1983-02-24

GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
Hon. Edward Broadbent (Oshawa), seconded by Mr. Nielsen, moved:
That the entire question of compliance with the Government's Conflict of Interest Guidelines of April 28, 1980, as they concern all matters relating to the Scotia Coal Synfuels Project and the conduct of the Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister, the present Minister of Finance, the Minister of State (Mines), Mr. Alastair Gillespie, or any other official of the Government of Canada or of its Crown Corporations with respect to the Scotia Coal Synfuels Project, be referred to the Assistant Deputy Registrar General, who is responsible for the administration of the Conflict of Interest Guidelines, with the instruction that he examine all of the materials relating to the Scotia Coal Synfuels Project with the power to call for such papers, materials or information as may be required to adequately complete his enquiries and, with the instruction that a report be made to the House within two (2) weeks of this date, failing which this House has lost confidence in this Government because of its lack of moral standards.
He said: Mr. Speaker, the fact that the motion that is before the House today is not only in my name but has been seconded by the Leader of the Official Opposition (Mr. Nielsen) indicates the seriousness with which Members, at least on this side of the House, view this very important matter.
In parliamentary Government, there are two broad principles imposing limits on ministerial behaviour. On the one hand, there is the Criminal Code with its sanctions enforced by the courts of our land. On the other hand, with equal if not greater importance in a democracy, there are the moral rules, ancient and modern, by which a nation's leaders set standards of good conduct in public affairs.
These rules are not enforced by law. They are enforced only by conscientious men or women wielding power who have a sense of propriety. They depend for their continuity on the good character of those in office. They depend ultimately on integrity, respect for the ordinary people of the land and a deep acceptance of the need for a parliamentary moral tradition. They are beyond cynicism.
Today we are dealing not with law but with morality. Today Ministers of the Crown and the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) himself are being judged according to the moral requirements of our parliamentary democracy. The issue is no less serious than that.
In my comments I want to be as precise in my reasoning and as careful in the selection of words as I can be, because the
accusations that are going to be made should only be made in a parliamentary democracy after the most careful thought, after the most careful marshalling of evidence. I am going to attempt to do that, and I hope that those who are replying on the Government side will follow this approach themselves. When they hear the arguments, I hope they will meet them head on. I am, of course, convinced, as will be evident in what I have to say, that they will be wrong; but I do hope they will deal with the substance of the matter because that is exactly what I intend to do.
The guidelines established by the Prime Minister on April 28, 1980 established a code of conduct for Ministers and former Ministers. Under the guidelines for former Ministers, it was made clear that for a two-year period after they left office they were forbidden to seek beneficial relations with Departments over which they formerly exercised authority. 1 want to quote part of that specific guideline at this point. It reads:
Within a period of two years of leaving office, Ministers should not:
c) lobby for or on behalf of any person or commercial corporation before any
department or agency for which they were responsible on an ongoing basis
during the last two years of their participation in the ministry.
Very clear indeed is that guideline. Under the guidelines for present Ministers, there are no time limits whatsoever. I will quote briefly from that one. It reads as follows:
In any official dealings with former office holders, Ministers must ensure that they do not provide grounds or the appearance of grounds for allegations of improper influence, privileged access or preferential treatment.
While these guidelines are not legally binding, they establish a code of conduct which is essential to the functioning of our parliamentary system. While Ministers who violate the guidelines are not, therefore, violating law, they are in violation of the moral code according to which our parliamentary Government must function. It is my contention that in the matters pertaining to the Scotia Coal Synfuels Projects, there was clear and palpable violation of these guidelines.
I want to take them case by case now and I want to discuss the situation involving the former Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources, Mr. Alastair Gillespie, specifically his involvement in the Scotia Coal Synfuels Project. I want to say to Your Honour and Members of the House that I want to take everyone through this step by step, and I hope Government Members will note the arguments and deal with them if they can.
On March 31, 1977 Mr. Gillespie, as Minister of Energy, signed an agreement with the Hon. J. William Gillis, the then Minister of Mines for Nova Scotia, entitled "Canada-Nova
[Stage Direction]
February 24, 1983
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Scotia Agreement on Oil Substitution and Conservation". Under this agreement the federal Government provided $9.2 million for the reduction of Nova Scotia's dependence on imported oil. A number of projects have already been supported under this fund. Funds for it are administered by a federal-provincial management committee.
The next significant date is June 4, 1979 when Mr. Gillespie resigned as a Minister in the Government of Canada.
In October, 1980 Mr. Gillespie initiates co-operation in a joint coal liquefaction venture among the following: Cape Breton Development Corp; Gulf Canada Products Co.; Nova, an Alberta Corporation; Nova Scotia Resources Ltd; and Petro-Canada.
On December 6, 1980 Mr. Gillespie writes to Marshall Cohen, then Deputy Minister of Energy, informing Mr. Cohen of the formation of the consortium and requesting guidance as to the form of application that should be used to obtain financial assistance in such a project.
On December 6, 1980, in his "Dear Mr. Cohen" letter-or "Dear Mickey" letter more correctly-Mr. Gillespie asks for help from Mr. Cohen, his former Deputy Minister. He informs Cohen that he has become chairman of the executive board of the consortium. Mr. Gillespie, writing to his former Deputy Minister, concludes with these words:
-we need your assistance and support, and we need your guidance on how we should formalize our relationship with you.
On December 16, 1980 a letter is sent from Mr. Cohen to Mr. Gillespie advising that a proposal should be submitted to the Management Committee for the Oil Substitution Agreement.
On January 7, 1981, still within the two-year period, a letter from Mr. Gillespie is sent to Mr. P. J. Read, federal cochairman of the Oil Substitution Agreement, requesting a grant of $1 million for purposes of a feasibility study on coal liquefaction.
About a week later, on January 13, 1981, Dr. Read replies to Mr. Gillespie that the Oil Substitution Management Committee was prepared to enter into negotiations leading to a contribution from the fund of up to $1 million. In March of the same year, at the official level, consideration was given to whether the Gillespie project fitted into the Oil Substitution Agreement. There was some concern expressed that the two did not quite mesh. It was decided that it was not clear whether coal liquefaction was covered by the Oil Substitution Agreement. Therefore, an agreement subsidiary to the Oil Substitution Agreement was found to be advisable as between Canada, Nova Scotia and the consortium. Changes were made to accommodate Mr. Gillespie.
On April 4, 1981, Mr. Gillespie appears at Port Hawkes-bury with the Deputy Prime Minister of Canada (Mr. Mac-Eachen) and Premier Buchanan to announce the formation of the consortium. Gillespie, at this point in his life, is clearly a very happy man.
Now I would like to turn to the involvement of a man who at this point in his life has his career at stake. I do not do this lightly. The present Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) in my view has been a man all along who has gone into politics to do what he thought ought to be done, not to get personal gain, either in terms of finances or in terms of other personal benefits. I say that and I mean it. The present Minister of Finance is a man with whom I have disagreed profoundly in debate, but he is a man whose capacity to work and to act in what he regarded in the past as the best interests of the country I have never doubted at all. It is for this kind of reason that the argument I will now make is not one that pleases me to make.
On January 15, 1981 a copy of a memorandum respecting the Scotia Coal Synfuels Project is addressed to the Minister of Finance, signed by the Senior Assistant Deputy Minister on behalf of the Deputy Minister. In the memo addressed to him, the Minister of Finance is explicitly informed of Mr. Gillespie's involvement in the project. This memo reads as follows:
There were a number of meetings between Mr. Gillespie and his associates and departmental officials during the past few weeks to help frame the technical and time dimensions of this project.
Mr. Gillespie's participation is made abundantly clear back in January, 1981. It is clear that the present Minister of Finance saw the memo, since it sought his guidance on one issue and was followed up by a handwritten note from a woman, named Maureen to Energy, Mines and Resources, to a person named Mike, which read as follows:
Could you please call John Walsh directly . .. or me ... with Minister's comments.
The "Minister" is the present Minister of Finance. As of this date there can be no doubt whatsoever that the Minister of Finance knew about the project and about Mr. Gillespie's involvement in it.
On April 3, 1981 the present Minister of Finance, the then Minister of Energy, signs a Treasury Board submission. It is sent, not that day but on April 13, and then is very quickly withdrawn. Attached to this Treasury Board submission is an annex to a schedule, and it is a document which specifically notes that Alastair Gillespie and Associates is a party to the consortium.
[DOT] (U20)
On September 3, 1981 the Minister of Finance, then the Minister of Energy, signed a Treasury Board submission seeking approval of the tripartite agreement involving the Government of Canada, the Government of Nova Scotia and the consortium headed by Mr. Gillespie. This was approved on September 14, 1981 by the Treasury Board.
It is interesting to raise at this time the question as to whom was present at that Treasury Board meeting, and which Ministers were involved in the decision at that time.
On September 25, 1981 signatures to the agreement were attached. The agreement was deemed to be effective retroactively as of June 30, 1981.
February 24, 1983
[Stage Direction]
On February 17, 1983, following questions in the House, the Minister of Finance wrote to the Prime Minister saying that to the best of his knowledge he was not informed at any time of discussions concerning the Scotia Coal Synfuels Project.
On February 23, 1983, in a further letter to the Prime Minister, the Minister of Finance retracts what he said in the earlier letter and admits that on April 3, 1981 he had indeed signed a Treasury Board submission in connection with this project.
1 want now to say something more specific about the deal itself. On December 6, 1980, in his letter to Mickey Cohen, Deputy Minister, Mr. Gillespie made it clear that the consortium under discussion would not proceed unless there was, and I quote:
-a grant of $1,000,000 from the oil substitution fund-
Some six weeks after, on January 23, 1981, in a letter to Mr. Gillespie, Dr. P. J. Read, federal co-chairman of the Oil Substitution Agreement, urged the advantage to be obtained in having the co-signature of the Minister of Energy himself to the draft. This was because the fund was not set up for the purpose of Mr. Gillespie's project. The Minister's signature, it was argued, would obtain the following benefit:
It would indicate a ministerial directive to the Oil Substitution Agreement Management Committee to interpret the scope of that Agreement as including coal liquefaction studies whereas, up to now, the Management Committee has interpreted the Agreement as being directed exclusively to electricity generation.
The meaning of this is clear. It means the original proposal was changed by the Minister to meet Mr. Gillespie's requirements.
On January 3, 1981, Dr. P. J. Read wrote to Mr. Gillespie stating that the Management Committee had agreed in principle to the project to a maximum of $1 million. A memorandum to the Minister of Energy, looking back on this at a later point, made it clear that this was federal money being passed through the Canada-Nova Scotia Committee.
On April 13, 1981, there is a very interesting piece of correspondence. Dr. J. H. Walsh, Senior Adviser, Coal, Department of Energy, Mines and Resources, wrote a memorandum to Dr. K. Whitham, Assistant Deputy Minister, Conservation and Non-Petroleum. The memo directly raised the issue of Mr. Gillespie's possible violation of the guidelines. I would like to quote at length as follows:
The role of Mr. Gillespie: Concerns were expressed regarding the retaining and daily consultant fee ($600) to be paid to Mr. Gillespie, and about the terms under which the Consortium partners have the right to buy out his interest. There is also a question of whether Mr. Gillespie's participation is in variance with conflict of interest guidelines. I replied regarding the financial arrangements between Mr. Gillespie and the Consortium members-
And note this, Mr. Speaker:
-that this matter was wholly transparent and that Ministers could approve or disapprove in their wisdom.
The memo continues:
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With regard to conflict of interest matters, I noted that Mr. Gillespie's term as Minister ended June 4, 1979, when Mr. Hnatyshyn was appointed.
It is very clear what is being said.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: I am sorry to interrupt the Hon. Member for Oshawa but I have to advise him that his time has expired. Perhaps he would like to seek unanimous consent of the House to continue.


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: There is not unanimous consent.


Some Hon. Members:: Shame.


Mr. Waddell:: Dictators.


Mr. Broadbent:: That is as low as you can get, Lalonde.


Mr. Lewis:: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I would like the record to show that the Progressive Conservative Party was in favour of extending the time for the Leader of the New Democratic Party (Mr. Broadbent).


Mr. Skelly:: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order to suggest to the House that the particular issue before us is so important today in terms of reflecting on the credibility of all of us-the credibility of the Government, the senior Ministers and the Prime Minister.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Order.


Raymond John Skelly: I would seek unanimous consent to change the rules to allow-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Order. I ask the Hon. Member to come to his point of order.


Raymond John Skelly: I request the Chair to seek unanimous consent of the House to agree to a question period after the first round of Members' speeches, in the interest of providing adequate information on this very serious matter. It is in the interest of the Government to clarify the issue.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Order. What the Hon. Member is proposing is a ten-minute question and answer period following the speech of each and every Hon. Member in the House. I must tell him that that is the Chair's interpretation of the Standing Orders, so it is not necessary to seek unanimous consent.
I see the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Pinard) rising, perhaps on a point of order. When the points of order are complete, I will indicate that the time has come for the ten-minute question and answer period.


Mr. Hnatyshyn:: I have a question.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: I have to recognize points of order first.


Mr. Dingwall:: I am rising to ask a question, Mr. Speaker.

February 24, 1983
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The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: The best way to proceed at the moment is to dispose of points of order. I see the Hon. Member for Hamilton Mountain (Mr. Deans) rising. I presume he is rising on a point of order.


Mr. Deans:: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I am rising on a point of order to ask the Government House Leader (Mr. Pinard), recognizing the courtesies that have been extended by this side on frequent occasions to Members who have asked for an extension of time, whether he might not consider that an extension of time for the Leader of the NDP (Mr. Broadbent) might be an appropriate action to consider now.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: The President of the Privy Council has twice risen. I do not know whether he seeks the floor on a point of order.


Mr. Pinard:: Mr. Speaker, the microphone light did not come on and I did not know that you had recognized me; I apologize. I think we are all equal in this Chamber. We have many Members who are interested in asking questions of the accusers. I would like us to get to this question period as early as possible.


Mr. Clark:: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if I might ask the Hon. Member for Oshawa (Mr. Broadbent) if he would indicate to the House what he intended to say in the remainder of his remarks?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, I thank the Right Hon. Member for Yellowhead (Mr. Clark).


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Order. May I simply remind the House that during the ten-minute period for questions, comments and exchanges, both questions and answers are to be short and sharp.


John Edward Broadbent: I thank the Right Hon. Gentleman for his question. It shows, at least on one side of the House, that a sense of fair play in this institution still remains.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Edward Broadbent: In answering the question which he put to me, I will conclude with three or four paragraphs and be well within the period. I want to say, in light of the evidence that 1 have brought forward, that there has been, in my judgment, a clear and deliberate violation of the moral guidelines.


Mr. Dionne (Northumberland-Miramichi):: Mr. Speaker, 1 rise on a point of order. The game that is being played right now is clearly outside the intention of the rules. It is okay for the Hon. Member to get up and talk about a sense of fair play on one side-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Order, please. Whether during the period in which the Hon. Member was being recorded, or after when he was being called to attention by the
Chair, I did not hear anything which constituted a point of order.


John Edward Broadbent: I would conclude my answer by saying that it is very clear to me and to Hon. Members on this side of the House that the guidelines have been violated by the present Minister of Finance and by Mr. Gillespie. In terms of the responsibility of the Prime Minister in all of this matter, the best that can be said is that it has been abominable.
I conclude with this appeal. The Prime Minister must now act to clean house and restore, before it is too late, a sense of morality to public life in our land. It is not just for his personality or his Party that I make this appeal, because with this kind of behaviour all politicians in all Parties are affected. Until the body politic is cleansed by those at the top, we are all affected. It is time to act. It is time to restore some moral purpose to the politics of our country.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


David Charles Dingwall: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Hon. Member for Oshawa a question. He has made much of the guidelines and has referred to a portion which states:
Yn any official dealings with former office holders, Ministers must ensure that they do not provide grounds or the appearance of grounds for allegations of improper influence, privileged access or preferential treatment.
1 would like to make two points. The Canada-Nova Scotia Agreement was signed in 1977, providing $9.2 million to a bank account in Halifax.


An Hon. Member:: Surprising it was not in Switzerland.


David Charles Dingwall: Second, I want the Hon. Member to specifically state where the preferential treatment was extended to the particular individual in question.


Some Hon. Members:: He did!


David Charles Dingwall: Let us have the facts. Where was the preferential treatment? There was no sleaziness. There was a press conference in Port Hawkesbury, with the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. MacEachen) in attendance. There was no attempt to avoid the facts. Therefore, will the Hon. Member clearly state in three or four lines where the preferential treatment was evident?
Keep this in mind, Mr. Speaker, that if the Hon. Member had read the agreement of understanding dated June 30, 1981, he would have found that in reference to the eligible costs which the Government of Canada would pay it specifically states at page 2:
"Eligible Costs" means the cost of the Feasibility Study and the working capital requirements of the Consortium, other than the per diem fees and the annual retainer payable to the developer pursuant to the Memorandum of Understanding;
Where is the preferential treatment?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, if I saw correctly during the period in which I was speaking, the Hon. Member was here for
February 24, 1983

the whole of my speech, which was carefully documented. After the documentation which I provided-


Mr. Blais:: Give us your conclusion!


Mr. Ouellet:: Answer the question!


John Edward Broadbent: After the documentation I provided, I find the question he asked to be not only sad, but also pathetic.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Jean-Jacques Blais: That is the point. That is exactly the point. Where was the preferential treatment?


John Edward Broadbent: You are out, boy, you are out!


André Ouellet: You are bloody dishonest, that is what you are.


David Charles Dingwall: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask a supplementary question. We have the Hon. Member for Oshawa talking about morality, yet when a specific question is raised about the integrity of another Hon. Member, he has no answer to give to the House concerning the preferential treatment. Where is it?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


David Charles Dingwall: Mr. Speaker, I again ask the Hon. Member for Oshawa to clearly state in two or three sentences or in two or three paragraphs, where is the preferential treatment? Will he who is so consumed with this particular issue kindly tell the House, where is the preferential treatment?


Some Hon. Members:: Come on, tell us!


John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, the questioner could obviously not-


Mr. Chretien:: Where is your-


John Edward Broadbent: Quiet over there. Listen to the answer. The Hon. Member could not understand the speech in the first place. I will try to give him the answer in two or three sentences. The guidelines prepared by his Prime Minister stated that a former Minister could not deal, negotiate or act in any way, in terms of self-benefit, with his former Department.


André Ouellet: That is not true.


John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Gillespie did that. He ought not to have done it. The same guidelines, this time for existing Ministers-


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


André Ouellet: This is not true! You have misquoted the guidelines.


John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, they are so overwhelmed by their own propaganda that they do not want to listen to the answers to the questions they pose. If they will shut up, I will answer.


André Ouellet: We want the truth!


John Edward Broadbent: Thank you very much.
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Hon. Marc Lalonde (Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, I rise today to reply to the serious allegations which relate to a joint agreement of the Governments of Nova Scotia and Canada and a consortium to fund a feasibility study for a coal liquefaction project in Cape Breton. This decision was taken during my tenure with the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources.
As Hon. Members know, since questions to Ministers may relate only to their present portfolio, I have been prevented from replying up until now. Hon. Members opposite have put me on trial. Throughout last week I listened to allegations and insinuations about my character and conduct. Therefore, when the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) returned last Tuesday night, I advised him of my intention to make a reply in my own defence at an early opportunity.
I welcome this occasion and I particularly welcome the opportunity to express my regrets to all my colleagues in the House of Commons that, through lack of recollection and inadequate information provided to me, I inadvertently contributed to misleading statements being made in the House last week and to which the Prime Minister referred yesterday.
All Hon. Members know the respect I have for the House of Commons and the privilege I attach to serving as a Member of it. The public interest is protected by a free Parliament reflecting a diversity of opinions strongly articulated and deeply felt. Candidates for public office surrender the right to privacy and accept the stresses of constant public scrutiny of their performance. Despite these pressures, there is no shortage of candidates eager to assume the responsibilities of public life.
For more than a decade, I have been privileged to serve this country as a Member of Parliament, a member of Cabinet, and a Privy Councillor to Her Majesty. I take pleasure in participating vigorously in parliamentary debates, contesting and challenging opposing views. However, I have never stooped to questioning the personal integrity or smearing the reputation of public men and women.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Marc Lalonde: A reputation of integrity is a precious asset, earned and accumulated little by little over time. I am not prepared to see my reputation destroyed by unfounded allegations of wrongdoing.
What is at stake is not merely one's personal reputation, but the respect Canadians hold for their public institutions and for the Government of this country which we proudly represent. More particularly, there must be no doubt about the moral integrity of the Minister of Finance. There must be no cause to believe that public decisions are influenced by the desire to win personal gain or to convey special favours.

February 24, 1983
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The current version of the conflict of interest guidelines dates from April 28, 1980. The pertinent section for incumbent Ministers reads as follows:
In any official dealings with former office holders, Ministers must ensure that they do not provide grounds or the appearance of grounds for allegations of improper influence, privileged access or preferential treatment.
The Leader of the Official Opposition (Mr. Nielsen) attaches great importance to whether contact between the former Minister and the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources occurred within two years after Mr. Gillespie's departure from the Government. That is not the question. It is irrelevant whether the contact occurred four days, four months or four years after Mr. Gillespie's resignation.
The question is, was a former Minister granted improper influence, privileged access or preferential treatment at any time? Clearly these prohibitions apply to my conduct on all occasions. It would be wrong to permit influence, privileged access or preferential treatment at any time.
To this question, the answer is that at no time did I, my colleagues, my officials or indeed provincial officials grant improper influence, privileged access or preferential treatment to a former office holder. The consortium's application to the Canada/Nova Scotia Agreement on Oil Substitution and Conservation was considered on its intrinsic merit and was processed through regular channels without my political intervention, much as agreements were reached with 12 other applicants.
The other relevant section of the guidelines provides that former Ministers are-and I quote, contrary to the Leader of the New Democratic Party:
-not to lobby for or on behalf of any person or commercial corporation before any department or agency for which they were responsible on an ongoing basis during the last two years of their participation in the Ministry.
It is obvious that contact between the proponents of the consortium and the Department was initiated within the period when Mr. Gillespie was prohibited from lobbying.
Some Members have given such a wide interpretation to "lobbying" as to encompass all contacts with the Department. Clearly, if the intent was to prohibit all contacts, the guidelines would have done so directly and simply. In any case, neither I, my colleagues nor my officials were lobbied by Mr. Gillespie. At no time did any of my officials, including my Deputy Minister or any of my colleagues, see a need to bring to my attention any possibility that a conflict of interest situation might arise.
Wednesday, February 16, was the first occasion on which it was alleged that I had violated conflict of interest guidelines. I note in passing that if the appearance of wrongdoing is now so obvious and if the agreement was so generally known that my personal involvement can be assumed, it is curious that Hon. Members opposite suffer pangs of conscience only after the passage of some 22 months after the project was publicly announced by the Premier of Nova Scotia, the Deputy Prime Minister of Canada, the members of the consortium and Mr. Gillespie.
Let us review the decision-making process in this case. Under the terms of the Canada/Nova Scotia Agreement, a joint federal-provincial Management Committee has the full authority, independent of Ministers, to approve projects under the Agreement. This Committee evaluates proposals by the criteria established under the Agreement, authorizes funding and monitors subsequent expenditures. The reference to Ministers sought primarily to confirm that Canada and Nova Scotia intended to include coal conversion under the Agreement. The proposal was favoured by the Committee because of their interest in assessing the feasibility of coal liquefaction and not because of the involvement of any particular member of the consortium.
Some have expressed doubts about the feasibility of coal liquefaction. Surely that is exactly what the study is designed to test. In addition it should be emphasized that the public funds in question had been transferred to the Province of Nova Scotia. A section of the federal-provincial agreement reads, and I quote:
The monies so contributed shall be paid into a special account in a chartered bank in the Province of Nova Scotia, upon the designation thereof as a special fund by order of the Lieutenant Governor of the Province of Nova Scotia, pursuant to the provisions of the Provincial Finance Act, and shall become public money of the Province of Nova Scotia.
In addition to the leading role taken by provincial authorities, Hon. Members will note that the proposal was submitted by a consortium which included two federal Crown corporations, one provincial Crown corporation and three private corporations. This again demonstrates the broadly-based nature and the legitimacy of the venture.
Moreover, the fact and nature of Mr. Gillespie's involvement in this venture were made known in a manner suggesting not the slightest attempt on the part of anyone to conceal its existence or disguise the consortium's receipt of public funds.
I might add that the public funds are specifically directed to the feasibility study itself. Fees and retainers payable to Gillespie and Associates had been specifically excluded, and he is not entitled to receive one penny from that fund for fees and retainers.
The very fact of the openness surrounding the project was evidently an important consideration for those Government officials who, as I have subsequently learned, assessed and rejected the possibility of the Agreement violating conflict of interest guidelines. Hon. Members are aware that the conflict of interest guidelines emphasize the importance of disclosure in the process of avoiding conflict or the appearance of conflict of interest. When there is an element of doubt, the fact of an involvement being willingly made public is evidence of good faith and bears directly on the question of whether reasonable persons might perceive a conflict of interest.
Furthermore, despite the public nature of this project and Mr. Gillespie's involvement, no one spoke out at the time. No one cried preference or advantage, or appearance of preference or appearance of advantage; not after the press conference in Nova Scotia in April, 1981, five months before the project was formally approved; not after the television and the newspaper
February 24, 1983

coverage of that event; not after a press release by the consortium; not after a press release by the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. MacEachen); and not after a press release by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Energy. 1 find it strange, Mr. Speaker, that Ministers would flaunt their wrongdoings by issuing press releases.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Marc Lalonde: To my knowledge, no one, not one journalist, not one Member of Parliament, not one Member of a legislative assembly, not one citizen, either orally or in writing, expressed reservations about any possible impropriety during the 22 months after the project was formally announced. I submit that no such accusations were made because no preference or advantage was given. No reasonable grounds existed to believe otherwise, and that reflects the fact that the project was considered and approved on its intrinsic merit.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Marc Lalonde: This remains valid, as valid today as it was when the project was announced almost two years ago.
I submit that this project was conceived, considered and consented to by honourable men dealing in good faith. I have satisfied my conscience and my sense of honour on which I have premised my life in public office.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Marc Lalonde: I submit that I was not lobbied, I was not asked, nor did I offer to intervene. I, therefore, suggest I have not by any act, or failure to act, provided grounds, or the appearance of grounds, for allegations of improper influence, privileged access or preferential treatment. I appeal to that sense of honour and decency which enables human beings to appreciate the same qualities in others. No individual can win public trust; ultimately it must be conferred by others. In return, that trust must be honoured.

Mr. Speaker, if I ever thought that I had contributed in any way, either by action or omission, to contravening the guidelines, I would have tendered my resignation immediately, without waiting to hear the slanderous accusations being made from the opposite side of the House. Politics is not my whole life, and I can make a living without it. There are a host of other challenges that are just as interesting, and I would love to spend more time with my wife and children.
By resigning, however, I would merely confirm the vicious insinuations and slanderous innuendo to which I have been subjected this past week. I intend to fight them with all my might, mindful of the fact that in the past we have too often seen virulent attacks against political figures, people who were honest, sincere and loyal being subjected to slander and libel. In any case, I do not intend to give in to that kind of political strategem. I take the integrity of our democratic institutions and my responsibility as a guardian of the public trust and as
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Minister of Finance too seriously to remain silent before such allegations. My public accountability is to this House, and I intend to act accordingly.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) some specific questions about his knowledge and recollection of this transaction.
The Minister rightly pointed out in his speech that from the floor of the House of Commons, because of the rules of ministerial responsibility, we are precluded from asking the Minister direct and specific questions with respect to his knowledge and involvement. I preface my question to the Minister of Finance on the basis that he will understand that this Parliament will survive as a viable and proper democratic forum only if there is no question about the veracity of statements made by Ministers of the Crown.
The Minister of Finance has now corrected the record once with respect to his recollection of the involvement of Mr. Alastair Gillespie as far as the Scotia Synfuels Project is concerned. I ask the Minister, in light of his letter to the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) which the Prime Minister disclosed yesterday, indicating the first knowledge he had of Mr. Gillespie's involvement in this consortium, as the main person for negotiation with the federal Government, was on January 15, 1981, upon receipt of the memorandum from his Deputy Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources, Mr. Cohen, whether the Minister has had an opportunity of canvassing all his records and his memory with respect to this transaction. Does he maintain that that was the first time that he was aware of Mr. Gillespie's involvement in this project?


Marc Lalonde: Mr. Speaker, the record, the documents tabled yesterday, are clear, and I thank the Hon. Member for referring to them. I can say that on the basis of the files which have been made public and to which I had access, and on the basis of checking my personal records, I have provided all the information that I had. Not only did I do that personally, but I asked the current Deputy Minister of Energy to go through all the files, or get his officials to do it for me. But I cannot guarantee that there may not have been somebody who may have said at a particular time in December or November that this project existed. I cannot guarantee that. I had been a Minister for two years during that period. As the Prime Minister said yesterday, I have sent about 320 submissions to the Treasury Board. I had 66 Cabinet memorandums during that time. 1 introduced Bills in Parliament. I corresponded with thousands of Canadian citizens. I met with thousands of them during that period. I made hundreds of speeches across the country. What happened on a particular day more than two years ago? I am sure my hon. friend himself does not remembe ' what he was doing on December 12, 1980, or on January 13.
I cannot give total assurance that I was not made aware of it before January, 1981, but that point, as I indicated in my statement today, is totally irrelevant. The point is that I must

February 24, 1983
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not as a Minister give any preferred access or preferential treatment to a former office holder at any time-two years, two months or 20 years after he departed. I can only tell the Hon. Member that to the best of my knowledge, after having myself examined and having had officials examine all of the papers and facts, that is the best information we have. Maybe my friend has information to the effect that I was informed in December. I will willingly admit it. It is irrelevant, but there it is.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: I say through you, Mr. Speaker, to the Minister of Finance that the Prime Minister has based his defence of the Minister's lack of involvement in supervising the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources at a time when there were negotiations by a former colleague, Mr. Alastair Gillespie, and the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources. He has based his defence on the fact that the Minister has written to the Prime Minister indicating clearly in the first instance that there was absolutely no knowledge of the involvement of Mr. Gillespie-a former colleague, a former Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources-as the instigator of this project until September, 1981. He has now changed the record by a letter to the Prime Minister which cuts out the foundation of the Prime Minister's defence of the Minister of Finance by saying that he had knowledge some time in advance of September, indeed in January.
I now put this to the Minister of Finance. In light of the clear guidelines, the clear prohibition set forth by the Prime Minister, prohibiting former office holders from having dealings on behalf of any person or commercial corporation, whether it be Alastair Gillespie or Gillespie and Associates Ltd., with any Department or agency for which they were responsible on an ongoing basis during the last two years of their participation in the ministry, the Minister knew this transaction was within the two-year time period, indeed well in advance of the inception of this matter, and yet he condoned an activity by his former colleague which is prohibited by the Prime Minister's guidelines. I ask the Minister how he could condone that activity.


Marc Lalonde: Mr. Speaker, I hope you will give me a few minutes to reply to all the wrong assertions made by the Hon. Member. First, the guidelines do not prohibit, as the Hon. Member has said, contacts or communications within a period of two years. The guidelines are quite clear. I hope that in the debate today people will refer themselves to the guidelines and limit themselves to what the guidelines actually say. What the guidelines say with regard to former office holders is very clear. They must not engage in lobbying. Let us keep in mind the guidelines as they are and not twist and change the wording of them.
Second, the Prime Minister did not base his defence of me on the fact that I was aware of the situation more than two years after the event. The question that arose from the Leader of the Opposition was, when did I know about them and
whether I knew within two years. The Prime Minister asked me. What did I do? I wrote to him within 24 hours after the question being put, after having checked my records and asking the Department to provide me with all the information they had. That information is contained in a letter that was tabled yesterday. I wrote the following to the Prime Minister:
I can add that, to the best of my knowledge, between my appointment and the signing of a memorandum to Treasury Board in this regard on September 3, 1981, I was not informed at any time of discussions concerning the Scotia Coal Synfuels Project between officials of my department or Crown agencies and representatives of the firm Gillespie and Associates Ltd., their agents or commercial partners.
That was what I wrote to the Prime Minister last week. Pursuant to that letter I talked to the Minister of Energy, and said "Please, will you have a full check made of all records having anything to do with this in order to ensure that this is exactly what happened". Almost one week later a new letter came from the Deputy Minister indicating that indeed more documents had been found. Immediately I wrote to the Prime Minister, and that letter is public, together with the letter of the Deputy Minister.
The record is clear. The question is, was there any lobbying within the two-year period? The view of my officials and myself, having reviewed the situation, is that there was no lobbying. I state that categorically as a Member of this House. The question is not whether I knew about this within the two-year period. The question is, did I grant privileged access or preferential treatment, or the appearance of it? To that question my answer is categorically no, that is not the case.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Debate.


Hon. Erik Nielsen (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, the reason we are in the position that we are in today is, first, that this Government, through its House Leader, brought on a debate in an attempt to end the Government's embarrassment; and, second, they felt that such a debate could be used either to stifle or to intimidate the Opposition.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Erik Nielsen: I can assure you, Mr. Speaker, that neither of those objectives will be met. Indeed, after listening to the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde), I can see every reason for believing that the motion that is before the House and which will be voted on later today will be supported totally by the Government side.
The embarrassment in which they find themselves will continue until such time as the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) takes the only steps a Prime Minister can take to clear his Cabinet of the clear and present suspicion of trafficking in friendships and indulging the "old boy network" of past and present Ministers. As for the Opposition, there is no way we stand to be intimidated or frightened off from the present issue by the threats of the other side.


Mr. Cosgrove:: You didn't have the guts to move the motion.
February 24, 1983


Erik Nielsen: The Minister of State for Finance (Mr. Cosgrove) says that we did not have the guts to move the motion.


Mr. Fisher:: He is right.


Erik Nielsen: We hear another interjection of "He's right". I am the seconder of the motion, long overdue, of the New Democratic Party.
Those threats were made yesterday. They are being made now. They were clearly implicit in the Prime Minister's remarks. They show the fear and desperation of the Government and confirm in the minds of Canadians that this is a Government with something to hide.
I would point out that even if the Opposition were subject to cold feet at the Prime Minister's huffing and puffing, certainly universally the media of this country is not, notwithstanding even threats against one of the most respected journalists in the electronic media that she is a slanderer.
The lead of that story was self-explanatory. I quote from the original Canadian Press story:
A former Liberal Cabinet Minister, now the Chairman of Carling O'Keefe Ltd., has masterminded a Cape Breton coal project that could pay him off handsomely with the help of Government money.
That indicates the tenor of the story which appears to be an example of clear, restrained, factual and accurate reporting. At least, not one of the major premises has been denied by the Government. They have contented themselves by saying: "We did it, but it's all right because we're Liberals". The Prime Minister's answers amount to this: "Liberals look after Liberals with public money. So what?"
It remains to be seen whether the majority of Canadians, who may not possess the Prime Minister's grasp of subtleties, will take the same view. I think not. Most Canadians will believe, as we do, that there is an exercise of favouritism here, that there is preferential treatment here, that there is privileged access here, and that there is improper influence here. That was borne out by a former Cabinet Minister, the first of a long line of them to leave under this Prime Minister, Mr. Eric Kierans, on this morning's CBC radio program.
This is clearly shown on the official record of events and I intend to turn to that in a moment. The question is, who is responsible?


An Hon. Member:: Turn to yourself.


Erik Nielsen: I hear an interjection by someone over there who does not have the courage to stand and identify himself, saying that I should turn to myself.


An Hon. Member:: Just wait.


Erik Nielsen: I invite him to make any accusation or charge that he wishes and I will deal with it.


Mr. Bujold:: Go outside the House.
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Erik Nielsen: If the Hon. Member wants to go outside the House, I will do that with him too.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Erik Nielsen: The question is, sir, who is responsible? The Prime Minister-


André Ouellet: That would be new for you; you never did it outside the House. That would be a new thing for you.


Erik Nielsen: Mr. Speaker, I hear the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Mr. Ouellet). I have never been convicted of contempt of court.


Mr. Crosbie:: Dial a judge!


Erik Nielsen: The Prime Minister, in a series of cases, such as the appointment of a former minister to the top position in Air Canada, the preferential treatment extended to the former Clerk of the Privy Council, Mr. Pitfield, has exhibited a tolerance and a sympathy for the practice of favouring friends of the Liberal Party. The Prime Minister has, in fact, acted as though the perquisites of office were his own private fief, to hand out as he pleases, to be used in the rewarding of favourites and advancing the cause of his Party. Most Canadians will regard this as an improper and perverted use of a position of trust.
One feels a certain sympathy for the Minister of Finance who, when he was minister of Energy, was slowly and insidiously dragged into a compromising position, perhaps even against his will, but who listened to the insidious arguments of the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. MacEachen) and subjected himself to the persuasions of the master of manipulation.
What, in effect, there is, sir, is a saying in Grit circles that "What A1 wants, A1 gets". The Deputy Prime Minister wanted this project so badly to bolster his fading fortunes in Nova Scotia that he, in turn, listened to the blandishments of Gillespie, who had gone to work setting up the consortium and securing agreement in principle from his former Department for a grant of $1 million for the extremely dubious project of extracting gasoline from coal.
I might say here, sir, that the Minister does not understand one of the fundamental factors in the principle of accountability-that he is fixed with the knowledge of his Deputy and all of the officials in the Department, whether he is informed by them or not.
The Deputy Prime Minister has placed himself in an invidious position. His defence of the current Minister of Finance has resulted in an indictment of himself. According to his statements, he knew what was going on and he gave enthusiastic approval. At the same time as he shrugged and stammered his way through an explanation as substantial as elfs wings, the Deputy Prime Minister, in desperation, conceived a new and further out reply. The guidelines, he said, are, after all, just rules of conduct. Simply a sort of golden rule that all those

February 24, 1983
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in official positions must follow. We must be guided by our own individual consciences, he said. This is not a safe maxim to entrust to this Government, sir.
These, then, are the bare bones. The records supplied by official sources show clearly that there was improper influence, that there was preferential treatment and that there was privileged access to information, to the goodwill of officials and to the help and assistance of the Minister's former Department. That has all been placed on the record by the mover of the motion.
All of this was enthusiastically acquiesced in by the Deputy Prime Minister, who involved himself in the project, called a press conference to publicize it on the day after the submission was prepared for Treasury Board, and publicly praised Mr. Gillespie who was sitting beside him at the press conference. Again, I say it is unfortunate that the former Minister of Energy should have been caught up in the toils of the overweaning ambitions of the Deputy Prime Minister. I am sure that no one at this moment regrets this more than he does himself.
Yesterday the Prime Minister advanced the theory that we on this side should not put forward criticism of the type of thing we are dealing with today because they would get back at us and we will be made somehow to suffer. "Character assassination" are words that are heckled across the floor. If we are to follow that through to its ultimate logic, the suggestion is that we must adopt the standards which prevail opposite. We must see no evil at all where Grits are concerned. We must not dare to inquire into practices which are detrimental to Parliament, even when they have been adverted to in the media and are being discussed in the public area.
Let me say to the Prime Minister-I am sorry that he and the Deputy Prime Minister are absent from a debate as important as this, and the Minister of Finance must be behind the curtain somewhere-there will be no gag law in this House of Commons as long as I am responsible for the conduct of parliamentary business on this side.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Douglas Glenn Fisher: We are waiting for the facts.


Erik Nielsen: The mover of the motion put the facts on the record. Those are the facts.


Douglas Glenn Fisher: You do not have any so you do not want to give them.


Erik Nielsen: The record in this case, from the Government's own files, clearly shows-


Douglas Glenn Fisher: It does not even have the merit of being intelligent.


Erik Nielsen: -first, a breach of the Prime Minister's guidelines by a former minister within the two-year period established by the Prime Minister. That is fact one.
Fact two is a breach of the guidelines by the current Minister of Finance, then the Minister of Energy.


André Ouellet: False. This is untrue.


Erik Nielsen: Fact three is a breach by the current Secretary of State of External Affairs (Mr. MacEachen), then Minister of Finance and, as now, Deputy Prime Minister of this Government, who used his enormous influence in the Government to favour a project about which the officials in the Department had strong doubts.


André Ouellet: You know damn well that you are lying.


An Hon. Member:: Smear!


Erik Nielsen: They say "smear", Mr. Speaker. Someone said "lie" over there.


Charles Joseph Clark: Ouellet accused you of lying.


Erik Nielsen: The Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs said "lie"? I ask him to withdraw it.
That gentleman over there is the Registrar General, the Minister to whom the ADRG reports; and it is to the ADRG that the motion of the Hon. Member for Oshawa asks the House to refer this matter. We can see his clear, unbiased and unprejudiced approach to this whole mess.


Some Hon. Members:: Withdraw, withdraw!


Erik Nielsen: Mr. Speaker, do you just simply sit there and accept an unparliamentary expression, or do you ask the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs to withdraw the charge of lying?


Douglas Glenn Fisher: Talk about appearances! There is the appearance.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: The Hon. Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Nielsen) has taken that step which necessitates action by the Chair. Until such time as the Leader of the Opposition had appealed to the Chair I was unable to take any steps whatsoever.


An Hon. Member:: Oh, come on!


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: The Hon. Leader of the Opposition has indicated that he heard the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs say the word "lie", or call him a liar.


Charles Joseph Clark: As did I.


John Carnell Crosbie: And I.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: I am not clear as to precisely what were the words. In either event, such language is unparliamentary and accordingly it is the responsibility of the Chair to ask the Hon. Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs to withdraw the expression.
February 24, 1983


André Ouellet: Mr. Speaker, I used unparliamentary language in my response to the entirely insidious and malicious comments of the Hon. Leader of the Official Opposition (Mr. Nielsen). I am prepared to withdraw the words I used.


Erik Nielsen: Mr. Speaker, the way that came over on the translation was that the Minister said-these are not my words; they are the translator's-that he does not wish to withdraw.


Some Hon. Members:: No, no!


Miss MacDonald:: That is what it said.


Erik Nielsen: That is what the translation said.


An Hon. Member:: That is not what the Minister said.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Order, please. I was not using the translation device, but I am informed and thought I heard in French that the Hon. Minister had withdrawn the expression.


Erik Nielsen: Fact four: Gillespie dealt directly or indirectly with two Ministers, the then Minister of Finance and Deputy Prime Minister and now Secretary of State for External Affairs, and the then Minister of Energy, now the Minister of Finance. The extent of those dealings is documented in material tabled by the Prime Minister and the current Minister of Energy and in replies in the House yesterday.
On the question of whether those dealings between two Ministers and a former Minister, involving the former Minister's Department and resulting in a very large Government subsidy to a project about which the departmental officials had expressed strong doubts, provided grounds-and I quote from the guidelines:
-or the appearance of grounds for allegations of improper influence, privileged access or preferential treatment-
There can be little doubt about that. We have been hearing little else but those allegations in the House for the past eight days.
Were grounds provided? The Prime Minister says not; the Minister says not. The record says something quite different. The Deputy Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for External Affairs, who appears to have been the prime mover in getting the project off the ground, holding regular consultations with the Deputy Minister of Energy and sitting on the platform with Mr. Gillespie, says that it does not really matter whether the guidelines were breached because, after all, they are just guidelines.
We have the Prime Minister's statement that the Minister knew nothing of the deal until September, 1981, and his additional statement yesterday admitting that his earlier statement was an error and that he had now rectified the record based on new information supplied by the Minister of Energy. That conduct of his alone, misinforming his Prime
Supply
Minister and placing the Prime Minister in the position of misleading the House, is sufficient to call for his resignation.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Erik Nielsen: It should be pointed out that, according to the Hansard record, the Minister of State for Mines (Mrs. Erola) outlined the project in some detail in the House in June, 1981, while the then Minister of Energy was in his seat, presumably in his own inimitable fashion, smiling his approval at that speech.
The summation of the record is that the Minister of Energy knew of the situation as far back as January, 1981 and received several reminders after that date, including a reminder of Alastair Gillespie's attachment to the program. That is a fact.
Gillespie was in clear breach of the guidelines, since he was in communication with officials of his former Department on the question of obtaining a large subsidy for a program initiated in that Department while he was still the Minister. At this point, only a year and seven months had elapsed since he was in office.
The Minister of Finance in a press conference last night said:
Subsequently, the Treasury Board submission in question was withdrawn-
Why we would want a Treasury Board submission in this connection, when all the funds were managed in a Nova Scotia bank account, I do not know. He continued:
-because there were questions as to intellectual property rights and also there was a discussion at the official level about the possibility of-ah-the allegations about potential conflict of interest.
And it is at that time that the Treasury Board submission was amended to provide a specific provision prohibiting Mr. Gillespie from receiving any money out of the contribution that would come from the Canada-Nova Scotia agreement. And that is the submission that finally I signed in September, 1981.
How in the world, with all those moneys-the $1 million from the federal coffers, the $300,000 each from two Crown corporations responsible to this Parliament and $300,000 in contributions from other Crown corporations-going into a common fund, could they mark those dollar bills so that Mr. Gillespie would not get any of the $ 1 million and would not get any of the $300,000 from the Crown corporations, is beyond me. It is interesting to note-


An Hon. Member:: It is beyond you, Erik.


Erik Nielsen: Well, perhaps someone over there would explain how they can mark the bills that are going into an account like that so that Mr. Gillespie would get none of them. I would be interested in hearing the accounting mechanisms they would employ to achieve that result.
It is interesting to note that the Treasury Board submission which was withdrawn was dated April 3, 1981 and was signed April 13, 1981. Had it been entered as signed, it would have

February 24, 1983
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been within the two-year prohibition in the guidelines preventing a former Minister from having dealings with his own subordinates. Attached to the submission was a note saying that Gillespie was involved. Because of the Minister's qualms about conflict of interest, this was held back until September.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Order, please. 1 am sorry to interrupt the Hon. Leader of the Official Opposition (Mr. Nielsen) but his time has expired. He may wish to seek unanimous consent of the House to continue-


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Let me be clear. I intimated that there might be unanimous consent, and it is clear that there is not. Questions. Answers. Comments.


André Ouellet: Mr. Speaker, 1 would like to ask the Leader of the Opposition, who said earlier that he had never been convicted of contempt of court, whether he remembers that in 1966, he copied, word for word, a confidential report drafted by a public servant and passed it off as his own. I also would like to ask him whether he remembers that Justice Dorion, in his report published in 1965, said on page 131 that if Tremblay had suffered as a result of certain statements, it was to be hoped that those who made the statements would recognize his decency and integrity. I therefore wish to ask the present interim Leader of the Opposition and hatchet man of the former Leader of the Opposition, whether when he said in the House yesterday-

"We caught a few fish in '65".
[ Translation]
-whether that is not a reflection of the narrow and vicious mind of a politician who has made a career of destroying or attempting to destroy reputations.


Erik Nielsen: Mr. Speaker, what the Minister has again said is that we should not, when we see evil, say anything about it; as Parliamentarians we should shut up, close our eyes and close our ears to any wrongdoing whatsoever.


André Ouellet: Answer the question, answer the question.


Erik Nielsen: I had the courtesy to listen to the Minister's question, a courtesy which I am not being accorded in answering the question.


Miss Campbell:: Answer it.


Erik Nielsen: I will answer it. There is a lady over there from Nova Scotia who asks me to answer the question. The reason the Minister is asking these questions is to cast an aspersion personally on me-


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Erik Nielsen: -that somehow-


Marc Lalonde: Who are the fish?


Erik Nielsen: -I am anti-French, anti-Quebec.


André Ouellet: Who are the fish?


Charles Joseph Clark: It is Ouellet's racism.


Erik Nielsen: The last time I looked, sir, I do not believe the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. MacEachen) was from Quebec. His name is MacEachen.


André Ouellet: You are trembling.


Erik Nielsen: The last time I looked, neither was the Minister of State for Mines from the Province of Quebec. She is an Anglophone. The last time I looked, wrongdoing is wrongdoing, and a Member of Parliament has an obligation to raise that in this House and call it as he sees it.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Raymond John Skelly: Mr. Speaker, I wish to address a question to the present Leader of the Official Opposition (Mr. Nielsen). What I would like is a quick summation of the Official Opposition's position on this particular matter. The very short attempt to muck-rake on the other side seems to be off track.
Is the Leader of the Official Opposition and his Party taking the tack that this matter is not a matter on the specific detail of attempting to prove it here in Parliament, but a matter of the behaviour of the Minister? It is his behaviour that casts into question his competence and integrity to continue as a Minister. Therefore, the integrity of the Government is in question in the eyes of the Canadian people, ultimately which question falls on every Member of the House of Commons, this democratic institution. Is that the position that he is putting forward?


Erik Nielsen: Mr. Speaker, that is precisely correct. The matter goes to the heart of the theory of ministerial accountability, a theory which the Minister has breached with or without any guidelines by virtue of the fact that he is seized with the knowledge. What we are asking for, as I understand the motion of the Leader of the New Democratic Party-


Mr. Chenier:: Go kiss him, Erik.


Erik Nielsen: -is that this matter be referred to the Assistant Deputy Registrar General, who would have the power to examine all of the facts in an impartial way and report back to Parliament. Unless the Government agrees to that impartial, independent examination by the official-and the Government itself is charged with that responsibility-then the Government
February 24, 1983

has failed to keep its confidence in so far as this House is concerned by reason of its lack of moral standards.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


David Charles Dingwall: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member noted yesterday that the benefits of the project were irrelevant. I just want to say to him that, notwithstanding the moral question of integrity, the real substance of this is the possible creation of 2,000 jobs in Cape Breton.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Flora Isabel MacDonald: We have heard that before.


David Charles Dingwall: The Hon. Member made much of the Deputy Prime Minister's role in this particular contract. I would like to clarify for him that the Premier of the Province of Nova Scotia has played a major and important part in getting this project to where it is today.
The Hon. Member made reference to a press conference in Port Hawkesbury. I want to quote for the Hon. Member what took place in the Nova Scotia House of Assembly a week after that press conference. I shall read what the Premier of the Province of Nova Scotia said:
-Mr. Speaker, unfortunately, has not as yet been signed and therefore federal participation in the project has not been forthcoming. But I will repeat again what I said a few weeks ago, that if the federal Government does not come through with cost-sharing on that project, then this Government has enough confidence in this province and in coal production that we will go the limit and look after it ourselves.
The Premier of Nova Scotia was very much involved, but to carry the logic of the Leader of the Opposition, the Hon. Member for Yukon, much further, you would think that the money provided under the Canada-Nova Scotia Agreement to this consortium was bad money.


Charles Joseph Clark: Question.


Some Hon. Members:: That is a speech.


David Charles Dingwall: Money was provided to a friend, a cohort and a supporter of the Premier of the Province of Nova Scotia, Mr. Medjuck-


Some Hon. Members:: Question.


Mr. Smith:: He is entitled to make comments. Read the rules.


David Charles Dingwall: -in 1980 whereby $300,000 was provided to his company. Is that wrong money? Should that money be spent on that project? Is there something wrong with that? That is total irrelevance on the part of the Opposition. The Hon. Member realizes that he has not made a case for preferential treatment.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Erik Nielsen: Mr. Speaker, I will be considerably more brief in my answer to that non-question.


André Ouellet: Why don't you answer mine at the same time?
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Charles Joseph Clark: Go to a judge, Andre.


André Ouellet: You have never been a lawyer, my friend. You do not know anything about that. For a student to flunk law, you should reserve your remarks.


Erik Nielsen: I would simply quote from the Hawkesbury Sun which quoted the Deputy Prime Minister, remarks he has not denied at all. Indeed, the Deputy Prime Minister has reaffirmed what he said in answer to questions from me yesterday. He is quoted as having said this:
Things always come out right in the end. Gillespie is now one of the beneficiaries of his own foresighted policies.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Are there any more questions? The Hon. Minister for Indian Affairs and Northern Development (Mr. Munro).


Hon. John C. Munro (Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development):: Mr. Speaker, unlike my hon. friend the Minister responsible for the Post Office, whom the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Nielsen) indicated was endeavouring to label him anti-French, anti-Quebec, when I direct some remarks to the Leader of the Opposition, I will not be charged on the ground-


An Hon. Member:: What about dredging?


Miss Begin:: Listen.


John Carr Munro: -that the Leader of the Opposition is anti-French or is anti-Quebec. But I certainly will endeavour to point out to my colleagues in this House that his tactics over the years-and I have been a Member of Parliament in this House for some time-are abhorrent to any politically responsible Member of the House of Commons.
I think the challenge that faces us in this House today is to endeavour to separate the gossip that is so prevalent and about which we have heard so much from demonstrable evidence. 1 do not think many of us in this House have heard much demonstrable evidence.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: We have seen it. Look at the documents.


John Carr Munro: If the Leader of the Opposition wishes to look at the so-called list of facts and one wishes to read his comments in the "blues", I suggest not one scintilla of demonstrable evidence to back up one of those facts will be found. Just because somebody says a fact is a fact, of course, does not make it so, least of all the Leader of the Opposition with his track record.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Carr Munro: What is so strange is that the previous Leader of the Opposition probably was in rather constant contact, I would assume, if there is any communication within the Conservative Party of Canada, with Premier Buchanan. The Premier publicly announced this project on a

February 24, 1983
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platform as far back as April, 1981. The present Leader of the Opposition protests with outraged indignation that it is his duty to ferret out, and the minute he does, to declare any wrongdoing. Is that not then a direct indictment of his own previous leader who was aware of this since April, 1981, and did not make one reference to it? Why? Perhaps he cannot ask his previous leader to resign since he has already done so, but surely it would be grounds for his repudiating publicly his continued support for the past leader.
I am sure that most Canadians sometimes feel that this place, in some of the conduct that we render ourselves to as Parliamentarians, is almost laughable when we have disputes like this subject of derision. This subject of derision that we are all-all the people of Canada-subjected to now is authored again by the present Leader of the Opposition.
We all know that there is not a major scandal or any scandal at all that attacks the credibility of any Government, when its actions were displayed in such open fashion back in April, 1981, when people of political persuasions other than the Government benefited by it, and when there is a demonstrable lack of outrage months following that from the gentlemen opposite. Who are they trying to kid? What an insult to the people of Canada that his Party would try to manufacture an attack like this. Unfortunately, one of its harmful effects is the deluge after in terms of impaired reputations.
I would like us to compare this scenario now with the so-called winter of scandals of 1964 and 1965. Let us compare the state of the Conservative Party then and now and ask ourselves: Is history repeating itself? When the Rivard affairs broke and allegations were made against the then Minister of Justice, Guy Favreau, let us look at the state of the Conservative Party at that time. The late Mr. Diefenbaker was, as usual, under severe attack from his own backers. It was during that time that Dalton Camp was the President of the Conservative Party. That leader, the late Mr. Diefenbaker, did not even have the support of his own national president. He had talked about sensitivity to Quebec.
Mr. Balcer in the Conservative Party during December, January and February-I am talking about late 1963 and early 1964-indicated absolutely no confidence in the then leader of the Conservative Party and that if the then leader did not submit himself to a leadership contest, he would have to declare himself an independent. So did another Conservative Member by the name of Remi Paul. Of course, that is what prompted Dalton Camp at that time to say that the Conservative Party was an organization in ashes in the Province of Quebec.
So vulnerable and shocking was their display of disorganization and disloyalty within their own ranks that who was to emerge to divert public attention from that type of disgraceful disarray? The Hon. Member for Yukon charged again. He then diverted the Canadian public from this spectacle and made charges in the House against the then Minister of Justice concerning the Rivard affair.
What happened then? There was a Dorion inquiry. Did the fact that Dorion inquiry to look into any alleged wrongdoing by the then Minister of Justice at all dissuade the Member for Yukon from making charges and innuendoes in allegations while the inquiry was taking place? Not one bit. One has only to check Hansard. How do you like that for this moral character with his righteous indignation?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Carr Munro: After his smears against the then Minister of Justice of all kinds of wrongdoings, what was the then Minister finally indicted with by Mr. Justice Dorion? It was the fact that he did not seek independent legal advice. That is hardly justification for the type of deplorable character assassination by the Hon. Member for Yukon.
If that were not enough, there was then what was said about the then Minister of Immigration, Mr. Tremblay. Just look through Hansard, if you want to feel shame. Read Hansard and see what the then Leader of the Conservative Party and the Member for Yukon said about Mr. Tremblay, or what the then Leader of the Conservative Party said in Guelph about the Minister's underworld connections. One of his assistants had been named in the Rivard affair, and his list showed him as having bought furniture from a company that then went bankrupt. What did the facts later disclose? They showed total and complete exoneration by Mr. Justice Dorion with reference to the Rivard affair. Of course, when it came out in the press that he had paid as promptly as anyone could be expected to pay for his furniture, the whole case against Mr. Tremblay disintegrated. Were there any apologies offered for a character then ruined by the authors over there of character assassination?


André Ouellet: No.


John Carr Munro: It destroyed this man in public life, but it may have bought temporary peace within the Conservative Party.
Now, do we see any parallel in terms of rewriting history? Tell me, if this is not to be parallel to the disgraceful conduct of the Member for Yukon, let him offer one scintilla of evidence of wrongdoing of the nature alleged here.
Just read the guidelines, which state that in any official dealings with former office holders, Ministers must ensure that they do not provide grounds, or the appearance of grounds, for allegations of improper influence, privileged access or preferential treatment.
If there is anything that the present Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) has been charged with, it is that back in January, 1981, I believe, there was a memorandum that one columnist referred to as preferred or favoured treatment that he did not first identify. I do not even know whether the Hon. Member for Yukon, who says that he based all his facts on a detailed review of the documents, even looked at that most pertinent document. If the Hon. Member has read it, tell me what clauses or phrases would constitute preferred or favoured
February 24, 1983

treatment? Again, he has made his charges without the slightest accuracy or devotion to detail. It is another outstanding example of character assassination on the part of the Member for Yukon.
I just want to warn Hon. Members that if we carry on in this way I can predict what may very well be the mood of this House. I say that because those types of smears were protracted by the Hon. Member for Yukon over a period of seven or eight months, until he hoped that his Party would get its internal affairs in order. Are we then again to suffer this type of degradation in the House for months while the Hon. Member for Yukon does his hatchet job on personalities in public life in order to buy time for the Party? I hope not. That is too much of a disfavour to us all.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Carr Munro: Let me just remind some of the Members, in case they think this is humorous, of what it was like in this House back in 1963 and 1964 as the Hon. Member for Yukon rode roughshod over every decent principle in public life. It is on record that many Members at that time were sick of the unhealthy activity of their fellow Members. They were all scurrying around Ottawa trying to get somebody on to the other. It was predicted at that time by Richard Gwyn, who wrote a book called "Shape of Scandal" in March of 1964, that the House was near collapse from the charges that were emanating from the other side without substantiation.


Mr. Epp:: Quote him today.


John Carr Munro: Premier Manning of Alberta was saying that so deplorable was the conduct of Members here that a new political force was urgently required. A Gallup poll came out indicating that he was not far off the mark. That is how far this House had fallen, and all its Members.
When I see the Leader of the New Democratic Party (Mr. Broadbent) lending his name to a motion obviously designed by the Leader of the Opposition, that honourable Party, in terms of civil liberties, has fallen a long way. It may be indicative of the destitution of its present policies.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Carr Munro: In those days there was no gossip which was too vile for Members of Parliament to repeat against each other. The whole environment was one of total decay. Members of Parliament were predicted openly in the press to be heading toward a collective death-wish during those months.
Most people, even many thinking Members of all Parties, viewed the conduct of their fellow colleagues with total revulsion. That is how unhealthy the environment was at that particular time. In fact, there was no period in the last 30 years comparable to the darkness of that particular period. Its only comparison was something in the United States called the
Supply
"nightmare decade", under Senator Joe McCarthy. That is how obnoxious the whole situation was.
I have witnessed the moral outrage of the Hon. Member for Yukon. However, let me just repeat some of the track record of the Hon. Member when he has tried to indict the morality of any person in public life, let alone the Minister of Finance, who has exemplified morality of the highest public order in his whole time in public office.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Carr Munro: In 1966, Geoffrey Stevens of The Globe and Mail referred to the Hon. Member for Yukon as being "irresponsible and reprehensible". He was referring to his performance in the Throne Speech debate.
The Hon. Member accused Prime Minister Lester Pearson of posturing as a defender of central Government and Parliament while collaborating with Quebec Premier Jean Lesage for purposes of political expediency. He implied that the Pearson cabinet was deliberately soft on organized crime. He even blamed the Government for the fact that Georges LeMay, wanted in Canada, was at liberty, without even bothering to check out whether Georges LeMay had escaped from a jail in Miami.
Stevens wrote:
Unfortunately, Nielsen's tactics are all too often successful. He receives wide publicity each time he puts the screws to the Government-
He also wrote:
The Government has not found any way to cope with The Terror from the Yukon. If it takes issue with him, it is playing into his hands, giving him an opportunity to renew the attack. If the government ignores him, it runs the risk of appearing to give the stamp of truth to his allegations.
Does not that sound a bit like McCarthyism?
In March of 1966, the Hon. Member for Yukon charged that the murder of Francois Payette was linked to fraudulent bankruptcies. He was criticized in the press for not providing any details whatsoever of the accusation.
In June of 1966, still on the bankruptcies binge, the Hon. Member was taken to task by several editorial writers. On June 7, 1966, the Ottawa Citizen chided him for his long list of allegations trotted out before the House without a shred of evidence.
Dealing with my own portfolio, it is a little ironic, but the Hon. Member for Yukon was caught in another form of duplicity. Again in 1966 he was caught giving a report on economic development for the Yukon to the Yukon Territorial Government's committee of the whole. As it turned out, it was a slightly reworded version of a restricted document prepared by my own Department. He publicly defended himself and said that he authored the document. He later acknowledged that it was a document from the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development.


Some Hon. Members:: Shame, shame!


André Ouellet: That is his level of morality.

February 24, 1983
Supply


John Carr Munro: That is just part of the long list of character assasinations and duplicity of this Member of Parliament from the Yukon. That he should be so outraged at the immorality of someone in public life, let alone the Minister of Finance is literally, almost more than I can bear.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Don't slip.


John Carr Munro: Hon. Members should look at the track record of this Hon. Member and his behavioural pattern over the years. I might say that even in my own trial against The Toronto Sun, even after the charge was erroneously made by the Sun, reference was unfortunately and unceremoniously made to it by certain Members of the Opposition. The Hon. Member for Yukon will recall that in a debate in the House of Commons he again made reference to some type of smear conduct linking me to that story in The Toronto Sun. He was to find later that the Toronto Sun story was totally false, as reported in the transcript of evidence, and I won a judgment of $75,000.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Carr Munro: That might indicate that not only is there a disturbing similarity of conduct and behaviour on the part of the Hon. Member for Yukon with reference to his previous deplorable conduct back in the sixties, into the seventies and now, but that there is also a deplorable and distasteful pattern of consistency with that of the Toronto Sun. Is there any greater insult I can pay to any Member of Parliament?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, I have some questions. First, let me express our bewilderment that the Minister has stored up that speech for so long. We are glad that he finally got some of it off his chest.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Charles Joseph Clark: Second, let me congratulate him on his success with the Toronto Sun.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


John Carr Munro: They were not very kind to you either, Joe.


Charles Joseph Clark: The Minister made reference, in his single allusion to the question under debate here today, I believe, to the memorandum from Mr. Cohen, the Deputy Minister to the former Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources who is now the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde). I presume that since he referred to it, he is familiar with all its aspects. He will
know that that memorandum from Mr. Cohen to Mr. Lalonde began with the words, "You will recall that Mr. Gillespie has organized", etc. In other words, there was a very clear reference in the memorandum to an earlier occasion when this involvement by a former Minister, Mr. Gillespie, had been brought to the attention of the present Minister of Finance.
Would the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development tell us, what were those earlier occasions? Will he elaborate upon the words in that memorandum "You will recall"? How long in advance did the Minister of Finance know?


John Carr Munro: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member for Yellowhead-


John Carr Munro: -must have heard the Minister of Finance when he gave that very explanation in his opening ramarks. Let me just tell the Hon. Member that the Minister of Finance clearly stated to the House that he obviously must have been familiar with the situation to the degree it was brought to his attention, but he forgot, and he has explained all the dealings he had. Why, it would be totally impossible for any Minister to recall all those events in a portfolio as busy as that. However, that is not the point.
What I really said about the memorandum was "Show me". Of course, this is where the fundamental weakness rests with the Official Opposition. Nowhere in that dissertation of the Leader of the Opposition, including his utilization of the document, did he back up his so-called or alleged facts with any evidence. I challenge him, turning his challenge back to him. I assume that the previous Leader of the Conservative Party also read the document. Would he show me where there is any basis for coming to the conclusion that there has been any breach of the guidelines in the memorandum? That is the point at issue.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: I have a problem. The House will realize that it is one o'clock, and accordingly 1 do now leave the chair until two o'clock this afternoon.
At 1 p.m. the House took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The House resumed at 2 p.m.
Erik Nielsen: "Right Hon."


Some Hon. Members:: Right on.


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, I will have-

February 24, 1983



STATEMENTS PURSUANT TO S.O. 21


Mr. Gaston Gourde (Levis):: Madam Speaker, the House of Commons is under the attack of head hunters, and their designated target is the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde). In view of the fact that the Progressive Conservative Party has been falling apart at the seams since the recent convention, an orchestrated campaign is being launched by the remnants of that party in exile in an attempt to undermine the credibility of the Government. They have been slinging mud every which way, hoping that somebody, anybody, will be the victim of their tactics. Those Members have spent and will remain a long time on the Opposition benches, and they have become experts at muckraking.
In my opinion, Madam Speaker, their attitude flies in the face of basic parliamentary principles. It will be necessary to call Canadians as witnesses to put an end once and for all to those remarks. Anyone spitting into the wind may well get it in the eye, and that is something the big names of the Opposition ought to know by now.



CANADIAN ARMED FORCES


Mr. Gus Mitges (Grey-Simcoe):: Madam Speaker, the Royal Canadian Legion and its membership across Canada have expressed deep concern regarding our country's ability to discharge our military obligations adequately, should the occasion arise.
Reports have indicated that our Armed Forces at this point in time are extremely undermanned and lacking in sufficient modern arms and equipment.
Although the purposes and objectives of the Royal Canadian Legion are to strive for peace, good will, and friendship among all nations, the Legion also advocates the maintenance by Canada of adequate and sufficient forces on land, sea and air for our defence, and to discharge faithfully our obligations regarding our commitment to NATO and to our partners in the Commonwealth. Therefore it is the hope of the Royal Canadian Legion and its members, and I believe of all concerned Canadians, that the government and the Department of National Defence will give serious consideration to this concern and give it the highest priority in their deliberations.



EMPLOYMENT


Mr. Denis Ethier (Glengarry-Prescott-Russell):: Madam Speaker, since the Hawkesbury CIP mill closed down last December 1st, 450 people have been out of work. Those people are honest and eager to work, they do not think that unemployment insurance benefits are a solution, and they have not lost their willingness and their eagerness to get back to work. Quite the contrary. A group of unemployment CIP workers recently appeared before their municipal council with the following message, and I quote:
Mr. Mayor and members of the council:
We have been without work for nearly two months and we wish to make a proposal which, we hope, will interest you. We, the undersigned, agree to work without pay on any project we would deem worthwhile in the interest of the people of Hawkesbury and the surrounding area.
Fully aware of our limited skills, we humbly offer our services in the Firm belief that, thanks to your ample resources, we will be able to do some good for the community.
This message was signed by 15 people whom I commend for their initiative, namely: Yvon Laliberte, Lucille Dubois, Robert Sauve, Robert Hughes, Alvarez Laliberte, Jacques Parent, Roch Parent, Jean-Paul Marinier, Denis Leclair, Daniel Gauthier, Mario Lafrance, Guy Lauzon, Lucien Sabourin, Roger Laframboise and Abbey Massia.
I urge unemployed workers in the various communities of Canada to do the same.
*  *



AGRICULTURE


Mr. Len Gustafson (Assiniboia):: Madam Speaker, I rise to make a statement to the House on an important matter as it relates to the economy of the farming community but which, if endorsed, would have an important, positive impact on the whole country.
Canadian farmers face in the next year a critical decrease in the price of wheat in the international marketplace. Given the serious increase in the cost of production which is approximately 25 per cent, and the world wheat price falling approximately one dollar a bushel, bringing farm net income down approximately 25 per cent in this current year, it is most important at this time that the floor price of domestically consumed wheat be increased. I therefore call upon the Government of Canada, through the responsible Minister, to set the floor price of domestic red spring wheat and Durum at seven dollars a bushel for the crop year beginning August 1, 1982.

February 24, 1983



LABOUR CONDITIONS

[Stage Direction]
CLOSURE OF MacMILLAN-BLOEDEL LUMBER MILL AT CHEMAINUS, B.C.
Mir. Jim Manly (Cowichan-Malahat-The Islands): Madam Speaker, yesterday MacMillan-Bloedel Limited announced the permanent closure of its mill at Chemainus, British Columbia, with the loss of more than 600 jobs. In the past two decades MacMillan-Bloedel has taken money made in British Columbia to finance expansion into Europe, Malaysia, Brazil, and Alabama. Now it tells 600 workers that they are no longer of any use. It deprives the town of Chemainus of an economic base, but it continues to hold 309,000 prime acres of forest in Tree Farm 19 on the east coast of Vancouver Island. It continues to control a total of 2.8 million acres of B.C. forests.
MacMillan-Bloedel must be called to account for its exploitation of human labour and natural resources and its callous disregard for the human and social consequences of its policies. The people of Chemainus demand action from both the federal and provincial Governments. I call on the federal Government to require corporations making profits from Canadian resources to reinvest substantial funds in Canadian plant and technology. I further call on the Province of British Columbia to take all steps necessary, including expropriation of Tree Farm 19, to ensure that a sawmill will continue to operate at Chemainus.

[ Translation]


Joseph Roger Rémi Bujold: Madam Speaker, 1 should like to bring to the attention of the Government and the House a ticklish situation which is developing in the Magdalen Islands which are part of my riding. As you know, the European Parliament and a number of EEC ministers have banned the sale of all goods containing seal pelts from their respective countries, which is resulting in very serious hardship for the people in the Magdalen Islands, especially in view of the fact that some 700 residents will be forced to give up hunting altogether this year and face a loss of income of approximately $500,000. With this money, Madam Speaker, they would have been able to prepare for the opening of the new fishing season scheduled for early May and get the additional income they need to support their families.
Therefore, Madam Speaker, I urge the government to see to it that the seal hunt takes place this year as usual by, first of all, disregarding the essentially groundless arguments which ecology conscious people have put forward in Europe, and also by seeking other markets for seal pelt goods.



THE CONSTITUTION


Mr. John McDermid (Brampton-Georgetown):: Madam Speaker, we in the P.C. Party believe that one of the cornerstones of our free and democratic society is the right to own and enjoy property in this great land, Canada.
During the committee discussions on Canada's Constitution, my colleague, the Hon. Member for Wellington-Dufferin-Simcoe (Mr. Beatty), on behalf of our Party introduced an amendment on January 23, 1981, covering property rights. It read:
Everyone has the right to life, liberty, security of the person and enjoyment of property and the right not to be deprived thereof except in accordance with principles of natural justice.
This amendment was accepted by the present Solicitor General (Mr. Kaplan) on behalf of the Government on a Friday, and then rejected by the now Minister of Energy (Mr. Chretien) on the following Monday. Why? Because the Liberals succumbed to blackmail by the socialist hordes on my left who threatened to withdraw their support if this amendment was included in the Charter. So, true to form, the Liberals withdrew the amendment. Now the Government has a golden opportunity to rectify the situation because it does not need the support of the New Democratic Party.
1 am urging the Government to support this addition to the Constitution and include property rights on its formal agenda of March 15 and 16, when next it gets together with the Provinces to discuss amendments to the Constitution. It is a basic right in Canada to own and enjoy property and must be included in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.



CORPORATE AFFAIRS


Mr. Rod Murphy (Churchill):: Madam Speaker, I rise to protest the actions of the Minister of State for Finance (Mr. Cosgrove) in approving the sale of the Winnipeg based Monarch Life Assurance Company to the Toronto based North American Life Assurance Co. This action threatens the job prospects of over 300 employees in Manitoba and transfers the control of investments of over $447 million from western Canada to Toronto. Monarch Life Assurance Company is 100 per cent owned by Canwest Capital Corporation in western Canada, which is headed by former the Liberal Leader in Manitoba, Izzy Asper, and is financed with the help of the taxpayers of Canada through a 46 per cent ownership by CDC.
I call upon the Ministers responsible to explain why taxpayers are paying for 46 per cent of Canwest Corporation when it portrays itself as being a western investment corporation, and

February 24, 1983
at the same time is selling off western assets, western jobs and western investment prospects to eastern Canada?



EDUCATION


Mr. Robert Bockstael (St. Boniface):: Madam Speaker, toward the end of 1981, and again about this time last year, we heard a great deal about how much the federal Government was "cutting back" on its transfers to the provincial Governments for health and post-secondary education. The Deputy Prime Minister and Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. MacEachen) rejected those charges at the time as totally unfounded, and the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) said that our transfers for the coming fiscal year would increase more rapidly than the rate of over-all federal expenditures.
There is proof of these statements in the Main Estimates tabled on Tuesday, which show a 20.9 per cent increase in our transfers to the Provinces for these purposes. We are providing them with $6.32 billion, an increase of $1.15 billion over current cash outlays. This is $160 million more than originally anticipated, because we are protecting the Provinces against the decline of tax revenues. So let there be no more talk about how badly the Provinces have been treated in these very difficult times.



FREEZING OF DOMESTIC OIL PRICE URGED

Mr. Bill Yurko (Edmonton East):: Madam Speaker, it is becoming increasingly evident that world oil prices will be subjected to severe buffeting and wild fluctuations in the near future. Such price gyrations, mainly in a downward direction, will give rise to accentuated world economic instability, both internationally and domestically, in many countries.
In Canada the formula for establishing domestic oil prices contained in the September, 1981, Canada-Alberta oil agreement is redundant. It is imperative that domestic oil price stability be maintained for the next several years to assist in the economic recovery of the nation. Therefore, Madam Speaker, may I suggest that an agreement be reached immediately to fix or freeze the Canadian domestic oil price at its current level of $29.75 per barrel for the lifetime of the Ottawa-Alberta agreement which expires in 1986. Such an agreement should be pursued and finalized during the meeting between the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) and Premier Lougheed on Monday.
Oral Questions



HUMAN RIGHTS


Mr. Andre Maltais (Manicouagan):: Madam Speaker, I would like to draw the attention of the House to Bill 111 which was passed in Quebec not long ago. A number of editorial writers and commentators have pointed out this was the first time that human rights and freedoms were legislated away. However, I would like to inform the House that it is actually the second time the Province of Quebec has ignored the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, in fact, it has happened before, when Bill 37 amalgamated Baie-Comeau and Hauterive. At the time, the people of Baie-Comeau were prevented from holding meetings, thus limiting their right of assembly. The citizens of Baie-Comeau then asked the Minister of Justice to be particularly vigilant with respect to the rights of Quebecers.
Madam Speaker, I therefore wish to ask the Minister of Justice (Mr. MacGuigan) who is in the House today, to be particularly attentive to the rights of Quebecers, because in this country of ours, all Canadians should be equal before the law and have the same privileges and legal recognition.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Flora Isabel MacDonald: Madam Speaker, my question is directed to the Prime Minister. On February 17 the Prime Minister informed the House that the first time the Minister of Finance became aware of the Scotia Coal Synfuels Project was, and I quote from Hansard at page 22933:
-the first knowledge he had to this arrangement was on September 3, 1981.
Yesterday the Prime Minister came into the House and informed us that that information had been misleading and that in fact the Minister of Finance had known of the transaction as early as January, 1981. Would the Prime Minister inform the House if he is standing by that information which he gave us yesterday? Is that the date the Minister first was aware of it?


Right Hon. P. E. Trudeau (Prime Minister):: Madam Speaker, I heard the Minister answer that question this morning, and my answer is in the affirmative.

February 24, 1983
23174_________________________________
Oral Questions DEPUTY MINISTER'S MEMORANDUM OF JANUARY, 1981


Flora Isabel MacDonald: Madam Speaker, the Prime Minister says that the Minister first was aware of this transaction in January, 1981. He will have looked at the memorandum from the Deputy Minister to the then Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources, now the Minister of Finance. The memorandum addressed to the Minister, dated January 15, 1981, states:
You will recall that Mr. Gillespie has organized the Scotia Coal Synfuels Project whose object is to study the possibilities for the liquefaction of coal in Cape Breton-
1 would like to know what the Prime Minister makes of that statement which says that his Minister of Finance would have recalled that transaction before January 15, and whether or not, over night or today, he has questioned the Minister of Finance to see what date it was that he knew, before January 15.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, 1 have not questioned the Minister. I repeat, I heard him answer questions very clearly this morning that that was the earliest recollection he had of any knowledge as acquired from the documents themselves of the transaction. The House heard the Minister go on to say that he was not swearing that there had not been any previous knowledge, he just had no recollection of it. The Minister went on to make the point, which I make, that in this sense dates are irrelevant from the point of view of that Minister, since he is bound, regardless of dates, by the guidelines which say there should be no privileged access.


Flora Isabel MacDonald: I find the Prime Minister's answer incredible when in the first instance his defence of the Minister was made on the basis of dates which he provided to the House.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


STATEMENT BY MINISTER OF FINANCE IN NOVEMBER, 1980
Flora Isabel MacDonald: I would like to ask the Prime Minister, since he cannot have it both ways, since he cannot argue that the dates matter one way one day and they do not matter another day, has he followed up the question which was put to him yesterday, by my colleague, the Hon. Member for Don Valley West, with respect to the Minister's statement before the Committee on Alternative Energy and Oil Substitution on November 25, 1980, when the Minister indicated that he was aware of projects being undertaken by Petro-Canada with regard to coal liquefaction? Has he followed up on that particular request to find out if the Minister was aware that one of those coal liquefaction projects was indeed the one in Cape Breton?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: No, Madam Speaker, 1 have not. 1 took note that we were having a debate
today on this whole subject and that the Minister was subject to questioning. I would have thought that the Hon. Member could have inquired directly from the Minister.


Flora Isabel MacDonald: The Prime Minister shirks his responsibility.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: If the question was not asked by one of the Opposition or not asked by the hon. lady from Kingston, maybe she is shirking her responsibility.
As to the question of dates, I want to clear up that matter. It is true that on the first day that this was raised, February 16, without any prior notice, and certainly without any occasion for me to refer to the guidelines which had been issued some few years before, I was listening to questions and attempting to answer them in terms of the questions asked.
I note that in the second round of questions on the first day the subject was raised, February 16, the Hon. Member for Calgary Centre feeds into his question the problem of two years as being a critical date. Then there is an exchange between myself and the Hon. Member for Yukon as to what the dates are. Then the Hon. Member for Calgary Centre comes back with dates again.
1 just want to say that not having had notice of the subject, being told that in some way two years was a critical period, not having the guidelines before me, I said well, if two years is critical, it appears from the facts that are being alleged that it has been more than two years, so 1 was answering with the defence in terms of the accusations made.
Since then the accusations have become more precise. They have referred not to the post-employment guidelines but to the role of the Minister himself. The Minister this morning, and certainly the Deputy Prime Minister and myself have all conceded that the dates are irrelevant, that a Minister is bound in his dealings with former office holders whether it is a period of six months or two years.


REASON FOR PRIME MINISTER CORRECTING STATEMENT
Flora Isabel MacDonald: Madam Speaker, if the dates are irrelevant, why did the Prime Minister consider it necessary to come into the House yesterday to correct what he said previously?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, quite obviously, because I had-


Flora Isabel MacDonald: Misled the House.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: The Hon. Member says "misled the House". I used the words myself yesterday. I had given a date to the House based on some information which appeared to be wrong. I can hardly see how the Hon. Member can seriously fault me for having set that information right and, at the same time, reproach me with talking of dates. Dates are the area in which there was wrong information. Therefore it was surely my duty to set it right at the first opportunity.
February 24, 1983


STATEMENT IN DEPUTY MINISTER'S MEMORANDUM
Hon. Perrin Beatty (Wellington-Dufferin-Simcoe):: Madam Speaker, in the memo from the Deputy Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources of January 15, 1981, the following statement is made:
In anticipation of this development, provision was made during the planning stage of the National Energy Program for a maximum of $1 million to be available for federal participation in this project.
In view of the fact it is directly relevant to the debate here today at what point the Minister of Finance became knowledgeable about this project and about Mr. Gillespie's involvement, can the Prime Minister tell the House whether he has any reason to believe that, if specific reference was made in the NEP in the early planning stages of it, in the summer or fall of 1980, the Minister of Energy at the time would not have understood that Mr. Gillespie was involved and should have asked questions about conflict of interest?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, 1 did not realize the question was addressed to me. 1 believe that was only mentioned at the end. Would the Hon. Member repeat the whole question, please?


Henry Perrin Beatty: Gladly, Madam Speaker, because it is an important one. I know the Prime Minister would want to give a straight answer to the House. The memorandum from Mr. Cohen to the present Minister of Finance said explicitly that, in the early planning stages of the NEP, the Minister of Finance and the Department had written in provision for this specific project to the tune of $1 million. Does the Prime Minister think there is any reason to believe that that is the case, that the present Minister of Finance would not have known about this deal and about Mr. Gillespie's involvement in the summer or fall of 1980, and that he should have been asking questions about conflict of interest?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I cannot say, Madam Speaker. I do not have the documents in front of me to which the Hon. Member refers, and I will not fall into the error I made on the first day, of answering questions on the basis of the questions asked. I would like to know what the million dollars refers to. Maybe it refers to this, maybe it does not. Maybe Mr. Gillespie was kept in somebody's mind, maybe he was not. 1 do not know.


ROLE OF ALASTAIR GILLESPIE IN DEALING WITH DEPARTMENT
John Edward Broadbent: Madam Speaker, I have a question for the Prime Minister. Yesterday in this House the Prime Minister was reluctant to agree that Mr. Gillespie was indulging in what many, I think, have appropriately called lobbying. Since then, following the tabling of documents in the House, new information has emerged. I would like to ask the Prime Minister a question based on that.
In March of 1981 the Department of Energy officials expressed concern that the oil substitution agreement was not intended to cover the coal liquefaction proposal made by Mr. Gillespie. As a result, following representations made by Mr. Oral Questions
Gillespie, an entirely new agreement was entered into in order to qualify Mr. Gillespie's proposal. Would the Prime Minister not agree that this action is as clear as possible an illustration of lobbying, and also agree that this is proof positive that special favour indeed was given to Mr. Gillespie?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, on the first point about lobbying, it seems to me that there is nothing in the documents referred to by the Hon. Member which indicates there was lobbying or that Mr. Gillespie came back in March, 1981. It is the officials themselves, looking at a submission to Treasury Board, redesigning it, and having the Minister sign a document again. It seems to me that this indicates that the officials were on their toes, that they were making sure that the submission was correct and in conformity with government policy, that they were alert to any possibility of conflict of interest guidelines. That is the reason why they specified in the amended contract that Mr. Gillespie would have no access to the funds which were allocated for the substitution program by the Government of Canada to the Government of Nova Scotia.


John Edward Broadbent: I would say to the Prime Minister the officials certainly were on their toes. They took the action that they thought was appropriate and necessary in order to qualify Mr. Gillespie for the proposal. It was the clearest possible case that Mr. Gillespie got from the Government of Canada what no other citizen got. That is what they did. Anyone who believes the contrary is just kidding himself.


FORMER ENERGY MINISTER'S SUBMISSIONS TO TREASURY BOARD
John Edward Broadbent: Madam Speaker, I would like to ask the Prime Minister a question flowing from the same information which was tabled in the House yesterday. On April 13, 1981, the then Minister of Energy sent a submission on this project to Treasury Board. The same submission was suddenly withdrawn when questions were raised about Mr. Gillespie's participation in it. In September, safely three months past Mr. Gillespie's two-year time limit, a new revised submission over the present Minister of Finance's signature was submitted to Treasury Board. Can the Prime Minister deny that this this was anything but a cynical attempt to avoid his own guidelines?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, now the Hon. Member is, I think, making an accusation about privileged access having taken place by officials. That is a serious accusation. If he is seriously making it, I will ask the Minister to inquire into that aspect of it. It is significant that the Hon. Member is talking of officials. They are the ones who prepared a submission for the then Minister. They are the ones who had him sign it. They are the ones who withdrew it when they thought that there might be some privilege given to Mr. Gillespie. My reading of the document is that they acted in a laudatory fashion by withdrawing it and

February 24, 1983
Oral Questions
making sure that the submission was written in a way that Mr. Gillespie could not have access to public funds.


QUERY RESPECTING PURPOSE OF MINISTERIAL CONDUCT GUIDELINES
John Edward Broadbent: Madam Speaker, the Prime Minister is confusing two facts. First, it is true that officials rewrote the document so that the money could be laundered in a certain way to get to Mr. Gillespie, leaving the appearance that the guidelines were enforced. It is also true that the proposal was changed in substance, technically, so that, quite apart from the financing, Mr. Gillespie's proposal would qualify.
Does the Prime Minister prepare guidelines for moral behaviour for his Ministers with the intent that they be enforced, or is it all part of a cynical exercise by the Prime Minister himself?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, the Hon. Member asks a rhetorical question and I will not deal with it, but I will certainly deal with the preamble.
He says that the agreement, the submission, was rewritten so that the money would get to Mr. Gillespie. If he is making an accusation there, I suggest he is dead wrong. The agreement was rewritten, the submission was rewritten so that the money would not get to Mr. Gillespie. If he has some information-


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I see the Leader of the New Democratic Party is shaking his head. If he has some shred of evidence that Mr. Gillespie has touched this money, got one single cent of it, then he should make that accusation. So far we only have headshaking.


John Edward Broadbent: Nonsense.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: What I see, Madam Speaker, is a group of officials acting in advice to their Minister, who want to make sure that the Oil Substitution Program is effective and that a program, judged to be beneficial for Nova Scotia by the Premier of Nova Scotia, can be brought into effect.
I think the officials, once again, were acting in a laudatory fashion when they made sure there should be no phoney accusations or conflict of interest and yet that the program proceed as it did.


DATE OF FORMER ENERGY MINISTER'S AWARENESS OF PROJECT
Mr. John Bosley (Don Valley West):: Madam Speaker, I have a question for the Prime Minister who has been informed today in the House that his then Minister of Energy appeared before the Alternate Energy Committee on November 25,
1980, and that recommendations were made in the planning stages of the National Energy Program to provide funds for this project which, I would assume, the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Energy at the time would have to know about.
Since the document on which the Prime Minister relied from the Minister of Finance yesterday said that rather than knowing for the first time later, he knew in fact for the first time in January, 1981, and since the evidence is clear that the Minister of Finance, if he was performing his duties, knew before that date, will the Prime Minister tell the House of Commons today whether he still maintains that he and the Minister of Finance are telling the truth to this House when they say that the then Minister of Energy knew nothing about this project before January, 1981?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, if the Hon. Member was following the debate closely he would have heard my answer to a previous question along those lines from the Hon. Member for Wellington-Dufferin-Simcoe, I believe, and the statements of the Minister of Finance in answer to a question from a Member of the Opposition Party this morning on that same subject. The Minister said that, as far as he could recollect, there was no information conveyed to him before. He admitted-


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: No, no! He did not say that.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: He admitted that he might be wrong in his recollection-


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Get another letter from him.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: -but he went on to concede that even if he had had information before, or if he had had it only months later, he would not use that as a defence. The guidelines themselves do not talk of a defence in terms of any elapse of time. The guidelines make it imperative upon a present office holder dealing with a former office holder that there be no privileged access. That is what the debate should rest on, not on the elapse of time.


John William Bosley: Madam Speaker, the Prime Minister, sooner or later, is going to have to deal with the fact that there is every reason to believe that the certifications that have been made to the House have been part of a cover-up and have misled the House.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John William Bosley: And that the question of whether the House has been misled is quite a different breach of parliamentary privilege.


An Hon. Member:: Oh, come on!
February 24, 1983


PROVISION OF FUNDS
John William Bosley: Madam Speaker, I have a supplementary question. Since the Deputy Minister says that funds were provided in the planning stage for this project-I quote, "for this project"-and since the national energy plan when it came out on October 28 did provide funds for this project, why should any thinking Canadian believe that a consortium that was formed the day after, on October 29, did not, in fact, have advance knowledge of what was in the budget itself?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, the Hon. Member makes something of the fact that the House has been misled and seems to have some accusation in the back of his mind. I conceded this morning that the information given to the House in the first instance-I conceded that yesterday-was wrong. If the Hon. Member wants to say that the House has been misled, he can. He should also add that the House was given the information to make sure that that error was corrected, which I did.


SIGNING OF CONSORTIUM AGREEMENT IN OCTOBER, 1980
Mr. Jim Hawkes (Calgary West):: Madam Speaker, the Prime Minister brought up the issue of privileged access. On October 28 at 8 p.m. the Finance Minister stood in this House and announced at page 84 of the National Energy Program and at page 9 of his speech that there would be special funds to utilize Cape Breton coal. Part of that would be to turn coal into liquid fuels.
The very next day the former Minister of Energy signed the consortium agreement, with one of the partners being Petro-Canada.
Does the Prime Minister expect the House to believe that they had no advance knowledge of what would be in that budget? Is there a budget leak? Was there a budget leak, or was there not?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, the Hon. Member is talking about October 20 but he has not mentioned the year. I imagine he is talking about 1980.


Frederick James (Jim) Hawkes: 1980.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: If he is now complaining about a budget leak which took place in 1980 and asking me about it, I would say I have no recollection. But they would be pretty dumb ninnies over there if they had not noticed that there was a budget leak until three years after.


BUDGET ANNOUNCEMENT IN OCTOBER, 1980
Frederick James (Jim) Hawkes: Madam Speaker, the Prime Minister will know that in the month of October, 1980, seven of the nine members of the Board of Directors of Petro-Canada were appointed by Mr. Gillespie and were still serving. They included Mickey Cohen and Ian Stewart.
Oral Questions
I ask the Prime Minister again, is it reasonable to assume that on October 29, 1980 a consortium could reach an agreement to take advantage of a $1 million fund which the then Minister of Finance announced to this House the preceding evening after eight o'clock saying that the money would be available? Does that not stretch the concept of privileged access just a little bit?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, it obviously has not struck any Member of the Opposition or any member in the media or anybody in the country for some years. There is probably some explanation that I do not know, but it cannot be only the dumbness of the people over there. It must be that in some way the funds were available under a pre-established program. As a matter of fact we know that this program goes back to 1977. The funds were there since 1977.1 do not see what inference can be made as to a leak when the project was discussed or talked about some three-some years after the fund had been established.


EMPLOYMENT
Mr. Jean-Guy Dubois (Lotbiniere):: Madam Speaker, I would like to change the subject and talk about job creation, which might be more interesting for Canadians, especially for students. My question is directed to the Minister of Employment and Immigration and concerns the student job creation program called Young Canada Works. First of all, could the Minister inform the House today how much has been set aside in this year's budget for student job creation, and second, how much will be spent by the Province of Quebec?
Furthermore, we have heard that March 4 was to be the cut off date. Could the Minsiter inform the House whether there will be an extension for submitting Young Canada Works projects?


Hon. Lloyd Axworthy (Minister of Employment and Immigration):: Madam Speaker, I am pleased to inform the House that the Minister of Finance, who has a keen interest in the well-being of Canada's youth, has announced that he has earmarked $170 million for the Summer Canada program.

I just want to add that that major new allocation of funds for students in this country will allow us to employ upwards of 70,000 young people, divided between 10,000 going to special internship programs in the federal Government, the private sector and the non-profit sector, another 13,000 to go into work in internships with the Department of National Defence

February 24, 1983
Oral Questions
and the RCMP, and 41,000 to be working in community-sponsored projects.
We will be sending out letters to Members of Parliament at the beginning of the week to give their constituency allocations. I can indicate that the minimum for those constituencies will be doubled over last year, all in recognition of the importance the Government places on getting back to the nation's business, which is putting people back to work.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: Students want jobs, but they also want an ethical Government.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


THE ADMINISTRATION
Ian Gardiner Waddell: Madam Speaker, my next question is directed to the Prime Minister. I would ask him to follow the money in this situation. I wonder if he would note that in October, 1980, Mr. Gillespie was paid $30,000 as a retainer, and $600 per day. According to the documents which were released yesterday, that we did not have three years ago, Mr. A. W. Gillespie collected $4,237.50 for work on the project, the Scotia Coal Synfuels Project, in January, 1981.
In view of the fact that he dealt with a former Deputy Minister, in view of the fact that he clearly received personal benefits-this was just the beginning and he will get some later-and in view of the fact that the program was changed for his benefit, would the Prime Minister please indicate to me and to other ordinary Canadians what is in these guidelines? Is this not a violation of the guidelines on Mr. Gillespie's part?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, the Hon. Member has a document. Could he indicate by whom the money was paid to Mr. Gillespie?


Ian Gardiner Waddell: Well, yes, it was paid to the project and from the project which indirectly-


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Some Hon. Members:: Who paid? Who paid?


Ian Gardiner Waddell: They are in the documents; read the documents.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Ian Gardiner Waddell: Madam Speaker, I am quoting from the documents the Prime Minister tabled yesterday. What I am saying is that there were benefits paid to Mr. Gillespie-


Marc Lalonde: By whom?


Ian Gardiner Waddell: -and there seems to be a change in the program when it was put to the Treasury Board after the officials noted that there was an obvious problem with Mr. Gillespie being a former Minister.


REQUEST THAT TREASURY BOARD MINUTES BE TABLED
Ian Gardiner Waddell: Madam Speaker, I have a supplementary question. The Prime Minister can read the documents that he tabled; the documents are very helpful but they are not complete. Is he prepared to table before the House the real documents which will tell the real story, that is, the Treasury Board minutes of April, 1981, wherein the officials' objections were noted and the project was substantially changed so that they could launder the money to Gillespie?


ROLE OF ALASTAIR GILLESPIE
Hon. Elmer M. MacKay (Central Nova):: Madam Speaker, I would like to pursue with the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources an answer which he gave me on Tuesday with respect to the role of Alastair Gillespie. He responded to me by saying:
-Mr. Gillespie's contribution was to persuade the various partners in this project-
And he mentioned the Government of Nova Scotia. However, he did not mention Petro-Canada or Devco. I want to ask him if he is familiar with the definition of lobby in the Oxford Dictionary, which is synonymous with "seek to persuade". With the benefit of that, persuade/lobby being synonymous, I would like to ask the Minister whether, on the basis of the memorandum which has already been referred to, he would not agree that the Province of Nova Scotia, whose desire to create jobs and to develop coal was evident, was used to wash the money through or shelter this project in a clumsy subterfuge to keep the guidelines from applying to Alastair Gillespie.
[ Translation]


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Madam Speaker, unfortunately, I did not wade through the Oxford dictionary to find synonyms and definitions of "dog food". I shall, however, answer the Hon. Member's question regarding Mr. Gillespie's role, and I shall also be dealing with this a little later this afternoon. Mr. Gillespie initially had talks with the Nova Scotia Minister of Energy whom he met in April 1980. Subsequently there were several meetings with the Premier of Nova Scotia, which means that Mr. Gillespie started working with the people who would be initially funding the project, namely, the Government of Nova Scotia, and it was not until later on that he got in touch with the Federal Government and made representations for the implementation of a program that is open to everyone, and Mr. Gillespie did not receive any special privileges. He represented
February 24, 1983

a group that was interested in developing a project that had been considered in Nova Scotia for many years. When the present Minister of State (International Trade) was Premier, Mr. Buchanan, the then Leader of the Opposition, asked him about the feasibility of carrying out this project. Thus, the project that Mr. Gillespie, together with other people, decided to promote in the best interests of the people of Nova Scotia was not a new project.


Elmer MacIntosh MacKay: Madam Speaker, I did not quite get the last of the Minister's answer, but I think he said in the best interests of presumably everyone.


USE OF FUNDS ALLOCATED TO NOVA SCOTIA
Elmer MacIntosh MacKay: Madam Speaker, I wonder if the Minister is aware of a comment by his former Cabinet colleague, Eric Kierans, who said that what he put together was a minimal investment at a minimal risk and was really at the expense of the Canadian people, whether they were Nova Scotians or whether they were Canadians under the federal Government. I wonder whether Mr. Kierans' sentiments are now, with the benefit of mature reflection, shared by the present Minister of Energy, and if he intends, even at this late stage, to do anything about it to take away some of the ironies, whereby this money that was supposed to be spent to develop jobs for Cape Bretoners has been siphoned back to Toronto for the benefit of Alastair Gillespie.
Hon. Jean Chretien (Minister of Energy, Mines and
Resources): Madam Speaker, I think it is a very bad reflection on the Premier of Nova Scotia, Mr. Buchanan-


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: [DOT]-who has all along been supporting this project. I was talking yesterday with Mr. Buchanan about it, and I asked him if he was in favour of trying to be less dependent on imported fuel and if he was in favour of this project.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: What did he say?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Fine, you can laugh if you want, but I talked with Mr. Buchanan yesterday. He said that it is a vital project for the future of Nova Scotia. I am glad that at least one Member from Nova Scotia is getting up, because for weeks and months they were all silent about it. He is the first one to get up, but he is well known for what he does. He called his Leader, the former Leader, dog food. I am not surprised that he tried to throw dirt on somebody else.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!
Oral Questions


THE PREMIER OF NOVA SCOTIA
Maurice Adrian Dionne: Madam Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources. Since it has been suggested that the Government used the Government of Nova Scotia as a shield to make a profit for Mr. Gillespie, does the Minister share the view of the Hon. Member for Central Nova that the Premier and Government of Nova Scotia are that stupid?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Madam Speaker, even if I have politically disagreed with Mr. Buchanan many times since he has been Premier, I have to tell you that I consider Mr. Buchanan a gentleman and a very honourable public servant.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Madam Speaker:: Order, please.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Madam Speaker, I think I have to add to my answer.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Madam Speaker:: Order, please. I know that the Hon. Minister's afterthoughts are terrific, but he had resumed his seat.


QUERY RESPECTING APPEARANCE OF FAVOURS
Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: Madam Speaker, I should like to direct my question to the Right Hon. Prime Minister. On Tuesday of this week when the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources was asked what was Mr. Gillespie's involvement, he said, as reported at page 23093 of Hansard'.
I think Mr. Gillespie's contribution was to persuade the various partners in this project-
After reading the documents in which there is a lot of reference to Treasury Board minutes, that changes had to be made and that new Treasury Board submissions had to be ordered, I would like to ask the Prime Minister whether he is still convinced, now that he in his own mind has put the time frame out of this issue as being non-important, that at this stage as well, through all those documents, there was not the appearance that special favours were being granted.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, the Hon. Member, as have others, made much of the fact that the submission was changed. Indeed it was, but in a way that would discriminate against Mr. Gillespie. This indicates, indeed, that the officials were conscious of the guidelines, and this, indeed, indicates that with regard to former office holders the two-year period or the one-year period, depending on the particular action, is a relevant one. But that is with regard to former office holders.
I can only express, I repeat, admiration that the officials would have had the presence of mind to dig up the guidelines

February 24, 1983
Oral Questions
as they related to former office holders and to make sure, in order to protect the Minister, that there would be no suspicion of advantage given to Mr. Gillespie. That is why there was a change. It was not a change made to accommodate Mr. Gillespie; it was a change made to discriminate against him to make sure that he could not receive funds from the $ 1 million which is in the control of the Government of Nova Scotia.


REQUEST THAT PRIME MINISTER SEEK RESIGNATION OF MINISTER OF FINANCE
Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: Madam Speaker, what we are dealing with here is not the narrow view of legality but the question of whether the Government has the ability to continue governing.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: In view of the example of Lord Carrington when he resigned from the British Cabinet, because he failed to foresee the Argentine invasion of the Falklands, and who wrote:
In my view much of the criticism is unfounded but I have been responsible for the conduct of that policy and I think it right that I should resign.
Does the Prime Minister not feel at this stage that his Government is so weakened and its credibility in the eyes of the Canadian people is so tarnished that he must call for the resignation of his Minister of Finance?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, in so far as the Canadian public are concerned, I hope that they will listen in full to the debate in this House. I particularly hope they will listen to the speech made this morning by the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development-


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: -so they can judge as to the moral right to govern. As to the ability to govern, Madam Speaker, I suggest that question will be put at 5.45 p.m. tonight and we will see the answer.


ACCOUNTING MECHANISM USED IN MAKING PAYMENTS
Erik Nielsen: Madam Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the Prime Minister. He has stressed on more than one occasion that all of the moneys of the partners to the consortium went into the Consolidated Revenue Fund of the Province of Nova Scotia, that is, the federal contribution as well as the contributions of the two federal Crown Corporations responsible to Parliament and the Contributions of the other members of the consortium. The Prime Minister is also familiar with Clause 4 of the
agreement requiring invoices to be submitted from time to time by the consortium and paid out of that fund.
Can the Prime Minister explain to the House the accounting mechanics by which a cheque written on that fund in payment of the invoices of the consortium would exclude any federal contributions of the federal treasury or the two Crown Corporations involved? By what mechanics could they sort out the individual hundred dollar bills, thousand dollar bills, or whatever, that went to pay the invoices, by cheque, of the consortium?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, of course I said nothing of the kind that was attributed to me by the Hon. Member for the Yukon. I merely said that federal funds under the agreement, some, I believe, $9.3 million at the outset, were transferred to the Government of Nova Scotia to be held by it in a bank in that Province and to be disbursed only with its authority. Those are funds that come from the taxpayers of Canada, the Government of Canada. As to funds which might come from the consortium itself, of course, we have no control over that. It is obviously from those funds that Mr. Gillespie was paid, not from the slush fund of the former Right Hon. Leader of the Opposition.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


POLICY ON ALTERNATE FORMS OF ENERGY
Erik Nielsen: Madam Speaker, I have one further question for the Prime Minister. It concerns the policy defined in 1977 which was for the purpose of seeking alternate forms of energy in order to diminish reliance on imported oil for the purpose of generating electricity. That is the definition of the policy applicable in 1977. By what authority can a preamble to an agreement, the agreement of June, take that policy, narrowly defined for the purpose of generating electricity, and enlarge it for the purpose of liquefying coal to produce petroleum products for other purposes?
While answering that question, could the Prime Minister also explain, in his opinion, whether he feels that the Appropriation Act passed by Parliament to allot the funds for that purpose has also been amended by a preamble to that agreement which I described?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: The Hon. Member asks me if I feel that. The answer is no, Madam Speaker.


Erik Nielsen: What about the first part?


POSITION OF MINISTER OF FINANCE
Raymond John Skelly: Madam Speaker, my question today for the Minister of Finance is sort of prefaced by the statement that no code of conduct and no criminal code can compel activities that are honourable or have integrity. Does the Minister of Finance recognize that the
February 24, 1983

issue before us today is an issue of crisis of confidence in the Government and in this institution? Does the Minister recognize further that his resignation would not besmirch his character or the Government but it would simply clarify the crisis of confidence and allow this Parliament to stop tearing itself to pieces and proceed with the business of the people?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, when someone has a pang of conscience usually it strikes you immediately when you see something happening not 23 months after the event as the Opposition is doing at the present time.


REQUEST THAT PRIME MINISTER SEEK RESIGNATION OF FINANCE MINISTER
Raymond John Skelly: Madam Speaker, my second question is for the Prime Minister. It is a problem of awareness. It has to do with the necessity of preserving the honour and integrity of this House as well as the necessity of preserving the confidence people have in democratic institutions. The reason for obtaining that resignation is a thousand year old tradition and it would allow this House to get on with the business of the people. Would the Prime Minister, in response to the need of this House to resolve this issue- because he has certainly gone a bridge too far-be prepared in the interests of the preservation of confidence and integrity of the House to ask the Minister for his resignation?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, as to the technical aspects of this debate, I hope it will indeed be resolved in one way or the other, and that is the purpose, I understand, of the non-confidence motion put by the Opposition.
As to the substance of the matter, as to whether there has been a scandal or not, or whether there has been some unbecoming or wrong character by any Minister of this Government, I think that is the issue.
I think in the conscience and mind of an impartial observer, if he or she will look at the circumstances surrounding this- the transparency of it-the fact that the whole project was put together in the first instance by a provincial Government, the fact that the funds were controlled by the provincial Government, and the fact that the guidelines foresee the reality that former Ministers will be able to deal with Governments of which they previously had been Members and prescribe the limits to that conduct-once again, this whole thing is so open-and the fact that it comes now some 22 or 23 months later, as the Minister of Finance has said, can only make me feel that the Official Opposition is looking for a diversion and that the NDP is looking for a diversion, one from their leadership contest, and the other from their dismal showing in the Gallup polls.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!
Point of Order-Mr. Collenette


PETITIONS
Madam Speaker:: I have the honour to inform the House that the Clerk of the House has laid upon the Table reports of the Clerk of Petitions stating that he has examined the petitions presented by Hon. Members on Wednesday, February 23, 1983, and finds that the petitions meet the requirements of the Standing Orders as to form.


BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Philip Derek Lewis: Madam Speaker, I would like to ask the Hon. President of the Privy Council to give us an idea of the business for tomorrow and next week.


Yvon Pinard: Madam Speaker, yesterday, I asked the Opposition parties to let me know whether they wanted this Friday to be an Opposition day as well, so they could have a thorough debate on the matter now before the House. They did not, however, indicate any interest in this arrangement, so that tomorrow and next week, we shall resume debate on Bill C-143 which authorizes the Government to borrow certain sums of money.
If at any time we should complete debate on the amendment to Bill C-143 or on the second reading stage, we shall resume consideration of Bill C-139, an Act to amend the statute law relating to income tax (No. 2).


POINT OF ORDER
Mr. D. M. Collenette (York East):: Madam Speaker, I gave you notice of a point of order that I wished to raise at three o'clock.
In Question Period today, the line of questioning was similar to the Orders of the Day. I understand that this deviates from the normal practice that is accepted in the House, as outlined in Beauchesne's Fifth Edition, Citation 357, which quotes Beauchesne's Fourth Edition, Citation 171, which states:
The traditional restrictions on questions are those listed in Beauchesne's Fourth Edition at Citation 171, which is as follows ...
A question oral or written must not:
(v) anticipate an Order of the Day-

February 24, 1983
Point of Order-Mr. Collenette
I was in the Elouse in 1975. I remember your predecessor, Speaker Jerome, raising this matter in an independent judgment one afternoon. This can be found in the Journals, pages 439 to 441, on April 14, 1975. Speaker Jerome was referring to a practice which had started to develop whereby questions were addressed to a matter that was before the House on that very day. He also went on to talk about special debates.
1 submit that today we do have an Order of the Day which deals specifically with the various matters relating to the former Minister, Mr. Alastair Gillespie, and therefore it is inappropriate, improper and counter to normal practice to permit such questions in Question Period. I hope that today's experience does not constitute a precedent.


Madam Speaker:: I thank the Hon. Member for raising this question. Before entering Question Period I was aware that a point of order to this effect might be raised.
In fact, Beauchesne does say that one should not anticipate the Orders of the Day, I suppose meaning that during Question Period questions may not be asked on the subject of the Order of the Day.
The Hon. Member has quoted a ruling by my predecessor which was made in 1975. I attempted to find other precedents, some of which I have before me. I note that Speakers before me have made several admonitions to the House about this particular question. It is hard to understand the reason behind this kind of citation from Beauchesne, except to say that enough debate is enough. That is to say, if we are debating the question on one day, that is sufficient and questions on that particular topic should not be asked during the Question Period.
I have difficulty in interpreting that and seeing the meaning behind such a citation. Since I could not interpret it in itself without referring to precedents and to what previous Speakers had said, I went through those precedents and found that there had been several admonitions by Speakers and that subsequently, after making those admonitions, the Speakers had allowed questions anticipating an Order of the Day or questions very close to anticipating an Order of the Day.
I find that there are opinions expressed by Speakers, not necessarily rulings, that go both ways. I personally have allowed questions to be asked anticipating the Orders of the Day in matters of motions of non-confidence, feeling that answers to those questions might be helpful in subsequent debate.
Since there were opinions expressed on both sides, I thought there was no point in restricting the debate today on this particular question and I decided to allow the questions to take place, following in this respect practices which have been accepted by the House.


Yvon Pinard: Madam Speaker, considering the problem we are facing now, namely, that we cannot raise points of order during oral question period, if the same situation ever arises again, we
shall have to wait until after question period, that is, until the damage is done, to seek a ruling that will be useful in future.
From your decision, I understand that today's occurrence does not constitute a precedent, and that you will be assessing the facts as you go along, in light of the circumstances, depending on the subject and on what is happening. Is the House to understand from your ruling that you have decided to go against the ruling of your predecessor, Mr. Jerome, or that you reserve the right to change your mind the next time the situation comes up?


Madam Speaker:: That is a matter of judgment, is it not? The Hon. Minister mentioned precedent. There are precedents to support both sides of this matter, and I could indicate them to the Hon. Minister to let him judge for himself.
There are other factors that should be considered when there is some uncertainty as to the kind of ruling that is desirable and when precedents are practically as numerous on both sides-factors that are of primary importance in conducting the proceedings of the House, namely, that Hon. Members must be allowed to express their views as completely as possible on certain matters. However, the subject before the House today is so important to Hon. Members that they discussed it during question period for a whole week, so important that today, the Government has decided to allow the Opposition to use an Opposition day to discuss a subject, and that happens to be the subject the Opposition has selected for debate.
I am not saying that in future, I would not intervene to cut short questions that concern a subject on the Order Paper, but I think that generally speaking, the practice of the House has been to accept such questions. Thus, in the interests of the House and of all concerned, I decided today to allow them. As far as the future is concerned, we shall see.
As for the point raised by the Hon. Minister, namely, that points of order may not be raised during question period and that Hon. Members must wait until question period is over and the damage is done to raise a point of order, I would remind the Hon. Minister that this rule applies to all points of order, and that he is not being penalized any more than he would be otherwise. The rule would apply just as well to someone on the other side of the House who might feel there were grounds for raising a point of order.


Yvon Pinard: Madam Speaker, far be it from us to criticize your ruling. However, the Hon. Member who made the point of order did so on two grounds-first, a very clear citation from Beauchesne which does not consider the importance of the subject but says that no question may be put on a subject that is on the Order Paper, and second, on a ruling made by your predecessor, Mr. Jerome. I am not criticizing today's ruling but, considering the manner in which you clarified your ruling, I would appreciate it if you would indicate to the House whether today's approach is to be considered a precedent or whether you reserve the right, even if points of order may not be raised during question period, to use your discretionary
February 24, 1983

powers in a future situation to prohibit questions about a subject on the Order Paper.


Madam Speaker:: I want to say to the Hon. Minister that 1 did not make today's ruling on the basis of the importance of the matter. As the Hon. Minister is aware, it is not up to the Chair to determine whether or not a matter is important. 1 said that Hon. Members found this matter was sufficiently important to make it the subject of their questions during a number of oral question periods and also of today's debate on an Opposition day.
The Chair does not rule on the importance of debates. I said the House found-1 believe I said that, and in any case, if I did not, that is what I meant-the question was sufficiently important to bring it up during oral question periods. What I said today does indeed constitute a precedent. There are quite a few similar rulings. There are precedents that support the raising of such questions and other precedents that do not, and today's precedent is one more to add to the list of those that do favour allowing such questions.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)
David P. Smith: Madam Speaker, the following questions will be answered today: Nos. 4,628 and 4,670.


Mr. Mazankowski: 1.	Was the second phase of a study conducted on behalf of the Department of Transport regarding commercial vehicle driver performance improvement and, if so (a) how will this phase differ from Phase I (b) what were the conclusions and recommendations of Phase I and how were the recommendations implemented?
2.	Was a role played by the Provinces in the development and implementation of the studies and, if so, what was that role?
3.	Will Phase II be the final phase?


Mr. Jesse P. Flis (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Transport):: 1. Phase II of the Commercial Vehicle Driver Improvement Project was initiated in November, 1982 and is expected to be completed in July, 1983.
Order Paper Questions
(a)	Phase I examined current practices and research. Phase II builds on this knowledge to define criteria and develop tests to measure safe and efficient driving.
(b)	A number of recommendations concerning further study were made in the Phase I report. The main recoummendations concerned the improvement of commercial vehicle driver training and the use of incentives to promote safe, fuel efficient driving. Before these recommendations can be implemented systematically, it is necessary to have the measurement criteria and tests being developed in Phase II.
2.	Yes. Several provincial representatives from Alberta, Manitoba and Ontario are currently on the Advisory Committee for this project.
3.	A final phase will be required to identify and/or develop effective training and incentive programs and evaluate them using the tests developed in Phase II.


Mr. Mazankowski: Was a survey of transportation energy research, development and demonstration activity in Canada conducted on behalf of the Department of Transport and, if so (a) what was the purpose (b) what were the findings (c) to what use will the results be put (d) who performed the study?


Jesse Philip Flis: Yes.
(a)	The purpose is to compile a comprehensive public and private sector inventory of current and planned activity in transportation research, development and demonstration in Canada, thus ensuring a meaningful exchange of information and a co-ordination of research on transportation energy related subjects in all sectors.
(b)	Full documentation of such activities will be available at the conclusion of the study, scheduled for March 31, 1983.
(c)	The results will be the basis for the establishment of a transportation energy clearing house, which will be monitored and updated on a regular basis by the Technical Committee on Transportation and Energy of the Roads and Transportation Association of Canada.
(d)	Canadian Resourcecon Ltd. of Vancouver.


David P. Smith: I would ask, Madam Speaker, that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.


Madam Speaker:: The questions enumerated by the Parliamentary Secretary have been answered. Shall the remaining questions be allowed to stand?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.

February 24, 1983
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GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Broadbent, seconded by Mr. Nielsen:
That the entire question of compliance with the Government's Conflict of Interest Guidelines of April 28, 1980, as they concern all matters relating to the Scotia Coal Synfuels Project and the conduct of the Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister, the present Minister of Finance, the Minister of State (Mines), Mr. Alastair Gillespie, or any other official of the Government of Canada or of its Crown Corporations with respect to the Scotia Coal Synfuels Project, be referred to the Assistant Deputy Registrar General, who is responsible for the administration of the Conflict of Interest Guidelines, with the instruction that he examine all of the materials relating to the Scotia Coal Synfuels Project with the power to call for such papers, materials or information as may be required to adequately complete his enquiries and, with the instruction that a report be made to the House within two (2) weeks of this date, failing which which this House has lost confidence in this Government because of its lack of moral standards.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: When the House rose for lunch at one o'clock, the ten-minute question and answer period related to the remarks of the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (Mr. Munro) was in process, and there are eight minutes remaining for that period.


Ian Deans: Mr. Speaker, I have one very short question to ask the Minister who spoke before lunch. 1 do not want to put words into his mouth, but he made much of what could be generally called a character assassination. I first want to say to the Minister that I think he placed a rather unfair-


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Ian Deans: -interpretation on the motion. The motion deals strictly with the request that the appropriate person review the various documents involved.
As a Member of Parliament, if it came to the Minister's attention that there might be reason to believe that a former or present Minister was in violation of the guidelines governing conduct, what would he do about it other than to raise the matter in the House of Commons? What other way is there to get to the bottom of an issue?


John Carr Munro: Mr. Speaker, that is a unique thesis. I could, in a hypothetical way, put certain positions forward which would be anything but flattering to the Hon. Member who has just spoken in terms of his own character. However, they would be hypothetical. If I could answer his question, just as his question is, my assertions with respect to the Hon. Member's character would be hypothetical. They would be damaging but would have no foundation in fact.
So that is my way of answering the Hon. Member. He might care to put forward a specific proposition, speaking against the conduct of a particular Minister, and back it up with demonstrable evidence other than innuendo of a deplorable kind which has already been expressed by some of the Hon. Member's own colleagues. I am not referring to the motion but, rather, to some of the comments which, if the Hon. Member
wishes to read the blues, he would find to have been totally objectionable. They quite clearly inferred, if they did not overtly state it, that there has been a deviation from morality on the part of the Minister of Finance and others, yet in the same breath they refused to offer any evidence, which is hardly something that the Hon. Member himself or I would ever condone.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: I would like to direct a question to the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (Mr. Munro). I do not want this debate to reach a low level; I simply want to reaffirm the fact that as far as I am concerned, there are more men and women of conviction in the present Cabinet than in any other in the history of the country, and I have checked with historians. I want to ask the Minister whether or not he thinks this is a clear case involving conflict of interest guidelines, which state:
Within a period of two years after leaving office, Ministers should not:
(c) lobby for or on behalf of any person or commercial corporation before any
department or agency for which they were responsible on an ongoing basis
during the last two years of their participation in the Ministry.
The Minister will understand that. I would also ask him whether he will consider the letter from Alastair Gillespie to Marshall A. Cohen, dated December 6, 1980, which the Minister will understand was written within two years of Mr. Gillespie's leaving the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources. In the letter, Mr. Gillespie sets out some of the details of this particular project and says, in the last sentence:
As you can see, we are now well launched; we need your assistance and support, and we need your guidance on how we should formalize our relationship with you.
Will the Minister, on a fair reading of the correspondence which has been tabled and of the guidelines, not at least admit that Mr. Gillespie was in clear breach of those conflict of interest guidelines that I recited?


John Carr Munro: Mr. Speaker, perhaps the Hon. Member is basing this whole debate, in attacking the character of the Minister of Finance, on a paragraph which he has taken out of context in the entire letter. He said that someone has written and asked, "Would you please explain the process which I should follow in order to obtain a certain result?"


Arthur Jacob (Jake) Epp: No, it was in Gillespie's writing.


John Carr Munro: If he lays that before the House in all seriousness as the basis for the type of assault he is founding now, I think the Hon. Member is being absolutely ridiculous.


Mr. Fraser:: I wonder if I could ask the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (Mr. Munro) a question arising out of what has gone on here the last several days and in relation to his own remarks here today. It seems to me that there are two issues involved. I am wondering if the Minister would agree with me. One concerns what, in fact, Ministers do
February 24, 1983

or do not do, or what they should not have done. The narrow issue concerns whether they acted improperly or illegally. It seems to me that the Government is asking the House to prove that something illegal was done.
However, the other issue which has been before us since the beginning of the debate concerns whether or not the guidelines were broken. In view of the fact that several days ago the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. MacEachen) said that it is for Ministers to judge whether the guidelines are broken, how can the Canadian public and how can we as Members of the Opposition subscribe to such a system of guidelines when the decision whether or not they have been broken is left with individual Ministers who have an interest in the very issue which is raised?
The Minister has spent many years in the House. He will know, despite his complaints this morning about character assassination, that I as an Hon. Member have never entered into anything of that sort. I am concerned to know what the Minister thinks about what we and the public should think as to who is the judge of whether the guidelines have been broken. The guidelines in this case can be broken without any crime being committed.


An Hon. Member:: Parliament is the judge.


John Carr Munro: Exactly, Mr. Speaker. That is why the Hon. Member and the rest of us got elected. Parliament is the judge. The conduct of all Hon. Members will be judged in this House. This House has to be satisfied, not on the basis of gossip or because of allegations that are highly politically motivated that fall within the pattern of conduct, as I explained this morning, on the part of the Leader of the Opposition, which is quite clearly discernible over a twenty year pattern, but on the basis of something that is demonstrable evidence, something other than gossip.
I have the highest respect for the Hon. Member, a lawyer from the West Coast. I know he knows the difference between gossip and demonstrable evidence. Would he please supply some demonstrable evidence? I am not saying in a court of law, but would he show us where the Minister indeed has been guilty of any of these smear allegations that have been made up to now? They have been totally unsubstantiated, that is all.


An Hon. Member:: What is the use of guidelines if you do not respect them?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: I am sorry to inform the Hon. Member that the ten-minute question period has expired, but I think I did hear an Hon. Member rise on a point of order. If not, debate.


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, in beginning my remarks I want to echo two sentiments that were expressed by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) this morning. The first is that the issue here is not a question of personal reputation, not at all. The issue here is a question of
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the integrity of the Parliament of Canada and the integrity of the Government of Canada. That is the issue in this debate.
The second, and I am pleased that the Minister of Finance himself chose to underline the importance of this matter, is that if it is important for all of us to be judged as men and women of integrity, then it is particularly important for some Ministers of the Crown to be so judged. That obligation rests with particular weight on the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau), and as the Minister of Finance said today, its rests with particular weight upon the Minister of Finance.
There can be no question about the probity or honesty or integrity of the Minister of Finance. It is precisely because that question of the integrity of the Minister of Finance is so important that we are raising and pursuing this matter here and asking that it be judged by the impartial authority established by the law to judge exactly these questions.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: If I may express a personal view, I regret that Parliament has to raise the matter. In my judgment, the Minister should have acted himself, as Ministers in the parliamentary tradition have acted before, and he should have resigned. That would have been the proper course of action. I need not remind the House of the practice that has been long established in the parliamentary tradition. We were reminded the other day, those of us who still read Richard Gwyn, of a case that is precisely on point which occurred in Great Britain, and I quote Mr. Gwyn:
In 1953, Agriculture Minister Thomas Dugdale resigned after discovering that junior officials, without telling him, had improperly failed to compensate farmers for expropriated lands.
He quotes the Minister:
"I take full responsibility for any mistakes done by my department," Dugdale said in his resignation speech, "just as when any officials bring off successes on my behalf, I take full credit for them".
That is the tradition, the practice and the standard that is followed in Parliaments that have a degree of self-respect and by Ministers who have a degree of self-respect.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: Closer to home, just to establish the Canadian tradition, I remind this House of the most regrettable resignation of the Hon. D'Arcy McKeough from the cabinet of the Government of Ontario. Why did Mr. McKeough resign from a central senior ministry? He said that it was because he felt he was guilty of no more than a mistake in judgment. On that basis, a man of honour in the Canadian parliamentary system set down his office. On that basis he resigned, as he should have, and as this Minister should have resigned.
We have had read into the record earlier today a most recent case, a compelling case, the case of a Minister who was probably the most important, next to the Prime Minister, in the Government of Great Britain, the case of Lord Carrington. Lord Carrington resigned from his position as the Foreign Secretary of the United Kingdom, not because he made a mistake but simply because he failed to foresee an eventuality,

February 24, 1983
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and on that basis alone, because he failed to foresee what was going to happen in the Falkland Islands dispute, Lord Carrington had the honour and the courage and the respect for the traditions the respect for the public place of public people, that he stepped down.
Some Hon. Members may have read the excerpts in the recent issue of New Yorker. Let me quote for the House:
Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher didn't want to accept Carrington's resignation, but he gave her no choice, saying in their private conversations what he later said publicly, which was this: "I was wrong in the assessment of what they (the Argentines) were doing and therefore I am responsible." He declined to share the responsibility with the Ministry of Defence or with the intelligence services, which may have miscalculated Argentina's intentions. Mrs. Thatcher told reporters that she had "spent a lot of time Saturday and Sunday trying to persuade him not to put in his resignation." But, she continued, "when he put this to me as a point of honor and said there had to be honor in politics, I was not at liberty to refuse." Nothing more was involved than the "point of honor"-no concealed disagreements over policy, only Carrington's determination to take full responsibility for what he described as "a humiliating affront to this country."
That was a Minister who acted within the traditions of this Parliament. He resigned on a point of honour because he was a man of honour, and that is the course that should have been followed by the Minister of Finance.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: I should make a distinction and underline a point. There has been talk about the unusual importance of the Minister of Finance to this Government. No one who knows the state of affairs in the world would deny the unusual importance of Lord Carrington to the Thatcher government in Great Britain. The difference is not in their importance; the difference is in their standards, and it is an unhappy day for this Parliament when we have to admit that the standards of the Parliament in Westminster appear to be higher than the standards of the Parliament of Canada.
What we have here, to aid Ministers and to aid the public, is a system of guidelines established so Ministers will not be operating in the dark and the public will have some basis on which to judge the performance of those who sit on the Treasury benches. We have those guidelines. They are designed precisely to create confidence in the system. Let me quote from the guidelines outlined in the Prime Minister's letter to the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. MacEachen), the man who was sitting silently at Port Hawkesbury before the expiry of the date. The letter dated April 28, 1980 reads:
The precept of fulfilling one's official responsibilities in an objective and disinterested manner lies at the very heart of our system of government. Ministers, therefore, have an obligation to meet the highest standards of conduct and to arrange and conduct their personal affairs in a manner which does not conflict or appear to conflict with their public duties and responsibilities.
That is the relevant excerpt from the letter of the Prime Minister to all of his Ministers. That is the standard which should guide them. I underline the point. Not only is there the question of avoiding conflict, but there is the question of avoiding the appearance of conflict as spelled out in the
guidelines that were presented to that Minister and to every Minister on the Treasury benches.
The guidelines deal with two cases. They deal with serving Ministers, people who are now serving in the Cabinet, and the guideline there that is relevant to this debate is, and I quote:
In any official dealings with former office holders. Ministers must ensure that they do not provide grounds or the appearance of grounds for allegations of improper influence, privileged access or preferential treatment.
That is the guideline as it applies to serving Ministers.
As it relates to former Ministers, first of all, the guidelines concerning former Ministers are restricted to two years. There is one that is of particular relevance here, and I quote:
Within a period of two years of leaving office, Ministers should not:
lobby for or on behalf of any person or commercial corporation before any
department or agency for which they were responsible on an ongoing basis
during the last two years of their participation in the Ministry.
Those are the guidelines which apply to former Ministers. Those are the guidelines which apply specifically to the act of lobbying, which we believe was carried on by the former Minister, Alastair Gillespie, within the period prohibited by these guidelines, of which he was aware.
There are two cases, but there are times when those two cases come together, because, Mr. Speaker, if a serving Minister knows a former Minister is breaking the guidelines, and helps him break those guidelines, then that serving Minister is guilty also. The Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. MacEachen) is guilty. The Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) is guilty. The Minister of State for Mines (Mrs. Erola) is guilty.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: That, Sir, we allege is the case here. We believe that the guidelines applying to serving Ministers were broken. We believe that the guidelines applying to former Ministers were broken. But that is not for us to decide. We have established a place and a procedure which allows precisely these questions to be judged. What has been proposed by the Leader of the New Democratic Party (Mr. Broadbent) and what is supported by this Party, is precisely that. This question of allegations that guidelines have been broken should go to the officer whom Parliament appointed to judge these allegations so that a fair and impartial judgment can occur. That is what we are asking. We are asking that the Liberals stops the cover up, that they allow a fair judgment to be made by the very officer whom they have appointed precisely to judge cases of this kind. That is what we are talking about.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: Let us look at the facts of this case as we know them. Let us review what has happened here.

Someone on the other side said that it is about time. I agree.
I am taking part in this debate because I want to say exactly what has been going on this morning.
February 24, 1983


Mr. Pelletier:: This was done neither by the Leader of the NPD nor by the Hon. Member's party.


Charles Joseph Clark: It was done earlier by the Leader of the New Democratic Party. If the Hon. Member for Sherbrooke (Mr. Pelletier) wants to take part in this debate, he may. He kept silent during the constitutional debate and perhaps he will keep silent once more.


Irénée Pelletier: I did not keep silent. It is not the same in Eastern Canada.


Charles Joseph Clark: Never!


Irénée Pelletier: This is what you are doing!


Charles Joseph Clark: Let me speak, Sir, about the facts in this case. Let me deal with Mr. Gillespie. Let us first of all identify Mr. Gillespie. Alastair Gillespie is the former Minister responsible for the program which is in question here. He went out of Government in June, 1979. June 4, 1979, was the date when the two-year clock started to run. On December 6, 1980, that former Minister, Alastair Gillespie, wrote a letter, a "Dear Micky" letter to his former Deputy Minister. I will quote from the "Dear Micky" letter as follows:
Dear Micky:
As you know, I have been working on this project for some time. Indeed, it has taken rather longer than I expected, but I am now satisfied that we have a solid base from which to move forward. I have been encouraged by your support for the concept and your view that it would be regarded as a candidate for assistance under the "oil substitution fund", provided it had the support of the Nova Scotia government.
That is the relevant portion of the "Dear Micky" letter from the former Minister to his former Deputy Minister.


An Hon. Member:: Signed "Alastair".


Charles Joseph Clark: That is right, signed "Alastair". I remind you, Sir, of the guidelines regarding lobbying, prohibiting lobbying. The Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) has suggested from time to time that lobbying cannot occur with just one call, that lobbying has to occur over a period of time. That is his peculiar definition. Without arguing that for a moment-I believe it is an incomplete definition-let us accept the Prime Minister's own definition of lobbying and say that it has to occur over a period of time. Let me then quote again from Alastair Gillespie's "Dear Micky" letter, "As you know ... ", dear Micky " ... 1 have been working on this project for some time." There is no question. It is there in the records, which the Government itself placed on the Table of the House of Commons, that lobbying had been going on for some time. The actions of Alastair Gillespie were in clear violation of the prohibition against lobbying within the two-year period.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: Another reference which is interesting to me is the specific reference to the Oil Substitution Fund. In my judgment, that specific reference to the Oil Substitution Fund in this letter is open to the interpretation that Mr. Gillespie
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knew there was going to be a problem with the eligibility of his program for the oil substitution fund. The letter also refers, I remind the House, to earlier discussions. We do not know whether those earlier discussions dealt with the fact that the project which Alastair Gillespie was putting forward did not meet the criteria strictly, or there was doubt about it meeting strictly the criteria of the Oil Substitution Fund. His letter makes specific reference to that. It is open to the interpretation that that was designed to establish a case and to carry on the lobbying. That interpretation, unhappily, Mr. Speaker, has been confirmed because the agreement was later specifically changed to permit the Gillespie proposal. The Government's own document, among the documents which were released yesterday by the Prime Minister or the Minister of Finance, says this:
Canada-Nova Scotia-Scotia Coal Synfuels Project Agreement executed 25 September 1981 and effective retroactively to 30 June 1981. Since the 1977 Canada-Nova Scotia Agreement did not clearly state that coal liquefaction was included, the Oil Substitution Fund could not automatically be used. Hence Canada entered into this tripartite Agreement in part for the purpose of agreeing further with Nova Scotia that coal liquefaction was a valid use of the Oil Substitution Fund.
That was the result of the lobbying which occurred in the "Dear Micky" letter and other conversations of which there is no record in the House of Commons, but there is clear prima facie evidence of lobbying by Mr. Gillespie in a way which violated the conflict of interest guidelines which apply to former Ministers of the Crown.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: Again, what we are dealing with here is evidence of, and I quote, "improper influence, privileged access or preferential treatment". Those are the words of the guidelines. You will recall, Mr. Speaker, that the other day in this House of Commons I raised, and later made available outside, a Cabinet document which indicates that the Government's own official-


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: It is not a Cabinet document.


Charles Joseph Clark: Then tell us what it is.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: It is an internal memo, not a Cabinet document. Do you know what a Cabinet is?


Charles Joseph Clark: I know what a Cabinet is. A Cabinet is a group of men and women with honour, and we do not have one in this country now.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: It was, Mr. Speaker, an internal memorandum, but it came from the officials of the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources, and it said that this particular project was not viable from an energy point of view, was not viable from an economic point of view. Also, it indicated very, very strongly the heavy weight of expert evidence against proceeding with this proposal. Yet, they proceeded with it. The

February 24, 1983
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Alastair Gillespie factor prevailed. That at least has to be the prima facie case which we refer to the judge appointed by this Government to judge precisely these kinds of questions.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Charles Joseph Clark: The Members opposite are trying to shout me down. That is exactly the case we had, Mr. Speaker-


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Watch out, you will wake up the Speaker.


Charles Joseph Clark: I believe, Mr. Speaker, it is doubtful that this project, if it had other sponsors, would ever have been approved, but that is a matter which we are prepared to allow to be judged by the judge whom Parliament appointed, to whom the Liberals want to keep the case from going. They do not want the case to go to the judge. They want to hide the evidence and stifle debate here in the House of Commons.
Let me raise this very important question: what in the world was Alastair Gillespie doing there? What is his expertise in energy matters? Was he there because he is an expert? No, because he is not. Was he there because he had a whole passel of money? No, because he does not. He was there for one reason. He has one asset, and his asset is the "Dear Micky" connection. "Dear Micky, dear Marc, dear Allan, dear Pierre, cher Jean." That is the reason why Alastair Gillespie is involved in this case. That is prima facie evidence, Mr. Speaker, that the guidelines have been violated. That is all that the Associate Deputy Registrar General needs. That prima facie evidence should go before the judge whom this Parliament appointed so that he can see whether the guidelines by which we are supposed to live and Ministers are supposed to live have in fact been honoured. That deals with Alastair Gillespie.
Let me deal now with the Minister of Finance. First the Minister of Finance denied knowing anything about it. He denied knowledge. Then he admitted knowledge. He said he had misled the House but he did not really mean to. As I pointed our earlier, when honourable Ministers in Ontario, Britain and throughout our system, mislead the House, they resign. That is what honourable Ministers do. This Minister did not do that.
Let us review the facts that are known so far, and I emphasize so far because it may well be that not all the facts are yet in the public domain. We have a memorandum dated January 15,1981, well within the period of prohibition for Alastair Gillespie to be involved in matters with his former Department. I will quote from that memorandum. It is from Mickey again. This is the Mickey to Marc document. It is from the Deputy Minister to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources and it reads:
You will recall that Mr. Gillespie has organized the Scotia Coal Synfuels project whose object is to study the possibilities for the liquefaction of coal in Cape Breton, possibly using the now-dormant refining facilities of the Gulf Company at Point Tupper. Mr. Gillespie now has commitments of $300,000 from each of four participants: Gulf, Nova, Petro-Canada and Devco. In anticipation of this development, provision was made during the planning stage
of the National Energy Program for a maximum of $1 million to be available for federal participation in this project.
The Minister was told that on January 15, 1981. The memo began with the words. "You will recall", which suggests that the matter was brought to his attention before that time. The Minister says it does not matter when he knew. Well, it matters very, very much.
That was accompanied by a memorandum asking for the Minister's comments. The Minister's comments were sought. We do not know what the Minister's comments were. They were not in the package.
I note that I am coming near the end of my time. I am citing the evidence that the Hon. Member for Sherbrooke (Mr. Pelletier) wanted. The comments were not in the package presented to the House of Commons. The Minister's comments were asked for. We do not know what they were, but we do know what happened. Nothing happened. For nearly three months after the Minister was advised, nothing happened. Nothing happened until a Treasury Board meeting on April 3, 1981.


Marc Lalonde: There was no Treasury Board meeting.


Charles Joseph Clark: I will make reference to the Minister's own words outside the House in a media interview when he said that the matter did not then go to Treasury Board on April 3, 1981, it did not go to that meeting because "there was a discussion at the official level about the possibility of-ah- the allegations about potential conflict of interest". He said "at the official level". The officials raised the objection two and a half months, nearly three months, after the Minister knew about the conflict of interest problem. Officials had to raise the objection. He did not do it himself. He did not carry out his duty. That is very clear from the evidence that is available to us.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: The Minister is trying two escapes. He says that Alastair Gillespie received no benefit. Let me review it quickly. The guidelines for the program were changed. That is a benefit. Second, the program continues to be studied despite the overwhelming opposition of officials who are expert in the matter. That clearly is a benefit.
Then there is the question of money. The Minister claims he did not make a direct payment of Government money to Alastair Gillespie. As the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Nielsen) has made clear, it is going to be very hard to persuade anybody of that because, how do you trace the payments? He cannot argue that there were no benefits to Alastair Gillespie from the consortium. The consortium is paying him $30,000, some $600 per day. He is getting benefits. Do you think he would be getting benefits if he were not involved in this consortium? Do you think he is there out of charity? Of course he is getting benefits as the result of his "Dear Mickey" "Dear Marc" relations with the Government of Canada. There can be no doubt about that.
February 24, 1983

I see, Mr. Speaker, from your posture that I am near the end of my time. There are a few things I would like to say. If I have the opportunity to continue, I will do that. If not, I will naturally respond to questions.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: I thank the Right Hon. Member for noticing the time. I am not sure whether he wants to seek unanimous consent.


Some Hon. Members:: Continue.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: The question before the House is that the Right Hon. Member seeks unanimous consent to continue.


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: There is not unanimous consent.

Questions, answers and comments.
The Hon. President of the Privy Council (Mr. Pinard) has the floor.


Yvon Pinard: Earlier, the Leader of the Opposition mentioned that the purpose of his motion was to refer the matter to the Assistant Deputy Registrar General for investigation. Can he tell the House very specifically what leads him to believe that the Assistant Deputy Registrar General should be responsible for investigating such a matter?


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, first, the regulations concerning conflicts of interest designate the Assistant Deputy Registrar General as the authority responsible for examining such matters. If the Government wants to introduce an amendment to give this responsibility to a judge, for instance, or to have a parliamentary investigation, we would be willing to consider it, but this is what the law provides and we want to obey the law. This is the first part of my answer.
The second part concerns the second way in which the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) is trying to elude his responsibility to resign in this situation.

He said that this is all the fault of his officials. That is what the Minister of Finance said. That is a flagrant breach of all the traditions of parliamentary democracy. Let me just remind him of the readings on this matter by J. E. Mallory on "The Structure of Canadian Government". 1 am sure the House would like to hear about this. It reads:
All official acts of government officials are done on the authority and in the name of the minister. Accordingly any act by an official of the public service, within the scope of his duties, is one for which the minister must assume responsibility.


Marc Lalonde: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I never said what the Hon. Member says I said. I would hope that he would at least be honest.
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Yvon Pinard: I regret that the Leader of the Opposition has tried to kill time to avoid answering questions. My question was simple and to the point. First, under what act can he claim that the Assistant Deputy Registrar General has the authority to carry out the type of enquiries mentioned in his motion? Second, is it not true that his former House Leader, the man who has taken his place as Party Leader in the House, wrote to the Assistant Deputy Registrar General to ask him to launch an enquiry? And third, does he have the courage to tell the House whether he has received a reply from the Assistant Deputy Registrar Genera! stating that he has no authority to make that kind of enquiry, that he answers to the Prime Minister, and that he has definitely no jurisdiction to analyze the guidelines applicable to former Ministers? Does the Leader of the Opposition, the former Leader of the Opposition, have enough courage, to sustain his argument, to substantiate his allegation, to tell us what act he is invoking and whether his Leader of the Progressive Conservative Party did indeed ask the Assistant Deputy Registrar General to make an enquiry? Finally, can he tell us whether he got a reply? Three very simple questions!


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, this Government is really beyond belief. They are now trying to say "Yes, you have caught us, yes our finger is in the cookie jar, but there isn't a judge who can look at it." That is what they are trying to say. Let me answer them. They have admitted guilt. They just say there is nowhere that guilt can be judged. Sooner or later they will have to go before the court of public opinion and have their guilt judged. When that happens they will be thrown off the Treasury benches.
Let me respond precisely to the question put to the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Pinard). I quote from a document of his own Government, which reads:
On behalf of the Prime Minister, the Assistant Deputy Registrar General is responsible for implementing the federal Government's policy on conflict of interest, in particular the conflict of interest organization, applies conflict of interest guidelines to Ministers of the Crown, designated Members of their exempt staff and full-time Governor in Council appointees.
That clearly establishes the authority of that official to judge the application and the adherence to the conflict of guidelines. It is the Government's own document. It did not pass an Order in Council in this case as it did regarding the uranium cartel. In the case of the uranium cartel where it did not want the facts to be know, it made it illegal to discuss them. It did not do that in this case. It is here, in its own document, that the Assistant Deputy Registrar General is responsible for policing the guidelines. We are saying, let the policemen police; let the judge judge. Stop hiding.

February 24, 1983
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Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Yvon Pinard: Mr. Speaker, the former Leader of the Opposition deliberately refused to answer my questions. I have asked him very clearly, first, is it true that the new Leader of his Party has written a letter to the Deputy Registrar General seeking for a formal inquiry in this matter?
Second, did he receive an answer, and if so, what is it? It is as simple as that.
If he does not have the courage to answer those two questions, that proves the phoney aspect of the motion and it proves that the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Nielsen) is not able to substantiate his own speech and his own attitude in the House.


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, I am advised that the Leader of the Opposition has indeed sent a letter of that kind. I do not know if there has been a response. The Leader of the Opposition has not seen a response to a letter of that kind.
We would be concerned, naturally, if, before an official of the Parliament of Canada had an opportunity to reply to the Leader of the Opposition, regarding his competence to judge a matter of this kind, there would have been an intervention by the Government.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: We know that this is a Government which telephones judges. We hope that this is not a Government which tries in advance to silence the Assistant Deputy Registrar General.


Yvon Pinard: Mr. Speaker, I still want the Leader of the Opposition to answer the second part of my question. On what grounds does he insinuate that anybody on this side would have phoned or talked to the Deputy Registrar General on this subject? If so, I dare him, I challenge him, to state that outside the House of Commons and I challenge the former Leader of the Opposition to make a formal accusation that any Member on this side would have done that.
What I am asking the Leader of the Opposition is, how is it that the motion moved by the Leader of the NDP is in the same wording, or almost the same wording, as the letter that would have been sent-


An Hon. Member:: How did you get the letter?


Yvon Pinard: -or the request that would have been made by the existing Leader of the Opposition-to an inquiry in that case by the Deputy Registrar General? Is that true? Is that a fact?


Charles Joseph Clark: Madam Speaker, what I have said is that I hope there has not been that kind of interference.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Charles Joseph Clark: I will check the record. But we know the record of this Government, which is, after all, a Government that phones judges.
Let me ask the President of the Privy Council a question. How does he know the language of the letter of the Leader of the Opposition to the Deputy Assistant Registrar General?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: I will recognize the Hon. President of the Privy Council, followed by the Hon. Member for Restigouche (Mr. Harquail), and that will complete the ten-minute period.


Yvon Pinard: Mr. Speaker, the question was very straight. The answer is that I do not know about the wording of the letter.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Yvon Pinard: What I know about is that the answer of the Deputy Registrar General has been made public. I know that the Press Gallery had this answer before I raised my question to the Leader of the Opposition. It is strange that the Press Gallery knew about this answer in which the Deputy Registrar General says that he has absolutely no authority to make that inquiry, when the Leader of the Opposition tell that he does not know about this answer and that his Leader does not know about it.
I ask him again, how is it he is asking for an inquiry when he knows, when his Leader knows, that the Deputy Registrar General has no authority to carry out such an inquiry, and that that has been made known to the Press Gallery even before I asked my question?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: The Hon. Member for Restigouche (Mr. Harquail).


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker-


An Hon. Member:: What about the question?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: I think I can rely on the Right Hon. Member for Yellowhead (Mr. Clark) to understand when I say that the Chair has permitted a particularly sharp and excellent exchange of debate. But the Chair is concerned that other Members ought to be able to enter the debate. I know that the Right Hon. Member for Yellowhead will find it quite acceptable and that it will be quite simple for him to handle any remarks that he may wish to make in terms of the President of the Privy Council.
I will now recognize the Hon. Member for Restigouche.
Is the Hon. Leader of the Opposition rising on a point of order?


Erik Nielsen: No, Mr. Speaker, on a question of privilege. The President of the Privy Council has become confused, as the record will show. He has been referring to the Right Hon. Member for Yellowhead as the Leader of the Opposition.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!
February 24, 1983


An Hon. Member:: Former.


Erik Nielsen: I know who he is, but the President of the Privy Council obviously does not. I suggest that he correct the record and allow me to inform him that late yesterday afternoon 1 did write such a letter. The Government having failed to do so, I took it upon myself to ask the ADRG to undertake the investigation, in no way near the terms of the motion of the Hon. Leader of the New Democratic Party.


Some Hon. Members:: Order, order!


Erik Nielsen: So let us clear that up. I made the letter public. 1 have not seen any reply.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Erik Nielsen: If the Press Gallery has seen a reply, I certainly have not. I am waiting anxiously for the reply.


An Hon. Member:: Tell your Leader.


Erik Nielsen: I did not tell my Leader anything about it. I am the Leader of the Opposition.


Mr. Harquail:: Mr. Speaker, we are witnessing a very interesting conflict between the former Leader and the now acting Leader of the Opposition, leading into my question to the former Leader of the Opposition. He said it was not his intention and he disliked very much besmirching or attacking anyone's reputation on the floor of this House, especially someone who would not be here to defend himself. He has always said that.
He commenced his remarks today by making the statement that it was not his intention to attack anyone's reputation. That is in direct conflict and shows a split in attitude between himself and his present Leader, the man who just identified himself as Leader.
My question has to do with the Right Hon. Member's position when he was heading the Clark administration. Did he establish financial guidelines for Ministers during his term of office as Prime Minister?


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, let me first of all indicate that we were told by the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. MacEachen) that guidelines have no effect now, they are only for guidance. We are now told by the President of the Privy Council that there is no one who can judge these Ministers when they violate their guidelines-when they state that the level of their conscience is not strong enough to meet the standards of centuries of parliamentary practice.
Regarding the question put by the Hon. Member for Resti-gouche (Mr. Harquail), first of all I should tell him that in my opening remarks I was only quoting the Minister of Finance. 1 admit that is dangerous. I was quoting the Minister of Finance, so if he has a quarrel with my remarks let him speak to the Minister of Finance-let him write him a letter. If he cannot get him directly he can write "Dear Micky" and it will be passed on in a memorandum later on.
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As regards the guidelines, yes, there were guidelines established by my administration. If he needs further information on them I would refer him to the spouse of the Hon. Member for St. John's West (Mr. Crosbie).


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Is the Hon. Member for Restigouche (Mr. Harquail) rising on a point of order?


Maurice James Harquail: Yes, Mr. Speaker.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: I will expect the Hon. Member to come within a matter of seconds, not minutes, to his point of order, which is an appeal to the rules of the House.


Maurice James Harquail: I only want to make one point, Mr. Speaker. With respect to the new rules regarding the ten minutes, I think there must be an opportunity for debate and an opportunity for exchange. Also I think that we have to apply the word "fair", and, in fairness, give opportunities to Hon. Members on both sides, when they are posing questions, as has been admonished by the Speaker, to put a pointed question and to get a pointed answer. We have not seen that this afternoon.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: The Hon. Member refers to the Standing Orders of the House and, accordingly, at first blush he may have a point of order. 1 will not spend more than a couple of seconds to indicate that all Hon. Members should be aware that the ten-minute exchange of comments and questions are new rules of the House. If there are people who think that I am not doing the best I can in that regard, I wish they would let me know directly.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I only want to make one remark about the guidelines which the Leader of the Opposition established at that time. They were so badly screwed up that the wife of the Hon. Member for St. John's West (Mr. Crosbie) said, "Your guidelines, Mr. Clark, I will not abide by them", and the Right Hon. Member for Yellowhead (Mr. Clark) had to go back to the drawing board.


Charles Joseph Clark: That is not true.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: He could not even meet the request or the requirements of the wife of one Member.


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, I know that the Hon. Minister would not want to mislead the House. In fact, the spouse of the then Minister of Finance was concerned about the guidelines, but she adhered to them because in my Government, I am proud to say, not only did the Ministers adhere to the guidelines, so did their spouses. We were a Government that respected guidelines, in distinction from this Government.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Anyway, Mr. Speaker, in rising to speak in this debate, I want first to situate the context of the issue before the House. It is very evident from long experience in the House that the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Nielsen) enjoys

February 24, 1983
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fishing for non-existent scandals but knows nothing about the substance of problems facing Canadians.
For years Nova Scotia has been more dependent upon imported oil than any other Province, and for years Nova Scotians have puzzled over how to use their abundant coal resources to reduce their dependence on imported oil. It is known that gasoline can be made from coal. The Germans did so during World War II, the South Africans do so today, and millions of dollars are being spent in the United States in research on coal liquefaction.
Even at the time that Premier Buchanan was Leader of the Opposition, he was asking then Premier Regan about the prospects for coal liquefaction. The idea was supported by the former NDP Leader, in Nova Scotia, Jeremy Ackerman and by Mr. Walsh who was President of the Coal Council of Canada.
In 1977, the Canada-Nova Scotia agreement on oil substitution and conservation was signed to create a fund to provide money for projects that promised to reduce the use of imported oil for electrical energy, in particular, and generally to reduce consumption of oil. Thus there is nothing sinister or scandalous about giving money to research and development which might lead to lessening dependence on imported oil in Nova Scotia and would also create, if successful, thousands of jobs in Cape Breton.
Indeed, almost every day in the House of Commons, the Tories and the NDP complain that the Government does not do enough to encourage research and development and, by its very definition, one is never sure if one is going to be successful with research projects. This does not mean that they should not be undertaken or encouraged, any more than should one stop drilling for oil because one does not find something in every hole. A lot of money has to be risked on research and development, pre-feasibility studies and feasibility studies before one can think of starting a project costing potentially billions of dollars.
I come now to the issue of Mr. Gillespie's involvement and whether he sought to use improper influence, gain preferential treatment or receive privileged access-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Reid (Kenora-Rainy River)):: Order, please. The Hon. Member rises on a point of order.


Mr. Greenaway:: Mr. Speaker, I would just like to point out to the Hon. Minister that Canada has one of the most wretched records-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Reid (Kenora-Rainy River)):: Order, please, that is not a point of order.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: -from the Government of Canada. On March 12, 1980, Mr. Gillespie met in Toronto with the Minister of Energy of Nova Scotia, Mr. Barkhouse, to talk about coal liquefaction and its prospects in Nova Scotia. No one can complain about this. One week later, on March 19, 1980, he met with officials of Petro-Canada to ask them what they thought of coal liquefaction.
On May 15, 1980, Mr. Gillespie had privileged access to Premier Buchanan and must have sought preferential treatment from the Tory Government of Nova Scotia. Mr. Buchanan invited Steve Rankin, President of Devco, to the meeting. Mr. Gillespie gave Mr. Buchanan and Mr. Rankin a copy of a paper he had written entitled, "Coal Liquefaction, A National Priority for Atlantic Canada". Mr. Buchanan expressed his support for the idea. Mr. Gillespie wrote letters to Mr. Rankin and Mr. Buchanan on May 22, 1980. Again, this is hardly a contravention of the guidelines.
On May 27, 1980, Mr. Gillespie met with Mr. Cohen, then Deputy Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources, to speak about coal liquefaction in Nova Scotia and to inform him of Premier Buchanan's support of the idea. In June 1980, Mr. Gillespie began to speak to corporations to put together a consortium. This was completed in October 1980.
On November 12, 1980, Mr. Gillespie met with Mr. Cohen for a second time to tell him of the formation of the consortium. On November 16, 1980, Mr. Gillespie spoke to Premier Buchanan again, and again obtained his support. On December 6, 1980, Mr. Gillespie wrote to Mr. Cohen to tell him that he wanted to apply for funding from the Canada-Nova Scotia Oil Substitution Fund. On December 11, 1980, Mr. Gillespie wrote a similar letter to Buchanan.
On January 5, 1981, Premier Buchanan wrote to Mr. Gillespie expressing his support, but conditional upon a Nova Scotia Crown corporation becoming a full partner in the consortium. If ever there has been preferential treatment, here is where it can be found, and it is preferential treatment accorded to Nova Scotia.
On January 22, 1981, Mr. Gillespie wrote back to Mr. Buchanan accepting his conditions.
Here I want to pause and tell the Leader of the Opposition that Mr. Gillespie would be agreeable to tabling all his correspondence with the Government of Nova Scotia. I made that request last night of Premier Buchanan, and he said that he does not want to become embroiled in a controversy in the House of Commons, but that he is on record as supporting the project and continues to support it as good for Nova Scotia. But as of last night he was unwilling to agree to table the correspondence. Perhaps the Leader of the Opposition could ask him again.
Also I want to set out that the consortium is formed of Gulf Canada Products, Petro-Canada, Devco, Nova Corporation and the Nova Scotia Resources Corporation, all of which together own 97.5 per cent of it. Alastair Gillespie and Associates own 2.5 per cent. Would they get together simply for the benefit of Alastair Gillespie?
To return to my chronology, on April 4, 1981, Premier Buchanan, the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. MacEachen) and Mr. Gillespie appeared together on a public platform in Port Hawkesbury on Cape Breton Island. If there was a conspiracy by the federal Cabinet to give preferential treatment to Mr. Gillespie, then the Tory Government of Nova Scotia was a motivating force and principal party to the conspiracy.
February 24, 1983

Later in April 1981, federal officials decided that action had to be taken to prevent even the appearance of favouritism toward Mr. Gillespie. Therefore, the draft agreement between Canada, Nova Scotia and the consortium was changed so that eligible costs are defined as, "the cost of the feasibility study and the working capital requirements of the consortium, other than the per diem fees and the annual retainer payable to the developer". In other words, Mr. Gillespie's fees are wholly paid by the consortium completely outside of the costs of the study. There is no direct or indirect payment to Mr. Gillespie of Government money.
What about the gain to Mr. Gillespie if he sells out or is bought out? First, if the project does not go ahead, there is no possibility of financial gain. Indeed, he would lose his whole investment, as would all the other partners to the consortium. Second, if the project goes ahead, then Mr. Gillespie may sell out or be bought out by the other members of the consortium. As the developer and promoter, he negotiated with Gulf Canada on behalf of the consortium. The contract is between Mr. Gillespie and the consortium and not the Governments of Canada or Nova Scotia. It is totally irrelevant to the debate in the House of Commons.
What about the accusations of privileged treatment by the Government of Canada? I can assure the House that Mr. Gillespie has no more privileged access to the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources than do any of the other partners in the consortium. If any of the other partners had approached the Government on behalf of the consortium, they would have received exactly the same treatment.
Finally, what about the results of my Department's study of the project? There has been no Cabinet document, as the former Leader of the Opposition has suggested. A draft document was prepared by officials which concluded that a project based on the technology then being considered by the consortium would not be commercially viable.
This economic analysis was valuable. It led the consortium to search for and to investigate alternative processes which aimed for minimum capital cost and maximum yield of liquid fuel. Thus the possibility of considerable savings in capital cost became evident, with a small decrease in operating costs and with correspondingly lower sensitivity to the cost of coal.
The new process data led the consortium's financial committee to conclude that the nominal return on investment would not be 4 per cent, which was the original finding, but up to 18 per cent. Shortly thereafter, in its continued search for better processes, the consortium discovered that technical advances in two-stage processes had achieved significantly better yields than the processes evaluated in the pre-feasibility study.
The promise of lower capital costs, the promise of higher yields of fuel, and the fact that new versions of the process would use substantial quantities of natural gas, possibly derived from the Sable Island field, prompted the consortium to initiate further studies.
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The new process approach may require some time to commercialize as it is unlikely to be in production before 1990. This delay, which would have been a marked drawback when the project was initiated under circumstances of rapidly increasing oil prices, is no disadvantage in the present circumstance. In fact, there is every possibility that the new technology will be ready for the next excalation in oil prices. The Province of Nova Scotia, represented through its Crown Corporation, Nova Scotia Resources Limited, concurs in this new approach.
I shall be asking the Government of Nova Scotia if it wishes to proceed. If Premier Buchanan wants more work to continue on this project, the federal Government will certainly not object to the continued use of funds from the Canada-Nova Scotia Oil Substitution Fund. On the contrary, the federal Government remains convinced that the project will be good for Nova Scotia by creating thousands of jobs and good for Canada by contributing to energy self-sufficiency. Where is the scandal in all that? It would be a great tragedy if the Opposition were to block this project. Therein lies the scandal.
Yesterday I tabled in the House all the documents I had in my possession. 1 did this in the spirit and by the letter of the Access to Information Act. Today I gave more facts that I obtained from Mr. Gillespie which have absolutely nothing to do with me. This is a project, and the guidelines as debated in this House of Commons are in relation to the then Minister of Energy. I asked the officials if at any time they felt they had been lobbied or pressured. They told me that at no time had that been the case. I think they are honourable.

Today, I can proudly say in the House that I believe the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde), who was Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources at the time, acted in the best interests of the Canadian Government and the people of Nova Scotia. As a Minister, he acted responsibly in every way.
There has long been a tendency to try to lessen the role of Quebec Members in the House. I am very pleased to see that today, the Minister of Finance, who has served his province and his country with great integrity, both as adviser to a Government, although not on the same side as I was, and I was already in politics . . . Later, as Minister, he always put the public good before private or partisan interests. His record speaks for itself. Mr. Speaker, it would have been a tragedy if today, the House had been obliged to accept the resignation of the Minister of Finance, because there are few people serving this country who have worked so intelligently and so hard to make Government projects a success.
What is at stake today? The future of a province which has probably suffered more than any other because of its depend-ance on imported oil. When 80 per cent of the energy generated in Nova Scotia came from oil imported at the kind of prices we had before the Energy Program was established, when there was no Federal compensation, all clear-thinking

February 24, 1983
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Nova Scotians were anxious to ensure that consumers of electric power in their province would have access to alternative sources of supply, and that coal miners in Cape Breton, which has a great deal of trouble selling its coal because it has a high sulphur content, could go on producing the coal that would be beneficial, eventually, to Nova Scotians. Last night, the Premier of Nova Scotia, Mr. Buchanan, asked me during a telephone conversation to forget this partisan quarrel and to make sure that in future the people of Cape Breton and Nova Scotian consumers would be able to benefit from their own natural resources.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: I think it is a scandal that these people again, for a matter of diversion, love to make accusations or try, as they often do.

There was a gentleman in my riding by the name of Fernand D. Lavergne, and the Right Hon. Prime Minister has met him-who gave me the following advice: Jean, in politics, when the mudslinging starts, do not worry. The mud will dry out and fall to the ground. In English, they say:

He who throws dirt, loses ground.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Those are two proverbs. I have been a Minister for a long time. I have my own rules, and I will tell you one of my rules. The instructions that I have given to my staff are that whenever a Member of Parliament calls, he or she should have priority for my attention, whatever their Party affiliation may be. People who have served in this House and have had the guts at one time in their life to run for Parliament will always receive a phone call from me and I will always accept their calls.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: Potential delegates-


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Come on! You need that. You have a Member of your Party who calls you dog food that nobody wants to buy. We are not that dirty with you. You are looking for delegates, and I wish you the best luck possible. We love you too. You have a great career as Leader of the Opposition.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: This is what disgusts me the most. I have been the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, the Minister of National Revenue, the President of the Treasury Board, the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce, the Minister of Finance, the Minister of Justice, and
the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources, because I spent 20 years of my life in this House serving the people. When I leave, should I go on Sparks Street with a tin can and ask the people to help a poor guy who worked for the Government of Canada?
As the rules apply, it is not forbidden for former Ministers to call Governments. They can do that. The problem is to make sure that they do not get privileged access. It is exactly what happened with this file. The officials bent over backwards to make sure that not only did he not have any privilege but that there was no appearance of privilege. They told me privately, when I asked them if they felt at any time they had been lobbied, that they had not. They said they had been dealing in this case exactly the way they could have dealt with any citizen of Canada.
With respect to those who try to destroy people by character assassination, there is a proverb which I learned today in the English language, and I think it is still true, which says "He who throws dirt, loses ground".


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Henry Perrin Beatty: Mr. Speaker, perhaps the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Chretien) could draw that aphorism to the attention of the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (Mr. Munro), particularly following his speech today.
I want to ask the Minister a question with respect to a statement that he made today. He indicated that the document entitled "Scotia Coal Synfuels" dated September 13, 1982, was not a Cabinet document and was, in fact, an internal memorandum. Why is it that yesterday he said that first, he was tabling all relevant documents, particularly all letters between Mr. Gillespie and the Government and, second, "all internal memoranda relating to the project for the same time period". He continued to say, as reported at page 23142 of yesterday's Hansard:
The only relevant documents which I am not tabling are those which are in Cabinet confidence, in this case submissions to the Treasury Board.
If that is the case, why has this document never been tabled in the House by him?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, he already has it. If he wants me to give him another copy I will get a copy made and send him one. It was available. It was quoted from by the former Leader of the Opposition.


Erik Nielsen: Give us a copy.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: I do not mind. I do not have it but I will check it out. 1 asked what that document was and they said it was an internal memorandum. The former Leader of the Opposition, who we hope will be back in his job soon-


Erik Nielsen: Me too.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: -quoted it as a Cabinet document, and I say that it was not one.

February 24, 1983


Henry Perrin Beatty: Mr. Speaker, we know something about the worth of statements made by these Ministers in this case. With regard to the memorandum which he does have and did table yesterday, the one from Mickey Cohen to the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde), dated January 15,1981, it states:
In anticipation of this development-
In other words, the consortium being formed.
-provision was made during the planning stage of the National Energy Program for a maximum of $1 million to be available for federal participation in this project.
Meaning that particular project.
Can the Minister indicate whether in fact it was the case that when his predecessor drew up the National Energy Program it was fully his intention to set aside $1 million for the Gillespie project? Can he tell the Flouse at the same time if he is aware of the statement by his predecessor to the Committee on Alternative Energy and Oil Substitution, which was, "Yes, I can tell you that on this program there is not a word in this program that I did not approve personally. The officials worked but it is a Government program. The decisions and options that were retained were those retained by the federal Government, not by officials as such"? Can the Minister tell us that and confirm that in fact, at the time the NEP was being drawn up, his predecessor set aside $1 million to go to the Gillespie consortium?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I think that there was a fund that was created in 1977 in which $9.3 million was available. There was some money remaining. I discussed this problem at length this morning with some of my officials. The Nova Scotia Government did not want to use that fund. It wanted to have it paid by the federal Government through another fund. It eventually came to the conclusion that it was to come from the oil substitution program. To this day it would like us to pay directly without using that fund, so they might keep it for something else.
I do not blame the Nova Scotia Government for trying to get more money from the federal Government. It is absolutely legitimate. But I understand that the discussions with the Nova Scotia Government over this program began long before the budget was brought down. It was always intended that the money was to come from the oil substitution program which was under the control of the Nova Scotia Government's treasury. I am certain, from the research that I have done, that there is not any link at all between that and the budget, because the funds were already under the control of the Nova Scotia Government.


Elmer MacIntosh MacKay: Mr. Speaker, the Minister has just stated some alleged facts about the origin of the money that was used by the Province of Nova Scotia for very laudable reasons, and to the admitted benefit of the Province of Nova Scotia. That is not the issue. As a matter of fact, let me quote to the Minister from the bottom of page 2 of this memorandum with which he should be familiar. It says:
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In the event that the Province of Nova Scotia insists on Novaco being admitted to the industrial group solely on the strength of the funding from the Oil Substitution Agreement and if this is not acceptable to you-
Being the Minister of Energy at the time:
-it will still be possible to arrange federal participation in the project by applying NEP funds directly.
That is directly, not through any washing arrangement to which the Province of Nova Scotia was finally prevailed upon to agree.
I want to refer briefly to the interjection made about my referring to my friend, the Right Hon. Member for Yellow-head (Mr. Clark), as dog food. That was not the context. At least I did not refer to another substance that dogs sometimes make, which sticks to people's shoes, which his Leader did when he referred to the unemployed truckdrivers of LaPalme. Maybe he forgot that.
I want to say to the Minister that I am a little surprised that he knows so little about his portfolio that he did not realize, for example, that my colleague's Province of Prince Edward Island is much worse off for energy than Nova Scotia. While everyone concedes that this is a very laudable project, we come back to the point that the Province of Nova Scotia was used by the federal Government for its own purposes, taking advantage of the Nova Scotia Government's understandable desire to develop coal. It is interesting that the coal in my area was never developed like this, and 1 am glad that it was not if it required the methodology that was used in Cape Breton.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: What was referred to was that they explored many avenues, and the avenue that the Hon. Member refers to was not acceptable. That is why we used the other avenue. That is well known. Can you blame the people for looking at all the possible avenues in searching for what can be done? They discussed all the aspects, but they have to look at what the results of those discussions are. The result of the discussion was that the first financing had been carried out through the substitution program, which is under the control of the Nova Scotia Government. We cannot have the same type of project in P.E.I. There are other kinds of agreements with P.E.I. on the problem. They do not have coal in P.E.I., so we cannot liquefy potatoes. We are talking about the liquefaction of coal.


Mr. Andre:: Mr. Speaker, I will be very brief. The Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Chretien) and the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) indicated earlier today and on other days that the funds for this project are paid-the Minister should listen because he has misled the House-from the Nova Scotia Consolidated Revenue Fund and they are part of the 1977 agreement. I would like to quote from a memorandum to the former Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources from Marjory Loveys, which is found at page 250 in the pile of documents that he tabled yesterday, and which states:
The $1 million slated for the coal liquefaction consortium is in addition to the money in the fund-

February 24, 1983
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This is the relevant section:
-it has been passed through the fund for administrative reasons:
So it is being passed through the fund for administrative purposes. This is federal money. The Minister has misled the House. Will he now have the decency to stand up and say that perhaps he has forgotten about this document which he tabled yesterday?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: The Hon. Member said I misled the House. It is very terrible. There was another memorandum sent the day after, I understand, containing instruction that the money must come from the Oil Substitution Fund. The Hon. Member should read the whole file. Perhaps I am learning a terrible lesson in that I may have given too many documents to the Hon. Member and he has become confused.


Charles Joseph Clark: We know the truth.


Philip Derek Lewis: Did you give them all?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: The Hon. Member for Vancouver South.


John Allen Fraser: 1 wonder if I could ask-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Order, please. I am sorry but 1 am not certain whether the Hon. Member for Hamilton Mountain (Mr. Deans) is rising for the question and answer period or to seek the floor on debate. I thought it was the latter, so I excluded him.


Ian Deans: Debate.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources is rising on a point of order.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, come on!


David Charles Dingwall: Mr. Speaker, I have just one comment. The Hon. Member for-


Philip Derek Lewis: One question!


David Charles Dingwall: -for Central Nova (Mr. MacKay), who just spoke-I just wanted to make one comment.


Philip Derek Lewis: Point of order!


David Charles Dingwall: I would like to-


Harvie Andre: That is not a point of order!


Henry Perrin Beatty: You are the Parliamentary Secretary. Ask him in his office!


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: If the Hon. Member wants to raise a point of order, he should refer to the Standing Orders of the House. If he wants to ask a question, he must wait because 1 have already recognized the Hon. Member for Vancouver South.


Henry Perrin Beatty: The Parliamentary Secretary is asking his Minister a question.


Yvon Pinard: So what is wrong with that? You do not like the truth?


Flora Isabel MacDonald: That shows how much they ever get together.


John Allen Fraser: I would like to ask the Minister a question. Several days ago the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. Mac-Eachen) said that those guidelines are self-enforcing, there is no monitoring agency, they are left up to the conscience of the individual to follow, and Ministers are to follow the guidelines "according to our judgment", in other words, they will judge themselves. At the same time, the Deputy Prime Minister was critical of the Opposition and said that, in its dealings with this matter, it was not acting according to the principles of natural justice.
One of the principles of natural justice is that no man shall sit in judgment of his own cause. That goes back to the seventeenth century. Can I ask the Minister, on behalf of the Government, whether it is the position of Ministers, the Government and the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) that there is no judgment to be exercised by anyone else except the particular Ministers as to whether or not there could be the appearance of a breach of the guidelines? Is this to be something that-


Marc Lalonde: The Prime Minister and Parliament.


John Allen Fraser: -is to be completely decided by the Minister who is involved in seeing or hearing something?


Marc Lalonde: That is what we are debating today.


John Allen Fraser: Is it that Minister who is to decide, or is there no one else who can make a judgment?


Marc Lalonde: We are passing a judgment today.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: There are two aspects to the question. As far as the Minister is concerned, he is responsible to the Prime Minister. If the Prime Minister concludes that his Minister has acted improperly, he will ask him to resign.
In this case, the Prime Minister has accepted the word of his Minister of Finance. I am glad to be sitting next to the Minister of Finance and saying that I also think that the Minister acted in an entirely proper fashion. This is the court for Ministers. Their responsibility is in relation to the Prime Minister and the Prime Minister takes the necessary action. In this case, he has kept his confidence, rightly so, in my judgment, in the Minister of Justice.
In relation to the public, there is another court, which is this House of Commons. At 5.45 o'clock p.m., everyone will have a chance to express their views.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


February 24, 1983


Ian Deans: Mr. Speaker, in an attempt to return to what I consider to be the question before the House of Commons, I want to start by saying to Government Members that no one is questioning the character of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde).


Mr. Gourd:: Look at the questions you asked this week.


Ian Deans: I want to suggest that perhaps Hon. Members opposite should be kind enough to listen. I have listened all day to every Hon. Member who spoke. What I am personally doing is questioning the Minister's judgment. That happens to be my job, to come to Parliament and to elicit from the Cabinet the information I believe is necessary in order to make proper judgments about matters of public importance. I am not likely to ever suggest that the character of the Minister is to be questioned. However, I see some important questions which should be answered. We should not become drawn into a discussion of the value of the project because it is not a matter which is before the House at the moment. It is entirely possible that an accurate assessment of the project would prove it to be of little value. However, another assessment may well prove it to be of considerable value. However, that is not the question.
The question before us centers on two questions. First, it centers on whether a former Minister of the Crown, or Ministers who have left office, violated the guidelines as set out by the Prime Minister. Second, it centers on whether the present Minister of Finance who, at the time this deal was entered into, was the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources, has fulfilled all of the requirements of the guidelines for Ministers in office. I would like to deal with those two questions and to state my reason for asking the questions that I raised earlier in the week, and my reason for rising in the debate today.
The first question is, did Mr. Gillespie adhere to the guidelines as set out by the Prime Minister? First, let us consider what the guidelines state so that there is no doubt as to what we are discussing. The guidelines state that a former office holder must not, within the relevant time period, lobby for or on behalf of any person or commercial corporation before any Department or agency by which he was employed or with which he had a direct and substantial official relationship during the period of two years prior to the termination of his employment. That was the guideline in place when Mr. Gillespie was a Minister. Mr. Gillespie, in accepting his appointment to the Cabinet, accepted the fact that he must abide by that guideline if he left office.
I suggest that there is quite clear evidence which would show to anyone reviewing the documents tabled by either the Prime Minister or by the present Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Chretien) that Mr. Gillespie most certainly did carry on a continued relationship with the former Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources on behalf not only of himself but also on behalf of other corporate citizens, and that in so doing he was clearly in violation of the guidelines.
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No matter how often Hon. Members say, "Not so", the record is clear. Mr. Gillespie telephoned, there are records to show that he carried on correspondence, and even went as far as seeking the assistance of Mr. Cohen, the Deputy Minister, in getting his project "off the ground", in exactly those words. He was therefore using his former position as a Minister in a way which was in clear violation of the guidelines.
Further, at the time Mr. Gillespie was a Minister, there was a guideline stating that a former office holder must not, within the relevant time period, give counsel for commercial purposes concerning the programs or policies of the Department or agency by which he was employed or with which he had a direct or substantial official relationship during the period of one year prior to the termination of his employment.
I want to suggest that there is even on this count clear evidence on the record to show that in the year immediately after Mr. Gillespie left the Ministry he did in fact give counsel and therefore was in violation of that guideline also. If we accept-and quite clearly the Cabinet members and others who are carrying on private conversations frankly do not give a damn about it because they have already decided to whitewash the thing-however, if one accepts that there was at least sufficient evidence that one could draw that conclusion, that there was sufficient evidence that Mr. Gillespie might have been in violation of the guidelines to the extent of having other than Members of Parliament wonder about it, then you have to wonder why the Minister of Energy did not himself recognize that that may well pose a problem for him at some future date.
Let me suggest to you that it is not only the Members of the Opposition who are concerned about whether Mr. Gillespie violated the guidelines. In the letter contained in the voluminous documents that were tabled yesterday, there is a memorandum from Dr. J. H. Walsh to Dr. K. Whitham, dated April 14, 1981, and in that memorandum he says:
3. (ii) The role of Mr. Gillespie: Concerns were expressed regarding the retaining and daily consultant fee ($600) to be paid to Mr. Gillespie, and about the terms under which the Consortium partners have the right to buy out his interest. There is also a question of whether Mr. Gillespie's participation is in variance with conflict of interest guidelines.
Mir. Lalonde: Read on.
Mir. Deans: Do not worry, I am going to read on. It goes on:
I replied regarding the financial arrangements between Mr. Gillespie and the Consortium members that this matter was wholly transparent and that Ministers could approve or disapprove in their wisdom.
We are now questioning the wisdom of the Minister, and I think quite rightly so.
Beyond that it goes on to say:
With regard to conflict of interest matters, I noted that Mr. Gillespie's term as Minister ended June 4, 1979, when Mr. Hnatyshyn was appointed. In any case, I could not see that there was any direct benefit to Mr. Gillespie arising out of the negotiations with the two Governments.


Marc Lalonde: Ha!

February 24, 1983
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Ian Deans: Wait a minute. It goes on:
Mr. Shulte replied that he would refer this question to the Privy Council Office which I believe is the correct agency to consider this matter.


Marc Lalonde: Right.


Ian Deans: So, quite clearly, although the opinion was given by the writer of the document, Dr. Walsh, that he himself did not see the conflict, Mr. Shulte, who was there as the counsel, said that he thought the matter should be referred to the Privy Council Office for a decision.


An Hon. Member:: Then what happened?


Harvie Andre: They amended the agreement, that is what happened.


Ian Deans: There is no further memorandum to show that the Privy Council Office was either approached, considered the matter, or replied. However, there are the amendments to the agreement, as the Prime Minister said today-


Marc Lalonde: They are not amendments to the agreement; they are amendments to the Treasury Board submission.


Ian Deans: Thank you the amendments to the Treasury Board submission, in which the situation surrounding Mr. Gillespie was altered. Let me say to the Minister of Finance, I want him to think about this for a moment. It was quite clear that under the situation that had prevailed during the period leading up to April 14, 1981 that there was serious doubt as to whether Mr. Gillespie was indeed not violating the conflict of interest guidelines. In order to correct that, the Treasury Board submission was changed to rechannel the funds. I put to the Minister, if you ever needed more evidence that in fact an agreement was entered into from which Mr. Gillespie benefited, which he otherwise would not have been entitled to, what more proof do you need? Mr. Gillespie, quite clearly, was not entitled to participate as he had been participating. The decision of the Government was then to change the Treasury Board order to allow him to be able to participate. I put to the Minister that that is quite clearly preferential treatment. Who else but Mr. Gillespie could be in that situation? So right off the bat we have a prima facie case of preferential treatment accorded to Mr. Gillespie. He got what he otherwise would not have been entitled to by virtue of a change that was made to a Treasury Board order.


An Hon. Member:: Or he was in conflict before.


Ian Deans: He was in conflict, that is what I am saying. He was in conflict right up until April, 1981. Otherwise, why change it? The only reason they changed it for him was because he had been in conflict and they were not willing to run the risk of having him maintain himself in conflict, and so he was given preferential treatment. I do not think that is an unreasonable conclusion to draw. It may be arguable, I concede, but I do not think it is unreasonable to draw that conclusion.
I want then to suggest that if one draws that conclusion, it is therefore equally valid to draw the conclusion that the information contained in the memorandum that I just quoted was brought not only to the Assistant Deputy Minister's attention
but would, undoubtedly, because of the conflict of interest question, be brought to the Deputy Minister's attention, and should have been brought to the Minister's attention.
I say to the Minister that under no condition should the Minister have agreed to sign any document that conveyed benefit to Mr. Gillespie that he had not been entitled to receive as a result of the guidelines that were in place. That is the basis for the argument that I make. The Minister then has to assume his responsibility. His Ministry altered the rules of the game. They did this because they knew that Alastair Gillespie was clearly in conflict. The Minister signed the approving orders to alter the rules of the game. The Minister in so doing assumed the responsibility for conveying on Alastair Gillespie a benefit that he would not otherwise have been entitled to. It is for that reason, I say to the Minister, that I seriously question his judgment. I do not question his honesty; I do not question his character; I question his judgment, damn it, and that is why I am here.
I put to the Minister that he, at the time that this matter was brought to his attention, should have taken a look at the guidelines that pertain to Ministers of the Crown. It says quite clearly in the guidelines:
In any official dealings with former office holders, Ministers must ensure that they do not provide grounds or the appearance of grounds for allegations of improper influence, privileged access or preferential treatment.
I say to the Minister, in all fairness, based on the argument that I have put, an argument that I believe if it was put in a court of law, if it were a law that we were dealing with, would be sustained; an argument that I believe if put before an impartial tribunal-which have asked for, incidentally, and have been refused-would be sustained.
I put to the Minister that there is no doubt in my mind, and I raise it for no other reason, that Mr. Gillespie violated the guidelines; that the Ministry altered the terms to accommodate the violation; and that the Minister signed the document to accommodate the alteration of the terms which enabled them to circumvent the guidelines. There is quite clearly the appearance of grounds for allegations of improper influence. More important, there is certainly the appearance of grounds for allegations of privileged access, and there is most certainly the appearance of grounds for preferential treatment.
I say to the Minister that although he made an eloquent speech defending what in fact was not in question, he has not addressed himself to the matters that I have put before him. He has not addressed himself to the question of whether, in signing the document which altered the terms and conditions, he in fact aided and abetted Alastair Gillespie in getting benefit, potential and immediate, to which he would otherwise not have been entitled. And I say this to the Minister, although no doubt he does not care. He does not even listen, which is unfortunate. It is unfortunate there is a majority on that side of the House, it truly is, because if there was not, they would
February 24, 1983

have to listen to the arguments being put, as opposed to chatting with the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Miss Begin) who obviously does not give a damn about this, either.


Marc Lalonde: I can listen to you while I am listening to someone else.


Ian Deans: You can, can you? Is that the same way you dealt with the documents which you did not know existed, doing two or three things at a time?


Marc Lalonde: Why will you not cool off?


Ian Deans: Why don't I cool off? Do you know why I don't cool off? You are drawing this institution down to a level the likes of which it has not been in years.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Ian Deans: The reason I do not cool off is that this institution is the only thing that stands between the country as it now is and total anarchy. And I say to the Minister that if he can stand up and satisfactorily refute the points which I have made, then I suspect that I would withdraw my argument. But I say to the Minister, frankly, that I do not see how he can do that. I do not see how he or the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau), or the current Minister of Energy or, for that matter, the Attorney General (Mr. MacGuigan), could claim for one minute that Alastair Gillespie was not lobbying. I do not see how any one of them could claim that in the process of lobbying, he was not violating the guidelines. I do not see how anyone can claim that when that violation of the guidelines was brought to the attention of the Ministry, a new submission was drafted in order to circumvent the violation which existed. And I do not see how anyone could claim that if the Minister signed that amended proposal, he is not an accomplice in Mr. Gillespie's violations. I therefore cannot see how the Minister can claim that he is entitled to remain in office.


Marc Lalonde: I have listened with great interest to the Hon. Member's speech and to the attempt he has made to present his case, I think reasonably. Let me put the case to him another way and ask him whether or not he could see the other side of the point which he tried to make, in all fairness and in all reasonableness. He said that Mr. Gillespie had been given preferential treatment because the Treasury Board submission was modified.


Ian Deans: Yes.


Marc Lalonde: He says, yes. Well, that is a strange leg to put his argument on, I would submit, for the very simple reason that Mr. Gillespie has been treated in this case in a way which is indeed different from that accorded to any other average citizen who would have applied. Why has he been treated differently? Because, as he is a former office holder, the Government and the officials have taken exceptional care to prevent him from having access to public funds under the
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Canada-Nova Scotia agreement. Far from being an occasion of damning the Minister or of damning the officials, the fact that they have taken that extra care to get the Treasury Board submission changed to eliminate the possibility for Mr. Gillespie to have access to any of these funds, surely should demonstrate to any reasonable being, and I assume my friend is a reasonable being, and approaches this situation reasonably, that all due care was taken to ensure that the conflict of interest guidelines were respected. Surely my hon. friend has quoted from documents and memos where officials have said, "Hey, there is that conflict of interest guideline. We must ensure it is taken care of. The official of the Treasury Board said, 'I will check with the Privy Council Office' ", and in the end, the Treasury Board submission and the agreement had a special provision inserted into it to take into account that particular situation.
Does my friend, as a reasonable man, not see that there is another side of his argument and it provides a completely different conclusion from the one he reached using the same facts? It is a completely different conclusion and it shows that the officials and the Government acted responsibly.


Ian Deans: I thank the Minister for making my case for me.
I want to suggest to the Minister-


Monique Bégin: Listen to the Minister.


Ian Deans: I listened. Believe me I listened. I have sat up every night for the last week puzzling over what has been going on.


An Hon. Member:: You were talking to Mark Rose.


Ian Deans: I was not talking to Mark Rose. Do you want to hear my answer or do you want to talk? The Minister made the case extremely well. He said that the Ministry officials recognized the potential for a conflict of interest. They recognized the potential because in fact Mr. Gillespie had been in that conflict of interest position for almost two full years. They recognized that. They then decided that if they continued with what they were proposing, he would not be able to participate.


Marc Lalonde: No way.


Ian Deans: No. Hang on. They decided they had to alter the Treasury Board order-


Marc Lalonde: To take extra care.


Ian Deans: In order to allow Mr. Gillespie to not violate the guidelines. I put to the Minister, if Mr. Gillespie had been in violation of the guidelines, and if the Treasury Board orders had to be altered so that he was not in violation-


Marc Lalonde: Even appearing to be in violation.


Ian Deans: -are you not giving him something which he would otherwise not be entitled to? You had to change the guidelines to entitle him to participate. You had to change the Treasury Board orders.

February 24, 1983
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Marc Lalonde: We can't change the guidelines. We respect the guidelines.


Ian Deans: I can only suggest to the Minister that 1 believe what has happened is that, having been in power for such a long time, the Liberals sense, perhaps, that whatever they do is right, regardless of whether it is right or not. And I resent it because it is quite clear that Alastair Gillespie violated the guidelines, and it is clearly stated that that was a concern of the Ministry officials. So they then altered the Treasury Board orders to allow him to do what he was doing, with impunity.


David Charles Dingwall: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Hon. Member for Hamilton Mountain (Mr. Deans). He talked about fairness in his speech and, being a fair-minded person, perhaps he would agree with me that the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde), as well as the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. MacEachen), are not stupid individuals. And if they were to try to give a benefit to, or confer a benefit on Alastair Gillespie, which would hopefully not be noticed by Members of this Chamber or other Chambers, can he explain to me why then would the Deputy Prime Minister and the Premier of the Province issue press releases, go to a press conference, be televised on CBC, be spoken about in the Nova Scotia House of Assembly with Mr. Gillespie, the Deputy Prime Minister and the Premier of the Province? Can he explain that?
While he is on his feet, Mr. Speaker, would he explain why it has taken his Party 23 months to raise the issue, only raising this issue after the Conservative Party raised it? They sit for two days in waiting and then raise the question. Would he answer those two particular matters?


Ian Deans: Thank you. I will answer the last one first. The time involved is totally irrelevant. The question surely is that if there was a violation, then whenever one finds the violation, one must raise it publicly. If it took 22 years to find the violation, it is still a violation. It does not alter the fact.
With regard to why the Deputy Prime Minister sat on the platform and why the Minister of Finance did what he did, the answer to that is very difficult to Find. That is why this whole debate is taking place. We frankly question their judgment on the matter.


Monique Bégin: We question yours.


Ian Deans: We think that, along with the loud-mouth Minister of Health, they probably made a mistake and were given bad advice. Perhaps, with the benefit of hindsight, they might see that what they did, in light of the circumstances that are now clear to everyone and with all of the documentation that is now available, was an error. In making that error, they put their own particular positions in jeopardy.
That is what ministerial responsibility is all about. When you become a Minister-if you do-you will Find that everything that happens in that Ministry is your responsibility. As was said by a forced to retire British Member of the House of Commons who was in the Cabinet, he accepts the credit when
his department does something right, and he accepts the blame when they do something wrong. In this instance they did something wrong.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: Order. The time provided for questions has expired. Debate.


Hon. Bryce Mackasey (Lincoln):: Mr. Speaker, in 45 minutes we will be asked to vote on a non-confidence motion for the supply period ending March 26, 1983. It is significant that the Leader of the New Democratic Party (Mr. Broad-bent), in putting his reference to a lack of moral standards and the need to refer the issue before us to the Deputy Registrar General, attached it to a vote of non-confidence, knowing full well that it would be defeated. Nobody in their right mind would expect the Government to bring on its own defeat simply to refer to the Deputy Registrar General an issue that the House thinks should be referred there.
Immediately we have the hypocrisy of the Opposition in attaching that to a vote of non-confidence. It shows that deep down they do not want it to go there. That was obvious from the questions today. It is obvious that we will win this vote of confidence. As usual, they wanted the best of all worlds, an opportunity, a day if you like, to belabour the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) once more. That is fine. I understand the role of the Opposition.


Mr. Speyer:: How do you?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: You are new here and a little stupid, and that does not help.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: Order. I would request the Hon. Member for Lincoln (Mr. Mackasey) to address his remarks to the Chair.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Mr. Speaker, I must apologize to my hon. friend. I really mean that sincerely. I do not really appreciate heckling, and it is one of the things that I have not done in my 20 years here, any more than I have had to attack anybody in this House personally. There is something about the House of Commons that is rather important to me. I do not for a moment pretend that it is not important to me or to others. Truthfully, I can point out 10, 12 or 15 Members, including the Hon. Member for Bow River (Mr. Taylor), who understand the House of Commons. They understand that sooner or later in our whole parliamentary process the House of Commons becomes the arena, the centre of the whole parliamentary system. It is not the committees, not the newspapers, but the House of Commons. I see the Hon. Member for Nepean-Carleton (Mr. Baker) wants to get closer to the action and the excitement. As a Member of the House of Commons he has mastered, as I have, the ability to use the same speech on all occasions.
It is rather ridiculous, and would be almost amusing if it were not sad, that at a time when the country is concerned about unemployment, the future, the need to get on with a new budget, and concerned with cleaning up the business of the
February 24, 1983

House so that we can do things to generate the economy and bring down unemployment, Members of both Parties opposite have placed priority on the question of whether Mr. Alastair Gillespie did or did not breach the spirit of the guidelines. For that matter, they think they see an opportunity to bring down the Minister of Finance.
I have had my differences with the Minister of Finance over the last 20 years. He is rather hard-headed, even if he smiles a lot, but he is a man of integrity. He has devoted the best years of his life to the service of his country. I understand why the Minister of Finance, despite the opportunity waiting for him out of here as a top notch legal expert in this country, wants to be here to defend his reputation, because his reputation is important to him. It is, as he says, probably the most precious asset any of us have in life. I have been worried and concerned in my 20 years about the immunity which each and every one of us in this House has. Every time this debate arises, whether it is brought to a head, as this one will be, or whether it is continued in Question Period, sooner or later you find reasonable Members, who individually are friends of mine, acting collectively, dropping their own standards, acting like a pack, braying at the nipped feet of the Minister of Finance, much like a pack of wolves trying to bring down a grizzly. For what purpose? What is there about this House that changes reasonable people into that kind of people without any moral standards of their own?
As the Leader of the New Democratic Party attempted to spell out this morning, the issue before the House is one of morality. He is absolutely right. It is a more important issue than legality, because the people of Canada judge the House of Commons by the collective morals of the Members of this House. That implies that not only must the Cabinet have morals and not only should the backbenchers of the Government have a moral code, but so should Members opposite practice what they preach.
My good friend, the Minister of Energy quoted an old English proverb. I suppose I could have suggested one to him which applies to Members opposite: "People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones".
This Government has been charged with corruption day in and day out in Question Period. There have been inferences of slander and innuendoes. What are we guilty of? The defender of the morals of the House of Commons for 20 years, the Hon. Member for Yukon (Mr. Nielsen), told us what those standards are today. This Government is corrupt because it pays Mr. Macdonald $800 a day.


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: It is corrupt because it appointed Mr. Pitfield to the Senate and the Member for Lincoln to Air Canada.


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: That's fine. Also because the Minister of Finance, in their opinion, is not a man of integrity.
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Let us look at the record of the Tories in 1979. What was the going rate in 1979 for Tory lawyers hired by the Tory Minister of Transport? Was it $100 a day? Was it $150 a day?


Some Hon. Members:: Higher.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Was it $200 a day? I will read it.


An Hon. Member:: Name them.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I do not get down to personalities.
In the famous Mississauga railway accident inquiry, set in motion on December 4, 1979 by Order in Council, legal counsel was hired by the then Minister of Transport. I want to say that I have great respect for him. I do not question his integrity. Nor do I question the fact that one of the firms he hired goes by the beautiful name of Tory, Tory, Deslauriers and Binnington of Royal Park Plaza, and then there were Keyser, Mason, Coleman, McTavish and Lewis. With good Scotsmen in there it means the job will be done. What was their fee? Was it $50 or $60 per day? No, it was $100 per hour.


An Hon. Member:: Oh, oh!


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: And no allowance for inflation, Mr. Speaker. It was not limited to $800 per day-it was limited to $6,000 per week.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Expensive lawyers!


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: There was nobody on a per diem, and we do not have to worry about overhead. None of the $800 has to go for office expenses-that is a separate issue. The cheques are not paid to the representative of Tory, Tory, Deslauriers and Binnington, they are paid directly to the company. Were any additional fees charged for expenses? Not too many. Oh, there were some fees paid to various legal assistants. An extra $6,000 in the case of Tory, Tory; telephone, travel, office supplies, courier services, searches, photocopies, are all meticulously charged over and above.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Above?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Another $14,363.92.
1 am not going to embarrass the other firm which was not thought of with quite the same respect and perhaps was not of quite the same quality. It was not entitled to the same fee, and only got $95 per hour.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: A cheap firm.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: All I know, Mr. Speaker, is that I am sure we got value for our dollar. That was a very important investigation and a very serious accident. I am not appalled by the fact that Tory, Tory, Deslauriers and Binnington were paid a total of $167,074.97 for their services. It shows how important it is to get $95 per hour rather than $100, because they

February 24, 1983
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managed to earn no less than $205,257.00. I am not questioning the integrity of those lawyers, whether they were Liberals or Tories. As far as I am concerned they were qualified Canadians, and I mean that sincerely. Nor am I questioning the judgment of the then Minister of Transport. All I am asking is that the same sense of integrity and judgment be applied to this side of the House.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Hypocrites!


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: There were dozens and dozens of similar experiences in the short time the Tories were in charge, that I could dig out every day I wanted to then dig out, all of which were perfectly proper, all of which reflected the fact that the Government in power was doing its job, all of which, if brought into the House with the tactics used by the Opposition, could smear the reputation of each and every one of those Ministers and each and every one of those recipients.
That is one of the problems and worries that plague ex-Ministers-and I have been "ex" more often than most people in this House. I, too, have my sense of integrity, and I am not afraid to express it and utilize it.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: The Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) is all
ears.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Oh, the Hon. Member is interrupting me. I have seen a slight change in his standards in recent weeks and I want to talk about that.
There is something about this House which I respect-1 will go as far as to say 1 love it. It brought me back, and I keep coming back here.


An Hon. Member:: Like a song.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: You will never be back-oh, I am sorry, Steve. I meant your seatmate.
Unless we maintain a certain standard of morals in this House, all of us, including the Government, including Cabinet Ministers, including myself-this House will not continue to serve the country and the people of this democratic country, properly.
It behooves all of us to meet a level of morality which the Leader of the New Democratic Party attempted to spell out earlier today.
I suppose, Mr. Speaker, that people at home-and many are, those who are unemployed-watching this House day in and day out-frustrated with the unemployment insurance cheques running out, frustrated after looking for jobs all morning-I suppose their priorities are different from ours. They turn on the radio to listen to Question Period or the television to watch it, hoping that something will be said to give them some hope of recovery, some sense of what is going on and whether certain projects are about to take place.
What do they see, day in and day out? Grown men playing Perry Mason, attempting to discredit one of the best Ministers of Finance-


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Mr. Speaker, it almost escapes reality at times, and I mean that. I do not get angry, because I have seen these changes in friend of mine. I am sure there are times when I lose my temper and say things that I regret. I was not too upset today when the Hon. Member for Yukon referred to the corruption of the Government, or to the appointment of the Member for Lincoln (Mr. Mackasey) as Chairman of Air Canada. Nor was I particularly upset when that bounced, although I could not quite understand the morality of the Conservatives, since in that same week they named Jean Wadds, the former Party President, to be High Commissioner in Great Britain. I could not understand what she had that I did not. Mind you, she was a Tory and I was a Liberal. But a Party with their moral standards would not take that into consideration.
When he mentioned that another symbol of our decadence was the appointment of Michael Pitfield to the Senate, I asked myself, who would make the best addition to the Senate- Michael Pitfield or Lowell Murray? 1 suspect, after the fiasco in Winnipeg, that if appointments still had to be made he would never make the Senate.
Is it not time we all took a long weekend, or just a weekend, and did a little soul searching about what has gone on in the House in the last few weeks?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Hypocrisy!


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I do not pretend that this is a Sunday school. It never was and never will be, nor should it be. I believe in strong debate. I envy those people who speak easily, as I do not. 1 envy the great Parliamentarians, particularly those in Great Britain where debate has been a way of life and where the people have a sense of history, a sense of integrity and a love of democracy. They understand that the written word, but more particularly the spoken word, is sometimes the difference between the democratic process and dictatorship or some other less favourable system.
I have to say-and I wish the Hon. Member for Yukon were in the House-that his tactics were more suited to the sixties than to the eighties. I must confess that I listened to him this morning attempting to convert or amend his speeches that brought down people in the sixties, to today. I doubt if a single backbencher in the House will ever again fear the mighty Member for Yukon, who made an almost pathetic contribution; it was merely a pathetic contribution. It was almost like Mohammed Ali going into the ring once too often. There was nothing there. There was nothing there for one reason-there is no substance to the argument that the Minister of Finance acted immorally or without a sense of integrity or conferred special treatment on one Alastair Gillespie. No amount of articulateness on the part of the Hon. Member for Yukon could create something that was not there.
February 24, 1983

There is another change from the 1960s and 1970s, that is the fact that everything we say now goes directly into the homes of Canadians through the media of television and radio; members are judged a little differently than just by the written word. People in those days had to depend on the objectivity or lack of objectivity of the newspapers to determine what was really going on. Smear and insinuation work well when they are confined to newspapers, but they work less well when heard on television and radio. I suspect Canadians do not particularly appreciate Members of Parliament resorting to tactics to which they would not dare resort 50 feet away from the Flouse of Commons.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: Order, please. The time provided for the Hon. Member's speech has expired. Is there unanimous consent to allow him to continue?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: There is not unanimous consent. Questions. Comments.


Mr. Regan:: Mr. Speaker, I would like to direct a question to the Hon. Member for Lincoln (Mr. Mackasey) who has performed so well. I was bothered by the question of the Hon. Member for Cape Breton-East Richmond (Mr. Dingwall) to the Hon. Member for Hamilton Mountain (Mr. Deans) about this matter having been carried on openly and not in a sneaky fashion. This seems to indicate that there was no bad intent on the part of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) or the Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. MacEachen) who participated in a press conference and television statements. It seems to me that if they had thought there was anything wrong being done for Mr. Gillespie, they would have had him as a silent partner in that consortium with the other businessmen, not up front and centre.
I want to ask a question arising out of that. Is the Hon. Member aware that the Hon. Member for Central Nova (Mr. MacKay) is from the next seat, the adjacent seat to where this press conference was held, and that he has had a reputation over the years of digging into everything and trying to bring up any muck that he could? Having in mind the fact that he was the only Minister in the Government of the Right Hon. Member for Yellowhead (Mr. Clark) who did not submit his conflict guidelines report to the Deputy Registrar General within the time limit provided-


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Gerald Augustine Regan: -is it what one calls a question of a conscience of convenient time that means that back in 1981, when this matter was announced in his newspapers and in the constituency next door to him, he did not see anything wrong? He would dig around and charge that he was being bugged by the
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Government, when it turned out that he was bugged by the people he hired himself to search his office. Does it not strike the Hon. Member as strange that that Hon. Member did not at that time bring up the question of any impropriety? He had a calendar-he has a calendar, I know, in his office-and he knew who Mr. Gillespie was, but he did not suggest that there was anything wrong. Why do they bring it up now and not two years ago?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Mr. Speaker, it may surprise the Minister if I were to tell him that I was not particularly amused by his question because I am not particularly interested in whether the Hon. Member for Central Nova (Mr. MacKay) submitted his expense account or whatever he was supposed to submit. It does not bother me. When I talk about a moral conscience in the House, it applies to this side of the House as well as to the opposite. It seems to me that if we have a good case at any time, in debate we can make it without being concerned about the private weaknesses of Members opposite. I know it is difficult to keep the border line, but those who master the technique understand the House better.
I am interested in some of the facts involved and I understand that is good, old-fashioned politics. But to be consistent-and I am-I do not think it has anything to do with the issue. The issue we are debating here-and I direct this to the gentleman who asked the question-is the integrity of the Minister of Finance and whether there is sufficient evidence from the Question Period and today to suggest, insist or prove that there has been any lack of integrity on his part or any wrongdoing.
Surely the Members opposite without conviction with their love for democracy, their concern for justice, would have long ago made a case here, gone the traditional route and challenged the Minister to go before the Standing Committee on Privileges and Elections, and put his seat in jeopardy. I am sure they have that integrity, the Members opposite who have participate in Question Period every day. Thus, I can only come to the conclusion that they have not been satisfied that there is sufficient evidence or any evidence of any lack of integrity on the part of the Minister of Finance. Hence, maybe that is why they are falling back on the issue moral standards.
I might say in my reply that some of the questions in recent pays but by Members of the New Democratic Party reflect a healthy hypocrisy on their part. The Hon. Member for Comox-Powell River (Mr. Skelly) was not too kind and charitable in his reference to Ministers, I think yesterday. I think he almost chocked to death in his demand that Members resign. Resign for what? There are some Members of the New Democratic Party, not all, who have obviously demonstrated that sanctimoniousness which has always been one of their characteristics as far back as the thirties, that they are purer than anyone else. I suppose that is the hallmark of a true socialist. If the Hon. Member for Comox-Powell River feels so strongly about the Minister of Finance resigning, then he has the time today or on Monday or Tuesday to go the honourable way and make a charge in the House of Commons. Then we would deal with it in the appropriate forum, which is the

February 24, 1983
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Standing Committee on Privileges and Elections. I doubt if he has that courage.


Maurice Adrian Dionne: Mr. Speaker, my question is not designed to amuse the previous speaker, but in view of his long experience here, both as a backbencher and as a Minister, I want to ask him if he is as concerned as I am. I heard him speak about his concern about this kind of debate and, even more important, the kinds of questions which have been asked for more than a week now, going into the homes of the nation. Is he concerned, not only about the reputation of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde), but whether he believes that indeed the reputation of any Minister or any Member of the House is safe if other Members can get up and, through innuendo and smear, attack an individual in the House, without making a charge, without repeating those charges outside the House, without putting their reputations on the line too?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Mr. Speaker, I do not think too many Members resort to those tactics, although some on this side have not been above adopting such tactics at one time or another. I have thought of this many times because I was here in the sixties. 1 was here, but I was not too concerned about the Ministers who were under attack. I was concerned about those who were not part of the House of Commons, concerned about those who did not have access to the House of Commons to defend themselves. Mr. Gillespie does not have that access, but at least he is a political figure and he can defend himself outside this place. I remember a young law student named Guy Lord whose name was dragged into debate by the Hon. Member for Yukon. He had to leave here because of the stigma, and went to Paris to complete his studies. When the reports were tabled a month later by the judiciary he was totally exonerated of any wrongdoing. I am not suggesting that he was brought into the debate on purpose. I mean that. Because of our immunity there are innocent victims, and just like others who suffered from those difficult times, there is very little we can say by way of consolation. That should not be interpreted as meaning any limitations should be placed on the role of the Opposition. The Opposition has an obligation to probe, demand and ask the type of questions, which I thought the Hon. Member for Hamilton Mountain (Mr. Deans) did today in very appropriate parliamentary style. That is the job of the Opposition. It is not the job of the Opposition to drag in red herrings and to smear people, or to use the type of tactics that could not be used by learned counsel in court. Perhaps it is time to review the whole concept of immunity. Maybe we could set up some rules.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: Order, please.
[ Translation]
The President of the Privy Council (Mr. Pinard) on a point of order.


Yvon Pinard: Mr. Speaker, I am rising on a point of order to get the floor. I would like to draw your attention to Standing Order 35(1), which I quote:
Unless otherwise provided in these Standing Orders, when the Speaker is in the Chair, no Member, except the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition, or a Minister moving a government order and the Member speaking in reply immediately after such Minister, or a Member making a motion of "no-confidence" in the government and a Minister replying thereto, shall speak for more than twenty minutes at a time in any debate. Following the speech of each Member a period not exceeding ten minutes shall be made available, if required, to allow Members to ask questions and comment briefly on matters relevant to the speech and to allow responses thereto.
However, Mr. Speaker, keeping in mind the first few words of that Standing Order 35(1) which read "Unless otherwise provided in these Standing Orders", I will now quote Standing Order 62(13) to which I draw your attention because it is contradictory:
During proceedings on any item of business under the provisions of this Standing Order-
-and this Standing Order refers to an Opposition day such as we now have-
-no Member may speak more than once or longer than twenty minutes. Following the speech of each Member, a period not exceeding ten minutes shall be made available, if required, to allow Members to ask questions and to comment briefly on matters relevant to the speech and to allow responses thereto.
Here is the point 1 want to raise, Mr. Speaker: the Hon. Member who is about to speak belongs to the Progressive Conservative Party. Of all speakers today, he is the only one who will not have had the opportunity of facing questions and answers once he has completed his remarks, because of the hour at which he will begin his speech. Under the circumstances, if he has the least bit of courage, I am asking him to agree in advance to shorten his remarks by five minutes so as to enable Hon. Members to ask him a few questions at the end of his intervention.


Harvie Andre: Mr. Speaker, 1 am not rising on a point of order. If the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Pinard) wants to ask me questions, I am quite prepared not to see the clock for five minutes so Hon. Members on the other side can ask questions. I am asking only for ten minutes in which to give my speech. Certainly we will give unanimous consent not to see the clock for five minutes so that Hon. Members can ask their questions.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Harvie Andre: Let me make it abundantly clear, and I am being repetitive in terms of what has been said here earlier today by Members from this side of the House, both by Conservatives and by New Democrats, but the question at issue is not the character of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde). There is no accusation nor has there been a hint of an accusation that the Minister of Finance has pocketed some money or has gained illicitly from this deal. There is no suggestion that the Minister of Finance acted in a way con-
February 24, 1983

trary to the Criminal Code or contrary to any other law. What is at issue here is whether he fulfilled his responsibilities as a Minister of the Crown in terms of the guidelines for minimum acceptable behaviour as laid down by the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau). That is what is at issue, Mr. Speaker. That, and nothing more.
It was interesting to listen to speakers from the Government benches today. They stood up and said that they deplored muckraking; there has not been any; and then they resorted to 20 minutes of muckraking.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Harvie Andre: I shall not go up that blind alley. I will not be attracted by that red herring or that straw man which the Hon. Member for Lincoln (Mr. Mackasey) whipped the blazes out of. I will not be attracted by the straw man which the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (Mr. Munro) destroyed or the straw man that was taken on by the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Chretien). We are not impressed with these battles with straw men. What we are concerned about, as has been so eloquently stated today by many, many speakers, is the integrity of Parliament-


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Harvie Andre: -and the authority of the Minister of Finance, of all positions, probably next to the Prime Minister, second most important to the nation. The unscuruplous integrity which must be associated with that office clearly has been thrown into question. Overwhelmingly it has been thrown into question by any measure of objective analysis that, the Minister is in violation of the guidelines, as is the previous Minister, not just in the eyes of the Conservative Party, or in the eyes of the New Democratic Party, but in the eyes of every single correspondent working for newspapers, radio and television. They have all reached the same conclusion. If we are wrong, so is everybody else who, in a public way, has commented on this matter. Everybody is wrong except for the Liberal Party. Everybody is wrong except for the Treasury benches and the sheep who follow. That is an absurd situation.
What we have is a clear violation of the conflict of interest guidelines by the Minister of Finance, the former Minister of Energy, Mr. Gillespie and, quite probably, the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. MacEachen), the Minister of State for Mines (Mrs. Erola) and perhaps the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans (Mr. De Bane), who in his previous incarnation was responsible for the Cape Breton Development Corporation. I will not go over all the evidence that clearly establishes beyond and shadow of a doubt that Mr. Gillespie was in violation of the guidelines. The guidelines have been read several times. I want to read them once more because an important part was left out. These guidelines read:
Within a period of two years of leaving office, Ministers should not:
(c) lobby for or on behalf of any person or commercial corporation before any
department or agency for which they were responsible on an ongoing basis
during the last two years of their participation in the Ministry.
On the next page we find:
For these purposes "department or agency" includes Crown corporations-
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We have Crown corporations called Petro-Canada and Devco. The former Minister of Energy, Mr. Gillespie, was the Minister responsible for Petro-Canada. He was clearly responsible for Petro-Canada. That means that he should not have had any dealings with Petro-Canada for two years.
The current Minister of Energy said that Gillespie's job was to persuade the other participants. He admits that Gillespie lobbied Petro-Canada. He persuaded them, if you prefer that language. Clearly, it is overwhelmingly established that Mr. Gillespie is in violation of the guidelines.
I will not go over the memos that have been mentioned in terms of the information tabled yesterday which clearly established Mr. Gillespie's culpability. There is the "Dear Micky" letter. They say they treat everyone commonly. I have about 20,000 constituents who would love to be on the terms of "Dear Micky, I have a deal. Do you think you could get your boys to help me with this deal?" Is that not seen as preferential treatment to any reasonable person on the outside? Of course it is preferential treatment.
The Prime Minister says that lobbying is persistent contact. He says that there is no evidence of that. Then they table three inches of documents showing the kind of contact that was occurring. Does it take a file of documents three feet thick before persistence is established?
Of course, there is the quote from the Deputy Prime Minister in Port Hawkesbury that Gillespie is not the beneficiary of his own foresighted policies. From the words of the Deputy Prime Minister, Gillespie is in violation of the guidelines. Automatically, any responsible Minister is also in violation of the guidelines as the current Minister of Finance, the then Minister of Energy, clearly is.
If our system of responsible Government has any meaning whatsoever, Ministers must be responsible for what their deputies do. They are fixed with the knowledge of their deputies. Ignorance cannot possibly be an acceptable defence if we are to try to retain some semblance of parliamentary democracy.
Cohen knew what was going on. Therefore, the Minister of Finance knew too. Cohen and Stewart were directors of Petro-Canada, which was a part of the deal. Therefore, the Minister of Finance was responsible. Finally, the Minister of Finance, as the Minister responsible for Petro-Canada while this deal was going on, has a third level of responsibility in terms of honouring the guidelines, which he most certainly did not honour.
What has happened here during the last week was a bungled attempt to cover up. That is exactly what we have seen. We saw the Prime Minister, on the first day this was raised, saying that it was outside the two-year period, as if that applied to sitting Ministers, which it does not. The next day he stated to the House that he had talked to the Minister of Finance, and the Minister of Finance assured him that he knew nothing about it until September, 1981. The next day he comes in and says that actually it had nothing to do with the federal Government; it was handled by Nova Scotia. We have brought

February 24, 1983
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to the attention of the House already once today a memorandum to the Minister from one Maureen Lovies which indicates that in fact the million dollars from the federal Government was laundered through Nova Scotia. Then we have the indication that the Minister had forgotten somehow, but he knew on January 15. After looking at the documents, we find, from the document of January 15, in the words "You will recall", a clear indication that the Minister of Finance knew well before January 15. He has been misleading the House. There has been an attempt to cover up, but as more information became public, that cover-up, has been prevented.
In my final minute let me just say to those Members opposite who have said that the reputation of the House is at stake, that they are right. That is what is at stake here. What is at stake is parliamentary democracy. If that kind of behaviour, a clear violation of these guidelines, is to be permitted and sanctioned by the vote of a bunch of sheep on the backbenches of the Liberal Party, then this House has lost its right to sit. We have no purpose in being here if that kind of behaviour is to be sanctioned.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: Order, please. It being 5.45 p.m., it is my duty, pursuant to the provisions of Standing Order 62(9), to interrupt the proceedings and put forthwith every question necessary to dispose of the business of supply.

Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the said motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.


Some Hon. Members:: Yea.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: All those opposed will please say nay.


Some Hon. Members:: Nay.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: In my opinion the nays have it.
And more than five Members having risen:


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: Call in the Members.


Madam Speaker:: I declare the motion lost.
Motion (Mr. Broadbent) negatived.
It being now 6.15 p.m. I do now leave the chair until eleven o'clock tomorrow.
At 6.16 p.m. the House adjourned, without question put, pursuant to Standing Order.

Friday, February 25, 1983