1984-12-05

STATEMENTS PURSUANT TO S.O. 21


Hon.   Chas. L. Caccia@Davenport: Mr. Speaker, by the thousands, Canadians have expressed their shock and dismay about the proposed cuts in environmental and wildlife research activities. Highly trained biologists, zoologists, and specialists in a variety of disciplines, are about to lose their jobs. Their only prospects seem to be south of the border because provincial Governments are not prepared to absorb them, nor is the private sector.
A better understanding of the role of wildlife in the ecosystem is an essential and never ending process. The Minister of the Environment (Mrs. Blais-Grenier) must understand that wildlife research and activities mean more than human health. In addition, the announced cuts have dealt a heavy blow to the morale of people within her Department. She must fight for the preservation of the Canadian Wildlife Service at its present strength before the announcement of cuts.
Today, in a letter by author Farley Mowat and the President of the Public Service of Canada, Jack Donegani, to the Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney), they urge him to reconsider the cuts in the Canadian Wildlife Service. We on this side of the House again urge the Minister of the Environment to fight for the Canadian Wildlife Service, reject the cuts, and restore confidence in her Department, by her employees-


Mr. Speaker:: I must inform the Hon. Member that his time has expired.


THE ECONOMY
Mr. Iain Angus (Thunder Bay-Atikokan):: Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Finance (Mr. Wilson) has made it quite clear that the rationale behind all the cut-backs and tax increases in his economic statement is to increase investor confidence in Canada.
The Canadian investment community has now had ample opportunity to witness the new Government in operation and to assess its supposedly new approach to our economic problems. Has it responded like the Government suggested they would? Has it suddenly found renewed faith in the Canadian economy and begun to invest, and produce the tens upon tens of thousands of jobs that we were promised would be created overnight? The answer is clear, and it is no.
Just last week, for example, Great Lakes Forest Products Limited of Thunder Bay announced that it will be investing $25 million to build a newsprint mill in the United States because it has more confidence in the American economy than in Canada's. Today's Globe and Mail indicated that production and employment by Canadian manufacturers have taken a sharp drop. A spokesman is quoted as saying: "There sure seems to be a lack of confidence".
The Government's approach is not working because it is based on faulty assumptions. Just wanting increased investor confidence is not enough. We need concrete actions to put Canadians back to work. It is obvious that Canadian investors, as well as the Canadian public, do not have faith in the Conservative Government's approach. They do not believe, as I do not believe, that the Conservatives have any answers. Not only is the Government's honeymoon just about over, but it appears that most Canadians are ready to sue for divorce.


HUMAN RIGHTS
Mr. Gilles Bernier (Beauce):: Mr. Speaker, I want to take this opportunity to express the satisfaction of my constituents in the riding of Beauce and that of all Canadians with respect to the positive attitude taken by the Canadian Government in providing aid to Ethiopia.
Our Government's initiative was instrumental in persuading other countries, agencies and thousands of Canadians to make a generous contribution.
Mr. Speaker, everyone understands that we should help people who are starving and many of whom are actually dying of starvation. However, I think our own attitude in this country is entirely ambiguous, in that we are not prepared to protect the right to life of defenceless creatures. This is a shameful injustice, Mr. Speaker.

December 5, 1984
We do not want to let old people, men, women and children die in Ethiopia, and our actions are laudable. But why do we let our own children be killed, in a civilized country?
We are willing to protect and to help people in need, but why do we let our own children be killed by abortionists who operate freely without any scruples?
Finally, Mr. Speaker, as a Member of this House, 1 still fail to understand how we can make such admirable efforts to feed the hungry of the world and at the same time let others kill those who have a right to be born.


BANK OF CANADA
Mr. John A. MacDougall (Timiskaming):: Mr. Speaker, at the time when the Government is attempting to lead the way in curbing excessive government spending as a result of the economic mess this Party inherited from the Liberals, 1 want to point out a situation I discovered within the Bank of Canada.
Currently the Ottawa office of the Bank of Canada operates a cafeteria which offers employees heavily subsidized meals. For example, from yesterday's menu patrons could order beef short ribs for 80 cents, or tuna casserole for 65 cents. Milk sells for 20 cents. A side order of vegetables or rice is 15 cents, and soft drinks are 10 cents. I support your move, Mr. Speaker, to raise prices in our restaurants and cafeterias on the Hill, and I strongly urge the Governor of the Bank of Canada to do the same. The Bank of Canada should be setting an example, not breaking the bank at the taxpayers' expense.


ATOMIC ENERGY OF CANADA LIMITED
Mr. Len Hopkins (Renfrew-Nipissing-Pembroke):: Mr. Speaker, it has been brought to my attention that Atomic Energy of Canada Limited is putting on an elaborate display today relating to all of its major activities on the pure science side, in the applied science areas, as well as information relating to the Candu reactor and, even more important, to the little known and numerous achievements that nuclear research has attained in the field of medical science. This display and public relations effort will take place at Atomic Energy of Canada Headquarters here in Ottawa, and only the Progressive Conservative Members of the House of Commons have been invited to participate.
I cannot emphasize enough the importance that the Conservative Members of the House of Commons should give to this very vital and key project in the field of the pure and applied sciences. I would impress upon each and every one of them that they should take the opportunity to attend and get
the real side of the story about this great achievement in the scientific history of Canada. I have been given to understand that a similar, future display will be presented for the Liberal caucus Members and one for the NDP caucus Members.
Some Canadians do not place enough emphasis on the outstanding, positive achievements of the many brilliant and dedicated expert personnel that we have in our country. The time is long overdue when the positive side of nuclear research must be accurately, spontaneously, and credibly placed on the record for all to see, not only in our own country where we sometimes give our own people the least credit for achievement, but also-


Mr. Speaker:: I would like to advise the Hon. Member that his time has expired.


ENVIRONMENTAL AFFAIRS
Mr. Bill Blaikie (Winnipeg-Birds Hill):: Mr. Speaker, yesterday I appeared before an interdepartmental hearing on auto emission standards to urge them to recommend the implementation of lower, less polluting auto emission standards for this country. Reducing auto emissions to at least the American level would be a step in the right direction, not only in reducing acid rain but also in enabling us to get tough with the Americans with respect to their massive contribution to acid rain. Reducing Canadian automobile emissions would help restore the credibility on this issue that was lost through previous Liberal inaction in this area.
The Government must also act in those areas where it itself has damaged the ability of Canada to advocate with integrity that the Americans be more sensitive to acid rain and other environmental problems; by re-instating the herring gull egg program which monitors toxins in the Great Lakes, and by reversing cuts in wildlife services, some of which affect international agreements and concerns like the future of the porcupine caribou herd in the Yukon.


EMPLOYMENT
Mr. Pierre H. Vincent (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of National Revenue and Canada Post):: Mr. Speaker, the Trois-Rivieres riding which I have the honour to represent in the House is one of those that have been affected by the notorious and dismal affair of the Laprade Fund. I use the expression "dismal affair" because the previous government never fulfilled its commitments in this regard. We all know
December 5, 1984

that the money earmarked for the Laprade plant project that never materialized was supposed to be spent in the affected ridings to create permanent jobs, mostly in the energy sector.
Mr. Speaker, the previous government, not content with failing to fulfil its promises, made a farce out of the Laprade Fund by distributing right and left, here and there and everywhere in a wanton fashion subsidies which have never created permanent jobs of any sort.
Mr. Speaker, I cannot find words strong enough to describe the stupidity of the previous government in this affair, and my constituents are well aware that the members of that government are now trying to wash their hands of the whole mess as they sit on benches opposite. Yet, Mr. Speaker, I suggest that for my constituents it is better that way.


ABORTION
Mr. Gordon Taylor (Bow River):: Mr. Speaker, Canadians are law-abiding people and expect our courts and juries to uphold the law of the land. Yet in Toronto a jury acquitted Dr. Morgentaler, who admitted he broke Canada's laws and would continue to do so. A father who breaks the law by stealing bread to feed his hungry children is sent to jail, but in this case we have a jury acquitting a man who denies life to unborn babies. The fact that he has broken the law many times should not now make it right and proper. These juries are saying: "Break the law often and it is okay". If one believes the law is wrong, he has every right to work for a change but, until it is changed, it should be obeyed. Any other philosophy will bring chaos to the country.
Morgentaler's lawyer appears to justify breaking the law by saying: "... the right to control one's body is essential.. . ". Right on, Mr. Lawyer, but that control should happen before the act of intercourse, not by killing the child after he or she is conceived. I congratulate the Government of Ontario for appealing this case, and I hope the appeal court makes it abundantly clear that the laws of Canada must be obeyed by all, including Dr. Morgentaler.


POLITICAL PARTIES
Mr. Brian Tobin (Humber-Port au Port-St. Barbe):: Mr. Speaker, 1 would borrow a phrase from President Reagan by saying that we will soon be able to consign those kinds of dinosaurs to the ash bin of history.


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


Brian Vincent Tobin: I rise today to tell the House that the rebuilding of the Liberal Party of Canada has already begun under our most distinguished and right hon. Leader (Mr. Turner). On Monday a major poll conducted by Eastcan Research of Halifax was released and showed that the Liberal Party of Newfoundland now stands at 48 per cent in the polls while the governing Tories stand at 42 per cent. This poll shows what Newfoundlanders think of the Tory way of doing things, both in the Province of Newfoundland and here in Ottawa. Newfoundlanders and Labradorians have recognized the age-old maxim of our grandfathers: Tory times are indeed hard times.
May I offer a word of advice to the Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney)? He should listen less to the applause of the mindless 211 cheerleaders he brought with him to the House of Commons, and pay more attention to the voices of the people of Canada who are upset at the double-cross that was perpetrated on them by a Prime Minister who promised compassion and gave them a cold shoulder, who promised to listen and gave them a closed door, and who paraded himself as the voice of ordinary Canadians, but who, in only a few months, has forgotten where those Canadians live and who they are.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Hon. Donald J. Johnston (Saint-Henri-Westmount):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Minister of Finance I would like to address my question to the Prime Minister, who has just entered the House. I am tempted to note that the Minister of Finance is so afraid of losing his briefs that he is costing the Canadian taxpayers their shirts.
He confirmed in the House yesterday that we would see interest rates of 6.5 per cent. At the same time, in the same week, he authorized a long-term 20-year bond issue at 12 per cent that will cost Canadian taxpayers millions and millions of unnecessary dollars, if his forecast is correct.
How can the Government instil the sense of investor confidence in the private sector that it seeks if it issues a forecast which is completely imcompatible with the bond issue authorized earlier this week?


Right Hon. Brian Mulroney (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, I think that this Government instills a sense of confidence, in the markets and elsewhere, by bringing the first degree of sanity into the public finances of the country that we have seen in a long, long time.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!

December 5, 1984
Oral Questions


Martin Brian Mulroney: One of the major offenders who sent out conflicting signals was my hon. friend when he was running for the leadership of his own Party. He contradicted official government policy. He confused a lot of people, including the delegates to the Liberal leadership convention-but not enough.
The policies of economic renewal and growth which have been set out by the new Government and by the Minister of Finance are the stuff which will inspire sound decisions and will bring back a positive investment climate which will create jobs in Canada.


Donald James Johnston: Mr. Speaker, that's no answer; it is more bafflegab of the kind we got yesterday from the Minister of Finance.


GOVERNMENT BOND ISSUE
Donald James Johnston: Mr. Speaker, I would like to direct my supplementary question to the Minister of State for Finance. If there are anticipated declines in interest rates, there are ways of managing the public debt under those circumstances. Undoubtedly the Minister has heard of, or perhaps considered, indexed bonds. Why does the Government not take this opportunity to cancel the issue that was proposed this week, go back to the drawing board and come up with a flexible instrument which will send a positive signal to the private sector and will result in the saving of millions and millions of dollars for Canadian taxpayers?


Hon. Barbara McDougall (Minister of State (Finance)):: Mr. Speaker, I am very happy to answer the Hon. Member's question. 1 recall a time when the former Government issued Canada Savings Bonds at 19 per cent.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Barbara Jean McDougall: We have no intention of cancelling the issue. It was appropriately priced and placed in the market. We are thoughtful when we put these issues together. As the Minister of Finance has suggested, our intent is for interest rates to come down under our administration. That has been a long time coming because of the former Government's record.


ECONOMIC STATEMENT CREDIBILITY
Donald James Johnston: Mr. Speaker, I would hope that we are not going to see Ministers indulging in political arithmetic, because political arithmetic is exactly what she has just indulged in.
Is the Minister really not saying that the economic forecast was not credible, that the interest rate forecast was not credible, and that the deficit forecast was not credible? In short, is she not saying that the entire economic program as announced in the mini Budget of November 8 is not credible?


Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, I know that many of my hon. colleagues in this House agree that indeed, the economic statement was credible. Canadian people believe it is credible. I am sorry that the Hon. Member is having difficulty finding it credible.


DISASTERS
Hon. Jean Chretien (Saint-Maurice):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask a question of the Right Hon. Secretary of State for External Affairs. Canadians are horrified by the tragic accident at the Union Carbide plant in Bhopal, India. Is the Right Hon. Member in a position to inform Canadians what kind of assistance the Canadian Government is offering to our friendly allies in the Indian Government?


Right Hon. Joe Clark (Secretary of State for External Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, the Government shares the horror which is expressed by the Hon. Member for Saint-Maurice. We have been, as he will understand, in active touch with Indian authorities. I am not at this stage in a position to announce the response of the Government of Canada, if, indeed, a response is appropriate in terms of aid or other assistance to the people of India.

[ Translation]


ENVIRONMENTAL AFFAIRS
Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary for the Minister of the Environment.
I would like to ask the Hon. Minister whether her department is now taking the necessary action to prevent such a tragedy from occurring in our own country-it appears the same company is engaged in similar activities here in Canada-and in such a way that we can guarantee Canadians that there is no possibility a tragedy of this kind will occur in this country.


Hon. Suzanne Blais-Grenier (Minister of the Environment):: Mr. Speaker, the Commission de la sante et de la securite au travail du Quebec is monitoring Union Carbide factories very closely on behalf of the Province of Quebec, and I am keeping in touch with provincial agencies to ensure that an accident of this kind does not happen here.
December 5, 1984


THE ECONOMY
Mr. Lome Nystrom (Yorkton-Melville):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of State for Finance. It concerns the November survey of the purchasing managers of Canada which shows the sharpest drop in production and employment which we have seen in the last two years. A spokesman for their association said in reference to the business community: "There sure seems to be a lack of confidence". Because of the shocking results of the survey which show this drop in production and employment, is the Minister now prepared to recommend to Cabinet a change of the policy of spending cuts and tax increases which, obviously up to this stage, has not worked?


Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, I do not agree with the Hon. Member that the measures we have proposed are not working, and will not work. This is a very small survey. 1 believe there were some 200 firms involved. As the Hon. Member knows, there are any number of surveys coming up, with any number of conclusions. Our forecasts indicate, and our information is that confidence is increasing in this country, and will continue to do so.
[ Translation]


MEASURES TAKEN BY GOVERNMENT
Lorne Edmund Nystrom: I have a supplementary, Mr. Speaker.
Since business has already lost confidence in this Government's economic policies, what other measures does the Government intend to take in order to turn this trend around, if it remains as it is now?


Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, this Government is working every day toward rebuilding confidence and employment. I might point out to the Hon. Member that, even in the survey from which he quoted, production had increased by 23 per cent.


EMPLOYMENT
Hon. Warren Allmand (Notre-Dame-de-Grace-Lachine East):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Prime Minister. As the Prime Minister knows, on November 8 his Government cancelled the summer employment program for students, which represents a cut of $85 million in the Summer Canada Program. He should also know that in only four months, approximately on April 15, the students of Canada will be on the streets and available for work.
Oral Questions
Many students are already looking for summer employment. Many of them are wondering how they are going to pay for next year's tuition. Will the Prime Minister assure this House that if he has any alternative program for summer employment-if he has one-he will do as was done in other years, and announce that program before this House adjourns on December 21 ?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Employment and Immigration has already assured the Hon. Member, and through him, the House, that the programs of the previous Government in this area were unworkable-


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Martin Brian Mulroney: -and considered as such by all Canadians, including the students of Canada who passed judgment on them along with the rest of the country, on September 4. We will have in place appropriate and helpful programs to deal with the requirements of students, in advance of next summer, by a long shot.


REQUEST FOR REINTRODUCTION OF SUMMER CANADA PROGRAM
[Stage Direction]
Hon. Warren Allmand (Notre-Dame-de-Grace-Lachine
East): Mr. Speaker, I have the impression the Prime Minister is telling the country and the students that he has no program for next summer. As he knows, the Minister of Employment has told us that she is launching a series of consultations with business, the provinces, and the unions. That will take three months, too late for next summer.
Mr. Speaker:: Order.


William Warren Allmand: Will the Prime Minister, at least for this year, reintroduce the Summer Canada Program? Will he also table the proposals the Minister of Employment is bringing to the provinces, the unions, and the business sector, so that we can all be privy to the documents she will discuss with them?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, 10 years of silence on the Liberal benches have done wonders for his lungs, but not for his logic.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


William Warren Allmand: No action.


Mr. Deans:: That is what you meant by civility.


Martin Brian Mulroney: The Minister will be bringing forward helpful programs designed to assist students who need these programs.


William Warren Allmand: When?


Martin Brian Mulroney: At the earliest possible moment pursuant to an intensive and thoughful consultation process, and in ample time to deal with the requirements of students.

December 5, 1984
Oral Questions ENERGY


IMPACT OF MOVE TO WORLD OIL PRICES
Mr. Ian Waddell (Vancouver-Kingsway):: Mr. Speaker, will the Minister of Energy confirm the general accuracy of a report by Cyrus J. Lawrence, a prominent energy analyst from New York City, who says that the chief beneficiary of the Government's change to world oil prices will be Imperial Oil which will receive a windfall profit on its own oil of $95 million, or roughly 60 cents a share?


Hon. Pat Carney (Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to remind the Hon. Member that the chief beneficiary of our move to world oil prices will be the unemployed Canadians who will be back to work because of the changes that take place in energy.


REQUEST THAT WINDFALL PROFIT TAX BE INTRODUCED
Ian Gardiner Waddell: Mr. Speaker, since the ordinary Canadian will be paying this $95 million at the tank and in his heating bill, is the Minister prepared to say that she will apply a windfall profits tax to this gift of $95 million?


Pat Carney: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of going to world oil prices is to get some cash flow generated in the energy industry which will supply jobs and energy security for Canadians at a time when our foreign sources of supply are looking unstable.


EDUCATION
Mr. Roland de Corneille (Eglinton-Lawrence):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Hon. Secretary of State whose responsibility includes student loans. He has just heard that the Conservative Government still has no program in place for employment this summer that the students know about. He also knows that 94 per cent of post-secondary graduates hold down jobs.
Can he tell us why the Government has frozen $5 million which is used for student loans, and taken a route which will most certainly add to youth unemployment instead of reducing it? Is the money going to be saved on the backs of our youth?


Hon. Walter McLean (Secretary of State):: Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague will know that there is division of opinion amongst Canadian students regarding the relative importance of additional financial support for student loans, and of incentive to create jobs. The students are concerned almost to a person that there be jobs available when they are finished university. Therefore, the result was a decision by this Government to focus on job creation and at the same time, as he
knows, the assistance to students under the Canada Student Loans Program was increased by this House last year.


GOVERNMENT POSITION
Roland de Corneille: Mr. Speaker, how can the Minister sit in submissive silence while the Government freezes this additional grant of $5 million, and at the same time it plunks down $220,000 for the education of political aides? Is the education of political commissars more important than the education of young people to get a job?


Mr. Beatty:: Ask Lloyd Axworthy.


Mr. Axworthy:: Mine were already trained when I got them.


Walter Franklin McLean: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member chooses to ignore the adjustments in assistance to the students which were made during the last period of time. He also chooses to ignore the fact that it was his Party which imposed six and five on the entire university community and brought about increased pressure upon the institutions and the students.


NUCLEAR ARMAMENTS
Ms. Pauline Jewett (New Westminster-Coquitlam):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Secretary of State for External Affairs. On November 30 he said that he would consider proposing to the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. a ban on further Cruise missile deployment. Does the Minister's suggestion of November 30 mean that Canada will actively consider joining Belgium and other NATO advocates in calling for a moratorium on further Cruise missile deployment in Europe?


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, as I have tried to make clear on two occasions in the House, we are considering whether, in light of the very encouraging initiative taken by the Soviet Union and the United States to resume discussions about nuclear arms control, there are initiatives or suggestions that it would be useful for Canada to make to both parties as a means of advancing that process. That is a matter which is still under very active consideration. I expect to be in a position to indicate whether we think it would be useful to take that kind of initiative, before the week is out. If we decide it would be useful to take initiatives of that kind, I will naturally indicate to the House the nature of any communication we would send to both parties in the context of trying to add to the success of the Geneva talks.
December 5, 1984


GOVERNMENT POLICY
Pauline Jewett: Mr. Speaker, if the Minister is not interested in joining Denmark, Greece, and other NATO partners in a nuclear freeze, and is not interested in joining the initiative which has now come from Belgium and other middle-sized NATO countries to call for a ban on deployment of Cruise missiles, how can we avoid the conclusion that he is not interested in any NATO initiatives except those that are authorized by the Pentagon?


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, I frankly doubt that I will ever persuade the Hon. Member, but I have some faith that the general public of Canada is far more understanding, both of the issue and the effectiveness of Canadian response.


Pauline Jewett: You don't even listen to the Canadian public.


Charles Joseph Clark: Surely there has not been a time when it would be less appropriate for the Government of Canada to act independently, in a way that may upset the agreement that has been reached between the Soviet Union and the United States to come together on talks, than it would be to do that now. It is the view of the Government that there has been a very significant move forward on the part of the Soviet Union and the United States in their agreement to come together to talk about how we can reduce nuclear arms.


Pauline Jewett: What about Belgium?


Charles Joseph Clark: We want to advance that process, not throw it off course.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Pauline Jewett: What about Greece?


PRESENCE IN GALLERY OF DISTINGUISHED VISITORS, MR. GARY FILMON AND MR. WILLIAM HUTT
Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. May I interrupt the proceedings to advise Members of the presence in our gallery today of Mr. Gary Filmon, Leader of Her Majesty's Official Opposition in the Manitoba Legislature.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: On a very special matter which is very personal and dear to myself, may I also introduce one of Canada's greatest actors, William Hutt.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!
Oral Questions FISHERIES


GEORGES BANK BOUNDARY DECISION-POSSIBLE UNITED STATES REQUEST FOR MORATORIUM
Mr. George Henderson (Egmont):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Right Hon. Prime Minister. It has been reported that the Reagan administration will formally request a one year moratorium on the implementation on of the Georges Bank boundary decision. The Secretary of State for External Affairs has indicated that should such a request be made it would not be accepted, but that he would renegotiate or deal with the U.S. officials should a request be made. Will the Prime Minister assure the House today that such a moratorium will not be accepted by the Government?


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, I thank the Hon. Member for Hamilton East for her applause. I hope that from time to time she will extend that same courtesy to her Leader.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: The question raised by the Member for Egmont is very important. We have not received an official request from the Government of the United States. The position of the Government of Canada is very clear. We did not want to have this matter resolved in the courts. We preferred to have it resolved through negotiation. It went to the courts, and there has been a decision rendered by the courts which we regard as final.


George Roland Henderson: Mr. Speaker, I thank the Secretary of State for External Affairs for that answer.


REQUEST THAT PRIME MINISTER NEGOTIATE MANAGEMENT AGREEMENT
George Roland Henderson: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary question is for the Prime Minister. Will he use his offices to deal directly with the President of the United States and the U.S. administration in order to effect a good management and conservation agreement based on good, sound management principles in the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, which will benefit both Canadian and American fishermen?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, I will certainly continue to use my good offices to advance the cause and interests of Canadian fishermen.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
Mr. Derek Blackburn (Brant):: Mr. Speaker, my question is also for the Secretary of State for External Affairs. Why is it government policy at this time, in order to sweeten the deal about to be entered into between Canada and Turkey for the sale of some Buffalo STOL military aircraft, to add to it a gift

December 5, 1984
Oral Questions
of some 20 CF-104 Starfighters, precisely when the NATO countries of Turkey and Greece are almost at the brink of going to war over the remilitarization of some of the islands in the eastern Aegean, especially when our own Canadian soldiers may be caught in the crossfire in Cyprus?


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, it is my understanding that it has been the practice for some time for Canada and other NATO countries, when there is a change in the aircraft we use, to make available to other NATO countries aircraft that will no longer be in use in Canada. It is my understanding that we have made that offer to both Greece and Turkey.


TENSION BETWEEN GREECE AND TURKEY
Derek Nigel Ernest Blackburn: Mr. Speaker, I will repeat my question in a much more important way. At a time when both of those countries may very well go to war and break up the southeastern flank of NATO, why is it that Canada insists on getting involved in the sale of arms to precipitate that kind of blow-up in the eastern Mediterranean which may end the southeastern flank? It is most serious.


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, I find it surprising that the Hon. Member appears to have come to a sudden awareness of the tensions between Greece and Turkey.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Charles Joseph Clark: Those have been known to most Members of the House, and to the Canadian public, for a long time. If I may deal with what I think is the assumption at the basis of his question, naturally we would not be entering into those kinds of arrangements if we thought there was a significant danger of Canada's involvement heightening the tension or making it more dangerous.


PENITENTIARIES
Mr. Bill Vankoughnet (Hastings-Frontenac-Lennox and Addington):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Solicitor General. Is the Minister aware that yesterday in my constituency three persons escaped from the Bath Institution, possibly with outside help, then forcibly entered a home, terrorized two hostages, left them bound, and stole their car and three weapons? I am appalled at this incident and at the many escapes that have taken place in that area.
What measures is the Solicitor General taking to ensure that this kind of terrorizing does not recur? Will he give the House assurance that he will look closely at the problem of classification of inmates?


Hon. Elmer M. MacKay (Solicitor General of Canada):: Mr. Speaker, I can well imagine the trauma suffered by the Reeve and his wife, and the frustration felt by the Hon. Member, as a result of this very regrettable incident. As the Hon. Member knows minimum security institutions have, as a key element, the classification of the types of people who are in them. Predicting human behaviour is an inexact science. I am awaiting the result of thesecurity inquiry and the rationale for having these particular inmates in that particular institution.


THE CONSTITUTION
Mr. Jean-Robert Gauthier (Ottawa-Vanier):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to put a question to the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada (Mr. Crosbie). Section 133 of the constitution requires the use of bilingual introductory documents before the Quebec courts and at the federal level. Since the Minister of Justice has made an about-turn withdrawing his support for juridical bilingualism, more specifically in the MacDonald case in Quebec involving a ticket drawn up in French only handed to that gentleman, is the Minister of Justice effectively going to be the executioner of linguistic equality for any minority wherever it lives in this country?


Hon. John C. Crosbie (Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada):: Mr. Speaker, I believe that the hon. gentleman is referring to the MacDonald case in the City of Montreal. The issue there is the language of the ticket. We are intervening in the Supreme Court of Canada appeal to put forward the Government's position on official language issues. We have given financial assistance to the litigant who was arguing that the ticket was invalid because it was in English only. However, it is not a comparable case to the Bilodeau case. I am sorry; it was in French only.


Mr. Lapierre:: Or Chinese.


John Carnell Crosbie: It could be German.


GOVERNMENT POSITION
Jean-Robert Gauthier: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary question is directed to the Prime Minister. Could he explain this contradiction to the House and Canadians? The Secretary of State finances the Courts Challenges program and has given money to Mr. MacDonald, as the Minister has just indicated, to present his case in front of the Supreme Court of Canada. The Minister of Justice in the same Government is taking a diametrically opposed view, in
December 5, 1984

oppositon to the position held by the minority group. Can he explain that?


John Carnell Crosbie: Mr. Speaker, the explanation is quite simple. This is not something new. This has been the policy for a number of years.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: This is the first time you have done it.


John Carnell Crosbie: The object of this program is to permit official languages issues to be tested in the courts. It is not to give financial assistance only to those litigants who make arguments with which we agree.
In some cases we finance the litigants because they have an issue that should be decided upon by the courts but we take the opposite point of view and argue an opposite point of view. That has been going on for 10 years or since the policy has been in effect. There is nothing peculiar about it. The hon. gentleman should be supportive of it.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: Baloney. You have changed your position.


AUDITOR GENERAL
Hon. Edward Broadbent (Oshawa):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Prime Minister. In light of his election promise to make available to the Auditor General of Canada all the information that he wanted pertaining to the Petro-Canada takeover of Petrofina, why did he change his mind, accept the advice of the Clerk of the Privy Council and cut off access to certain information, including information that the previous Liberal Cabinet wanted kept secret? The Prime Minister had a choice. Why did he not provide the openness that he promised?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, I think that my hon. friend knows full well that I have tried to live up to the letter and the spirit of that commitment. I have met with him and explained privately, as I have explained publicly in the presence of my right hon. friend, the Leader of the Opposition, that it was the intention of this Government to put out under public scrutiny all of the information that was available to us so that the Auditor General and the Canadian public could make a decision in regard to the Petrofina-Petro-Canada transaction.
1 referred to the difficulty we were having in terms of Cabinet confidences as they affect communications between Ministers, that constitutional custom has required that they remain private. They do not affect this ministry. We have nothing to hide at all.
It was my view that, by instructing the Chairman of Petro-Canada to attend before the Public Accounts Committee and to bring all information, that would be a significant first step
Oral Questions
in providing Canadians with all of the information that they require in this file.


REQUEST THAT CONVENTION GOVERNING CABINET DOCUMENTS BE CHANGED
John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister knows that there is an important difference between the work of a committee of this House, as important as that is, and the ongoing rights and responsibilities of the Auditor General. There is a fundamental difference in responsibilities.
Why did he not change the existing convention which hitherto has excluded our Auditor General from having access to such information? I ask this in light of the fact that the Auditors General of Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, with whom I have just spoken, have the precise right that the Prime Minister promised to give our Auditor General. Why did he not deliver on that promise of openness?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, indeed I have been attempting to deliver fully on that commitment, which is not all an unreasonable one. I felt that the proper manner in which to proceed was to make sure that all evidence that impacted upon that transaction, hopefully including the presence of former Ministers of Energy before the committee, be educed to enable the Auditor General and the people of Canada to make that determination.
If that turns out not to be the case and the Auditor General feels that other information would be appropriately sought by him, I would be ready to meet with him to find a formula to allow him to secure that information.
We have absolutely nothing to hide. We did not do the deed; others did. We want it examined by the people of Canada.


John Edward Broadbent: Either the Prime Minister does not understand the general principle or he is deliberately obscuring the reality.


Mr. Hnatyshyn:: That is beneath even you.


PRIME MINISTER'S POSITION
John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, we are concerned about the Auditor General having an ongoing right and not having to respond to a particular case. Why will the Prime Minister not give the Auditor General of Canada the right of access to economic information that he requires to do his job, and which the Prime Minister promised to Canadians during the election? You had a choice. Why don't you deliver?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, my hon. friend is advancing a novel theory.


John Edward Broadbent: No.


Martin Brian Mulroney: It is that as Cabinet discussions ensue the Auditor General can be there to examine Cabinet documents in confidence.

December 5, 1984
Oral Questions


John Edward Broadbent: No. That is not what I am saying.


Martin Brian Mulroney: That is exactly what you are saying. That is the inconsistency of your position.


John Edward Broadbent: That is not what I said.


Martin Brian Mulroney: That is why I have asked for something that appears to be difficult. I have asked for the good faith and co-operation of my friends from the NDP who, 1 am sad to say, appear to be more interested in scoring some brownie points than getting the truth out.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Martin Brian Mulroney: We want all the information made available to the people of Canada, and I need your help and co-operation to do it.


CANADA POST CORPORATION
Mr. Arnold Malone (Crowfoot):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of National Revenue in his position as the Postmaster General. Bearing in mind that mail moved from St. Joseph's, Missouri, to Sacramento, California, by pony express in a guaranteed ten-day period in 1860, does he approve of the fact that mail frequently going through the Calgary Post Office to rural small communities will too often take 10, 15 or 20 days for delivery?


Henry Perrin Beatty: First, Mr. Speaker, let me thank the Hon. Member for his useful statistics. I can assure him that the Canada Post Corporation, in an attempt to cut storage costs, wants to move the mails as quickly as possible.
I will certainly refer his comments to the President of the Canada Post Corporation. I can assure him that the Corporation will do everything possible to speed up delivery.


SOCIAL SECURITY
Mr. Jean-Claude Malepart (Montreal-Sainte-Marie):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Right Hon. the Prime Minister.
In answer to a question I put to the Prime Minister last Friday-if I may be allowed to quote Hansard, for it is a very
important matter concerning the spouse's allowance for people aged 60 to 64-the Prime Minister said this:
-our objective is to help those people in our society who are most in need, and I think that is the basic purpose of any decent social program in this country.
Mr. Speaker, we believe there is a real need for such measures among people between 60 and 64-
Here is my question: does the Prime Minister know that he may have misled the House in his answer Friday since the program announced and selected by the Progressive Conservative government is designed exclusively for widows and widowers, and that it discriminates against the 340,000 Canadians who are separated, divorced or single and who have similar needs?


Hon. Jake Epp (Minister of National Health and Welfare):: Mr. Speaker, in response to the Hon. Member's question, the Government has indicated, both in the Throne Speech and in the economic agenda paper, that legislation will be forthcoming. If we had an economic climate whereby we could advance the cause which he puts forward, we would love to do it. We would love to help people who are in need. We will move as quickly as we can. That is why we want economic growth. 1 would suggest to him that he agree with us to reverse the economic trend of the Government of which he was a part, and have economic growth so that we can help the very people he asked about.


Jean-Claude Malépart: I have a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker, and it is directed to both Ministers. First of all, the Prime Minister did not answer because I am saying that he misled the House. Should he care to answer, 1 would ask him why he misled the House and raised false hopes in respect of elderly Canadians. To the Minister of National Health and Welfare, is he aware-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member now sits on the Opposition benches and he is raising strong objections against the economic assistance program for widows and widowers-that is what you are saying-whereas we are quite prepared to help those people in our society who are most in need.


LABOUR RELATIONS
Mr. John R. Rodriguez (Nickel Belt):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Right Hon. Prime Minister.
December 5, 1984

At Lebel-sur-Quevillon, the workers at Domtar, a company in which the Quebec Government has a 45 per cent interest, have been on strike for seven months.
Since he will be meeting his new friend Mr. Rene Levesque this week, could the Prime Minister suggest to Mr. Levesque that it is high time Domtar employees were made a satisfactory offer so that the whole community could go back to work as soon as possible?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, I think we have inherited enough problems in this federal administration as it is, without my giving instructions or advice in this area to the Premier of Quebec.
You are right that we are trying to maintain friendly relations with the Government of Quebec, as we indeed are with the Government of Manitoba.


John R. Rodriguez: I have a supplementary, Mr. Speaker. Could the Prime Minister show the 1,200 people of Quevillon who are on unemployment insurance as a result of this strike that he is concerned by the seriousness of the situation and that he will ask the Quebec Premier to intervene personally in order to put an end to the strike as soon as possible?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, we are always concerned about prolonged strikes. The Minister of Employment and Immigration has already held consultations on the matter and offered our assistance where it would be beneficial, but I think you will understand that it would be difficult for me to intervene directly in this matter. In the circumstances, however, I shall be glad to transmit my hon. friend's position and let Mr. Levesque know that we are all hoping for a speedy end to the strike.


EDUCATION
Mr. Don Ravis (Saskatoon East):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Secretary of State. Prior to the September 4, 1984 election, his Department committed $2 million for a toxicology centre at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon. Could the Minister advise the House if he would consider an increase in the financial commitment to the toxicology lab so that the University of Saskatchewan could establish a centre capable of meeting the needs of all western Canada?


Walter Franklin McLean: Mr. Speaker, in response to the Hon. Member's question I remind him that this action was taken when the previous Government established an amount of $2 million just prior to the last election, under the program of centres for specialization. I assure him that it is a priority of this Government, in reviewing future
Oral Questions
involvement with the provinces, to encourage centres of excellence. I will be entering into discussions with my provincial colleagues, first of all about priorities for joint co-operation on federal-provincial relations. The type of situation which he outlined is the type which I believe will be a model for federal Government concern and support.


ABORIGINAL RIGHTS
Mr. Keith Penner (Cochrane-Superior):: Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development told the House that he is going to launch a full-scale review of the native claims policy, including the possibility of abolishing the extinguishment requirement, provided the Minister of Justice does not stand in his way. That being so, could the Minister tell us why he is insisting that the deadline of December 31 be met in the claim which is being negotiated by the Council for Yukon Indians?


Hon. David Crombie (Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development):: Mr. Speaker, I thank the Hon. Member for his question. As he may know, the deadline was not set by me. The deadline was set by agreement between the parties a year ago, and it was delayed for another year. I have simply taken the view that the agreement in principle, which has already been initialled, should now be ratified. I think that is a just and fair view within the existing situation.
At the meeting I had with the Council for Yukon Indians in Vancouver last week I outlined that situation. I think it is one that it understands, because I also indicated it to the Council in Yukon a month before that.


MINISTER'S POSITION
B. Keith Penner: Mr. Speaker, the Minister knows that the Council for Yukon Indians is not ready to sign by December 31. Will the Minister take us into his confidence and tell us whether he is having undue pressure put upon him by the Hon. Member for Yukon? If that is the case, does he need any help from us in overcoming that pressure?


David Edward Crombie: Mr. Speaker, I indicated on an earlier occasion that my door is always open to the Hon. Member for Yukon. I think in this particular case the Hon. Member and I can rest easy. As he may well know, in my discussions with the Council for Yukon Indians in Yukon I indicated, on the question of extinguishment, that whatever change would occur with respect to the principle of extinguishment, the agreement would not be a bar to them. With respect to the funding, and the deadline of December 31,1 indicated that the funding was available until the ratification occurred. If the ratification occurs, the funding will also flow.

December 5, 1984
Oral Questions
1 might also add that it is not a question of the CYI alone. There are 12 bands, eight of which have already indicated-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, with great respect to the Minister.


YUKON INDIANS'CLAIM
Mr. Jim Fulton (Skeena):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the same Minister and it is in regard to the same case. I think he is aware that just six days ago in Vancouver he made it very clear to aboriginal groups in British Columbia that his Department, and he personally, were undertaking a fundamental review of the aboriginal claims policy. 1 agree with my colleague who just asked the Minister a question. How can the Minister possibly expect the Council for Yukon Indians to ratify that claim when it was made quite clear to him, and to other Members of the House, that the Council was simply not ready to do that? He is jeopardizing the process with the Council for Yukon Indians, and with other aboriginal groups in Canada.


David Edward Crombie: Mr. Speaker, if that were the case, 1 would agree with the Hon. Member; of course it is not. When I was in Yukon six weeks ago, I indicated to the Council for Yukon Indians, the chiefs, and the General Assembly, that on the question of self-government and extinguishment, two matters which were beyond the question of the agreement in principle, I would undertake to ensure that the agreement was not a bar to any future opportunity both in terms of self-government and extinguishment. That was understood, and that is exactly what 1 repeated in a letter to Harry Allen of the Council for Yukon Indians. 1 also repeated it in Vancouver. It is a just and fair agreement.


RATIFICATION OF CLAIM
James Ross Fulton: Mr. Speaker, the Minister is asking the Council for Yukon Indians to buy a pig in a poke. Will he at least allow the CYI to wait, in terms of the ratification of its claim, until the Minister has completed a review in his own mind and has publicly examined and put forward the result of his fundamental review in terms of extinguishment and in terms of the aboriginal claims policy?


David Edward Crombie: Mr. Speaker, I am sure the Hon. Member understands that there was an agreement in principle. When in fact I became the Minister, the agreement in principle was already in place and initialled both by the negotiator for the Government and the negotiators for the CYI. Indeed they are in the process of ratification. All I want them to do is complete that ratification. I made two changes in order to assist-one with respect to extinguishment and one with respect to self-government. Those two matters were very important and went as far, I think it will be acknowledged, as it is possible to go.
Finally, may I say the choice is theirs. There is no pressure whatsoever. 1 indicated that December 31, their deadline, was acceptable to me.


CLERK OF PETITIONS' REPORTS
Mr. Speaker:: 1 have the honour to inform the House that the petitions presented by Hon. Members on Tuesday, December 4, meet the requirements of the Standing Orders as to form.


BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order with respect to House business. I would like to advise the House of a change in the order of business for today. Rather than proceeding directly to Bill C-ll, it is my intention to call the motion to establish the task force on reform of the House of Commons as the first item of business this afternoon. This motion stands as item No. 3 under the heading of Government Business on the Order Paper.
If the House concludes its consideration of the motion, we will then proceed to deal with Bill C-ll, an Act to provide borrowing authority, at second reading. When debate on Bill C-ll is completed, we will then call Bill C-12, an Act to amend the Excise Tax Act and the Excise Act.
With respect to the business for tomorrow, it is my intention to call, if necessary, Bill C-ll, followed by C-12, in that order.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Mr. Lome Greenaway (Cariboo-Chilcotin):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present the first report of the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Forestry, in both official languages.


JUSTICE AND LEGAL AFFAIRS-FIRST AND SECOND REPORTS OF STANDING COMMITTEE
Mr. Blaine A. Thacker (Lethbridge-Foothills):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present the first and second reports of the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs.
[Editor's Note: For above reports, see today's Votes and Proceedings.]
December 5, 1984


PETITIONS
Mr. Fernand Robichaud (Westmorland-Kent):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present a second petition from the residents of the city of Sackville, who are also concerned about the proposed cut-backs in Canadian Wildlife Service. Programs of vital importance for the protection of our environment will be affected and even cancelled.


Mr. Don Boudria (Glengarry-Prescott-Russell):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present a petition from the residents of the Glen Robertson region who regret that VIA Rail will no longer serve their region.


Don Boudria: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present a second petition similar to the first one, but which is signed by the residents of the Casselman area who deplore the changes made in the VIA Rail service in their community.


Mr. Cyril Keeper (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, to the Honourable the House of Commons in Parliament assembled, the petition of the undersigned residents of Canada who do now exercise the right to present a grievance humbly sheweth that whereas Canada has enjoyed a tradition of affordable universal telephone services-


Mr. Speaker:: I must remind the Hon. Member that it is not permitted to read the front page or to read the petition. What is permitted is to present the petition and to make a short summary of the subject matter. 1 have the feeling the Member is in fact reading the petition.


Cyril Keeper: Thank you for the direction, Mr. Speaker. Basically the petition concerns the question of deregulation of Canada's telephone system and seeks to preserve the tradition of affordable telephone service in Canada.
Order Paper Questions



NORTHWEST TERRITORIES CONDOMINIUM ORDINANCE VALIDATION ACT


Mr. Dave Nickerson (Western Arctic) moved: for leave to introduce Bill C-214, an Act to validate the Northwest Territories Condominium Ordinance.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House that the Hon. Member shall have leave to introduce the Bill?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Dave Nickerson: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of this Bill is to remove minor impediments in the current law, thereby permitting the construction of condominia in the Northwest Territories and helping to alleviate a serious housing shortage.


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

[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)
Mr. Paul Dick (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of State (Government House Leader)):: Mr. Speaker, the following questions will be answered today: Nos. 16 and 85.


Mr. Howie: How many lawyers are employed by the Department of Labour?


Hon. Bill McKnight (Minister of Labour):: There are four lawyers assigned to Labour Canada from the Department of Justice.


Mr. Malepart: 1.	Did the Prime Minister give a reception on the occasion of the Queen's visit and, if so (a) at what cost (b) who was invited?
2.	Did the Prime Minister give a reception for the Prime Minister of France and, if so (a) at what cost (b) who was invited?


Mr. Len Gustafson (Parliamentary Secretary to Prime Minister):: 1. The Prime Minister hosted a reception and farewell dinner for Her Majesty the Queen at the Convention Center in. Winnipeg on October 6, 1984.
(a) The cost for the reception and dinner was $ 164,465.65 with an additional $9,443.00 for 21 musicians from the Winnipeg Symphony to play during the dinner and reception.

December 5, 1984
Motions for Papers
(b) The reception and dinner was attended by 1,600 guests.
The invitation list included members of the "Precedence of Canadian Dignitaries and Officials", leading citizens from communities across Canada, representatives from the three federal political parties and the Canadian and international media.
2. The Prime Minister hosted a reception and dinner for His Excellency Laurent Fabius, Prime Minister of France at the Westin Hotel in Ottawa on November 7, 1984.
(a)	The cost for the dinner and reception was $45,893.37.
(b)	428 guests attended the reception and dinner.
The guest list included the French Ambassador and Embassy officials, members of the French delegation, representatives of Francophone media from the provinces, members active in the Francophone communities of the provinces, Francophone businessmen and members of the arts community.


Paul Wyatt Dick: Mr. Speaker, I suggest that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.


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


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Paul Wyatt Dick: Mr. Speaker, I ask that the Notice of Motion for the Production of Papers be allowed to stand.


Mr. Speaker:: Shall all Notices of Motions for the Production of Papers be allowed to stand?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from Thursday, November 22, consideration of the motion of Mr. Hnatyshyn:
That a Special Committee of the House of Commons to be composed of Mrs. Bourgault and Messrs. Blaikie, Cooper, Ellis, Friesen, McGrath and Ouellet, be appointed to act as a Parliamentary Task Force on the Reform of the House of Commons to examine the powers, procedures, practices, organization and facilities of the House of Commons, bearing in mind the balance between the respective constitutional responsibilities and roles of the House of Commons and the Government, such an examination to include, but not be limited to, the following matters:
(a)	the Permanent and Provisional Standing Orders;
(b)	the role of the private Member in the House of Commons;
(c)	the accountability of Ministers to the House of Commons;
(d)	the legislative process;
(e)	the funding, facilities and staff support services made available to Members of the House of Commons;
(/) the administration and management of the House of Commons; and
(g) the procedures and powers of Committees of the House of Commons and
the role and the use of parliamentary task forces;
That the Committee have all the powers provided to standing Committees pursuant to Standing Order 69(8);
That the Committee have the power to retain expert, professional, technical and clerical staff;
That the Committee and members of the Committee have the power, when the Committee deems it necessary, to adjourn or travel from place to place inside and outside Canada and that, when deemed necessary, the required staff accompany the Committee or members of the Committee, as the case may be;
That all the evidence adduced by the Special Committee on Standing Orders and Procedure and the reports of that Committee as tabled in the House of Commons during the 32nd Parliament be referred to the Committee;
That, notwithstanding the usual practices of this House, if the House is not sitting when an interim or final report of the Committee is completed, that the Committee shall report its findings by depositing its report with the Clerk of the House and that it shall thereupon be deemed to have been laid upon the Table;
That the Committee be authorized to include in its interim and/or final reports drafts of proposed permanent or temporary Standing Orders drawn to give effect, if concurred in by the House, to any permanent or temporary change or changes proposed by the Committee;
That the Committee be authorized to include in its interim and/or final reports recommendations as to the implementation of any reforms proposed in the reports of the Committee;
That Messrs. Penner, Binns, Comeau, Duguay, Jardine, Ravis and Young be appointed as alternate members of the Committee;
That changes in the membership of the Committee be made only pursuant to Standing Order 69(4)(6); and
That the Committee shall report to the House finally no later than June 28, 1985.
And on the amendment of Mr. Guilbault (Saint-Jacques), seconded by Mr. Gauthier,-That the motion be amended by adding the following words:
"and that it be an instruction to the committee that it shall include in each report its assessment of the effects of its recommendations on the role and the rights of the opposition."
Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. As you will appreciate, Mr. Speaker, I have changed the order of business for today. I have the pleasure of advising the House
December 5, 1984

that we have had discussions with the House Leaders with respect to the disposition of this important motion.
I simply rise to say that my understanding is that the Deputy House Leader of the Official Opposition and the House Leader of the New Democratic Party will be addressing their positions with respect to this matter. It is my understanding that we will proceed with the order of reference and allow the motion to pass in its original form. That will allow the very excellent committee of Private Members named within that order to proceed with the important and widesweeping powers contained in the order of reference.
It is with great pleasure that I indicate to you, Mr. Speaker, on this brief point of order, that we have in the spirit of co-operation agreed to proceed with this matter at this time.


Mr. Speaker:: The Hon. Member for Hamilton Mountain (Mr. Deans) on this same point of order?


Ian Deans: Yes, Mr. Speaker, and even more briefly than the House Leader. We have agreed to pass this post haste. My colleague from Humboldt-Lake Centre (Mr. Althouse), who has the floor as 1 recall, is prepared to wind up his remarks in five minutes. At that point we will have no further speakers.


Mr. Guilbault (Saint-Jacques):: Mr. Speaker, the Government House Leader is correct. We have had discussions on this subject and we are prepared to allow the motion to pass with very limited debate. We may have one more short speaker. I thought the House Leader might elaborate on some of the peripheral points accompanying this agreement, namely the fashion in which the Opposition will be dealt with in committees of this House and on related matters. Maybe he will let us in on his plans in this regard.
Mr Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, I will wind up the debate.


Mr. Speaker:: I take it we have finished with the point of order.


Mr. Vic Althouse (Humboldt-Lake Centre):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to wind up the remarks that I began several days ago on this topic. We were debating the establishment of the special committee to investigate the changes to the rules of the House of Commons. As you will recall, Mr. Speaker, we had hit upon a rather unfortunate series of incidents. The various committees of the House were being struck under a set of rules and guidelines that ignored the long-standing traditions and past practices of those committees and of the House. It was a very difficult set of circumstances under which the changes to the rules of the House of Commons were to begin.
The Government had sent signals indicating that it was going to ignore a lot of the old traditions and past practices not only of this House but of parliamentary democracies all over the world. Members of our Party and Members of the Official Opposition as well expressed some doubts about opening up the process of reviewing the rules given the way we felt the
Parliamentary Reform
current Government had mishandled its very huge majority in committee.
With some trepidation we are now prepared to resume the study of the rules of the House of Commons even though we note, as I noted the other day, that such a committee had done substantive work in the previous Parliament and had made reports which had unanimous support, not all of which have been acted upon. I feel that it might have been in the interests of parliamentary reform if those reports had simply been acted upon rather than beginning a whole new round of parliamentary review.
We are hoping that the Government will keep its word to act in a responsible manner in spite of its very large majority. Now that the Government's mind has been jogged by events of the past few days, we hope that it will continue to recognize the need, if a parliamentary system is to operate properly, for the Opposition to have its firm rights and responsibilities guaranteed not only by the rules but by the precedents and traditions of the House. We hope that that will be the case and I am looking forward to hearing from the Government House Leader (Mr. Hnatyshyn). I would hope that he would confirm that guarantee and read it into the record so that we can finalize the decision to set up such a committee.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Questions or comments on the Hon. Member's speech? Debate.


Don Boudria: Mr. Speaker, I want to add a few brief words to what,has already been said. As much as Members of the House are willing to entertain a proposal to have a special committee struck to change the rules of the House, I must say, and several of my colleagues are of the same opinion, that we question the Government's sincerity in doing this because at the same time as it was introducing such a motion, it was unilaterally changing the traditional rules under which we had operated. Specifically, Mr. Speaker, I draw your attention to the first meetings of the committees of this House.
A few weeks ago we attended the first meeting of the Agriculture Committee and several Members who are present today will recall what happened then. Just for your information, Mr. Speaker, what opposition members had to contend with on that particular day was a series of pre-printed resolutions introduced by government members in committee. I am told that these resolutions were unprecedented. One of these resolutions was introduced by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Blais) and was a resolution to have the committee sit in a mini-quorum fashion for the purposes of hearing witnesses, having only four government Members present and without a representative of the Opposition.
Needless to say, several members of the committee, particularly opposition members, were very upset by this proposal made on behalf of the Government. The Hon. Member for Algoma (Mr. Foster) and I spoke extensively. As a matter of fact, the foundation meeting of the committee which traditionally lasts only a few minutes dragged on well into the better

December 5, 1984
Parliamentary Reform
part of an hour and a half on account of the very difficult situation in which the Government chose to place the Opposition.
As far as 1 and many of my colleagues are concerned, if Conservative members want to hear witnesses on their own, they can call such a meeting a Tory task force and not a parliamentary committee. If there are to be such Tory task forces, then Tory members can invite guests at the expense of the Tory Party and not at government expense. As well, they should publicly advertise that it is in fact a Tory task force that is sitting. On the other hand, if we are to have parliamentary committees, we should respect the traditions of Parliament which are that opposition members are to be present at such committees.
You will recall, Mr. Speaker, that when there was a dispute in the House regarding how many Parties should be present in order to take a vote, the Government was made helpless for a number of days. A vote could not be taken when bells were being rung. The Government at that time simply had to wait for opposition members to return as per a ruling made by the Speaker. Everyone contended with that, as unfortunate as the incident was. Today, when the shoe is on the other foot, the Government says that it wants to be efficient. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Agriculture made a speech indicating that the Government should be efficient. Curtailing the role of opposition members was done in the name of efficiency.
Efficiency is a noble cause. We are all in favour of efficiency. I am sure that a dictatorship would be far less cumbersome than a democracy. However, we have not chosen to run our country by dictatorship. We have chosen to run it by parliamentary government and by responsible government through Members of the House of Commons. Having decided as a society to run our Government that way, I find the actions of the Government to be totally unreasonable.
This Government stated many times in the past during an election campaign which we can all remember that it was going to be open and accountable to Parliament. That was one of its 338 or so promises. It promised it would be respectful of Parliament's wishes. Government members said many other fine words to us during the election campaign.
Taking these actions in the name of efficiency is just not good enough. We in opposition are of the view that whenever a mini-quorum sits, there should be at least one opposition Member present. To refresh our memories, a minim-quorum means four Members sitting for the purposes of hearing a witness.
We are also of the view that the Member leading off in debate should always be a member of the Official Opposition according to the traditions of this House. Having myself come from another legislature, Mr. Speaker, I can tell you that that is the way it was done there as well. The Official Opposition was usually recognized first in debate. I am sure that rule was not written down in any of the Standing Orders of that particular House of Assembly but it is an acknowledged principle under which Hon. Members always operated.
1 would hope that now that the Conservative Party has formed the Government of the country, it will afford as many courtesies to the Official Opposition as the previous Government afforded the Conservative Party when it was in opposition. If I can make one promise, it is that we will not abuse the rules the way Conservative members did.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Questions or comments? The Hon. Member for Athabasca (Mr. Shields) on a question or comment?


Mr. Shields:: No, Mr. Speaker, I wanted to make a few brief remarks.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Questions and comments. The Hon. Member for Megantic-Compton-Stanstead.


Mr. Gerin:: Mr. Speaker, 1 must say to my colleague that 1 was present at the time and that his eloquent intervention today comes as a surprise to me, because he did not even bother to join in the debate on a motion moved by the New Democratic Party and voted against the NDP on the very same principles he has just been upholding.


Don Boudria: I want to answer that, Mr. Speaker. The Hon. Member knows full well that we in the Official Opposition wanted our right to make the first intervention in a debate to be recognized. One can indeed refer to the Opposition generally, but the Official Opposition does have a special role. Having voted against the long-standing parliamentary practice, whereby there ought to be at least one Opposition Member in attendance for a mini-quorum, the Hon. Member ought to admit that he has to change his mind today as a result of the agreement among parties. Besides, I am sure he realizes now that he was mistaken when he took the position he did at the time.


Jack Wendele Shields: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the Hon. Member recognizes the proposition to which he alluded about committees and the reduced quorum for the purpose of hearing witnesses. Does he not realize that this was done to accommodate people who might be travelling from the Northwest Territories or the far reaches of Canada to Ottawa to appear before a committee to give evidence which is taken down verbatim and made available? During the time of a reduced quorum, there would be absolutely no possibility of a vote. A full quorum is required for a vote. That protects opposition members. It was proposed strictly to accommodate that sort of thing and not to put the committee in a position where one or two opposition members may boycott the committee after having gon to the expense of bringing a number of people from British Columbia or the Northwest Territories to Ottawa to appear before the committee. Has the Hon. Member given that some thought?
December 5, 1984


Don Boudria: Mr. Speaker, certainly we have given that some thought. But I want to remind the Hon. Member that if we want to hear witnesses and if the Government on that particular day, through some misfortune, is in the position of having no opposition members present, all it has to do is find four more members. If there are eight members present, an opposition member does not have to be present. Obviously, that point is not valid.
We are talking about the presence of an opposition member for the purpose of a mini-quorum, not for the purpose of a full quorum. A full quorum of eight members has not got the necessary component of having an opposition member in order to deliberate. Now that the Hon. Member has mentioned that, it should be changed as well. The rule should be changed to require an opposition member to be present whether it is a full quorum or a mini-quorum. However, we are not talking about that today; we are talking only about a mini-quorum. In other words, a quorum of four for the purpose of listening to witnesses.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Are there any further questions or comments?
I would like to bring to the attention of the Minister that if he intends to speak he will be closing the debate.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: No, Mr. Speaker, I would like to speak on the amendment.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Fine.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the Hon. Member for Prescott-Glengarry-


Don Boudria: Glengarry-Prescott-Russell.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Glengarry-Prescott-Russell. He can henceforth refer to my constituency as West Saskatoon.
This is a situation in which there have been discussions between the Parties. I will not belabour the point which has been made, except to say that we are very serious on the government side in ensuring that the rules are fair, not only in terms of the majority of the Members of the House, but fair with respect to the rights of the Opposition. This particular situation is one which has caused some concern for the Opposition. As has been pointed out on different occasions, it was not intended to cause the Opposition any reason for concern. However, because it has been raised and because there is a question of perceived fairness, I will be quite happy to deal with it.
I have indicated publicly and I will reiterate on the floor of the House of Commons that henceforth, in terms of the reduced quorum for the purpose of hearing evidence in committee, we are prepared to have in the standing committees a motion put forward which would provide for the presence of one member of the Opposition as a minimum for the purpose of hearing evidence. I believe the majority of committees have already passed that motion. It is to ensure that opposition
Parliamentary Reform
members will be present. Opposition members from time to time have pointed out to me what I think is a truism; that is to say, it is not their intention to abuse the right of having one Hon. Member appear before committees. I accept their words as serious Members of Parliament on behalf of their respective Parties. We all share the same interest, that is, to make this institution as effective as possible.
I am pleased that this particular motion will be passed. It is an opportunity to examine the operation of this institution and to consider how we can better strengthen the role of Private Members, not only on the floor of the House of Commons, but also in terms of their work within committees.
Reference has been made to the fact that previous work has already been done with respect to the Standing Orders. The Hon. Member for Humboldt-Lake Centre (Mr. Althouse) has drawn this point to the attention of the House. I have taken a position in the spirit of consensus which I believe must exist on this committee. It would have been very easy for us to have taken unilateral action. The substantial majority which we have in this House would have allowed us to move forward and implement our view of how the universe should unfold in terms of parliamentary reform.
Reform without consultation is no reform at all. The Hon. Member for Humboldt-Lake Centre asked me to consult the operation of the House as it is now constituted. I accept that and propose to do so. There have been a number of meetings and I have tried to advise the opposition Parties in every instance of the Government's intention with regard to legislation, statements or other initiatives. That is absolutely essential to the operation of the House.
With respect to the recommendations of the past Parliament, there are new Members who should have the benefit, through their representatives on this committee, to examine and review the recommendations brought forward by the previous committee. That is a fair and equitable way in which to deal with this. It was not our intention to prolong debate, because the committee which is about to be formed has a limited life-span. It is required to report before the end of June, 1985. Time is of the essence. It will be required to make serious analyses and serious suggestions-


Ian Deans: Why don't you sit down if time is of the essence?


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, I will tell you a secret about the House Leaders' meetings. I have to listen to the House leader of the NDP hour after hour, so now I will have my day in front of the television cameras. I should get the George Cross medal for bravery!
I appreciate the spirit of co-operation that has existed. In terms of the operation of the committee, the request has been made that the Official Opposition have precedence in leading the questioning, particularly with respect to estimates and the examination of expenditures. That is a tradition with which I am quite satisfied and with which I agree. There will be equity in terms of operation of the committees. I look forward to the work of the committee proceeding at the earliest possible date
926

December 5, 1984
Borrowing Authority
so that we will have the benefit of the sage counsel and advice of the excellent members who have been asked to serve.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Are there any questions or comments on the Hon. House Leader's speech?


Jacques Guilbault: Mr. Speaker, I would like to comment that the formula which was just proposed by the Government House Leader would satisfy us. After all the debate which has been had in this House on this subject, I believe we are coming to terms regarding more reasonable arrangements which will be suitable to us. I take it from what the Government House Leader said that perhaps it was something which happened with new members on the committee. It was certainly not something planned by himself or by the Government.
We feel better about it now and I would even go as far as to suggest to Hon. Members that, if 1 had unanimous consent, I would withdraw my amendment, which was seeking, in fact, some form of protection for Hon. Members representing the Opposition. If it is agreeable to Hon. Members, I will withdraw the amendment and we could continue on with the main motion.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The Hon. Member for Saint-Jacques (Mr. Guilbault) is withdrawing the amendment. Is there unanimous consent for its withdrawal?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.
Amendment (Mr. Guilbault, Saint-Jacques) withdrawn.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Is the House ready for the question on the main motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Question.
Motion (Mr. Hnatyshyn) agreed to.


BORROWING AUTHORITY ACT, 1984-85 (No. 2) MEASURE TO ENACT
[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mrs. McDougall that Bill C-ll, an Act to provide borrowing authority, be read the second time and referred to the Standing Committee on Finance, Trade and Economic Affairs; and the amendment thereto of Mr. Riis (p. 694).
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The Hon. Member for Laurier (Mr. Berger).


Mr. Berger:: Mr. Speaker, I understand that an Hon. Member of the New Democratic Party has to leave shortly because of an appointment. With your accord, I would desist from speaking at this time, as long as you could rearrange the order.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Fine. Then I will recognize the Hon. Member for Thunder Bay-Atikokan (Mr. Angus).


Iain Francis Angus: Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the Hon. Member for his co-operation in allowing me to catch a plane.
I rise at this time to speak in favour of the motion of my colleague that the borrowing recommendations of this Government be changed. This is the first occasion, except for the period of Standing Order 21 statements and Question Period, on which I rise to speak in this House.
I would like to say a few words in relation to my election on September 4. The voters in my riding made two very important decisions on that day. First, like many other Canadians they decided enough was enough and that Liberals should no longer reign in this country. Where my constituents differed from a large majority of the population of Canada is that they saw through the promises made by the Conservative Party, realized that they were no different from the Liberals and opted instead for New Democratic representation in this House.
This Bill, Mr. Speaker, is yet one more example of why my constituents voted the way they did. If they had voted Conservative, they would have been voting for borrowing authority of $16 billion sight unseen, with no indication of what the money was going to be spent for. If I dared to vote in favour of this Bill, Mr. Speaker, my constituents would have every right to ask me to resign immediately. I want to thank those voters, Mr. Speaker, for their support and for their faith in my abilities. I also want to thank my riding association and the hundreds of persons who worked not only during the two-month pre-election period but who have worked over the last seven years to send me to this House. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank my family without whose support I would not be here.
I am very pleased to speak today on this Bill, Mr. Speaker, because this week marks a very important event in the riding of Thunder Bay-Atikokan and in the neighbouring riding of Thunder Bay-Nipigon. For the first time in a number of years citizens of those ridings who are cable subscribers are able to watch the House of Commons live without the aid of a converter. I noticed earlier today the former Member of Parliament for Thunder Bay-Atikokan was in the gallery, the now reincarnated commissioner for the CRTC. I am sure he will be pleased to know that whereas he was unable to make that change in the television service, I was successful.
The community of Thunder Bay and Atikokan and the parts in between have suffered much over the last number of years. This past winter there were over 14,000 people registered as out of work and looking for employment in our communities. That cost is staggering, Mr. Speaker. One of the reasons I am opposed to borrowing $16 billion without knowing what it is going to be spent on is that my constituents believe that they should know how this Government is going to deal with their unemployment situation. That unemployment problem is
December 5, 1984

extremely expensive. Unemployment insurance benefits last year for the Thunder Bay district amounted to $55.7 million. Welfare benefits for the City of Thunder Bay cost $2.5 million. Lost federal revenue over the same period amounted to $144 million. That is well over $200 million cost to the taxpayers of this land because of the unemployment situation in the Thunder Bay area, and it is the direct result, Mr. Speaker, of too many years of Liberal economic policies, which seem very clearly to be carrying through under the Conservative reign.
There is a plant in Thunder Bay called CanCar Rail Incorporated. It is a facility which was nationalized by Bill Davis and company, the Conservatives of Ontario. It is currently without functioning contracts. Its employees have been laid off for well over a year. In fact, in September ten employees became exhaustees of unemployment insurance; in October 150 employees became exhaustees; in November it was 100, and in December 25 to 50 employees have run out of unemployment insurance benefits. Those employees will not be getting back to work until June at the earliest. It is very clear that this new Government must act to provide some kind of income support in order to allow these people to survive over this long winter.
Before we approve any spending of this nature, we would also like to see what kind of urban transport policy will be put in place. What kind of program will there be for VIA to require the production of double-decker rail cars? Both of these things will have a big impact on the CanCar rail facilities.
Because the railroads and the Wheat Board could not come to an agreement last winter as to how much to pay to ship grain from Thunder Bay to the Seaway ports, over 1,000 men and women were laid off. This year it will be worse. The combination of poor crops in the lower Prairies and the two bridge failures we have experienced and are still experiencing will cause those lay-offs to occur again. In fact, there will be more people laid off and for a longer period of time.
We must do something about the capacity of the port of Thunder Bay. The lake shippers would like to have elevators which are almost full so that they can move their boats in and out very rapidly. The railways, on the other hand, would prefer to have the elevators nearly empty so they can move their cars in and out quickly. Thunder Bay is an extremely fine-tuned port. If nothing goes wrong on the rail or the water, everything moves smoothly. However, if there is a disaster on the rail lines which blocks CN or CP from coming in for any length of time, the port of Thunder Bay is in trouble. If the problem of the damaged bridge on the St. Lawrence had occurred in July, Mr. Speaker, the port of Thunder Bay would have shut down because it would have filled up very quickly.
The community of Atikokan was abandoned by the former Liberal government. It was only provided with make-work projects after the two mines closed. Every day in this House, Mr. Speaker, I am amazed at how we did not learn from the experience of Atikokan. We did not learn that we should not allow Canadian steel companies to purchase their iron ore from the United States. We did not learn that we should not
Borrowing Authority
allow companies to shut down communities arbitrarily, because it is not just mines we shut down, it is communities. Well, Atikokan is surviving, but no thanks to the federal Government. It is surviving due to individual initiative by the people in that community, but there are still some needs that have to be dealt with.
I noticed with interest that earlier this fall, when a mine closed in the riding of the Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney), the Government was very quick to provide some special assistance to that community. Well, the special assistance I need for the community of Atikokan is income support for those miners laid off in 1979 and 1980. Because of age and the damaged bodies they have as the result of many years in the mine, they need some kind of early retirement program which will allow them a decent level of survival. I want to know what kind of programs this Government will have next summer. 1 want to know now so I can tell the young people in my community what kind of jobs will be available to them. They are planning for their future and they want to make sure they can afford to go back to school next fall. So far this Government has done nothing but reduce the amount of employment opportunities.
There are many more things I could say about my community, but I will leave it at that for now. To summarize, I would just like to suggest that much has been said about the need to restore investor confidence in this country. What we really have been witnessing is nothing but a confidence game rather than a means of establishing confidence. We need a mechanism to ensure that people are put back to work. The majority of Canadians would prefer to work, whether it is in the home or outside. They would rather be doing that than collecting pogey or welfare. If we in the NDP were to support this Bill and the borrowing of $16 billion, we would be giving the Government a blank cheque and I do not think the people of Canada want us to do that.
[ Translation]


David Berger: Mr. Speaker, for me also this is the first opportunity I have to rise in this new Parlement, and I would like to take a few seconds to thank my constituents of Laurier for the confidence they showed me on September 4. I am very proud of the relationship I have established with so many people in my constituency from the time I was first elected in 1979, and I would like to give to all the men and women in my riding the assurance that I will do everything in my power to deserve their confidence during this new term of office.
I am very pleased to rise in this debate on borrowing authority, and I also note with great interest that the Minister of State for Science and Technology (Mr. Siddon) is here, listening to this debate, because I have a few comments on matters for which he is responsible.
I would first like to suggest, Mr. Speaker, that the statement made by the Minister of Linance (Mr. Wilson) and this bill
December 5, 1984

Borrowing Authority
requesting borrowing authority now before the House, coming so soon in the life of this new Parlement, prove to anyone who may still have any doubts about it the failure of this Progressive Conservative government. Perhaps you will say it is too early to make such an assessment, that I may be too critical. I do not think so, Mr. Speaker, and I will try to prove it within the next few minutes. Let us not forget that this Government was elected without a program and without goals. The only thing indeed that united that motley collection in the Progressive Conservative Party was that they were against the previous Liberal Government. Mr. Trudeau, the former Prime Minister, often reminded us that the Progressive Conservative Party represented all the people and all the elements in our society who were against something.

He referred on a number of occasions to that "coalition of antis".
[ Translation]
It sems rather obvious by now that there is no strategy and no plan. The only thing we can see is a sort of hardened position based on the Conservatives' blind faith that the deficit has to come down no matter what, and a few weeks ago the Minister of Finance (Mr. Wilson) let the axe fall right and left without suggesting alternative solutions. They are now seeking our approval to borrow, but we do not have a budget, we do not have estimates.
The cutbacks ordered by the Conservative government are a fair indication of what it does not like, but we do not know what it likes. Our leader, the Right Hon. Member for Vancouver Quadra (Mr. Turner) summed it up for us when he said: We will have to wait until spring to find out what this government likes. Mr. Speaker, that reminds me of a football team-I know you are a sports enthusiast and follow the game very closely-it reminds me of a football team whose defensive unit goes on the field, without a play-

The quarterback, as you know, Mr. Speaker, has to improvise. He goes into the huddle and scratches out the plays on the back of his hand or in the dirt. This is the kind of government we have today.
[ Translation]
The government of the Progressive Conservative Party has no plays, it is always in a huddle, and Canadians are left to hope that the huddle will not last too long. This blind obsession with cutting down the deficit will have a devastating impact in the field of science and technology, my responsibility as Opposition critic. The new government was hardly sworn in that it rushed to cut research tax credits. A few weeks later, we heard the statement of the Minister of Finance and whole programs of energy and environmental research were terminated, whole programs of summer employment for youths and students, Summer Canada, labour training programs were cancelled, and all that in spite of the challenging promises of
this government which was supposed to promote research in this country.

1 remember that when the Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney) was Leader of the Opposition last March or April, he made a speech and said that we must double research and development spending in this country and triple our resolve to reach it.


Mr. Siddon:: Have patience.


David Berger: But what have we seen? We have seen the contrary.
I am very pleased to see the Minister of State for Science and Technology (Mr. Siddon) here today. Earlier today I spoke to the chairman of the Standing Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates and asked him if we could conduct hearings into the cutting, the slicing, the destruction of the energy division at the National Research Council. The Minister is very well aware of that. I cannot believe that this is what this Government intended. Something went wrong some place. I just cannot believe that it has embarked upon such a foolhardy path.
1 would like to read into the record a letter to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Miss Carney), a copy of which was sent to the Minister of State for Science and Technology. It is from the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Waterloo. The author states:
*	(1550)
The curtailment of the 61-man Division of Energy at the National Research Council is a great blow to Research and Development in renewable energy. What the government has done has far reaching negative consequences, specifically:
*	Loss of jobs in the private sector, estimated at around 1500 to 2000. These are mainly in the small business sector.
*	Loss of export potential for made-in-Canada renewable energy and energy conservation products.
*	Loss of inflow of technical know-how through loss of participation in the International Energy Agency activities.
*	Loss of highly skilled personnel at NRC and elsewhere whose efforts have put Canada in the forefront of alternative energy research.
In a similar letter from the Brace Research Institute Faculty of Engineering at Macdonald College of McGill University, the authors summarize some letters they have written to the Minister of State for Science and Technology and to the head of the solar energy program at the National Research Council. They write:
We feel that the Conservative Government is adopting a policy to completely dismantle the entire Canadian renewable energy industry which has a great potential for providing employment and small business opportunities for Canadians.
They are undertaking this dismantling operation without any consultation-
This puts the lie to every single promise that that Government and its Leader made.
-of those of us in the private sector who freely gave of our time and efforts to establish with the previous regimes, programmes destined to stimulate the Canadian economy.
They are ignoring the fact that Canada will host a World Forum of Renewable Energy in June 1985.
December 5, 1984

They are not diversifying our R&D capabilities in energy. Instead of undertaking R&D to create jobs they are putting us at the mercy of foreign imports.
I have several other letters which I will not be able to get to today, Mr. Speaker. I will conclude by saying that the Government has again provided us with no alternative. It has told us what it does not like. Presumably it does not like the energy division of the National Research Council. It does not like the summer employment program for students. They have not told us how these cuts are going to stimulate investment in the private sector.
I wish the Conservatives would explain to us how Canadian businesses are going to be taking more risks and how they are going to be putting up the research and development monies which we need in the country. The only answer they have is that these cuts will somehow reduce the deficit. Presumably they might lead to lower interest rates which would lead to further investments, except that in his statement the Minister of Finance (Mr. Wilson) states very clearly that interest rates in Canada depend upon the United States.

Last Friday, November 30, less than three months after the election of this new government, was a historic day in Canada. For the first time, I heard one reporter-there might have been others-suggest that this government would only last one term.

In his column Don McGillivray stated:
The Tories don't look invincible now. It's strange now to remember the forecasts of only a couple of months ago that they would be unbeatable for a generation.
After the goofs of recent days, it's possible to see this as a one-term government, disintegrating like the government of John Diefenbaker did.
I rest my case, Mr. Speaker. I think I have read into the record ample evidence to demonstrate the intellectual bankruptcy of the Government. It will not take long before the Government starts to plummet rapidly in the polls of the country and in the confidence of the voters of Canada.


Mr. McDermid:: Mr. Speaker, I was very interested in the comments of the hon. gentleman. He said that there has been absolutely no consultation with the non-renewable energy sector. I wonder if he is aware that they are having their convention at the present time. I spent-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Order. There are no questions or comments. Is this debate?


John Horton McDermid: I am sorry.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Order, please. Would you please take your seat. We are now on 10-minute straight speeches. There are no questions or comments. I would like to recognize the next speaker, the Hon. member for Mount Royal (Mrs. Finestone).


William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: I rise on a point of order.
Borrowing Authority


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The Hon. Member for Winnipeg-Birds Hill (Mr. Blaikie) rises on a point of order.


William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: Mr. Speaker, perhaps somebody could send the new Member a copy of the Standing Orders.


John Horton McDermid: On that point of order, Mr. Speaker.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I am sorry. I know this is Wednesday afternoon. On December 8 there will be a full moon. I would hope that Members would maintain decorum. I would like to recognize the Hon. Member for Mount Royal. No more points of order.


Mrs. Sheila Finestone (Mount Royal):: Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak on the legislation which is currently before the House, namely Bill C-ll, the borrowing authority Bill. The Conservative Government is seeking authority to borrow $7.3 billion in the present fiscal year, 1984-85, plus $16 billion for the fiscal year 1985-86 for which it has not tabled, or does it intend to table, estimates until next spring. In essence, the Conservatives are asking us to accept, de facto, that they will seek to spend the people's money in the best interests of the people.
I suggest that the best interests of the largest percentage of the population are not being considered at all. In fact, the beautiful rhetorical phrases that the Government has used, is using and plans to continue using cover a travesty of its actions and its lack of concern for the majority of the population. They feel that they can lull us all into insensitivity to the real issues and the real plight by talking about, for example, imposing a minimum tax on the rich, which essentially will be a small amount of money in the total picture and certainly will not assure that justice and equity will be achieved. They think it will and plan to go merrily along their way implementing these unconscionable cuts which will surely severely affect the majority. We shall not be duped.
In its November 8 economic statement the federal Government announced that it planned to reduce its spending in the fiscal year by $4.2 billion through program expenditure reductions, eliminations and increased cost recovery. Of these reductions some $515 million, or 12 per cent of the total, can be said to be social-type expenditures. For example, expenditures of the Department of Employment and Immigration would be reduced by $432.3 million in 1984-85. Among the programs affected by the cuts will be the Mobility Program, the General Industrial Training Program, Young Workers Exchange Program and the Summer Canada Program. It is also anticipated that this Department's expenditures will be reduced by $200 million by tightening interviewing procedures to ensure that only those who are entitled receive benefits. I think, Mr. Speaker, you will recognize Flora's private snoopers there. I think that is a disgrace.
Another $90 million is expected to be saved by considering severance pay and pension income as earnings when determining the eligibility for unemployment insurance. Thus, workers who lose their jobs would not receive unemployment insurance benefits until they exhaust their company pension and their severance pay. This is a mean and reactionary cut-back that

December 5, 1984
Borrowing Authority
affects the least protected in our society and I believe has created much discontent.
Cut-backs in employment programs can be particularly consequential for women, young people, the handicapped and visible minorities. 1 suggest that these groups constitute a majority of our population. These groups suffer from higher than average unemployment rates and need special assistance to find work. The unemployment rate for women between the ages of 35 and 44 who return to work when their children enter school is much higher than that for men.
With the increasing need for two incomes in the family and with the increase in self-supporting women as a result of separation, divorce or their being unmarried mothers, the number of women looking for work is much greater than it was a few years ago.
With the workplace in transition, the need for training and retraining programs becomes an imperative for our new entrants to the workplace and those displaced by new technology. Since they do not have access to adequate training programs, the cut of $40 million in the General Industrial Training Program hits very hard. Women account for approximately 23 per cent of the trainees in this program. There must be an ongoing response to those who have difficulty finding work. The Government does not seem to be looking hard for those solutions.
The highest unemployment rate is among young people with very little or no previous work experience. That unemployment rate is close to 18 per cent. Although staying in school longer is one of the employment solutions, Canada student loans have been cut back by $5 million and $3 million has been cut from the Young Workers Exchange program and $85 million has been cut from Summer Canada. Without student loans and assistance in finding summer jobs, many young people will be forced to quit school. Yet many cannot find work. It is a vicious circle. The promises of action some time in the spring do not answer their need to develop to their fullest potential.
I believe the Government is completely forgetting about the finest natural resource that we have, our human resource. It has forgotten how one should go about developing that resource. Let me bring to the attention of the House an article that appeared in Le Droit today-

-where it is stated: "Champagne avoids the real problems."
The Minister Mrs. Champagne, who is also responsible for the coordination of activities related to the International Year for Youth in 1985, performed an incredible feat when she did not mention once in her speech the unemployment problem affecting 17 per cent of our young people between 15 and 24 years of age.
She did not refer either to the programs planned by her government. The young people were clearly disappointed when the Minister representing them in the government did not say a word or make a single policy statement about their future. I find that absolutely shocking, Mr. Speaker.

Another important area that I would like to bring to the attention of the House is the expenditure cuts in housing. A cut of $9.6 million will affect social housing expenditures whose object is to assist Canadians whose income is insufficient to gain access to adequate housing. Another $29.4 million will be cut from the Residential Rehabilitation Assistance Program, the object of which is the repair and modernization of existing houses and the improvement of housing and living conditions. In my riding of Mount Royal there is a tremendous number of old stock housing which is in serious disrepair and badly in need of renovation. We also have a high demand for co-op housing. These are the exact areas which the Government has chosen to cut.
My constituents and other Canadians with whom I have talked are obviously not saying the same things that the Minister of Finance, (Mr. Wilson), the Minister of Labour (Mr. McKnight) or the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Miss MacDonald) have heard. That is of great concern to me. We must either speak louder or improve their hearing aids.
With respect to social housing, there are only 147 transition houses which provide emergency shelter, safe houses and second stage housing. We need many more. Only 45 per cent of Canada's population lives in an area with a shelter for battered women and most workers feel that funds need to be increased before real inroads can be made in attempting to address the housing shortage for battered women. In the last 20 years there has been an acute increase of single parent families from 6.5 per cent to 10.4 per cent. Elderly women are in serious need of protected housing. The Government's commitment to Canadians in need has reflected itself in decreased grants. These cut-backs seriously jeopardize the health and welfare of the general public.
In conclusion, the extent of the cut-backs may affect the service-producing industries in which women, youth, the handicapped and visible minorities are involved. I cannot support the budget or this Bill until we have some idea of what the Government plans to do.


Mr. David Orlikow (Winnipeg North):: Mr. Speaker, I have learned one thing in the years that I have been here, most of which have been during Liberal governments. This Bill has amply and vividly demonstrated that message. I have learned that the more things change, the more they are the same.
We are being asked to give the Government authority to borrow more money to finance its expenditures until the end of this fiscal year in March, 1985. That is a standard procedure which we see almost every year and to which we have no objection. However, the other aspect of the Bill is a proposal to allow the Government to borrow $16 billion for the next fiscal year.
The reason I began my remarks by saying that the more things change the more they are the same is that the Liberal government introduced a similar Bill. No one fought such a Bill more strenuously than the Official Opposition at the time,
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which is now the Government. When we dealt with a similar Bill in 1982, the present Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. Clark), who was then the Leader of the Official Opposition, moved a motion. In that motion he said that the granting of authority for the borrowing of a sum greater than the amount which is required to meet the Government's need to the end of the current fiscal year is objectionable in principle and that the House therefore declines to give second reading. What the Secretary of State for External Affairs was objecting to then is precisely what his Government is asking the House to approve at this time.
While we are not opposed to the Government borrowing funds to meet its expenditures, we are opposed to giving the Government a blank cheque for the next year, for the same reasons which the Conservatives gave when they were in opposition. We have no budget for the coming year. We have no details or explanation of the kind of programs the Government proposes to put into effect. We certainly have no explanation in any detail about what cuts in existing programs it proposes to make. When we see the cuts that the Government has already made in this year's programs, we can have nothing but fear about what it proposes to do.
This is not the only government that has a deficit. I point out to Members of the House that every government in Canada, including the previous Liberal government, the present federal Government and every provincial government, including Conservative, NDP, Social Credit and Parti Quebe-cois governments, have deficits. Even if there was a Liberal provincial government, it would have a deficit. Every provincial government has a deficit, not because they are overspending but because of the slowdown in the economy, the recession. Revenues are down. They are substantially lower than those governments had calculated. The only way in which they could operate without deficits would be by having major cut-backs in the services which provincial governments provide for the people in their provinces, and the people are not ready to accept that.
We do not have deficits because we are overspending. We have deficits because revenues are not what they should be. If our economy was working as it should be and instead of 11.5 per cent unemployment we had a 5, 6 or 7 per cent rate of unemployment, deficits would be very small.
Ten of the most prominent economists in academic communities in Ontario and Quebec and in think-tanks such as the C. D. Howe Institute have agreed that the Government should try to reduce the deficit. They have said that along with proposals to reduce the deficit, the Government needs to get the Bank of Canada to ease its monetary and fiscal policies. We cannot do much as long as we have interest rates such as those which prevail today.
We are told that interest rates are down substantially from what they were. However, the real interest rate-that is, the difference between the increase in the cost of living and the interest rates charged-is not down very much from the time
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when it was 20 per cent. It is now down by eight points, but the rate of inflation has also been reduced by the same amount. The real interest rate is very high and it will continue to be high as long as the Conservative Government follows the same advice which the former Liberal government received and permits the Governor of the Bank of Canada to tie our interest rate policy to the American interest rate rather than to have a policy which meets the needs of Canadians.
I oppose this Bill not only because it gives the Government money for the next fiscal year, but because I am very apprehensive about the kinds of cuts the Government has made in its desire, intention and determination to reduce the deficit. First of all, the Government cut back on programs which helped people in greatest need. I should like to give a few illustrations. It has cut back on housing programs which are very important to older people and people in the lower income brackets. It has cut CHIP by $84 million. There are thousands of homes in every city in Canada which were built 60 to 100 years ago. Those homes are energy inefficient. This program helped to rehabilitate such homes and help people save hundreds of dollars per year in heating costs. It was not only important to the individuals in those homes who benefited from the program; it helped cut down on the amount of heating oil and non-renewable energy resources which were being depleted at a rapid rate.
The Government has also cut $29.4 million from RRAP. In every city there are older homes which are falling into a state where they are virtually unusable. As a result of this program, funded in part by the federal Government and in part by provincial governments, tens of thousands of older homes in poor areas of our cities have been modernized and rehabilitated, have been rewired and replumbed. For the Government to cut back on that kind of program is a disgrace. Similarly there have been cuts in the funding of public housing. If there is one area in which the governments of Canada, federal and provincial, ought to be ashamed of themselves, it is in their programs to provide adequate housing for people in lower income brackets. I am thinking of people on welfare and single parent families. Their incomes are too low for them to obtain adequate housing. They need rental rates which they can afford, yet that is the kind of program which the Government cuts back by $9.5 million.
There are thousands of young people attending university. The only way in which they can continue to attend university is by finding work in the summer, yet the Government cut Summer Canada programs by $85 million.
I could continue but I see Mr. Speaker indicating that my time is up. In conclusion, the cuts in the budget which the Government has made are the worst ones it could have made, even if I agreed that cuts were required, and I do not.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The Hon. Member for Montreal-Sainte-Marie (Mr. Malepart).

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Jean-Claude Malépart: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased with this opportunity to speak to Bill C-ll. I do not think anyone will be surprised to hear that I disagree with the Bill as presented by the Government. One reason is that I do not think we can really trust a Government and a Party that asks the House for borrowing authority for next year, without bringing down a new budget, without tabling the Estimates. Why we should not trust this Government? Well, what this Government has achieved, or rather has failed to achieve since the election campaign and its outcome on September 4, shows why it cannot be trusted.
For instance, the Government promised it would create jobs, but if we look at the mini-budget, all it contains are cutbacks and potential lay-offs and unemployment. I see the Minister for Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Mr. Cote) opposite. This Government made a commitment to engage in consultation and to refrain from unilateral decisions. The first thing the new Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs did was to ignore the people who take care of UFFI cases, and instead made a unilateral decision, that is, he recommended to Treasury Board that cuts be made in the program.
Another example is subsidized housing. During the election campaign, Members in all ridings promised co-operative housing when they were in the Opposition, and they were asking for more funds. But lo and behold: the mini-budget provides for cuts in subsidized housing and the RRAP program.
Mr. Speaker, I can think of another area as well where the Prime Minister said 'with his hand on his heart' that he would never tamper with the universality of our programs. And what do we see now? A document that challenges the universality of those same programs. Not only Liberal Members, not only New Democratic Party Members are saying that we can no longer trust this Government. I know some Members of the Progressive Conservative Party, senior Members, who are starting to feel uncomfortable. They did not expect their Government to act this way. As for the junior Members, sooner or later they will wake up as well. After Christmas they also will start to react. There are also the media, and I would like to quote from an article by Lysianne Gagnon in the newspaper La Presse, in which she comments on the universality issue, and I quote:
"With his hand on his heart-"
August 1984: on every platform, with his hand on his heart and in solemn tones, Brian Mulroney repeated that he would never never challenge the principle of universality for social programs: that is, he said, "a sacred trust".
August 1984: in the riding of Saint-Hyacinthe, Andree Champagne, the Progressive Conservative candidate, is indignant. Her Liberal opponent had the effrontery to distribute in the riding a speech by John Crosbie in which he said it would be necessary to revise the universality of social programs and keep them for the people who really need them. At a press conference, Mrs. Champagne protested that it was "monstrous" to scare senior citizens with the "purely personal" thoughts of Mr. Crosbie. (One would have to suppose that Mrs. Champagne was oblivious to the fact that Mr. Crosbie was not exactly an unknown within the Party, being the former Minister of Finance and the Opposition critic for finance. Less discreet than his colleagues, he had shown the
Party's true colours at the beginning of the election campaign, when he was soundly reprimanded by his leader.)
November 1984: the Mulroney Government announced its intention to review the universality of social programs.
For the time being, only old age pensions and family allowance would be on the review list, so they said. The Prime Minister, his hand on his heart and with sincerity in his voice, swore that he would never tamper with medicare.
One wonders whether that is not precisely the government's ultimate goal.
Why this nagging doubt? And why not? When one has been lied to once with so many solemn promises, the odds are that it could happen again. But there are other indications.
Anyone who believes that the Government's main objective in challenging the universality principle is to give more to the poor is naive beyond belief. This is a good selling point, but in fact, everything suggests that this is not a transfer of funds to assist the disadvantaged, but simply an initiative to save the government some money, in line with the main obsession of the Mulroney Government which is to reduce the deficit.
Mr. Speaker, I think that more and more, in all walks of life, virtually the only people left who have any confidence in this Government are the Conservative Members of Parliament, and that is why we cannot grant this Government the requested borrowing power because of its lack of credibility.
Today and last Friday, I asked a question to the Right Hon. Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney) about spouse allowances for people between the ages of 60 and 64. In reply to my questions, the Prime Minister himself said that he was willing to help all needy people between 60 and 64, but in fact, the government is only helping the small group of widows and widowers between 60 and 64. This discrimates against those between the ages of 60 and 64 who have the same needs and the same income, but who are single, separated or divorced.
Mr. Speaker, we know that the initiative announced by the Minister will provide assistance to 85,000 people at a cost of S300 million. However, what the Prime Minister and the Minister did not tell us, and what the Conservative Members certainly do not know, is that the Governments will save about SI70 million of these $300 million because about 40 percent of those who will become eligible for the new program were already eligible for welfare benefits, which means that the Government is giving with one hand and taking away with the other. Instead of helping a greater number of people, the Government is now depriving 340,000 people aged between 60 and 64 who live alone, of the right to spouse allowance or old age security pension with guaranteed income supplement.
Mr. Speaker, I do not trust the Prime Minister, but 1 do trust the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Epp), as he and perhaps the Minister of Manpower and Immigration (Miss MacDonald) are the only members of Cabinet to defend the rights of ordinary Canadians. What about the rest of them? We know where they come from. They are more interested in defending the multinationals. I trust that, with the assistance of some of the Members opposite who will very
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soon be receiving visits from senior citizens, these other members of Cabinet can also be made more aware of the situation.
I am confident that this will happen because I know some of the Conservative Members, and they are honest people who will defend these senior citizens in the interest of all Canadians. I do not believe this cause to be partisan, either Liberal, NDP, Conservative; rather, all Members of this House and all Canadians should make it their cause to guarantee that the legislation passed by this Government will be fair and will really meet the needs of people between 60 and 64 who live alone. And we know that the very great majority are women, and I am confident that when the legislation is introduced the Government will have mended its ways, and instead of discriminating against a group of people for reasons of marital status, they will introduce a bill that will meet the needs of the entire population.
There is another important issue the Government will give us a chance to discuss and that is the universality of social programs. I have already suggested how sad it was for the Government's approach to foster class struggle. Unfortunately, the Prime Minister himself has made a comparison-is it normal that someone earning $500,000 should get family allowances? And the documents tabled by the Minister of Finance reflected the class struggle existing between those earning from $20,000 to $30,000, from $40,000 to $50,000.
In my view, there are enough devisive factors in Canada as you are very much aware Mr. Speaker, that we should not be creating new ones. Speaking on the issue of universality, we need only look at the tables provided by the Government-if there is an area where the rich are favoured, it is not through program universality but through tax exemptions.
Let us consider the support which the Government provides for families with children, that is the family allowances. A taxpayer earning less than $10,000 gets $359, while another taxpayer earning $80,000 is left with $175 per year after tax. Let us turn now to the child exemptions based on the income tax tables. People earning less than $10,000 pay no income tax at all. They have zero income. People earning $80,000 get a $363 tax saving.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I am sorry, but the Hon. Member's time has expired.


Ms. Lynn McDonald (Broadview-Greenwood):: Mr. Speaker, this is an outrageous piece of legislation before us today in Bill C-ll. It is the sort of thing the Conservatives opposed in opposition, the sort of thing they said ought never to happen. They were very critical of borrowing for expenditures that had not been specified in a Budget. They were very critical when the Liberals did this. In terms of contempt for the public and disregard for Parliament, the Conservatives are indeed the equal of the Liberal Party.
We have before us today a proposal that $23.3 billion be borrowed. Of this amount, $16 billion is for expenditures for
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the following fiscal year. We do not have any details of that. Of the $7.3 billion for expenditures for the remainder of the fiscal year, $2 billion is for a very loosely defined contingency fund; in other wrods, an expenditure which is totally inappropriate.
We are not opposed to borrowing in principle. Obviously every government has to borrow. If we were in government, we would have to borrow as well. It is what the borrowing is for, specifically the justification for the program. We either have no detail or we have the proposals in the economic statement, in effect a short-term mini-budget which shows that the Government's expenditures are short-sighted and misguided.
An alternative to borrowing more is to raise the money by taxes, specifically by closing the loopholes by which many people avoid paying taxes. This could be the source of an enormous amount of money. This Government does not choose to pursue that option which is open to it. It would be more fair for the Canadian public when medium and low income earners are having to pay very high taxes because corporations and better off individuals are benefiting from these enormous loopholes. The economic proposals that we have in the economic statement show that the Government is making important cuts in some areas. I think these cuts could be characterized as being harmful enough in certain areas to hurt the agencies concerned.
I can think of cuts to expenditures in the area of arts and culture. We are seeing cuts which total under $100 million. That is really not enough money to help the deficit. However, that amount of money is very important to an area like arts and culture in which expenditures have not been generous. Cuts to this area mean that particular companies cannot perform, programs will have to be cut back, artists and writers will not get grants, books and magazines will not be published, and all kinds of activities which are important to the cultural life of Canada will not happen. This cut-back particularly affects artists who, on average, are low-income earners. Spectacular monetary successes in the artistic world are few and far between. The average performing artist or writer lives on a very modest income and a very high proportion of them actually live below the poverty line.
There have been no cost-of-living or general increases to funding in the area of arts and culture over the last decade. Now its funding is getting cut and those cuts are sufficient to hurt arts and culture. However, what is $100 million when we have a deficit as large as we do? If we really want to attack the deficit, we must take much sterner measures and go after the lost revenue. We would go after tax loopholes and tax expenditures for corporations if we were really serious about the deficit.
Let me turn to some of the specific cuts contained in the economic statement of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Wilson). There was a cut to the Summer Canada Program, a program which employed students in the summer. This program certainly provided excellent projects for the riding of Broadview-

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Greenwood. It provided good jobs for students and helped local agencies and people. The program gave young people a good opportunity to work.
Cuts have been made to the Canada Oil Substitution Program. Goodness knows we need to be working on oil substitution and better conservation measures for this important nonrenewable resource. However, cuts have been made to that program.
Cuts have been made to the CHIP program and there have been reductions in funding to energy research and development. There have been really misguided cuts in the budget affecting science and technology. There have been cuts to radiation research, pollution research, research on the extent of damage caused by the spruce budworm, Canada wildlife research and a toxicology centre which has been doing very important research. These were important programs. However, the amount of money gained by these cuts is not significant in terms of reducing the budget deficit. This harm is being caused by shortsighted policies and is not a serious attack on the deficit which the Government says it is really trying to attack.
Cuts have been made to the 1986 census. There has been a 25 per cent reduction to the Residential Rehabilitation Assistance Program, something which will affect a lot of people. There was a cut of $180 million to external aid. Yet the Government talks about increases in its aid to Ethiopa. I remind the House that among these cuts to external aid are cuts to IDRC, to CIDA and to projects in which Ethiopa took part. On the one hand there is the pretence of being more generous by meeting a crisis, and on the other hand there are cut-backs in perhaps less glamorous programs but ones which are very important to attacking the problem of under-production of food and under-development. Surely it is that kind of aid with which we must be equally concerned.
A cut of $9.6 million has been made to the CMHC social housing program. Co-ops and public housing will be hit. Co-ops need more money, not less. We in Canada have a very good co-op system. There are many people who are on waiting lists for co-ops. There are plans for co-ops to be built. It is an excellent form of housing. There is a crying need for public housing. There are homeless people, families doubled up and families living in inadequate housing because the private market is building housing which is not affordable for a great many individuals and families. Yet there are budget cuts to this very critical area.
I suggest that the Government might do better by looking for its economic ideas in the recommendations of the Economic Council of Canada. Just last week, the Economic Council of Canada published its annual review and recommended that there not be budget cuts of the nature of those made. The Council suggested that the Government ought instead to increase its revenues. The Council does take the deficit problem seriously. It thought there should be a conservative attack on the deficit but it did recommend the following:
Our research .. . shows that much of the fiscal plight of governments today is of their own making, since they have forgone in various ways revenues that in earlier days they were able to levy effectively.
Of course, the Council is speaking of the taxing of wealthier individuals and particularly of corporations, a sector which is paying less and less of the tax burden. The Economic Council of Canada notes that corporate income taxes provide only 10 per cent of the revenue of the Government of Canada, while personal income taxes provide up to 28 per cent of it. Corporations at one time paid a lot more than that.
The Economic Council of Canada very cautiously recommends that tax increases be implemented by the elimination of exemptions and loopholes and by the imposition of very modest rate increases. This is an alternative that could be considered instead of these vicious cuts to social and public housing, co-ops and external aid.
There are a great many tax loopholes and exemptions available. Taxes forgone through RRSPs, for example, amount to $2.6 billion. That is an enormous amount of money. Yet the cuts to arts and culture expenditures amount to under $100 million. That shows that the Government does not have the right priorities. It is tampering with important and vital programs but is not going after moneys that are available to it. These moneys could be tapped into, retaining more money for the vital social programs of Canada. Fast resource write-offs-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I regret to inform the Hon. Member that her time has expired.


Mrs. Lise Bourgault (Argenteuil-Papineau):: Mr. Speaker, 1 was not prepared, I did not expect to speak today, but while listening to the Hon. Members opposite, I told myself: What nonsense! I must rise in this debate. As you know, memory is the faculty that forgets. Hon. Members opposite do not seem to recall that not so long ago, they were governing this country and the pandora's box which was inherited from them and which we have had to open, was not as interesting as we had hoped at first.
Therefore, this borrowing authority is requested to clean up the mess left by the previous administration. We have to make a review in order to borrow that money.
As you know, Mr. Speaker, some Hon. Members opposite do not seem to-For instance, I feel that my colleague the Hon. Member for Mount Royal (Mrs. Finestone) is too easily influenced by the old guard of her party who have certainly failed to tell her how their government was run. As a matter of fact, Mr. Speaker, you certainly remember something which adversely affected my riding, namely, the wanton expropriation at Mirabel by the Canada Lands Company. That is the perfect example of mismanagement. Do you realize that they found it necessary to expropriate a surplus of 80,000 acres of land for an airport for which only 17,000 acres were required-As you know, this was paid for with public funds and today it is things like those-
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An Eton. Member from Western Canada was telling me today that in Alberta there are facilities which were leased by the previous government and which are now costing millions of dollars, although they are not being used-All these things we must cope with now.
I do not intend to start a long debate on this, but I feel 1 must provide the House with some examples which I think are significant. My hon. friend referred to our senior citizens. We all know members of the party opposite love nothing better than to frighten Canadians by saying that a Conservative government would do away with the unemployment insurance scheme and the programs for senior citizens. But that did not stop Canadians from making a choice on September 4. As an example, here is what one of my hon. colleagues opposite was complaining about at a meeting. He said: "There are Conservatives in front of us, and both to our right and left". This is so because Canadians decided on September 4 that enough was enough, that they were fed up with the previous administration.
Mr. Speaker, I shall conclude by saying that it is difficult for a blue sea to tolerate ships with Liberal captains at the helm, but the time will come when Conservative captains will take over the ships and sail them to safer harbours.
Mir. George Henderson (Egmont): Mr. Speaker, I rise today more out of fear and frustration than out of respect for the legislation of this Government. I am finding it very difficult to accept the hypocrisy of a Government that speaks of reducing the deficit and then proceeds to borrow billions of dollars without indicating to Canadian people for what that money will be used. It is a Government which speaks of confidence, consultation and openness. I am sure if it could fit it into its public speeches, it would find a way to convince the people of Canada that it is the sole representative of truth, beauty and light.
The Government, through Bill C-ll, has asked to borrow $7.3 billion on the basis of a financial statement which consisted of lightly considered cut-backs. What concerns me most is the fact that the Government wants to borrow $16 billion without a budget or the Supplementary Estimates which would indicate where the money would end up. The Bill states that $16 billion may be required for public works and general purposes. That is certainly a wide-open definition. I for one would like to know where the money will be spent.
Will the money be directed to areas which would be of benefit to Canadian people? After all, the Government has told Canadians that they will see a brand new prosperous day. Canadians have been told that it is a Government which has only their best interests at heart. Can I believe, and can I presume, that Prince Edward Islanders will also be witnessing this brand new day? Let us go back to the Government's indication of its interest in Canadian people and see what prosperity is held in the financial statement for the Islanders.
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It is clear to me after reviewing background papers of the economic statement that every segment of the Prince Edward Island society will be adversely affected. I cannot agree that the programs and services which are necessary for the maintenance and growth of the primary industries on Prince Edward Island should be subjected to such radical cut-backs.
Let us examine agriculture. The dairy research program will be eliminated and special export payments for dairy products will be restricted. What effect will this have on dairy exports? What effect will it have, for example, on the sale of evaporated milk from Prince Edward Island to the Algerian market? What effect will it have on the sale of cheese from Prince Edward Island to foreign markets? Those are serious considerations that arise out of the economic statement.
The federal Department of Agriculture will be reducing its operating expenditures and restricting grants and contributions in such areas as livestock improvement. If we talked to most small farmers and farmers in Prince Edward Island in general, we would find that it was a very good program. We should be trying to improve that program, and it should be continued. We should be trying to improve livestock and genetic strains among other things in this country.
Canagrex was eliminated before it had a chance to prove its worth. That was a very important program. I realize there was some opposition to it, but, in general, Prince Edward Islanders were for Canagrex. Farm organizations have already criticized the elimination of Canagrex.
Additional levies will be imposed by the federal Government for services such as food inspection. We should think about that. In Prince Edward Island 80 per cent of the potatoes produced go on the export market. To reduce inspection could be devastating. The Island is basically disease-free but has diseases such as ring rot. If that disease got on the foreign markets, Prince Edward Island would lose those markets. It would be the end of the potato industry in Prince Edward Island, or wherever potatoes are grown in Canada.
The agricultural input quality assurance and records of livestock performance will be eliminated. What effect will that have on Island farmers? Those are matters which should concern each and every Member of Parliament; not just opposition Members, but also government members.
When we talk about business we must realize that farmers and fishermen are business people. That is what a large portion of this great country is made of. Let us examine the fishery. I must say that the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans (Mr. Fraser) escaped much of the wrath of the economic statement. However, $30 million was cut out of that budget. It is a budget which should have been increased. When I was on the government side of the House, I advocated many times that the budget of the Department of Fisheries should be increased.
We could examine the small craft harbours branch. That annual budget is $40 million. That is not enough to maintain the harbours and ports. Those are areas which should be considered. The Minister of Finance (Mr. Wilson) announced

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in his economic statement the closing of three research facilities, including the Ellerslie fishery station in my riding. After consultations with the Minister, it was evident to me that he did not realize the implications of that decision. He has assured me that he will give it consideration. I applaud him for that. Hopefully, the station can be restored. I do not think that when the cuts were made the Government realized the impact they would have on the 2,500 oyster fishermen and shellfish fishermen in P.E.I.
Not too many Members understand what the shellfish fishery is in Atlantic Canada, and certainly the oyster fishery in P.E.I. The oyster industry is one area in which both men and women work. It is one area in which anyone can participate. It is an industry which has grown drastically over the years. It is something which the Government should be pushing to expand. It would create more revenue for the Government through taxation. But the Government went about it in the wrong way totally by eliminating the back-up research which is necessary to develop this most important industry. Tourism is extremely important to the Province of Prince Edward Island and to Atlantic Canada. But what do we find? We find increases in ferry rates. I realize that what is good for one part of the country may not be good for another. Certainly, some of my friends on the Government side of the House agree with an increase in the price of gasoline. However, they do not consider the ill effects it has upon our tourist, agriculture and fishing industries. I feel I could continue for another half hour on the complications caused by just a few cut-backs, but in the time I have left I want to go on record as saying it is very difficult for me, as a Member of Parliament representing the Province of Prince Edward Island, to agree with this great borrowing authority of $16 billion without knowing where the money is going to be spent.


William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: Mr. Speaker, the Bill we are debating now is a classic example of the kind of political move which breeds cynicism about politics and political parties. It brings into question the credibility of the Official Opposition of just a few years ago. What is the Canadian public to think-those who pay attention to these matters- about a Progressive Conservative Government which now requests Parliament to do the very same thing that those Hon. Members, when they were in opposition, so self-righteously and indignantly condemned. This is the sort of thing which breeds cynicism. One has to ask just what the Official Opposition of just a few years ago had in mind. The only conclusion one can come to is that at that time they were insincere in their protests. We remember all the rhetoric about the abuse which was being heaped on Parliament by the Liberal Government. We heard then that in coming to Parliament and asking for this kind of borrowing authority the Liberals obviously had no respect for the long tradition of parliamentary scrutiny of parliamentary expenditures, and it was this situation, in part, which helped the Conservatives to get the mandate they did. People had a sense, and rightfully so, that the Liberals were abusing Parliament. Now we have a Conservative Government
and instead of an indication that this Government does indeed want to depart from the attitude towards Parliament which it so righteously condemned just a short while ago, we get identical action. There must be bewilderment on the part of a great many Canadians who voted Conservative on the basis that they considered the Liberals were disrespectful of Parliament and who thought some change might be forthcoming.
I feel it is particularly ironic, Mr. Speaker, that we should be debating Bill C-ll on the same day that a motion was finally passed to bring in to being a special task force on parliamentary reform. The objections of the Official Opposition to this kind of Bill just a few years ago were based on its understanding and respect for Parliament. And on the very day we begin what I hope will be a genuine process of parliamentary reform, we see before us in Bill C-ll an unfortunate indication that the new Government is no more respectful of Parliament, and no more willing to change, at least at this point, than the previous Government. Therefore, I say, Mr. Speaker, as one who will be part of that new task force on parliamentary reform, that I intend to go into it with the kind of positive and hopeful attitude which I know is absolutely necessary if that committee is to finally have an effect on the life of this Parliament and on the House of Commons for years to come. I am disappointed at the same time, Mr. Speaker, and I am taking this opportunity to say so-because I unfortunately did not participate in the debate surrounding the creation of the task force itself-that the new Government did not seize the opportunity to show good faith when it came to the issue of parliamentary reform. It did not use the mandate it received from the Canadian public, partly as a result of its rightful criticism of the Liberals and their attitude towards Parliament, to begin by making a few changes. The committee will have to spend many hours trying to arrive at what it hopes will be the right recommendations so that Government will finally act. It would have been a spur to that committee to have received any sign whatsoever that the Government actually was open to change. It also would have been a sign of hope, not just to members of that task force, but to all Hon. Members of Parliament, and to everyone concerned about parliamentary reform. We did not receive that indication, Mr. Speaker. Instead we got a hassle with respect to quorums in committee and who had to be present when we were to hear evidence.
The Government could have taken the opportunity to adopt some of the unanimous all-party recommendations by the Special Committee on Standing Orders and Procedure of the last Parliament. The recommendation which comes most quickly to mind is with respect to the election of the Speaker. Purely from a tactical point of view, Mr. Speaker, the Government could have determined who it wanted to be Speaker. I say this with no reflection on who actually became Speaker because I happen to believe the present Speaker is doing an excellent job. However, the Government could have seized the opportunity to adopt the recommendations of the Special Committee with respect to the process by which we elect the
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Speaker. It would have been assured of having its own way, in any event, given the massive majority it has in the House.
Government could have given the House of Commons more control over its own life by bringing in changes with respect to the Commissioners of Internal Economy, by having all-party representation either on that committee or by changing the various structures by which the House administers itself. There were a number of recommendations with which the Government could have proceeded, but it did not. I, for one, am disappointed. Nevertheless, I will go into the work of the new task force on parliamentary reform with a positive and hopeful attitude, knowing that the chairman is serious about parliamentary reform. I am sure that all Hon. Members who have been assigned to that particular task force by their respective parties are also serious about parliamentary reform.
I would like to comment, in the context of the borrowing authority, on the over-all strategy of the Government. I, as the environment critic for the New Democratic Party, have been particularly concerned about the cut-backs in Environment Canada. I am very concerned about the reductions in federal Government programs in the Canadian Wildlife Service of the Department of the Environment. I would just like to take what time I have left to say that the cut-backs in the Canadian Wildlife Service with respect to wildlife toxicology projects, projects to rehabilitate endangered species, conservation of international wildlife, and wildlife interpretation, are, in my view, a classic example of short-sightedness. It is a classic example of being pennywise and pound foolish. It is a tragic failure on the part of this Government because any real long-term, stable economic growth will have to be based on an economic model which does not put environmental concerns aside for the moment in order to have economic growth, thus setting up a false dichotomy between healthy economic growth and environmental matters. The Government should see that at some point we will have to develop a way of thinking economically that faces up to the fact that long-term, stable economic growth has to take environmental considerations into account. What we have here on the part of the Government is not that realization. In fact it is, as I say, a tragic failure to make that connection.
I can only hope that over the course of the next weeks, months or years, however long it takes, by working with others concerned about the Canadian environment, indeed the global environment, we can bring this Government to realize that this is indeed short-sighted and it should begin to see the world differently.


Cyril Keeper: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to be taking part in this debate, because it is a very important one. I want to say a few words in the other official language. The question at issue in this debate is: what is the Government going to do with the money for which it is seeking borrowing authority from the House? The Govern-
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ment has given us no information on how the borrowed funds are going to be used. That is a very important matter, Mr. Speaker.
Second, I want to ask this Government how it can justify borrowing large sums of money without providing information. Is this how the Government respects Parliament?
Third, I want to ask the Government how it can possibly ask for permission to borrow a lot of money while at the same time wanting to give the public the impression that it is eager to reduce the deficit.

This is an important debate on three important questions, Mr. Speaker. What is the purpose of the spending for which authorization is sought to borrow this money here today? What is the Government's attitude toward the notion of accountability of the executive to Parliament? How can the Government, without any credibility whatsoever, come before us to borrow large sums of money at the same time that it preaches frugality to the public?
Dealing with the first question, the Government is asking to borrow $23.3 billion, $7 billion for this fiscal year, of which $2 billion is for a discretionary fund. The Government has not identified the purpose for which that money will be spent. It just wants to have the money on hand without specifically identifying what it is for. Could the Government possibly be borrowing this $23.3 billion for a worth-while public purpose? If so, it would be incumbent upon us to give the request serious consideration. Since the Government has not provided us with information regarding the $16 billion for the next fiscal year or the $2 billion in the discretionary fund for this fiscal year, we are left to wonder and speculate about what it wants to spend the money on. Therefore, I would like to posit some possible and useful public purposes for which the Government could use this money, which would then make it incumbent upon us to consider the request seriously.
For example, if it were seeking the money to invest so that the public would get a decent return, we would know it was going to be put to a useful purpose and would not be wasted. However, the Government has given us no information. In fact, it has deferred needed public works for both this fiscal year and next. Public works not only put people back to work but also provide facilities to serve communities for many years to come. It is bad enough that the Government cancelled public works, but even worse than that, it has deferred them. By doing that, the Government is admitting that those public works will have to be done in the future. Obviously they will have to be done at a higher cost than the cost at which they could be done today, and they will be done at a time when inflation is higher than it is today, so it will cost more to do them. That is a waste of public money.
If these people across the way, Mr. Speaker, were to borrow for a useful purpose, we could consider the request very seriously. But their actions have demonstrated that they are not seeking to borrow for a useful purpose. The Government could be borrowing for the useful purpose of better insulating

December 5, 1984
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homes so that energy could be better conserved. This could be done if we were to make dollars available to home owners so that they could insulate their homes properly. That would be a useful public investment. Electrical utilities in the United States have found that it is cheaper to produce electricity through conservation than it is through the construction of new hydro facilities, for example. Investment in conservation gives a real return. If this Government were to say that it wants to borrow money to provide for better insulation in homes across this country, then we would have to consider that seriously. But once again, actions speak louder than words. It is there in the economic statement.
What did the Government do regarding home insulation? It cut the Canadian home insulation program. That makes no sense in the present environment and it certainly leaves us with no justification for approving the borrowing request. From the perspective of investment or return on investment, Mr. Speaker, the Government's request falls short. It would be helpful, Mr. Speaker, if the Government would invest in the insulation of homes and the rehabilitation of older homes. There are many older homes across the country which are structurally sound. If a few dollars were spent on those homes, they could be brought up to par and would last for many more years. That would be a useful investment of public dollars.
Is there any reason for us to believe that the Government will be using the funds it wants us to approve today for such a worth-while purpose? Would it invest in the rehabilitation of older homes in the country? Its own economic statement tells us it will not Mr. Speaker. In that economic statement, the Government cut the Residential Rehabilitation Assistance Program. It cut monies from public expenditures which would have allowed older homes to serve a useful purpose for a much longer period of time. From the perspective of investment, based on the Government's actions, since it will not give us any information on what it wants to use this money for, its request for approval of borrowing falls short.
Perhaps we could look at its request for borrowing from a different perspective. I will wrap up what I have to say, Mr. Speaker. We have had simply to speculate upon the possible uses to which the Government would put borrowed funds. A few short months ago that Party was in Opposition and it recognized the importance of the accountability of the executive to Parliament in the area of public spending. Now that that Party is in office, it has failed to recognize the basic truth. This is a severe disappointment and it will increase cynicism in the country.


Mr. F. Oberle (Prince George-Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, my intervention will be very brief because of our eagerness on this side of the House to get on with some business that would reflect the programs of the new Government. We would like to expedite the process of cleaning up the business that was left behind by the former government. As you know, Mr. Speaker, from time to time we are required to sit in the House in the afternoon and to listen to such diatribe as that which has gone
on this afternoon. At such times one feels the need to make a speech and the desire to set the record straight.


William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: The truth hurts.


Frank Oberle: We have heard all kinds of suggestions for ways in which we might improve the economic situation in Canada. The Hon. Member for Birds Nest, for instance, suggested we should protect the migratory-


William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order. I believe that you and other occupants of the Chair have, on numerous occasions-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I appreciate the point of order. It is the Hon. Member for Birds Nest-sorry, it is Birds Hill, Winnipeg-Birds Hill.


William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, the name of the riding that I represent is Winnipeg-Birds Hill. It is not Birds Nest, it is not Birds Eye, it is not-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: All right, I regret that. Will the Member please take his seat. We will try to rectify that.


William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: I hope that Mr. Speaker himself-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Will you please be seated?


William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: -will keep that in mind.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: We will try to rectify that. It is Winnipeg-Birds Hill.


Frank Oberle: Through you, Mr. Speaker, I wish to offer the Hon. Member my apologies. I should know, of course, that the riding is Winnipeg-Birds Hill. The reason I made the mistake is that he suggested that the solution to economic recovery would be to look after migratory birds. That is what he suggested in his speech. That is probably why that Freudian slip was made.
Another Member, who just sat down, suggested that if we insulated all our homes, that would be the solution. If we insulated ourselves from the reality of the mess that was left us by the people who now know all the solutions to our problems, maybe the problems would go away. However, the fact is that they will not go away.
This year's budget is $100 billion, Mr. Speaker. We all know that today's promises are the obligations and taxes of tomorrow. The promises and stupid commitments of the former government are the obligations of today. For example, $25 billion will have to be paid in interest payments. We need money to pay the interest so that the New York bankers do not come in and repossess your car or the front door. We must pay some interest. There is nothing you can do about that. These people made sure of that.
We are locked into transfer payments for social programs. Our friends in the Liberal and New Democratic Parties sug-
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gest that we should now enrich and enlarge these social programs quickly. They say that it is the solution to our problem, but we say the cause of the problem is that we have lived beyond our means for some time.


William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: It is not the cause of the problem.


Frank Oberle: We are now paying for the sins of the past.


William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: There is no sin in medicare.


Frank Oberle: 1 sat on the other side for 12 years. Every time a Bill like that came up, we had legitimate reason to complain.


William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: Where is the sin in medicare? Where is the sin in family allowances?


Frank Oberle: Mr. Speaker, I do not want to use the name of the Hon. Member's riding again, but I offered him the courtesy of allowing him to speak, and now I would ask that I be extended the same courtesy.
I will be very very brief. All I want to do is to be helpful and to tell these people that there are certain expenditures over which we have no control in the short term until we pay for the sins of the past. The bankers are knocking at our door and we must pay $25 billion in interest next year. We have to borrow money to pay the interest. I would ask the socialists across the way to make a simple comparison. It is pretty hard not to compare them with a bunch of birds. If they are not yapping they are doing something else. At this particular moment they are yapping.


Mr. Riis:: You are bad-mouthing birds again.


John Horton McDermid: They are all from Birds Nest.


Frank Oberle: Let me give you some helpful hints to demonstrate that insulating homes and protecting the migratory birds, as important as they are, are not the solution to our $36 billion deficit. Put yourself into a situation where, having met with your banker a few months earlier to float a $5,000 loan to buy a new car, you are going back to him and asking for another $1,000 to pay the interest on the money already borrowed. The banker would ask for the key for the car. There is no difference between that situation and the situation we are facing here. We are going back to the bankers, the innocent, unassuming public of Canada, and selling them Canada Savings Bonds. We are telling them that we need money to pay last year's interest.
Another fellow wants to start another Crown corporation. He wants to buy another business so he can have some dividends later on. I would like to ask him how much in dividends he has been receiving from Petro-Canada this year. How much in dividends has the CDIC, Eldorado Nuclear, or any of these companies, paid this year?


William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: What about the $6 billion in the Petroleum Incentive Program?
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Frank Oberle: Now you want to buy more Crown corporations. That is not the solution.


Nelson Andrew Riis: What are you doing for forestry?


Frank Oberle: We struck a raw nerve, Mr. Speaker. Obviously these people do not want to be exposed to the truth. They do not want to be exposed to reason. They would just like to see these carts dragging along the beach in mud up to the axles. We have other ideas and you must be patient.


William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: You have your head in the mud.


Frank Oberle: You have to wait until our schemes and good ideas which we will be bringing forward once we dispose of this Bill will bear fruit.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Let us hear one of your good ideas.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I would like to correct something here. I regret that I called the Hon. Member for Winnipeg-Birds Hill, Winnipeg Birds Nest. I also regret that I did not say that the Hon. Member for Prince George-Peace River (Mr. Oberle) was the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of State for Mines.


Mr. Carlo Rossi (Bourassa):: Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to be taking part in this debate and to speak to Bill C-l 1. I want to take this opportunity to congratulate you on your appointment to the Chair and also to wish you a satisfying career in the House of Commons. Mr. Speaker, I shall, if I may, take advantage of this opportunity to greet all my constituents in the riding of Bourassa, a riding I have proudly represented in Parliament for six years.
Mr. Speaker, my riding encompasses the total area of the City of Montreal North, a wonderful place to be, as a resident confided recently. It is situated on the north side of Montreal Island, along the northern arm of the St. Lawrence, known as Riviere des Prairies-


Mr. Della  Noce@: Just before Duvemay!


Carlo Rossi: I will get back to Duvernay later on, just give me a chance.
-it has a population of 92,000, spread over various communities.
Mr. Speaker, on September 4 of this year, Canadians gave this Government a clear mandate. We on this side of the House have accepted the outcome of the democratic process. However, we must be realistic. Throughout the election campaign, the Progressive Conservatives found it very easy to repeat to Canadians that it was time for a change and that they would find jobs for everyone and would find a solution to the unemployment problem. Mr. Speaker, that is the way they

December 5, 1984
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conducted their campaign, and in a local newspaper in my riding, a newspaper with an Italian name, the Progressive Conservatives said, and I will not repeat it in Italian, of course: A house and a job for everyone! Promises, promises. And speaking of Italian origin, Mr. Speaker, perhaps you will allow me to correct what the Hon. Member for Duvernay (Mr. Della Noce) said on page 896 of Hansard on December 4, 1984, and I quote:
I would like to add, as the sole Member of Italian origin, that 1 am proud to represent in this House both the riding of Duvernay and the entire Italian community.
Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member mislead the House, probably unwittingly, since I take him to be an honest man with a good reputation, he probably did not intend to mislead the House, and made this statement in entirely good faith.
But I myself am of Italian origin, and for the information of the Hon. Member, I was the first Canadian Quebecer of Italian origin to have been elected to this honourable House. I believe that for six years now, I have served the Italian community and all the other communities in my riding very well, and I can inform the Hon. Member for Duvernay that the people in my riding will certainly not require his good services, since their own Member is doing his job quite well, thank you.
Mr. Speaker, this Government has made many promises, including that of finding jobs for everyone. Canadians believed all the glowing promises made by the Progressive Conservatives. They believed that the Tories would provide prosperity and, above all, jobs. The Canadian people will soon realize that they have been duped and fooled. But Hon. Members of the Progressive Conservative Party ought to be careful. We are keeping our eyes peeled! Remember that an American President once said:

You can fool some people for some time but you can't fool all the people all the time.


An Hon. Member:: Say that in French.


Carlo Rossi: I can also say it in Italian, Sir. One of the many cutbacks which took me by surprise, Mr. Speaker, is the one related to the Summer Canada Program which was set up by the Liberal government and which was a boon to thousands of young students. The Progressive Conservatives have described that program as a band-aid program.
Mr. Speaker, again I say to the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Miss MacDonald) that it is not a band-aid program, if only because it does enable students throughout Canada to work during their summer holidays and earn a few dollars to help pay their tuition fees. It seems that nobody wants to hear anything about this Summer Canada Program. Earlier today, the Hon. Member for Notre-Dame-de-Grace-Lachine East (Mr. Allmand) asked a question about the
Summer Canada Program, but the Prime Minister evaded the question neatly, and there was no meaningful answer, Mr. Speaker.
A few weeks ago I asked the Hon. Member for Parry Sound-Muskoka (Mr. Darling) whether he thought the Summer Canada Program was a band-aid program. Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member himself did admit that it was nothing of the kind, and I fully agree with him.
In addition, Mr. Speaker, in the newspaper Le Droit last December 5, there was an article about the Minister of State for Youth (Mrs. Champagne) entitled 'Champagne avoids the real problems1, which said the following:
Minister Champagne, who is also coordinator of the activities surrounding National Youth Year 1985, has managed not to mention even once in her speech the problem of unemployment which affects 17.6 percent of our young people between the ages of 16 and 24.
"In fact, there was no mention of the real problems", as one of the students noted, Mr. Speaker.
I see that you want me to hurry up, Mr. Speaker.
In closing, I would like to mention that my main concern, is about the students who will want to work next summer. I therefore urge the Prime Minister, the Minister of Employment and Immigration, the Minister of State for Youth, and also the Minister of Finance to do something for them.
Finally, I want to ask this Government to keep its promises, and I also want to say this to the ministers involved: "Please, reverse your stand and see to it that our students can find work!" As for the Government, it should be true to its commitment to provide prosperity for Canadians and jobs for those who want to work. These are some of the promises made by this Government, and in the interests of all Canadians, we sincerely hope that those promises will be kept, and you can be sure, Mr. Speaker, that we of the Official Opposition shall always support Government initiatives aimed at providing employment for all Canadians.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The Hon. Member for Duvernay (Mr. Della Noce) on a point of order.


Mr. Della  Noce@: Yes, Mr. Speaker. I did not want to interrupt the Hon. Member for Bourassa (Mr. Rossi) when he quoted something I said. I did not want to mislead the House, but there was indeed a mistake. Hansard should read the only Italian Member of the Government. I would like to point out to the Hon. Member that there is another mistake, namely where the English version says:
The riding is a veritable paradise for people.

The word "paradise" was omitted.
December 5, 1984


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I regret to inform the Hon. Member that that is not a point of order.


Mr. Ray Skelly (Comox-Powell River):: Mr. Speaker, it gives me a good deal of pleasure to join in the debate this afternoon. Also I should like to join with other Hon. Members in congratulating you on your appointment. I am certain the House will run more smoothly and that high sticking will be kept to a minimum.
The Government proposes to borrow something in the order of $16 billion. It is interesting to sit in the House today with a kind of feeling of deja vu or a reverse of dej'a vu and to hear the screams and shouts from this side about borrowing without any plan or indication of what the borrowing will be used for. It is interesting to hear the ragged comments of the former opposition group which simply put down any necessity for giving the House of Commons and the taxpayers of Canada some indication of what it proposes to do with $16 billion. It is an amazing situation. Some of the open government about which those Members talked is complete nonsense in view of the comments they have made to date.
I should like to offer some suggestions in terms of spending that $16 billion. If they would simply keep their promises, that $16 billion would be adequate. A reminder of some of their promises might be useful. In my partiuclar area and along the entire coast of British Columbia, which now has a number of Tories representing it who made those same promises, the fishing industry is a disaster. The Conservative Government promised to spend $100 million in a buy-back program to assist fishermen who are in an extremely bad position. It was promised. The $16 billion could help deliver it. Why not keep some of the promises made by the Government during the election period? The Tories promised $200 million for Salmo-nid Enhancement Program. It would put thousands of people back to work on the coast of British Columbia, thousands of people who are financially flat on their backs and facing ruin. They recognize that problem. They made a promise to those people and now they are failing to keep it. The $16 billion of borrowing could be used for that. A firm, hard promise was made and nothing was delivered.
That same Party, campaigning for votes of the people in the forest industry who are suffering as badly, promised a $100 million reforestation program. It would create an enormous amount of employment on the coast of British Columbia. However, what do we hear from the Conservative Government? There has been absolute silence on that promise. We hear that the cupboard is bare.
Fishermen, loggers and others in the forest industry, have lost the opportunity of employment. They could be put back to work in the Salmonid Enhancement Program and in reforestation programs. Of course they could be assisted in the buyback program, it it ever comes to pass.
They also promised to revamp the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. People involved in the fishing industry on the coast of British Columbia in communities from Prince Rupert
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to Vancouver who are dependent upon fishing, as well as industries and small businesses which are dependent upon fishing, were promised that the Department of Fisheries would be revamped. That Department affects the lives of a great many people and many of the businesses there. They promised to make it more responsive to the people of that area. They promised to create an advisory committee. It was more than an advisory committee; the Conservatives called it a management committee comprised of representatives of the industry. What do we have right now? We have 1,200 public servants in the Department of Fisheries on the West Coast who have received no instructions from the Ministry in Ottawa. They have no instructions on what to do. There is a policy void out there. No one knows what is going on. Instead of revamping the Department or establishing a management committee, we have chaos out there right now. People are losing their vessels and their homes. They are unable to qualify for unemployment insurance. The prospect with a Conservative Government in place is that social assistance is the order of the day for those people.
If they want to borrow $16 billion, they can go ahead and do it. However, they should at least give us some indication of what will be done with that money. Why do they not keep their promises? The people along the coast of British Columbia would be a lot better off.
The fishing industry on the coast of B.C. is in serious trouble. The Government promised open government. A number of cabinet Ministers have said, "Our door is open; if you have a problem, raise it". I am somewhat confused because a number of major groups out there are having difficulty. They are in a policy vacuum. They know they have had an enormous number of hundred million dollar promises. All they received was $4.2 billion in cut-backs, as well as the $30 million in cuts in the Department of Fisheries to which my colleague referred. There is nothing for them. They will spend this winter, perhaps next spring and perhaps the next fishing season with nothing. By that time there will be nothing to make policy about because that industry on the coast of B.C. will be finished completely.
Turning to the buy-back program, it is critical that the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans (Mr. Fraser) and the Government move now with assistance. People are losing their vessels. It was impossible for many people to earn income from fishing this year. It is a complete disaster because the Department of Fisheries and Oceans compressed the fishing season so much that very few people earned enough money to make their boat payments. Many people did not earn enough money to qualify for unemployment insurance. Income was at an extremely depressed level.
The Minister cannot sit here and do nothing. He must act quickly. This buy-back program was promised. It was on a scale of $100 million. It should have been under way this year. People should have an understanding of what will happen. The promise was made, it should be kept. Time is wasting and time is critical.
I should like to refer briefly to the management committee. The cut-back in fishing time has been a serious problem. The

December 5, 1984
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Department of Fisheries has literally put many fishermen out of business. In the Johnstone Strait, communities such as Port Hardy, Alert Bay, Port McNeill, Campbell River and many others are dependent upon the fishery. They have been promised that it will continue to exist. However, the indication through the Department of Fisheries now is that that fishery is being compressed. Eventually it will be destroyed and they will be driven out. The gulf trollers, the people who work on the Straits of Georgia, were invited some years ago to take either an inside licence or an outside licence. Those who opted for the inside licence in the Gulf of Georgia were told that that fishery would continue and that they should have no fear of being put out of business.
Last season the Department of Fisheries and Oceans put them out of business. It limited their fishing season to a point where they could not earn enough income to provide a living. This virtually destroyed many people. They were told that the burden of conservation on chinook salmon was so important that everyone had to share. The gulf trollers were told that they could not fish on April 1, that they would have to start at almost the mid-point of the fishing season and that they would be shut down early. The Minister of Fisheries and Oceans at that time said that the burden of conservation had to be shared, but it was not shared by the recreational fishery. There was a complete slaughter in the eyes of many people as the chinook salmon were simply reallocated from gulf trollers to the recreational fishery. Those fish never got to the spawning grounds.
The Minister of Fisheries and Oceans must make a statement indicating what will happen to gulf trollers who were told that they would continue to have a place in the fishing industry in the Province of British Columbia. It turns out that that is absolutely false.
The idea of open government is not coming to pass. We are seeing many important groups on the coast of British Columbia asking for meetings with the Minister. He does not have to make commitments to them. He simply has to give an indication that the door is open. Many groups want to meet with him including, we are given to understand, officials within his own Department who cannot get time. The Native Brotherhood of British Columbia would like to meet with him. Important Indian bands along the coast of B.C. would like to meet with him. United Fishermen and Allied Workers and other groups within the industry would like to meet with him, but there is no opportunity. His flacks are too efficient. They are saying, "Maybe next year". Maybe it will be some other time. Maybe it will be after there is no fishing industry. Open government does not exist. Anyone who thinks it does is extremely naive or a fool.
The Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (Mr. Crombie) had the courage to venture out to British Columbia with his officials. He met briefly with many groups under the responsibility of his Ministry. He attended the native brotherhood convention, an extremely important group on the coast of B.C. I urge the Minister of Fisheries to get his can out there and meet with these groups. He should at least
hear their problems and suggestions for solutions and then get on with the business of making the statements that will give them the opportunity to know where their lives are going. Where is this open government?
The Salmonid Enhancement Program is vitally important. We are watching the destruction of the fishing industry and the salmonid species on the coast of British Columbia. In some cases this is coming about as a result of overfishing and in other cases as a result of habitat destruction. We know that we have to get more involved in the process of salmonid enhancement. The program in that area was cut drastically by the previous Government. The present Government promised $200 million in salmonid enhancement funding. It must deliver on those funds. It must create employment so that fishermen who are not able to earn income this year-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I regret that I must interrupt the Hon. Member. He is a minute over his time now.


Fernand Robichaud: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, for this opportunity to speak on the amendment to Bill C-l 1. Of course I support the amendment moved by the Hon. Member for Kamloops-Shuswap (Mr. Riis).
I would like first to thank the people in Wesmorland-Kent for their vote of confidence on September 4. There is no doubt the constituents of Wesmorland-Kent have a sixth sense, the so-called common sense, because they were not taken in by the two other candidates' alluring promises.
I would also like to congratulate you, Mr. Speaker, and assure you of my fullest co-operation in carrying out the business of the House.
Coming back to this legislation, 1 do not see how 1 could support a measure requesting the authority to borrow $16 million for 1985-86 without seeing any supporting documentation.
If I were expected to support this legislation merely on a confidence basis, I would say that this Government has not as yet deserved such a confidence, and that this lack of confidence is the result of the attitude adopted by the Government towards Canadians.
If I may, Mr. Speaker, I would like to refer to the tourist industry, not only in my capacity as the critic of the Official Opposition in that regard, but also because that industry will be playing a major role in the economy of my area.

I would like to read a few quotations from a newsletter of TIAC, the Tourism Industry Association of Canada. It is dated October 5, 1984. The present Minister of Regional and Industrial Expansion (Mr. Stevens) spoke to an audience in 1979. The following are a few quotes from that speech:
December 5, 1984

Canada needs your industry more than she has ever needed it before to first help correct our current account deficit and to give more employment for Canadians.
On the part of government we must regulate you less, tax you less-
Mr. Mulroney, too has expressed an understanding of the problems facing-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Order. Will the Hon. Member refer to the Right Hon. Prime Minister by his title, please.


Fernand Robichaud: I am quoting from a newsletter.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: It does not matter. Please refer to him as the Right Hon. Prime Minister.


Fernand Robichaud: "The Right Hon. Prime Minister, Mr. Mulroney, who has expressed-".


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Order. "The Right Hon. Prime Minister" will be sufficient.


Fernand Robichaud: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Right Hon. Prime Minister-
-too has expressed an understanding of the problems facing the tourism sector. The following quote from one of his speeches in Halifax during the campaign shows his concern. "A Progressive Conservative Government will recognize the importance of the tourism and travel industry to the Canadian economy in general and the Atlantic provinces in particular by implementing the following three-point program: As part of our proposed national conference on the economy, we will examine gasoline, alcohol, food and lodging taxes which are reducing the competitiveness of Canada's tourism industry".
We know the actions that have been undertaken by this Government. The price of gasoline has increased by nine cents a litre. The price of alcohol has increased by 1 per cent. The fares for ferry services in Atlantic Canada, a service that is vital to the tourism industry, will be increased substantially. Not only will the services in national parks be reduced, but it will cost more to use those facilities.

Mr. Speaker, it is a most deadly sin, in the sense that they knew very well what they were undertaking to do. Indeed, last spring the Opposition Members were continuously criticizing the Government about the price of gasoline. And in no less than 26 speeches did they oppose oil price increases. I repeat, Mr. Speaker, this is a sin because they knew very well what they were doing. I cannot trust a Government that acts in such a way.

In his economic and fiscal statement, the Minister of Finance (Mr. Wilson) said, "We must have faith in ourselves and in our country". I agree with that. However, if we are to have faith in the Government, the Government must show it has some heart for the people, for faith comes from the heart. I cannot have faith in the Government because the Government has shown no feeling for Canadians.

This is why, Mr. Speaker, I cannot support the Bill as introduced, because the Government has not yet deserved my confidence, and I support the amendment to Bill C-l 1.
Borrowing Authority


Mr. Les Benjamin (Regina West):: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to take part in this debate for the first time, if for no other reason than to be of assistance, aid and comfort to the Government and to assist the Progressive Conservative Party.
The point we have been trying to make is not necessarily NDP policy. We are not asking for NDP programs to be implemented. We are asking the Government and Progressive Conservative Party Members to do what they demanded in Parliament all along and fought for, I must say to their credit, with some success. In the summer of 1982 they fought the government on a borrowing Bill on excellent grounds. We were pleased to support the Progressive Conservative Party in the summer of 1982 on this very same subject. We are only trying to be helpful. I do not understand why Conservative Members are not applauding our assistance. I do not understand why they cannot rise in the House and say that we have had enough of the old Liberal style of borrowing Bills drafted by the same old bureaucrats and that the new Government will put in place the changes it promised on September 4 by changing the way the Government requests borrowing. However, we are getting the same thing the Liberals gave us at least twice in the last few years.
There was strenuous opposition to the methods being used by the then Liberal government on the part of members of the Progressive Conservative Party and members of the New Democratic Party. In order to implement its own policies and remain true to the excellent battle it fought in June and July 1982, all the Conservative Government needs to do is what the opposition Parties succeeded in forcing the then Liberal Government into doing in 1982. It should delete S16 billion from this Bill, because that is the amount of money that is to be borrowed for the Fiscal year 1985-86 which does not begin until April 1.
I do not know of anyone who would ask to borrow money he or she would not need for another four and a half months. I do not know of anyone who would lend money to someone who asked for that. Why does the Government want to have the authority to borrow money at least four and a half months before it will need it?
I have been reading Hansard from 1982. I believe one of the best quotes in Hansard comes from the Right Hon. Member for Yellowhead (Mr. Clark). As reported on page 19454 of Hansard, he said:
That is an affront to this Parliament. No banker outside of these walls who deals with a businessman or businesswoman, large or small, would grant a line of credit to a financially crippled business that refuses to provide projections of its cash flows. No banker would do this, yet that is what this Government is asking the House of Commons to do.
The Government has not told us what its cash flows will be between now and the end of March and it certainly will not have the foggiest idea what those cash flows will be in the next fiscal year until a budget is brought in and the taxpayers know what the tax regimes will be. In any event, Hansard of those days makes excellent reading. It is the one time when most

December 5, 1984
Borrowing Authority
speeches made by Conservative Members were really worth reading.
I hope that Conservative Members appreciate that we are trying to be helpful to them. All we have done is to move the same motion that was moved by the Right Hon. Member for Yellowhead in July, 1982. I thought that that would be appreciated by my hon. friends in the Progressive Conservative Party.
We can support the borrowing of $5.3 billion for the rest of the fiscal year. We can even go along with the borrowing of $2 billion for a cushion to take care of any unforeseen happenings, whether it be an emergency with the Canadian dollar or emergency spending for other things that might occur between now and the end of March. We find that acceptable. However, to ask us to approve the borrowing of $ 16 billion before we are even into the next year, is, as the Right Hon. Member said in 1982, an affront to Parliament.
The Government is trying to cut the deficit. Of course, when it cuts the deficit, it increases unemployment. This means that deficit cutting is the Government's first priority, although "jobs, jobs, jobs" is a first priority as well. That outfit over there has more first priorities than any outfit I have ever seen.
I would like to quote the words of someone who is not a member of the NDP who supports the arguments we have made since this Parliament started. Dr. Harold Chorney is a professor at the University of Concordia and I like what he has said because I used words to the same effect during the Throne Speech debate. It is nice to see these words reiterated by an economist. My information reads:
Chorney's study says "the current debate about the deficit seems to ignore the lessons of the 1930s".
Do you remember, Mr. Speaker, how R.B. Bennett, Mackenzie King and that breed of cats from the 1930s harped at us, at Parliament and the people of Canada? It goes on:
Then, as now, the cry was to reduce deficits, restore "sound public finance" and let the private sector promote economic recovery. Then, as now, this policy was doomed to fail."
The current policy is doomed to fail just as the policy of the 1930s failed. If the Government wants to cut the deficit, it has to take measures which include additional borrowings starting now. If the Government can reduce the unemployment rate from 11.5 per cent to 7 per cent or 7.5 per cent, it can wipe out the $34 billion deficit over a period of three and a half years. That is all the Government need do. If it wants to get rid of the deficit, that is the route to go.
If the Government were to ask Parliament for borrowing authority in order to create jobs, put businessmen back into
business and workers back to work, these people would be paying income tax, and that would liquidate the borrowings. The Government would be accomplishing the objective that all of us in this House want. However, it has its priorities reversed.
If the Minister of Finance (Mr. Wilson), the Minister in charge of CMHC and other Ministers had completed an across-Canada survey of what housing projects are in the works that can be started sooner than otherwise planned, we could borrow now whatever our share of the cost would be. This could be done in order to advance programs, whether they be senior citizens' programs, co-operative programs, public programs or any private housing programs in which federal authorities may be involved. We could canvass all of the municipalities in Canada. We could ask what works are in progress that could be advanced and speeded up. We could borrow whatever money is required for the federal cost-sharing responsibility now and get those projects started.
If you could give me another 60 seconds, Mr. Speaker, I would call it six o'clock. I would be happy if you could do that.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I regret that the Hon. Member's time has expired.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I am certain that with the unanimous consent of the House, my hon. colleague could complete his remarks.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Is there such unanimous consent?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I hear a "No". I regret to inform the Hon. Member that there is not uanimous consent.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I would like to use this moment to move, seconded by the Hon. Member for Humboldt-Lake Centre (Mr. Althouse):
That the Hon. Member for Lincoln (Mr. Martin) now be heard.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Standing Order 33 does not apply in this case. I regret but it is six o'clock.

It being six o'clock, this House stands adjourned until tomorrow at eleven o'clock a.m., pursuant to Standing Order 2(1).
At 6 o'clock the House adjourned.

Thursday, December 6, 1984