question, and in the second part he referred to the NRC, the National Research Council. I take it that the hon. member is referring to the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council. In that case I can say that the five-year plan presented by NSERC is one which I support. The funding which is required for the first year to meet the commitments under that plan has been granted. While definitive decisions have not yet been taken with regard to funding for the second year, I am seeking to obtain as much funding as I possibly can for those programs.


James Gordon Gilchrist: Madam Speaker, there has been universal condemnation of the MRC and NSERC funding announced by the government of late. All the newspaper are carrying reports on the matter and all the scientists are deploring the

February 10, 1981
Oral Questions
government's broken promises. Would the minister explain why he has failed with his cabinet colleagues to obtain sufficient funding for this most vital sector of Canada's economy where there are problems with creating jobs and upgrading careers? The minister's failure is probably the result of not enough effort in cabinet and because of his two hats, namely, the important matter of the environment which he shares with science and technology, to the serious detriment of science and technology and the condemnation of the science community.


John (Moody) Roberts: Madam Speaker, generally I try to accommodate the hon. member, but 1 would be misleading the House if I were to say that I failed. I have not failed.


Mr. Nielsen:: Roberts for leader.


John (Moody) Roberts: The hon. member is forecasting, I hope pessimistically, what the level of funding will be. As I said in my earlier response, those decisions have not yet been definitively taken. I do not believe that I shall fail in meeting the expenditures which are required.


COMPARISON OF RATES OF GOVERNMENT FUNDING
Hon. Flora MacDonald (Kingston and the Islands):: Madam Speaker, I would like to determine, perhaps once and for all, the rate of the minister's failure-


Mr. Crosbie:: It is total.


Flora Isabel MacDonald: -and to point out to him that last year the Conservative government increased funding to the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council by $41 million, to the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council by $5.8 million, and to the Medical Research Council by $12 million. The minister said on May 5 that he would do more than the Conservative government, that he would increase the funding considerably above figures put forward by the Conservatives. I have listed the levels of funding that would have been granted to each of those councils. Will the minister stand by his commitment that he will increase, this year, the amount to those granting councils by more than the Conservative government? Is that what he is now saying?


John (Moody) Roberts: Madam Speaker, I am saying that there will be further increases in the budget of the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council. I am also saying the government has far exceeded the figures which were established by the Conservative government with regard to science and technology development and research and development.


Flora Isabel MacDonald: Madam Speaker, the minister, of course, would not give the commitment now which he gave in May; he is backing away. That is the flip-flop which the minister has made with regard to these very important research granting councils and which we would like to point out. That flip-flop has been condemned by the whole scientific community Madam Speaker. They have termed the action of the minister
the ultimate doublecross. In face of the charges that have been made, does the minister realize that this program of funding for the research councils cannot be something that is started and stopped, something that is a stop and go policy? What explanation does he have for the approach that is taken, that in one year under the Conservative government it is adequately funded, and the next year it is severely cut back?


John (Moody) Roberts: Madam Speaker, I am sorry, but I simply have to reiterate what I have already said. The hon. lady is anticipating a cutback which has not taken place and which I do not expect to take place. The basis of her question is erroneous.


CONCERN EXPRESSED BY SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY
Mr. Simon de Jong (Regina East):: Madam Speaker, my question is also directed to the Minister of State for Science and Technology. The scientific community is indeed interested in the long-term funding plans and the intentions of the government. There are rumours of zero growth. The increases that have been announced are not increases that will cover the increased operating costs for scientific research. There is chaos, anger and frustration in the scientific community. That is shown in all the press releases that the scientific community has put out in the last few days. Will the minister tell this House and the scientific community what the funding will be for the federal granting agencies, and will he clearly state what they can expect?


John (Moody) Roberts: Madam Speaker, there are expressions of concern on the part of the scientific community. I admit that, and I welcome it. I am glad that the scientific community is making its concerns known as dramatically as possible. The hon. gentleman has asked me to announce what will be in the estimates before the decisions on the estimates have definitively been taken. Clearly, I cannot make an announcement on a decision that has not been taken.


Simon Leendert de Jong: A supplementary question, Madam Speaker. Normally the scientific community knows by the previous November what the funding will be but it is now in a state of utter confusion. When will the minister let the scientific community know what is in store in the years to come? The president of the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, Dr. Gordon MacNabb has stated that funding of at least $27.8 million above inflation is needed to maintain the five-year plan for R and D which was endorsed by the Liberal government last year. By slashing the budgets of the granting councils-


Madam Speaker:: Order, please. I have to ask the hon. member to come to his question.
February 10, 1981


Simon Leendert de Jong: My question is this, Madam Speaker. Does the government now mean to repudiate the five-year plan it originally requested and approved, reducing to a charade its commitment to reach 1.5 per cent of GNP for research and development by 1985?


John (Moody) Roberts: Madam Speaker, certainly not. We are not repudiating the plan. What we are doing, as is normal in the estimates process each year, is determining the amount of money required to keep us on track with the planned objective.


AMOUNT OF FUNDS COMMITTED TO MEDICAL RESEARCH COUNCIL
William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: Madam Speaker, my supplementary question is directed to the Minister of National Health and Welfare. Could the minister tell the House why there is as yet no announcement of a renewed five-year plan for medical research in Canada? In doing so, would she please confirm or deny reports from the research community itself that there is only to be a paltry 7.9 per cent increase in funds for medical research, thus severely hampering the ability of the research community to do needed work in areas which the minister herself has indicated need attention, such as toxicology?


Hon. Monique Begin (Minister of National Health and Welfare):: Madam Speaker, I must point out to the hon. member that the budget of the Canadian Medical Research Council is now under study. Naturally, we will do the best we can.


PRESENCE IN GALLERY OF CANADIAN SKIER MISS GERRY SORENSEN
Madam Speaker:: I just cannot resist recognizing the presence in our gallery of Miss Gerry Sorensen, who last weekend won her first women's world cup downhill.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!

[DOT] (M25)


PETRO-CANADA ACQUISITION OF PETROFINA-ROLE OF FEDERAL GOVERNMENT IN FINANCING TAKEOVER
Hon. Michael Wilson (Etobicoke Centre):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources. Last week I drew attention to the existence of sloppy management on the part of Petro-Canada in the takeover of Petrofina. Yesterday we were treated to an incredible
Oral Questions
display of this same sort of management when the chairman of Petro-Canada announced that he had reached agreement to acquire Petrofina but he did not have any understanding with the federal government as to what role the federal government would play in financing the large expenditure of $1.5 billion. This amazing lack of control causes me to ask the minister the following: what instructions did he give to the chairman of Petro-Canada as to the basis on which they will take over Petrofina? Were there any limits set on the total size of the transaction? Was there any direction regarding the size of the company or the role which the government would play in the acquisition, or did the minister just simply say, "Bill, hop out and buy me an oil company and send me the bill later" ?


Hon. Marc Lalonde (Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources):: Madam Speaker, cabinet examined the negotiations with Petrofina and it authorized the acquisition, setting a maximum limit on the price to be paid.


Thomas Edward Siddon: What was that?


Marc Lalonde: The exact way this is to be financed is a matter which will be discussed between cabinet and the president of Petro-Canada.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Mr. Andre:: When?


Thomas Edward Siddon: Who is going to pay it?


Marc Lalonde: Some funds may come from equity, some from borrowings and some from taxation. This is a matter we will review with the authorities of Petro-Canada, and a decision will be made in due course.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Madam Speaker, the chairman of Petro-Canada said yesterday that he could not support any financing on the financial statements of Petro-Canada, that the total amount would be financed by the government through its tax. Mr. Hopper also said that the government "played no role in choosing the target or setting the price." Since the federal government has been called on to finance the entire amount of the transaction, could the minister explain why the federal government did not play a role in setting the price when in fact it is going to be called on to levy the taxes which will finance the entire transaction?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, I regret that my hon. friend is distorting the facts even more than his leader does when he talks about Petro-Canada. The statement Mr. Hopper made was quite clear. He said it was considered conceivable that Petro-Canada could get less than 100 per cent equity from the government, and if it got less it would have to borrow the balance. I have not seen a report anywhere where the president of Petro-Canada said that it would all have to come out of equity and that they could not borrow for this particular purpose. I would hope that my friend would have a little more respect for the truth.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!

February 10, 1981
Oral Questions


Marc Lalonde: He might pass on the message to his leader when talking about Petro-Canada and this particular deal.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Marc Lalonde: As far as the point raised by my hon. friend is concerned, the decision to go after and take over Petrofina was made by the board of directors and management of Petro-Canada. Negotiations were carried out on a business basis by the management of Petro-Canada. The government has approved the takeover. It also fixed a maximum limit that we were ready to consider for that takeover.


An hon. Member:: How much was that?


Marc Lalonde: Within that mandate, the rest of the deal was carried out by Petro-Canada, as it should have been in such a situation.


DATES OF GOVERNMENT ACTION RESPECTING ACQUISITION OF PETROFINA
Right Hon. Joe Clark (Leader of the Opposition):: Madam Speaker, I have a couple of supplementary questions for the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources. They both relate to dates. Will the minister of energy tell us on what date cabinet began to examine the acquisition by Petro-Canada of Petrofina, and on what date did cabinet approve that acquisition?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, the authorization to Petro-Canada was given on the Tuesday, the week before the takeover actually took place. If my hon. friend could give me a calendar, I can tell him the exact date. If he checks, it would be Tuesday about two weeks ago. The takeover took place at the weekend.


Charles Joseph Clark: That was half my question. The other half of the question is: on what date did the examination of that acquisition begin? When did the cabinet first consider that matter? While I am on my feet may I point out that the minister has told us that it was approved on Tuesday. I want to know the date on which the consideration began.
Second, I should like to ask the minister to give us an indication as to whether he has satisfied himself that no knowledge of that intention on the part of the cabinet or of Petro-Canada came into the hands of anyone other than the people authorized by cabinet to know that information. Can he give us the assurance that he has looked into that matter and that there was no insider information?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, I apologize. I said Tuesday to the hon. member. It was on Thursday at the end of the day that cabinet considered this particular acquisition proposal, and the final negotiations took place on that weekend. So cabinet was acquainted with this proposal and took the decision on Thursday at the end of the afternoon.
So far as the question raised by my hon. friend is concerned, I notice that he cast some completely unfounded and rather despicable innuendoes in a speech to students in British Columbia in this regard. I have indicated that if there is any evidence and any information to the effect that any improper action has been taken by anyone in this deal, it should either be drawn to the attention of the government or to the attention of the Ontario Securities Commission or the Quebec Securities Commission which have authority in this respect to carry out a full investigation. If the Leader of the Opposition has no evidence of anything, I do not think he should carry on in this manner.


Madam Speaker:: Order.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: Madam Speaker, we would not want the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources to be less than candid with the House on this matter.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Charles Joseph Clark: I notice that the minister himself has not answered my question. My question was whether he has satisfied himself, as the minister responsible, that such information was not in the hands of anyone other than people authorized by cabinet.


Mr. Baker (Nepean-Carleton):: Yes or no?


Marc Lalonde: Quite obviously, Madam Speaker, I have no evidence at all that any such information would have been given to anyone not authorized to receive the information. The cabinet was seized with this issue, as I indicated, the Thursday before the deal was made in Brussels. Frankly, I find it quite offensive that the Leader of the Opposition should cast general aspersions on officials or unnamed persons without having a shred of evidence to substantiate them.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Harvie Andre: Have you looked at how the stocks have performed?


ASTRA TRUST
Mr. Bob Rae (Broadview-Greenwood):: Madam Speaker, I should like to put a question to the Minister of State for Finance in view of the fact that the first failure of a trust company in 50 years in Canada is apparently a subject which is not sufficiently important to merit the attention of the Minister of Finance. I should like to put to the minister the same question I put yesterday to the Minister of Finance with respect to the collapse of Astra Trust and the affairs of Mr. Carlo Montemurro and his associated companies, incorporated in the province of Ontario.
February 10, 1981

With your permission, Madam Speaker, 1 should like to repeat the question 1 asked yesterday for the benefit of the minister. I am sure that it would be of some interest to the House to know that there were already so many problems with this company-I am referring to Astra Trust-and with associated companies, that in 1978 the federal Superintendent of Insurance attached conditions and renewed the trust company's charter for only a three-month period.
My question to the minister is this: why did it take the department two years, between 1978 and 1980, to find out the nature of the scam which was involved, and the scam is the relationship between the four companies in question, and how was it possible for the department to continue to allow investors in southern Ontario to put their money in Astra Trust when the department itself had severe suspicions about the integrity of these four companies?
[ Translation]


Hon. Pierre Bussieres (Minister of State (Finance)):: Madam Speaker, in the introductory remarks to his question the hon. member describes the extremely complex situation surrounding this case. As the hon. member is fully aware the situation grows even more complex owing to the fact that two levels of government are involved. One company, Astra, is incorporated under federal legislation while others hold provincial charters. The hon. member is asking me how it can be that although very stringent conditions were imposed on its operations in 1978, the company was not liquidated until 1980. I should like to indicate to the hon. member that some conditions were imposed precisely because the office of the Superintendent of Insurance was keeping a very close watch over the operations of that company. However, the hon. member ought to understand that monitoring operations were all the more difficult as the other companies did not come under the jurisdiction of the Superintendent of Insurance. As evidence of that, it was not before 1980 that the Superintendent of Insurance was made aware of the Re-Mor operations.


REQUEST FOR PARLIAMENTARY COMMITTEE INQUIRY
Bob Rae: Madam Speaker, the minister himself has just said that the situation is very complicated, and I agree with him. When you look at the transcript of the evidence before the Ontario select committee, you find that it is a very complex story, in fact, as scam going back to 1972. In view of the complexity of the situation and the fact that a select committee of the Ontario legislature has said, as it appears in the interim report of that select committee before it was dissolved because of the Ontario election:
-it has received evidence indicating that political influence was exerted on federal officials to incorporate and licence Astra Trust as a federal trust company. The committee invites the Parliament of Canada to examine the transcript of its proceedings and to take such action as it deems appropriate.
It is precisely because of what the minister calls the complexities in this case that the Ontario committee has asked that this be referred to Parliament. Why does the minister not refer
Oral Questions
this matter to a parliamentary committee so that we ourselves can examine the complexity and try to come to a solution of this very difficult problem?
[ Translation]


Pierre Bussières: Madam Speaker, concerning the fact that a licence was issued to the Astra Company, I have already explained that, contrary to what may have been said, the Superintendent of Insurance has assured me that never was there any political pressure on him with respect to the recommendation. Madam Speaker, he made a serious and thorough investigation just as is done before it is recommended that a trust company be incorporated. I would suggest that what matters is to make sure indeed that there is a thorough investigation before incorporation papers are issued and, second, that proceedings are taken against any person who might have been involved in criminal activities and have benefited from the complexity of the situation. In that respect the Department of the Superintendent of Insurance works closely with the Ontario Provincial Police to bring criminals to justice if they are involved in illegal activities.


PETRO-CANADA GOVERNMENT FINANCING FOR ACQUISITION OF PETROFINA
John Carnell Crosbie: Madam Speaker, I would recommend that the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources consult the Prime Minister on his definition of the truth.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


John Carnell Crosbie: My question to the Minister of Finance is this. Mr. Hopper said yesterday that he wants federal assistance in purchasing Petrofina because his cash flow will be limited, that his investments in other activities will be limited if the government does not supply the $1.46 billion after collecting it from the Canadian consumers of oil products, regardless of their ability to pay, and that the government should give it to him to buy Petrofina. To collect that amount of money in one year will cost at least 8 cents a gallon on gasoline and 6 cents on heating oil. There have already been eight increases in oil product prices since the end of December of last year under this government, and this will be the ninth.
Will the minister now tell the House what the government intends to do, particularly in view of the fact that there is no equity in this matter, that everybody, rich or poor, will have to pay it, that the poor will pay more in proportion than the rich, that there will be no tax credit for lower income taxpayers as we proposed, and that there will be no exemption for farmers, fishermen or urban transit systems? How is he going to collect this amount of money for Mr. Hopper?

February 10, 1981
Oral Questions


Madam Speaker:: Order, please.


Hon. Allan J. MacEachen (Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance):: Madam Speaker, the hon. member will recall that in the budget speech it was stated that in the event of an acquisition there would be the imposition of a particular tax, and that is how we will propose to finance whatever portion, still undetermined, we would put into this acquisition.


John Carnell Crosbie: Madam Speaker, this government is going down the slopes faster than Miss Sorensen went down the slopes. The minister will remember that on January 23 he had an advertisement in the Scotia Sun which said, "Vote Liberal and the price will stay down". It has gone up eight times since. Now the minister talks about the ninth time the price of gasoline products will go up. I wonder if the minister will resign, or will he continue to be a living example of hypocrisy and stay here in this House as Minister of Finance.


Madam Speaker:: Order. Does the hon. member have a question?


Walter David Baker: He was just clearing his throat.


John Carnell Crosbie: My supplementary question to the minister is this: will he reject Mr. Hopper's pleas that he take another $1.4 billion from the oil consumers of Canada, and will he follow his own election promise and keep the prices down and reverse the last eight price increases?


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Madam Speaker, the answer to both questions is probably yes.


RAILWAYS
Hon. George Hees (Northumberland):: Madam Speaker, I have a question for the Prime Minister. It is exactly one year since the Prime Minister made his famous election promise to double track the CNR from Winnipeg to the Pacific Ocean. I wonder if the Prime Minister would bring the House up to date on the progress he is making with his favourite project, in addition, of course, to the 30 per cent of the line which had already been double tracked before the Prime Minister made his promise.


Right Hon. P. E. Trudeau (Prime Minister):: Madam Speaker, knowing his ardent interest in sports, I am sure the hon. member would permit me to preface my answer by saying that in addition to the lady already recognized in the gallery, there are two excellent male speakers-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Charles Joseph Clark: Skiers.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: -skiers, and I would be happy to give Your Honour an opportunity to recognize them, unless you want me to do it on your behalf.
Seated in the gallery are Mr. Ken Read, who was the first male skier to win the World Cup-


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: -and Mr. Steve Podborski, who is the current leader of the World Cup men's downhill division.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: As to the question raised by the hon. member, he was kind enough to give me notice of the question.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I am sure he is distressed that his colleagues in his own party are always side-tracked because, as a former distinguished minister of transport himself, he is not used to being put on the sidings as, through the fault of his party, he has been.


An hon. Member:: You are not laughing, Joe.


Walter David Baker: You were better with skiing, Pierre.


Charles Joseph Clark: Have you got the answer, Pierre?


Madam Speaker:: May we have that answer?


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, there is some concern opposite.


Charles Joseph Clark: The concern was the Chair's.


Madam Speaker:: I was asking the Right Hon. Prime Minister if we could have his answer.


Charles Joseph Clark: No.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Well, Madam Speaker, in addition to the 30 per cent which was under construction at the time I gave my last answer to the hon. member in the House-that was in April-I want to give more details today. There are three sections to the project. There is the Edmonton to Valemount section.


Charles Joseph Clark: That is Valemount.


Walter David Baker: That is like NORAD.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I am told by the right hon. member that is pronounced Valemount.


Mr. Beatty:: Take the train and visit.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, I have a lot of time. All the answers are written, so if hon. members want to continue-
February 10, 1981


Walter David Baker: Table it.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I will gladly do that.


Madam Speaker:: I wonder if the Prime Minister would please give the answer in his usual brief manner.


Walter David Baker: Go ahead, George, ask a supplementary question.


George Harris Hees: Madam Speaker, I did send the Prime Minister notice in the hope that this would help him not to mess it up.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


George Harris Hees: But it is obvious that more than notice is necessary.
As a practical politician, does the Prime Minister not regret very much the fact that he offered so much and received so very little in return for his promise, and could he also bring us up to date on his other favourite project-and tell us how he is making out-which is to twin western ridings with eastern Liberal members of Parliament?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, the first section, which is some 310 miles long, is under construction, and it will be double tracked by the mid-1980s. With respect to the Vale-mount to Vancouver section, some 440 miles, about half of it will be completed by 1988. In so far as the third section, that is the Winnipeg-Edmonton section, 50 miles of it has already been completed. We figure that by 1988-


An hon. Member:: Before they get back to power.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: while this government is renewing the mandate which will come a couple of years down the road, at least 40 per cent of the whole line will be double tracked. That will be some 590 miles out of 1,450. In this way we will permit at least the CN to be moving those rich resources which are so bountiful in the west and which would not have been able to move if we had not double tracked and continued to double track the CNR.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


POSSIBLE DEVELOPMENT OF BAY OF FUNDY TIDAL POWER
Mr. W. Kenneth Robinson (Etobicoke-Lakeshore):: Madam Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources. In view of the fact that Japan has a project to harness tidal power and is about to build a number of artificial concrete estuaries in Japan-Bay of Fundy, so to speak-to harness tidal power and transform it into electricity, will the minister indicate if he will consider such a project for the Bay of Fundy to provide electricity for New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island so that these provinces will have less reliance on oil, and will he look into the Japanese
Oral Questions
project to obtain expertise, if necessary, to develop the electric tidal power potential of the Bay of Fundy?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, there is already a management committee under the Canada-Nova Scotia agreement on oil conservation and substitution, and that committee has been approached to update the federal-provincial study on tidal power out of the Bay of Fundy. An extensive study has already been carried out. The government is willing and ready to update that study.
The hon. member has referred to the Japanese experience or project in this regard. I am sure that the federal-provincial group which is examining this situation will want to review the project which is being considered by Japan.


LABOUR RELATIONS
Mr. Mark Rose (Mission-Port Moody):: Madam Speaker, my question, directed to the Minister of Labour, concerns a very serious labour matter in British Columbia. Despite the acceptance on the part of the telecommunications workers of at least three mediation reports, the foreign-owned B.C. Telephone company continues to ignore our Canadian labour traditions and to behave like some cross between a southern textile corporation and a nineteenth century Texas cattle baron. I should like to ask the minister what he intends to do, from the vantage point of his high office, to get these two parties to settle this matter, especially to lean on the British Columbia Telephone company and to bring an end to this long and bitter labour dispute which has gone on for far too long, and is likely to escalate.


Hon. Gerald Regan (Minister of Labour):: Madam Speaker,
I thank the hon. member for a very important question because this topic is one of very severe concern to people in British Columbia at this moment. I had the opportunity of being in Victoria and Vancouver last Thursday and Friday and of examining the situation at a meeting with the labour department officials in that area. There is no question this is a particularly difficult work stoppage. I express my regret as the Minister of Labour that the B.C. Telephone Company has not seen fit to accept the Peck conciliation report which was accepted by the union. What I also found in British Columbia was very widespread concern that the management of B.C. Tel owned, as it is, in the United States, was perhaps not as sensitive to the situation in British Columbia as might be desired and, if they were, then perhaps a settlement might come more rapidly.


Mark Willson Rose: 1 thank the minister for his reply. I would like to suggest that while he uses the words "sensitive to our labour traditions" on the part of B.C. Tel and its foreign roots, some

February 10, 1981
Oral Questions
people would describe it as union busting. I know the minister was in British Columbia last week and I know also he did not meet with both sides personally. I am going to ask him if he will go to Vancouver, call both sides together, have a meeting and get this whole matter settled, and force the B.C. Telephone Company, by his very persuasive powers, to begin to provide decent service for the consumers in British Columbia, and also civilized treatment of the B.C. Tel workers.


Gerald Augustine Regan: Madam Speaker, the very distinguished member is well aware I have no powers under the legislation to force the parties to agree. At the moment I judge to be the appropriate one, where a mediator of a very senior nature can be helpful in bringing the parties together-there has to be the right climate, a willingness and perhaps a recognition by B.C. Tel before a mediator can be successful-I will appoint a senior mediator. We have already had a conciliation report. I will review it very thoroughly, and hopefully before the end of the week may find a situation in which a senior mediator would be appointed.
[ Translation]


CANADIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION STRIKE-FAILURE OF NEGOTIATIONS-GOVERNMENT POSITION
Mr. David Kilgour (Edmonton-Strathcona):: Madam Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Labour.
The conflict between the French-speaking journalists and the CBC seems to have become shamefully protracted. Francophones outside Quebec have not had access to a single French language national news service for over three months as they cannot have a private network in their own language like the people of Quebec. Of course, it is a well-known fact that settling this conflict is not a priority for the government.
However, since the negotiations through the mediator appointed by the Minister of Labour have failed and the union has asked for a new special mediator from outside the government framework to be appointed, can the minister tell us whether he plans on agreeing to this request and whether he thinks that a similar conflict between English-speaking journalists and the CBC would become as protracted?


Gerald Augustine Regan: Madam Speaker, the hon. member refers to the other work stoppage in the country which is most troublesome to my department at the present time. I would only say to him that we have grave concern about the length of time the deadlock has existed between the CBC and the French-language journalists. I have, at the moment, probably the most able mediator in the country, Mr. Guy de Merlis, participating in mediation efforts with the parties. He was meeting yesterday, and I believe again today, with Radio-Canada. If a settlement is to be achieved, there is no question it will be necessary for Radio-Canada to move from some of the entrenched positions they have taken, and there will probably be the necessity of further movement
on the part of the union. I point out to the hon. member there has to be a willingness on the part of the parties to settle, to move, and to conciliate and only in those circumstances can an end of the effort come.
1 remind the hon. member that by using mediators of the calibre of Guy de Merlis and others in our department, the federal Department of Labour, both under the present government, the previous government and the government before it, has achieved a higher percentage of settlements without work stoppages than any other jurisdiction in the country.


POSSIBILITY OF ADDITIONAL FUNDING TO SETTLE STRIKE
David Kilgour: In short, Madam Speaker, on the constitutional package, he wants to play the Prime Minister's game, with the French-speaking people of Canada. My supplementary question is for the President of the Treasury Board. Can the minister confirm that Treasury Board has set aside additional funds in anticipation of a settlement of the CBC conflict and can he tell us whether he intends to notify the CBC officials that their obvious desire in allowing this conflict to go on is now too apparent to the French-speaking people?


Hon. Donald J. Johnston (President of the Treasury Board):: Madam Speaker, the member is well aware that our people have nothing to do with those negotiations. In any event, if a submission is made for additional funds, we shall certainly consider it.


AGRICULTURE
Mr. Doug Neil (Moose Jaw):: Madam Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Agriculture. I am sure the minister is aware, after his travels to the west and from communications he has received, that confusion still reigns with respect to the herd maintenance program. He has probably read the three motions presented by members of the opposition in the last ten days containing recommendations for a solution to his problem. I am wondering if the minister had the opportunity of examining these recommendations, and is he giving consideration to them because they would go a long way toward solving his problem?


Hon. E. F. Whelan (Minister of Agriculture):: Madam Speaker, the herd maintenance program is administered by another minister, the Minister of State in charge of the Canadian Wheat Board, but I do have a lot to do with it. I just want to say we met last week and again this week, and I believe there will be another meeting. We cannot change the criteria that much-


An hon. Member:: Change the minister.
February 10, 1981


Eugene Whelan: -that we would open the whole program up. There have been over 20,000 cheques mailed to farmers out of 29,623 applications, according to the information I have, and more of these are being processed every day. The appeal board is just meeting. It has made representations to us about two major changes it wants. We may have to go back to Treasury Board to make those changes, and that would delay the whole program because it changes the spending of the money which has been appropriated. We are very conscious about doing that. We do not want to open it up that wide again, because we might offend other farmers who have not even submitted applications but would then say, "Well, I am also entitled to submit an application". This is a new program. I think it has worked very well according to the correspondence I have received. Western farmers are some of the greatest letter writers of all, and I have received very few letters-only compliments from them in the form of letters.


Douglas Charles Neil: Madam Speaker, if the minister is not really in charge of the program, perhaps the Prime Minister would consider taking the program away from the minister in charge of the Wheat Board in the other place, and turning it over to the Minister of Agriculture who seems to have more of an understanding with respect to western farmers.
I understand the minister will be going west either today or tomorrow. Would he give consideration to discussing the problems with some of the farmers and some of the members of the appeal board? I understand there are still some 10,000 outstanding applications.


Eugene Whelan: Madam Speaker, there are 10,000 applications. We have been lenient in allowing them to submit late applications. I understand they have even been receiving applications as late as this week, contrary to the rules and regulations. But, we still told them to accept applications at this late date. We are in constant touch with them; every day we are in touch with them in Regina.
I will be in Regina tomorrow afternoon for a couple of hours. Possibly the whole appeal board will be there. The two from Ontario, the three from Manitoba, the three from Saskatchewan and the one from Alberta will be there. While 1 understand two of them are in Ottawa at the present time attending the Canadian Federation of Agriculture annual meeting, they will be back. They are farm leaders in their own right; they are highly qualified people. If we can make some modifications without going back through the whole rigmarole of Treasury Board, which would delay the payments to farmers, we will do that. But it will delay payments if we have to go through that procedure.
Oral Questions FISHERIES


SPORTS FISHING IN ONTARIO-PROPOSED CHANGES IN DATES OF SEASON
Mr. Bill Vankoughnet (Hastings-Frontenac-Lennox and Addington):: Madam Speaker, in the absence of the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, I should like to direct my question to his parliamentary secretary. Many people in eastern Ontario are concerned about the proposed changes in the split fishing season in divisions nine and ten. Apparently due to the calendar formula used, there could have been a reduction in the February, 1981, season for lake trout from 16 days to nine days. In light of the fact that the Ontario minister of natural resources apparently amended the Ontario fisheries regulations under the federal Fisheries Act, affecting the closed season variation order on the lake trout and splake season in divisions nine and ten, and apparently forwarded these changes to Ottawa on or about January 6, 1981, for approval, could the parliamentary secretary advise the House if in fact this matter has been approved? If not, would he expedite and clarify this matter so that sports fishermen and businessmen, such as the lodge owners in my constituency, can be assured of a longer fishing season within the law?


Mr. George Henderson (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Fisheries and Oceans):: Madam Speaker, I will take that question as notice and get the answer for the hon. member tomorrow. I am not familiar with that aspect of the fishery.


FARM CREDIT CORPORATION
Hon. Don Mazankowski (Vegreville):: Madam Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Agriculture. What action is the minister contemplating with respect to replenishing the Farm Credit Corporation with adequate funding to meet the needs of farmers throughout Canada, particularly young farmers? If he is not anticipating any increase in funding to the Farm Credit Corporation, does he have some other program in mind which might be unveiled by the government?


Eugene Whelan: Madam Speaker, last year we lent over $500 million to farmers. The majority of that-over 75 per cent or around 75 per cent- went to young farmers. We would like to be able to lend more. We are drafting new legislation which will allow us, when presented to the House-and the hon. member will have to be patient until it is presented to the House-to raise money from the private sector; that is the intent.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Madam Speaker, could the minister indicate to the House how much money will be included in this appropriation, and what rate?


Eugene Whelan: Madam Speaker, if 1 could give the hon. member the information he wants as to the rate, I would

February 10, 1981
Privilege-Mr Oberle
probably be drawing a much higher salary than 1 am, that is, if I could forecast what the interest rate will be here or anywhere else in the world.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Eugene Whelan: 1 would just say that we have a preferred interest rate for the Farm Credit Corporation. At the present time it is 12.75 per cent interest, which is a very enviable interest rate for anyone else in business. I am sure the hon. member recognizes that farmers are business people and that whatever interest rate we devise will be one that is fair and equitable.


PRIVILEGE
Frank Oberle: Madam Speaker, I ask the Minister of Labour (Mr. Regan) to remain in the chamber for a minute. I am confident it has not escaped Your Honour that during the course of question period the Minister of Labour took it upon himself to insert his very limited jurisdiction in a labour dispute which is currently causing very serious difficulties in the province of British Columbia. In so doing, he departed very dramatically and radically from a well-accepted practice in the House of Commons, that a minister who has not examined a situation or has not availed himself of sufficient information from both parties involved in a labour dispute like this one, should not take it upon himself during question period on the grounds that we are dealing with a foreign company, to take sides in a labour dispute which in this case has caused serious interruptions in the province of British Columbia.
After I have examined the "blues", I wish to reserve the right to confront the minister further and hopefully to move a motion or, if nothing else, to give the minister an opportunity to correct his very unfortunate statement today. If he does not choose to do so-


Madam Speaker:: Indeed the hon. member should wait until he sees the "blues". I fail to see that there is a question of privilege in that to which the hon. member has referred. If he is not satisfied with the answer he received, or if he has some objection to the way the answer was formulated, it is a matter of debate, but not a question of privilege.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Hon. Yvon Pinard (President of the Privy Council):: Madam Speaker, under Standing Order 41(2) I would like to table in both official languages copies of order in council 1980-2824, being the list of acting ministers.


NATIONAL ENERGY BOARD ACT
Marc Lalonde: for leave to introduce Bill C-60 entitled "An act to amend the National Energy Board Act".


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

[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)
Mr. D. M. Collenette (Parliamentary Secretary to President of the Privy Council):: Madam Speaker, the following questions will be answered today: Nos. 1,323, 1,709, 1,777, 1,785 and 1,909.
I ask, Madam Speaker, that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.


Mr. Friesen: Is it the intention of the CFDC to lower interest rates on interim and development loans and, if so (a) by what percentage (b) will existing loans be renegotiated (c) what amount will be lost in revenue?


Mr. Peter Stollery (Parliamentary Secretary to Secretary of State and Minister of Communications):: (a) No. The
corporaton has decided to maintain the normal interest rate, that is, the preferential bank rate plus 2 per cent.
(b) and (c) Not applicable.


Mr. McKinnon: 1. Are CANEX operations subsidized by the Department of National Defence at CFB Esquimalt and, if so, to what extent?
February 10, 1981

2. (a) What were the profits from CANEX operations at CFB Esquimalt for the fiscal year (i) 1978-79 (ii) 1979-80 (b) what proportion of the profits were remitted to the department for (i) buildings (ii) maintenance (iii) utilities (iv) salaries for managers, supervisors and accounting services (c) to what specific uses are the profits put?


Mrs. Ursula Appolloni (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of National Defence):: 1. Yes. Public support is provided in the form of accommodation in otherwise vacant buildings, basic management and accounting services in accordance with Treasury Board decision 689194-guiding principles for the provision of services and recreational facilities at Canadian Forces establishments and the provision of support to the Canadian Forces exchange system and associated non-public funds organizations. Staff support to CANEX consists of one officer and two other ranks on a full-time basis and one officer, five other ranks and one civilian employee on a parttime basis.
2. (a) The total net profits after all expenses including the remittances made to the Crown as listed in Paragraph (b) below were:
(i)	$102,366
(ii)	96,647
(b)	(i), (ii) and (iii)
1978-	79-$29,480.71
1979-	80-$42,544.46
These figures are based on an annual review of all CANEX operations across Canada.
(iv) No remittance was made to the Crown for salaries of the staff listed in Paragraph I above.
(c)	In both 1978-79 and 1979-80, 10 per cent of net profits were reinvested as working capital in the CFB Esquimalt CANEX operation. The remaining 90 per cent were contributed to the CFB Esquimalt base fund, for the provision of base recreational, amenity and community programs.


Mr. Stevens: For the current fiscal year, what are the estimated expenditures of Petro-Canada for (a) advertising (b) free or subsidized publications (c) other information conveyed to the public?


Marc Lalonde: Petro-Canada reports as follows: (a) $1,214,000 (of which $926,000 is related to the conversion of gasoline marketing operations); (b) $118,191; (c) $1,821.


Mr. Stevens: For the current fiscal year, what are the estimated expenditures of Canadair Limited for (a) advertising (b) free or subsidized publications (c) other information conveyed to the public?


Hon. Herb Gray (Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce):: In so far as the Department of Industry, Trade and
Order Paper Questions
Commerce is concerned: Canadair Limited, (a) $159,100; (b) $99,700; (c) $15,000.


Mr. Waddell: What is the total amount and breakdown of the public affairs budget at AECL, including employee expenses, exhibits and displays, literature and films, programs for schools and specific projects such as the Nuclear Information Centre at the Manulife Centre in Toronto, including the set-up and operating
costs?
Hon. Marc Lalonde (Minister of Energy, Mines and
Resources): Atomic Energy of Canada Limited reports as
follows:
Chalk River Nuclear Laboratories	$226,000
Whiteshell Nuclear Research Establishment	$231,000
Nuclear Waste Management Program (WNRE) $598,000 Nuclear Information Centre in Toronto	$140,000.
These figures included employee expenses. However, the accounting systems at AECL's sites are not maintained in such a way as to provide a breakdown for exhibitions and displays, literature and films and programs for schools.
In addition to the above-mentioned funds, public affairs of a corporate and international nature are funded from commercial revenues. These include work in support of marketing.


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


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Mr. Gordon Towers (Red Deer):: Madam Speaker, the parliamentary secretary has stated from time to time that he would look at question No. 811 which has been on the Order Paper since May 8, 1980. 1 am just wondering whether perhaps there is some reason the parliamentary secretary is not able to answer this question, or what he intends to do about it.


David Michael Collenette: Madam Speaker, as usual, I will reply by indicating that I am looking into the situation. I remind the hon. member that many questions were put on the Order Paper before his. Sometimes it requires a lot of work to develop a particular answer, but I will do my best to get his particular answer as soon as possible.

February 10, 1981
Borrowing Authority



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from Monday, February 9, consideration of the motion of Mr. Bussieres (for the Minister of Finance) that Bill C-59, to provide supplementary borrowing authority, be read the second time and referred to the Standing Committee on Finance, Trade and Economic Affairs.
Mr. Gordon Taylor (Bow River):: Last night when I concluded my remarks I was speaking about the policy of this present government, which appears to be trying to borrow its way out of debt. I want to now continue what I have to say with respect to this borrowing bill.
The government is asking the House of Commons to approve another borrowing of $14 billion. This sum, added to the $12 billion which received approval earlier, totals $26 billion. 1 wonder when the government will realize that this constant borrowing is simply shoving this country into bankruptcy, slowly but surely? When will the government realize that if we do not start paying our bills soon, as we expect our people to pay them, havoc will be brought on the people of this country.
The government asks us to look at its record, since it does not tell us what it will spend the money for. The government does not say what the interest rate will be or what the conditions of borrowing will be. It simply asks for carte blanche approval to borrow this $14 billion. That is the way it is framed in the bill. This is a subject which I would like to deal with.
If the government had an excellent record and went to a banker with all the material we have in this bill the banker might be inclined to loan some money, but I am in doubt as to whether it would be $14 billion. The banker would probably lend some money on the security of Canada. An individual who goes to the bank with this same type of arrangement and says to the banker, "I will not tell what the money is to be used for; you do not have to tell me what the interest rate is", would not get to First base in borrowing any sum of money from any banker in this country. This is what the government is doing with the representatives of the people. It is saying it will not tell us what it plans to use the money for but that it will simply borrow $14 billion.
I wish to look at the record of the government to see if there is any reason to believe it might be planning to use this money to increase production, or to create production. As I outlined last night, if the money was to be used to create and increase production then there might be some sound reason to borrow the money. But the money is being used in many ways; the government is not saying what it is being used for. It may be used to finance another trip to Austria for the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau). He asks the people of Canada to spend their
holidays and their money in this country while he heads off to Austria to ski. The skiing is just as good in the Banff, Lake Louise, and the Hinton areas; which is good enough for Canadians but not good enough for the Prime Minister. These trips cost a lot of money. Maybe the money is being spent to finance another trip to Arabia. This will not create any productivity, it is simply spending money. You can borrow until you are blue in the face but if you are not creating productivity which can be used to pay back the principle sum, plus interest and some profit, you will bring on ruination. That is what is happening in this case.
I again ask if we can believe what the Prime Minister of this country says. The record tells the story. In 1968 there was a federal expenditure of about $12 billion. Mr. Trudeau led the people of Canada to believe that-the Prime Minister led the people of Canada to believe-


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. I believe it is the practice to refer to members of the cabinet or the Prime Minister by their office rather than by their names, and to refer to hon. members by using the names of their constituencies.


Gordon Edward Taylor: Mr. Speaker, I changed the words to "Prime Minister". But that does not sound any better to me. As a matter of fact, it sounds a little worse, since we expect the Prime Minister of Canada to be careful with respect to the expenditure of public money. After all, it is money which belongs to other people, not to him.
What happened in the Prime Minister's ten years in office? His expenditures went up to $52 billion and then he went out of office. Do you not think he would have had time then to reconsider and make up his mind that, yes, mistakes had been made? The answer is no. The expenditures are now up to $63 billion, with another deficit of about $13 billion or $14 billion. How can you believe what the Prime Minister says when this record gives us this type of information?
I would like to deal now with the civil service. What did the Prime Minister have to say about the civil service? In 1968 the Prime Minister promised to cut the civil service by 10 per cent. What happened? Instead of cutting it by 10 per cent he has increased it by more than 50 per cent-that is 100,000 employees. This is completely opposite to what he promised the people of Canada. Now the government brings in a bill like this and we are expected to believe it is doing something good, but we are not told what it is.
What about inflation? In 1968 the Prime Minister appeared on national television to talk to the Canadian people about inflation. I believe it was August 13, 1968. I do not know if that was a Friday or not, but it probably was. This is what he said:
We would be on the way to financial disaster if nothing were done to bring spending under control. To spend vast sums on welfare, education and other programs while allowing inflation to continue would merely place hundreds of thousands of Canadians on a treadmill they could not escape.
That is exactly what the Prime Minister has done. He has placed hundreds of thousands of people on that treadmill.
February 10, 1981

Instead of doing something about spending he has increased it by more than $50 billion.
The record is not very good. The public debt has increased under the Prime Minister by two and a half times. It will rise to over $100 billion this year. The public debt has increased faster under this Prime Minister than under any prime minister in the history of Canada. If he wants records, that is certainly one! The Prime Minister is sliding this country downhill faster than Steve Podborski can move on the slopes. I wonder what the government must see happen in this country before Liberal members and the Prime Minister realize what they are doing to Canada; I wonder what catastrophe will have to happen.
The flight of capital leaving this country is about $6 billion already. This capital provides jobs, builds industries and creates productivity elsewhere. As the hon. member for Athabasca (Mr. Shields) has pointed out a number of times, our drilling rigs are leaving the country, while the Minister of Energy laughingly says there are still a great many of them working. Those that are working, will finish their jobs, that is for sure, then they will head where they will get a fair deal, some return on their money. We have no hope of attaining self-sufficiency in oil at the rate we are going. There is not a proper climate in this country to invite people to invest their money here.
There is practically nothing being done to help agriculture in western Canada. There is nothing but talk, yet more than a million people are unemployed. Inflation, the national debt and the civil service are all increasing. Borrowing is also increasing. We are not paying our debts, instead we are borrowing another $14 billion. What will it take to awaken Liberal members opposite to an awareness of what they are doing to this country? They wonder why some people in the west talk about separation. Westerners are talking about it because this government will not listen or see. I understand that when the Minister of Energy went out west he had to have four RCMP plain-clothes officers to guard him. What was the cost of this protection? It is strange that a minister, while travelling in Canada, would require Mounted Police to guard him. It is probably the first time in the history of our country such a thing has occurred. If the minister would do his job and provide a fair deal, there would not be this situation. The minister has said he cannot obtain a deal because Alberta will not negotiate. Alberta made an offer which was turned down. The government is quite prepared to pay $38 and $40 per barrel for oil from other countries, but not to pay $20 and $25 for Canadian oil which would help to create jobs.
There is also the matter of our shameful foreign debt. To illustrate what I am trying to say, I will go back in history. At the end of World War II in the year 1945, Canada had a foreign debt of $7 billion. At that time Canada had a shipbuilding industry which at the height of its production turned out one 10,000-ton freighter every two days, an aircraft industry which turned out Lancaster bombers, Mosquito fighter
Borrowing Authority
bombers and Hurricane fighters, and an automobile industry which was the second largest in the world. We had huge natural resource reserves and energetic people who wanted to work, all of which assured industrial expansion without the fear of creating an unmanageable demand for imported raw materials.
In 1945 Canada had the potential to become a net exporter of capital. By 1978 when Canada should have become a credible nation comparable to Switzerland, West Germany and Japan, it was still following the system of sending out raw materials and buying back the finished product, which has the effect of creating jobs elsewhere while our own people live meagrely, on relief, or on unemployment insurance. By 1977, in a time of peace, Canada had accumulated a debt of $106 billion. How can anyone compare those figures and be proud? Other countries, such as Argentina, had a debt at the end of 1976 of $6 billion; Brazil, $14 billion; South Korea, $7 billion and Spain, $6.7 billion, but Canada had a debt of $106 billion. Why is that?
It is, I suggest, because Canada has had a sustained orgy of successive foreign expenditures, of buying elsewhere and of creating jobs elsewhere while our own people cannot find jobs and are walking the streets. The Canadian government has had a deficit in all but four of the last 28 years. If the government cannot balance its budget, it borrows the money to pay its debts. How can we create a surplus in Canada with the government operating in this fashion?
Increasing deficits retards growth and creates unemployment. A nation's strength is based on the extent of its external holdings, but the Prime Minister and his government measures our strength by the extent of our external debts. The more debts we have the more prosperous are the people according to the Liberal Party. In 1976 we sent more than $4 billion to the United States to cover the interest on our debt. The amount has risen to $6 billion, and we are not even paying on the debt itself. No other business could survive in this way.
Let me go back to the end of World War II. At that time West Germany and Japan were weakened by the war. Large portions of their vital industries had been destroyed by bombs. Much of the Japanese land was held by other countries such as Manchuria, China and Korea. Their foreign assets had been expropriated without compensation. However, none of these setbacks stopped the people of those countries. If these countries had followed Canada's policy of sending out raw materials to be made into finished products, they would have been on the rocks as well. They decided to get to work and create production in their own countries.
Japan and West Germany have rebuilt their industries and today are creditor nations from which other countries borrow money. In 1945 they were almost at the bottom of the barrel when Canada was close to the top with only a debt of $7 billion. Now Canada's debt is approaching $200 billion and these countries are lending money to other poorer countries. The situation will not improve unless the government changes its policies. But the government is asking us to continue with its same old policy of borrow, borrow, borrow.

February 10, 1981
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The government still believes it can borrow its way out of debt. If only the government would realize that there is a lot of potential in Canada. There are tremendous industries. A prime example is the oil industry in western Canada. When this industry should be thriving, rigs are leaving the country and there is no development, nothing but stagnation. Men from Ontario, Quebec and the maritimes want to work in the west, but the government says it would prefer to buy oil from foreign countries at excessive rates. It will not give the people of this country a fair deal.
If I were a member of that government, I would obtain answers from the Prime Minister and the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Lalonde) or I would leave the party. I would not permit them to ruin this country. We have a chance of creating productivity, jobs and increasing our gross national product but, instead of entering into an agreement with Alberta and Saskatchewan, the federal government is doing everything possible to ruin the oil industry.
The government has levied a tax on the natural gas which belongs to a provincial government. In the history of democratic representative government, this has never been done. However, this government will do anything to hurt the west. It seems to forget that by hurting the west it is hurting the rest of  Canada. As a result it must borrow money to stay in operation. It is a growing crime.
Earlier today the Prime Minister referred to double tracking. He is far better at double crossing than he is at double tracking. I wish he would tell the people of Canada the truth and get this country back on the rails. He should forget about double tracks and put Canada on a single track before it is completely ruined. If the government continues to push matters, the mood of the west will worsen. Even now people are gathering in towns saying that they will not put up with this, and that if the federal government does not want them they will go it alone. If such a thing happens, people will point their finger of blame at the Prime Minister and the Minister of Energy. I charge that by their actions they are deliberately trying to break up this country. In most other countries, people would not stand for such a situation, but because the people of the west are such staunch Canadians and because they want to stay in Canada they continue to hope that something will change. I hope the change will come soon.
The government says it needs this money in order to have a cash flow, while they are talking of borrowing money to create a cash flow they are chopping down the cash flow of the oil industry in this country by 20 per cent to 30 per cent, from the present cash flow of $170 billion. That is what the government is doing, chopping down the cash flow, yet it expects the industry to be happy. The most optimistic forecasts show that the industry needs a cash flow of $260 billion in order to reach energy self-sufficiency by 1990. That is being cut back, however, by 20 or 30 per cent. It already appears that 50 per cent of the exploration funds that were to be spent in Canada and would have provided jobs, has gone to the United States. No wonder they say, "Welcome Canadians. Congratulations Canada, you are helping to develop our industry, helping to
make us self-sufficient in energy." It is no wonder they thank us, because that is exactly what we are doing.
At present we import enormous amounts of oil at world price. With taxation dollars and borrowed money, we pay for this oil.
The government discourages exploration for new reserves. The people of Canada must finance the so-called security of supply with foreign oil at world prices while the government stubbornly refuses to correct what it knows is a mistake. It refuses to enter into an agreement with Alberta and Saskatchewan, the provinces that own the resources. These resources are not owned by the people of Canada, but by the provincial governments.
Through the constitutional debate the NDP has tried to fool the people into thinking it is doing something for them by entering into an agreement with the Prime Minister. The Leader of the NDP (Mr. Broadbent) has sold out western Canada; as a matter of fact, he has sold out all Canada by entering into an agreement to do something that is not even equal to what we already have in their BN A Act which gave the provinces the right to control the natural resources-in fact to own them, not control them. The government says, "We will let you control them and maybe we will step in and take them over."
The government talks about Canadianization, Mr. Speaker, but does it think it is fooling the people of Canada? This is nationalization. It is paying out exorbitant sums and that is a rip-off of the taxpayer. We sometimes hear politicians talk about the rip-off of government but this is a rip-off by government of the taxpayer. It is taking huge sums of money out of the taxpayers' pockets to buy Petrofina, another oil company. Will that company create any more wealth? It may if it starts exploring but it should already have been doing something in that area which it could have continued. It has done pretty well to this date, but now the government is taking money out of the pockets of the people in order to pay an exorbitant price for this company, and it thinks that is good business. Even the president of PetroCan says we are so heavily laden with debt that we have to dip into the pockets of the people to pay the price, which is far more than it is worth. One could have expected the government to pay slightly more than the net worth of the company, but not the exorbitant amount it has offered.
In the early days in Rome the government had an excellent fiscal policy which they called fiscus or fisc, which means "money bags" in English. In ancient Rome fiscus was a wicker basket. The emperor used to keep these baskets of money around him and when he wanted to buy a new fiddle or pay the fire insurance or go on a trip, he would take some money out of the nearest basket. Then, when people paid their taxes, he would put that money into the basket. That is a balanced budget; he did not spend all the money he had. He did not take all the money in the basket and go on a wild orgy of spending,
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sending money to other countries, and taking trips. He lived on a balanced budget.
Baskets are no good to this government, Mr. Speaker. It has been to the bottom of the basket years ago but it continues borrowing on the credit of the country in order to fill the baskets. It still has not learned how to cut down government expenditures, however, or how to start living within its means. It still has a $13 billion deficit. People are getting fed up with this procedure and I do not blame them.
The bill before the House exemplifies the policy of this government. It is a warning to the people of Canada that the government still has not learned to live within its means, to cut down expenditures, to cut down on the civil service if necessary, and to stop spending money it does not have and as a result has to pay exorbitant interest rates in order to borrow.
Under the Prime Minister the Liberal ship is running loose in Canada today, without a rudder, without a compass, without an anchor. It does not know where it is going but it is operating on borrowed money. It expects the people of Canada to pay up and keep on smiling.
The people of Canada are getting fed up, Mr. Speaker. It is time the government woke up to the facts of life and realized that it cannot continue to run the country without a plan, without a compass, without an anchor, without a rudder, simply by borrowing money whenever it wants.
I do not think any member of the House should give the government permission to borrow $14 billion. That would be criminal, particularly if it were granted on the basis of this bill. This government has not even promised to create any new production; it will simply carry on as before.
As I said earlier, Mr. Speaker, I certainly admire Steve Podborski. He certainly goes downhill fast but this country is going downhill even faster under the Liberal leadership. It is time we woke up. We cannot continue to live on borrowed money; it is time we paid our debts and began to live within our means. We cannot continue sending raw materials out of the country. We should create a climate that would encourage people to invest their money here in order to get industry moving.
There is no better incentive than to say to the people of Canada "You can make a dollar if you invest your money here." Instead of that we talk about Canadianization or nationalization. We say, "If you do well we will take it away from you. If you do well, as Alberta did, we will hound you until we drive you out of the country." That is what is happening with this government. It is enough to make one ashamed to be a Canadian citizen.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Carnell Crosbie: Mr. Speaker, this is the first opportunity I have had to speak in these exalted halls since the emergency debate on the economy as we were adjourning in December. I have been away, Mr. Speaker. The sight of this government and the way it squirms and deals with the country's problems is enough to drive anyone out of the
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country. I was delighted to go to countries like Kenya and see how they really function. This country is not functioning on the same level as Kenya unless we want to look at the wild game parks and then at the government benches.


Monique Bégin: What about South Africa?


John Carnell Crosbie: I will come to South Africa and Brazil also. 1 will deal with the universe if the House will give me time. To come back to Canada, Madam Speaker-


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. I would prefer to be known as Mr. Speaker.


John Carnell Crosbie: I hate to be called to order by the sexists opposite, Mr. Speaker. As I said before, I am not cognizant of what sex the Speaker is. It matters little to me. The Speaker is in the chair and I pay the Speaker all due deference whether the Speaker is a male, a female or whatever the Speaker might be!


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


John Carnell Crosbie: However, we are dealing with this borrowing authority bill. I have been thrown off stride in the logical progression that I was going to take, Mr. Speaker. First, I want to thank my colleague, the hon. member for Calgary Centre (Mr. Andre), who handled matters so well for me while I was away for the last three or four weeks broadening my knowledge and experience.


Mr. Fox:: It didn't take much time.


John Carnell Crosbie: I also want to thank the hon. member for Mississauga South (Mr. Blenkarn), the critic for the finance portfolios who also helped out so admirably, who was so hard working, so intelligent and determined. It was a great solace to me knowing that I could leave and the world would not even notice I was gone. As a matter of fact, it was a great disappointment also. In any event, these two gentlemen did a fine job to fill in for me while I was gone, and 1 would like to thank them for that.
This bill was first introduced by the Minister of Finance (Mr. MacEachen) on January 16 when he attempted to sneak this through the House as part of the income tax amending bill. The Minister of Finance, that shrewd old fox-we are all told how shrewd that old master of House procedure is-was caught by the tail-


Francis Fox: Watch your language.


John Carnell Crosbie: -and the big bushy tail was amputated when the hon. member for Calgary Centre drew this illegal procedure to the attention of the Speaker. You, Mr. Speaker, are now standing in for the Speaker. Therefore, that portion of the bill had to be changed. But in his remarks on this part of the bill, the Minister of Finance at page 6284 of Hansard said this:
-the budget strategy of gradually reducing the size of the budget.

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This is but to laugh, Mr. Speaker. This is to say that more is less; that less is more. The minister's deficit which he now admits to be $14.2 billion is $3 billion more than the deficit would have been had the election turned out in an opposite manner last February 18. How can the budget strategy gradually reduce the size of the deficit? I stand here quite confident in saying this; the deficit is not going to be reduced, the deficit is going to increase. There will be no reduction in the deficit. I ask hon. members why? Because the Minister of Finance has no guts or the courage to impose a regime for the next three or four years that will result in the lessening of these deficits. I will come back to that later.
There is a new twist in this bill. I will leave the rest to the Minister of Finance's remarks, because 1 do not want to stoop to low comedy in the House this afternoon. That is what his remarks were, low comedy. Instead, I will pass on to the real minister of finance, the associate minister of finance. I think that is what he is called. Mr. Bussieres is his name. Whoever he is, he is twice the man the Minister of Finance is. He is twice as knowledgeable. He spoke on the first day of the debate, which was January 30. He explained there is a new twist in the bill. He said that this bill is to provide authorization to borrow $14 billion. On July 17, 1980, we authorized the government to borrow $12 billion. But $12 billion over a period of six months is not enough for this government. It has to have that amount reinforced by another $14 billion. There is a new twist. Of that amount, $3 billion is not to expire at the end of the fiscal year 1981-1982, it is to continue. The previous borrowing authority bills have had a provision that the borrowing authority granted expires at the end of the financial year concerned. This concerns the year 1981-1982, from April 1, 1981, to March 31, 1982. However, at page 6741 of Hansard, the Minister of State for Finance (Mr. Bussieres) said:
The $3 billion margin for contingencies being requested is in line with the margin that has been provided and deemed necessary in recent years.
In other words, the government wants the $3 billion to continue on ad infinitum after the end of the next financial year for contingencies. What kind of contingencies could there be that would require a $3 billion line of credit? What is in a billion, this government asks. What is in $3 billion? If this government is so negligent and so careless, or if its economic actions are so harmful that we have a $3 billion contingency which the government does not have borrowing authority to handle with the government's $14 billion authority, then the government should come back to this House and tell this House and the Canadian people: "We have a contingency of $3 billion. We have an emergency of $3 billion." What other reason does the minister give for asking for this extraordinary authority? On the same page, he continues as follows:
A weakening Canadian dollar, on the other hand, could give rise to the need to borrow foreign currencies to replenish official holdings of foreign exchange which are depleted through foreign exchange operations.
Earlier the minister said the government only has to go to the public markets to borrow $11 billion in 1981-1982. That is all the government had to do, according to the budget which was tabled in this House. The government will get the other
$3.2 billion from the pension fund and other sources without having to go to the public markets to borrow money. The minister says the government will have to borrow only $ 11 billion next year. The minister asks for $14 billion in this bill and he asks that the $3 billion continue on beyond March 31, 1982, so the government will not have to come back to the House if a contingency arises. What is the contingency? The Minister of State for Finance fears a weakening Canadian dollar. He gives the answer away. Instead of a weakening Canadian dollar, with the resources this country has, the Canadian dollar should be a burgeoning dollar. If we had economic sanity and economic sound policies we would have a burgeoning dollar. It would not be worth only 83 cents or 84 cents, it would be back to the level of the old "Diefendollar", the 92.5-cent dollar with which the Liberals attempted to damage Mr. Diefenbaker. Here is a picture of our predecessor, the minister of finance of the day, Donald Fleming. I am holding up a "Diefendollar". This was used to make laughter at the expense of the government back in the 1960s. The "Diefendollar" at 92.5 cents looks pretty good to Canadians today. This crowd is shivering and shaking in their shoes because we have a dollar that is now between 83 and 84 cents and the government wants $3 billion in contingency funds because the government may have to go weaseling its way into the international markets of the world to borrow $3 billion, or in excess of $3 billion, during this year to help the Canadian dollar. Hon. members might ask why. I can tell them it is because the government's new economy policy in the energy field is crushing the Canadian dollar. It is driving money out of Canada. It is discouraging the business sector. It is doing exactly the opposite to what this country needs. That is why the government needs the $3 billion.
We are not voting for this $3 billion. We are voting 100 per cent against this borrowing authority bill and this attempt to get a $3 billion contingency item. We are voting against the $14 billion borrowing authority for this government which is bankrupt. If it had an economic policy, any economic courage, economic wisdom or economic guts-even if we thought the government was wrong-headed we would vote for them, but we are not going to vote for an amorphous, gradualist mass of mush which is all this government presents for economic and financial policies to this House. We will not vote to allow the government to borrow one cent, $1, $1 billion, $14 billion, and certainly not $3 billion for contingencies. The greatest contingency we could have in this country is another election. That is the contingency I pray for during this present year.
The minister said, as reported in Hansard at page 6742 for January 30, 1981, the following:
Up to January 23, 1981 in domestic markets the government has borrowed a total of $8.8 billion,-
But the government has lost in Canada Savings Bonds redemptions $1.1 billion. Imagine a government in which the people of this country have lost so much faith it has a net loss item on the sale of Canada Savings Bonds; in other words, a net reduction of $1.1 billion despite the government's great Canada Savings Bond campaign last fall. A government with
February 10, 1981

that kind of result should resign, because those Canadians who have a few dollars to invest have lost faith in it.
The government tells us it borrowed $1.1 billion outside Canada, of which the government has repaid $300 million. The government still owes that amount outside Canada. That is the amount it has borrowed this year to date.
We want them to come back and explain to the House what they did before March 31, 1982, how much they have borrowed outside, and what lines of credit they have. We will not give them unlimited authority. They can smash this legislation through with closure; they have the majority, they are the bully-boys of confederation. They will ram their Constitution down our throats, they will ram their new energy policy down our throats, but, by God, we will attempt to regurgitate it. That is the least we can do. They have the majority, they have that solid phalanx over there. They can push it through, but not without our making our protest, not without our asking questions and making the points we are making now and which we hope to continue making during the rest of this debate.
There will be no borrowing authority until there is evidence of some action in the economy. Look at the results of last year. I will refer briefly to the business review of the Bank of Montreal. In its brief economic review of 1980, the bank concludes that:
There were in 1980 about 160,000 housing units started. This will make the year the slowest housing year since way back in 1966.
Where is the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Axworthy) now? Where is he now that he has finished cutting the throat of the chairman on the Advisory Council on the Status of Women? He was a mighty man in the fall of 1979 when he was going to do a hell of a lot for housing in Canada, when he was worrying about the lower-income people and when he worried about women. The only woman about whom he is worried now is poor old Doris whom he forced out of office because she is one of the few Liberals in this country who has a backbone. Where was he when we had those miserable 160,000 starts last year, the worst since 1966?
The review goes on to say that the productivity performance in 1980 was dismal. The per worker output declined 3.5 per cent as compared to the 1.2 per cent drop in 1979. It states there is a worrying acceleration in labour costs per unit of output. Increases in this area will range close to 12 per cent. There is a 12 per cent increase in labour costs per unit. It says that on the inflation front, consumer prices are up for the year as a whole to 10.2 per cent, and the prospects for next year are that they will be over 12 per cent. Over all, the GNP in real terms will fall one half of 1 per cent, the first drop since 1954. That is the record of these economic miracle men. They came in in 1963. This is their worst year since 1954. We do not hear them boasting about that. Where is the silent Minister of Finance? He has more to be silent about than any other minister in our history. Where is he slithering and slinking around in the country? He is in the cubbyholes, in the crevices, he is behind the telegraph poles so he will not be recognized.
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We have not heard a squeak from him, we have not had a major speech from him, we have not heard anything from him, no declaration of policy, except that he is a gradualist. Yes, he certainly is a gradualist.
I should like to come back now to the business review of the Bank of Montreal. It states that:
Spending on housing will drop about 15 per cent, twice the rate of decline in 1979.
They conclude with this:
Unquestionably 1980 was the worst year in Canada's post World War II history.
All that is thanks to the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau). Do you remember him, Mr. Speaker, on election night on February 18, coming on our screens? He said hello to the 1980s. We can see what the Prime Minister will do to the 1980s. He is not only crucifying our economy, he is crucifying the country.
I have only a limited amount of time, Mr. Speaker, unless hon. members will give me unlimited time so that I can develop my views properly. Here is a study by Pitfield Mackay Ross. Our situation is really serious in January of 1981. The study states:
Inflation in North America will continue at very high rates. We anticipate consumer price inflation in 1981 somewhere in the range of 11 to 12.5 per cent-
Wage growth has accelerated markedly over the last six months. A year of both widespread labour strife and very high wage settlements appears unavoidable-
Economic policy does not appear to offer any easy solutions. Monetary policy simply is not working and the central governments appear incapable of balancing their books.
If the inflation performance in North America were to take a decided turn for the worse over the next year or so, the authorities would quite probably opt once again for mandatory controls.
Then they look at the consumer price index and they remove food and energy in Canada and mortgage rates in the United States as the extraneous shock or external factors, and they look at what they call the core or underlying rate of inflation. In Canada the trend from 1968 to 1978 in the core rate was 6.2 per cent, in 1979, 7.7 per cent, in 1980, 9.4 per cent and in 1981 they forecast the core rate will be 10.5 per cent, and the total CPI will go up to 12 per cent. No western country can function in any economic sense if it is going to have an inflation rate of 10 per cent or 12 per cent for the next unknown number of years.
Let us look at the analysis of William Mackness, a well respected economist at Pitfield Mackay Ross. He calls it "Inflation in North America". Let us see what his conclusions are. At page 4 he says:
-the more fundamental problem is that the economic, social and political structure in North America has become highly inflation prone-
As a practical matter, public policy has already abandoned any determined effort to re-establish price stability. Rather than wrestling inflation to the ground, policy is now aimed at the less ambitious goal of containing inflation in the low double-digit area. The basic idea is to achieve minimum output and employment objectives first and worry about inflation second.
Further on in his analysis he states:
-inflation expectations in North America are high, higher than ever before .. . it has taken years to change inflation expectations, and now that a change has been effected it will not be easily reversed-

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Lack of fiscal and monetary discipline and associated interventions by governments are generally regarded as the key forces producing higher inflation. For example, credit creation in Canada has been underwritten by an annual 16 per cent rate of expansion of the domestic banking sector over the last decade. More recently, both the federal governments in Canada and the U.S. have been producing repeated, large deficits. The inflationary consequences of runaway public spending and money printing are well understood, but this knowledge has not spurred effective efforts to control public spending or the rate of credit expansion.
This eminent economist concludes that we are in the grip of double-digit inflation and that this government and governments in North America will do nothing about it. In the face of this analysis, anyone who puts a dollar into a long-term bond must be insane. If you are facing a 10 per cent or 12 per cent inflation, not only for the next year but for the rest of the 1980s and perhaps longer, you will not want to invest in a long-term bond. The long-term bond market will be eliminated. The whole financial structure of this country is endangered by this process.
I am only citing these authorities so that I can say these are not my views alone. I am not an eminent economist; I am only a lawyer-politician who has done his best to study the issues and who has come to some conclusions. But I am citing people who are respected and well-known economists to show the kind of situation we are in. We have no indication from this government that it will attempt to overcome it. All we have from the government is bluff and hyprocrisy. The document of October 28 was not a budget but a strangulated energy plan which has given the whole oil and gas industry of this country a gigantic hernia. It has ruptured any future we had in developing our energy sector.
I will refer to one other article in the January issue of the magazine Executive. The article is written by Peter Cook and it is entitled, "Business: What's ahead?" He points out the rewards of shortsightedness and he says:
When Finance Minister Allan MacEachen presented his October budget, it seemed to be largely irrelevant to the needs of the Canadian economy in 1981. Now, at the start of the year, it is beginning to look dangerously irrelevant, both at odds with the economic forces that are at work in the North American economy and with the long-term needs of Canadians for a return to supply-oriented non-inflationary growth.
That was where we were headed in our budget of December, 1979. He says:
The budget took aim at consumers by raising energy prices and unemployment insurance rates.
What is turning out to be far more shortsighted, however, is the pursuit of policies which are incompatible with reducing inflation, and at variance with the Bank of Canada's monetary stance and an erratic energy policy which is playing havoc with the prospects for business investment.
Once the notion of discriminating against certain types of investment is put into practice, business confidence as a whole is undermined.
Then he goes on with his analysis.
The Bank of Canada has to be concerned about a slippage in the dollar set in train by MacEachen's damaging budget measures.
And on and on and on.
The MacEachen budget, by zeroing in on the energy and resource sector and on foreign ownership, was aimed directly at the one area of capital spending still exhibiting strength.
He says this:
But in the energy sector, even a modest tally of the projects being deferred or cancelled wipes $2.5 billion off capital spending proposals for this year. The implications of this are that instead of outlays on major energy projects rising from $5.6 billion last year to $7 billion this year, they will fall to $4.5 billion. By itself, that represents a 1 per cent fall in the economy's predicted rate of growth this year-
This is the doing of the Minister of Finance. This is the man who has done this damage. This is the man whose policies are reducing the growth in the GNP. This is the man who is stopping the only thing that could help Canada and push us ahead economically in the eighties, the energy sector.
I am not giving my own authority. There are dozens of articles like this. Every time you look at the paper, talk to a columnist, or an economist, you get the same analysis, but this government plunges blindly ahead on these suicidal policies and asks us to vote them approval to borrow $14 billion. Like hell, Mr. Speaker, are we going to vote them authority. If they want that authority, they are going to have to clutch it. They are going to have to grab it. They are going to have to take it by strength, by force, by the force of their numbers, but they are not going to get it from us voluntarily-not likely.
I can go on. I do not know how much time I have. I will make just a quick runthrough of some excerpts from the press. The Montreal Gazette: "Canadian workers lose ground on pay":
Canadian manufacturing workers slipped from being the second highest paid group of their kind in the 10 leading industrial nations in 1975 to third lowest last year.
That is Liberal progress. "Bank of Montreal sees inflation close to 12 per cent." "MacEachen favours gradualist approach." He sure does. He is gradual on any improvements. "Economy expected to stutter through partial recovery." Mr. MacEachen has given our economy a stutter, and as long as he stays in office, we are going to stutter and splutter. I am not going to go through all the predictions for 1981. They are dismal. They are deplorable.
"Syncrude members shelve $2 billion expansion." That is the result of the great Lalonde, that great vulture circling in the sky with a great vulture policy. "Syncrude members shelve $2 billion expansion" to add to the tar sands and the heavy oils that that great wheeling vulture has already stopped in their tracks.
"Energy-related investment now deemed a weak spot in economic recovery bid," says T. A. Wilson, director of economics at the University of Toronto.
Energy-related investment, which had been counted on to support an economic recovery, is now a source of weakness, "with a $2.5 billion negative fiscal shot"-
This was from the proposals in the budget. The new energy program, and I quote:
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-will collect about $4.5 billion for the federal coffers in the first half but... only $2 billion will be recycled.
They are taking $2.5 billion out of the Canadian economy and not putting it back. That was from the head of the department of economics at the University of Toronto.
"Slower growth and higher inflation forecast for 1981". January 7, "Forecasts now bleaker than three months ago". And on and on it goes. This Minister of Finance comes into this House to ask us to approve his $14 billion in borrowing authority. What a joke. Not one cent, not a plugged nickel will we agree to give to the government in borrowing authority unless the government can bring in a new economic program and persuade us that they are on the right track, that they are taking some action, which they have not done to date.
Let me get on to the subject of energy for a few minutes and the great new energy policy. We have had in the last few days a fantastic display. The Crown corporation, Petro-Canada, is going to buy Petrofina, a privately-owned oil company. The majority of it is owned by Belgian interests. They are going to pay $1.46 billion for that company.
Petrofina was started some 20 years or so ago by a Canadian who went around Canada looking for money to start this oil company, this concept he had. He could not get any. He could not get it from Canadians. He left Canada. He got it from Belgium, from entrepreneurs in Belgium. It was not his fault. He wanted to get it from Canada, from Canadians, but Canadians would not put their money into it; nor would the Canadian government, the Liberal government of that day, put their money into it. No, they would not do that because they were favoring the policy that was going to give ownership of the oil and gas industry to non-Canadians. They did not give a darn in those days. They do not now. It is just their cynical electoral ploy. So he got the money from Belgium, and now the Canadian taxpayer is asked to pay $1.4 billion to buy the assets of Petrofina. The government gave its Crown corporation authority to go ahead with that purchase without even deciding how it would raise the money. Mr. Hopper, the chairman of that corporation, stated yesterday that this is so and that he wants the government to collect the whole $1.4 billion from the consumers of oil and gasoline products in Canada; from the people who buy heating oil, from the people who buy gasoline for their cars, from the farmer who buys diesel fuel, from the consumers of oil products all over Canada. He wants to collect his $1.46 billion from those consumers, and does he offer them an energy tax credit? This is the crowd that went berserk at the budget of December, 1979. They pretended to go berserk.
Does this minister offer those consumers of Canada today an energy tax credit to help them meet the ownership charge of Petro-Can, the Lalonde vulture charge going down around their necks?


Mr. Evans:: Order.


John Carnell Crosbie: Never mind order. Lalonde is a vulture circling this country ready to pounce on the consumers of oil and gas products, and I say he is a vulture. If it is unparliamentary, I
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will not say he is a vulture. I will withdraw it, but I will still mean it.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member must refer to members of the cabinet by their position in the cabinet.


John Carnell Crosbie: Certainly. The Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Lalonde) is a vulture, certainly in Canada.


Mr. Knowles:: An hon. vulture.


John Carnell Crosbie: An hon. vulture. He wants to collect this.
There was an 18-cent gasoline tax. That was a tax just on gasoline.


Francis Fox: Too much.


John Carnell Crosbie: It was not on heating oil or any other product that came from a barrel of oil. Hon. gentlemen were shocked and dumbfounded. They were stupified by the inhumanity of that measure, and you know that since December of 1979 they have had eight increases in the price of oil. Eight increases have gone ahead under this government, this "humanitarian" government, this hypocritical government, this government that does not know the truth from falsehood. This government does not know truth if it stares it in the eye. This government is a government of vultures and of revulsion. There have been eight increases. I will not read them all out, but I have them here for anybody who does not believe me; January 1 and April 1. Then there was the 9 per cent change in the sales tax. There was the Syncrude levy up 75 per cent. There was a July 25 18-cent a barrel subsidy on Canadian crude. There was a $2 per barrel increase on crude oil announced July 31, and in the October budget there was the petroleum compensation charge. All of those increases brought total increases in 1980 to between $4.70 and $4.88 a barrel. That is the crew that promised they would not increase the amount to over $4 a barrel.


A. Daniel McKenzie: That is only the start.


John Carnell Crosbie: That is only during 1980, and it is going to be far worse in 1981. Do you know that in Montreal in December of 1979 gasoline was costing $1.18 per gallon? In December, 1980 it cost $1.46 per gallon, if you got it at the cheapest outlets; that is 28 cents to 30 cents more than the cost a year ago under this brilliant Liberal regime. And it is worse than that in other areas of Canada. That is how they keep their promises.
What promises? Did those gentlemen make promises? Just look at the Minister of Finance and see what he did. We are unlucky in the rest of Canada that we do not get the Scotia Sun up here. January 23, 1980, page 2, section 1 was sent to me by a concerned Canadian:
"Here is a copy of an ad which "Allan J." ran in January 1980 for his election campaign. Give it back to him!!!!!
The Scotia Sun is published out of Port Hawkesbury, Nova Scotia. There is the benign-looking Minister of Finance, and

February 10, 1981
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he has this big ad in the paper. He says this: "December 11, '79 Tory gas prices go up-Would you let the Tories raise the gas price again? "
Then he goes on with various deceptions, etc. "Vote for Clark, Crosbie and the Tories and you have their promise that the price of gas will go up again!" "Dec. 13, '79 the price comes down because Allan J. MacEachen and the Liberal Party spoke up for you".
* (1610)
What an encouraging message to give the electorate. He is not here, unfortunately. I hope he listens to the tapes. Is it not wonderful what Allan J. MacEachen and the Liberal Party did for these people. Then he goes on to say "Vote Liberal and the price will stay down". Is that English? Do we all understand? Is that one of Canada's official languages, vote Liberal and the price will stay down? That was the promise, the solemn commitment of Mr. Allan J. MacEachen, now the Minister of Finance, to his voters in Port Hawkesbury and his district Cape Breton Highlands-Canso Liberal Association. Here is a picture of the man himself with dark glasses. No wonder he has dark glasses on. He is ashamed of the lies he was getting on with during that campaign. There it is in black and white. I say it is a lie. He lied during that campaign, his promises were a lie, his promises were a deception, it was deceitful, it was disgraceful, it was hypocritical because the prices have not stayed down. The prices have done nothing but go up. There it is in black and white, the testimony, the hypocrisy of that hon. gentleman and he has presided over eight increases in oil prices; not just the price of gasoline, Mr. Speaker, but the price of every product made from a barrel of oil, including heating oil, with not one cent of relief to the Canadian taxpayers who are being positively ground down by that same gentleman who put that same ad in the paper.
I can cite you another 1,000 from the Liberal ranks across the country in their disgusting, deceitful and hypocritical campaign which got them back into power without one word on changing the Constitution and not one word of what they are trying to do to Canada now, which is to force a complete change in our system of government. Not one word of that was mentioned. Just lies and deception, hypocrisy and bilge is what they got elected on. They have had eight increases in the price of oil and gasoline and now along comes the ownership charge-the Lalonde ownership charge-hip-hop-hippiting along. We do not know how much it is going to be but we know this: to raise $1.46 billion in one year to help PetroCan buy Petrofina you have to charge eight cents additional a gallon on gasoline, six cents a gallon more for heating oil and 24 cents a million cubic feet of natural gas. You can vary that around. The minister will come back and say "we are not going to collect all this in just one year". He will say, "we are going to collect it in three years". I say I do not give a good continental in how many years it is collected. It is $1.46 billion from the Canadian consumer, from the widow as well as the rich man, and while the widow is paying it, and the longshoreman is paying it, and the unemployed Newfoundlander is paying it, and the unemployed Quebecer is paying it, and the
pensioner is paying it, the fat cats made hundreds of thousands of dollars on the leaks from your government out buying shares of Petrofina over the last six months.
There is no equity in that. There is nothing but help for the fat cats and screw the lower income people, screw them down-not care about them. There is not one cent of care about them and not one concern about them. That is the government we have opposite us today. You must have goodwill to be able to sit here in the chamber and realize how bad it is. There is no sign of conscience in the whole ranks of them over there. Every Canadian who earned under $21,000 a year, Mr. Speaker, was going to get relief; $80 a year for each adult in the family and $30 for each child, which is $220 for the average family, to help them meet the higher costs of energy and to help them meet our excise tax on gasoline. There was no tax on heating oil and there was no tax on these other products. Now, just to enable PetroCan to buy Petrofina, which will not increase the production of oil or gas in Canada one cubic metre or inch, whether the metric system, the old English system or any system-to purchase Petrofina will not help Canada meet his oil self-sufficiency goal at all-the consumers of oil and gas in Canada are going to be gouged for up to $1.46 billion.


An hon. Member:: Plus interest.


John Carnell Crosbie: Suppose they do it over three years so that prices do not go up as I have indicated, eight cents a gallon this year and six cents a gallon for heating oil, then there would be another $500 million in interest which will have to be gouged out of the Canadian consumer of oil and gas by the hon. gentleman opposite who got into office under these false pretences and who stopped Canada on its way to an economical comeback, who stopped the government which was concerned about the poor and the unfortunate and the elderly. It has stopped them in their tracks with their hypocrisy and deception. The hon. minister of welfare laughs. I hope the hon. minister will give the people she is supposed to look after more money to pay that charge.


An hon. Member:: Eighteen cents a gallon.


John Carnell Crosbie: Not only that, Mr. Speaker, but there is not even any mortgage interest or property tax credits to help the home owners of Canada. There is nothing. The price is already up 39 cents a gallon now. It is double the 18 cents. Who are they helping with their cheaper gasoline? Americans are laughing all the way to the bank. They are pouring over the border of the United States and are laughing at the foolish clucks of the Canadian government who are subsidizing oil products so it pays them to come across the border. The number of U.S. residents who crossed the border to fill their tanks with cheap Canadian gasoline rose more than 40 per cent in the first 11 months of 1980, Statistics Canada reported yesterday in the Montreal Gazette. They were lured by the low value Canadian dollar. There were 24.3 million Americans who drove into Canada, stayed less than a day between January and November, filled up their tanks and went back to
February 10, 1981

the U.S. They saved themselves $8 or $9 when they filled up their tanks, courtesy of the Canadian taxpayer and the Canadian consumer of oil and gas who soon are going to be asked to pay for this. Is it any wonder we are the laughingstock of the world, Mr. Speaker?
1 was just in South Africa and I have not the time to address all the issues here today. I will go anywhere where 1 think I can learn something. I will advise the hon. gentleman to go. I went to Sakunda to see what they are doing in South Africa. They are paying the world price for oil and they have Sasol 1, Sasol 2 and are now producing Sasol 3 to come on the market next year. They are making gasoline from coal because they have huge deposits of coal. Sasol makes a good profit in doing that. They are leading the world in it. Necessity is the mother of invention. Here we are with our tar sands stopped, the heavy oil resources stopped, Syncrude stopped; the whole energy scene has stopped. Here is a small number, 4.4 million whites and 18 or 19 million blacks, 2.5 million coloured people and Indians in South Africa and they can do these kinds of things in spite of all the problems they endure.


Bob Rae: How many people are there in South Africa?


John Carnell Crosbie: Go to South Africa and learn.


Monique Bégin: Why do you speak of colours.


Bob Rae: Why do you accept the division? Who speaks for the people of South Africa?


John Carnell Crosbie: You don't speak for anyone.


Bob Rae: Neither do you.


John Carnell Crosbie: I have gone there and seen, you big loudmouth. Have you been there? You keep your mouth shut till you go and learn for yourself, you professional bleeding heart.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member for St. John's West has the floor.


John Carnell Crosbie: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I had more respect for the hon. member for Broadview-Greenwood (Mr. Rae) until I heard such ignorant statements. I had more respect for the hon. member for Broadview-Greenwood until he got on with that nonsense. Why does he not stop his sophomoric, left-wing, bleeding heart tactics, go to South Africa and see for himself the problems they have and how they are attempting to deal with them by what they have done. I can tell you they are dealing with their economic problems one hell of a lot better than we are.
Let's try Brazil. The Prime Minister just went to Brazil, so Brazil is all right. He went there in his sneakers so he could make a quick getaway. What are they doing in Brazil? In Brazil they are building automobiles with engines which can use alcohol made from cane sugar. They are going to save 275,000 barrels of imported oil a day because of that. What are we doing here?
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Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I regret to interrupt the hon. member, but his allotted time has expired. He may continue only with the unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


An hon. Member:: No.


John Carnell Crosbie: We are drinking 275,000 barrels of alcohol a day to forget the policies of this mad government.


A. Daniel McKenzie: Mr. Speaker, I will take over from the hon. member for St. John's West (Mr. Crosbie). I congratulate him on his excellent address and for exposing our fraudulent government's utter audacity to come forward requesting more borrowing authority to support its blank cheque style of government which we have witnessed since 1969.
I should like to point out how it all started under the Liberals in 1969. The erosion of parliamentary control over government spending has its genesis in certain parliamentary rule changes instituted by the Liberal government in 1969. In the summer of that year the government invoked closure, that is the termination of debate, to ram through Rule 75c which permits a minister to close debate where there is not agreement between all parties. That is the rule under which they did it. This rule has effectively prevented Parliament from properly scrutinizing government expenditures. Departmental estimates are shuttled off to the already overworked committees and are then reported back to the House. Thus debate on them is limited and seldom meaningful.
As well the number of votes on estimates has been reduced. This further restricts parliamentary debate on government spending. If one examines the estimates, one will see various estimates going through with "$1" marked beside them. That is how it all started. That is why we are faced with a bill to borrow $14 billion; that is why we are the largest borrowers of money in the world; that is why there is uncontrolled spending. The report of the Auditor General makes excellent reading for everyone, and certainly the report of the Lambert commission exposed the way the government has been operating since 1969. It was actually started in 1963, but it was accelerated with the rule changes in 1969.
The government will not only wallop it to us with tremendous borrowing; it will hit us with increases in the unemployment insurance premiums paid by employees and employers. They will rise by an incredible 3316 per cent. I understand some of the premiums might be increasing as much as 46 per cent to bail out the Liberal government. It will give the government an additional $1.1 billion per year of taxpayers' money.
I should also like to point out that spending will be $6.2 billion higher under the Liberals by 1983-84 than it would have been under the Progressive Conservative government and its responsible finance minister, the hon. member for St. John's

February 10, 1981
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West. The government will spend a total of $16.8 billion more between 1980-81 and 1983-84 than had been planned by the Crosbie budget. That is $1,900 per taxpayer per year.
The Liberals promised a progressive reduction in the size of the deficit, another lie. The deficit in 1983-84 will be $500 million larger than the deficit of last year and $2.7 billion larger than the projected deficit for 1983-84 in the Crosbie budget. Over the next four years, the total cash requirements of the government will be $12.7 billion higher than what was projected in the Crosbie budget. To meet these requirements the government will have to either borrow more money, thus driving up interest rates, or print more money, thus driving up inflation.
I should like to discuss the government's purchase or takeover of Petrofina. I received a copy of a letter today which was addressed to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Lalonde). It was from one of my constituents, a gentleman with 25 years of experience in the oil industry. I should like to point out what he said in his letter about this ridiculous takeover. He said:
1 was under the impression that the Canadian government wanted an involvement in the oil industry to assist private enterprise in the development of resources with the long-range objective being to make Canada self-sufficient.
Many of the objectives outlined were attainable within the present framework of government offices and regulations without becoming actually involved in the industry. As a person who has been involved in the oil industry for over 25 years, you leave me with a large question mark as to why the Government of Canada has to be involved in the service station business. Other than possibly to continue to retain the support of the NDP.
The acquisition of Petrofina does not give Canadians anygreater involvement in the research and exploration for oil. You have acquired approximately 1,200 service station outlets of which many cannot be economically operated. They are two and three bay outlets, mainly two bays, are poorly located and to obtain operators who can pay their overhead costs and make a profit, will be in many cases impossible.
You have purchased a refinery that is by oil industry standards obsolete and inefficient in design and in need of considerable maintenance and upgrading.
I hope the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources will check out these points to find out just what he bought. It sounds as if he bought a pig in a poke. The letter continues:
The other so-called assets that you purchased with our money have a very debatable asset value, certainly nowhere near the price you have paid for this takeover.
I will go into that in more detail in a minute. The former owners of Petrofina are still laughing. They cannot understand how on earth the government would pay that amount of money. It continues:
It is very sad to see politicians such as yourself develop a twisted image of a good industry and become involved in the actual operation. Already we see signs of considerable overspending by Petro-Canada in the operation of the Pacific 66 Service Stations and other facilities taken over in western Canada.
I understand that one of the reasons for the involvement in the marketing of petroleum products is to have a window to look into the oil industry to determine how we make a profit.
You did not have to spend billions of dollars to do this, many of us could have explained it all to you. It is known as hard work, dedication and the freedom to express good constructive thinking processes. These are characteristics that one seldom finds in government-operated business endeavours.
That is the opinion of an expert on this purchase. Other people have done some homework and have conducted studies
into this purchase or takeover. I should like to refer to the article entitled: "Canadians will foot bill" which appeared in today's edition of the Ottawa Citizen by Dian Cohen. In part it reads as follows:
PetroCan offered $1.4 billion for Petrofina. That amounts to $120 a share, so far above the market price and even the asset value of the company that its president, Alfredo Campo, was ecstatic in his disbelief: "It's so far beyond what any company would pay for it, or what the market was indicating, that I wonder how it makes sense," said Campo.
If that is the case, why on earth did the Liberal government pay more than the market price for it? It simply does not make any sense. The article continues:
An objective economic analysis of this deal must conclude that there is nothing economic in it. Petrofina was selling for under $70 six months ago. It rose to just under $90 as the government played footsie.
Petrofina has for months been encouraging its employees to buy shares in the company.
During question period today the Minister of Energy was asked if there were any leaks. He said we should go to the Securities Commission if we have any evidence of leaks. It will be very interesting for the minister to find out why Petrofina was advising its employees to buy shares over the last number of months. There is no question that the government has leaked some information to some people. Dian Cohen goes on to indicate:
Petrofina knew it had a sucker.
Yes, Petrofina certainly had a sucker in the Liberal government, but unfortunately it is not the Liberal party's money that is paying for this lemon. It is the Canadian people who have been suckered again by another Liberal government. The article continues:
I wonder who else took advantage of the situation?
The crucial energy problem in Canada is getting the stuff out of the ground. That will not happen until the federal government realizes that the world price is much closer to the economic value of oil than its contrived price.
Surely there was a better way to spend $ 1.46 billion.
I think a better way to spend this money would be on building a natural gas pipeline to the maritimes. That would have made more sense than buying a bunch of gas stations. I would like to point out that 85 per cent of the oil which is needed in the maritimes must be imported. I will go into the cost of the importation of oil in just a minute.
Today there was mention made in question period about statements made by Mr. Hopper, the head of Petro-Canada, who wants the taxpayers to buy Petrofina. He points out in a recent newspaper article:
I would like 100 per cent of it to be paid out of that tax, in other words. I would like 100 per cent equity because we are pretty well strapped with debt.
So, Petro-Canada is pretty well strapped with debt. It has no funds with which to purchase Petrofina so the Canadian people must pay for it at the pumps. Figures bandied about have indicated that it will cost up to 3 cents a litre more for gasoline, which amounts to 13 cents a gallon. If that is the case then this year Canadians will be paying something in the range of a 50-cent a gallon increase. Mr. Hopper went on to say:
February 10, 1981

I am not looking at anyone right now. I do not know anyone who is even remotely interested in selling at fair and reasonable prices... It would not surprise me if we did not do another acquisition for two or three years.
I hope they will not "do another acquisition" again after the way this one was handled. It sounds like Mr. Hopper is very nervous. I do not think he was very much involved in this arrangement, it was more typical of the political manipulation by the Liberal government.
It was pointed out in the House yesterday by the hon. member for Moose Jaw (Mr. Neil) how much it will cost us for cheap gas and cheap energy. The hon. member said this:
The fact that the Liberal National Energy Program is counterproductive to Canada reaching energy self-sufficiency by 1990, and given the fact that under this program Canada will require 500,000 barrels of oil imports a day by 1990, at a cost of $43 billion annually to Canadian taxpayers-
That is what it will cost for cheap gas annually-$23 billion. Who does the government think it is kidding?
It is not very often one finds too many in the Liberal party with a conscience, but on occasion a couple of them crop up. Recently two members spoke out against the energy policy. They came up with some pretty good points. This subject matter was covered in a local news article, which reads:
Doubts about the federal government's National Energy Program are beginning to surface in the Liberal caucus itself.
At least two Liberal M.Ps say it's time for Ottawa and Alberta to resolve their bitter struggle over energy pricing and revenue sharing.
If domestic energy prices have to move substantially closer to world levels to get a pricing deal, Keith Penner and Dennis Dawson said in recent interviews, then so be it.
In this same article Mr. Dawson, who is the hon. member for Louis-Hebert and Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Employment and Immigration, said:
-the gap between Canadian and world oil prices "has to diminish.''
That is a very honest and straightforward statement. It is time the Liberal party stopped kidding the Canadian people that it will give them cheap gas and energy. There is no such thing in this world today. The article goes on to quote the hon. member as saying:
"There is a question of how long we can keep prices down.
Basically, 1 think that we made a commitment to keep prices below the Tory level for one year."
That actually did not happen, Mr. Speaker. The article continues:
Finance Minister Allan MacEachen, however, has said energy prices will be lower than what the Tories proposed throughout the government's term.
He is also a little off base with that remark.
The aerospace industry is another area in which the government is spending money. I support this expenditure. Unfortunately, the large amounts of money being spent in the aerospace industry are all being spent in Ontario and Quebec. With regard to the new fighter aircraft contract, the Liberals have announced that 48 per cent of the work will be done in Quebec, 39 per cent in Ontario, which leaves 12 per cent for the rest of Canada. I am very concerned about the five aerospace firms we have in Manitoba. These firms will not get in on any of the contract work, since the government keeps
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pouring the money into the east. There was an announcement some ten days ago that de Havilland will be receiving some loan guarantees. A report in The Globe and Mail in this respect had this to say:
The federal government also announced it will support the Crown-owned company with a $450 million loan guarantee that will also cover the $275 million design and development costs through the 1981-1985 period. Initial design and development costs will be $170 million .. . Financing will be done through bank loans and other lending instruments.
This is a subject which I must continue to raise, Mr. Speaker, until we receive some firm commitment with respect to some work for the five aerospace Firms in Manitoba. The east has certainly received more than its fair share.
I would also like to point out some of the excellent work The Globe and Mail has done with respect to the government's energy package. The reports are well researched and certainly point out the weaknesses in the National Energy Program. In an editorial dated February 9, 1981, The Globe and Mail had this to say:
When your heating bills rise, and your gasoline bills rise, chances are the provinces and the oil companies have nothing to do with it: you are helping to improve the federal government's cash flow and enable Petro-Canada to fly its colours from gasoline stations from coast to coast. We appear on the brink of a new definition of self-sufficiency: the government helps itself, and its take is never sufficient.
That last remark certainly seems to be the motto of the Liberal party: consumers and taxpayers in Canada must continue to pay and pay.
There are also some encouraging articles being published. A recent statement by the B.C. minister of energy, Mr. McClelland, pointed out that after a three-day fact-finding tour through Ontario, the minister:
-has come to the conclusion that Ottawa eventually will abandon its controversial energy policies and work with the provinces to achieve energy self-sufficiency.
I hope Mr. McClelland knows what he is talking about. That is something which all of us can go home tonight and pray for, that this ridiculous energy program will be withdrawn. Experts and authorities from across the country have pointed out that this program is counterproductive to Canada becoming energy self-sufficient.
It is not just Alberta which has been hit. There are oil companies and plants in Saskatchewan which have also suffered. The latest energy package has priced Lloydminster crude out of U.S. markets. This is a type of heavy oil which we do not have much use for in Canada. With the latest taxes imposed on this heavy oil plant in Lloydminster the product is just not saleable to the United States. A recent article in the Alberta Report of January 23, 1981, pointed out:
Heavy oil producers in Saskatchewan, already reeling under the load of provincial royalties and the new federal taxes imposed in the October budget, were hit with another blow this month. The National Energy Board, in its monthly price-setting ritual, determined that heavy oil exports were "deeply undervalued" and advised energy minister Marc Lalonde that a hefty 30 per cent increase in the federal export charge was warranted. U.S. consumers, however, found the board's so-called "just and reasonable export price" anything but. They promptly cancelled orders from their Canadian producers, who were left scrambling to find either new buyers or storage for their oil. Producers are appealing to the NEB to reconsider its opinion.

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The government has not left anybody out and it is hitting from all angles. Just to wrap it up, I would like to quote a gentleman who has helped expose the irresponsible mismanagement of financial matters by Liberal governments, Mr. Don McGillivray of Southam News, who wrote in one of his articles:
Here's the record: 1970 was the last year when the federal budget was in the black with a surplus of $500 million resulting from $14.1 billion in revenue and $13.6 billion in spending.
The budget deficit was $400 million in the fiscal year ending in 1971, $700 million in 1972 and nearly $1 billion in 1973. It reached $1.4 billion in 1974 and $1.6 billion in 1975.
At that point it was still manageable, but in the past five years revenue growth has stalled while spending has surged ahead:
In fiscal year 1976, the gap between the two was $5.3 billion; in 1977, $6.1 billion-
And on it goes. Mr McGillivray went on to say:
The upward march of the deficit faltered in the 1979-80 fiscal year when the federal government was $11.5 billion in the red but resumed in the present fiscal year. MacEachen forecast a deficit of $14.2 billion last April, the net result of $45.6 billion in revenue and $59.8 billion in spending.
In layman's terms, the Liberals are spending well over $1 billion per month more than what is taken in in revenue. It is a ridiculous and irresponsible position for this country, but there seems to be no end. We keep hearing the ridiculous statements which the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) first made in 1968 when he said that we would have endless inflation if we do not control spending. But his word means absolutely nothing. On the campaign trail, the Liberals said that they would control spending, but they have absolutely no intention of doing any such thing and the figures will bear me out. I have here an article which I took from the Citizen. Although it is about the Prime Minister, I believe it applies to all Liberals who, while on the campaign trail, like to give out the odd true statement:
Pierre Trudeau scraped the bottom of his barrel when he told a Brandon audience: "Whenever I see bankers, oil company presidents and newspaper giants argue we are doing something wrong, then I think we must be doing something right."
What fatuous nonsense. If the best the Prime Minister can do to try to sway audiences is to use simplistic rhetoric the like of which hasn't been heard since the Winnipeg strike, then he should keep his mouth shut.
At the time bankers were expounding the need for a proper cash flow for small Canadian oil firms. Their comments had nothing to do with multinationals or oil barons, but small oil producing firms which were suffering a reduced cash flow and as a result were leaving for the United States. For example, recently at Coutts, Alberta, there was a mile-long lineup of oil industry trucks waiting to cross into the United States. It has a new energy policy which makes it worth while for these firms to drill marginal wells and go into the tough areas, unlike the National Energy Program.
There is no way Canada will achieve energy self-sufficiency under this program. The Financial Post of recent date carried an article entitled "Don't Hinder Mining's Growth". I hope the government will not introduce the same program in mining as it has in oil. I also hope the minister of energy for British Columbia knows what he is talking about when he says that
the Liberals will have a second look at their National Energy Program, because it is having devastating effects on this country. I hope the government will search its conscience and withdraw this ridiculous program as soon as possible.


Mr. Howard Crosby (Halifax West):: Mr. Speaker, Bill C-59, which enacts the Borrowing Authority Act for 1981-82, allows the government to obtain an additional $14 billion in loans to finance public works and for general purposes. While the statutory provision is short and simple, the effect of the action authorized is extensive and complex in both human and economic terms. There is no magic involved in borrowing. Everyone knows that whatever is borrowed must be returned.
In the case of Bill C-59, what the government proposes is to borrow money-vast sums of money. There will be a clear requirement that those vast sums of money must be repaid in the times specified and, more importantly, that interest will be paid during the term of the loan. Those Canadian home owners who face renegotiation of their mortgages in 1981 and those Canadians who must replace their automobiles or acquire furniture or equipment know all about paying high interest rates. They know the devastating effect of increased monthly payments on the family budget.
Do hon. members know what will happen to a family with a home mortgage which expires this month? Let us suppose that the mortgage was granted in 1976 when interest rates were relatively low and that the interim payments have reduced the principal amount owed to $40,000. If the interest rate was 9 per cent, the monthly payment required to pay off the loan in 25 years would be $331. But with an interest rate of 15.5 per cent, the monthly payment would be $513, a difference of $182. By current standards, an interest rate of 15.5 per cent for a residential mortgage is considered good. A Canadian home owner might well be faced with a 16.5 per cent rate which, on a $40,000 mortgage, would add $27 to the monthly payment. It would bring the increase to over $200 per month.
Let us consider the increase in home mortgage costs at this level in the context of general inflation. Canada has experienced an inflation rate and a consumer price index increase in the 10 per cent range over the past years. If this 10 per cent inflation rate were applied to a $331 mortgage payment for five years, the resulting increase would approximate the same amount. That is, a $331 mortgage payment with a 10 per cent yearly increase over five years would rise to $530 so the total increase is approximately $200.
The point is that what Canadians are experiencing in a variety of ways, including mortgage rates, is the effects of inflation. For most people, the real question is whether their incomes have kept pace with galloping inflation. Keeping pace will allow them to maintain but not improve their standard of living.
Applying the same 10 per cent rate, a wage earner receiving $15,000 in annual income in 1976 should be earning approximately $24,200 annually today, otherwise he or she is falling
February 10, 1981

behind the annual inflation rate. While I have applied a 10 per cent inflation rate to mortgage payments, I can assure Canadians that it can be applied with similar effect to most consumer goods and services.
There are, of course, exceptions, some of which are notable. The electronics industry, for instance, has kept price increases in line and the price of some primary food items has not increased with the inflation rate. By and large, Mr. Speaker, consumers are paying for inflation in the cost of the goods and services required for basic needs.
When a family's income falls below expenditures it has two choices: it can reduce spending by cutting back on the goods and services purchased or it can borrow to meet the deficit of expenditures over revenue. I can understand the reluctance of Canadian families to cut expenditures on goods and services as in most cases it means reduction in the standard of living and in such essentials as food, clothing, home shelter and transportation.
We know that borrowing money in order to meet a deficit will result in more problems. Many Canadian families whose incomes have not kept pace with inflation, face a difficult decision. Those faced with a budget deficit can make a choice whether to cut back on expenditures or to borrow. The Canadian government has made the choice for the national family and that choice is to borrow the funds needed to pay the difference between national revenues and national expenditures.
How times have changed. I remember in the early fifties reading an editorial reprinted from the New York Times that compared the state of the United States economy to that of Canada. At that time the United States was resorting to deficit financing but the Canadian government was budgeting for a respectable surplus. The editorial suggested the United States government should follow Canada's example and reduce expenditures to equal revenues. Now the situation seems to be reversed and the President of the United States has faced the American people with the hard economic facts. Government spending has eroded their economic strength and President Reagan has issued a challenge both to government officials and the people to face the problems and solve them. The president has placed reliance on the private sector and plans to reduce taxation, in the belief that the taxpayers will generate economic activity. At the same time, he plans to cut back on government services and promote the kind of self-reliance that made the United States a strong nation. Like the rest of us President Reagan realizes that some people need assistance and I am sure he will continue with that kind of essential service to those who cannot provide for themselves.
In Canada, things are different. Instead of positive action our government has set up a constitutional smokescreen and has introduced a bill in Parliament to authorize the borrowing of $14 billion. It has taken no steps to reduce the drain on the national economy. The money is being spent to provide services the citizens of Canada do not want.
Let me review the historical facts that brought about this problem in the national economy and which brought us to the
Borrowing Authority
current position of requiring borrowing authority in the range of $14 billion. We must bear in mind that this is in addition to a borrowing authority passed in July, 1980, in this House by which the government was authorized to borrow $12 billion for that fiscal year.
There is now an accumulated budget deficit of $69 billion. I do not need to tell anyone what a drain on the national economy a deficit of that magnitude is. What has gone wrong, Mr. Speaker? I think the problem goes back to 1970 when Canada had a buoyant economy and government revenues and expenditures were in line and within reasonable limits. Reacting to that economic situation, the government began looking for ways of spending the public funds being accumulated. It sought to establish programs that had appeal for some segments of the population and which resulted in vast and extensive payments. Under the existing law the provincial governments, and not the federal government, were required to meet those payments. In those days of wine and roses, the late sixties and early seventies, the federal government began to involve itself in areas that were primarily of provincial concern. There is the established programs fund through which the federal government provides funds for what are essentially provincial services. It is now seeking to reduce the amount provided to the provinces.
Just recently the community services program has been cancelled. The federal government became involved in that area in the 1970s when revenues were high and funds easily available. Now it seeks to absolve itself of responsibility for community service and it has cancelled that program.
That is not all the government has done. It is now changing agreements that have been in force and in place for many years. I have particular reference here to the agreement respecting the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Many years ago, when some of the provinces did not have a provincial police force, the federal government offered the services of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Because it was in the interests of the federal government at the time, those services were highly subsidized by the federal authority. With the pinch of inflation, with eroding revenues in comparison with expenditures, the federal government now seeks to withdraw that service and it seeks to fine the provinces with all the cost of the service although it is claimed that the formula now being considered contains a substantial amount of federal subsidy. The cost to the provinces of providing the service the Royal Canadian Mounted Police used to provide for them will be a further financial drain.
The change in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police agreement, the cancellation of the community services program and the changes in the established programs fund are all an indication that the federal government is facing the result of its actions over the past ten years. It is facing the fact that it has overspent and that for many years revenues have been less than expenditures. That is what has brought about this deficit of $69 billion. That is why the government has to come before Parliament for the second time in a parliamentary year asking for authority to borrow this vast sum of money.

February 10, 1981
Alimony and Maintenance
I hope to continue my speech at eight o'clock when the House resumes, Mr. Speaker. In the meantime, let me say that the provincial governments cannot afford to pick up the slack created by the federal government's withdrawal from these programs which were brought into play at a time when it was not concerned about the financial stability of Canada, when it was spending money like a drunken sailor and was setting up programs which were not needed.
I see that it is five o'clock, Mr. Speaker.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: In accordance with the wishes of the hon. member, I declare it five o'clock.



O700) PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION

["It being 6.05 p.m. and pursuant to order made earlier this day, I do now leave the chair until eight o'clock p.m.\nAt 6.05 p.m. the House took recess."]
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 40, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Central Nova (Mr. MacKay)-Combines-Investigation of relationship between Bell Telephone and Northern Telecom; the hon. member for Skeena (Mr. Fulton)-Environmental Affairs-Alice Arm, B.C.-Grant of dumping permit to Amax-Request for inquiry into circumstances.
It being five o'clock, the House will now proceed to the consideration of private member's business, as listed on today's Order Paper, namely, public bills, private bills and notices of motions.



The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: The Chair has before it 16 public bills ranging from order No. 17 to order No. 49. With the agreement of the House, we might proceed by grouping them all together, and perhaps we could put the suggestion before the House that all orders preceding No. 50 stand by unanimous consent.


Mr. Herbert:: Mr. Speaker, I will not take up too much of the time of the hon. member for Capilano (Mr. Huntington). However, I want to bring to the attention of the House, as I have done on a number of previous occasions, the problem we face today, namely, that the hon. member for Capilano who will be speaking in a couple of minutes will be speaking on a bill which is the twenty-fifth item of business on the list of public bills. Preceding his bill are 24 bills, eight of which are printed while 16 are not printed. All of the 16 bills which have
not been printed were put on the Order Paper on May 2, 1980. According to our rules, as I understand them, the bill should be ready for printing when it is presented to the House.
I have one point I want to put on the record. Yesterday I presented a bill to this House for first reading. It was ordered for printing at 3 p.m. yesterday afternoon. That bill was printed and on my desk today, which indicates it is not a staff problem. You may not wish to take action today, Mr. Speaker, but I do suggest this should be my last time of asking. I suggest in the very near future, maybe this time next week, that you rule that bills not printed should be dropped from the Order Paper.


David Michael Collenette: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Vau-dreuil (Mr. Herbert) has brought this matter to my attention a couple of times. I would say he has a reasonably valid point because Standing Order 69 does state:
No bill may be introduced either in blank or in an imperfect shape.
I suppose it is up to you, Mr. Speaker, to determine whether or not the continuation of these bills on the order paper, even though they are not printed, contravenes the Standing Order. The situation is dealt with in Beauchesne's fifth edition, Citation 719. It is the current practice when a large number of bills are introduced at the beginning of a session that we usually waive the normal Standing Order on normal practice. This is covered in Citation 713, which reads:
The first reading of a bill, the order for printing and the appointment of a day for second reading are taken together as one formal stage.
Citation 713 is superseded by Beauchesne's Citation 719 on the occasion of private members' bills. I will read Citation 719 into the record so that we are perfectly clear on this:
At the commencement of a session there are usually a large number of public bills introduced by members thereby making it impractical or impossible for the Speaker to review the provisions of each of the bills. Therefore, the practice that has been unanimously agreed to, in recent sessions, is that the House proceeds to the introduction and first reading of those bills, so that each may be scutinized between its introduction and its being called for second reading, in order to allow the Speaker to consider whether there is any defect in the bills in respect of the practice and usages of the House.
Perhaps it is up to you, Mr. Speaker, and the Table to determine whether or not that last sentence applies in the case of bills which have been officially introduced, are on the Order Paper but are not yet printed. 1 ask that you look into this matter.
Perhaps the whips of the other parties could draw this to the attention of their own colleagues so that we will not have the situation whereby a large number of bills are listed on the order paper but cannot proceed. As the hon. member for Vaudreuil has stated, this is the reason for such a large differential between the numbers that proceed on any given day. There may be a space of fifty. I believe you will be asking for a number of bills to stand, many of which were introduced, or notice given at the Table last May but are not yet printed. Perhaps this is the fault of the hon. members concerned. I would agree that you might want to take up the suggestion of the hon. member for Vaudreuil in drawing this to the attention of the original proposers of those bills.
February 10, 1981


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: I want to thank both the hon. member for Vaudreuil (Mr. Herbert) and the Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Collenette) for their comments. 1 think the Chair does wish to take up the remarks by the hon. member for Vaudreuil for the rather embarrassing reason that approximately one month ago he raised the same question. It comes to me in the chair as a difficulty that the hon. member has not yet been given an appropriate answer.
I have followed the references made by the parliamentary secretary and had a look at some of the Standing Orders which might be applicable. I think the proper thing to do is to take the matter under consideration. However, at the same time I want to assure the hon. member that I think he is prefectly correct. He should not have to stand the fourth time on this subject. In my opinion, the way to go about this is to assure him and all hon. members that on the next day on which this type of matter comes before the House, the Chair will be prepared to rule on the subject.
In the circumstances, shall we proceed by unanimous consent or by consent of the government?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: We shall stand all orders preceding No. 50 on today's Order Paper by the consent of the government. Is that agreed?


Stanley Howard Knowles: We have unanimous consent.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: My apologies to hon. members. I could not hear the hon. member for Vaudreuil. He has said by unanimous consent.


DIVORCE ACT
Hon. Ron Huntington (Capilano) moved: that Bill C-250, to amend the Divorce Act (alimony and maintenance orders) be read the second time and be referred to the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs.
He said: I notice seven minutes of the private members' hour have now elapsed on a technicality.
Hon. members will be aware that the purpose of Bill C-250 is outlined in the "Explanatory Notes" as follows:
The purpose of this Bill is to propose a scheme, within the constraints of the procedural restrictions that parliamentary tradition imposes on private members' initiatives, whereby maintenance and other money orders made pursuant to the Divorce Act could be enforced by the courts making the orders.
1 have been a great fan and I have appreciated the words and the wisdom of Mr. Alexander Solzhenitsyn ever since he came to the western world in exile from his homeland. He has been a very intelligent observer of what we are doing to our freedoms and our land. We have seen in the first seven minutes
Alimony and Maintenance
of the private members' hour an example of one of the observations he has made of our society and one of the ways in which we are dealing and endangering our freedom. I might just read from the address of Mr. Solzhenitsyn on June 8, 1978, at the Harvard Commencement Exercises. In part, his speech covered the direction of freedom, and it reads:
In today's western society, the inequality has been revealed of freedom for good deeds and freedom for evil deeds. A statesman who wants to achieve something important and highly constructive for his country has to move cautiously and even timidly; there are thousands of hasty and irresponsible critics around him, parliament and the press keep rebuffing him. As he moves ahead, he has to prove that each single step of his is well founded and absolutely flawless.
Actually an outstanding and particularly gifted person who has unusual and unexpected initiatives in mind hardly gets a chance to exert himself; from the very beginning, dozens of traps will be set out for him. Thus mediocrity triumphs with the excuse of restrictions imposed by democracy.
We just saw seven minutes of that in this chamber this evening.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Order, please.
The parliamentary secretary is rising on a point of order.


David Michael Collenette: Mr. Speaker, in the interests of parliamentary harmony, I think there would be agreement on this side to recoup the five minutes we lost on a point of order. We are not unduly restricting the hon. member for Capilano (Mr. Huntington). If it is the hon. members' wish for private members' hour to be extended to 6.05 p.m., I am sure my colleagues will agree with me.


Stanley Howard Knowles: We would agree to seven minutes after six o'clock.


Arthur Ronald Huntington: Mr. Speaker, if I might proceed without further interruption on this most serious matter which exists in our society-


David Michael Collenette: Do you want five minutes?


Arthur Ronald Huntington: I will accept the offer. I will accept any time that can be given. In the negotiations preceding private members' hour I pleaded with the government to allow the subject to go to a committee, but that has been denied me. I have been told that the government, once again, will talk out this important issue. Therefore, the bill will die. Nothing will ever come of it from this government. The government has had opportunities ever since 1972 to address this important matter, this important cancer which is destroying the dignity, freedom and potential life for children being reared in separated and divorced families.
That is the issue with which we are dealing today, and the warning of Solzhenitsyn is in play right here in this House at this hour. So how is it possible for a member to address something constructively on an issue as important as this, Mr. Speaker?
Bill C-250 deals with a problem which has been around for a long time. It affects children being reared by single parents who are experiencing continuous stress in their daily lives and
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February 10, 1981
Alimony and Maintenance
who are struggling because the maintenance orders of family courts are not being enforced. I have personal experience of working wives who, bringing up three children, are almost breaking down trying to maintain some kind of standard of living, some kind of style and self-respect in putting their children through the educational process in this country. I am sure every person in this House knows of cases of such breakdowns and knows of the breakdown in the process of carrying out the maintenance orders from the courts of this land.
What this bill is trying to address is a system whereby the courts will enforce the orders. What we are trying to put in place is legislation which would remove the haven for people who have been given court orders to assist in the maintenance of their children in the case of a family breakdown. What is involved here is the peace of mind and mental health of mothers. Most of the people in these cases are women who are trying to raise their children without support when the court orders are not enforced. The problem is the complete, utter, shameful and disastrous degree of apathy on the part of the staff who back up the family courts because federalism in this Parliament has not worked in co-ordinating the split jurisdiction in the matter of family law. We have even heard the subject of reform of the family law brought up in the constitutional debate. We have seen the draft legislation of the provinces dealing extensively with this issue. We have seen the Law Reform Commission come down with reports in 1975 and 1977, and we have seen other working papers on this issue. We have the Canadian Bar Association's resolution number eight which was published in September of 1980 on this very issue of the garnishee powers of the court and the enforcement of court orders for the support and maintenance of children.
I should like to refer to the study paper of the Law Reform Commission of Canada entitled, "Family Law, Enforcement of Maintenance Orders". I should like to read its conclusion into the record. It reads:
Something is profoundly wrong with a body of law and practice that fails to attain its objects more often than it succeeds. Failure is the universal characteristic of the traditional system for enforcing maintenance orders in Canada. With a few notable exceptions in recent years, apathy has been the companion of failure.
I just spoke of the apathy which exists in the rooms behind the courts and of the failure of our society to enforce the support orders, the result of which is the destruction of dignity and the removal of equal opportunities for children reared in such circumstances. The Law Reform Commission of Canada continues its conclusion as follows:
The burden of this social evil is and has always been carried by women, most of whom are found in the least economically influential strata in Canada. It would be consciously avoiding identification of one of the main reasons for the present shameful situation (and we use the word "shameful" advisedly) if it was not mentioned that the voice of women has historically been virtually absent from the councils of those who designated, shaped and administered the present system.
Reform involves two courses of action. First, there must be an effort by governments in Canada to improve individual laws and practices which deal directly with maintenance enforcement. Second, the whole body of marriage breakdown law must be thoroughly reshaped.
I am not just speaking idly here. This bill has a very long history in the House. May I remind hon. members that it was a member on their side, Mr. Barney Danson who, before he became a minister of the Crown, placed this bill on the Order Paper in the Twenty-ninth Parliament. When he became a member of the government and a Privy Councillor, I went over to him and asked him whether he would mind if I, as an opposition member, picked up his initiative because of the personal experience I have had in this regard. He welcomed my suggestion, and in the first and second sessions of the Thirtieth Parliament, first readings were given and second reading debate took place on Bill C-203. A very interesting and active debate ensued, as reported in Hansard of Friday, November 26, 1976, during which it was pointed out that perhaps the bill was not in order as a private member's bill. Hon. members on the government side spoke very constructively in the debate, with the exception of one hon. member, and the matter received a very good airing.
I went back to that debate and, after studying it, I sent the record out to lawyers in the community who are concerned about the swinging-door syndrome which exists in the family courts. Mr. Donald Moir, a family lawyer in Vancouver, has volunteered hours and hours of his time, as have other lawyers, in the drafting of a bill which would address this very serious swinging-door syndrome and this disgraceful and shameful situation we have allowed to exist in our society. The draft came to me and I had to put it into a form in which it could be presented as a private member's bill in the House. I believe the parliamentary legal counsel worked on it for a period of about three weeks to put the thrust of that draft bill into a form which could be presented to the House. My hope today was that the initiative, which has now been before the House since 1972-this is the second time it has had second reading debate, and the bill has had an immense amount of background study-will be accepted by the government. My hope is that the government will see fit to have the bill withdrawn and send its subject matter to committee where we can bring in the experts of the land and where we could probably start debate on an amendment to Section 15 of the Divorce Act, as is outlined in the bill. This bill is the best effort of the concerned people who have assisted a private member in this initiative.
When the bill was before the Thirty-first Parliament, it remained in the draw because the government was going to take action on it. We all know what happened. Things have changed and the Liberal government is now back in power.
The whole matter of family law is so serious and is such a national disgrace that all of the provincial governments have prepared papers on it. The Law Reform Commission of Canada has prepared its sequence of papers, the Senate has prepared reports on it, but the House continues to frustrate the initiatives of private members and to prevent the movement of this subject matter to a committee where the government itself could pick up the initiative and do something about this shameful and disgraceful situation.
February 10, 1981

1 have personally seen women, trying to raise three children on their own, breaking down and experiencing serious health problems because of the failure of their husbands to maintain payments under a court order. I have seen them going back to the family courts to obtain an order which would provide maintenance. These orders would last only two months, following which there was no more money.
Surely to goodness in this age at this hour in this House when we talk about International Women's Year, we should address one of the most serious problems they have. I can give statistics with respect to the number of women at or below the poverty level who are in the disgraceful and shameful circumstance of not receiving support, and the courts fail to enforce support orders. I can give the House chapter and verse on three different experiences I have had in which there have been serious problems. I have seen companies-those evil businessmen we hear so much about-take on the responsibility of supporting, rearing and educating children in such circumstances.
The Law Reform Commission released a working paper on divorce in 1975. It released a working paper on the family court. In 1977 it released a paper on eligibility to attachment. I have already reminded the House of resolution No. 8 of the Canadian Bar Association. If ever there was an example of federalism not addressing the problems of a country like Canada, I think this is classic, for all the federal government has to do is take an initiative very similar to the one in this private member's bill before us. All it has to do is take such a simple initiative to overcome one of the major failures of our legalistic society. Nothing I have observed causes more loss of dignity and more intolerance for law and order than the disgraceful poverty conditions children of broken homes are reared in as a result of our inability to correct this shameful situation.
I remind hon. members that on October 16, 1979, the hon. member for York South-Weston (Mrs. Appolloni) moved a motion under Standing Order 43 on this same issue. I know hon. members opposite, including the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice (Mr. Irwin), know of this. I know all lawyers in this House who are skilled and versed in the nature of law and in the problems of law are aware of this problem, but where is the initiative and the will to correct this disgusting apathy we and civil servants behind the law courts and the enforcement of these orders have?
This package I have in my hand is the package of papers I have received from lawyers out in the field on this issue. This second package is the package of papers I have received from parliamentary counsel on this issue. I have the best efforts draft of the provinces, and I have papers from each of the provinces on the family issue. Most of this problem could be resolved if we in this House accepted the challenge this bill offers us, and if we moved the subject matter of this bill into a committee and took the initiative on Section 15 this bill offers, which is not an idle wish or statement. It is a considered,
Alimony and Maintenance
studied application with respect to the problem within the limits our process here allows a private member. If we could take this initiative and this subject matter and bring in the experts of the land, we could address this and give some hope and some chance to the children and the progeny of broken homes and broken marriages, a very high percentage of whom are being raised at or below the poverty level.
Quite frankly, I am surprised that the government has decided not to allow the subject matter of this bill to go to committee and that hon. members opposite will talk the bill out.
This matter has been around since April of 1974 in its various phases. It was here on February 14, 1975. It was here on November 26, 1976, when it had second reading debate and was talked out. That debate was studied. There were adjustments, and the outcome of that debate is in the bill before us today. Here again, this is not good enough. Once again the bill will be talked out, I am told. The issue will remain static and this shameful, disgusting, disgraceful condition of lack of uniformity of enforcement of separation orders will continue to exist. Back in 1976 the government said it would bring down a bill that would address this situation. The Thirty-First Parliament said it would address this situation. We are now into the Thirty-second Parliament, and we are still not going to seize on this opportunity to move this subject matter into committee so that we can get this nasty, disgusting, and disgraceful situation within our society fixed.
And we wonder why federation is not working. We wonder why there are critics of this place. This is a prime example of why the Parliament of Canada is not working. We do not accept social challenge. We do not address the needs that are out there and to which we have all been exposed.


Mr. Ron Irwin (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Justice and Minister of State for Social Development):: Mr. Speaker, I want to commend the hon. member for Capilano (Mr. Huntington) for bringing these points to the attention of the House, as he has done so forcefully now and in the past.
I think perhaps his denunciation is too broad. We are as concerned as he is about the welfare of spouses who have to take care of their children, and about the lack of enforcement. In many cases there is no collection because there are no funds. I believe one of the seven major causes of family breakdown is lack of Finances. In many cases-although the figures are high-orders have not been enforced simply because there are no assets. A good friend who was a family court judge once said to me that it is like putting one blanket over two beds. That is the problem in collecting these finances.
However, we in this Parliament are concerned, as are a number of jurisdictions across Canada. Provincial jurisdictions are trying to come up with new and better methods of enforcing these monetary obligations. After all, if we do not collect from delinquent spouses, it is only the taxpayer who has to pay.

February 10, 1981
Alimony and Maintenance
The money is taken not only from provincial coffers but also from federal coffers because we contribute substantially to provincial payments.
The current process is found in Sections 14 and 15 of the Divorce Act, and I will read them both. Section 14 says, and I quote:
Effect of decree or order. A decree of divorce granted under this act or an order made under Section 10 or 11 has legal effect throughout Canada.
Section 15 states, and I quote:
Registration and enforcement of orders. An order made under Section 10 or II by any court may be registered in any other superior court in Canada and may be enforced in like manner as an order of that superior court or in such other manner as is provided for by any rules of court or regulations made under Section 19.
What is the effect of Sections 10 and 11 of the Divorce Act? By virtue of these sections each maintenance creditor, in whichever province of Canada he or she may be, of a Section
10	maintenance order, which is an interim order, or a Section
11	maintenance order, which is a final order under the Divorce Act, wherever made in Canada automatically has available all superior court remedies of every province for enforcement.
A point can be made that the court itself should enforce the order, police the order, hire accountants, hire collection agencies or hire any number of people within the court system to go out and collect. This suggests that the bureaucracy is better at doing a specific job than the private sector. I respectfully suggest, by itself that is not always the case, as evidenced by many of the things bureaucracies have tried to do.
What is the situation today? How can these orders be enforced? They can be enforced by at least six or seven methods which 1 can suggest: garnishment proceedings, equitable receivership, examination of judgment debtors, attachment of debt or bank accounts, seizure of personal property, execution against land and proceedings for committal. I suggest that in 50 per cent of the cases there is nothing at the end of those processes because there was nothing there at the beginning.
When the delinquent spouse decides to separate, most of the major assets are split at that time and the minor assets, which are usually few and far between, must be seized. In addition, in most of the provinces, provincial enactments permit the filing of superior court maintenance orders in provincial family courts and make these courts available to spouses. This is exactly what the hon. member is suggesting. In some cases this is a good method. In many cases there is a great deal of dissatisfaction with bureaucratic collection of funds for spouses.
Over and above this we have the traditional show cause hearings whereby the defaulting debtor is forced to come to small claims courts and explain why he has not paid or face imprisonment on summary conviction and continuing attachment of his wages. This way, indirectly, maintenance orders made pursuant to the Divorce Act in the superior court of one province may be enforced by the family court of either the
same province or any other province. Family court procedure could be made more productive by innovations, and there have been innovations. In some family courts there are automatic systems of enforcement under which the enforcement is done by the specific court on an automatic basis.
In certain provinces they have even gone further and have computerized the process. The point is, Mr. Speaker, no matter how good the process is, we still must go to the basic needs of the family. It is not the case when two millionaires divorce or split. It is at the lesser level where there is a lack of money that we have the problem. Many times the spouses are brought into small claims courts. Again, if there is nothing there, how can you collect?
What we are talking about today is basically machinery. We are all interested in better machinery. Suggestions have been made by the hon. member for Capilano. He did not, all by himself, discover the process. I assure him that many members on this side of the House have been discussing the same thing for many years. I believe the next speaker tried on at least three occasions with private members' bills to do the same thing. It is not something he discovered or solely cares about. There have been suggestions that the new Federal Court rules could be amended to provide for garnishment orders, which is a good idea. In that way you can go ex parte to the Federal Court and seek your remedy.
There have been suggestions that the Divorce Act be changed to provide for garnishment orders. This is very close to what the hon. member is suggesting. He is also suggesting the federal civil service, including senators, Members of Parliament and so on, should be exempt from any protection because they are now under the royal prerogative. I agree with him and I think the government agrees with him. The government has and is tabling effective legislation. Once it is passed, it will bring into this House exactly what the hon. member has suggested.
One attempt in May, 1978, was Bill C-49. Legislation was introduced but it died on the Order Paper. It was based on the Law Reform Commission recommendation and on the report on attachment of remuneration payable by the Crown in right of Canada.
In March, 1979, during the fourth session of Parliament, Bill C-52 was given first reading. It also failed. In June, 1980, the federal government introduced Bill C-38, the garnishment, attachment and pension diversion act, which is now being considered. The proposed legislation would, subject to certain conditions set out in the legislation, permit provincial law on garnishment or attachment to apply to moneys paid by the Crown in right of Canada for salaries, fees, honoraria and like payments in respect of their performance of services for the Crown. As I indicated, once this becomes law, federal employees, Members of Parliament, senators, judges and others could be garnisheed for maintenance and support debts as well, like any other citizen, as they should have been long ago. In addition, superannuation moneys due to retired public servants would be subject to diversion for satisfying mainte-
February 10, 1981

nance orders, which are matrimonial orders, and not ordinary debts.
In conclusion, the substance of what the hon. member opposite said is endorsed and is concurred with in the spirit but not the exactitude of what he is suggesting in this proposed legislation. We all want the best for estranged spouses. It is a matter of what mechanism we will use, the best mechanism, to reach that desired goal.


Bob Rae: Mr. Speaker, I want to indicate to the House that the hon. member for Capilano (Mr. Huntington) has not raised just one problem but in fact two or three. I recall having discussions before the dissolution of the Trudeau government in 1978, when this was one of the last items going down to the wire before the House was dissolved, on the question of the garnisheeing of wages of Crown employees. It is unfortunate we still have this anomaly in the books. If Canadians were aware of this anomaly they would be somewhat surprised, if not outraged, that the average citizen working in the private sector is liable for garnishee orders and that federal civil servants, Members of Parliament and senators are still immune from application of the garnishee order which is enforceable on anyone else. It is clearly an absurd situation. It is so clearly absurd that I am surprised the government has not made an effort to bring in that kind of measure at any time. It seems to be the sort of thing which, in this day and age, would be very quickly passed by the House. ! am surprised this government and the previous government did not choose to introduce that particular measure and have it voted on rather than some of the other measures which they decided to have us vote on.
They obviously chose the wrong ones. There is no reason for crying over spilt milk. We have to deal with the measure before us. 1 hope very much the government will not talk this bill out because it does deserve study. What has obviously happened-and I think the hon. member for Capilano has expressed it very well-is that family law reform has become a subject of constitutional contention. This has taken the question of the Divorce Act away. Some of the limitations in the Divorce Act and the problems in the Divorce Act have been taken away from the floor of the House of Commons and the attention of the government. Clearly, if it is the government's view-and it has been expressed by the government-that family law should be a question of provincial jurisdiction, and I can see very strong arguments in support of that proposition, then clearly the whole motive and impetus for this kind of amendment to the Divorce Act will not receive very much attention from the government. On reflection, the government should recognize there is nothing stopping it from introducing an amendment to the Divorce Act which would facilitate maintenance and alimony payments subsequent to a divorce order. I do not see why we should have to wait for the process of constitutional reform in order to get that amendment. The hon. member for Capilano expressed his frustrations. Let me assure him that I have mine and that we all have frustrations with respect to this problem. I do not see why we should wait for the ultimate resolution to the question of family law
Alimony and Maintenance
jurisdiction. In my view a fundamental principle has been expressed in the piece of legislation put forward by the hon. member for Capilano. The principle is that it should be possible, without the continual necessity of returning to court time and time again, to get an order upon every default which can be immediately enforced and will provide for maintenance and alimony payments to the dependent spouse.
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice and Minister of State for Social Development (Mr. Irwin) made an important point, that there is an assumption behind the whole area of alimony and support payments and their relationship to welfare, and the real problems of dependants which are created by family break-ups. I am sure all of us as members of Parliament are acquainted with these problems. There is an assumption that the so-called supporting spouse actually has something and that it is simply a question of finding a speedy way to get the courts to act, apparently that will produce the solution. I can think of the problems I have dealt with firsthand in my constituency. In many, many cases the real problem is much more profound-"there ain't nothin' there". One can enforce all the orders one wants on the departed spouse, but if the departed spouse cannot be found, if he has managed to tie up his affairs in such a way that there is no way of getting at them or, if one sees that there is really nothing there, then clearly the human problems described so eloquently by the hon. member, which all of us recognize as being very real, will still be there. Perhaps this is where the philosophies of the hon. member for Capilano and myself about dealing with this problem differ; perhaps that is where we part company.
Having said that and having indicated our support, it seems to me there are two solutions to the problems. One solution might be called the best solution, that is, that we make fundamental decisions on the questions of where family law should be and who should be responsible for it. We should attempt to unify the world of divorce, separation orders, court orders, maintenance orders and property orders as best we can. The questions on whether one goes to the supreme court in one's jurisdiction for a divorce, whether one goes to the family court for a separation arrangement or whether the enforcement of separation orders is different than the enforcement of alimony and maintenance payments under divorce judgments must be changed.
Although I understand many groups are unhappy about the idea of any federal jurisdiction over the area of family law being taken away, on the basis of the evidence we have heard, it is perhaps one of the first areas which most Canadians could agree should be handled in a unified manner at the provincial level. I should like to borrow the words of a political philosopher: In many cases the best solution may be the enemy of what is clearly good in the bill before us.
It could be five or ten years before we reach constitutional agreement on what should be done about family law. Until we reach that solution, we must do everything we can to facilitate

February 10, 1981
Alimony and Maintenance
the enforcement of maintenance and alimony payments subsequent to divorce orders. That is the reason I hope the government will not decide to talk out this bill, but will refer it to committee where it can be studied. 1 think we will Find a fair amount of agreement in committee among all members of the House; we want to reduce the technical objections a spouse can mount for his failure to make alimony and maintenance payments. We want to make it as easy as possible for dependent spouses to have orders enforced. Also, we want to make it possible for dependent spouses to have their orders enforced by way of garnishee orders on all Canadian citizens, whether or not they are employees of the Crown.
In summary, the problem stems from the fact that in a sense we are in the middle of a constitutional question. We should not allow the constitutional question to ignore the very real human problems which exist and have been shown to exist by everyone who has studied or looked at this problem. The proposals of the hon. member for Capilano go some way toward finding a partial solution to the problem. We should consider adopting this partial solution until such time as a final resolution is found for the question of where family law decisions should be made.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Order, please. Before recognizing the hon. member for Surrey-White Rock-North Delta (Mr. Friesen), I should like to indicate that earlier I did not want to interrupt the hon. member for Capilano (Mr. Huntington) during his contribution to this debate. But there was an exchange between himself and the hon. Parliamentary Secretary to President of Privy Council (Mr. Collenette) in which it appeared agreeable that private members' hour be extended to 6.05 p.m. in order to allow for some of the time which was taken up earlier by points of order. In accordance with what appeared to be an agreement at that time, I feel obligated to put that matter to the House. Shall the time provided for the consideration of private members' business be extended to 6.05 p.m. by unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Agreed and so ordered.


Mr. Benno Friesen (Surrey-White Rock-North Delta):: Mr. Speaker, I consider it a privilege to speak on the bill in the name of the hon. member for Capilano (Mr. Huntington) which deals with continuing garnishees for alimony payments in divorce actions. Unfortunately, it is necessary to debate this subject, but I compliment the hon. member for Capilano for not only introducing the bill, as he has done in other years, but for his persistence in pursuing the matter. Over the years he has not let the matter drop and has made certain that our attention was refocused on this very important subject.
Briefly I should like to refer to one of the recommendations of the Law Reform Commission. As indicated in the explanatory notes in the bill, the commission recommended:
The rights of family dependants should no longer be ignored merely on the basis of legal anachronisms-
On the basis of legal anachronisms, we cannot allow the hurt and pain in our society to continue because of our inability to deal legislatively with those problems. This is not a matter of politics. There should be no politics in these subjects which are of immediate human dimensions. I have experienced the reward of seeing the subject matter of a private member's bill go to committee. I applauded then and 1 do so today when the government looks past the politics of a matter and moves to the heart of it, which involves the people in question, allowing subject matters such as this to be taken to committee, whether it be justice and legal affairs or health and welfare, as it was in the case of my presentation. In the committee these human problems can be dealt with by people who deal with them daily. It is a place where legal testimony can be given.
In Canada something in the order of one out of every three marriages ends in divorce. I understand that in the United States the figures for marriages ending in divorce are approaching one out of two. Behind those statistics, Mr. Speaker, lie the untold thousands of cases of anguish, of people who are left on tenterhooks because they cannot reach the kind of settlement which is their due.
I know of one case, and I am sure the hon. member for Capilano is also aware of it, which involves a marriage break-up. In this case the husband left, moved to another province and then returned. He was well-to-do and had plenty of resources.
He was called upon by the court to pay alimony and child support. He would refuse to pay this money until the former spouse went before the court to collect it. Then, on the last day, he would make that payment to the court. He would wait long enough before paying the money to force her to pay out most of it in legal fees. The next month he would do the same thing. In euphemistic language, this is called a "legal anachronism". It is a polite way of dealing with this matter on the floor of the House of Commons. It is legal jargon, but in the lives of people who are affected by this legal anachronism it is far from adequate.
When we view the statistics with respect to marriage breakdown in our society today, we must admit that our structure is breaking down. As someone said to me some time ago, it is far too easy to get married. He said it ought to be more difficult to get married and easier to obtain a divorce. To obtain a driver's licence we must first have had some driver training. The potential driver must demonstrate his ability to drive. In order to get married all you have to do is go to the court house, get a licence, show that you are of age and physically healthy. There is no preparation for the development of interpersonal relationships, how to handle family finances, how to build organic family units or how to handle stress in a family. We really do not prepare people the way we ought to.
We must admit that in our society we have not taught people to accept accountability for their decisions. Instead, we are teaching people to cop out from the responsibility and the decisions in their lives. Because people have been able to do
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this for a long time, they feel that after they have been married, then divorced, they can then cop out. Somewhere along the line we must assume responsibility for those who refuse to be accountable and make them learn the lesson of accountability.
We have terms like "no fault insurance". Maybe there is a place for that kind of insurance, but I wonder about the name "no fault insurance". We have been teaching people that no one is at fault. We now have terms like "creative divorce". How can you have creative divorce when at least two people will be hurt? How can that be creative?
This bill puts the emphasis where it ought to be, on the person who has been directed by court order to pay child support or alimony and who is now trying to walk away from that responsibility. The hon. member for Capilano is doing us a service by bringing this matter to the attention of the country. I trust the government will see that this is not a political issue, but a very human one. I hope the government will allow the subject matter of this bill to be brought to the committee, whether it is justice and legal affairs or health and welfare. At this point that is not material. What is material is that we have an opportunity to study in depth the matter the member for Capilano has brought before us. This would allow the government to obtain the kind of evidence which is needed and later on a bill could be presented to the House, based on further evidence which could be built upon the work that the hon. member has already done.
[ Translation]


Mrs. Celine Hervieux-Payette (Parliamentary Secretary to Solicitor General):: First of all, Mr. Speaker, I should like to thank my colleagues for giving me this opportunity to speak on a topic which is dear to me. I must say how very happy I am to see that my Progressive Conservative colleagues are also concerned about social issues. They even want more bureaucrats to solve a problem. To my mind, they will certainly not settle it through a measure under which women will continue to be the victims of a system forcing them to appeal to the courts and behave like beggars asking for handouts to which they are fully entitled to begin with.
Mr. Speaker, Quebec's Bill 183, an act to promote the payment of support, with which 1 am more familiar, received royal assent on June 18, 1980, and is being enforced by a network of administrative offices throughout the province. I also know that Ontario has set up a similar organization and that the provinces are about to enter this field, since they recognize that the problem relates to social affairs and primarily falls under provincial jurisdiction.
So, Mr. Speaker, I am glad to see that my colleague is interested in the lot of divorced women and children generally. However, the bill ignores separated women and their children, as well as common-law wives and their children. That is why 1 suggest that this bill is woefully inadequate and does not meet the current needs of Canadian women. Without insisting on the jurisdictional aspect of the problem, just the same 1 should
Alimony and Maintenance
like to point out to my colleague that negotiations have been under way since 1979 to reach agreement with a view to transferring to the provinces legislative powers over divorce, and that question was also on the agenda during the intensive negotiations held last summer. The transfer of social affairs or family law to the provinces is still on the agenda.
Therefore, on the eve of an agreement with the provinces, 1 suggest it would be altogether premature to adopt a measure which in fact would do precious little other than create one more administrative organization at a time when two provinces whose residents constitute over half the people of Canada already have a system to ensure the payment of support.
I can inform the hon. member for Capilano (Mr. Huntington) that this system already exists in Quebec, where it is working very well. Many people are satisfied with the new legislation which has been introduced, which is more relevant to the civil code than to the jurisdiction of the federal government. I do not wish to protect women's rights through a new administrative mechanism, but I would like them to have the opportunity to collect money which in most cases is for their children and to be ensured they will receive that money regularly.
In fact, Germany has a minimum amount which is actually paid by the state. The spouse is required to pay the state the difference between the state minimum standard and the actual alimony or maintenance order payments. Denmark has a similar system. A minimum amount is paid for each child and that amount is ensured. Women do not have to beg for this money, nor is the court required to intervene. This system is working very well.
What we are dealing with is the very narrow scope of divorce. I hope the hon. member will take another route, perhaps through legislation that deals more with income security which has the effect of protecting all persons, and will take the advice of his colleague from British Columbia who says that we should not try to attain perfection. I am not trying to attain perfection, but I would like to see decent legislation which deals with the problem with which many women have been living for years.
I believe we are very close to solving this problem by having the provinces deal with the matter. Of course, the federal government can help by establishing the system in other provinces. 1 do not believe the Department of Justice will withdraw its support, but I presume that most of the provinces can as easily establish the same system which already exists in Ontario and Quebec to ensure the collection of maintenance. This would eliminate the need to establish an administrative body at the federal level, which would only have the effect of complicating the situation.
Because of the reciprocal agreement between Ontario and Quebec, women of either province may have their maintenance orders enforced if the spouse has moved from one province to

February 10, 1981
Borrowing Authority
the other. Bill C-250 is very laudable, but it limits the possibilities and may create certain problems. I do not see why the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs should continue to study the problem when it is very well known. I ask the hon. member for Capilano and the hon. member for Surrey-White Rock-North Delta (Mr. Friesen) to think on the scale of the revenue problems which women in general face in Canada. Certainly, this very partial measure would not provide that the spouse pay money to the person and members of the family who are to receive the support.
[ Translation]
Mr. Speaker, that is why I think that the claim of a person entitled to support more properly falls under provincial rather than federal legislation. We would only add confusion to the current situation if we were to endorse a measure that in fact would duplicate others which are about to be adopted. I simply wish that my two friends opposite would help us expedite passage of Bill C-38 on the recovery of alimony payments and all debts owed by civil servants. I think that bill is much more urgent and 1 hope my colleagues will help us adopt it as soon as possible. I suggest we could come to grips with our problem and let the provinces handle the other one which they are about to solve much more efficiently than we could.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: It being 6.05 p.m. and pursuant to order made earlier this day, I do now leave the chair until eight o'clock p.m.
At 6.05 p.m. the House took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The House resumed at 8 p.m.


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Bussieres (for the Minister of Finance) that Bill C-59, to provide supplementary borrowing authority, be read the second time and referred to the Standing Committee on Finance, Trade and Economic Affairs.
Howard Edward Crosby: Mr. Speaker, when I began my remarks on Bill C-59 to enact the Borrowing Authority Act, I said that the government has utilized its borrowing authority over the past few years to accumulate budgetary deficits equal to $69 billion. That is, by the end of the 1979-80 fiscal year the government had $106 billion in
liabilities and only $37 billion in assets, leaving a difference of $69 billion.
Many hon. members who have already spoken in this debate provided detailed and statistical data relevant to the government's fiscal position in 1981. I do not intend to repeat the information already provided, but I want to underline the fact that we are discussing the authority of the government to borrow and I want to consider the historical and financial facts that have resulted in the necessity for vast government borrowing. I want to indicate the effect of continued deficit financing and vast borrowing on individual Canadians and the Canadian economy.
In order to relate our national economy to individual Canadians, it is helpful to reduce some of the many statistics to more human terms.
The budget deficit of $69 billion, if shared by 24 millions Canadians, results in a per capita debt of almost $3,000 for each individual. When it is remembered that Canada has about six million families in 1981, it can be seen that the share of the national debt per family is about $12,000. It is important to consider what the financial future holds if the $12,000 is added to the current family debt and the interest burden of that debt is added to the family's monthly and yearly expenses. This is not entirely an academic exercise because Canadians are, in the final analysis, responsible for the financial debts of the national government and through the income and other taxes they pay either directly or through corporations, they have to retire the national debt as well as provide the funds to pay the interest.
In simple terms, for the fiscal year 1980-81 the government forecasted expenditures of $60 billion. Expenditures will exceed revenues by $14.1 billion and $12.1 billion will be required to service the national debt. That means that at least one dollar out of every five spent by government will be for debt servicing. Over 25 per cent of government revenues will be blown away on interest charges. Mr. Speaker, $12.1 billion out of revenues of $45 billion will be used for interest charges. That is a contribution of $500 for each Canadian and $2,000 for six million Canadian families.
In contrast to that, most of the provinces have a much better fiscal record. In most cases expenditures have been kept in closer alignment with revenues despite pressure to provide expanded services in education, health needs and other basic areas. The province of Nova Scotia, for example, has a net average debt of $1600 per person and about nine per cent of revenues are required to service debt charges.
When we speak of government borrowing, when we mention budget deficits, when we calculate debt service charges, we are talking about your money and mine. We are talking about the dollars and cents taken from all Canadians through various forms of taxation. This taxation includes the Canada Pension Plan and the unemployment insurance program which are, in reality, sophisticated forms of taxation.
Canadians must recognize and must realize that our taxation system, in all its direct and indirect forms, is simply the
February 10, 1981

method by which the government funds the services it provides. Continuance or expansion of government services simply results in increased taxation in one form or another.
Included in my previous remarks on Bill C-59 was a reference to the current high interest rates which contribute to the burden imposed by extensive government borrowing. I mentioned the plight of the home owner who faces a new mortgage or a mortgage renewal in 1981.1 pointed out the difference on a $40,000 twenty-five year mortgage at 15.5 per cent or 16.5 per cent as opposed to 9 per cent or 10 per cent. This difference amounts to about $200 in monthly payments. A similar problem faces Canadians who must replace an aging motor car, furnish a house or an apartment or buy household equipment. They would welcome a chance to borrow at 15.5 per cent because they face bank rates of 18 per cent, 19 per cent or more. At the same time, income may not have kept pace with inflation. At a 10 per cent inflation rate, a person earning $15,000 in 1976 would have to earn something in the area of $24,000 today. In short, you do not have to tell Canadians about high interest rates, but you may have to remind them that their government is continually entering the money market to borrow funds at similar high interest rates to Finance government services and spending deficits. The catch is Canadians are paying for past overspending. In the budget documents which were introduced in this House on October 28, 1980, here is what the government says to the people:
To the extent that Canadian wage-earners demand high wage and salary increases, or businesses attempt to increase prices at more rapid rates than have been projected here, a wage-price spiral of equal or even greater destructiveness than that of the mid-1970s could develop. For the variety of reasons reviewed in this paper, such a spiral would almost inevitably lead to lower real growth, higher unemployment, and lower investment and productivity growth.
What the Minister of Finance (Mr. MacEachen) was saying in his budget of October, 1980, was that even though Canadians face high interest rates and a high level of inflation, they must not take steps to increase their incomes because that would result in even further difficulty. One can see that today the Canadian citizen is in a trap.
I have said affluence and continued growth of the gross national product in the late 1960s and early 1970s resulted in expansion of existing government programs, new projects and programs and financial assistance to the provinces for public works and services under provincial jurisdiction. After establishing the standard of services and after committing the provinces to these programs and projects, the federal government seeks to bury many of its commitments because the economy has soured. Real economic growth has stopped, and the gross national product has declined. The money-well has dried up and the federal government must fold its financial tent.
The proposed cut of $1.5 billion in the established programs budget, the cancellation of the $250 million community services program and the change in the contributions required for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police services, which will cost a province like Nova Scotia $10 million, are all examples of government withdrawal from these areas of service.
Borrowing Authority
But what is the government doing after a decade of record spending? It refuses to come clean and raise taxes in a direct way so that Canadians will know what is happening. Instead, the federal government is transferring back to the provinces the cost burden of established programs and services. For example, take the community services program. It involves the provision of sewer and water services and similar municipal services in communities across this land. Clearly that has been a municipal responsibility in the past. It is normally financed with the assistance of various provincial governments. But the federal government has involved itself in that field. It has sparked and generated more activity. Communities, cities and towns became committed to the installation of these community services. Secondly, with very little warning-although the minister said he did warn those involved-the program gets cancelled. This is simply a way in which the federal government transfers that expenditure item back to the provinces.
The established programs fund is another example of the federal government transferring financial responsibility back to the provinces after the federal government has involved the provincial government in the kind of expenditures involved in these established programs. A particular item is university education, which is clearly a provincial matter under the control of the provincial government. Nonetheless, the federal government became involved in it, sparked and generated activity which otherwise might not have occurred. Now the provinces are stuck with the result. Again, the federal government is simply transferring expenditures back to the provinces. For those provinces which employ the Royal Canadian Mounted Police as a provincial police force, they now have to renegotiate their contracts. This will again result in a transfer of millions of dollars in expenditures to the provinces which seek to maintain those police services.
This is a gutless way to cut expenditures. It is unfair to the provinces and it puts the burden back onto the people whom the government does not have the internal intestinal fortitude to tax in the First place.
Yet the government will raise taxes. It has introduced a tax on resources which will yield $4 billion. It is taking over offshore resources on the Atlantic coast and denying the legitimate rights of provinces such as Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. What we are fighting over in Canada in this area is the control of resources and the revenues from those resources. The federal government is simply seeking to increase its resource revenue so that it can avoid applying direct taxes which would normally be necessitated because of the kind of spending the government has been carrying on over the past number of years.
Everybody knows that income taxes, sales taxes and all the normal forms of taxes have reached their limit. In my view, the federal government is seeking to impose taxes in other forms.
Having said that, Mr. Speaker, and having issued these warnings against the dangers of continued borrowing, in the light of high inflation and interest rates, let me say this: at this same time we must carefully consider cutbacks in government

February 10, 1981
Borrowing Authority
services for the sake of the future of our provincial governments and all people in Canada. We have dire economic and employment problems which can only be resolved by government action.
I want to review some problems which I believe require government attention and assistance nationally, and in the Atlantic region, particularly Nova Scotia.
First, we have to build on our strengths by developing and processing our natural resources in Canada. Most Canadians will think of our mines, minerals and agriculture, but the Canadian Fishery has a potential for gigantic export sales exceeding those of wheat.
Second, we must move to resolve our energy problem and assure energy self-sufficiency for all of Canada by 1990.
Third, we have to recognize the desire for a high standard of accomplishment on the part of Canadians and promote industry based on technology. To do that, we must maintain our educational system and sponsor research and development science and trades training.
Fourth, we have to realize that we are a trading nation in an international community. We want to put Canada first, but some activities are international, such as marine transportation. Canadianization, no matter how good the motives, will do more harm than good. We must excel in marine, ground and air transportation and provide all the related facilities.
Let me direct the rest of my remarks to Nova Scotia and the Atlantic area and consider the state of our regional economy in the context of changing national policies. I said we must build on our strengths, resolve our energy problem, promote individual accomplishment and realize our international trade potential.
In Nova Scotia, without demeaning our agricultural industry or our manufacturing segment, I believe we have three major growth areas, all ocean based, upon which our hopes for the future should be based. These growth areas include the Atlantic fishery, marine transportation and energy.
Let me speak briefly about the fishing industry in Nova Scotia and across Canada. It employs 100,000 persons directly. That is an employment force greater than the armed forces of Canada. It has two principal segments on the Atlantic coast: the offshore industry which involves large vessels and relatively substantial onshore plant facilities, and the inshore fishery which involves in most cases individual fishermen or partnerships of fishermen who operate their own boats and sell to the plants.
Over the years, unfortunately, under the administration of the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans (Mr. LeBlanc), there has been a great deal of conflict between the offshore and the inshore fisheries. Some of it is the product of people's imagination, but some of it is real. I have urged many times in this House that the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans move to resolve these difficulties so that those concerned can get on with the business of developing the fishing industry on the
Atlantic coast. Unfortunately, I have to say that in many areas and on many occasions the minister has only served to heighten these differences between the segments of the fishing industry. I know he is capable of a better performance and I know that in the future he will use his good graces and his good offices to resolve these difficulties.
There are other areas of the Fishing industry which have been left untouched. One of them is aquaculture. In Europe and in other parts of the world this is a developing industry which involves onshore operations. It has proved to be highly profitable. I believe it is a matter of provincial jurisdiction, but it is an industry which could use federal aid and assistance.
Similarly, in the matter of fishing vessel construction, there has been confusion over government policies in the past few years. Programs have been suspended, terminated and reinstituted, and the fishermen are left confused by what kind of assistance is available for vessel construction. I have urged, on several occasions, that instead of direct assistance some form of a tax rebate system be applied similar to the housing program.
In Nova Scotia today there is a controversy over licensing which stems from the policies of the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans. Even the leader of the opposition in Nova Scotia has risen to challenge the minister on his policies. If he does not want to take it from us on this side of the House, surely he could take the criticism of his colleague in Nova Scotia and do something to resolve the difficulties in licensing.
Let me complete my remarks on fisheries by saying that the hope of the fishing industry on the Atlantic, coast for the future is that the standards of the industry, in providing a product that is acceptable worldwide, will be raised. The federal government can do much to assist in this area, and I hope it will take that action.
I mentioned marine transportation. In my constituency, the port of Halifax employs, directly, and indirectly, some 10,000 people and generates over SI billion in Financial considerations. It has one of the finest container piers on the Atlantic coast, and we are in the process of constructing and hope to open next year in the spring of 1982 a new container pier at Fairview Cove. The future of marine transportation is great, and the facilities in Nova Scotia are of world class. We hope that in the future facilities will be expanded across the province, which will result in the development of the Strait of Canso as a superport. This is in part dependent on the iocation of a liquid natural gas terminal, and we in Nova Scotia are happy that the Minister of Finance has said that the choice of the location of a liquid natural gas terminal will be decided by the National Energy Board on the merits of the competing ports. He has said repeatedly that the Strait of Canso will get every consideration, along with the port at Gros Cacouna on the St. Lawrence River. I say that because some people in Nova Scotia are very wary about the fact that this kind of consideration will take place. So we take the Minister of Finance at his word, and we hope he will communicate this to his colleague, the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Lalonde) who, on occasion, has said some different things
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with respect to the capability of the port at Gros Cacouna and its chances of being the location for the liquid natural gas terminal.
Third, I want to speak about energy. Let me say very briefly, as I have said many times in the House, that we have a very serious energy problem in Nova Scotia and on the east coast. For many years, we have been dependent, to the extent of 90 per cent of electric generation, on foreign oil supplies and we have been totally dependent on foreign oil supplies for home heating and for transportation fuels. But we have moved, in the last few years, under the guidance of Premier John Buchanan of Nova Scotia, to instituting a coal conversion program, which has substantially reduced our dependence on foreign oil. Now we are dependent, for electrical generation, to the extent of only about 3 per cent. But this involves the development of our coal resources. I am happy to note that the Minister of Finance announced last week a grant of $109 million for the development of a coal mine at Donkin and the Prince mine.
The hon. member for Cape Breton-East Richmond (Mr. Dingwall) was with the minister when the minister made the announcement, and apparently he was not in the least embarrassed by the fact that this announcement might have been made two or three years ago. We hope now that they have finally broken the ice and made the decision, they will proceed with the development of these mines so that we can utilize the coal resources, which are estimated to be in the range of 3.5 billion tonnes, with 800 million tonnes which can be mined by conventional means. So by 1990, we expect to use some 8 million tonnes of coal in Nova Scotia, and that will be welcome relief in relation to our energy problem.
We look forward to a natural gas pipeline extension in Nova Scotia which was promised by practically everyone on the other side of the House. It was promised by the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau), by the Minister of Finance, and finally by the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources who said it will go ahead and the only problem is that the National Energy Board has not approved it yet. That may be a stumbling block, but the minister has assured us it will go ahead, even if he has to pass a bill, as he said for those who did not know that the minister could pass a bill on his own.
One of the big projects in Nova Scotia for the future is the development of the Fundy tidal power. If you look at the National Energy Program, you will Find that there is not one word in it about tidal power. Yet the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources has the colossal gall to stand in the House today and speak about the development of tidal power. He did that because the Premier of Nova Scotia is in New York City right now negotiating an agreement with the New York state power authority over the development of Fundy tidal power. We hope that that development will go ahead with or without the help of the federal government because, as an article reporting on the meeting states, Nova Scotia and New York are natural partners in this venture.
There are other matters in relation to energy which 1 should like to mention. There is the location of the liquid natural gas
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terminal, but, most important, there is the development of offshore oil resources. It has been said that the oil fields already under exploration and development in Hibernia off Newfoundland could supply the east coast area with petroleum sufficient for their needs. But there is the danger that the development will be retarded by the disputes between the federal and provincial government over ownership and the effect of the National Energy Program. So I hope that the government, and more specifically the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources, will resolve these difficulties so that we can get on with the development of offshore resources by the private sector.
In concluding my remarks on Bill C-59, let me say, Mr. Speaker, that no one believes the government can go on overspending and borrowing without drastic results being felt in the economy, but at the same time we have problems in Canada which must be resolved by the government, with appropriate assistance in the appropriate places. What we need is sensible judgment on the part of the government in cutting expenditures and in economizing, but not at the expense of the Canadian people and not at the expense of the projects which must go forward to resolve our problems in Canada and in Nova Scotia.


Mr. John Thomson (Calgary South):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to suggest to you that I think 95 per cent of the constituents in Calgary South would vote against Bill C-59. 1 would go one step further and say that if all Canadians were given the opportunity, they would vote against Bill C-59.
The Liberal government is a great proponent of referen-dums. I just wonder what would happen if this government were to put Bill C-59 to a referendum in Canada. Do hon. members opposite honestly think that the majority of Canadians want our government to go out and borrow $14 billion?


David Michael Collenette: Hear, hear!


John William Thomson: "Hear, hear": the favourite government response is contempt for the Canadian people. Most Canadians recognize the insanity of borrowing ever-increasing amounts of money to finance a government which has no commitment to restraint. I think most Canadians would go along with borrowing some money if they had any trust that this government would practise restraint, but with this government, spending is out of control. This government gives lip service to curtailing its expenditures but proceeds to spend money in the same way it has since 1968.
How does a country continue to spend more than it takes in revenues? This is the answer of one government spokesman: the answer is quite simple; the state will have budgetary deficits and finance itself through loans; in practice that will be done through the intermediary of the Bank of Canada, which will open up a credit account in the name of the government in return for loan certificates; if the bank does not have enough currency in circulation, it can always print some without any inconvenience, when needed.

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Those are the words of the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau). It can always print some money without any inconvenience, when needed.
Where has that policy led this country in the last 12 years? It has led us to high unemployment, high inflation and low productivity. We can always print more money without any inconvenience. Inconvenience to whom? There is no inconvenience to the government; that is for certain, but there is a lot of inconvenience to the Canadian people.
I have never been able to understand why you, Mr. Speaker, and I have to balance our bank accounts and our incomes against our expenditures and why companies have to balance their expenditures against their revenues but the government does not. I am a chartered accountant, and I still have never been able to understand how the government can continue to borrow and borrow money and never, never practice the principle of balancing its books. Is Canada different from the rest of the world? Can we borrow our way to prosperity? I think what the Liberal government would have the Canadian people think is that we can borrow our way to prosperity. Well, we cannot borrow our way to prosperity. No society has ever received more than it earned, and I do not believe Canada will be any exception to this rule. It has not demonstrated that so far.
If you and I, Mr. Speaker, wanted to borrow money, or any company wanted to borrow money, we would have to explain what the money was to be used for and how it would be repaid. Do we see any evidence of that in this bill? What are we borrowing $14 billion for, and how is the money to be repaid? Do the people of Canada know that? Is the government prepared to tell the people of Canada what the $14 billion will be used for? Does the government tell the people of Canada how it will repay? No, it just makes a blanket statement that it wants a blank cheque for $14 billion, and it will put the responsibility on the backs of our children. That is what the Liberal government has said. It wants a blanket borrowing authority for $14 billion without any indication of what it will be used for.
Deficit spending by the Liberal government has become an accepted way of life. The budget of the Minister of Finance (Mr. MacEachen) and the Speech from the Throne attested to the fact that the Liberal government is not prepared to come to grips with our enormous fiscal deficits but, rather, it will simply borrow the funds necessary to finance runaway government expenditures.
That was said by the Minister of Finance in his budget statement last October, and it was said earlier in the throne speech. The government said it would not curtail its spending. It said it would be a deficit-financed government. That is the Liberal commitment to the people of Canada. This government will not attempt to cut its spending; it will deficit finance and continue to deficit finance whether we like it or not.
On a national accounts basis expenditures for the current fiscal year are expected to be approximately 16.8 per cent higher than they were last year, and yet the government and the Minister of Finance have the audacity to say that expected
growth in government expenditures will not exceed the rate of growth of the economy. How can a man stand up before the people of Canada and say that the rate of government expenditures will be confined to the growth of the Canadian economy and at the same time present a document which indicates that expenditures will rise 16.8 per cent? Where is the credibility in such statements? How can the people of Canada trust a government which makes such ridiculous statements?
In a speech to the House of Commons on April 21, 1980, the Minister of Finance assured Canadians that the rate of growth of government expenditures would be tightly controlled and that government deficits and financial requirements would diminish as economic growth resumed. How will economic growth resume in Canada if the government takes more and more away from the private sector? What evidence do we have, if there is any, to support the claim that the Canadian economy will grow and thereby our deficits will be reduced? I say that the statement of the Minister of Finance was just so much pious piffle, and the Minister of Finance knows it.
The Liberal government has no commitment whatsoever to restraining government expenditures. I have just a few statistics to put on the record. The average annual rate of increase in government expenditures in Canada was 19.4 per cent in the years 1970 through 1977. This compares with an annual rate of increase in the United States of 10.9 per cent. The rate of increase in government expenditure in Canada was almost twice that of the United States in the years 1970 to 1977. In fiscal 1980, spending by all levels of government in Canada represents 42.5 per cent of our economic output, compared with 30 per cent in 1961.
In 1980, of everything Canadians produce, everything we do and everything which is wealth-producing, all levels of government take 42.5 per cent as compared with 30 per cent in 1961. Is it any surprise to anyone that this government stands before the Canadian people tonight and asks them for authority to borrow $14 billion to finance a deficit in 1980 which will be close to $15 billion? It should not be any surprise.
Let me put this in a little greater perspective. In order to balance the federal budget in 1980, it would be necessary to double the revenue from personal taxes or apply a tax increase of more than $500 to every man, woman and child in Canada. If we wanted to balance the fiscal budget, we would have to double personal taxes in this country, and every man, woman and child would have to pay an additional $500. I suppose that does not really concern hon. members opposite because they know somebody somewhere in future generations will pay for it, so they would rather not face up to our fiscal responsibilities today. They would rather throw them onto the backs of future generations. If Canada is to continue to prosper, there is only one way, and that is for the federal government to move toward a balanced budget.
That is almost heresy today, isn't it, and politicians in Canada talk about moving toward a balanced budget. It certainly is for the Liberal government. I am not here to stand
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before you and tell you we can move toward a balanced budget quickly. I think it can be done over a period of five or six years. Federal government expenditure is a question of commitment. It is a question of commitment by the government that federal government expenditures must grow at a lesser rate than their revenues. We cannot burden the economy with more taxes and at the same time increase productivity. I think even my friends opposite recognize that. We cannot burden the Canadian economy and the Canadian taxpayer with further taxes and have any hope of increasing productivity in Canada.
As I said, there are those who say a balanced budget is out of the question, and there is no question it is a difficult political exercise. It can be done if the government has the backbone to impose the necessary restraints, restraints on the civil service and by eliminating ridiculous programs such as the oil stabilization program. It is madness for the Canadian government to borrow money to pay for a $3 billion oil subsidy to Canadian consumers. Even the Canadian consumers would consider that madness.
They are increasing federal borrowing by $3 billion in order to subsidize the consumption of gasoline, not only by Canadian consumers but by foreign consumers, foreign air carriers and United States' motorists coming across the border.


An hon. Member:: Terrible.


John William Thomson: We can move toward a balanced budget if the government has the backbone to sincerely face up to restraint.


An hon. Member:: Hear, hear!


John William Thomson: The royal commission of inquiry on financial accountability, referred to as the Lambert commission, recommended significant changes, including establishing a framework of accountability for government. It has been two years since that report was made and I see precious little evidence that the Liberal government has initiated any efforts whatsoever to comply with the recommendations of the Lambert commission.


An hon. Member:: It's coming.


John William Thomson: The Lambert commission in March 1979- and I would just like to remind those opposite-after two years of careful study and consideration reached the deeply-held conviction that the serious malaise pervading the management of government stems fundamentally from a grave weakening and, in some cases, an almost total breakdown in the chain of accountability, first within government and second in the accountability of government to Parliament and the Canadian people.
I guess the only time we in this House of Commons are accountable is when we have an election. How can a Member of Parliament be accountable to his constituency for borrowing $14 billion? How can a Member of Parliament be accountable to his constituents for massive over-expenditures by government on capital projects? How can we represent to our constit-
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uents that we have, in our government, sound management and accountability for expenditures? We cannot. None of us can.
Financing of the federal deficit contributes significantly to the rate of inflation, high interest rates and unemployment. Government spending and fiscal deficits take away from the productive sector of the economy, the sector which creates the jobs. Government cannot create jobs by spending. Actually, government spending takes jobs away from the private sector because it takes that money away, spends it, and does not create investment. The federal deficit, as I said, contributes to inflation. There is no authority in the Bank of Canada or any financial authority that I know of in Canada that would not say today that a substantial part of the inflation we are experiencing in Canada is due to the federal deficit and continuing deficits which this country has experienced since 1974.
Federal deficits have contributed to high interest rates because the government is borrowing $14 billion. If the government were not borrowing that money, there would be that much more money available for private enterprise, and others in the economy, and they would not be driving interest rates up. For the government to go out on the market and borrow $14 billion is to simply drive up interest rates.
We will not have decent interest rate levels in Canada until this government learns to face up to fiscal responsibility. Horror stories of mismanagement by the federal government over the past 12 years are endless. I could stand here from now until tomorrow night reciting them, and I am sure many other members could as well.
I would like to refer to a few examples of overspending on major capital projects. For instance, in my home town of Calgary in 1973 it was decided that the Calgary International Airport should be rebuilt. It was estimated the terminal would cost $57.7 million. In 1977-1978 the final cost when the building was completed was $127.4 million, a cost overrun of $69.7 million. In Montreal, a project referred to as MAPP involved the construction of a postal plant. Approval was finally given in 1974 for an expenditure of $161 million. The final cost came in at $273 million, a cost overrun of $112 million, or 70 per cent.
We turn now to the Prince Rupert grain dryer, something very close to the heart of the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pepin), I am sure. Approval was originally given for $705,000 to construct this project. The final cost was $3,812,000, a cost overrun of $3,107,000, or 479 per cent over the budget.
The government told the Canadian people that the Prince Rupert grain dryer and Calgary international airport would cost so much money, and then it gave out a blank cheque, having no regard for and no control over those estimates. The original cost of constructing the Mirabel airport and the acquisition of land was estimated to be $243,495,000. The final cost was $360,667,000, for a small overrun of approximately $170 million, or 48 per cent. That is one of the small percentage cost overruns. It only cost the Canadian people an additional $170 million.

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Where would any of us end up if we were to conduct our financial affairs that way? Where would the largest company in North America or, for that matter, in the world end up-


An hon. Member:: Ask Massey-Ferguson.


John William Thomson: In connection with the overruns and major capital projects-and there is a thick file of them which I could go on reciting-I would say the Conservative government, while we were in power, initiated a task force to investigate the means to control to a greater extent this area of government expenditure.
I have to conclude the Liberal government does not consider it important enough to re-establish this committee. Perhaps they would find it too embarrassing.


An hon. Member:: There is nothing embarrassing about it.


John William Thomson: That is probably true. Then we have the Canadian Unity Information Office, that wonderful government department of which I am sure all Canadians can be proud. The Canadian Unity Information was established as a three-man operation in 1976 with a budget of $1 million; today that department employs 90 people, and its budget for 1980 was $10.6 million. The government saw fit to increase the budget of the Canadian Unity Information Office to $17 million as soon as it took office, so now the budget of the CUIO is $26.6 million, and its director of finance indicated that its actual spending for this fiscal year will be closer to $31 million. This money is being spent for political purposes, to promote the interests of the Liberal Party at the expense of Canadian taxpayers. We must make no mistake about that.
Why do Canadians need their government to tell them that Canada is strong? Do they really need that? Why do Canadians need to pay for Canada geese flying across television screens to identify with their country? It is a ridiculous waste of money, yet the Liberal government says that it cannot trim government spending. We are tightening the belt, we are telling them how to identify with Canada.
They tell Canadians that we have a strong Canada and that we do not have an energy problem when we do. It is a ridiculous and profligate waste of taxpayers' money.
The Canadian Unity Information Office is nothing less than a propaganda machine designed to convince Canadians that Liberal policies are the best policies. This government department is manipulative and designed to support decisions of the Liberal Party. These programs cause more national divisiveness and promote deep mistrust by Canadians of their federal government.
Another example of needless government spending is the acquisition of Canadian Petrofina. The government acquired the company for $120 a share which just over one year ago was selling its shares at $50. Over 50 per cent of the assets of Canadian Petrofina are represented in service stations, its Montreal refinery and real estate. The question I should like to
ask the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Lalonde), the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, or anyone in authority in the Liberal government is: how come real estate, service stations and a refinery-hardware-can appreciate in value from $50 to $120 a share or 150 per cent in one year? Again the Canadian taxpayer ends up footing the bill.
I could find some sympathy for the acquisition if it was adding one drop of oil to Canada's energy security. But no energy security is derived from the acquisition of Petrofina, not one barrel of oil or one cubic foot of gas. It will not do Canadians any good, but they will pay for it at the gas pump. It will place Petrofina in the hands of an inefficient, wasteful organization called Petro-Canada.
If they wanted to reduce the fiscal deficit of about $15 billion and to reduce this borrowing bill, they could have taken the money they spent on Petrofina. The philosophy of the Liberal government is that the market system will not work and has not worked for Canadians. This country was built on the free market sytem, but the philosophies of the Liberal party and my friends to the left is that the market system will not work and that private initiative left to itself cannot guarantee prosperity. There is no guarantee of prosperity in this life for anyone. The government cannot guarantee prosperity. If Canadians believe the Liberal government can guarantee prosperity, they are wrong, but the Liberal government can guarantee greater and greater deficits, more and more government spending, and more and more government control over their lives.
Another statement of the Prime Minister was that prosperity must be assured through state planning. The Liberal philosophies are: the market system will not work, private initiative left to itself cannot guarantee prosperity, prosperity must be assured through state planning. This is bureaucratic control and interventionism. The Liberal government believes it knows what is best for everyone, that Canadians are not capable of making decisions for themselves.
I do not think very many members of the Liberal government were exposed to life in business or to working in a business, so they do not understand the work ethic or what makes Sammy run. They have never tried to understand the work ethic. They fail to understand that most Canadians enjoy working and the fruits of their work. It makes them feel good and they have a feeling of accomplishment, but in return they seek a sense of participation and a reward which is commensurate with their input. That is called "incentive". The Liberal government does not understand the meaning of the word "incentive"; it does not understand human motivation, it does not understand what motivates people to build a better mousetrap. Without a system of incentives, people cannot be motivated to be innovative or to develop excellence.
We have all the evidence before us of state-controlled economies, without exception they are dismal failures. We can look at the United Kingdom, Italy, France and Sweden. We can look at the food lines and the people lining up to purchase clothing in Czechoslovakia. Perhaps Czechoslovakia is in a
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more advanced state of socialism, but not too long ago I saw the people in Czechoslovakia lining up for food and clothing, I saw the weariness and frustration in their eyes. The people in the United Kingdom, Sweden and other socialist countries are taxed to the point that productivity no longer exists.
Sweden, the United Kingdom and Italy are no longer competitive in many areas. Why are they not competitive? It is because of government intervention and the socialist myth that government can do it better. I never saw such a tragedy as the one in Prague, the hopelessness and despondency. That is what socialism has done for that country. Before the Second World War, Czechoslovakia was one of the most productive and innovative countries in Europe. I will not deny that the market system has its faults-yes, it produces an unequal distribution of wealth. I will grant that to my friends in the NDP, but as someone said-and I do not know who it was-that socialism creates an equal distribution of misery. The history of nationalized industry throughout the world is one of gross inefficiency and, consequently, a continuous drain on the resources of the economy. It is no exaggeration to say that the main reason the United Kingdom, Sweden and Italy have fared so badly in the recent past is due to their nationalized industries.


Bob Rae: What is the unemployment rate in Sweden?


John William Thomson: The unemployment rate in Sweden is very close to 1 per cent or 2 per cent; however nobody can afford to buy anything, because they are taxed so heavily. As I said the other night, a person making $25,000 a year pays $13,000 a year in taxes. You can buy a pair of galoshes here in Canada that will cost $10, but there I had to pay $50 Canadian a pair. Their standard of living has gone from the second highest in the world in 1971 to nineteenth today.


An hon. Member:: But they have full employment.


John William Thomson: Yes, they have full employment. But full employment is not creating any productivity for Sweden. It is forcing them to nationalize most of their industries. I would like to talk for a moment about the National Energy Program.
Underlying the whole thrust of the National Energy Program is the concept of state control. I challenge the Liberal government to deny that. That is why it was created. The man who created it was Dr. Edmund Clark, a committed socialist. That is something everyone knows. He wants state control over the energy industry in Canada. If the National Energy Program's objectives were security of supply and independence from world oil markets and, second, opportunity for Canadians to participate in the energy industry and fairness on pricing and revenue sharing, then I fully endorse those objectives. However, the National Energy Program is a far cry from ever achieving any of those objectives. The main reasons why the National Energy Program will never fulfil the stated objectives are the ill-conceived foundations upon which the plan is structured.
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I would like to mention a few of them. The cornerstone of the National Energy Program is that the government's conception of Canada is one in which the central government controls all economic activity in the country-regional interests in Canada are best administered from Ottawa. It is no accident that both the constitutional crisis regarding patriation of the British North America Act and the energy war are occurring at the same time.
The critical issue in both instances is what kind of a nation Canada is today and what kind of a nation it will be tomorrow. Are we to have strong provinces or are we to have an economy dominated by a central government? If the federal government persists in moving Canada toward a unitary state then this country will not survive. My constituents will not stand by and watch the federal government steal their resources. I am making that abundantly clear now, Mr. Speaker.
If we want a government to control all our energy policy in this country, then let us look at some of the things they have done in the past. In the early 1970s the minister of energy promised oil self-sufficiency by 1980. Today we are importing
500,000	barrels of oil per day. That is Liberal government energy policy for you. We have waited ten years for frontier land regulations. There has been no effort whatsoever to maximize the use of heavy shut-in oil in Alberta. There have been no government initiatives to aid in the use of heavy shut-in oil reserves in Alberta and western Saskatchewan. This may surprise you, Mr. Speaker. Petro-Canada refused to participate in Hibernia. That is Liberal policy for you.
Then we have the great deal with the government of Mexico. We pay higher than world price for a low-grade quality crude. We cannot even refine it because we do not have a refinery which can handle it. Then having made the deal with Mexico, the Mexicans turn around and say that they cannot sell it to us and that they can only give us about 50 per cent of their deliveries. That it Liberal energy policy for you.
The federal government says it must have a far greater share of oil and gas revenues. Yet it is not prepared to recognize the legitimate rights of the provinces. When we are talking of sharing, do we not have to talk about price? What are we sharing? How can you talk intelligently about any sharing program or any percentages if you do not talk about what you are sharing? Let us talk about what price we are sharing. It is claimed by the Liberal government, with their manipulative tactics in the National Energy Program; meant to deceive the Canadian people, that the federal government's share is only 10 per cent, the Alberta government's share is 45 per cent and the industry's share is 45 per cent.
That is 45 per cent of what? And 10 per cent of what? Is it 45 per cent of 41 per cent of the world price? That is what we are talking about. Why do we not talk about a revenue-sharing program based on fair energy prices? What would that produce? Let us not even talk about world price for oil, let us talk about something in the range of 75 per cent or 85 per cent of world oil price. If the province of Alberta and the producers were receiving 75 per cent of world price, the federal government's share of the revenue under the existing formula would

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be in excess of 50 per cent. The federal government and the Minister of Energy know that full well. It is deception-gross deception.
If we are only paying 40 per cent of the world price for crude oil, what is happening to the other 60 per cent? I could make the argument that the federal government is taking that 60 per cent, turning it around and subsidizing the Canadian consumer. A great many people would agree with that. Authority after authority outside the oil industry have stated that the government's pricing strategy is ridiculous and unfair. I have said this before, and I will keep on saying it. Do you know of any industrialized country in the free world which is subsidizing the consumption of a scarce commodity? As I have said, it is a subsidy which will be paid for by our children. It is a subsidy to U.S. motorists, foreign air carriers and Saudi Arabia. It is madness.
While I am talking about the National Energy Program, and in that I have just one minute left, I would like to read to members opposite a letter from the Independent Petroleum Association of Canada dated January 26, 1981, to the Prime Minister. I will not bother reading the entire letter, but I will read this paragraph:
In view of the far-reaching national and international implications of the NEP, we respectfully request that your government establish a special joint committee of the Senate and House of Commons to undertake a full examination of the impact and ramifications of the National Energy Program. We believe the program merits the same level of thoughtful scrutiny as the constitutional reform proposals. The consequences are too serious to have the elements of the NEP treated as routine legislation.
I plead with members opposite to give that request their sincere consideration. I think we can all learn something from it. Let us put the National Energy Program out on the table. If it is as good as the Minister of Energy and the Minister of Finance say it is, and if it will create security for Canadians and if it is fair, then why hide behind it?
Let us refer the matter to committee where it will receive the attention of the people in the industry who know something about it. Let us put the facts on the table and provide the truth to the Canadian people.
Mir. David Orlikow (Winnipeg North): Mr. Speaker, the government proposes to borrow money in order to meet its expenses at a very serious time. Over one million people are unemployed in the country, and the majority of them are willing and anxious to work. The cost of living increased by over 11 per cent in the past year. The cost of food increased by over 13 per cent and the cost of energy increased by over 19 per cent in the past year. People from my constituency called me last month after they received their heating bills for December. For the first time these people, who live in small modest homes, were billed for expenditures in excess of $100 for the month. It is not surprising when one realizes that the cost of gasoline went up by 30 per cent in the past year.
I could not participate in this debate without spending a few moments discussing some of the comments made by the hon.
member for Calgary South (Mr. Thomson). His argument is that government spending is intrinsically bad and private sector spending is obviously good. However, the government has established a hospital insurance plan which protects people from the Atlantic coast to the Pacific coast from financial disaster brought about because of a major illness.
Unlike the United States where there is no similar hospital insurance plan, Canada has a medical plan which pays the hospital bills of its citizens when they become ill. Canadians no longer worry about going bankrupt or into debt as a result of illness. This hospital plan is in place because of government policy, not because of a private insurance plan. Many people in Canada who have reached the age of 65 can live in some comfort and dignity because we have an old age security plan and a Canada Pension Plan. It is becoming increasingly obvious that private insurance plans operated by the private sector have not met the needs of the Canadian people.
The hon. member for Calgary South, who has now left the chamber, said that government operations usually result in failure and inefficiency, that we should leave such operations to the private sector. Where has the hon. member been? Why are the Government of Canada and the government of Ontario being asked to bail out Massey-Ferguson? It is not because of government that Massey-Ferguson is in its present financial situation. Where was the hon. member when we were discussing bailing out Chrysler? It was not the government which put Chrysler in its difficulty, it was inefficient management in the private sector.
The hon. member for Calgary South railed against public or state ownership. The hon. member comes from a province which has had a publicly owned telephone system for more than 50 years. We have not heard him suggesting that the Alberta government get rid of that telephone system. There is also a publicly-owned airline. Pacific Western Airlines, in Alberta. I wonder how the hon. member squares that fact with the principles he enunciated today. Then there is Ontario Hydro which was implemented originally by a Conservative provincial government and which has been operated all these years under a Conservative government regime.
I have named a number of the more prominent government-owned companies. There are companies in Alberta which are partly owned by the people of Alberta and by the government. The Alberta Gas Trunk Line, which is now called Nova, I understand, is 50 per cent owned by the Alberta government. The hon. member said again and again in the course of his speech that the countries in which the governments become involved in economic decision-making are facing difficulty. He went on to list countries which he implied had socialist governments and as a result were in a great deal of trouble.
The facts prove the hon. member wrong. The hon. member included France in his litany of countries which are in trouble. Any economic indicator at which one would care to look will show that France is doing better than Canada, and it is no accident, although there has not been a socialist government in France for more than 20 years. However, the government of France believes that it should be involved in the planning of
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the economy. That government sits down with its industry and discusses, for example, the direction in which it should expand its efforts, what fields are likely to be profitable in terms of production and employment, where investments should go, and, ultimately, in what direction the country should go.
The government of Japan, and there has never been a socialist government in that country, is heavily involved in the decision making of Japanese industry. I visited Japan a year and a half ago. While there we were briefed by the Canadian ambassador with regard to a Japanese industrial strategy. There is not a decision made by a major Japanese corporation which is not first cleared with the Japanese government. If the corporation can show the government that its investment, expansion or whatever will serve the interest of the Japanese people, then the government encourages the industry to go ahead. The government often allows the industry to borrow money from the bank at less than the going rate of interest, simply because it is in the interest of the Japanese people.
The Japanese would not allow the kind of situation to develop there which developed in Canada whereby International Nickel used its profits, loans from the government and unpaid deferred corporation taxes to develop its nickel deposits in Guatemala and Indonesia. These foreign mines compete in the world market against Canadian mines and as a result, thousands of Canadian workers have been driven out of the mining industry.
West Germany has had the best economic record in the world in recent years. The hon. member for Calgary South may not know it, but West Germany has had a social-democratic government for a number of years now. That government does not nationalize every industry and probably has less public ownership than Canada.
That government follows a deliberate policy of meeting with the business interests and the trade unions to work out policies which will help it expand its production facilities, increase the number of workers and meet the needs of the people both in the country and in the foreign markets which are so important to every country that has a manufacturing base.
I have one last thing to say about the remarks of the hon. member for Calgary South. He spoke of the Liberal government's policies on energy, saying they were bad, they were destroying industry and were having terrible effects on the country. This is not the time to debate that matter in detail, but I would remind the hon. member that in 1970 the Government of Canada told the people that proven reserves of natural gas would meet the needs of this country for 923 years. It was shortly before 1970 that the then minister of energy, mines and resources, Mr. Greene, told the people of Canada that there were sufficient oil supplies to meet their needs for about 100 years. We all know that both estimates were terribly wrong.
Where did the former minister get his information at that time? He got it from the oil and gas industry which was interested in exporting more oil and natural gas and for that
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reason gave out information which it must have known to be wrong. It was done for the industry's own purposes and was not in the best interests of the Canadian people.
1 say to the hon. member for Calgary South that he ought not to put his trust quite so much in the good will, the common sense and farseeing approach of the private sector; sometimes he should think about what is good for the people of Canada as a whole and not just for the private sector.
I want to say one other thing to the hon. member for Calgary South. When I was looking over my notes in preparation for this speech, I came across another speech, one that I made in October, 1979, when there was a Conservative government. The same kind of bill was before the House at that time. It is true that we were not being asked to give the government authority to borrow $14 billion, we were being asked for permission to borrow $7 billion. If it is a crime to borrow money, then I say to the hon. member for Calgary South that the only difference between the Liberal government and the former Conservative government is the extent of the crime.
We are not opposed to a proposal to borrow money if the reasons given are adequate. If we felt that the money was to be used to improve the wellbeing of the Canadian people, if we felt that the money was to be used to provide more jobs for the Canadian people, if we felt that the money was to be used to provide better living conditions for the Canadian people, we would agree to it but as far as we can tell, there is no indication that the money will be used for any of those purposes. If we are being asked to provide money to meet the deficit which is expected between the amount we spend and the amount we take in as revenue, then we must ask ourselves why this deficit has occurred.
I want to say to hon. members on the government side of the House that one of the main reasons for the deficit is that the economy is not working at full capacity. In the years after World War II it was estimated by economists at the Economic Council of Canada, who certainly were not radical, that full employment was achieved with the employment rate between 3 per cent and 4 per cent.
The present rate of unemployment is more than twice that; it is over 8 per cent. According to official statistics, 945,000 people in this country are unemployed. That figure refers to those people who are actively looking for work, but there are several hundred thousand people in this country, particularly young people and more particularly those in the slow-growth areas, who are no longer looking for work. In large parts of Newfoundland and Nova Scotia there is no use looking for work as none is available. There is no use looking for work in the eastern part of Quebec because there is none. The same is true of parts of northern Ontario and the Interlake region of Manitoba. These are just a few examples.
We must ask ourselves what the consequences are of having one million people unemployed instead of 400,000. One consequence is that we lose about $5 billion per year in production. Mr. Speaker, 500,000 more people at work would bring taxes in the neighbourhood of $1.5 billion into the coffers of the

February 10, 1981
Borrowing Authority
government. These 500,000 people who should be working and paying taxes are not working; they are not paying taxes and they are not buying goods to the extent that they would if they were working. They are not in any position to buy homes, refrigerators, stoves, television sets or any of the basic items, the manufacture of which provides jobs. Not only are they not working and not paying taxes but many are collecting unemployment insurance benefits. The federal treasury is subsidizing the unemployment insurance plan by about $4 billion per year.
These are some of the reasons for the kind of deficits we have today. We must ask if we need to have that many people unemployed. 1 do not believe that it is necessary. We must also ask if we have met all the needs of the Canadian people. Not only have we not met the needs of the ordinary citizen, we have not met the needs of the country. We should be able to sell the goods we produce but we find that we cannot even move the grain that the western farmers produce. This is not my area of expertise, but the last figure 1 saw showed that we could have sold another $1 billion worth of grain per year if we had been able to move it.


Mr. Pepin:: That is your fault.


Mr. Orlikow:: The minister says that is my fault. There is one thing a Liberal minister will never admit and that is that anything wrong with the country is his fault. 1 would remind the minister that this country has had Liberal government for-


An hon. Member:: Too long.


David Orlikow: An hon. member says for too long. We have had Liberal governments for about 54 of the last 60 years, so when the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pepin) says it is my fault that we cannot move the grain I am sure he says it with tongue in cheek.
We need to upgrade the whole railway system, the rail lines and rolling stock. We should be planning to electrify the transportation system but according to the Liberal and Conservative philosophy, we cannot afford to do that. We cannot afford anything.
We need to modernize our automobile industry. The hon. member for Hamilton Mountain (Mr. Deans) dealt with this question last night. Our automobile industry is in a state of chaos. The auto pact is a complete failure. The multinational automobile companies are making plans to rationalize the industry. Those plans leave very little for this country. Canadian auto workers face a very dim prospect if they have to depend on the decisions made up until now by this Liberal government.
We need an industrial strategy. We need to look at those fields in which we have obvious natural advantages. We have tremendous natural resources. We have coal, oil and gas. Where is the drilling equipment and the mine machinery produced? It is not produced in Canada, it is imported into Canada.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Don't exaggerate that much. That is wrong.


David Orlikow: These are the facts. We say that the large part of the deficit money that we are being asked to approve in this bill is required due to faulty economic strategy and the mistaken philosophy of this Liberal government aided and a betted-although they huff and they puff-by our Conservative friends on the other side.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


David Orlikow: I suggest that the deficit would be substantially less if we had a tax system which was equitable and fair. Let me illustrate what I mean by that. There was a time not many years ago when federal expenditures were met in a way in which personal income tax and corporation taxes paid about the same percentage of the federal government's expenditures. Those days are long gone. Today personal income tax contributes a very large percentage more to meet the expenditures of the Government of Canada than does corporation tax. That is true because ever since 1945 Liberal and Conservative governments have so changed the tax system that corporations are paying less and less of the cost of providing services required by the people of Canada. How did that happen? It happened in the following ways. Depreciation and write-offs far in excess of actual depreciation have been accorded to Canadian corporations, resulting in several billion dollars of deferred corporation taxes which will never be collected.
We are permitting the corporations in this country to use money, which they would have paid in taxes, to expand their productive facilities, to increase their business and to make larger profits. They are doing that with what are, in effect, interest-free loans. I suggest to members on both sides of the House, Liberals and Conservatives, that there is not one ordinary Canadian citizen wanting to buy a house or to meet any of his or her expenses who would not be delighted to get the kind of break we give to the corporations in this country, namely, an interest-free loan. I have the strange idea that the ordinary citizen who wants to buy a modest home in my constituency is at least entitled to as generous treatment by the Government of Canada as are the large corporations.
Tax benefits to resource and other companies have been such that our largest companies are paying tax at a substantially lower rate than the tens of thousands of small businessmen who employ most Canadians. Let me refer to an article which appeared in the Ottawa Citizen of August 23, 1980. It is entitled "Income tax system is riddled with Liberal holes for oilmen". I shall quote just a few paragraphs from that story. In referring to a study, we read:
They show that federal tax concessions are so big that the government's share of oil and natural gas income fell in 1979 amid a 54 per cent increase in industry profits and a 17 per cent gain in provincial royalty earnings.
The article goes on as follows:
-compared to 1978, "current income taxes paid were almost unchanged (in 1979) at $1 billion, reflecting largely a greater use of the investment incentives available".
February 10, 1981

Another paragraph reads:
The corporate tax deferrals include a wide range of special write-offs for depletion, depreciation, and exploration and development investment and equipment.
The provisions became steadily more numerous and generous in a series of Liberal budgets from 1974 to 1978.
According to a report published by the energy department last November, the tax concessions "reflect a concern with providing incentive to develop new energy supplies".
In a practical way what does that mean? Let us just look at the big five oil companies. Imperial Oil's profits increased in the first nine months of 1980 to $481 million from $309 million in 1979, an increase of 56 per cent. Texaco's profits increased from $169 million in 1979 to $278 million in 1980, an increase of 59 per cent. Shell's profits increased from $174 million in 1979 to $267 million in 1980, an increase of 54 per cent. Gulf Oil's profits increased from $206 million in 1979 to $286 million in 1980, an increase of 39 per cent.
That is what has happened in the oil industry. But to listen to our Conservative friends, particularly to our Conservative friends from Alberta, one would think that government policies are starving the oil companies, that they are putting them out of business. Nothing could be further from the truth.
I want to talk about what our tax policies have meant to the banks of Canada. The continued life of income debentures beyond 1978 means that the banks' effective tax rate is down to about 18 per cent. Large holding companies whose only revenue is dividends are receiving a substantial public benefit. The public treasury is short some $400 million a year in lost revenue. The banks paid $256 million in taxes on $492 million profit in 1970, and paid even less taxes, amounting to $230 million on $1,272 million profits in 1979.
If my colleague from Kamloops says it is unfair, it is not only unfair, it is scandalous that a government concerned about the welfare of the people of this country would permit that kind of situation to go on.
I want to talk for a few moments about what we ought to be doing and on what we ought to be making expenditures. One of the most serious problems in this country is that we have no industrial strategy. Our manufacturing industries are being decimated. The most recent tariff negotiations which took place resulted in the lowering of tariffs. They are finding it increasingly difficult to compete not only in international markets, but in our own Canadian market. We have no industrial strategy. The Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce (Mr. Gray), when he was on the opposition side of the House, talked continuously of the need for an industrial strategy, the need to redesign or reorganize our manufacturing industries so they would be able to compete not only in the Canadian market but in the international market.
That has not happened. The only thing we have had from the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce, is desperate, stop-gap measures to prevent companies like Massey-Ferguson and Chrysler from going bankrupt and shutting down completely. We have no industrial strategy. The government has
Borrowing Authority
failed, partly because, like the Progressive Conservatives, it does not believe that it should intervene in the economy, that it should sit down with the business community, sit down with the workers in this country and try to assess what our natural advantages are, what our natural resources are, what our human resources are, what our scientific and technical resources are, what our natural advantages are and in what field we should expand. That has been completely lacking, despite all the speeches made by the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce and despite all his protestations since he became minister in the present government.
That lack of an industrial strategy cannot be demonstrated more vividly than in the failure of the Liberal government to deal with the fact that there is hardly an industrialized country in the western world which has as dismal a record in expenditures for scientific research and development as has Canada. For a variety of reasons, which I cannot go into in detail tonight, Canada is at the bottom of the totem pole amongst the OECD countries in expenditure for research and development. That has been true for close to 15 years. We are now spending less than 1 per cent of our gross national product on scientific research and development, at a time when every other country in the western world is spending at least 1.5 per cent, and some of them as much as 2 per cent, and more than 2 per cent, of their gross national product on scientific research and development.
During the term of the former Liberal government, we were told by the then minister of state for science and technology that the government had drafted a plan so that by the year 1983 we would be expending 1.5 per cent of our gross national product on research and development. That was in 1978, and the then minister was projecting that we would spend 1.5 per cent of our gross national product on research and development in 1983, by which time nearly all the other countries in the western industrialized world would probably be spending 2 per cent to 2.5 per cent of their gross national product on research and development.
What do we find? We find that the present Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce just a few days ago announced a new goal. He said that the 1.5 per cent of our gross national product to be expended on research and development will now not be reached until 1985. That goal, and the way in which the minister proposed to reach it, has been criticized by every agency involved in research and development. In the Montreal Gazette issue of January 20, there is a news story entitled, "Industry cool to research policy". It reads:
Canadian businessmen showed little enthusiasm yesterday for a federal government program whereby it promises to increase spending for research and development but will ask industry to increase its share of total spending.
It goes on to point out that:
-under the five-year program, industry will be asked to increase its contributions by 17 per cent a year to $3.7 billion from $895 million.
Robert Long, president of the Canadian Advanced Technology Association said that the policy "makes one wonder whether the government is serious".

February 10, 1981
Borrowing Authority
Dick Wertheim, spokesman for Northern Telecom Ltd., said that the rhetoric which the minister used to announce the policy is dangerous because it could lull the public into thinking something is being done. The President of the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, Gordon Mac-Nabb, said about the minister's announcement that critical shortages of research talent may prevent Canada from achieving the goal of higher spending on research and development.
Responding to the federal government's recent announcement of a framework for achieving research and development spending of 1.5 per cent of the gross national product by 1985, Mr. MacNabb said:
-there aren't enough people in the physical sciences: chemistry, physics, engineering and computer science, for example.
As if it were not bad enough that the government has retreated from its commitment after its very late conversion to the idea that we must spend 1.5 per cent of our gross national product on research and development, we now have the news, from what I am certain are very reliable sources, that this government, in its desire to hold down government expenditures, is giving very serious consideration at the cabinet level to getting out, in the next few years, of the federal government's commitment to sharing the cost of post-secondary education with the provinces and giving notice very shortly to the provinces that it proposes to cut back and then to eliminate the cash expenditures it makes to post-secondary education.
According to what I consider to be authoritative sources, the government proposes to cut $2 billion to $3 billion from its funding for the established programs financing. Where do they propose to do that? They propose to reduce their contributions to post-secondary education to the provinces by $1.5 billion. This will be a calamity for our post-secondary education. What does it mean to my province? I wish the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Axworthy) were here because, as a former university professor in Winnipeg, he knows the importance of universities to our province, as they are important to every province. To my province, it means a reduction, in the cash part of the secondary EPF which can be allocated to the universities in my province, to $52 million. Of that $52 million, about three quarters would be cut from the funding which the federal government now provides to the three universities in Manitoba, the University of Manitoba, The University of Winnipeg and Brandon University, and the other quarter would be cut from the funding for our community colleges, which play such an important part in the training and education of the young people in my province.
This decision by the federal government, if followed, would be a disaster for education in all parts of Canada. Enrolment at our universities has levelled off. The increases which we had every year, beginning in 1945, have levelled off as the population of Canada has stabilized.
It may be that we need to change our educational system. It may be that we need to re-orient our universities. It may be that we need to change the direction of our community
colleges. But that is a decision which would have tremendous implications for the people of Canada. That is a decision which ought not to be made unilaterally by the federal government. That is a decision which ought not to be made just because the federal government believes it needs to control and reduce its expenditures. That is a decision which needs to be made after the closest and most careful consideration and in co-operation with the provinces and the universities and community colleges.
I want to close by urging the government to adopt the proposal made to it by the Association of Canadian Universities and Colleges and by the Canadian Association of University Teachers. The proposal made to the government was that before it embarks on this very dangerous course and before it makes the kind of unilateral decision which it seems to be moving toward in the Field of post-secondary education, it should discuss these matters in detail and with a great deal of care with the provinces and with the universities and community colleges.
I urge the government to adopt the proposal it has made for the establishment of a royal commission to look in a real way at the problems of post-secondary education which are so important to the people of this country.


Frank Oberle: Mr. Speaker, I wish to thank all my friends and colleagues who have waited here all night for this moment to listen to me conclude the debate for today. I have but ten minutes left, and I hope in those ten minutes to give a brief outline of what 1 will be saying about this piece of legislation tomorrow. I am glad I have this opportunity.
Bill C-59 is not a very big bill. I could read it into the record, but I will not. It has four paragraphs. One paragraph identifies Her Majesty, and I hope she has not read this bill because it is an insult to her. The other paragraph identifies the bill, which is known as the "Borrowing Authority Act, 1982", and then there are two more paragraphs which ask us to authorize the government to borrow fourteen thousand million dollars which it no longer has and has to borrow from a foreign source. What offends me about the bill too is that juicy little indication that this money may be borrowed in a currency other than that of Canada. Of course, it would have to be repaid in that other currency as well.
If I were to stand in this House to vote for this bill, I am sure my knees would buckle and give out from under me. I know if I came home and if my wife had watched me on television standing up to vote for this bill, she would probably rewrite her will. If I looked at myself in the mirror, I am sure it would explode.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


David Michael Collenette: It is a wonder it has not already done so.


Frank Oberle: I am sure my children would walk out and never speak to me again.
February 10, 1981

We really have to analyse in detail what this piece of paper-all four paragraphs of Bill C-59-means. It gives the government authority to run all over the world and commit the Canadian taxpayer to SI4 billion, which will have to be repaid by someone. I think hon. members opposite are actually out to prove that those who said you cannot drink yourself sober were wrong and those who said you cannot spend yourself rich were wrong.
It is just mind-boggling by any standard that anyone would lay a piece of legislation like this before a group of intelligent people and expect them to pass it without debate.
I sat here all day waiting for my great moment tonight, and I have not seen one member of the Liberal Party participating in this debate, despite all the charges which have been made from this side, despite all the arguments we have made and despite all the evidence we have produced with respect to how this money is to be spent and the kind of burden it produces for the taxpayers of Canada. Twenty-five cents of every dollar this government collects from the average Canadian in the form of taxes goes to interest and debt charges. It is paid to foreign banks because that is where we have to borrow money. It is just simply mind-boggling to look behind the scenes of this place and to make any rhyme or reason of what the government is proposing to do.
If the government needed this money to improve social conditions in our country or to create new economy, if it were stimulative borrowing to invest in the economy in order to stimulate the economy and build for the future and even if it were for planting trees which would ripen 80 years from now, that would be an investment in the future, but that is not what we are doing with this money.
My friends on this side of the House spent all day today and yesterday-and will tomorrow-explaining to the government just what kind of deal it made recently with respect to the acquisition of Petrofina. It is hard to imagine that the government would spend $1.46 billion to acquire an oil company which owns 1,000 service stations and an antiquated refinery in Montreal and, in doing so, work toward one of the goals in the energy program.
There are two goals in the energy program. One is Canadian ownership. There is no longer any doubt about what that means in terms of this government's reception. It means government ownership of the oil industry. The other component in the energy package is energy self-sufficiency.
When I begin the debate tomorrow, I want to spend some time analysing this takeover because 1 have been examining Petrofina for some time. I looked at it particularly before the government spread the rumour that it might be interested in acquiring it. That was at the time the shares of that company were trading for about $70 while the value of the shares of every other oil company, in response to the government's energy package, was reducing. Petrofina shares increased in value quite significantly, from $70 to about $85 per share. There is no doubt about the fact that there were rumours that Petro-Canada, the people's oil company, was interested in making an acquisition, and not just an acquisition of any
Adjournment Debate
multinational oil company or any big oil company but Petrofina.
But the $85 was not good enough. The chairman of the people's oil company explained that on television the other day. They were just talking over coffee and saying, "What do you fellows think of selling?" It is like selling one's motorcycle or your wife's old bathtub which is sitting in the back yard to someone who wants to use it for a flower garden. It was like asking, "Do you want to sell that old bathtub out back?" The owner might say, "Sure, we would be interested; what do you think it is worth?"
"Well, about $150 a share".
"You are a little out of line, but we are interested".
A couple of months later there is a phone call. This is the way the man explained it on television. The phone call was to this effect: "Were you fellows serious when you said you were interested in buying this little oil company?"
I see that you are rising, Mr. Speaker. The hour has arrived. I will have some fun tomorrow. I want to save my energy. I am sure all my colleagues will be back so that I can tell them about Petrofina and the people's oil company.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION

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

Hon. Elmer M. MacKay (Central Nova):: Mr. Speaker, last Friday I asked the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Mr. Ouellet) to take some steps with respect to the relationship between Bell Canada and Northern Telecom. I thought it was a particularly good time to do this since Bell has recently been making noises about yet another rate increase. I wish to put a few things on the record tonight wb:c',i cause me some concern, and I hope the government will examine them.
A couple of weeks ago members of the board of Northern Telecom met in Toronto. Subsequently, a loss of $185 million in their U.S. operations was announced. There were about six Northern Telecom aircraft on the tarmac at that time, such as Lears, Falcons and Gulf Streams, which the company used to fly their directors to the meeting. Northern Telecom is owned by Bell Canada. Mr. de Grandpre is chairman of the board of Northern Telecom and chief executive officer of Bell. He is paid by both companies. One has to ask whether the CRTC

February 10, 1981
Adjournment Debate
knows, condones and approves of the gross waste of funds which affect Bell Canada, for obvious reasons, in the way Bell Canada conducts its affairs.
The Toronto Star summed it up pretty well in a recent article on its business page when it said:
Bell Canada, dragged down by a large loss and huge write-off from 54 per cent owned Northern Telecom Ltd., reports an almost non-existent net profit for the final quarter of 1980 and a lower profit on the year-
Bell said yesterday it had a lower fourth-quarter profit on operations of $92.2 million or 49 cents a share compared with net profit of $104.2 million or 62 cents a year earlier. But including a $90 million charge resulting from the Northern Telecom write-off, final net was $2.2 million, with no net earnings applicable to common shares.
I read this excerpt for a specific reason. In the U.S. Northern Telecom lost $185 million. In Canada it made a profit of approximately one-half of that, something in excess of $90 million. The question is, who in our country is subsidizing this profit picture? Obviously it is the telephone subscribers in Ontario and Quebec. Northern Telecom showed huge losses in the U.S., where it has to meet competition. In Canada it has a sweetheart deal whereby there is little or no competition, thanks to the weird relationship the CRTC and the Canadian government are prepared to condone. Again, who subsidizes this situation, and why should it be?
Bob Scribner, a former top executive who resides at Vero Beach, Florida, retired from Northern Telecom about a year ago. As a gesture of appreciation, presumably in lieu of a gold watch, he was given the use of a Northern Telecom aircraft for a year. He happily flies all over the place, including going to places and meetings which have nothing to do with Northern Telecom, and this is done presumably at the expense of the shareholders. Perhaps he flew from Vero Beach and back for the last shareholders' meeting; 1 do not know. The question is, who pays for the huge U.S. losses and company lavishness for its directors? We do.
Bell Canada's rates are based on returns on assets and, therefore, losses in the company's operations, wherever they take place, are of great concern to consumers. If equipment is being sold at artificially high prices here in Canada-reflecting lack of competition-to subsidize heavy losses in the United States where Northern Telecom cannot meet competition, Canadian consumers are subsidizing this operation with every telephone call in the same way they will be subsidizing the purchase of Petrofina with every gallon of gas which they buy. In the latter case there is supposed to be some Canadiani-zation involved. There is none in the way they are subsidizing telephone calls. Why is the government allowing this conflict of interest to persist whereby the chief executive officer of Bell has a similar capacity-in the sense that he is chairman of the board-and has a substantial part of his salary paid by Northern Telecom? Why do company directors have private jets at their disposal to take them to directors' meetings such as the one in West Palm Beach this February?
I am not against private enterprise, needless to say, or a company rewarding its management in an appropriate way as long as it is not a fraud against the shareholders or as long as
it does not affect consumers where there is a monopoly involved, as is the case with Bell.
There are certain questions I should like to ask tonight, but I do not have the time to put them all forward. I should like to know whether the government, the CRTC or the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs and Postmaster General (Mr. Ouellet) would see fit to check them out. For example, I am informed that a very plush, lavishly-furnished apartment is in existence in London for the use of Northern Telecom executives. Does it include a Jaguar and a full-time chauffeur? Is there an apartment like that in Florida? Why do Bell and Northern Telecom executives frequently take trips together on the excuse that this is done to entertain customers? Perhaps a closer analysis of this would reveal that the entire process is probably a facade.
Northern Telecom makes lavish use of jets. They are used extensively by Northern Telecom executives. Most of the time they fly practically empty. Usually a number of them end up going to the same place, each carrying only one or two persons. Mr. de Grandpre, Walter Light, Mr. Ebey and Mr. Thackray, Northern Telecom executives, all have residences in New Hampshire. Does Walter Light view the New Hampshire place as his permanent residence? I hear he only rents an apartment in Toronto. Are corporate jets used to fly these people to New Hampshire? It is interesting to note that very often Friday meetings are scheduled at out-of-the-way places, which then paves the way, as an excuse, on the way back to stop in New Hampshire for the weekend.
The head office of Northern Telecom, on paper, is in Montreal. However, practically all the executives are in Toronto. This is another facade. For what purpose? The 1980 board meetings are an example. Less that 50 per cent of such meetings were held in Montreal.
As I mentioned before, when Mr. Scribner retired, instead of being given a gold watch, he was given the use of a Northern Telecom jet for a year. I will continue at some later time; I realize my time has expired.


Mr. Gary F. McCauley (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs and Postmaster General):: Mr. Speaker, the results of interrelationships between telecommunications concerns in Canada have recently received an increasing amount of public attention. As the hon. member for Central Nova (Mr. MacKay) indicated, the recent announcement of losses by Northern Telecom raised the question of the extent to which such losses will be subsidized by increased rates charged to the subscribers of Bell Canada, Bell Canada being the majority shareholder of Northern Telecom.
Since 1967 the interrelationship between Bell Canada and Northern Telecom has in one form or another been under investigation by the director of investigation and research, the Department of Consumer and Corporate Affairs' main anticombines enforcement officer. Early assessment of the relationship convinced the director that formal charges could not
February 10, 1981

be laid against the companies at that time. However, in 1973, the director filed notice before the Restrictive Trade Practices Commission that he would initiate an inquiry under section 47 of the Combines Investigation Act, which allowed him to investigate, without necessarily laying charges, the results of the interrelationship between these two companies.
In December of 1976 a summary of the material which had been gathered was submitted by the director to the RTPC pursuant to section 47. The statement of material, or the "Green Book," as it is called, is entitled: "The Effects of Vertical Integration on the Telecommunications Equipment Industry in Canada". The director concluded in the statement of material that the existing vertical integration between Bell and Northern Telecom, then called Northern Electric, would appear to be contrary to the public interest and indeed ultimately against the interest of both Bell Canada and Northern Telecom.
An initial hearing on this matter was held in Ottawa in June of 1977. Since that time the RTPC has heard submissions from a number of interested parties. As of today's date, the RTPC has held 223 days of hearings. These hearings were held in a number of major cities across Canada. The commission has also heard evidence from various manufacturers, distributors, telephone companies and expert witnesses called by the director of investigation and research. As well, many firms and individuals have appeared on their own behalf to present evidence.
In his appearances before the RTPC, the director has taken the position that Bell Canada should be required to divest its interest in Northern Telecom. The report of the RTPC on this matter is expected at the end of this year.
I hope the foregoing will serve to indicate that the Department of Consumer and Corporate Affairs has been active in supporting the consumer interest in this matter.


ENVIRONMENTAL AFFAIRS-ALICE ARM, B.C.-GRANT OF DUMPING PERMIT TO AMAX-REQUEST FOR INQUIRY INTO CIRCUMSTANCES
James Ross Fulton: Mr. Speaker, my question tonight arises from a question I raised on January 16, 1981 with the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance (Mr. Mac-Eachen). I hope whoever responds for him tonight, since he is not in the chamber, will take care to listen to what I have to say and respond in relation to that rather than simply respond with what is on a piece of paper which happens to be in his or her hands.
The issue of Amax at Alice Arm is viewed seriously by Canadians from coast to coast. It is something which has been raised many times in this House. I would like to quote from answers which have been given to me by a variety of ministers in the past months, which indicate some of the serious reservations I have in terms of how the government is dealing with this serious issue.
Adjournment Debate
On Tuesday, July 8, 1980, I raised this issue. The following is part of the answer I received from the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans (Mr. Le Blanc):
We will obviously review this whole issue and come back to the hon. member when we have more information.
I have received nothing in relation to that question from the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans.
Also on July 8, 1980, I put a question to the Right Hon. Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau). He said:
If the hon. member would like to have an answer, maybe I could take his question as notice.
I have had absolutely no answer in relation to that since July of 1980.
On October 21, 1980, I asked a question of the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. I quote from his answer:
I may have a fuller answer for the hon. member early next week.
Since October 21, 1980, I have had no further answer from the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans.
Also on October 21, 1980,1 asked a question of the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (Mr. Munro). I quote from his answer:
I indicated that if he wanted to give further consideration to the materials before him before asking me to consider seriously a public inquiry, I would be more than happy to give him that opportunity. As I perceive it, further discussions will be going on before I will be required to make any decision of that kind.
To this date there has been absolutely nothing in relation to that minister's response.
I also put a question to the Prime Minister on October 21,
1980.	He replied, in part:
-we asked for a review-
To this date there has been no review and no response from the Prime Minister.
On October 27, 1980, I debated this issue at some length, with no response from anyone on the government side.
On October 31, 1980, I raised a question of privilege, in response to which the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans said:
In this case, my review of the situation leads me to think that this was a matter of what was on balance, the best judgment. Until I have been given further information I think that would still be my position.
Since that point in time I am unaware of any further information the minister has had. He certainly has not provided me with anything in writing.
On November 13, 1980, I rose under the provisions of Standing Order 43. My motion was turned down by the Liberals. It was a call by the five main churches of Canada requesting a full public inquiry. As I said, the motion was turned down. Many of those churches have not had a response from the Prime Minister or from the minister responsible.
On January 16, 1981, I put a question to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance. That is what causes me to rise tonight.-In answer to my question he said:
Madam Speaker, I have no knowledge of that, and I will make inquiries.

February 10, 1981
Adjournment Debate
Following that response 1 asked him another question. He said:
Madam Speaker, I will have the representations of the hon. member considered and will give him an answer as soon as possible.
That was a month ago, Mr. Speaker.
Various ministers have been on the record now for one month, six months, or eight months giving bits and pieces of answers, but there has been no action.
On January 22, 1981, 1 again questioned the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. The following is part of his answer:
-might I say that a panel of experts has been set up to look into the matter, notice of which has been communicated to the Nishga tribal chief-
I rose the following day on a question of privilege, making it clear to this House that both those statements by the minister were patently false. They have not been corrected in Hansard yet. I think the people of Canada have a right to know what is going on in relation to Amax. Why is the Prime Minister hiding? Why is the Deputy Prime Minister hiding? Why is the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development and the whole cabinet hiding from this issue?
This is a further statement of the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, which he gave on January 22, 1981:
We are trying to find a way to get a scientific review of the project, not a legal one because it is not a legal problem. It is a question of scientific judgment and that is what we are working on.
I have had conversations with the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, and I know private citizens have had conversations with him. He is aware that this is a legal problem. He says he is concerned about the expensive legal costs that may accrue as a result of the revocation of the permit at Alice Arm to dump, as no other mining company in Canada has ever, or is at present, allowed to dump.
On January 23 in response to my question of privilege the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development said:
1 will endeavour to make a clarification on Monday.
Subject to checking, it was my information that the scientific panel was constituted. It may be in the process of being constituted, which is apparently at variance with what was said yesterday.
Anything could be in process at any particular point in time. Ministers of the government seem simply to stand up and shoot from the hip on any issue any time they want, and then the next day they get up and say they thought it was in process or maybe it is happening. At this point in time I am almost prepared to rest my case. I have gone to everyone with any potential political involvement in this issue within the cabinet, but they all continue to sit on their hands. I believe the question is a very serious one. I am aware that hundreds of thousands of Canadians are personally cognizant of this issue and would like an answer from this government.
As a responsible government, this government should come forward and listen to the different points of view or, at least,
when a minister says he is taking a question as notice in July, 1980, as did the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, an answer should be forthcoming. But I never received a note, a peep or anything. In October the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans again said he would give me a full answer within a week, but he has never given me anything. It is the same with the Prime Minister, the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, the Deputy Prime Minister, the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development and the entire Liberal Party. It is a litany of incompetence and false statements.
I hope whoever rises tonight will have the decency and honesty on behalf of all Canadians to tell us what is going on in relation to Amax.


George Roland Henderson: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have this opportunity to respond to the questions which have been raised on this issue. First, I would like to make it very clear that the suggestion that Mr. John Aird was in some way associated with the decision to approve regulations which authorized tailings disposal in Alice Arm are totally without foundation. There never have been any direct or indirect communications of which I am aware between Mr. Aird and members of the cabinet or their staff with respect to this matter. The decision to allow the deposit of tailings in Alice Arm was taken after a very careful review of data which indicated that this practice could be carried out without jeopardizing the fisheries resource. The regulation was approved with the clear understanding that the mine tailings would be confined to the bottom of Alice Arm at a minimum depth of 100 metres and that salmon and other important fishery resources would not be adversely affected.
Second, I wish to emphasize that we are not insensitive to the concerns which have been raised about this issue by the Nishga and other groups. Officials of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and Environment Canada have met with the Nishga to reassure them about the tailings disposal operation. As part of the regulations, a comprehensive monitoring program has been designed to ensure that the tailings behave as predicted. Furthermore, we have agreed to establish a special monitoring board which will involve the Nishga and provincial authorities in reviewing all monitoring information.
Despite these initiatives, some public apprehension still exists. Detailed consideration is being given to identifying the best approach for ensuring that marine tailings disposal, as proposed under the regulations, will in fact ensure that fisheries resources and the interests of the native people in the area are protected.
It must be emphasized that the Nishga are not opposed to the operation of the mine. Rather, they are seriously concerned about the long-term safety of marine resources in Alice Arm. This issue is essentially a technical matter, and for this reason the minister has previously expressed a preference for carrying out an independent scientific review as opposed to a full public inquiry. All options for dealing with this issue are still under consideration, and a decision is expected in a couple of days.
February 10, 1981

The minister has stated clearly his resolve to take whatever action is necessary in exercising his responsibility for protecting the fisheries resource.
Adjournment Debate


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: The motion to adjourn the Flouse is now deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly, this House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 2 p.m.
At 10.20 p.m. the House adjourned, without question put, pursuant to Standing Order.

Wednesday, February 11, 1981