1984-05-24

Hon. John Wise (Elgin) moved:: That this House condemns the continuing failure of the Government's policies to restore even pre-recession levels of employment opportunities for young people at a time when hundreds of thousands of young Canadians are about to join the labour force from our schools and universities and Canada's unemployment rate for young adults remains the highest of any western industrial nation.
He said: Mr. Speaker, I welcome this opportunity to lead off debate on an extremely important matter facing all governments, whether they be municipal, provincial or the federal Liberal Government we have in office at the present time. I am sure everyone would agree that one of the most critical challenges facing Canadian society, our business and industrial labour leaders, politicians at all levels, is that of youth unemployment. I am sure everyone would agree as well that how this challenge is met will shape the character of Canadian society for decades to come. Because of this challenge, and because of the deep concern we have for the fact that the present Liberal Government has not been able to deal adequately with the problem of youth unemployment, my colleagues and I have utilized one of those rare occasions we have today to put this motion before the House.
I think it would be interesting to examine and compare the record of this Government and that of the last Conservative Government in 1979-80. During that nine-month period in which we were in office we created jobs at the rate of 7,000 per month, for a total of some 60,000 jobs. In the 49 months since the election of this particular government, we find that it did not create jobs, that in fact the number of young people employed decreased by nearly 300,000. During the nine months we were in office we created jobs at the rate of some 7,000 a month, and during the period of time this Government has been in office it has decreased the number of jobs by 7,000 per month.
Official statistics indicate that at the present time we have some 525,000 to 550,000 young Canadians out of work. Indeed, if we examine some of the statements by the Minister of State for Youth (Mrs. Hervieux-Payette), who unfortunately is not in the House, and neither is the present Minister of
Employment and Immigration (Mr. Roberts)-I hope their schedules will permit them to join us before the-


Mr. Blais:: I rise on a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Cabinet is meeting this morning, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. McGrath:: That is not a point of order.


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


James Aloysius McGrath: Have you been blackballed, J.J.?


Mr. Crosby:: They kicked him out for leaking that document.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: Hon. Members also know that it is not in order to reflect on the presence or otherwise of Members in the House.


Mr. Deans:: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, I personally apologize to the Hon. Member who has the floor. I would not have risen, but Cabinet or not, the House of Commons sits on Thursday mornings.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Wise: Mr. Speaker, if we-
[DOT] (mo)


Mr. Lang:: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The Minister of State for Youth (Mrs. Hervieux-Payette) is presently on a speaking engagement in Montreal. She is travelling back and will be here this afternoon.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: It is not orderly to reflect on the presence of Members in the House of Commons, nor is it useful for the House proceedings to determine where Members are across the country.


John Wise: Mr. Speaker, I hope that exchange will not be taken off my time.
If we examine some of the statements which are being made across the country, and they are few and far between, by the Minister of State for Youth, we will find that she has actually admitted to the fact that the true number of unemployed young adults in the country is close to 700,000 rather than 550,000. There are about 1.2 million young Canadians in colleges and universities in the country. Within the next 10 days those young Canadians will be leaving schools, universities and other institutions of learning. A conservative estimate would be that approximately 50 per cent of those people will be joining the summer workforce. We could add 600,000 to that 700,000 and, if we did a bit of mathematical calcula-

May 24, 1984
Supply
tion, we would find that the actual number of young people who are out of work across the country is in the neighbourhood of 1.4 million Canadians.
During its 16 years in office the Liberal Government has been the architect of the unemployment crisis facing Canada and Canadians today. In 1968 when the Government first took office, total unemployment was approximately 358,000. Last year, in 1983, total unemployment had risen to 1.448 million Canadians. In 1968 one out of every 22 working people was out of a job. Last year that ratio rose to one out of every eight workers. In 1968 the unemployment rate was 4.5 per cent. In 1983 it rose to 11.9 per cent. In 1968 UIC benefits totalled some $438 million. In 1983 those benefits grew to $10.2 billion. During this 16-year period total unemployment in Canada increased by approximately 400 per cent.
As bad as the figures of total unemployment are, the youth unemployment situation in the country is even worse. In 1968 the unemployment rate for youth was 7.7 per cent, or 3.2 per cent higher than the total unemployment rate. In 1983 the youth unemployment rate rose to 19.9 per cent, or 8 per cent higher than the total unemployment rate last year. These are staggering increases. However, neither the total unemployment rate nor the youth unemployment rate should be accepted in a modern industrial economy. Youth comprise about 25 per cent of the Canadian workforce and about 37 per cent of its unemployed. When the hidden unemployed, those who have given up looking for jobs because there is no work available, are included in the unemployment totals, youth unemployment then comprises over 40 per cent of those who are unemployed.
These are stark numbers. In more human terms, continuing levels of high youth unemployment could alter the fabric of Canadian society. The longer a young person unsuccessfully looks for work, the more a sense of hopelessness sets in. As the months go by, young unemployed people start losing faith in themselves, their friends and their families and begin to question the worth of society.
I am sure everyone would acknowledge that it will take more than money to solve the youth unemployment problem. It will take attitudinal as well as structural changes. Governments and society face a major task in handling and coping with this problem.
The youth population of Canada indeed has been declining recently. In January of 1984, there were some 4.371 million Canadians aged 15 to 24. That was some 80,000 fewer than in the same month of last year and 182,000 fewer than in January of 1981. The number is expected to drop by an additional 90,000.
I am also sure that everyone would acknowledge the fact that as the Canadian economy expands, obviously more jobs are created. The youth unemployment rate should decline more rapidly and an improved economy will ultimately provide a solution to the youth unemployment rate.
However, waiting does not address the deep problems being faced by young people in this country today. The federal
Government should and could be taking certain actions in various areas to alleviate these problems. The Government should make greater use of the tax system through utilization of unemployment tax credits to encourage youth employment.
Since the Government has already announced that it will be using its purchasing power to encourage the hiring of women and the handicapped, we are of the firm opinion that this same policy should be extended to Canada's youth. The hiring of young people will not be very beneficial if it only leads to lay-offs of older personnel. Therefore consultation must take place among industry, business and labour to ensure that the worker displacement problem does not happen.
Greater emphasis should be placed on training and retraining programs in order to meet the present and future skill needs of the workplace. Task forces have studied and white papers, books, reports and reams of paper have been written about the unemployment needs of the 1980s and 1990s. However, governments, universities, industry and labour must work together in order to ensure a fulfilment of these needs. Greater use ought to be made of the career access program and the apprenticeship programs. As an example of what the future holds if nothing is done now, the National Advisory Panel on Skill Development Leave has pointed out that 35 per cent of Canada's working women, especially in the clerical, banking services and telephone sectors, could be unemployed by the 1990s because of advancement in technology alone.
Consideration should be given to the use of unemployment insurance funds as a development tool as well as a maintenance fashion. This would allow for more creative use of the unemployment insurance system. Too many young Canadians graduate from training programs or educational institutions and cannot find work. It is not because their skills are not in demand but because they cannot make contact with the employer who needs them. In the current fiscal year some 50 per cent of the graduates of classroom training courses are still out of work three months after graduation. In addition, the Ontario Government has shown that community college graduates have an unemployment rate of some 23 per cent as compared with an Ontario youth unemployment rate of some 14.7 per cent. I understand that one of the areas of major unemployment has been the computer-related field. With the ever-increasing use of computers, I find this to be an incredible statistic.
Clearly, therefore, as job-creation agencies, Canada Manpower centres across this country have not been performing adequately. These centres ought to be computerized so that the unemployed as well as the potential employers know what is available to them across the country. The longer it takes to get a job, the more discontented a person becomes with the Canada Manpower centres. As Members, we have all certainly experienced the difficulties with those centres almost on a daily basis. There ought to be better provision of counselling services at these centres throughout the country. The unemployed should not be treated as mere statistics.
More consultation is needed with the provinces as far as educational funding is concerned. We acknowledge the fact
May 24, 1984

that the British North America Act gave overlapping responsibility and jurisdiction for education between the federal and provincial governments. The Minister of Employment and Immigration has stated that the federal Government's traditional role of being responsible for upgrading educational skills indeed should be rethought. Too often, unfortunately, the federal Government's rethinking has evolved into federal Government dictating-dictating how and where money would be spent. That does not solve the problem but co-operation and consultation with the provinces will certainly help. A federal-provincial conference on educational funding should be called at the earliest possible moment.
In several parts of this country young people face a future of almost permanent unemployment. Wage subsidies and employment tax credits will be of little value in these economically depressed regions. In such regions there ought to be programs of community-based entrepreneurial development which will assist individuals and groups wishing to start new businesses to raise money, to cut through the red tape, to identify markets and to train workers.
These ten proposals, Mr. Speaker, will help to alleviate the problem of youth unemployment. Just as importantly, they will help to ensure the future skill needs of the country. These proposals would not necessarily, though I admit a couple of them would, entail the expenditure of more money. Rather they would entail a reallocation of present funds.
I recognize that my time has almost expired, but let me conclude by quoting the Hon. Member for Central Nova, the Leader of the Official Opposition (Mr. Mulroney):
No amount of make-work projects and Government schemes-no gimmicks- can substitute for sustained economic growth based on lower interest rates, technological innovation, and increased trade. These are the means to growth. These are the means to full employment. These are the means which will assure young Canadians the opportunities they deserve.
Let me conclude by repeating one of my opening sentences: How this challenge is met will shape the character of Canadian society for decades to come.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: At this time in our proceedings a ten-minute period is provided for questions or comments relating to the remarks of the Hon. Member for Elgin (Mr. Wise). Are there any questions?


Peter Joseph Lang: Mr. Speaker, my question for the Member is related to the quotation of his Leader who talked about the importance of lower interest rates. It is somewhat like talking about the importance of motherhood. Is the Hon. Member for Elgin (Mr. Wise) suggesting that the Conservative Party has changed its position on interest rate policy, that the Conservative Party will put in exchange controls or some other measure to lower interest rates? What is it that the Hon. Member suggests the Conservatives will do differently to lower interest rates and provide more jobs for young people?


John Wise: Mr. Speaker, I welcome the Hon. Member's question. I am sure he must feel somewhat uneasy in view of
Supply
the fact that the main thrust of the motion today is based on youth unemployment. I would have expected him to have placed that subject in very high priority and utilized the opportunity left open to him to direct a question with reference to the subject of youth unemployment. He has chosen not to do so. He has chosen to raise another broader issue on the Canadian economy, more specifically on interest rate policy as far as this Party is concerned. That would take much time to be able to respond adequately.
If the Hon. Member would take the time to check Hansard, he would find we are so concerned about that subject that our Party selected it as a topic on a recent Opposition day. I would recommend to the Hon. Member for Kitchener (Mr. Lang) that he check and read Hansard for that particular day. It will certainly enlighten him very much.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: The Chair would like to follow up on the point raised by the Hon. Member for Elgin. Questions asked of a Member who has just delivered a speech must be related to that speech.


Peter Joseph Lang: Mr. Speaker, I believe the question was directly related. I related it to his last remarks and the quotation in the Hon. Member's speech. He quoted his Leader who was downgrading the importance of specific government initiatives to deal with youth unemployment. He called them gimmicks and said that the real method of dealing with youth unemployment was to reduce interest rates. That is the relationship. I think the Hon. Member should read his own speech; then he will see the relevance of the question put to him.
Aside from that, the importance of interest rates is a relevant point. When interest rates go down, economic growth increases and we have more employment in general in the Canadian economy. Of course, it provides more opportunity for jobs. I agree with the Hon. Member in those remarks.
The reason I am putting a question to the Hon. Member is that I do not believe his Party has any different policies with respect to interest rates than the present Government. For them to say that they have a low interest rate policy is misleading.


John Wise: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member should take the time to listen to some of the statements which are being made, not only by his caucus colleagues but by a Cabinet Minister of his Government. He must have some second thoughts about the interest rate policy which his Government has been following. The Minister suggested that if he were elected leader of the Party, he would fire the Governor of the Bank of Canada.
Certainly there is a very direct relationship between interest rates and what is happening in the general economy; I have admitted that. There is no question about that. No one would deny it. Indeed, the people who suffer most seriously as a result of the high interest rate policy of the Government are small businessmen. They are the employers of some 70 per cent of all the labour force in the country. These enterprises

May 24, 1984
Supply
are the ones that would provide job opportunities and would take advantage of the employment tax credit and the career access program.
We put questions to the Minister of Employment and Immigration during examination of his estimates. We cautioned him that these programs would not be fully utilized because the state of the general economy still remained at a very low ebb. That results from high interest rates. The Hon. Member should be listening to what people in the industrial and financial communities have been saying, that there is a lack of confidence based upon the record of the Government. Many expenditures are being placed on hold, and some have been on hold for two years now. If we talk with businessmen or people who come to Canada looking for investment opportunities, they tell us in no uncertain terms that they will not participate in any massive investment until such time as an election is called and this Government is tossed out of office.


Mr. Hnatyshyn:: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I hate to intrude at this point in time, particularly in relation to the well known ruling with respect to reflecting upon the presence or absence of Members in the House. There is a well established convention in the House of Commons with respect to allotted days that we have at least one member of the Cabinet present in the Chamber. There is not one member of the administration in the House in response to this allotted day, which is contrary to the conventions of the House.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: Order, please. I can go even further by stating that Citation 316(c) of Beauchesne's Fifth Edition is clear. It is not orderly to reflect upon the presence or absence of Members of the House of Commons. The Hon. Member has made his point. I only hope that Members will stop harping on this during the day.


Mr. Althouse:: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member for Elgin (Mr. Wise) at the beginning of his speech spoke about the jobs created in the seven-month period when the Conservatives were in office. It would be instructive for the House to be given some further information about that period of time. Most business leaders and economists understand that results follow an action.
I was not a Member of the House of Commons at that time. Can he tell the House what specific actions were taken by that government to cause the creation of extra jobs, or was he simply referring to some of the proposals that were presented some seven months later, after these jobs had already been created in the Budget which was rejected both by the House and by the country?


John Wise: Mr. Speaker, I am simply reciting the record and the facts. Indeed, I am giving the benefit of the doubt. I am actually reciting Government statistics and facts. A number of things were done during that ten-month period. The very brief time that I have available to me would not allow an adequate explanation of what we were able to achieve during that very brief period of government. I regret very much the Hon.
Member was not here. He certainly would have enjoyed a very favourable period in the House.
Let me tie that in with the importance of small business and medium-sized business in the country. At that time we as a Cabinet were extremely worried because interest rates were pushing 12 per cent. The President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Gray) stood on this side of the House and said that if they went beyond 12 per cent, if he had occupied a government position at that time he would have the honour to resign.
There was a great deal more business activity going on during that period because there was more confidence in the economy. Small business people were investing in the economy. Interest rates were at 12 per cent. During the 49-month period, in fact a 24-month period taking it to the summer and fall of 1981, the Hon. Member will know what happened. Because of the policies of this Government, interest rates took off. Interest rates rose from the earlier level of 12 per cent and 13 per cent to as high as 21, 22 and 23 per cent. That makes an impossible situation for small business. Consequently, money did not come into the country in view of the lack of confidence shown and our own domestic capital fled the country. Obviously inactivity began in the small business sector and the farming sector as well. Job opportunities since then were simply not available.


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I do not want to be frivolous and I do not want to delay the House, but I believe this is important. It has to do with the point of order raised by my colleague from Saskatoon West. Is it Your Honour's ruling that it is in fact not an established convention of this House that a Minister be present at all times?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: Order. Is the Hon. Member coming to the point of reflecting on the presence or absence-


James Aloysius McGrath: You have not heard me.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: I am just trying to stop a Member from reflecting on the presence or absence of another Member in this House. If the Hon. Member is rising to do something else, I will listen to him.


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Speaker, I am rising to do something else. I will not name any Member. Consequently that will satisfy your citation from Beauchesne. It is an established convention of this House, given the fact that the Government is responsible for the management of the House, that there shall be at least one and usually two Ministers present at all times. Because of your ruling, a Minister came in. As a consequence of your ruling, which I felt was not in the context of the point of order of my colleague, the Minister got up and left the Chamber. It is important because I would not want that to be on the record as a precedent.


Ian Deans: Mr. Speaker, you cited Beauchesne's Citation 316(c):
May 24, 1984

Besides the prohibitions contained in S.O. 35, it has been sanctioned by usage that a Member, while speaking, must not:
(c) refer to the presence or absence of specific Members;-
I would ask if you would reflect upon the meaning of "specific". It is clearly appropriate in the House of Commons, as a result of normal usage, to refer to the absence of Members, provided one does not specify exactly which Member is absent. I would like you, not necessarily to rule at the moment, but to consider that it is appropriate for a Member to rise in the House of Commons or during the course of a speech to draw to your attention the fact that there is no one from the Cabinet present. That does not refer to a specific Member.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: The first point the Chair would like to make is that the original point of order raised by the Hon. Member for Elgin was directed at the Minister responsible for youth, which was quite specific. Second, Citation 316(c) reads:
-refer to the presence or absence of specific Members;-
This leads to some interpretation. It does not say "specific Member" but "specific Members". It was the interpretation of the Chair that the Cabinet is certainly of a plural nature. In any event, the point has certainly been made three, four or five times, regardless of the rules. I suggest we continue the debate.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, I wish to make an intervention on the point of order. This has been an interesting exchange. Under our rules, we are now involved in an allotted day which is very much a matter of supply. It is a matter of the members of the administration defending the spending of their departments.
The motion before us is a condemnatory motion relating to the Government's lack of policy with regard to youth unemployment. Accordingly, it becomes an important ingredient in terms of that whole process to determine whether the Government has any member of its administration present in the House to answer. The same point was raised and an undertaking was given by the Government with respect to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Chretien) not being available to discuss estimates before the committee. The Government understood the gravity of that allegation and gave an undertaking to see what could be done so that that Minister would be before the commitee.
We are now sitting in the House of Commons and having a discussion on the floor of the House of Commons with respect to supply. Without casting reflections on any individual Members or the reason they are not here, it strikes me that the convention of the House is always that the administration, the Cabinet, the executive, are here on the floor of the House of Commons prepared to answer questions and defend the Government's position vis-a-vis the motion on the floor. That is the crux of what we are doing here today. We are not reflecting on the absence per se.
We say that the Government cares so little about this topic that it cannot even spare a couple of Ministers to be on the floor of the House of Commons to defend its position on youth unemployment, and I think that is shameful.
Supply


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: The Chair would only remark that while the Hon. Member was labouring his point, the Chair was able to see that Cabinet is now represented in the House of Commons. If we could get back to the debate, it would be appreciated. The Hon. Member for Mission-Port Moody.


Mr. St. Germain:: Mr. Speaker, are we on debate?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: We are on debate. The time allowed for questions and comments has now expired. We are back on debate on the motion. The Hon. Member for Mission-Port Moody.


Ian Deans: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I gather that you were about to recognize the Hon. Member for Mission-Port Moody for debate. While I would not want in any way to impede him in his desire to make a speech, the normal practice has not been to recognize two members of one Party, one after the other. In debate on Opposition days, it has frequently been that the two Opposition Parties express their point of view and then the Government responds. I would suggest that although it is quite legitimate to recognize the Hon. Member for Mission-Port Moody now, it might be better to recognize him later in the debate.


Mr. de Corneille:: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I wish to support that same point. My reason is that I am sitting over on this side and I was assuming that you were recognizing the member of the NDP at this time, Mr. Speaker. However, I would also like to speak.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: The Chair realizes that a member of each Party is supposed to speak on the first round. With all due respect, perhaps the Hon. Member for Mission-Port Moody would yield the floor to the representative of the New Democratic Party. Would that be agreeable?


Gerry St. Germain: Agreed, Mr. Speaker.


Ian Deans: Mr. Speaker, I thank the Hon. Member for Mission-Port Moody (Mr. St. Germain) and I appreciate his courtesy. I would like to take a few moments to discuss the topic that is before us this morning. I believe it is a very complex topic. There is no doubt in my mind that it is one of the most important problems confronting Canadians at this time.
The question of providing adequate employment is a question that bedevils everyone in politics. I think it would be unfair to suggest that there is one simple solution that will automatically resolve the problem. I do not pretend for one moment to think that from the moment whichever of the political Parties comes to power, there would automatically be a job for everyone. I say "a job for everyone" advisedly because I do believe that unless, as a matter of principle, political Parties in Canada and perhaps in other parts of the world intend to ensure that every Canadian available for work

May 24, 1984
Supply
is given the opportunity to work, then no amount of patchwork programming will resolve the problem.
There is a shortage of jobs in Canada. However, there is no shortage of work. If one were to look across the country, one would see that there are any number of tasks which need to be done. The question then becomes whether it is a matter of the policy of this Government to choose not to have that work undertaken and completed or whether it is that because of financial constraints, the Government feels that it is better to put the available capital into other things than the completion of that work. I think we must address that question.
When looking at the over-all picture, it is hard to imagine that within the traditional sense of the word "employment" we will suddenly be able to create a sufficient number of jobs for everyone who is presently unemployed as well as for everyone who is entering the workforce for the first time. We all know that the technological change that is taking place is by its very nature designed to reduce the participation of individuals in the workplace. The technological change, the computerization and the robotics that have become so much a part of the workplace in Canada will, out of necessity and by its very design and intent, eliminate jobs that were of a traditional nature.
In the 1950s and the 1960s, I can remember young people entering the workforce from the high schools and universities as there were no community colleges in Ontario at that time. They looked forward to entering into the traditional forms of employment, the forms of employment that their fathers had had before them and perhaps even their grandfathers. People in Hamilton looked to the Steel Company of Canada, Dominion Foundries and Steel, the International Harvester Company, Protor and Gamble and perhaps to the auto industry outside Hamilton for employment. In those days there was even the Studebaker Company but that has gone by the boards now. People in Hamilton looked to those companies and to others for employment. Over the years, as a result of technological change, those employers have, in my judgment wrongly in some cases, reduced the necessity for human effort in the workplace.
I believe we will be faced with a terrible dilemma. How can we create those traditional kinds of jobs? I frankly think that the answer is that we cannot. We will not be able to keep pace technologically and in terms of our productive and competitive capacity if we insist on having things which were once done by hand and foot continue to be done by hand and foot in Canada while they are being done by machines and technology elsewhere. Therefore, I think we are being confronted with a serious problem. We will not be able to keep the same numbers of people working in the steel companies any more. We will not be able to keep the same numbers of people working in the automobile manufacturing plants any more. We will not be able to keep the same numbers of people making bottles, cans and all of the other things that they once made any more. What, then, are we going to do, Mr. Speaker?
If technology has changed the workplace in such a way as to make traditional jobs fewer, then we must look at non-traditional employment. We must also look to ways of making it possible for people to enter non-traditional fields while at the same time not over-burdening the cost factors in the world economy.
There are those who think that all we need do is get more people to buy more things and everyone will automatically be put back to work. That is not so. We in Canada are operating now at something like 70 per cent of the productive capacity of the technology that is currently available. The fact of the matter is, Mr. Speaker, that even if people were prepared to buy more, the machinery that is already in place is capable of producing more with a very limited increase in manpower. That will not be the solution to the problem.
What is the real problem, Mr. Speaker? As I see it, the real problem is somewhat different. Why do people need jobs? Aside from all of the benefits of going to work and being part of the social structure of the workplace, the main reason people work is to receive income. That is why people keep working long after they should retire, that is why people work overtime and that is why people take jobs that, even by their own admission, are back-breaking or mind-bending jobs that provide very little in the way of self-fulfillment. They do that because they need an income.
We in Canada will have to take a look at ways of opening up job opportunities where young people enter the workforce. That may require that we make some serious decisions about such things as hours of work and the length of the work week. It may require that we look at the question of whether or not the pension programs currently available in Canada, private and public, are adequate enough to allow people to move out of the workforce at a time when the kind of work that they have been accustomed to doing is becoming more and more difficult for them to do. Either they must move on to a different kind of lighter or less strenuous work, without a loss of income which would cause all kinds of difficulties meeting financial commitments, or they must fall within a structure that we may create which will enable people to retire at an earlier age. This would open up many of the traditional jobs that are currently being held.
In the 1940s, the 1950s and the 1960s, we moved from a 60-hour work week to a 48-hour work week to a 40-hour work week. I frankly believe that we must again take a serious look at whether or not we have reached a point in time when a further reduction in the work week would perhaps make sense, given our productive capacity and our ability to consume.
The next thing I think we must do is take a look at how one qualifies for benefits in the event that one is available for work but there is no work available. When that young person leaves his or her educational facility and goes out into the workplace, even if he or she attends every single interview available, registers with Manpower and sends a resume to every potential employer in the area, that young person will still find that there are just not enough jobs. And we are saying to these young persons that because they have never worked before, they are not eligible for any income. Not only can we not produce enough jobs for them, but if they are unfortunate
May 24, 1984

enough to have just completed school and therefore are without any work record and have not contributed to any insurance program, they are not eligible for any income either. That does not make much sense to me.
I believe, therefore, we must do some very dramatic rethinking about the prerequisites and requirements for people who are out of work, with no prospects of work. I believe we could begin by telling these young persons that if they are available for work, regardless of their age, and if, after having gone through all the various and many registration requirements, there is still no work available for them, then they are eligible for unemployment payments because they are unemployed. The fact that they did not work before is immaterial; they are still unemployed.
If a young person is available to enter the workforce, and the workforce has not grown enough so that there is a position available for them, that does not mean that they have to stop eating or stop paying their rent. It does not mean that they do not need any income. So it seems to me that we must begin by making a fundamental decision about income before we make any decision about employment. We have to make that decision now, and that decision must be that people who are available for work and for whom no work is available must be eligible for some kind of unemployment payments. We must start there.
Then, second, you say to the young people coming out of our educational institutions that if there is no work in the traditional sense, they will be eligible to draw certain payments. But they will also be encouraged to embark upon co-operative programs, self-employment programs within their community and in other communities. We must encourage those young persons to create the kind of jobs which are currently not being created.
I visited a high school the other day and put to the students something which I recognize in the long term is not going to work but in the short term is a good idea. There are any number of young people just about to leave their high schools for the summer. They will be looking for temporary summer employment. They used to get hired by the very companies I mentioned earlier, but these companies are not hiring now. They have already laid off employees and have no room for any young people. I suggested to these students that they are going to have to go out and seek work on their own.
One of the drawbacks they have is that they have no income to enable them to go out and do that. However, I suggested to them that there are things they could do. They could, for example, conduct a survey of all the agricultural communities surrounding the City of Hamilton. They could work in teams and go to each of the farmers and see whether or not there is work which the farmer requires and for which the farmer is prepared to pay. I told them they should do that to start with. And I feel that we should be prepared, as a national program, to provide some income directly to these young people in the form of employment income in order to enable them to go out
Supply
and undertake that search for work. There is a lot of work which needs to be done but the trouble is that these students do not have any income to get them from where they are to where the work is. Second, they have no way of making contact with those individuals who might be willing to hire them. I am talking now about temporary employment.
I also suggested to these young persons that perhaps they could take two or three small jobs and make them into one job. Perhaps they can go out and discuss with prospective employers the possibility of working for them one day a week, or even less. If they find three or four employers willing to hire them on that basis, that would enable them to get into the workforce and to gain experience. These suggestions are all short term but they do address one of the problems which confront, I believe, a large number of young people who will now be entering the workforce in a temporary way.
However, that is not going to solve our problem, Mr. Speaker. It is just a short-term solution. It will not do very much for the long-term difficulties. As far as I can see from looking at the future of employment in Canada, we must establish that everyone in Canada has a right to a job, given the fact that we require of people in our society that they do have a job. Our whole society was built on the basis of people working, and unless we are prepared, as a matter of principle, to ensure that everyone has the right to a job, they will never spend the time and effort seeking out the kinds of employment necessary to meet the demand. We must place an onus of responsibility upon ourselves and upon the Government.
I believe that all across this country there is work of varying kinds which requires doing and for which there are people available, but it is not being done. Two or three years ago we suggested, for example, that there was a need for an additional 100,000 housing units to be built yearly over the course of the following three to four years in order to meet the demand. If we had done that, we would have created 280,000 jobs annually. If we had done that we would have taken the pressure off the other employment areas which are being filled and we would have opened up an opportunity for some people to get back to work or to enter the workforce for the first time. You will remember, Mr. Speaker, that at the same time we were saying that we suggested there ought to be an immediate move to complete the east-west pipeline in Canada in order that we would create not only energy self-sufficiency but tens of thousands of jobs for people in the construction industry and the manufacturing industry. Had we done that, we would have reduced the number of people unemployed and opened up other job opportunities for those now entering the workforce.
You will remember, Mr. Speaker, that we said there had to be a complete revitalization, in fact, of the transportation system of Canada. We had to complete not only the railroad transportation system but the port facilities, inland and on the coasts. If we had done that, the tens of thousands of jobs which would have been created would have taken the preassure off the other employment areas and opened up jobs for young people entering the workforce. That would have been a helpful way to begin to solve that particular aspect of the problem.

May 24, 1984
Supply
We suggested that it was time we took a look at placing a requirement for the manufacturing in Canada of significant components of those products, such as automobiles and other products which are now being imported into Canada. We are not saying we should not import or export, but there must be a requirement to manufacture in Canada some of the parts we use in Canada. If the Government had followed that kind of direction, a significant number of jobs would have been created which would have made it possible for young people to enter the workforce.
I am sure the Hon. Member who spoke before me will appreciate that if we had begun to take advantage of the vast agricultural component of our country and had placed a greater emphasis on support for the farmer in his or her attempts to replace the obsolete farm machinery with new machinery in order to be competitive in world terms, we would have created jobs in the farm machinery manufacturing sector. There are a whole series of job-creation projects, both public and private, which could have been and still can be undertaken and which would have opened up 400, 500 or 1,000 jobs for Canadians presently unemployed or entering the workforce for the first time.
We have to restructure our apprenticeship training program, Mr. Speaker. It is absolutely essential that we make it a prerequisite for employers to take on apprentices and train young people in new techniques. Therefore we must begin developing apprenticeship training programs that will allow young people to learn the skills necessary to make them a valuable part of a productive society.
We have to undertake now to look at the need to face up, I think is the right word, to the problem of high interest rates which have bedevilled the Canadian economy. As the Hon. Member who spoke previously has said, and I am sure the Liberals will agree, we are the only people in the House of Commons who consistently demanded from the Government a lower interest rate policy. We have even gone so far as to say that we would be prepared to undertake whatever steps are necessary to achieve that policy.
In closing, Mr. Speaker, there are any number of ways that new jobs can be created. There are any number of ways that we can bring young people into the workforce both temporarily and permanently. There are new ways which have to be looked at of reducing the work week and the work life of people while guaranteeing a decent income. Therefore, I want to move an amendment to the motion, seconded by the Hon. Member for Humboldt-Lake Centre (Mr. Althouse):
That the motion be amended by deleting the period after the word "nation" and adding the following thereafter:
"-and in particular the Government's adoption of the United States
interest rate and monetarist policies, thereby reducing employment opportunities for young Canadians."


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: The Chair would rule that this amendment is in order. The debate from now on will
be on the motion and the amendment. We still have a ten-minute period for questions and comments.


Peter Joseph Lang: Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate the Hon. Member for Hamilton-Mountain (Mr. Deans) for giving a speech that was not just a blind litany of mindless criticism. He obviously put some thought into it and gave some alternatives. He went through about four different suggestions for dealing with the problem of youth unemployment, and unemployment in general. He talked about work sharing. I agree that that is an important aspect of dealing with the problem. The Government already provides mechanisms by which work sharing can take place. In my own community there are 64 different companies who use work sharing.
He also talked about having young people and others create projects in their communities to meet the various demands of Canadian society which have not been met by the private or public sector as yet. The Government has programs for doing exactly that, such as the Summer Canada program and the Canada community development projects.
The Hon. Member talked about the importance or major capital projects and how they can provide employment. Housing, transportation and farm machinery are the three examples he gave.


Ian Deans: You lost one.


Peter Joseph Lang: In the last several Budgets the Government has provided various incentives to stimulate the housing industry. As to transportation, the Crow rate was amended to provide a massive injection of capital for the revamping and modernization of our railway system. Numerous funds have been supplied for upgrading ports. Concerning farm machinery, we all remember that the Government provided assistance to Massey-Ferguson.


Ian Deans: That is not what I am talking about.


Peter Joseph Lang: Although I agree with many of the suggestions the Hon. Member has made, I guess the point is, how far do you go with increased funding in these areas, and is a limitation imposed by the deficit?
The Hon. Member talked about the apprenticeship training program. I think that is an extremely important area but there seem to be some obstacles to obtaining the co-operative effort needed between business, labour and government to attain an apprenticeship program which will deal with the problems in as effective a manner as we would like. I would ask the Hon. Member whether it is his position that unions should be more receptive to apprenticeship programs, because one of the obstacles is presented by the union movement itself.


Ian Deans: Mr. Speaker, it is interesting to see how different conclusions can be drawn from different things. The best apprenticeship programs in this country are offered through trade unions, Mr. Speaker. The construction industry runs its own apprenticeship programs. The apprentices who come out of those programs are of the highest quality. They are as good
May 24, 1984

as any apprentices anywhere in the world, and better than many. There is no reluctance on the part of the trade union movement to be involved in apprenticeship programs. The difficulty has always been that employers found it easier to go offshore and hire skilled labourers and tradesmen rather than take the time to put in place apprenticeship programs to meet their needs for the future. There is very little evidence to show that the trade unions in any way inhibited the development of apprenticeship programs.
Leaving that aside for the moment and referring to the Massey-Ferguson bail-out, I put it to the Hon. Member that that is exactly the wrong way to go about establishing and maintaining a viable farm machinery industry. What was required was that farmers have more income in their hands in order that they could afford to purchase machinery. If the farmers could not buy the machinery it did not make any sense to keep the plant going. The changes to the Crow rate took money out of farmers' hands. That was our argument all along. You cannot change the Crow rate and demand farmers pay out more of their available income for freight costs and then expect that they will also have money available to purchase new machinery. That was why we argued against the changes to the Crow rate.
I submit to the Hon. Member that the funding of the development of the transportation system based on changes to the Crow rate, not totally but substantially, worked counter to the efforts of the majority of people to create employment. It worked counter to the efforts we were putting forward to try and stimulate the manufacturing sector. Although the Government had the germ of an idea, it went about it the wrong way.
I will make one final point which I think is the most important point. One of the main reasons that there was a fall-off in job creation in the country, albeit influenced by international events, was quite clearly the very high interest rates. The Member asked whether I am prepared to see the money spent to undertake these major works projects. The answer is yes, I am prepared to see the money spent. With regard to housing, if we built the 100,000 housing units and created the 280,000 jobs, every single penny that was invested would come back either in the form of mortgages or rents. In addition, 280,000 people who were previously unemployed would be working and paying taxes. The companies which make all the component parts, be it shingles or taps, would be manufacturing and paying taxes.
I suggest that investing in that industry or in the pipeline, which would be of the same benefit in the long run, or in many of the other projects that we suggested, is the way to get people back to work and paying taxes. It will increase confidence and reduce the debt load of the Government.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: The Hon. Member for Mission-Port Moody (Mr. St. Germain). The Hon. Member for Eglinton-Lawrence (Mr. de Corneille) on a point of order.
Supply


Roland de Corneille: Mr. Speaker, I thought it had been indicated that we were going to hear from a member of each Party on the first round.


Ian Deans: It is a question.


Roland de Corneille: Is this still the question period?


Ian Deans: It is a question.


Gerry St. Germain: It is a question.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: We are still in the question period. I do not see what the Chair has done wrong in recognizing an Hon. Member who wishes to pose a question. The Hon. Member for Mission-Port Moody.


Gerry St. Germain: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member made the statement that we cannot create jobs. Why do people need a job?


Ian Deans: To get an income.


Gerry St. Germain: To get an income. This is exactly what he said.


Ian Deans: That is right.


Gerry St. Germain: He suggests a shorter work week. I agree with him that we are going to have to share. In the fifties, sixties and seventies we did shorten the work week. How can the Hon. Member recommend this at this particular point in time when he knows that every small business, from which sector I came just nine months ago, is on the verge of bankruptcy? That sector is the creator of jobs.
The Hon. Member made an excellent speech but he gave no indication of how we are going to bolster the engine of growth which is small business. He claims that we must shorten the work week. I ask in all sincerity how we are going to stimulate growth so that these small businesses can afford it. I agree that some of the larger businesses can afford it, but how can small business afford it?


Ian Deans: Mr. Speaker, I will be very brief. I will first say that there is no conflict in saying that you cannot create jobs and at the same time talking about looking at the work which needs to be done and doing it. In the process people become employed. I think the Member would recognize that there is no conflict between those two.
With regard to the work week, the argument being put forward by a significant number of people about the inadvisability of moving toward a shorter work week is the same argument that was put forward by basically the same people when the work week was shortened before. Although that argument has a certain appeal, it turns out in the long run not to have any real substance. If we are able to stimulate economic activity by doing a variety of things, as I suggest we will, if we are able to reduce the cost by stabilizing the interest rates and if we are able to stimulate activity in small businesses by virtue of the capital works projects, then the small business

May 24, 1984
Supply
entrepreneur will be in a position to accept a move toward a shorter work week. As a result there will be more people in the consumer marketplace, more people buying his product and more people active in society. That will be to his long-term benefit.
I do not think anyone is suggesting that a shortening of the work week would happen overnight. We must move systematically to reduce it in a gradual way, recognizing that there can be some detrimental effects, but also recognizing that the economy can be stimulated because there is new capital flowing to those small businesses.


Peter Joseph Lang: Mr. Speaker, I would like to comment on the Hon. Member's assertion that there is no resistance at all by the union movement to the apprenticeship program. He made the point, and I agree with it, that in the past business has tended to import skilled labour because it was cheaper to do so. However, government has put up obstacles to this by requiring that any new jobs must be posted across Canada for a full month before an immigrant can take that job. I also agree that business, labour and government all have a role to play in ensuring that a good apprenticeship program comes in and in dealing with the problem in other ways.
I do not think we can whitewash and say that the trade union movement is receptive to the apprenticeship program. They have legitimate concerns that this may be a method of reducing income and cutting costs in the workplace. I think that has to be legitimately addressed. We must set aside some of our natural biases, depending upon our Parties, to address that particular problem. I would like to hear the Hon. Member's ideas on this.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: The Hon. Member for Hamilton Mountain (Mr. Deans) has one minute to respond.


Ian Deans: I recognize the time is passing quickly, Mr. Speaker. Nothing the Member has said would lead me to believe that there has been resistance on the part of trade unions to the implementation of an accredited apprenticeship training program in Canada. There was resistance by trade unions to the thrust which would result in people being hired at lower wages to do the work already being done by others who would then be unemployed. Great Britain, Sweden, France and Japan have been able to establish apprenticeship programs which allowed young people to enter the workforce and be trained properly in the way in which the work was to be done without impeding or in any way detrimentally affecting the employment opportunities for those workers presently working. I do not see why that cannot happen in Canada. You will find no resistance on the part of the trade union movement.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: Order, please. The time has come to resume debate on the amendment. The Hon. Member for Eglinton-Lawrence (Mr. de Corneille).


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I do not want to delay this debate because it is an important topic.
My recollection, Mr. Speaker, was that you recognized the Hon. Member for Mission-Port Moody (Mr. St. Germain) who then, out of the graciousness for which he is well known in the House, deferred to the Member for Hamilton Mountain (Mr. Deans). It seems to me that under the circumstances, having been recognized, the logical person to be recognized to carry on the debate should be the Member for Mission-Port Moody. You had asked him, Sir, if he would be prepared to defer to the Member for Hamilton Mountain. I will not make any further comment except to say that, in all sense of fairness, he has been waiting and was prepared to proceed. I think it is only equitable that he now proceed with his speech.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: Earlier the Chair humbly recognized that it had made a mistake in not passing from the Progressive Conservative Party to the New Democratic Party since we are in an initial round today. To do what the Hon. Member is suggesting would simply compound the mistake by depriving the other Party from having a speaker in the initial round. The Chair has recognized the Hon. Member for Eglinton-Lawrence.


Roland de Corneille: Mr. Speaker, youth unemployment is not, as some members of the Opposition claim, a problem that can be solved easily or quickly. The public and the Opposition know that there is no quick fix. Nor is it, on the other hand, as some propose, a temporary aberration that can be blamed on the arrival of the baby boom generation. Rapid growth in the population has certainly had its effect, as has the recent recession, but of more significance I suggest is the way we do business in this country, the way our educational system works and the way we counsel and guide our young people as they prepare to enter the workforce.
Our young people in Canada represent the best trained and best educated generation of our history. Yet it is a cruel irony that many of them are still on the outside looking in, unable to find a job. It is no secret that many young people who are out of work are now coming to the conclusion that their skills and their education are of no use.
The youth of Canada are ready and able to take their rightful place in society and we, as a Government and as concerned adults, must see that they do. Technology is rapidly carrying us to the 21st century, but because of the rapidity of this change, all too often our skills and management techniques are still those of the 20th century. Exciting new jobs are being created that demand workers with specialized training. Our competitiveness in international markets and ultimately our standard of living depend on our ability to fill these jobs with qualified people.
We live in the age of the technician. If we do not train people for the types of jobs available in the labour market, if we persist in producing workers without the right skills, then the unemployment rate will remain high with jobs just going begging. The young people today recognize these facts and are expressing their concerns eloquently and admirably. Certainly
May 24, 1984

we respect and should encourage the pressure that should always be placed upon government to seek every avenue to try to provide opportunities for young people.
The young people tell us that we must concentrate on the development of skills and human resources for all segments of the youth population. We must generate meaningful activities in the areas of education, training and voluntary services for all those with depressed employment prospects. We must promote a sense of excellence and innovation and encourage young people to identify with these goals of society so that their considerable talents will improve. The public should not be misled that we can do this overnight.
This Government has already taken huge steps to respond to these concerns. Through our Youth Opportunity Fund, we will invest more than $1.3 billion in this fiscal year alone in training, job creation and employment services for young people. That is a significant amount of money.
The Youth Opportunity Fund is a comprehensive and overall global approach to a very complex problem. Through this fund, programs and services are made available for all youth groups, including the early high school leaver who has little or no educational skill that would provide him with a job in the workforce at the present time, students searching for summer work experience and all other young people looking for an entry into the world of work.
Today I would like to focus my remarks, which of course are limited by time, on the national training program and how the Government, through that program, is helping young people develop the skills that will enable them to be truly productive members of Canada's workforce. When the National Training Act was proclaimed in 1982, it allowed us to bring our training system up to date and to prepare Canadians for full participation in this technological era. With it, we have been able to develop policies and programs that compare favourably with those of other countries. The program is designed to help those who need to update their present skills, learn new ones or to be in a better position to find permanent employment.
The national training program is working at its full capacity to give Canadians the skills that they will need to find rewarding jobs. In point of fact, the Government has in place an enlightened program and policy that provides for the training and retraining needs of all its human resources. This Government is at the forefront of activity to develop the talents of all Canadians, but extends a helping hand to those who need it the most. While there is concern for all, undeniably, young people-especially those with little education and skills and those whose education has not prepared them for the realities of the workplace-are prime beneficiaries.
Perhaps at this point I should mention the extent of our financial assistance for training. This fiscal year we will be spending more than a billion dollars to help Canadians upgrade their present skills or to learn new ones. More than half of the total training budget is directed toward the purpose of courses in both public and private learning institutions for individual Canadians. This will provide training opportunities
Supply
for some 220,000 men and women, nearly half of whom will be young people.
Besides this institutional training, we have in place the industrial training component, projected to train some 61,000 Canadians during this fiscal year. More than 26,000 of them will be young people. Industrial training is highly important as it involves the co-operation and partnership of the private sector where trainees learn a trade under general industrial training or a skill of national importance under the critical skills training stream. The Hon. Member for Kitchener (Mr. Lang) alluded to that program and its importance a few moments ago.
This emphasis on training and retraining in high skill occupations is in fact in effect. It is an important aspect of the national training program. As a result, there has been a sharp increase in the number of trainees in occupations of national importance. In fact, in terms of trainee starts, the number has nearly doubled in less than two years. Occupations are designated as being of national importance when they have traditionally been in short supply or foreseen as being needed in tomorrow's high technology world for which appropriate training action can be taken to prevent or alleviate the shortage.
Another way in which the Government is helping to meet the challenge of change quickly is through what is known as the Skills Growth Fund. This fund, which was established through the National Training Act, assists public institutions as well as non-profit organizations to establish, expand or modernize training facilities. Since this Skill Growth Fund got under way less than two years ago, a total of 247 projects have been approved with a value of more than $165 million. Every province and territory has had projects approved. Both the public and private sectors have benefited. The figures show that public institutions such as community colleges have had 205 projects approved and a total funding of $148 million.
Just two weeks ago, the Government added another $30 million to the Skills Growth Fund for 1984-85. This money, coming as it does from the Youth Opportunity Fund, has been specifically designated to improve training opportunities and facilities for young people. Surely Hon. Members will agree that this is evidence of the Government's concrete action to help young people.
Let me cite a few examples to show how the Skills Growth Fund works to improve training opportunities. A youth job corps program in Toronto is using its $261,000 allocation for employment preparation. The Nova Scotia Nautical Institute in Port Hawkesbury is using its $3.2 million contribution to provide much needed maritime training to more than 300 trainees annually. The Youth Business Learning and Development Centre in Winnipeg has received $107,000 to provide training and clerical assistance to people with special needs. The focus of this project is clerical upgrading, including word processing. The training is computer-based and this innovative approach has already shown to be effective with the project's young clientele. On the West Coast, at the British Columbia Institute of Technology, the Skills Growth Fund has made

May 24, 1984
Supply
possible a new robotics program and the Pacific Vocational Institute is using the fund for a high-tech training centre.
I cite these examples, Mr. Speaker, to illustrate, since large amounts of money can boggle the mind and leave one with a lack of understanding and perception, how the Government is effectively working to ensure we have highly trained Canadians ready to meet the high-skill needs of our future economy. By citing the different places, I have endeavoured to show that this effort is being made across the whole nation, and is trying to provide meaningful opportunities for people to take on jobs in all parts of Canada.
I might add at this point that the operation of the Skills Growth Fund is an excellent example of how this Government co-operates with the provinces as well as with businesses, as we have indicated, in the private sector, and various other organizations, both charitable and community minded, in pursuit of a national goal. It is a comprehensive program involving all phases of community life, public, private and charitable.
A key element in preparing young people to enter the labour market is being able to predict which skills and professions will be in greatest demand in the next few years so that the education and training provided corresponds to the real needs of our economy. To do this effectively, we need to know what the needs will be and where. With this in mind, and in very close collaboration with other governments, labour and business, we have developed the Canadian Occupational Projection System, or COPS. The system has been designed to collect, process and disseminate information on the future supply of, and demand for, workers on a professional basis.
The goal, then, is to plan Canada's human resources better, and especially its young human resources. It is to plan, where there are people with little or no skills, for retraining, or for those who wish to have and need skills in those industries requiring people with special skills, and, of course, the professions. It is a totally comprehensive approach to the entire subject of human resources and employment. It is not a patchwork type of thing, here, there or the other place. It is a total approach to a total problem which has huge and important dimensions to it in the future.
I could go on about the efforts of the Government to train our young people for the world of work, but I am glad that I have had this opportunity to talk about one aspect of it to show that dismissing the work of the Government in a few simple words is most unfair, most ineffective and inaccurate.
I could go on about the efforts of the Government. Just two weeks ago, for example, we announced the establishment of a new youth training option. With $30 million of Youth Opportunity Fund money, this option will offer young people a new form of training lasting up to a year. It is being designed to provide participants with both theoretical training and structured on-the-job training and experience. When it becomes operational around Labour Day, it will truly provide young people with yet one more option for learning. I know that all Members here share this Government's concern for our young
people. Obviously this subject would not have been called on this Opposition Day if it were not a shared concern. I think it is important, therefore, for the whole picture to be given.
Our youth are standing on the threshold of greatness in the Canada of the future. We all have a stake in what happens to our young people. With the programs this Government has put in place and is putting in place, we are ensuring they acquire the knowledge, the skills and the experience that will equip them for the way ahead.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: Are there any questions or comments relating to the remarks of the Hon. Member for Eglinton-Lawrence?


Mr. Taylor:: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member for Eglinton-Lawrence (Mr. de Corneille) mentioned that the starts under the national training program doubled in two years. I believe the national training program came into force in 1982. If you start from nothing, doubling does not mean anything. If you have one and double it, you only need one more. But if you have 1,000 and double it, it would be 2,000. Could the Hon. Member give me the figures he has which show the doubling?


Roland de Corneille: Mr. Speaker, I do not have the release here from which I cited my figures, but I think to observe that when you start from nothing and you double it you have nothing is a cavalier approach to what I thought was a rather comprehensive description of a very serious and comprehensive program. It is a program which has a great deal of taxpayers' money invested in it and a great deal of thought has been given to it by Canada's civil servants as well as this Government to make it an effective training program for our people. To minimize its scope, to disregard it or to be a cavalier about it is really not the point here. I hope that is not what is intended.


Gordon Edward Taylor: Mr. Speaker, who is minimizing it? I am simply asking for the facts.


Mr. Beatty:: He says he does not know.


Gordon Edward Taylor: I am asking what is the figure. Is the conscience of the Hon. Member bothering him? I simply asked for the figure. What was the figure that was doubled? How many starts are being made this year? How many were made in 1982 and 1983? That is all I want to know. I am not minimizing the program, Mr. Speaker, I just want to know the facts. Is there no answer from the Hon. Member?


Mr. Fretz:: Mr. Speaker, it is amazing that we did not get an answer to the question posed by the Hon. Member for Bow River (Mr. Taylor). However, we know it is not necessary to answer if the Hon. Member for Eglinton-Lawrence feels he does not want to answer.
During his speech he said that there can be no quick fix. I do not think we are having even a slow fix to the problems we are experiencing in this country today. What we are having is an attempt at patching up. What we need are new initiatives as espoused by our spokesperson this morning, the Hon. Member for Elgin (Mr. Wise). Our Party does espouse job
May 24, 1984

training, as indicated in the speech delivered by the Hon. Member for Elgin.
We feel job training and job retraining is important, but what we need are brand-new initiatives, which we are not getting. Job training and retraining are not just good enough if there are no jobs for young people to go to. That is the area in which this Government is deficient. That is the area about which this Government is failing to do anything. This Government has literally failed in job training and retraining. Even if that were sufficient in itself, there are simply not the jobs for young people to go into because this Government lacks the determination, the political will and is deficient in the area of philosophy of getting jobs for the young people today.


Roland de Corneille: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments the Hon. Member has made about his concern about the effectiveness of the programs. By commenting on that, I think he should then provide some examples of where these programs are not reaching out or not meeting people's requirements. What I have been trying to do is to specialize in a certain specific area and provide facts and programs so that Hon. Members and the public may know the wide range of programs being made available to enable people to take on jobs. It is not only a matter of making jobs available but of making Canadians able to work in the jobs that are available or that down the line will become available. It is not possible, and I am glad it has been reiterated, to have a quick fix.
I believe the facts I have presented to the House concerning the programs in place and being funded at the present time will have to speak for themselves. I tried to show the comprehensive nature of them. I hope they will be effective. I know that in some cases in my riding in the City of Toronto they are effective.
We can talk about creating positions, but we also have to talk about the fact that many new jobs have been created. When we talk about figures and statistics, very often we become depressed or concerned about the fact that there is a large reservoir of unemployed. However, it is important that we are creating jobs at a record rate in Canada as compared with other countries in the western world. When we look at that fact and at the training programs available to Canadians, they comprise a policy. I hope the Government will never give up its efforts or feel satisfied with anything less than total employment.


Mr. Patterson:: Mr. Speaker, I would like to direct a question to the Hon. Member for Eglinton-Lawrence (Mr. de Corneille), but first I will refer to an article which appeared in my local newspaper. I received it just today. It indicates that the job situation in the Fraser Valley of British Columbia is devastating. This report was the result of the work of a task force established by the Fraser Valley College. In part the article reads:
College principal Dr. Barry Moore said "I found the report just devastating."
Supply
Also it pointed out that somewhere between 9,000 and
15,000	youths between the ages of 15 and 24 years are unemployed in the Fraser Valley region. According to the article, Dr. Moore stated:
It's just further indication of a major kind of new era we're going into, where 20 to 25 per cent of the people are not able to find jobs.
That's the prospect. I think we're facing a major, major shift in our society.
The Hon. Member referred to several programs which were put in place by the Government. What percentage of the amounts requested under the provisions of the various programs has actually been allocated to date?


Roland de Corneille: Mr. Speaker, I would not want to answer that question because I do not have the most recent facts. The Hon. Member should direct that question to the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Roberts) or to the Minister of State for Youth (Mrs. Hervieux-Payette) in Question Period.
However, I can point out that there are certainly programs in place in my riding. I have cited in my comments certain examples of programs across the country in order to point out that it is a real thing, not merely figures at which one could look and merely say: "Oh, the Government is throwing money at it". On the contrary, the Government is establishing carefully thought out programs in collaboration and consultation with the provinces and with the Public Service to work with institutions such as our universities and community colleges. The total picture involves many organizations throughout the country.
On May 14 there was an announcement by the Minister of Employment and Immigration that 300 projects were being undertaken with Imperial Oil which have just been enlarged. By increasing its fund base, Imperial Oil has been able to add to the program. I refer the Hon. Member to that press release as an example of the specific way in which we deal with the private sector. I am sorry I cannot give him the present statistic as to what is the exact percentage.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: Since there are no further questions or comments, the House will now proceed to debate.


Gerry St. Germain: Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak on a subject which I wish did not exist in the magnitude it does; as a matter of fact, I wish it was totally non-existent. Youth unemployment is the most terrifying blight which has reared its head in Canada since the depression of the 1930s. It is a serious social problem. If it is not corrected immediately, it will have lasting effects for generations to come.
Most young Canadians find themselves in a dead-end situation, actually on a dead-end street, due to high levels of unemployment. Parents and students have worked hard and sacrificed to obtain education. With unemployment being so high and the prospects so negative, they are asking why they

May 24, 1984
Supply
should obtain a degree or training. This is understandable; I have an unemployed youth in my own home who is trained and educated.
As of April there were 1,235,000 young people attending school full time. Over the next few months, if past experience is any guide, approximately 650,000 young people will attempt to enter the labour force, further magnifying and amplifying the problem. We are entering a new era, one that is totally different from what Canadians have had to face before. Rapidly changing technology, different labour laws and the development of a new philosophical working program surround us.
These changes require a great deal of planning, something which the Government opposite has totally neglected. Also they will require a great deal of understanding and a closer working relationship with our fellow Canadians. With this in mind, it is that much more important for them to have a functional education.
Why are we debating a non-confidence motion today regarding the Government's inability to cope with youth unemployment? The reasons are numerous. I should like to point some of them out in the House today. According to the Government, the current youth unemployment problem is based upon structural problems in the economy. The Liberals have said that we will never again see full employment. It is unadulterated hogwash that we will never see full or even close to full employment again. The structural economic problems to which the Liberals refer point to the mismanagement of the Liberal Government. Its structure for the last 16 years has caused these problems. Growth and jobs will come with good, sound management.
I would like to indicate how ludicrous is the approach of the Government to these problems. It claims that youth unemployment will disappear because the number of youths is declining. What will really happen is that youth unemployment will merely change category in Statistics Canada reports, but the problems will remain. Just the word "youth" will be removed. Yes, in two years or three years youth unemployment will decrease, but the problems will remain given the same administration.
Let me talk a little bit about the social stigma that unemployment brings to a community. The effects are not nice to talk about but it is time we started to recognize them. When people lose their jobs, or cannot get jobs, they lose their dignity. It is not only the families that suffers but entire communities. The riding of the Hon. Member for Fraser Valley East (Mr. Patterson) is directly south of mine. Reports are that we have up to 47 per cent unemployment in my riding. I have raised this matter in the House. Hopefully the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Roberts) will look at that area. That is an indication of the severity of the problem, as so aptly pointed out by the Hon. Member for Fraser Valley East.
Once someone is unemployed for a long period of time, studies show that it is harder to train and employ such an
individual. In Ontario, 20 per cent of those who are hard to employ eventually end up representing 50 per cent of the welfare costs.
Let me get down to the real social problems, problems I have seen as a peace officer in this country. Suicides among those between 15 to 24 have quadrupled since the 1940s. Of
4.000	suicides reported in 1981, 1,300 were teenagers. For each one carried out, there were 100 to 150 attempts. Alcohol consumption by those 13 to 20 years old sharply increased for both boys and girls. Frustrated by a society that appears to offer no future, no hope for the unemployed, they become depressed, despondent and eventually become addicted to drugs. That is the only alternative they see in the bleak window of life that has been caused by mismanagement. The only way out of this dilemma is to change the scene so that our youth can once again look to the future optimistically. They must be allowed to dream and hope must be restored. This can be done only by creating a country where they can develop job skills in trades or professions and become productive participants in this great country.
How did the Liberals attempt to deal with these problems? They first tried make-work programs that included no training. There was the Canada Works program. It was an attempt to delay the inevitable by taking tax dollars and throwing them in every direction. Now what do we hear from the Minister of Employment and Immigration? We should change our approach and start training with U.I. benefits. At last he is starting to listen to what we on this side of the House have been telling him. We must act now. We have a generation adrift.
The Government has been recycling people through its glorified welfare system, from UI to Canada Works. It is a vicious circle that does not go anywhere. I think the Government recognizes this. I went to look at some of the statistics with regard to these programs. In March, 1984 youth unemployment was just over 525,000, as pointed out by the Hon. Member for Elgin (Mr. Wise), a rate of 18.2 per cent. As the Hon. Member for Elgin pointed out, who knows the real figure? It could be as high as 1.4 million youth unemployed.
In 1983 the unemployment rate in Canada for young adults, those aged 20 to 24, was 18.5 per cent. This compared to 18.2 per cent in the United Kingdom, 14.6 per cent in Australia, 14.6 per cent in the United States, 7 per cent in Sweden and
4.1	per cent in Japan. Canada had the highest unemployment rate for young adults of any major western industrialized nation last year. The current rate is 17.1 per cent for both sexes, 19.6 per cent for young adult males.
The Hon. Member for Eglinton-Lawrence said that the Government had created jobs. With all due respect, they were short-term jobs. With all the respect in the world, there was no other way to go. I could see that with the policies it had. We spend about $3.2 million per day trying to reduce unemployment through these programs.
Youth form 25 per cent of the workforce and about 30 per cent of the unemployed. We know that we are in trouble, real trouble. The pre-depression figures-and I use the word "depression"-for June, 1981 show youth unemployment at
May 24, 1984

12.2 per cent, representing approximately 398,000 unemployed youth. At that time unemployment in the United States for youth was about the same as what it is now. We have surpassed that.
These costly, non-productive programs have jeopardized our economy and placed unreal pressure on small business, the real engine of growth and the only solution to job creation. These programs have led to high taxation. They have bled the country and business by not allowing for hiring and the expansion of youth training and actual youth employment. Excessive taxation, a lack of incentive for investment and no reward for risk by the Government has led to the horror story we see today.
There are solutions. The first one I would like to talk about is co-op education. I have visited Douglas College in my riding and Douglas College in the riding of New Westminster-Coquitlam. What is continually pointed out is the lack of understanding by the federal Government in dealing with the other two levels, the educators and the province.
The Hon. Member for Kingston and the Islands (Miss MacDonald) demanded an amendment to Bill C-12, urging the federal Government to negotiate with provincial education ministers and provincial educators, as agreed to by the Secretary of State (Mr. Joyal). That was raised in the House yesterday. All of this has taken so much time that we are now in the midst of a crisis and the Government is trying to adjust. We have been saying this for the last nine months that I have been here.
The Hon. Member for Eglinton-Lawrence talked about training. You can train everybody in the world to the highest degree, but if they have no job to go to and there is not a sound basis for an economy in which small business can develop, such training is useless.
We have pointed out a solution time after time in this House with regard to youth employment, namely our resources. Youth are adaptable to reforestation employment and physical work. The long-term effects of farming our forests instead of mining them would be beneficial in years to come as well as solving the problem at the present time.
May I call it one o'clock, Mr. Speaker?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: Order. I am sorry to interrupt the Hon. Member but it is now one o'clock. He will be able to continue his remarks this afternoon, when the House resumes the debate.
It being one o'clock, I do now leave the chair until two o'clock this afternoon.
At 1 p.m. the House took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The House resumed at 2 p.m.


Mr. Stan Darling (Parry Sound-Muskoka):: Mr. Speaker, while following up on a complaint from a constituent last week, I was reminded of the holes in the Unemployment Insurance Act through which a truck could be driven. It seems that the interpretation and the definition of full-time versus part-time employment differs in the Act depending on where the book is opened.
In the case of my constituent, the UIC had completely cut off his benefits because he had taken a part-time job. Fortunately, the national office of the UIC overruled the regional office in Barrie and gave him back his benefits retroactive to the cut-off date.
I feel that there are many people being victimized by the system in this way, most of whom would not think to contact their Member of Parliament to work on their behalf. I maintain that when a UIC recipient suspects that the system is not serving his or her best interests, that person should exercise his or her rights by contacting Ottawa. Meanwhile, it is the duty of the House to realign the Unemployment Insurance Act before the rights of others are completely undermined.
My constituent is happy with the action which has now been taken. What can we do about the thousands of people who are not happy?



HUMAN RIGHTS


Hon. Sinclair Stevens (York-Peel):: Mr. Speaker, the civilized world is aghast at the pitiless persecution of both Andrei Sakharov and his wife, Yelena Bonner. The treatment of the Sakharovs is an indication of the Soviet Union's contempt for human rights. Despite signing the Helsinki Final Act in 1975, which specifically confirms the right of the individual to know and act upon his rights and duties in the field of human rights, the Soviet Government has once again shown how few rights and how little dignity the individual is allowed against the brutal and overwhelming power of the state.
Sakharov, who in 1975 won the Nobel Peace Prize and was labeled the spokesman for the conscience of mankind, has been on a hunger strike since May 2. His reason for going on a hunger strike is very simple. His wife is badly in need of an operation, and the Soviet authorities will not allow her to leave the Soviet Union. What type of inhumane system would not grant this simple request?
In light of the treatment of the Sakharovs it becomes easier to understand the actions of a Government that could coldbloodedly bring about the downing of Korean airliner 007,

May 24, 1984
causing the deaths, of its 269 passengers, including 10 Canadians.


Mr. Speaker:: The Hon. Member's time has expired.



CANADA POST CORPORATION


Mr. Jim Fulton (Skeena):: Mr. Speaker, it is with some regret that I bring to the attention of the House the effects some free enterprisers have upon the costs of Canada's postal service. I have with me today a letter mailed to a Vancouver hospital from Post Office No. 179 in Tijuana, Mexico. The letter carries a 10 peso stamp and a 9 peso stamp. At today's rate of 132 pesos to the dollar, this makes the stamps worth about 15 cents Canadian, less than one half the cost of mailing a letter in Canada to a Canadian destination.
The return addesss on the envelope, which has been carefully concealed by the 9 peso stamp, is Williams and Wilkins, Baltimore, Maryland. The return address inside the envelope is Williams and Wilkins, Box 7220, Ancaster, Ontario. However, on contacting the manager of the Ancaster Post Office today, I learned that there is no Williams and Wilkins in Ancaster, Ontario. That there is no such company in Ancaster was confirmed by Bell Canada. The box, however, is registered to a Mr. John V. Basmajian of 106 Forsyth, in Hamilton, Ontario.
This is an abuse of the postal service of Canada and of other countries, Mr. Speaker. I urge all Canadians who are receiving mail bearing stamps from outside Canada but a return address from inside Canada, to forward the envelopes to Canada's Postmaster, the Hon. Andre Ouellet, at the House of Commons. By stopping this kind of abuse, we could have a less expensive postal system in Canada.



POLITICAL PARTIES


Mr. Gordon Towers (Red Deer):: Mr. Speaker, Liberal leadership candidates have been speculating out loud lately about their future Cabinet-making plans. I am reminded of a quip the late Mr. Diefenbaker once made about shuffling a deck of deuces.
Yesterday the Energy Minister alleged that a Saskatchewan NDP Member is considering crossing the floor to join the Liberals. That is the very first time I have heard of a rat swimming toward a sinking ship.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Thomas Gordon Towers: I wonder how much anguish this revelation will cause in the NDP caucus. Perhaps it will cause none. His
colleagues may be happy that he is finally finding a home and a haven in socialist heaven.




Gordon Edward Taylor: Mr. Speaker, Mr. "Turnaround-Turnabout-Turnover-Turner" certainly knows how to look after himself. He is a director of Bechtel Canada, Mas-sey-Ferguson, and MacMillan Bloedel, to mention a few from which he is putting into his pockets a few thousand dollars every year. He has been reappointed as a director of the CPR, the company to which the Liberals gave a guaranteed annual income at the expense of western farmers. Considering the payments the CPR is making to Turner, it is no wonder that freight rates went up.
If that is not enough to make every ordinary Canadian ill, hear this! As a director of the largest liquor company in the world, Seagram's, poor John receives only $15,000 per year just for his good looks, plus $500 for travelling expenses for every meeting he attends. With a smile on his face, the Chairman of Seagram's told reporters that "from a Seagram point of view it is not a bad thing to have a future Prime Minister on our board". Seagram's will then have a pipeline right into the Prime Minister's office. Seagram's knows what happened to the CPR when it had a pipeline into Liberal offices.
Mr. Turner will not resign his positions. Oh, no, the CPR can go right on extracting the lifeblood from the prairie farmers with higher and higher freight rates. Seagram's can go on increasing liquor prices so that it may continue to buy the favours of the next Prime Minister of Canada. Mr. Turner's answer is that he must look after his security. What about the security of the Canadian people, Mr. Speaker?




Mr. Doug Anguish (The Battlefords-Meadow Lake):: Mr. Speaker, instead of reading the Regina manifesto, which is the basis of the NDP constitution, this morning, as I usually do, I made the mistake of listening to the CBC world report. You can imagine my shock when I heard a story to the effect that I was planning to join the Liberal Party. So that there can be no confusion, I would like the House to know exactly what my contacts with the Liberal Party have been.
Earlier this year I was approached by a group of people, including some former Conservatives, who asked me if I would consider running as a Liberal in the next federal election. My
May 24, 1984

answer was no. Nevertheless those who approached me in Saskatchewan then arranged for the president of the federal Liberal Party to call me. Once again my answer was no. They also asked the federal Energy Minister to approach me. Once again my answer was no.
For the enlightenment of the Liberals, and anyone else who cares, I am a New Democrat now, and I am proud to say I will continue to be a New Democrat. I did not initiate any approach to the Liberal Party, and never will. However, the Liberals should not be discouraged from trying in Saskatchewan. Just last month two prominent Conservative executive members and a Conservative MLA announced they were joining the Liberal Party.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!



AGRICULTURE


Mr. Lee Clark (Brandon-Souris):: Mr. Speaker, cattle production is no longer the healthy, going concern it once was in Canada, and the Government has a duty to help the industry get back on its feet. Cattle producers' share of the consumer dollar is shrinking, farm bankruptcies are increasing, and there have been numerous meat packing plant closures in recent years. Last week Burns Meats of Brandon, Manitoba, became another casualty in a badly ailing industry.
While some factors in the livestock industry are difficult to control, there are steps which the Government could and should take. For example, Canada must offset the trade advantage now enjoyed by subsidized Irish and Danish beef exports into this country. One cannot overstate the potentially devastating impact of these imports on the Canadian cattle industry. In addition, Canada's good trading relationship with the United States is being threatened by the sudden invasion of Canadian beef into its market, beef we can no longer sell domestically. The solution is to introduce a countervailing duty on subsidized Irish and Danish beef imports. Until this occurs, Canada should impose an interim surtax.
Yesterday in this House the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) was asked whether he would support these measures. He chose to sidestep both the issue and his ministerial duties by offering absolutely no hint of how, or even if, he intends to take some kind of action. I appeal to the Government to introduce appropriate measures now, before the damage done to Canada's once thriving beef industry is irreversible.


Mr. Speaker:: The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (Mr. Gingras).


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Order! He is a Parliamentary Secretary.
Oral Questions



FINANCE


Mr. Rene Gingras (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development):: Mr. Speaker, today I would like to say a few words about the system of equalization payments in Canada.
When a senior citizen comes to my office to talk about a guaranteed income supplement that was cut off because last year his income increased, he usually leaves my office quite satisfied with the explanation he receives. However, when I hear a Quebec Minister of Finance like Jacques Parizeau, supposedly an economist, explain the system of equalization payments in Canada, I am absolutely flabbergasted. Just what is his understanding of the system? Is he an economist or is he terribly inconsistent? He asks for and accepts assistance when Quebec is in trouble and refuses to help the other provinces when Quebec's situation improves. His own figures prove that he has benefited quite considerably through equalization in recent years. And now he refuses to admit that the federal Government and the seventy-four Members from Quebec have anything to do with the improved situation in Quebec. As usual, in line with his separatist philosophy, he takes the credit for positive developments and blames us when things go wrong.
Mr. Speaker, this is definitely a no-win situation for us, and I have therefore decided to let Quebec voters draw their own conclusions at the next elections. My constituents are well aware what my Government has done during the recession in Abitibi, compared to which the Parti Quebecois's contribution was peanuts. They will realize-


Mr. Speaker:: I am sorry to interrupt the Parliamentary Secretary, but his time has expired.

With respect to the interjection at the beginning concerning whether or not Parliamentary Secretaries can make Standing Order 21 declarations the rules are quite clear, yes. Questions are another matter, but under Standing Order 21 Madam Speaker Sauve was most explicit that this should be permitted.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Hon. Bill Jarvis (Perth):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of State for Fitness and Amateur

May 24, 1984
Oral Questions
Sport. In this morning's edition of La Presse, the Canada Sports Pool Corporation was described as a veritable nest of patronage reserved for members and friends of the Liberal Party of Canada. The article went on to give names and appointments in support of this allegation.
Given that, above all others, any national organization devoted to support Olympics, medical research, and amateur sport, should be free of such allegations, I want to give the Minister the first opportunity to deny categorically the allegations contained in that article. I ask him if he is in a position now to give the House, and the country, that categorical denial?


Hon. Jacques Olivier (Minister of State (Fitness and Amateur Sport)):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to point out to the Members of this House that the newspaper article in question, which says that friends of the Party in power were appointed to the Canada Sports Pool Corporation, does contain a modicum of truth,, but there are also some statements that are entirely wrong. Certainly, there were people who belonged to the Liberal Party, but there are also individuals who belong to the Progressive Conservative Party, and I cannot deny that either. What I can say is that belonging to a political party is not, and never will be, a requirement for appointment. In this area, the Canada Sports Pool Corporation was led by a concern for competence and success. The basic requirement as to select individuals who had been successful with Loto Canada, before the Progressive Conservative Government decided to abolish the Corporation and hand over $500 million to the provinces, and that is strictly what happened.


William Herbert Jarvis: We in this Party look for competence and success also. But if there are any profits flowing from this sports pool, our concern is that they are not skimmed off by the sticky fingers of a bunch of Grit hacks. That is our concern.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


APPOINTMENT OF FORMER ASSISTANTS TO MINISTERS
William Herbert Jarvis: I wonder if the Minister could explain, Mr. Speaker, if it is by design or by coincidence that the ex-president of his riding association has received an appointment; that one organizer and one former assistant to the Minister of Finance received an appointment, and that a former Minister's assistant received an appointment in Manitoba. Are we to believe that that is sheer coincidence, or is it not, frankly, sheer design on behalf of the Liberal Party?


Joseph Mario Jacques Olivier: Mr. Speaker, as I said before, belonging to a political party is not a requirement for appointment to the Canada Sports Pool Corporation. However, if intelligent
individuals have decided to support a political party, this is a free country, and if they decide to do so, they can. Now, if my hon. friend opposite wants me to publish the names of people on the other side who have asked me to try and support certain appointments, I am willing to do so, and I should be quite happy to reveal the names of those hon. friends opposite.


QUALIFICATIONS FOR APPOINTMENTS
William Herbert Jarvis: In that case, Mr. Speaker, if nothing else but in the interests of fairness to Liberals everywhere, I wonder if the Minister could make public the qualifications for appointment. For example, is a 72-hour Liberal qualified, or must he or she have been a long-term member? If he or she is a donor, for how many years and for how much? The simple question is this: what are the qualifications for these Liberals before they receive the Minister's permission to jump into the porkbarrel and wallow around at the taxpayers' expense?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Joseph Mario Jacques Olivier: Mr. Speaker, once again, the Progressive Conservative Party did not spend enough time on its homework.
Let me give an example. Notices were published across the country. In fact, the Opposition Critic mentioned that jobs were available with the Canada Sports Pool Corporation. There were 1,200 job applications across the country. We are still examining these applications and interviewing prospective candidates.
Membership in the Liberal Party, Progressive Conservative Party or the New Democratic Party is not a requirement. However, if there happen to be intelligent individuals in the Canada Sports Pool Corporation who support the Liberal Party, all I can say to them is: thank you! They are just smarter than the rest. They know we want to do something for amateur sports. They know we want to make the Pool a success. In fact, we want to try and make up for the complete mess the Progressive Conservative Party made when it signed the agreement in 1979 and gave everything to the provinces, leaving nothing for amateur sports in Canada, for the Calgary Olympics, the Canada Games, the Panamerican Games or the Commonwealth Games! That was the policy of the Progressive Conservative Party.


Mr. Bosley:: And, Mr. Speaker, the Liberals will never bring in wage and price controls either.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!
May 24, 1984


REQUEST FOR APPOINTMENT LIST-REFERENCE TO LOTO CANADA EXPERIENCE
John William Bosley: Mr. Speaker, my question to the same Minister is very simple and is in two parts. Will the Minister file with this House a complete list of all those who have been hired?
Secondly, since the Minister says people have been hired because of their Loto Canada experience, will he tell this House which of the following is the truth-one, that the Sports Pool is not a lottery, in which case using the defence of lottery experience is just a sham and cover-up for hiring Liberal organizers, or, that the Sports Pool is a lottery and that experience is useful, in which case the Minister has broken his agreement with the provinces?
[ Translation)


Joseph Mario Jacques Olivier: First of all, Mr. Speaker, anyone who has worked for Loto Canada has gained an experience which can be useful in sports pools since he is expected to contact retailers and corner store owners to ask them whether they are interested in supporting a worthwhile endeavour from coast to coast. We do have previous experience and we recall that the provinces asked us to sign that agreement because there were profits to be made. You decided to let the provinces take over the whole operation, which is a fair indication that Loto Canada employees were doing a good job and running a profitable business. And if the Canadian Sports Pool Corporation thought that anyone who had worked for Loto Canada had good credentials, I said: Indeed, Sir, that is true!


John William Bosley: Some day, Mr. Speaker, the Minister is going to have to admit that the Government of Canada made a great deal more money out of that agreement than it is going to make out of the way this Government is running the proposal.


RATIONALE FOR CREATION OF SPORTS POOL
John William Bosley: Mr. Speaker, my question to the Minister is quite simple. The Minister knows full well that the experience with sports pools has not been good and that the probable financial success of this particular corporation is in some doubt, in the minds of many people. Given the evidence produced by the press, will the Minister now finally admit that the real reason behind creating the Sports Pool was not the Olympics, was not medical research, and was not amateur sport, but was in fact an opportunity created by the Government to put back on the public payroll, at big salaries and huge expense, Liberals who were put out of work when Loto Canada was killed?


Joseph Mario Jacques Olivier: Mr. Speaker, it is inconceivable that Members opposite have yet to understand that we need money to help
Oral Questions
amateur sports in Canada. Since we are talking about money, people have had enough of taxes, and the only way to find a new source of revenue was to set up the Canadian Sports Pool Corporation, and that is why we created it. The Progressive Conservatives are free to speak against amateur sports and raise objections against the fact that we want to help Calgary. But we are in favour of that, we are in favour of promoting medical research and we want to do everything we can to support amateur sports. If they are against that, so be it!


PENSIONS
Ian Deans: Mr. Speaker, my question is not about lotteries, although what I am going to ask the Minister of Finance about is rapidly turning into a bit of a game of chance. Recognizing that Canadians contributing to pension plans are entitled to expect that their hard-earned contributions will entitle them to a reasonable return when they retire, will the Minister take a look at some recent cases, such as Prestolite in 1978, and the most recent being CCM, which left 450 workers without any pension benefits, and determine how it can be that the federal Government, through the Enterprise Development Program, bailed out the Royal Bank, CCM's major creditor, to the tune of $8 million, while every single one of its 450 employees lost their pension benefits because CCM closed down?


Hon. Marc Lalonde (Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member is certainly aware that a Parliamentary committee has carried out a complete review of the various pension schemes and tabled its report. Based on this report, I proposed in my last budget a number of improvements to the Canada Pension Plan. I hope Parliament will support my recommendations and proposals. I should like to remind the Hon. Member, however, that over 80 per cent of corporate pension funds in Canada come under provincial jurisdiction. If he considers the cases which he has referred to, I think he will realize that these particular pension funds were regulated by the government of Ontario, and that the regulation and control of the pension funds in question were a provincial responsibility.
Now, this remains a serious problem which should be under constant review by both the federal and provincial levels of government.
As to the assistance provided under the Enterprise Development Program, it was meant to maintain jobs in an industry faced with major difficulties and not to salvage a particular bank.

May 24, 1984
Oral Questions


REQUEST FOR LEGISLATION TO PROTECT WORKERS' PENSIONS
Ian Deans: Mr. Speaker, I put it to the Minister that the problem does not require further study. It is clear that employees who have contributed over the years to company pension plans in Canada face the risk, in fact the probability, that during economically depressed times such as we have been having, their pension plans will disappear with their jobs. Will the Minister bring forward legislative proposals to alter the Canada and Quebec Pension Plans to ensure that the pension contributions of employees, whether private or public, will be protected in the same way as the Royal Bank investment was protected in the case of CCM?


Marc Lalonde: Mr. Speaker, obviously the Hon. Member will have to do a little bit of study himself after having said the problem does not need study. In his first question he asked me whether I would study the matter, and then in his second question he said it does not need study. He should at least be consistent from one question to the other.
The Hon. Member suggests that we should amend the Canada and Quebec Pension Plans to achieve the purpose he mentions. He knows, or should know, that it is not by amending the Canada and Quebec Pension Plans that you can achieve that purpose. Contributions under the Canada and Quebec Pension Plans are fully protected, by the Quebec Government in the case of the Quebec Pension Plan, and by the Canadian Government in the case of the CPP. What the Hon. Member is worried about is private pension plans, and this is outside of the ambit of the Quebec and Canada Pension Plans. As I mentioned before, over 80 per cent of the pension plans in the private sector are under the control of the provinces. The question of the specific cases he has referred to should be addressed in particular to the Governments of the provinces concerned.


PROTECTION OF PRIVATE PENSION PLANS
Ian Deans: Mr. Speaker, as you know, I did not ask the Minister to study it further; I asked him to investigate that specific instance. More important, I know that the Canada and Quebec Pension Plans do not cover it, otherwise I would not have asked for changes in the law to cover it.
Will the Minister recognize the need for protection of private pension plans into which people have been paying all their lives? Will he recognize that there are significant numbers of workers in Canada who are now over the age of 55, who cannot find employment or get unemployment insurance because they have run out of benefits, and who do not qualify for assistance, and they cannot even get their pension money? Will the Government move to negotiate changes in the pension arrangements in order to protect the pension investments of Canadian workers?


Marc Lalonde: Mr. Speaker, if the Hon. Member is asking whether the federal Government will discuss this particular issue with the provinces and see whether they can take steps in their own area of jurisdiction to ensure better protection under pension plans, of course we will do it. We have been doing it in the past, and we will continue to do it.
However, as far as imposing any particular legislation on the provinces in that regard is concerned, the Hon. Member knows that this cannot be done and should not be done.


NORTH ATLANTIC TREATY ORGANIZATION
Mr. Harvie Andre (Calgary Centre):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Defence. Last November 18 in reply to a question from myself here in the House, the Minister stated, as reported on page 28979 of Hansard, that "Canada needs to take a back seat to no one in terms of its NATO contribution." At approximately the same time the Minister was presenting to his Cabinet colleagues a document that stated, among other things, and 1 quote:
If a major international crisis were to occur, the Canadian Forces could not make a credible contribution to deterrence.
The fundamental purpose of NATO is deterrence. By the Minister's own words in this Cabinet document, we contribute nothing to deterrences. For the sake of his own credibility, would the Minister at least admit to the House that he was in error last November and that in fact Canada is not contributing significantly, or even modestly, to NATO deterrences?


Hon.   J.-J. Blais@Minister of National Defence: Mr. Speaker, the statement I made in November was valid in November. The statement I made then is still valid today. If the hon. gentleman were honest, Mr. Speaker, he would recognize that he had made allegations of like kind on a number of occasions in committee. I responded at that time. If he reviews the transcripts of the committee hearings he will see that I maintained the strength of Canada's contribution to NATO. I maintained, as well, the competence of that contribution.
The hon. gentleman knows that he made allegations which he claims were supposedly contained in a leaked document. He knows that I have refused to comment on any leaked document. He knows furthermore, Mr. Speaker, that if there were such a document, being a Cabinet document, it could not be subject to comment.


Harvie Andre: Mr. Speaker, one wonders how the Government expects to receive any respect at all from Canadians or our NATO allies, with that kind of attitude.
May 24, 1984


REQUEST FOR POLICY CHANGE
Harvie Andre: Mr. Speaker, the Cabinet document describes the sad condition of all three services, but in particular the Navy. It points out, as other people have done, that by the end of this decade we will have 12 serviceable ships in the Navy for a country with a coastline 100,000 kilometres long. As the Minister has pointed out in that Cabinet document, the Navy cannot live up to its defence commitments.
I will quote from the public record of what the Minister stated before the Senate. He said:
Currently approved funding levels fall some billions of dollars from the levels that would be necessary over the next 15 years to completely modernize the maritime force at the currently authorized levels.
In other words, this public statement by the Minister confirms what the Minister said in his Cabinet document, namely, that it is a facade to pretend that our maritime forces are living up to NATO commitments.
If the Minister is not going to commit, to use his own words, the billions of dollars the Navy requires, will he at least have the integrity to admit that we shall have to change our defence policies and rely even more on the Americans to protect our coastline because we are incapable of doing it ourselves?


Hon.   J.-J. Blais@Minister of National Defence: Mr. Speaker the hon. gentleman recognizes that last July I signed a contract to obtain six new frigates. The hon. gentleman knows as well that at the same time I announced the TRUMP, the Tribal Class Update Modernization Program. The hon. gentleman knows that those two programs were advanced in recognition that we needed to update our capital equipment in terms of the Maritime Command. There is no great mystery in that, Mr. Speaker. That is all part of the Government's attempt since 1974-75 to increase our investment dramatically in capital equipment.
The hon. gentleman will recall that in 1974-75 the Government spent $2.5 billion in defence expenditures. At that time the percentage given to capital equipment was roughly 8 per cent. This year I will be spending $8.7 billion. That is more than a $6 billion increase in 10 years in defence expenditures, Mr. Speaker. This year I will be spending over 26 per cent, as compared to 8 per cent in 1974-75, on capital equipment. That is a tremendous increase, Mr. Speaker. It is money well spent. We will continue to increase our spending in this area. In 1986-87 I will be spending $11.1 billion, Mr. Speaker, in order to provide the best equipment for the best Armed Forces there are within NATO.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Nielsen:: You will not be around.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: The Hon. Member for York-Peel. Does the Hon. Minister of National Defence rise to be recognized?


Jean-Jacques Blais: I rise to complete my reply, Mr. Speaker.
Oral Questions


Mr. Speaker:: It appeared that the Hon. Minister had given a fairly lengthy reply. The Hon. Member for York Peel.


RATE OF GROWTH IN DEFENCE EXPENDITURES
Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Mr. Speaker, my question is also for the Minister of National Defence. Would the Minister simply assure the House that the Government has indeed approved the maintenance of a 3 per cent annual real growth in expenditures for defence for this fiscal year and for the fiscal years 1986 and 1987?


Hon.   J.-J. Blais@Minister of National Defence: Mr. Speaker, I am glad that the hon. gentleman asked me that question. As you will recall, in 1979-80 when the hon. gentleman was President of the Treasury Board he was referred to as "Sine the Slasher". Those were the days when we did not meet the 3 per cent net increase which the hon. gentleman mentions. In effect there was a net decrease in defence expenditures during the time when that hon. gentleman was responsible for the direct Treasury, Mr. Speaker.
As far as the Government is concerned, we are maintaining our 3 per cent increase. As I advised the Committee on External Affairs and National Defence this week, I have accepted to submit to my colleagues a force goal for NATO of a net increase of 4 per cent in real expenditures for the military.


REQUEST FOR GOVERNMENT COMMITMENT
Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary question is also for the Minister of National Defence. I would like him to answer the question that I put. Would he indicate to the House whether the Government has definitively committed to a 3 per cent real growth expenditure increase not only for this fiscal year, but for the fiscal years 1986 and 1987? In short, can he assure the House that the Government has agreed to fund fully its commitment to NATO and our defence commitments generally at a 3 per cent real growth rate for the years to which I have referred?


Hon.   J.-J. Blais@Minister of National Defence: Mr. Speaker, I was in Brussels last week.


Erik Nielsen: Yes or no?


Jean-Jacques Blais: The Member for Parry Sound-Muskoka was with me at the time I made this statement. I indicated that Canada's undertaking to meet the 3 per cent real growth commitment is a real one, and one which I propose to honour.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Is it approved?


Jean-Jacques Blais: I suggest again, Mr. Speaker, that the proof of the Government's performance lies in how we have done in the past. Over the past five years, except for the time when the hon. gentleman was in government, our real rate of increase was 3.5 per cent in terms of defence expenditures.

May 24, 1984
Oral Questions BROADCASTING


CONTROL OF ABUSIVE PROGRAMMING
Mr. Jack Masters (Thunder Bay-Nipigon):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Communications. Pornography is an increasing concern to Canadians. At the moment the Subcommittee on Communications and Culture is studying sexual abuse in broadcasting. Is the Minister contemplating any action on Bill C-20, which is an Act to amend the Broadcasting Act, to address what is a very great concern to many Canadians?


Hon. Francis Fox (Minister of Communications):: Mr. Speaker, this is indeed an issue which we take very seriously. I have followed very closely the proceedings of the Special Committee on Communications and Culture which has heard a number of witnesses on this issue. I have also had the opportunity to discuss it at length with the Minister of State responsible for the Status of Women, and with my Cabinet colleagues. We have indeed decided to introduce an amendment to Bill C-20 to deal with the problem of abusive programming, particularly as it relates to women.
I think that this amendment will indeed make explicit the Government's commitment to the principle that all Canadians have the right to programming which respects the dignity and equality of individuals and groups. I would very much hope that we would have the co-operation of the Opposition to see to it that this amendment to Bill C-20, along with Bill C-20 as a whole, is adopted by the House as soon as possible.


HOUSING
Mr. Dan Heap (Spadina):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Public Works, who is responsible for housing. As the Minister knows, his Government allotted SI.8 billion in 1983 to subsidize housing in Canada. Of that, $372.5 million went to non profit housing, including co-ops, and $393.4 million to publicly owned housing, which is about 41 per cent of the total. The other 59 per cent went to private profit builders and renovators.
Considering that private profit builders serve the more affluent people in Canada and that subsidies to them encourage inflation of housing costs, why did the Government give nearly three-fifths of the total subsidy to the affluent, and a little over two-fifths to the needy?


Hon. Romeo LeBlanc (Minister of Public Works):: Mr. Speaker, while not accepting the Hon. Member's convoluted arithmetic, I would tell him that this Government, in social housing terms, has done a great deal. In fact, if the Hon. Member bothers to look at the annual expenditure, he will
realize that this Government does more than all of the provinces put together.
The Hon. Member also confuses different types of housing which constitute social housing. That is why, if he attends meetings like the one held in Toronto the other night, he may be tempted to confuse co-op housing and social housing. The reality is that the problem of co-operative housing concerns the percentage of those who are assisted and who benefit from the program. In fact the Hon. Member should know that the queue of those waiting for social housing, including singles, ex-psychiatric patients, and battered women, is growing longer. It is to these groups that I have tried to give some attention in the past couple of years.


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: If the Hon. Minister had accepted the invitation that he was extended to meet with 700 people on Tuesday, he could have presented that point directly and tried to make it credible. In fact, he dodges the arithmetic that he talks about.


FUNDING FOR CO-OPERATIVE HOUSING
Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: Mr. Speaker, the Minister has reduced the total social housing budget for this year by 10 per cent, to 22,500 allocations, but he has cut co-op housing by 45 per cent, to 3,339 allocations. Since his own CMHC report admitted last year that the capital costs of co-op housing are not significantly different from the capital costs of private profit housing, will he tell us why he has so savagely cut the allocations for co-op housing, and will he announce now where he will place the 7,653 allocations that he has not yet announced this far into 1984?


Roméo LeBlanc: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member should know from answers in the House that in fact, for a number of years, we had been given more than the normal allocation in social housing units in order to create some economic activity. It was understood all along by those who bothered to find out that, at one point, we would come back to the 22,500 level, where we are this year.
As for the reduction in one type of social housing, co-op housing, again I say to the Hon. Member that, as we face the problems of homeless singles, the problem of ex-psychiatric patients who have nowhere to go, and as we face the problems of rural and native housing, housing those who are the worst housed people in our country, we had to do some reallocation, and that is what I have done.


NATIONAL REVENUE
Henry Perrin Beatty: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of National Revenue. It concerns the economic intelligence network of his Department, which appears to have been set up by someone who has seen too many B movies and felt it was necessary to
May 24, 1984

have a group of gum shoes within the tax Department. In view of the fact that his chief of audit, Mr. Robertson, said that the group was killed because he found it frightening in its perception, why was the group ever established in the first place? Was it established with the knowledge of the then Minister? Precisely what was the nature of the information which the group hoped to get from External Affairs, the RCMP, FIRA, Statistics Canada, Energy, Mines and Resources, and from informers?


Hon. Pierre Bussieres (Minister of National Revenue):: Mr. Speaker, I think the Hon. Member was perfectly right in stressing the fact that this group was never operational and that, after the concept was developed, the departmental authorities decided that it did not meet its objectives. I am in complete agreement with this decision.
The idea was to have a special group appointed to collect information on larger companies, which information could be used to further clarify certain income tax returns. As was indicated by the Hon. Member, when this concept was developed, it was not considered to be compatible with the objectives of the Department and it was felt that it would not be proper to implement such a system in view of the nature and the function of the Department. In other words, this system was never put into effect and has never been operational.


APPROVAL FOR CREATION OF NETWORK
Henry Perrin Beatty: Mr. Speaker, was the previous Minister aware of this group? Did he approve of the creation of this group within his Department? Second, would the Minister tell the House whether any files were developed, such as files on individuals or specific taxpayers and, if so, what has been done with those files?
Finally, will the Minister give the House the unequivocal assurance that this group has not simply been buried within his Department and reconstituted within another branch of his Department?


Pierre Bussières: Mr. Speaker, on the first question about whether or not my predecessor had given his approval, I shall have to check first. In the second place, I would like to assure the Hon. Member that this system is not operational in any form whatsoever in the Department and that we have no intention of using it in any way.
Oral Questions


STATISTICS CANADA
Thomas Gordon Towers: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Supply and Services. Has the Department of Supply and Services, through Statistics Canada, ever provided any information for the Department of Revenue?


Hon. Charles Lapointe (Minister of Supply and Services):: As I stated in a press release at noon, Mr. Speaker, I would suggest it is quite irresponsible to imply even indirectly that Statistics Canada does not maintain full confidentiality with respect to data collected from Canadians. Statistics Canada has now been in existence for 65 years and that has always been the basic principle underlying all its operations. Under no circumstance has any Statistics Canada employee given information to any spy ring whatever, as reported in the article. Indeed, any employee who would release that kind of information would be subject to legal action under the law.


THE ADMINISTRATION
Hon. Don Mazankowski (Vegreville):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct my question to the Prime Minister. In the course of his discussions with the Liberal leadership candidates about campaign guidelines, was the issue of the acceptance or renewing of directorships on prominent boards of directors of Canadian companies ever raised and discussed? If so, were there guidelines established? I ask this in light of the fact that one of the candidates, since the campaign started, has accepted the renewal of his appointment to the board of directors of CPR, and just yesterday it was reported that the same candidate, Mr. Turner, accepted re-election to the board of directors of Seagram's, which prompted the Chairman of Seagram's to state: "From a Seagram standpoint it would not be a bad thing to have a future Prime Minister on our board". Would the Prime Minister indicate whether that was discussed during his discussions with the candidates?


Right Hon. P. E. Trudeau (Prime Minister):: The answer to the question is no, Mr. Speaker. However, I would volunteer that statements by third parties have nothing to do with what the leadership candidates and myself have said to each other.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Will the Prime Minister not agree, as I am sure most people would, that the statement made by the Chairman of Seagram's implies an expectation of favouritism? Does the Prime Minister not think statements like that and candidates reaccepting appointments to boards really serve to

May 24, 1984
Oral Questions
tarnish the image and, indeed, the credibility of people in public life?
[DOT] (M50)


CPR DIRECTORSHIP
Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, may I ask the Prime Minister how can the farmers of Canada have any hope, confidence, and trust in this administration when the Minister of Transport is so closely aligned to one of the leadership candidates, Mr. Turner, who is on the board of directors of CPR? Furthermore this situation is compounded by the fact that the former chairman of the CPR is serving in the Senate, and the former chairman of the CNR is serving as the Grain Transport Agency Administrator. How can farmers expect to get a fair deal from this regime?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member is free to do what I would not want to do, that is, to take sides in favour of one, or against one of the federal leadership candidates. I do not believe he has a delegate's vote. I take it that his enjoinder to people on this side is hidden support for the Minister of Agriculture, which I am sure the Minister of Agriculture will acknowledge.


METRIC CONVERSION
Mr. Bill Domm (Peterborough):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs. She was asked on November 2 if she would enforce metric regulations after Judge William Ross said it was legal to use imperial measurement. The Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs said:
-the law prevails and we will not be able to enforce any of those regulations in the Province of Ontario.
She later amended this statement to include all of Canada.
Why does the Minister propose to ignore the law now and, according to her recent press release, pass an Order in Council in July, after Parliament recesses in June, which would make mandatory the use of metric weigh scales?


Hon. Judy Erola (Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member is manufacturing statements that are not included in the press release. I recommend he buy himself a new pair of glasses and read the press release again. The press release states very clearly that we have gazetted our intention, as provided to us by an Act of Parliament, to regulate metric and imperial advertising. We are, indeed, extending regulations that were in effect up until the end of this year. This extension of regulations has been done because of the many, many requests that were put forward by such umbrella organizations as the Consumers' Association of Canada and the Retail Council. In fact there
were 242 member organizations at a metric forum that requested we put regulations in effect that would call for both metric and imperial advertising; advertising only. It does not refer to any use of metric scales.


William Henry (Bill) Domm: Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs might be able to convince some of those pea-brained dinosaurs in the Liberal Cabinet that it is not a new Order in Council, but I would suggest that the Minister read her own press release that says the amended regulations will be published shortly in The Canada Gazette and would become effective early in July. I say to the Minister: Pay attention to your own press releases.


SALARIES OF METRIC COMMISSION EXECUTIVES
William Henry (Bill) Domm: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs. Under the freedom of information legislation I have obtained a government document from Consumer and Corporate Affairs which indicates that $270,000 will be spent on Metric Commission executive salaries in 1984-85 representing a reduction of less than half a person year. The total salary costs for the Metric Commission in its phased-out year will exceed $1,663,000. The Minister better face up to the people of Canada. Is she going to phase out the Metric Commission, and is she going to pass Orders in Council against the decision of the Judge in the Ontario courts?


Judith A. Erola: Yes, Mr. Speaker, we are going to phase out the Metric Commission, as was the original plan laid out some time ago. The reason for the phasing out is that the work is done. Canada is now very close to being totally metric.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Judith A. Erola: And the metric forum to which the Hon. Member was invited, and in which he participated, indicated that there is overwhelming support for metric, that the children of our country are now fully familiar with the metric system. It is only the dinosaurs on the other side of the House who still cannot count.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


BEEF IMPORTS FROM COMMON MARKET COUNTRIES
Mr. Bert Hargrave (Medicine Hat):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister for International Trade. I believe he is behind the curtain.


Stan Darling: He is hiding.
May 24, 1984


Herbert Thomas (Bert) Hargrave: My question deals with the matter of subsidized Common Market beef imports. The Minister should be aware that these beef imports have already depressed our Canadian cow markets right across the country, by $5 per cwt. They have upset our normal trade patterns with the United States. The Minister should also be aware that our total beef imports for this new calendar year are up by 40 per cent, and those coming specifically from the Republic of Ireland are up by 306 per cent. In view of the fact that the Common Market has over 600,000 metric tonnes of surplus stocks of beef in storage, how can the Minister justify this extreme situation wherein Canada has certainly become the dumping ground for the Common Market's expensive mistakes with its overly rich subsidies?


Hon. Gerald Regan (Minister for International Trade):: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member outlines a situation that is factually quite accurate. There has been a vast increase in the shipment, from Ireland in particular, of beef into the Canadian market. As I believe I indicated to the Hon. Member, or to some other Member in the House on a previous date, to guard against the situation of dumping, if the Hon. Member is suggesting-to use that word-that pricewise this meat is being dumped, as well may be the case, then there is provision in Canadian law for the people who are being affected to take action by way of making a dumping complaint, which triggers an investigation that can result and will result, if the facts are there, in restrictions being placed on that unfair competition to Canadian producers.
The Government has provided these laws to give that sort of protection to Canadians who produce, in this case, meat. But it is they who are being affected and they must initiate an action in order for a remedy to be provided in this regard.
In relation to what the Hon. Member says about the European Community's agricultural practices, there is no question but that the practices they are following are, in effect, subsidizing many of their agricultural exports, are wasteful, costly to their own taxpayers, and have a very disturbing impact upon world trade.


Herbert Thomas (Bert) Hargrave: Mr. Speaker, let me say to the Minister that the cattle producers of Canada are very much aware of these regulations and particularly of how long it takes to get action. The Government, as recently as last week, did indicate some support for the recommendations of the beef import advisory committee. It is a situation almost as serious, right now, as in 1975-76 when we had unrestricted access to our markets by off-shore imports. That is how serious it is right now, Mr. Speaker.


GOVERNMENT POLICY
Herbert Thomas (Bert) Hargrave: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the Minister for International Trade. Is it possible that the Government's reluctance to act now, or earlier since it has known about this since February 16, relates to the current Liberal leadership campaign to be
Oral Questions
followed by the election, of course, and the well know Liberal policy approach of a cheap food policy in Canada?


Gerald Augustine Regan: Mr. Speaker, I want to say it has absolutely no relationship to anything of that type. The Hon. Member has to realize that, rightly or wrongly, the law provides a certain trigger for the investigation to take place. That is the same law that was in existence when the Clark Government was in office, and it is in existence now. It is a very sensible provision, and it is one which many countries have to deal with in these sorts of situations. Producers should take advantage of that provision. Certainly we are anxious to provide all appropriate protection against unfair overseas competition such as dumping. If the Hon. Member has time later this afternoon, he should drop down to my office and we can talk to the officials in the Department to see whether there is anything else we can do.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
Hon. Edward Broadbent (Oshawa):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. It concerns the brainwashing of a number of Canadian citizens in Montreal, funded by the CIA of the United States. In a letter to the Hon. Member for Winnipeg North written on May 10, the Minister described this act as a breach of sovereignty. Also he indicated that the Government of the United States had orally expressed its apology. Unfortunately, a spokesperson for the United States denies that what the Minister said is the case.
Considering that the public revelation of such regrets or an apology is an important means for these Canadians to obtain justice in the U.S. courts, will the Minister tell the House what official of the U.S. State Department, or of the CIA, made the apology?


Hon. Allan J. MacEachen (Deputy Prime Minister and Secretary of State for External Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, the expression of apology or regrets made by the representatives of the United States, or a representative of the United States, took place some years ago. There was an exchange of correspondence by one of my predecessors, the present High Commissioner to the United Kingdom, in which I believe he conveyed to a Member of Parliament the fact that a representative of the United States had expressed regret at this incident in Montreal.
There are other corroborative evidences within the Department by individuals still serving in the Department who recall this particular incident. There is no doubt in my mind that at that time there was an expression of regrets or an apology by the Government of the United States or a representative of the State Department.

May 24, 1984
Business of the House
Recently that has been denied or reinterpreted by a representative of the United States Embassy in Ottawa. Quite apart from that particular point-and it is an important one-the officials of my Department are under standing instructions to continue to press vigorously the case of those Canadians who, we believe, suffered an injustice in the experimental psychiatry which took place at the Allan Memorial Institute in Montreal.


PETITION
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: Order, please. I have the honour to inform the House that the petition presented by the Hon. Member for Winnipeg-Birds Hill (Mr. Blaikie) on Wednesday, May 23, 1984, meets the requirements of the Standing Orders as to form.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: The attention of the Chair has been drawn to an unparliamentary remark which appears on page 3953 of Hansard. The remark is attributed to the Hon. Member for Lethbridge-Foothills (Mr. Thacker). If it is correctly attributed, perhaps he would like to withdraw the unparliamentary remark.


Mr. Blaine A. Thacker (Lethbridge-Foothills):: Mr. Speaker, I draw your attention to Hansard of May 23, in which I am reported as having called the Hon. Member for Cowichan-Malahat-The Islands (Mr. Manly) a liar. I said: "You're a liar". What I should have said is that he was not telling the truth. In view of the fact that the Hon. Member is a man of the cloth, his remarks so enraged me that I said: "You're a liar". I withdraw that remark.


BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, would the Government House Leader outline for us the proposed business of the House of Commons for next week?


Mr. Pinard:: Mr. Speaker, tomorrow we will be dealing with second reading of Bill C-33. On Monday, we will start debating second reading stage of Bill C-25, respecting CDIC. On Tuesday and Wednesday of next week, we will start debating a Bill that will be introduced tomorrow, notice of which has been given on page X of the Order Paper. It is an Act to amend the National Housing Act. This Bill is interrelated to our mortgage protection plan. There is another Bill which is interrelated to the same plan and it will also be introduced tomorrow. It is intituled: "An Act to amend the Interest Act". These two
Bills are interrelated to our mortgage interest protection plan. The first one to be dealt with on Tuesday will be the one amending the National Housing Act. Those two Bills will be introduced tomorrow and will be debated on Tuesday and Wednesday of next week.
Finally, next Thursday will be another Opposition Day. Therefore I designate next Thursday as an Opposition Day. This is all subject to change, as usual.


Ian Deans: Mr. Speaker, I would have normally raised the question I am about to ask at the House Leaders' meeting, but because of the way the business was called, we did not have one today. Is the Government House Leader in a position to tell us what is the Government's intention with regard to Bill C-34?
Last week I raised a question about making provision for fast passage of the Bill. I offered to have the Bill go through second reading with one speaker from this Party, and I hoped to hear from the Conservatives that they too would be prepared to agree to a similar arrangement. I know the Minister of Labour has written to both the Leader of the Official Opposition and to the Leader of the New Democratic Party indicating that he would be willing to have the Bill pass through all stages expeditiously, meaning before the end of June, before the House rises, if we could agree to one speaker per Party at second reading and refer the Bill to committee.
Could the Government House Leader schedule in the next couple of weeks Bill C-34, the changes to the Canada Labour Code, in order that we might be able to have it passed into law before the summer recess?


Yvon Pinard: My hon. colleague will understand that it will be much easier for me to answer his question once the Leader of the Official Opposition replies to the letter sent to him by the Minister responsible for the legislation.
If the Minister has offered to debate the Bill and send it to committee with one speaker per Party, there is no question that the Government will support him. We will be ready to call this Bill within the reasonable delay mentioned, provided we have the agreement of the two Opposition Parties. It is somewhat early because the letter was sent only at the beginning of this week, but we do not know as yet what is the position of the Official Opposition. If there is an understanding among the Parties, certainly we will make it possible for one speaker per Party to be heard within the delay mentioned by the Hon. Member, provided that we have an answer within the next few days.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, this is all very interesting. I gather from the remarks of the Government House Leader that from now on I will negotiate House business with the Minister of Labour. I want to tell the Minister of Labour that as soon as I have an opportunity of seeing his letter, which was addressed to my Leader, I will get back to him and talk about what we will do in the next few weeks in terms of House business.
May 24, 1984


Ian Deans: I hope the Hon. House Leader for the Official Opposition will not go away and stamp his foot in the corner. 1 want to make it clear that from the point of view of this Party, although the Bill is not all we would have wanted to see, it is better than what pertains at the moment. We are prepared to do what must be done in order to see it become law before the House rises for the summer.


Ms. McDonald:: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Government House Leader concerning Bill C-19. Is it the Government's intention to bring in for debate at second reading the whole Bill, will it withdraw the Bill and bring in those parts for which there is agreement for speedy passage, or what?


Yvon Pinard: Perhaps the Hon. Member would see fit to raise the matter with her House Leader. We have already discussed it in a House Leaders' meeting. I intend to discuss it even further, if need be.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Mr. Jean-Robert Gauthier (Ottawa-Vanier):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present the first report of the Standing Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Commons on Official Languages Policy and Programs.
[Editors Note: For report referred to above, see today's Votes and Proceedings.]


NATIONAL REVENUE
Pierre Bussières: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 46(2), I wish to table the final report of the Study Group on Communications of Revenue Canada, Taxation Division.


PETITIONS
Mr. Gilbert Parent (Welland):: Mr. Speaker, I have a petition to the Honourable the House of Commons of Canada
Order Paper Questions
in Parliament assembled. The undersigned residents of Canada concerned about world peace humbly sheweth that they are members and well-wishers of the United Nations Association of Canada and are pleased to note that under the Right Hon. Pierre E. Trudeau's able leadership, Canada is attempting to excel in the arts of peace. They applaud the Prime Minister's courage and statesmanship and extend their warmest support in his lofty quest to bring about world peace and harmony. They urge the Prime Minister to persevere in the cause of world peace however great the odds against it might be. If through Canadian efforts the two superpowers are able to reach a meaningful arms control agreement, history may record that this was Canada's finest hour. And as in duty bound your petitioners will ever pray.


Mr. Albert Cooper (Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, I have the pleasure to present a petition on behalf of a number of people from the Worsley area in my riding concerning the Lord's Day Act and some of their concerns in that particular area.


QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER
[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)
Mr. John Evans (Parliamentary Secretary to President of the Privy Council):: Mr. Speaker, the following questions will be answered today: Nos. 403 and 530.


Mr. Howie: Did the Government incur any legal costs with respect to the Gulf of Maine boundary dispute and, if so, to date what (a) amount (b) is the estimated total cost of completion of the project?


Allan Joseph MacEachen: (a) The legal fees paid by the Government with respect to the Gulf of Maine maritime boundary case amount to $1,006,914.
(b) It is estimated that the total legal fees to the completion of the case will be $2,200,000, that is approximately $1,200,000 additional to the fees already paid.


Mr. Howie: What are the (a) names (b) positions of the persons who occupy positions on the Executive and Board of Directors of the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation and, in each case, what amount was he/she paid in respect of that position in the fiscal year ended March 31, 1983?


Roméo LeBlanc: I am
informed by Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation as follows:

May 24, 1984
Order Paper Questions
Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation
Members of the Board of Directors (April 1, 1982- March 31, 1983)
Name	Board of Directors	Executive Committee	Position	Annual Directors' Fees Salary RangeMr. Raymond V. Hession (Apr/82 - June/82)	X	X	President Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation	$66,800 - $78,800Mr. Raymond J. Boivin (Apr/82 - June/82)	X	X	Vice-President Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation	$65,600 - $77,200Mr. Raymond J. Boivin (July/82 - Mar/83)	X	X	Acting President Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation	$75,360-$88,610Mr. Jean T. Fournier (June/82 - Mar/83)	X	Assistant Deputy Minister Department of Finance	*Mr. Timothy E. Reid (Apr/82 - May/82)	X	Assistant Deputy Minister Department of Regional Economic Expansion	[DOT]Mr. Gerard L. Veilleux	X	Secretary to the Cabinet for Federal/Provincial Relations and Deputy Clerk of the Privy Council	*Mr. Frank J. Callaghan	X	X	President, D.B. and J. (1971) Inc. Charlottetown, P.E.I.	$3,021Mrs. Christine D. McKee	X	University Ombudsman, University of Manitoba Winnipeg, Manitoba	$1,749Mr. R. Jacques Plante	X	X	President, Perspective Travail Inc. Quebec, Quebec	$3,462Mrs. Sylvia J. Sutherland	X	TV-Radio Broadcaster CHEX Television Peterborough, Ontario	$2,834Mr. Ben Wosk, C.M.	X	President	$1,449Apr/82 - Mar/83)	Wosk's Ltd.
Vancouver, B.C.
Vacancy - Chairman of the Board
* Do not receive an honorarium due to their position with the Government. The Directors who are not public servants receive an honorarium of $150 per day for attendance at meeting plus reasonable travelling expenses.


John Leslie Evans: Mr. Speaker, if question No. 184 could be made an order for return, this return would be tabled immediately.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: Is it the pleasure of the House that question No. 184 be made an order for return?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Mr. Blenkarn: 1.	In the fiscal year (a) 1981-82 (b) 1982-83 were outside consultants employed by the then Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce and, if so (i) how many (ii) what was the total amount paid?
2.	Were any consultants paid more than $20,000 and, if so, in each case what (a) was his/her name (b) was the amount (c) services were provided?
Return tabled.


Mr. McKinnon:: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. 1 again ask about Question No. 368 which has been on various Order Papers for over three years. I have not yet received a reply. It is inconceivable that the Department of National Defence does not know how much it has increased its expenditures year by year over several years, as asked in the question. I would like an answer so that we can stop the misleading statements, such as the one we heard today from the Minister of National Defence about the expenditures of National Defence over the last few years.


John Leslie Evans: Mr. Speaker, it seems that the Hon. Member is proceeding right here and now to say that the Minister of National Defence was misleading the House during Question Period. The Minister responded to a question, perhaps not over the entire time period the Hon. Member is concerned about, but certainly over the time period for the last five years, indicating today that the increase in spending had been 3.5 per cent. If that is not an adequate time period, we will try to get that answer for the Hon. Member. However, the Minister made that statement today. The statement has to be presumed to be correct, as the Standing Orders imply. That should satisfy to a great extent the Hon. Member's question.
May 24, 1984


Mr. McKenzie:: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Parliamentary Secretary about question No. 11. I have raised this matter a number of times. We are having extreme difficulty with Mr. Michael Warren of Canada Post with regard to obtaining information on the operations of Canada Post. I could make no headway with him in committee.
Will the Parliamentary Secretary inquire why I cannot get an answer to question No. 11 which was placed on the Order Paper over a year ago? It is in connection with the salary range of all 26 vice-presidents and regional directors. A year is far too long to answer a question like that. I would like him to find this out for us because Mr. Warren will be back in committee and this information will be very helpful.
I have raised this question also a number of times and perhaps the Parliamentary Secretary can explain what is causing the delay in answering question No. 13, which was originally placed on the Order Paper on November 18, 1981. It is with regard to-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: Order, please. It is only necessary to mention the question number in order to get the reply from the Parliamentary Secretary.


A. Daniel McKenzie: Also question No. 2 asking why the Minister has two private parking stalls at the international airport. There is also the question which I placed on the Order Paper in October last year, question No. 5, a Public Works identity question.
The next one is extremely important to Manitoba. I would appreciate it if the Parliamentary Secretary would check into question No. 6 with regard to Secretary of State grants to multicultural groups in Manitoba. We want to find out who is receiving this funding. Is it just certain select groups?
A very important question was placed on the Order Paper in November last year, question No. 1 with regard to promotional practices in the Department of National Defence. There is considerable confusion. I would appreciate receiving an answer in a reasonable period of time.
I have raised some of these questions half a dozen times or more. We never get any kind of an answer as to what is causing the delay. I would like the commitment that the Parliamentary Secretary will come back with some kind of an answer, say next week, as to what is causing the delay.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: It is quite clear that there is no obligation on the part of the Government to reply. The Hon. Member can raise his points. He should mention only the question numbers and not elaborate too much on the questions themselves.


John Leslie Evans: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member should know that I am not in a position to make any commitment on behalf of Ministers. The questions are submitted to the Ministers and the Departments. The Ministers make every effort to get the replies as they are able. I can but ask that the process be examined and that they speed up the process if possible. I will do that, but I certainly cannot make a commitment on behalf
Supply
of the Minister to answer a question which, as you have said, Mr. Speaker, there is no obligation to answer in the first place.


Mr. Hawkes:: Mr. Speaker, I would like the attention of the Parliamentary Secretary for a second. When I was first elected to this Chamber, before questions were answered we would get notification that our question would be answered. We also received the answers at our desks here in the House of Commons. That system has changed recently. Answers now come to our office some 24 hours later. I wonder whether or not the Parliamentary Secretary, when he does answer a question, could see that we receive the answers in the House as well as receiving notification that the question is about to be answered.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: Order, please. That is a procedural matter and the Chair will look into it.
The questions as enumerated by the Hon. Parliamentary Secretary have been answered. Shall the remaining questions be allowed to stand?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Wise:
That this House condemns the continuing failure of the Government's policies to restore even pre-recession levels of employment opportunities for young people at a time when hundreds of thousands of young Canadians are about to join the labour force from our schools and universities and Canada's unemployment rate for young adults remains the highest of any Western industrial nation.
And of the amendment of Mr. Deans:
That the motion be amended by deleting the period after the word "nation" and adding the following thereafter:
"-and in particular the Government's adoption of the United States
interest rate and monetarist policies, thereby reducing employment opportunities for young Canadians."
Gerry St. Germain: Mr. Speaker, in continuing the debate on the motion of non-confidence in the Government opposite for its policies dealing with youth unemployment, I have only five minutes left to me and much material to cover.
I will first address the situation of the Ministry of State for Youth. I am glad to see that the Minister of State for Youth (Mrs. Hervieux-Payette) has arrived in the House. Such a Ministry would be an excellent idea if it were allowed to function as a Ministry of State. The Minister's mandate was to raise the public's awareness of the concerns of youth. With all
4016

May 24, 1984
Supply
due respect, Mr. Speaker, one only needs to look around to see that the concern of youth a thousand times over is unemployment.
As well, the Minister has been placed among three other Ministers, the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Roberts), the Secretary of State (Mr. Joyal) and the Minister of the Environment (Mr. Caccia). The Ministry of State for Youth has no authority and appears to be merely a task force for advising those other Ministers. As far as I can see, the only real jobs that the Minister of State for Youth has created to date are the ones in her own Ministry. Jobs have been created for more bureaucrats.
We need action, Mr. Speaker, not smoke and mirrors. Today we are addressing the subject of the killers of youth employment, which are high interest rates, lack of recognition for research and development by the Government opposite, the devalued dollar, poor management and the buying of elections at the taxpayers' expense. I would like to deal with some of the economic reasons for the lack of youth employment.
Investor confidence in the country has been totally destroyed. That is the reason we have the unemployment rate that we have today. An estimated $50 billion Canadians have left this country in the last six years. Taxation offers no incentive to reinvest. That taxation is created by irresponsible spending by the Government. That is why we opposed Bill C-24 so aggressively, Mr. Speaker. That Bill contained no provision for accountability and that is taking away from the unemployed youth of the country. There are no rewards for risk. Dealing with regional disparity, the special employment initiatives program is a clear-cut example of that.
By their own admission, Liberal Members have pursued social programs and neglected the engine that pulls them. They have neglected the engine of free enterprise, the engine of growth and the engine of small business. FIRA was an overreaction which drove every foreign dollar out of the country. What has been done about that? Liberal Members are now trying to make amendments which would resolve the situation that they have created. That situation is another cause of the massive unemployment in the country. The implementation of the National Energy Program in western Canada was an overreaction. Jobs were lost by the thousands. Liberal Members are now trying to make amends. It goes on and on, Mr. Speaker.
Dealing with Crown corporations, $2 billion has been put into Canadair and de Havilland. In 1982, that money would have saved every small business that went bankrupt and that would have meant jobs for youth in the country. Again, high interest rates and the deficit are the real killers. What are we going to do about them, Mr. Speaker?
The Leader of the Official Opposition (Mr. Mulroney) has indicated what we will do about research and development. He said:
We're going to:
1. Double the collective Canadian contribution to this indispensable sector during our first term in office;
2.	Set priorities and develop a co-ordinated approach to government-sponsored research;
3.	Improve the linkage between government labs, universities and the private sector, with special emphasis on small business;
4.	Encourage the production of new technologies and ideas by Canadian industries;
5.	Facilitate the introduction and adaptation of innovative technology developed abroad; and
6.	Encourage the diffusion of modern technology and know-how across the country.
Why?
Because according to the National Research Council, a 1 per cent increase in R and D expenditure (as a percentage of GNP) means creating 800,000 new jobs.
It is a question of good, sound management, Mr. Speaker. I realize that my time is running out. Therefore, when dealing with an issue as important as this one, I would like to finish on a positive note. We must learn to share with our young people and train our young people. Most of all, we must allow them to have a chance to excel and be prepared to take over where we leave off. Young people today are no different than they were 30 years ago. The only difference is that we must now plan for their future so as to allow them a brighter future.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: A ten-minute period is now provided in order to question the Hon. Member about his remarks. Are there any questions? Debate.


Hon. Celine Hervieux-Payette (Minister of State (Youth)):: Mr. Speaker, during a recent trip across Canada, at meetings with young people, youth organizations, unions and management, I realized how serious the problem was, and I must say this shed an often tragic light on the tremendous difficulties facing Canadian youth, because improved business conditions have not yet had a significant impact on unemployment.
I agree with the Opposition that a situation like this is intolerable. However, I cannot agree with the Opposition motion that refers to the "continuing failure of the Government" to restore pre-recession levels of employment opportunities for young people. I do not agree, because the present Government, through a host of measures and programs and by providing financial assistance, has tried to improve prospects for our young people, and in fact, the last Budget brought down by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) earmarked $150 million for this purpose.
Just a few days ago, I announced the allocation of $131.5 million taken from this amount, which is part of the Youth Opportunity Fund created last December to improve coordination of federal expenditures for youth. The amount included $30 million more for Summer Canada, bringing the total amount up to $200 million, which should help create more than 81,000 jobs for our young people this summer.
Similarly, Canada Employment Centers for students, which at a cost of $13.6 million provide thousands of young people with jobs and which last year found employment for 333,257
May 24, 1984

young people, should be increasing that number this year, as a result of the general business recovery and with the co-operation of businessmen and even private citizens across Canada, because no matter how small the job or the employer, they will all be considered because every job counts for these young people.
We have also just added $20 million to the Career Access Program, and there again, I would urge employers not only to give young people practical assistance in entering the labour market but also to take advantage themselves of the financial benefits, and I am referring to the wage subsidy to which they are entitled while training workers to their specifications. Incidentally, Mr. Speaker, this program offers a far more practical approach than the tax rebates suggested by the Opposition, which in any case would not be immediately payable. There are many other programs for young people, programs initiated in co-operation with other federal Departments, including National Defence, Fisheries and Oceans, Indian Affairs and Northern Development, Environment, Secretary of State and other Government agencies.
There are also federal programs such as Canada Works which largely benefit young people. Over all, in 1983-84 the federal Government spent $478.3 million on job creation for 169,400 young people. In 1984-85, the Government will be spending $618.6 million for the benefit of some 185,600 young people.
Mr. Speaker, it is a fact that the federal Government's training programs also largely benefit young people. For 198485, total funding exceeds $1,226 million and out of 281,000 participants, 132,100 will be young people. I might also mention that an increasing number of women is taking part in these training and job creation programs, but those who know me also know that I am not satisfied with these results and that I will continue to make every possible effort to improve the record.
Mr. Speaker, although I could provide many other details on federal programs designed to help young people, I am sure subsequent speakers will do so, in any case, and I therefore prefer to expand on other aspects of the problems that concern us all.
First of all, we must realize that for too many young people, getting a job continues to be extremely difficult. The disruption of the world's production apparatus and its repercussions on the Canadian economy have created a very difficult situation for all socio-economic partners. There is no general solution to the problems experienced by workers seeking jobs or by those who want to get ahead and are trying to find a job more in line with their career aspirations and their way of life.
Like their elders, young people see a job not only as a source of income but also as a way to independence and personal development.
Supply
At this very moment, more than 20 per cent of young Canadians between 15 and 19 years of age, and nearly 18 per cent of those between 20 and 24, are seeking employment. Again, these figures are of grave concern to governments, the private sector and even more so to young people themselves.
Young Canadian men and women are, for the most part, aware of the main obstacles created by these new labour market conditions. They know that their skills do not always meet the requirements of a rapidly evolving workplace. They also know that many of the obstacles to employment in the eighties are due to structural problems. However, in addition to criticizing, young people are also making some very valid suggestions. We have a lot to learn from the young, and we must have confidence in them. In my many meetings with young people, especially since my appointment as Minister of State for Youth, I have realized more clearly that their interests tend to coincide with those of the country as a whole.
Mr. Speaker, generally, the problems mentioned by young people with respect to their situation are well known. Nevertheless, the way in which they describe these problems and the solutions they propose are, if we take the time to listen and to understand, a great source of inspiration. That can only be the case if we invite them to take part in the discussions held prior to major decisions.


Frederick James (Jim) Hawkes: Order.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: The Hon. Member for Calgary West (Mr. Hawkes) on a point of order.


Frederick James (Jim) Hawkes: Mr. Speaker, I thought we had a rule against all Hon. Members, even Ministers, reading a speech, that the purpose of the chamber was to speak from the heart and from the head with knowledge, and not simply read something which someone else wrote.


Some Hon. Members:: Order!


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: The question of reading speeches is a bit more complicated than a mere ban on reading prepared text. Beauchesne devotes three different citations to this subject. Citation 309 sets out the general rule that a prepared text should not be read in the House. Citation 310 specifies a number of exceptions, one of which is Ministers of the Crown. Therefore, the Hon. Minister is quite in order in reading from a text.


Céline Hervieux-Payette: Mr. Speaker, I also write and read with my heart, and the Hon. Member could listen also with his heart.

Young people want to establish their identity as full-fledged members of society. They want more responsibility for choices

May 24, 1984
Supply
that concern them specifically and for those that affect society as a whole. They are also prepared to face the consequences of their decisions.
Mr. Speaker, they also have many complaints about the educational system. They say that schools are dehumanizing. They complain about the lack of proper career guidance and course packages that lack flexibility. Young people also want to be given more latitude in their choice of educational institutions, especially those going to university. Many of them feel their schooling does not prepare them fully to join the labour force. On the other hand, most of them are against an overly selective specialization which undermines the basic thrust of education by gearing it exclusively to the requirements of a labour force planned by Governments and the private sector.
In that respect, young Canadians blame employers for failing to provide adequate on-the-job training. That is especially true of the most underprivileged among those who have quit school too early, many of whom unfortunately become drop-outs.
Young people also complain about the lack of information on programs designed to help them and, in that respect, my colleague might give me a hand. A good many feel that those programs do not meet their expectations and they would like to see better coordination in the various programs or Government services, the private sector and youth-oriented agencies.
Young people are also asking for more worker mobility at the national and international levels. They want the kind of work which will help them improve their skill and knowledge. In that sense, they hope that the International Year of Youth in 1985 will give them an exceptional opportunity to participate fully in the review of their personal problems and in the decision-making process that concerns them.
Youth-oriented agencies are also advocating an over-all policy. Those agencies have pointed out that young people feel alienated from the consumer society and that they feel the need for commitments towards social institutions. We have been reminded as well that a good many well motivated and ambitious youths drop out because the future looks very bleak. Even though the search for employment and a guaranteed income are among their priorities, the agencies think that we must take more notice of the young people who are struggling to find a place under the sun and come to grips with their own worries about international political issues. Governments are urged to make every effort to help the most underprivileged youths. Since educational institutions and employers alone cannot solve their many problems, the most underprivileged youths, particularly native Canadians, need special services and more counselling.
Mr. Speaker, spokesmen for employers generally feel that the current economic situation is a barrier between youths and the labour market, and that the situation is not made any better because they lack the skills or training required to be hired. Employers emphasize that low productivity is now one
of the most serious problems of the industrial community. In an effort to boost productivity and compete on international markets, most industries now stress high technology, which in its initial stages often leads to lay-offs. Whenever there is an opening, an employer will give priority to a worker who has been laid off, and that does not make it any easier for young people in search of employment.
Employers believe that the key to the problem is related to how people are prepared for the labour market. According to them, young people need better training. They also recommend that school authorities provide a great deal more information on the requirements of the labour market and possible careers.
Businesses also need more specific information on the programs which make it easier to hire and train young people. For instance, it is suggested that the governments set up a consultation network involving employer organizations and school boards to determine the qualifications that are mostly in demand and facilitate the planning of human resources.
The business community is aware that unless the youth employment situation improves, society as a whole will suffer in a short time. However, businessmen are convinced that young people will make few gains on the labour market before there is a general economic recovery. Businessmen ask that the governments be very careful in passing legislation relating to the labour market. The private sector would like the state to interfere less often or, if this is not possible, to show more adaptability to the needs in certain sectors of the industry and certain areas of the country.
As a general rule, finally, employer representatives have agreed to reconsider the issue of how working time should be organized. If we decide on a policy of redistributing working time, they believe that emphasis should be placed on extending the schooling and training period. They suggest in this regard that tax incentives be provided to encourage workers to continue their training or to accept working time arrangements which would bring about a more equitable distribution of the time spent working.
Employers also admit that the situation is not easy for the governments and they recommend that emphasis be put on programs such as Career Access and international exchange programs. These programs and the support given to new businesses enhance our competitiveness and therefore the performance of the Canadian economy.
From the point of view of organized labour, Mr. Speaker, there is a dilemma where the offer and the supply of jobs are concerned. Union leaders wonder whether they must help young people enter the labour market or else protect the workers who are fighting against possible lay-offs as a result of the coming of new technologies. They note that there is now a problem of adults being pitted against young people in the workplace, especially in industries which choose to hire
May 24, 1984

students or apprentices rather than unionized workers. Like management, the unions believe that a general recovery of the economy will bring a solution to the employment problem of young people. For the time being, union priority is to protect active workers threatened by upheavals on the labour market. Union representatives believe that an industrial strategy centered on heavy industry and housing should result in the creation of a large number of jobs. In their opinion, the redistribution of wealth requires the promotion of early retirement, part-time work and work sharing or self-improvement leave without the participants being penalized by a decrease in their standard of living.
Union leaders also believe generally that we should improve on the work-study alternation programs and the wage subsidization programs which help the students to complete their training without accumulating debts.
The unions favour certain measures to promote the purchase of Canadian products and protect our markets against any excessive foreign competition. They recommend that cooperative endeavours be favoured rather than profit-sharing
systems.
Mr. Speaker, it would take too long to list all the suggestions originating from all quarters, as well as the problems encountered by particular groups such as women, natives and handicapped people.
The sorry plight in which our young people now find themselves was not an overnight occurrence, therefore we should not expect these conditions to improve in just one year. However, it gives us, their elders, the opportunity to ask ourselves definite questions about the kind of society we want to live in as well as to question the set of values we believe in. Young people are asking themselves these same questions in a very mature fashion and wonder often if they should base their expectations and lifestyles on the way of life we are offering them.
Mr. Speaker, we should strive to change our approach and involve young people in our decision-making process. As Minister of State for Youth, I feel that one of my main duties is to contribute to a change of attitude toward youth unemployment.
The year 1985 having been designated as the International Youth Year will certainly provide us with the opportunity to challenge our young people into taking part in the debate on our collective evolution. Funds made available for the International Youth Year will be granted as much as possible to local, regional or national youth organizations which are eager to set up activities by and for young people. On the other hand I intend to help the most talented of our young people develop their leadership qualities, initiate projects and take actions that could benefit all our young people. International Youth Year should be a time when our young people between the age of 15 and 19, including our drop-outs, unemployed and academically disadvantaged, should get together, become aware of their
Supply
identity, learn to act collectively and find their place within society.
Mr. Speaker, I often feel that the struggle waged by a number of youth organizations in an effort to claim their rightful place in our society is similar in many respects to that carried on by the women in search of their identity and recognition of their rights. We should deal responsibly with the pressure these groups are exerting on our institutions; otherwise, our society as a whole will suffer.
The International Youth Year gives us an exceptional opportunity to involve young people fully in the examination of problems of immediate concern to them, while at the same time providing a forum for a broader exchange of ideas at the international level. It is in this context that I intend to discharge my responsibility toward the International Youth Year. As with the other activities in which I am involved as Minister responsible for youth, I shall proceed by making a special effort to meet and listen to young people. It will be my duty to ensure that the efforts of the Canadian Government on behalf of young people yield tangible results, primarily for them but also for society as a whole.
During the fiscal year just ended the Canadian Government wanted to set the tone for the great debate on the place of young people in Canadian society. We have not hesitated to change the Government's priorities in order to make the problem of youth unemployment one of the main concerns in Canada. Federal Government programs and services have therefore been adjusted and in some cases changed completely to enable young people to derive the greatest possible benefit from them.
The appointment of a Minister of State for Youth is above all, I think, a sign of confidence in young people and a recognition of their interests which are in keeping with national interests and those that are defended internationally by the United Nations. The International Youth Year will provide us with an unprecedented opportunity for promoting international co-operation and understanding in the interests of young people.

It will also be my responsibility to ensure that the emphasis be placed on the most needy among the young and I am committed, as Minister of State for Youth, to ensure that all our young people privileged, and underprivileged have a full share in our Canadian society.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: A 10-minute period is now provided for questions to the Minister or comments on her speech.


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Speaker, I understood most of the Minister's speech, but I want to ask her a question in her capacity as Minister of State for Youth responsible for one of

May 24, 1984
Supply
the Government's most important programs designed to address the problem of youth unemployment, the Career Access Program, which we support.
My question is prompted by a press release issued yesterday, May 23, by the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Roberts). I will not read the press release but it announces under the Minister's name that Imperial Oil Limited, which we all know to be a multinational company operating in all parts of Canada, will provide 100 jobs through the Career Access job creation program to recent post-secondary graduates and young inexperienced persons. It goes on to state that placements will take place across Canada from Newfoundland to British Columbia and the Northwest Territories. It will benefit 68 university graduates, 9 technicians and 11 graduates of CGEP, not to mention some from a couple of community colleges. One hundred people, Mr. Speaker, from a major multinational company, which represents about one two hundredth of one per cent of the latest unemployment figures for youth. That means there are still 536,900 young people unemployed. This indicates to me that the program is not going well. If the private sector, especially the small business sector, is going to be the principal motor in getting this program operative, and we see a big company like Imperial Oil providing only 100 places, then I have grave doubts about the success of this program to address the serious problem of youth unemployment.


Céline Hervieux-Payette: Mr. Speaker, first I would like to take this opportunity to commend the management of Esso Imperial, for helping us give our young people that vital extra training that will allow them to enter the labour maket and get job experience. I would like to point out to the Hon. Member that for 1984-1985, a quarter of a billion, that is $250.6 million, will be provided for the Career Access Program.

That is 85,000 jobs and he was talking about 100. I would like to remind the Hon. Member that there are over half a million small businesses in this country and if they would just take one unemployed youth under Career Access they would all be employed. My goal is to place them in any corporation willing to give them the essential training they need to be in the workplace, a career-related kind of training. I compliment those who are willing to help us complement their formal education in school.


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Speaker, we want the Minister to succeed. We support the Career Access Program. We also recognize, as I am sure she does, that youth unemployment is probably the most serious social problem in the country today. Our concern is that because of high interest rates the small business sector is not able to take advantage of this program because of its 50-50 aspect. If they cannot take advantage of it because of high interest rates, and large multi-nationals like Imperial Oil can only provide 100 jobs, that raises grave doubts about whether this program will succeed unless the
Government can get its monetary policy under control. That is the concern I want to express to the Minister.


Céline Hervieux-Payette: Mr. Speaker, I would like to remind my hon. colleague that we just added $20 million to the Career Access Program. If the program was not successful and if the business community was not responding well, I have some doubt whether my hon. colleague, the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Roberts) would add money. As the Hon. Member knows, as the Minister of State (Youth) I am not responsible for the application of that measure. That is within the responsibility of my colleague, the Minister of Employment and Immigration. The program is working well.
I recognize that sometimes small businesses do not have access to this program. However, other programs are available as well. On-the-job training programs and other programs exist. This particular one is for well trained students graduating from colleges and universities throughout the country who are having problems obtaining their first jobs and getting the experience related to their education. It is especially for that kind of student. They are not the less privileged ones in the country. They are those who have a fine education but have a difficulty.
I would also like to remind my hon. colleague that the oil industry is not the most job creative. It is in the small and medium-sized businesses that we are looking for jobs for our young people. The recovery is showing some progress. I am sure that in the coming months small businesses will have access. Actually, the program is going well.


Mr. Malone:: Mr. Speaker, I have a question and perhaps one short supplementary question. The Minister has suggested that part of the cause of youth unemployment has been in the area of education. By implication she has indicated that the provinces have not done an adequate job in education. Which provinces have failed in providing appropriate education? In her view, has any province provided adequate education in light of the present conditions of our times?


Céline Hervieux-Payette: Mr. Speaker, 1 welcome this question. As former chairperson of a schoolboard for six years I know quite well what kind of training we are providing in schools in Quebec. I am not placing any blame on any institution in the country. I think there is an over-all responsibility throughout the country in management, business and the education sector to ensure that training is available and that we are filling that gap. I will not put the blame on the curriculum. We have the best educated generation of young people in our country in all our history. It is not education per se that we have to put the blame on.
I am trying to ensure that the unions are talking to the education system as well as the education system talking to management. I think that a concerted approach to youth unemployment is the only solution. It is not by blaming each other, other governments or other socio-economic partners that
May 24, 1984

we will solve the problem of youth unemployment. They are part of our society. We are part of the solution as well as part of the problem.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: The Hon. Member for Fraser Valley East (Mr. Patterson).


Arnold John Malone: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: The Hon. Member for Fraser Valley East.


Alexander Bell Patterson: Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to the statement of the Minister. She was saying that we should not be allocating blame. Of course, we all know that the blame rests primarily with the present Government because it failed to recognize the trend which brought us to the point we are today with a drastic unemployment problem among the young as well as older people.
In a question this morning I made reference to a report made by the Fraser Valley College. It set up a task force to investigate the very serious problem there. Dr. Barry Moore, the President of the College, found the report devastating. The second recommendation of the committee was for the establishment of a student placement and job search office at the college in co-operation with the Canada Employment and Immigration Commission.
To what extent are our Manpower offices authorized to respond to community initiatives such as this in their efforts to meet the challenge of youth unemployment?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: The Hon. Minister of State (Youth) (Mrs. Hervieux-Payette) for a brief answer to the question.


Céline Hervieux-Payette: Yes briefly, Mr. Speaker, I must say that currently in Canada, hundreds of Student Employment Centres already exist on our campuses. I cannot be specific as to that campus, but I know that if there is any possibility of expanding the program that is already in place, certainly my colleague, the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Roberts), will do it.
As for blaming the Canadian Government, I would remind the Hon. Member that there are eight Conservative provincial governments, one separatist government and a further Credit-ist one, and I did not blame the lack of youth employment on those governments. What is needed in my view is a co-operative action, friendly efforts from all parties concerned, whether management, labour, education institutions, youth groups or provincial governments. Blaming others will not solve the problem faced by our young people. They are counting on much more positive responses.


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


Gerry St. Germain: Point of order, Mr. Speaker.
Supply


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: On a point of order, the Hon. Member for Mission-Port Moody (Mr. St. Germain).


Gerry St. Germain: Mr. Speaker, we get such little opportunity to ask questions on such an important issue, is there a possibility that we could extend the question period for at least one more question to the hon. Minister? I would like to ask her a question, and I am seeking permission of the House, Mr. Speaker.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: Is there unanimous consent for the Hon. Member for Mission-Port Moody to ask an additional question?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: Agreed. The Hon. Member for Mission-Port Moody.


Gerry St. Germain: Mr. Speaker, the Minister mentioned that there was no solution to youth employment, the biggest issue facing this country today. She mentioned lack of productivity and training. I believe she possibly advocated protectionism in her speech. As a Minister of the Government, would the Minister please tell the House what if any suggestions she is making to stimulate the economy? She has said that the only way to solve the youth unemployment situation is through small and medium-sized business. Does the Minister have a suggestion? Would she tell the House what it is so that we can start establishing confidence in the country?


Céline Hervieux-Payette: Mr. Speaker, perhaps I should address a special clientele, those who have the most difficulty finding a job. They take more than 20 weeks to find a job. This includes about 250,000 young people in our country. These are unskilled, drop-out students in our country. Of the last $130 million which I announced, $30 million will be devoted to develop a special scheme to ensure that they get training on the job. I do not think the education system is the perfect formula for them. I think the private sector can help us in training them. Experiments have been conducted in other countries and I do not think I have time to name all of them, but the British scheme is one which we can look at very carefully.
I am willing, Mr. Speaker, to ask the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) for $250 million, or $1 billion for those 250,000 who need it, but before I do that, I want to test the formula and make sure that the private sector understands that we are working with them to develop the formula. I hope that by the time of the next Budget speech the Minister of Finance will be convinced that we have the right formula. In that way these unemployed people will have the possibility to get not only training, but jobs.


Gerry St. Germain: We do not want grants, we want a return of confidence.

May 24, 1984
Supply


Frederick James (Jim) Hawkes: Mr. Speaker, the only way to describe the last three-quarters of an hour is bizarre. In her response to the question by the Member for Mission-Port Moody (Mr. St. Germain), the Minister stated that she has been concerned about young people who have been unemployed for 20 weeks or longer. She describes them as the drop-outs and is incorporating a special amount of money in her budget to help that population. She says that she hopes to have better answers eventually, when and if Parliament is still sitting and when and if there will be a Minister of Finance to present a budget.
The Minister has been part of this Parliament for over four years. Ministers she has supported have cut out funding for functionally illiterate members of the workforce. It was well over two years ago when the Liberal Party, the Cabinet and the Minister decided to give no special funding for the dropouts when they become adults. Canadians can only become confused when they see different parts of the Government acting separately. They have trouble finding where reality lies.
On May 23, the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Roberts) issued an astounding press release to the National Press Gallery. In this release, the Government of Canada brags that it is providing a wage subsidy to Imperial Oil to employ approximately 100 young people. No member of the Chamber believes that the young people of this country do not need assistance in finding initial job experience and exposure to the workforce to gain a sense of their future. However, this is an attempt by a Minister of the Crown, who is charged with the public responsibility of administering billions of dollars of public expenditures, to create the impression that the Government played an important role in Imperial Oil's decision.
Let us examine whether the proposal outlined in this press release could be important. The press release states that these young people will be paid up to $15 an hour and that they will be employed for 52 weeks. It also states that the maximum subsidy can be $3 an hour. This means that for a maximum subsidy, Imperial Oil gets 20 per cent, or $3 of this $15 an hour. In reality, the subsidy can only last for 26 weeks. Therefore, if the job lasts for 52 weeks, Imperial Oil is contributing 90 per cent of that direct wage while the Government subsidizes 10 per cent.
We know that Imperial Oil is profitable and pays a corporate tax at a rate of 50 per cent. Since the subsidy must come into income, that 50 per cent tax reduces that 10 per cent to 5 per cent. Those are the direct wage costs in the case of a maximum subsidy. This does not include ancillary costs like the use of the personnel department and the issuance of cheques.
It is absurd to believe that Imperial Oil would make the corporate decision to hire an extra 100 young people based on what is a maximum 5 per cent subsidy only on direct costs. The Government is proving its absurdity by issuing such a press release and telling Canadians that this is a major announcement about what it is doing in the country to support
youth. It is absolutely incredible. The Government is saying that it is the champion of youth because 100 young people, with a 5 per cent maximum subsidy, have been employed by Imperial Oil. A government which would so rapidly take us toward the theatre of the absurd is incomprehensible.
When the Minister of State for Youth (Mrs. Hervieux-Payette) was appointed, I attempted to ask why that Minister had never been to a meeting of the committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration. Why did the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) not appoint someone who had been studying youth problems? Why did the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) or the Minister of Employment and Immigration not take advantage of the parliamentary task force report which was given to them in 1981 after 14 months of hard work, after listening to the youth of this country describe what needed to be done? That task force provided over 200 recommendations for changes in government policy.
It is now 1984 and we see the Minister standing in the House, reading a prepared text and telling us that she is busy studying the problem. She says that she is busy listening to the young people. In the meantime, Imperial Oil will hire an extra 100 young people. Eventually, at some indefinite date, perhaps the fall or 1985, she will make some recommendations to the Minister of Finance and if he is listening and finds room, we will then get a change in policy and the young people in this country will be happy.
The Government would make the young people of this country much happier if it would call an election. Canada's youth have no confidence in the Government, middle aged Canadians have no confidence in the Government and senior citizens have no confidence. Such a climate does not allow for progress or jobs. There is no feeling of the hope, energy or aspiration that once characterized this country.
How did we fall from the second highest standard of living in the world to fourteenth? Our standard of living is still falling. I remember 1976 when Members of Parliament from Alberta warned that jobs would disappear if there was interference in the oil industry. Today I hear the Minister of Youth say in the House that there is not much of a job multiplier effect in the oil industry. The transfer of funds from the western sedimentary basin to Canada Lands has reduced the job content of those amounts four to five times. In other words, the amount spent on Canada Lands to produce one job could have produced five or six jobs if it was spent on the western sedimentary basin. In turn, that would create jobs in Ontario and Quebec. Furthermore, such an expenditure would produce oil and gas and reduce the need to send our hard earned money to Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Iraq and Iran to create jobs there. If the entire purpose of the oil industry is to have Canadian jobs, then Canadians can believe the Minister when she says that this is a sector with no job creation potential because the Liberals' understanding of that sector has made it so. It has created a sector with job loss but very little job creation potential.
May 24, 1984

I come from a city, Mr. Speaker, that led this country in economic growth two years ago. Young people from Quebec, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, and Ontario were coming to my riding and to my city in droves to get a career opportunity, to get a job, to get a start in life. They could be starting apprentices, they could be university graduates, young people from right across the spectrum. But if you walk downtown in Calgary today you will find that 25 per cent of the office space is vacant. The biggest building in town, a red brick one, was built by Petro-Canada. It is basically empty. Forty per cent of its space is not occupied. Taxpayers are paying the rent for a building across the street which is completely empty as a result of Petro-Canada.
Jobs are created by economic growth. Canadians are willing to invest their money, their talent, their energy into the creation of that growth and into the creation of those jobs. It is only Government, specifically this federal Government, which has created an economic catastrophe. Bankruptcies, job loss and the lack of an economic growth engine are the results of policies brought into this Chamber by the Government. To avoid those kinds of mistakes, all this Government had to do was to listen to people who knew more than did the Government, who believed in all parts of Canada not just some narrow piece. The Government should have listened to those who really believed and understood. If each and every part of our nation is allowed to flower and develop we would have something greater than the sum of the parts because we have something more magnificent than the sum of the parts.
When we stand in this Chamber today and talk about youth unemployment, we are talking about the future. We are talking about a Government that has robbed a big part of a generation of its potential future. The economic malaise is not hurting people in my age group-some yes, but on average it is not hurting people in my age group in the way it hurts those in my children's age group. They are the ones having to develop a different lifestyle, one that accommodates the notion that they might never have the same kind of income opportunity or the same kind of job opportunity their parents had.
This nation was founded by people who told their children that their opportunities would be greater than their own. It turned out to be true. For most of us who serve in this Chamber that has been true. The opportunity system that we enjoyed as adults and as young people was greater than the opportunity system our parents enjoyed.
But, Mr. Speaker, things are now going the other way, and they do not have to. There is no nation on this earth that has greater per capita potential or greater resources for capital. Ours is a magnificent country with magnificent potential. We can provide the highest standard of living in the world for our people. But we must have public policy that allows it to happen and encourages it to happen and makes it possible for it to happen. What we cannot have in public policy is an ever and ever smaller group of decision makers, further and further removed from reality, making an increasing number of decisions. That is what socialism is all about.
Supply
In the four years I have been in this Chamber, almost every piece of legislation brought forward by this Government has created some small group of people appointed in private, paid in private, to make in private decisions that affect the lives of Canadians. In that kind of atmosphere, Mr. Speaker, I have seen investment capital leave this country, skilled human beings with talent energy and drive leave this country to make some other nations in this world a little richer than they might have been. I have seen very few people from other countries- relatively few-bringing their dollars, their talents, and their energy to this country to make this nation a little richer and a little better.
What is required is an about face in public policy. That will flow from the opportunity that Canadians will have to exercise their democratic right. If one really believes in the essence of the motion before this Chamber today, Mr. Speaker, it could put it into action by simply calling an election and letting Canadians decide whether the potential of this country has been well shepherded by this present Government, or whether it is time for a change. I for one say to the young people of this country that their future depends on change. The more rapidly we get it, the more complete it is, the more opportunity system there will be for our youth. Failure to change means continuation of the path on which we are currently treading. That is not good enough, Sir.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: Are there any questions or comments?


John Gerald (Jack) Masters: Mr. Speaker, I think all of us in this House share the same concerns about our unemployment problems. We have a special feeling for the many problems caused our youth in not being able to find the kind of employment they want, and want now. I do not think anyone on either side of the House has all the answers, or has a corner on the market of sympathy for our young people, or an understanding of their future. We should be going at this problem with a concerted effort, trying to encourage all sectors of the economy, all levels of Government, and all people to admit we have problem. We have addressed it in a number of ways. But let us find new ways together to solve the problem.
I believe in many respects an honest effort is being made. I believe the Government I support has taken initiatives and a very strong lead in this area. I would like to dwell on these measures in a moment. I cannot resist this opportunity to remind everyone of another part of the equation of the unemployment of youth in this country, namely, the inherent strength and resiliency of Canadian youth to accept the fact that, like many of us, these are difficult times. Maybe they too will do, and are doing their part in helping to get over this horrendous problem and this desperate feeling people have in not being able to find a job.
I feel in a personal way, as I am sure every Member of this House does, the concern and the troubles that youth have. The Hon. Member who just spoke said it is all because of the policies of this Government. If we follow that sort of logic through to its conclusion, then we do not need as many school

May 24, 1984
Supply
teachers now because we do not have as many children in the classroom as we once had. I guess some deliberate governmental interference brought that about, and I am being facetious when I say that.
One sector of the economy in which many youth expected automatically to find careers was the field of teaching. Now they have learned-and I have a son-in-law and a daughter in exactly the same position-that they cannot necessarily follow their careers at the time they want, in the place they would like and at the rate of pay they think they should receive. Therefore they have to look at the available options. The youth of the country in so many ways are examining their options. For example, if they realize that they cannot obtain teaching positions in Thunder Bay, for whatever reason, they know they have to look elsewhere. This is what happened in the case I mentioned. People graduating from an engineering school find that they cannot practise that career at this particular point in time, so they examine the options.
Before dealing with some of the positive measures that have been taken by the Government, let me say that I believe we have all learned a hard lesson through difficult times. Times have changed and situations have changed. We have to find new ways of going about conducting our affairs as Canadians. Canadians today are no different than they were during the days of the great depression when they had to go through all kinds of gyrations just to find a meal. I think Canadians are strong. I think our youth is strong.
As a government we have an obligation to create a climate in which our youth find opportunities as a result of hard work. We require policies which will provide a major expansion of jobs and an opportunity for the private sector to flourish. We require a better understanding between various levels of government-federal, provincial and municipal. Sometimes we as politicians become so involved in the problems of running our own House we forget we have colleagues in other Houses. That works up and down the ladder. We have to find better ways of accomplishing that.
In response to our caucus meetings in Quebec and in Newfoundland the Government created the Ministry of State for Youth. We heard from that Minister just a while ago. The Opposition wants to make light of that decision. It is a positive sign that the Government recognizes that the problem has grown. In fact, we have many Ministers looking after the problem of trying to create employment opportunities in the country. We now know that we will have to do even more on behalf of our youth; our future. The Government has created a strong voice in Cabinet to take initiatives, to help create jobs for youth, to help co-ordinate the efforts of other Ministers who are in positions to create jobs in our economy and to ensure that they take into account the plight of our youth.
In a moment I will be speaking about large sums of money. Unfortunately, sometimes in our dialogue in the House it is almost as though we could make the problem of unemployment go away, whether it be the youth sector or another
sector, just by identifying it and providing money. It is not that simple. One would think that $1.38 billion would eradicate the problem. It will do a great deal, but it will not cure all the problems of the unemployed youth. That is what we are trying to do in the creation of the Youth Opportunity Fund announced last December, followed up by initiatives in the Budget of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde). We are trying to use the funds of the people of Canada through programs such as the Youth Opportunity Fund to provide more opportunities for youth to work directly in enterprises sponsored by government and to assist the private sector, by indicating that we recognize that it makes the same investment in the youth of the nation as the Government and that we should do it together.
As I said, we created the Youth Opportunity Fund last year. Recently $131.5 million was added to that fund, to be used for a mix of new and existing youth employment programs. The Government is criticized for mixing and matching programs, for announcing what has already been announced and so on. The Government is trying to review all programs to ensure that the ones in place work efficiently, to add appropriate measures to make existing programs more effective, and to help create new initiatives.
I suppose when one is in the Opposition it is somewhat like sitting around a coffee table or a bridge table and solving in one hour of discussion in very simplistic terms all the problems of Canada. The Opposition urges the Government to do something concrete, to come up with a master plan. I am sure our Cabinet Ministers, or whatever Cabinet Ministers happen to be in power, are looking to do exactly that, to come up with a genuine idea which in a very simplistic way will cure all the problems of the country. Unfortunately that is not the way life works. We require a variety of ideas. We have to bring them together to maximize the efforts of Canadians to create more jobs. However, I recognize the particular subject we are discussing today is that of youth, so in a sense I will return to where I began.
Despite the fact that the Government has done many things, such as the ones I have already outlined, it has also implemented the Career Access Program which will give some 78,000 young people an opportunity to obtain on-the-job experience. We have some 455 student employment offices across the country which will put some 333,000 young people into jobs. Despite all these facts, we require an attitude which from time to time transcends parochial interests and partisan politics. We must recognize that we all have a responsibility to maintain that which will provide jobs for young people, middle-aged people and older people-the confidence Canadians essentially have in this country. It is there but it becomes eroded when we hear nothing but doom and gloom, when we paint a daily picture in the House that the world is coming to an end tomorrow.
I would not expect opposition Members to say that we are doing a great job, but I expect a few more positive suggestions as to how we can alleviate the problems of the young unemployed people of Canada. Hon. Members opposite certainly do
May 24, 1984

their best in their individual ridings to acknowledge job-creation programs, such as the Canada Summer Works Program, student employment programs and on-thje-job training programs, because they know they work. I would hope that they would join publicly, as they do privately and as they do in their own ridings in many instances, in saying we have problems, we have places to go, there are programs, yes, and if they were in power they would do them better. They are there, let's make them work. They should recognize that that is overstating the case. They are not joining in from time to time in a positive way, not recognizing they are unconsciously creating a feeling of gloom, a feeling of depression within the country. I do not lay all the blame for that thinking on the Opposition. However, they might want to consider that employing young people in satisfying jobs is the prime goal of all Canadians. We all have a job to do. We in this House have opportunities to speak to employers.
I read a statement the other day to the effect that if every employer in Canada would hire just one person, we would not have a problem. The Opposition might join with us in the larger battle of solving the problem of youth unemployment in this country. They can help us carry the message. We should try and convince Canadian employers that it is in their interest, as well as in the interest of young people, to make a concerted effort to train them, to utilize their talents and young minds, giving them the opportunity to grow.
I come back to the Ministry of State for Youth. The Member previously made light of this. It is interesting to note that the province in which I reside has recently mirrored our action. The Minister there is not called a Minister of State in charge of youth employment, but a commissioner for youth. Statistically it looks like Ontario is really on the go. Even in a wealthy province, which has a lot going for it and a good future, despite all the new jobs created-and we are creating new jobs all the time but creating more people to fill those jobs-we still have a specific and special problem with regard to youth unemployment. The Party in power in the Province of Ontario is not a Party to which I belong. It believes it must help solve a relatively new phenomenon in Canadian society and North American society. The problem is not peculiar to Canada. We have to do something extra special to prevent the degrading situation that exists when so many young people are unemployed.
I could recite the statistics relating to the dollars we are utilizing to create employment for our young people. We have the Skills Growth Program. Universities are being upgraded. Colleges have new equipment to train students better. This has not just occurred since we have had a Minister of State for Youth. We have recognized the problem. Those programs began a few years ago. We know that more has to be done.
I again make the exhortation to Canadians to recognize that it is absolutely essential that we find jobs for our young people. It is essential that we are honest with our young people. Young people are the most honest people that I know. They under-
Supply
stand when we say to them: "You have to be prepared to broaden your scope and thinking. You must recognize that if you are trained in this, you may have to try something else for a little while because from point "A" to point "B" may not be a straight line. You may have to make a small detour, but you will get there." Patience, faith, hard work and diligence, all of these so-called old-fashioned qualities that we seem to think have gone are still there. We have to remind young people that they have a part. They are playing that part. They are willing to do that. The different levels of government have to co-operate. After all, the money comes from the same common pot.
The private sector must continue to tell us what we can do to make the job of running an enterprise more profitable so that it can expand and create jobs. We must ask the private sector to join with us in targeting in on youth unemployment. I am a perennial optimist. I know that in our heart of hearts that is the way we feel about things in this country. Canadians, as always, look at diffiult problems and find solutions together.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Guilbault):: Are there any questions?


Howard Edward Crosby: Mr. Speaker, let me say at the outset that I think all Members are in agreement with the comments of the Hon. Member for Thunder Bay-Nipigon (Mr. Masters) with respect to our desire to create new employment and new employment activity for young Canadians. We have a complete consensus in that aim and goal. Where we come into difficulty and dispute is in the methods and means by which we attempt to achieve the goal.
The Member indicated the efforts made by the Government of Canada with respect to the establishment of some 480 student employment centres across Canada. Their hope is to achieve employment for some 333,000 students and young Canadians. That is a laudable goal. We wish the Government could go further and faster.
There are some problems in those employment centres. We saw evidence and reports of that in the press yesterday and again this morning. This morning I heard an interview with an officer of the Department of Employment and Immigration, one Brian Fuhr. He was being questioned about activities at the student employment centres. I was shocked to hear in the course of that interview, presented by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation on a local Ottawa station, that the officers of the Department of Employment and Immigration in these employment centres will not post the jobs for which federal funding has been provided. They will not tell the students what jobs are available. In the student employment centre in Ottawa there are 600 federally-funded jobs available. The officers of the Department will not tell the students what those jobs are so that they can make application for them.
At the same time, it was disclosed that the applicants for these available jobs are selected from the filing system. That particular office is two or three weeks behind in placing names in the filing system so that they could be selected for application for the jobs available.

May 24, 1984
Supply
Does the Hon. Member think this is the proper and fair way to conduct a student employment or summer employment program in which there is brief time available to apply for the job, where the employment period is short, to be caught up in that kind of bureaucracy, not being able to see what jobs are there, make direct application to the employer, and not have to go through some bureaucratic maze in order to have an opportunity to be employed for these very important summer months?


John Gerald (Jack) Masters: Mr. Speaker, I consider that an excellent question. I would not argue against the problems of bureaucracy and, why all of us keep coming back, wanting to do more through the private sector. The thinking in that instance might be that there is another process to be followed with regard to Government funded jobs so that there is a more equal opportunity for more people to have access to them.
I will just take a moment to respond to the Hon. Member. To respond to the Hon. Member, I would remind him that the debates are being monitored and I am sure that that is one area which should certainly be reviewed in a way that will possibly cut down on what I agree is a bureaucratic process which keeps the job seekers away from the job opportunities for a longer period of time than necessary. I believe that that is what the Hon. Member has said.
I have spoken of parochialism and I do not wish to be guilty of it myself, but it is also interesting to note that in my constituency, at least one of the local radio stations and perhaps more are co-operating with the Student Employment Centre by advertising to have jobs registered with the group as well as job opportunities. That program seems to be working very well and there has been a very strong response to it from the business community which has recognized the necessity for the program and has recognized that it does help businessmen find the employees that are required for their enterprises.
Returning to the Hon. Member's question, I think that that is a sign that there really is the room and the necessity for dialogue. I think the Hon. Member has made a good point and 11 would hope that the situation would be thoroughly examined.


Howard Edward Crosby: Mr. Speaker, I will content myself with the hope that the Hon. Member will use his good offices to pass this message on to the autorities responsible so that they may rectify this serious complaint. I noticed that the Minister is present in the House of Commons and she as well may take this into consideration.
The excuse given for not posting these government-funded jobs was that there were restrictions with respect to them. The first restriction was that the applicant had to live within the federal constituency for which the job was intended and the second was that there might be special restrictions. I do not think that that is any reason for not posting the jobs. I know that in my own area, there is no such requirement of residency in a special federal constituency. Some people are perhaps a
little suspicious that there may be something going on behind the scenes by way of pointing certain people in certain directions in order to obtain this employment. If the jobs were posted for everyone to see, we would be more assured of fairness.
I would like to make one further comment and ask another question of the Hon. Member with respect to a remark he made during the course of his speech. He said that we all want to maximize the efforts of Canadians to create more employment. I think that is a goal which we all desire devoutly. I would like to point out to the Hon. Member that independent agencies like the Conference Board of Canada as well as the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) have said in their economic predictions for the future that unemployment will continue at its current high rates for the next year or two and even longer. There is no indication that the economy will improve to the extent that we can reduce the unemployment rate to a figure less than 10 per cent or 11 per cent.
At the same time as this was being said, the Hon. Member's colleague, the Minister of Justice (Mr. MacGuigan), said in a speech which he made in the Province of British Columbia recently that full employment is possible and that if he became the leader of the Party, he would reduce unemployment dramatically over the next five years and reduce it back to its previous levels of 3 per cent or 4 per cent. Because the Hon. Member has access to information that is not available to Members of the Opposition, I would like to ask him if he knows how the Minister of Justice will reduce the unemployment rate in Canada if he becomes the leader of the Party.
Surely the Minister does not need to wait until he is the leader of the Party to implement a plan he may have to eliminate unemployment in Canada or reduce it to the level of 2 per cent or 3 per cent from its current level of 11 per cent. Surely he should share that plan not only with his colleagues in the Liberal Party but with his colleagues in Parliament. Let us get to work on the war on unemployment.
The Minister of Justice said in his speech that he did not accept the forecast of a 10 per cent unemployment rate for years to come and that he knows how to reduce that figure so that the unemployment rate between 1985 and 1988 will on average be less than the 9 per cent predicted by the current Minister of Finance. Perhaps the Hon. Member would share his thoughts with us and tell us how his colleague, the Minister of Justice, will reduce the unemployment rate to below the levels predicted by his other colleague, the Minister of Finance.
Perhaps the Hon. Member may simply say that there is no such plan, that we are stuck with the unemployment rates that were predicted by the Minister of Finance and that there is nothing that can be done about it. If that is the attitude of the Government with respect to unemployment and if the Government does not agree with the Minister of Justice who says that we can wage a war on unemployment and reduce it very dramatically, then I think the Government should quit and let someone else take over who will try to reduce unemployment.
May 24, 1984


John Gerald (Jack) Masters: Mr. Speaker, I believe that my time is almost up. I did mention that I am an optimist. All of us must realize when looking at projections that they are only projections and will remain projections unless something else happens. I can recall a time, Mr. Speaker, when I was a sales manager and I predicted in a very-pardon the expression-conservative manner a 10 per cent growth in sales. I found that the growth in sales went to 30 per cent and yet every economic barometer from the beginning of the year on which I based what I thought might be an optimistic prediction indicated that it was gloom and doom time and that we would not do well. These barometers were from early January. By December, because of all of the things that went on in the economy in general, those predictions did not hold true.
1 am not sure what my hon. colleague has in mind when he speaks of totally reducing unemployment. I think it is a goal for which we will all continue to strive but I would remind the House that projections are merely that. They are a form of looking into a crystal ball after having been given the best information at a given point in time. We sometimes do not meet the expectations of projections and we sometimes far surpass them. As an optimist, I think we will surpass them in this instance.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert) Order, please.


MESSAGE FROM THE SENATE
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: I have the honour to inform the House that a message has been received from the Senate informing this House that the Senate has passed Bill S-ll, an Act to implement conventions between Canada and the Republic of Tunisia, Canada and the People's Republic of Bangladesh, Canada and the United Republic of Cameroon and Canada and the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, an agreement between Canada and Kenya and conventions between Canada and the Arab Republic of Egypt, Canada and the Republic of the Ivory Coast and Canada and Sweden for the avoidance of double taxation with respect to income tax, to which the concurrence of this House is desired.


BUSINESS OF SUPPLY
[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Wise:
That this House condemns the continuing failure of the Government's policies to restore even pre-recession levels of employment opportunities for young people at a time when hundreds of thousands of young Canadians are about to join the labour force from our schools and universities and Canada's unemployment rate for young adults remains the highest of any Western industrial nation.
Supply
And the amendment of Mr. Deans:
That the motion be amended by deleting the period after the word "nation" and adding the following thereafter:
"-and in particular the Government's adoption of the United States interest rate and monetarist policies, thereby reducing employment opportunities for young Canadians.
Hon. Flora MacDonald (Kingston and the Islands):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to pay tribute to my colleague, the Hon. Member for Elgin (Mr. Wise), for having brought before the House for debate today an issue which the Government is always loathe to raise for debate, to bring into the House or to have examined. Indeed, when the previous speaker, the Hon. Member for Thunder Bay-Nipigon (Mr. Masters), addressed this issue in response to an Opposition Day motion, he glossed it over, if I may say, as if there were no real crisis in the country with regard to youth unemployment. What the Hon. Member does not seem to realize is that one out of every five young persons in this country is unemployed today. That is a national disgrace, sir, in a country like Canada.
The number one issue in this country today is unemployment. The number one issue under this Government a year ago was unemployment. If the Liberal Government were to be in office a year from now the number one issue would still be unemployment. That is the reason why the Canadian people will not accept this kind of government any longer.
Hon. Members who have spoken previously in this debate have said that Canada's employment rate as compared to the other ten western industrialized countries ranks eighth. That is where we stand in comparison to our counterpart countries in the industrialized world. However, when it comes to where we stand as compared to those countries with regard to youth employment, we rank last. Again, I say that that is a tragedy which the Hon. Member for Thunder Bay-Nipigon does not seem to recognize.
To put the statistics on the record again, Mr. Speaker, the rate of unemployment in Canada for those between the ages of 20 and 24 was 18.5 per cent last year. In the United Kingdom, that rate of unemployment was 18.2 per cent, in Australia it was 14.6 per cent, in the United States it was 14.5 per cent, in Sweden it was 7 per cent and in Japan it was an incredibly low 4.1 per cent. That is 4.1 per cent in Japan and 18.5 per cent in Canada.
Even if we were to look at the latest figures available to us for the young people in this category, we would find that in the United States the present rate of unemployment for young people is 12.2 per cent and in Canada the present rate is 17.1 per cent. That is a difference of five percentage points between Canada and the United States.
I suppose one can say that it is easy to rattle off a lot of statistics. They are really a group of words just bunched together. However, what you have to do is stop and analyse what those statistics mean in human terms. That is when one sees that they mean hundreds of thousands of young Canadians between the ages of 18 and 25 who are unable to get jobs

May 24, 1984
Supply
and whose lives are being scarred by a set of circumstances which they did not create. That is what one hears when one talks to young people, when one talks to the one young person out of the five who is unable to get a job in this country.
Often when we hear this tragedy discussed we hear it discussed in terms of the economic costs of unemployment, how much it costs us in employment insurance, in dollar terms. But how seldom do we hear this tragedy discussed in terms of the social costs to the country, and the greatest social cost to this country today is in the 500,000 young people who are out of work, the almost two million people in total who are without jobs in Canada today. We are not only losing their creativity and productivity, their ability to help develop this country, but these young people are also being condemned to a loss of dignity, a loss of self-worth and a loss of the very thing which each of us had on coming into the workforce. We had a feeling that we could do something to contribute to this country, a feeling that Canada needed us. But the young people of today are being condemned to a feeling that somehow or other they are not needed, that there is nothing they can contribute, and that is what brings about the loss of self-worth.
What is worst of all is that these young people are being forced by circumstances which they did not create to now assume the burden of paying for those errors. They are being forced to pay for the mistakes made by the present Liberal Government, particularly in the last four years.
When I mention mistakes, I look back to the economic plans, misguided Budgets and inappropriate policies brought forward by this Government in the last four years, certainly with the 1981 Budget in such sectors as the energy sector. What did those policies do? They caused widespread unemployment right across the country. There are the mistakes not only of introducing these policies, but the mistakes which the Government has made in administering the programs which it says are going to help out.
The Special Employment Initiatives Program, for example; how was that administered? It was administered by padding up Liberal ridings, treating the unemployed in this country, especially the youth unemployed, as if somehow or other a double standard should exist, that if they lived in a riding other than those held by a Liberal Member of Parliament they should not be considered as unemployed.
There has been a mistake made by the Government in not aggressively developing new and comprehensive training and counselling programs which could really prepare our young people for the changing and highly competitive world of new technologies.
I know that those comments may in some sense sound partisan. I believe they are true, but let me go beyond the comments and quote from some of the studies which are being done to show what is really happening to young people in our country today. I will quote from a recent report, Sir, of the Canadian Mental Health Association, entitled "Unemployment: Its Impact on Body and Soul". Chapter 6 in that study is headed, "Are youth the silent victims?" I would like to just quote from page 35 of that study, which says:
It is cruel irony that while our social institutions promote the importance of economic independence as a measure of maturity, our economic policies have created a situation in which youth are hard-pressed to find employment. They thus remain, by social definition, immature and dependent. This "dependency" can take the form of reliance on parents, on the state, on drugs. Regardless of its form, it is counter-productive to blame young people for their predicament when it is policies and structures that have created the context in which growth is stifled.
That, Sir, is not said by a body which is given to partisan statements. That is said by the Canadian Mental Health Association which has studied the impact of unemployment on young people. When it makes that statement it uses such words as "dependency, reliance, predicament". If I were to emphasize those words, Sir, I would say that they bring home, far more than statistics, what is really happening to people under the age of 25. Those words put the human, tragic face upon numbers and unemployment rates and the seasonally adjusted totals which we hear every time Statistics Canada releases its report on the labour force.
Let there be no mistake, Sir, the figures did not grow so alarmingly, nor remain high, because our young people are unwilling to work. That is not the case. It is not because they do not want to go to work. It is because they cannot find a job, any job at all, and the social consequences are alarming, particularly among those looking for their first jobs rather than continuing on in post-secondary education.
The study I quoted from, which was produced by the Canadian Mental Health Association, points out that unemployed youth are likely to feel bored, with nothing to do, no money to do it with, no clear goals and no sense of purpose. Second, they are likely to flounder in their search for a sense of personal identity; third, to have lower self-esteem than their peers who are employed or in school; fourth, to feel humiliated, and blame themselves for not staying in school or trying harder; fifth, to feel angry at, and resentful of, themselves and their parents, teachers, employers, governments and other institutions; and, finally, to be disillusioned with themselves and their society.
It is interesting to see some of the headlines which appear in the newspapers which collaborate these statements. I have one here which reads, "Jobless Youth: Hope the Major Casualty". And another reads, "Youth Revolt Feared Unless Jobs Available". This is what is happening to young people, and it is documented and clear if the Government would only take a look at what is happening. These are the feelings of young men and women supposedly, Sir, in the prime of their lives. In days past they would normally have been planning their futures. They would have been thinking about getting married, dreaming of being promoted in their jobs, or planning on buying a home or a car. That is the sort of thing they can no longer envisage. They cannot think about it. Instead, at the age of 20 or 21 they are prepared to give up. They have already been looking for a year or two years and they see no real future for themselves. No job, no money and a rapidly diminishing self-respect is the legacy that the Liberal Government has given to these young people.
May 24, 1984

Let us not be deceived, Sir, into thinking that these symptoms are restricted solely to those who go straight from high school into the labour force. Although statistics show that young people who receive no post-secondary education are less likely to find a job, schooling itself is no longer a guarantee of entry in the labour force. When I was looking at these statistics, Sir, one thing came very clearly to mind. They showed that 73 per cent of those young people who were unemployed have only a high school education or less. That points out the need for a clear remedial and fundamental skill development training. That is what is really needed by these young people. Not just for education's sake, but to give them the skills to enrol in training. Give them the fundamental education so that they can get enrolled in training programs. But what did the Government do two years ago? It cut off funding for literacy and basic training programs.
However, that is for the young people who have a high school education or less. Look at the others who have gone on and put in years of study and preparation, young people who are graduating from university and community colleges and can find no work to go to. No wonder they begin to ask themselves why they bothered to do it in the first place. Why did they bother juggling part-time jobs during the school year and search for and work hard at summer jobs so that they could get enough money to pay for their education? Why did they bother to go so heavily into debt to graduate and then find that they have no means of paying back those loans? That is what the young people of today are asking; to do all that and then find there are no jobs. No wonder they are disillusioned, no wonder they are giving up on the system.
This leads us to other problems and social burdens that unemployment brings about. Just recently there was a study done which shows the linkage between youth unemployment and crime. This comes to light in a book entitled Economic Opportunity and Crime. It says that in the case of crimes of violence we can demonstrate a fairly strong relationship between these offences and deteriorating economic conditions mainly reflected by unemployment. We have hypothesized that assaults will increase as a result of frustration of unemployment. I do not need to turn to economic or academic studies to bear this out, Mr. Speaker. I just want to read from a letter written by a widow who is in dire financial straits. She said that her son left home. He was away only one month. He tried hard, he could not find a job and welfare would not help him, so he stole food just so he could live. As a result the boy was put in a correctional centre for what he did, and he was not the only young boy who was there because of that.
Earlier this week in the Standing Committee on Health, Welfare and Social Affairs I asked whether or not we were undertaking in depth studies in Canada to show the correlation between unemployment, particularly youth unemployment, and the social costs that will be with us long after new jobs are created. As yet there has been almost nothing done in this field in Canada, but we need those studies in the same way that we need this Government and this Parliament to address the
Supply
problem. Not from the point of view, Mr. Speaker, of trying to patch up the problems, not to look for band-aid solutions, but to begin a different kind of approach, one that will see us investing in human resources inthe way we have invested in natural resources in the past.
We have nto had in this country a commitment by the Liberal Government that the development of the human potential in this country is as important and as critical as is the development of equipment or plant or natural resources. That attitude has to be turned around, Sir. Our greatest resource in this country is our people. We have to give the same kind of capital investment to the development of our people as has been done with the other sectors of our economy in the past. That, Sir, is what this Party is committed to. The studies we have done have shown that this is the only way to turn around this situation of youth employment.


Mr. Baker:: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Hon. Member. At the beginning of her remarks she was very unkind to the Liberal Government. She also mentioned the number of young people who will be seeking employment this summer so that they can return to university and trade schools and so on.
I would like to know if, in areas of high unemployment and where there is practically no industry, she supports the Government's summer student employment programs and, generally speaking, whether she supports direct government job creation in those areas I mentioned?


Flora Isabel MacDonald: The Hon. Member comes from Newfoundland. He certainly should know something about high unemployment in this country and the tragedy that this Government has not even recognized the problems of Newfoundland in any way, shape or form. He should be up there demanding that the Cabinet Ministers in his Government do something about turning around their attitude toward Newfoundland. It has been a disgrace and he should know it. I want to tell him that for a long time the intensive development of long-term jobs will be most critical. Certainly the summer programs have been supported, but what do they do for the 500,000 young people who will not have access to them? There are many in his riding of Gander-Twillingate who will not be beneficiaries of that program. What, may I ask, is he prepared to say on their behalf, because the Government is saying nothing for them.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: Before giving the Hon. Member the floor, I should comment that questions are directed to the person who has made a speech. The person who has made a speech should not be directing comments or questions to the questioner. The Hon. Member for Gander-Twillingate (Mr. Baker).


Walter David Baker: Mr. Speaker, of course there was a reason I asked the question. The Hon. Member who just spoke was part of the Government in 1979 and the first part of 1980. One of the most disgusting things that the Government did at that time, in which the Hon. Member was a key player, was to lay

May 24, 1984
Supply
down the law and say that there would be no direct job-creation programs from the federal Government. It said that perhaps the private sector should create the jobs. That is precisely why I asked the question, Mr. Speaker. That will be a key question in the next federal election. That is a key question in areas of high unemployment where private enterprise does not exist to any great degree at all.
If the Hon. Member is saying that she supports the Summer Student Employment Program and wants more money to go into it and other direct job creation programs, then she is at variance with her Party. That is why I ask the question. Would the Hon. Member reconsider her answer in view of what happened when the Conservative Party took power?


Flora Isabel MacDonald: Mr. Speaker, when the Conservative Party was in power the unemployment rate in the country was a lot lower than it is at the present time. He must bear the blame, along with everyone in that Party, for what has happened in the last four years. It is the policies of that Government that have driven the unemployment rate to the extreme height it is at today.
Of course the Hon. Member was not here earlier today when the various points as to what steps would be undertaken were spelled out. However, his constituents will know what they are. I would like him to know, Mr. Speaker, that the people in his riding are going to be asking him what he has done in the last four years to bring down the unemployment rate in Gander-Twillingate and the many other parts of Atlantic Canada which have suffered more than any other part of the country because of the policies of the Liberal Government.


Yvon Pinard: There are Tory Governments in those provinces.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: Are there any other questions or comments? Another supplementary question, the Hon. Member for Gander-Twillingate.


Walter David Baker: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member has still not answered the question. It is a key question. It is an important question of Government policy. It is an important question of Opposition policy. It is an important question that the Hon. Member is going to have to answer now or when the campaign is on, as will every person running for the Progressive Conservative Party. She still has not answered the question.


Flora Isabel MacDonald: Mr. Speaker, I do not quite understand the Member reiterating a question which I have answered two or three times. I realize it takes a little longer to get through to him. I have known that over the years, as have others. However, since he has asked about areas such as his part of the country, I will repeat what was said by the Hon. Member for Elgin earlier this morning.
In several parts of Canada young people face a future of almost permanent unemployment. Wage subsidies and employment tax credits will be of little value in these economically depressed regions. In such regions there ought to be programs of community based entrepreneurial development
which would assist individuals and groups wishing to start new businesses to raise money, to cut through red tape, to identify markets, and to train workers. That is what has not been happening and that is what must happen so that people can get permanent jobs.


John Wise: Mr. Speaker, I did not have any intention of posing a question to my colleague, the Hon. Member for Kingston and the Islands (Miss MacDonald). However, in view of the exchange which has taken place, I would like to direct a question to her. Has she had an opportunity to examine the record? I know she is an extremely busy Member. Can she recall that during the nine months when we were in Government we created some 60,000 jobs? That was a creation of 7,000 jobs a month. Would she agree that if we examine the record for the 49 months since this Government was re-elected to office we will see that during that period of time they have lost a total of 300,000 jobs? In the nine months we were in power we created jobs at a rate of 7,000 per month. In the 49 months since this Government has been in office they have lost jobs at a rate of 7,000 a month.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: A short response from the Member for Kingston and the Islands.


Flora Isabel MacDonald: Mr. Speaker, that is a very good and valid point which should be made. I hope the Member for Gander-Twillingate takes very strong cognizance of these important figures. In the last four years we have seen a major setback to the labour force of the country. We have still not recovered to the point where those in the employment force are at the level they were at in 1981. That is a tragedy. Those people are unemployed and the young people are still the hardest hit.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: The period for questions and comments has ended. For continuing debate, the Hon. Member for Burin-St. George's (Mr. Simmons).


Hon. Roger Simmons (Burin-St. George's):: Mr. Speaker, I would first like to come to the defence of my good friend and my colleague, the Hon. Member for Gander-Twillingate (Mr. Baker). He has been in the House for 10 years. They have been 10 vigorous years for him. He has fought like a Trojan and the happy result can be seen throughout Gander-Twillingate. I think it is unfortunate that there should be a suggestion that he has been less than an absolutely thoroughly good Member during that period, particularly in the last few months when he, as have all of us around the country, has had to deal with some difficult issues relating to the employment figures.
I thought I saw one of the more touching scenes in this House a few minutes ago when the very magnanimous and gentlemanly Member for Elgin (Mr. Wise) came to the rescue of the lady from Kingston and the Islands.


Flora Isabel MacDonald: Member for Kingston and the Islands. Point of order, Mr. Speaker.
May 24, 1984


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: The Hon. Member for Kingston and the Islands (Miss MacDonald) on a point of order.


Flora Isabel MacDonald: Mr. Speaker, I am in this House under the same set of circumstances as any other Member here. It has been very difficult for me, as a Member of Parliament, to listen to the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) of the country refuse to accord me the same title as any other Member of this Parliament day after day and year after year. Sir, I protest that I am entitled to be addressed as a Member of Parliament. It is on that basis that I was sworn into this Parliament. I insist that that is how we should all be addressed.


Yvon Pinard: Mr. Speaker, I rise on the same point of order.
I am sure that the hon. lady would not want us not to respect past practice. Very often it has been accepted in the House that we call a colleague the hon. gentleman from a certain riding. I am pretty sure that the hon. lady is not suggesting that we should not call her a lady. I respect her very much. There is nothing wrong and nothing contrary to parliamentary practice in calling an Hon. Member either an hon. gentleman, if I am addressing Mr. Dick, for example, or an hon. lady, if I am addressing my good colleague, the Hon. Member for Kingston and the Islands (Miss MacDonald).


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: I did not personally sense any intention to show any lack of respect. It might simplify matters if Hon. Members could restrict themselves to the use of the terminology "Hon. Member".


Roger Simmons: Mr. Speaker, as always, an excellent ruling. I hope the Opposition will keep that in mind when they sometimes refer to Ministers during Question Period as other than Minister.
The point raised by the lady from Kingston and the Islands-


Flora Isabel MacDonald: He just ruled.


Roger Simmons: The Hon. Member for Kingston and the Islands. You interpret me correctly, Mr. Speaker. Of course, I intended no disrespect. I used it in the same vein that she had, moments earlier, when referring to the Hon. Member for Gander-Twillingate as the gentleman from Gander Twillin-gate. It is quite common practice. It is far from me to suggest that she is not a lady.
I thought it was touching that the gentleman, the Hon. Member for Elgin came to her rescue so magnificently a few moments ago. At that point she needed rescue because she was impuning the performance of a Trojan in this House, the Member for Gander-Twillingate.
I happen to agree with the Member for Elgin thoroughly when he says that the Tories, during their nine months in office, created 40,000 jobs. I believe, and let the record show that, that they did create 40,000 jobs. Nobody would deny them that. Nobody on this side of the House would deny them
Supply
that because we know that the reason the programs were in place to create those jobs was that a Liberal government had preceded that Tory government for the preceding 16 years, from 1963 to 1979. Despite the fact that they wiped out every fisheries project in Atlantic Canada during their nine months in office, and despite their stated policy to do away with job creation programs, they were unable to wipe out all the jobs. Therefore, 40,000 jobs were created as a heritage, a leftover from a Liberal government. They were jobs that they could not destroy despite their most destructive efforts.
The gentleman from Elgin is absolutely right, the Hon. Member for Kingston and the Islands-


Flora Isabel MacDonald: You are learning.


Roger Simmons: I agree with the lady from Kingston and the Islands when she says that the attitude of some politicians toward Newfoundland and Labrador is absolutely despicable. She is absolutely right. Again, I remind you and her, Mr. Speaker, that among those politicians who manifest such attitudes are the two gentlemen from Newfoundland who are in the Tory Cabinet and who had such a despicable attitude toward Newfoundland that they were party to wiping out every single fisheries project in all of Newfoundland and Labrador. All of them had been approved, had gone through the Cabinet process during the Liberal years, had gone through the parliamentary process and were on track until the two gentlemen from St. John's got a hold of them. They put them off track very fast. She is right, that is despicable.
Speaking of other politicians, watching the performance these days of the Premier of Newfoundland, a man I know very well, makes one a little unhappy about what some politicians will dare to do. The economy of Newfoundland is not on track to the degree it could be if we had an agreement on the offshore. The reason there is not an agreement on the offshore has nothing to do with a lack of willingness on the part of the Government of Canada. It has nothing to do with a lack of willingness or desire on the part of the Newfoundland community at large. It has very little to do with any lack of willingness in the Government of Newfoundland as a whole. It does concern the attitude of the Premier of the province who fights not to win, but who fights to fight. His objective is to fight some more today and some more tomorrow. Until that attitude changes, I agree with the Member for Kingston and the Islands that we will continually have to lament the approach of some politicians who would put base, partisan politics before the good of the people of Newfoundland and Labrador. I thank her for raising that particular issue because it is an important issue to the gentleman from Gander-Twillingate, and an important one to me.
I also agree with her that the Tories were in power at a time when the unemployment rate was decidedly lower than it is today. Is she suggesting that because a government of whatever political stripe took office that somehow the unemployment rate suddenly shot downwards? Is that what she wants us to believe? The truth is that that unemployment rate was low

May 24, 1984
Supply
at that particular time because of 16 years of Liberal government that had preceded it.
She cannot have it both ways. She cannot on one hand blame the Government totally for the current unemployment rate and at the same time deny it credit for the low unemployment rate which existed when her government took office in June of 1979. It is no accident that she finds herself telling the truth about this subject as well. Of course the unemployment rate was low. She should also expand beyond that and tell the House and the country why the unemployment rate was low. It was low because she and her colleagues inherited an economy that had been managed well in the preceding 16 years by Liberal regimes, first under Mr. Pearson and subsequently under the current Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau).
I am grateful to Members opposite who participated in this debate today because they have given the people of Canada a warning. It is a warning of what the people of Canada can expect. The motion before us clearly shows us the haze and fog in which the Opposition continues to wander aimlessly day in and day out. It is looking for something with which to tempt what they clearly must see as an unwitting public that is unencumbered by any consideration of the facts. The Opposition critics rise to show the Canadian people how they are prepared to run the country. However, despite the fond hopes of the Opposition, the Canadian public is not that gullible. They know truth from fantasy. They know what is happening and they know that this Government has been a world leader in promoting the cause of youth.
It is interesting to note that while the national Tory Party spends its time trying to imagine what it would be like to be in power, its provincial counterpart in Ontario is wisely following Liberal initiatives. I am referring to the recent announcement by the Ontario Government of the appointment of Mr. Ken Dryden to the position of Youth Commissioner. It occurs to me that now that the hockey season is over the Opposition might want to consider asking Mr. Peter Pocklington if they could borrow Wayne Gretzky. He, at least, would give them some effective opposition. But the decision to appoint someone to focus the concerns of youth, as the Government of Ontario has done, is once again just following a good Liberal lead.
In December last year this Government announced its intention to focus on the concerns of youth by appointing the country's very first Minister of State for Youth (Mrs. Her-vieux-Payette). Since that time this Government has worked toward involving young people in planning their own future.
Let us look just a little more closely at the motion before this House. In its wish to deceive, the Opposition has tried to paint a picture of Canada as the worst performer of any western industrial nation. The Opposition says that Canada's unemployment rate for young adults remains the highest of any western industrial nation. That is what the Opposition says, Mr. Speaker. But that is simply not true, as Hon. Members opposite would know if they only took the time to examine the figures.
According to a recently published forecast prepared by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development during 1984 youth unemployment rates in Spain, France, the United Kingdom, and Italy were markedly higher than in Canada. In relative terms, Canada has not experienced the highest percentage increase in youth unemployment either. In comparing 1979 actual rates to 1984 forecast rates, Canada's youth unemployment rates will have increased by 42.3 per cent over the five year period. Obviously we on this side are not satisfied with that figure. We are working hard to reduce it, with, I might add, some very encouraging results to which I shall refer in a few moments.
The Opposition is fond of saying, as we see in this motion today, that Government policies are to blame for unemployment in Canada. So let us look at the performance of some other countries, Mr. Speaker, and see how well they have performed over the same period.
The average increase in youth unemployment rates over the same five-year period from 1979 to 1984 fo>
the seven countries surveyed by the OECD, which include the United States, Japan, West Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Italy and Canada, is 53.7 per cent, or 11.5 per cent higher than for Canada alone. Taken individually, our 42.3 per cent is significantly lower than the United Kingdom's 96.6 per cent. That is right; Canada has had a 42.3 per cent increase, and the United Kingdom, under a Tory Government, of course has had a 96.6 per cent increase. And what about West Germany? It had an increase of 291 per cent in youth unemployment in five years.
In fact, the OECD predicts that Canada and the U.S. will be the only countries whose youth unemployment rates will decline during 1984. Apparently, Mr. Speaker, the Government's policies in this area are not nearly as inadequate as Hon. Members opposite would have us believe.
There is no doubt that the past few years have been a difficult time both here and abroad. The recent recession left governments everywhere with little room to manoeuvre. Increases in the cost of money, couple with the entry into the eligible workforce of the baby boom generation meant that already fragile economies were stretched to the breaking point. In addition, our society is undergoing a profound change, largely as a result of new technology. It is only natural that when our society is changing so rapidly there should be a period of uncertainty during which traditional qualifications are unable to keep pace with technical innovations. But here again, through the Government's national training program, we are working at top speed to provide the young people of this country with the skills they will need to meet the rapidly changing demands of the Canadian labour market.
When these events are placed in the context of the proportion of young people in the workforce, the challenge that has been met successfully by the Government of Canada is truly remarkable. Most industrialized nations have seen a decline in youth as a percentage of the total workforce over the past few years. In absolute terms, however, Canada's decline, at 25 per cent in 1982, ranked third highest behind Austrlia and Portugal.
May 24, 1984

If time permitted I would have gone on and showed again that our performance in Canada fares much better than in the other industrialized countries. But just let me say that the difference here, and on that side of the House, is that our heart is in doing something for the youth unemployed.


Flora Isabel MacDonald: Creating it.


Roger Simmons: The heart of the Opposition is in painting the worst possible picture. The Opposition's heart is in destroying morale. Ours is in lifting it, by providing programs, initiatives, through private enterprise and by reaching out so that the thousands and tens of thousands of youth across this country, who are relatively in better shape than their counterparts in countries I have mentioned, may find jobs. On this side we are not going to quit until we continue to address the problem adequately. We have addressed it fairly adequately but we have not yet done enough. But we are not going to stop, Mr. Speaker, because we have a few naysayers on that side who want doom and gloom. We believe in our youth and that is why we put our money where our mouth is.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: There follows a ten minute period for questions or comments.


Arnold John Malone: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member for Burin-St. George's (Mr. Simmons) said that he puts his money where his mouth is. I want to know how much money he has.


Roger Simmons: Mr. Speaker, I am delighted to answer that question. I want to draw attention to the concluding remarks I made which are now reinforced by the question and the questioner. While we believe that serious things need to be done on a continuing basis to provide more jobs for youth, the Hon. Member's approach to the problem is to prove that if he is not witty, he is at least half-witty.


Mr. Dionne (Northumberland-Miramichi):: Mr. Speaker, in the first part of the Hon. Member's speech he referred to what the benefit of an agreement on the offshore of Newfoundland would be to the employment picture in Newfoundland. Can the Hon. Member explain to this House why the Government of Newfoundland was unwilling to accept the revenue sharing offer made to the Government of Newfoundland by the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Chretien) in the same terms which the Government of Nova Scotia was quite ready and willing to accept? Could he tell us what benefit that would have in terms of jobs to Newfoundland?


Roger Simmons: I thank my friend from Miramichi for his question. He is right, of course. There was an offer made by the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Chretien). He calls to mind the distinction I made in my speech between the Government of Newfoundland as a whole and the Leader of that Government, Mr. Peckford. It is well known because it was documented on the national news that day.
The Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources and Mr. Marshall went before national television cameras to say they
Supply
were pleased with the outcome of the meeting, that they essentially had an agreement and that they just wanted to take it back to their respective governments. Within a few hours the Premier of Newfoundland was on the radio basically saying, "Not so fast, we don't have an agreement yet". He was scared to death that they might have an agreement. They almost had it, to the credit of Mr. Marshall and the Minister of Energy. They were so near that they went public with their accord; they announced it on national television.
I just want to correct my good friend, the Hon. Member for Northumberland-Miramichi (Mr. Dionne), in one respect. He said that it was a deal somewhat like the one offered to Nova Scotia. He is wrong, only in the sense that it was a deal considerably better than the one offered to Nova Scotia. I mean no offence to Nova Scotians, but we in Newfoundland have learned that if we bargain long and hard enough we will get an even better deal than the other fellows, and that is the deal which the Minister of Energy offered Mr. Marshall.


Walter David Baker: Mr. Speaker, in his opening comments the Hon. Member perceived what was happening when I asked questions of the Hon. Member who spoke prior to him. When the Progressive Conservative Party was in office, it stated as its policy that there would be no direct job-creation programs from the federal Government, that that was the business of private enterprise, and that it would try to help out private enterprise.
I believe the Government of Canada should not only maintain but increase the amount of money going into the Summer Student Employment Program. In doing away with all direct job-creation programs, the Conservatives would see that program go down the drain. There would be no student jobs under it if they were in office again.
Would the Hon. Member explain to the House briefly the importance of that program which the Conservatives do not like and would not have in existence if they were in power? Would he explain to the House the types of accomplishments and the types of people who would work under that program? Could he indicate to the House whether or not they would have summer jobs if this federal Government program did not exist?


Roger Simmons: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member for Gander-Twillingate focused very well on yet another reason; whatever our loyalty to this Party of which we are a part, we have a greater loyalty to the youth of Canada. We have to get out there and do our utmost to ensure that the crowd which would rob them of the few available jobs never get into office. He says it so well that he fires me up even more to get out there and ensure that the people of Canada understand what is a pig in a poke when they are asked to vote Tory.
Concerning his question about the Summer Canada Program, I cannot think of any better job-creation program in existence. When I travel through my riding, I see them helping the aged. I see them repairing roads in small communities which have no vehicular traffic. I see them out with shovels and wheelbarrows. I see them improving slipways and

May 24, 1984
Supply
wharves. I see them doing things which add to the improvement of communities. I see them learning good job skills. I see them earning money so that they can attend university, return to high school or participate in funding the family budget, as meagre as it may be in some of those communities. I believe in that particular program. I shudder when I think of a day that it might be wiped out because of the rhetoric of some people about private enterprise who have no feeling in their guts about the youth of their country who desperately need that money and more of it.


Howard Edward Crosby: Question.


Mr. Manly:: I have a question for the Hon. Member.
[ Translation]


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: Order. It being 5.45 p.m., it is my duty-


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: I have used my discretion and decided that we cannot have questions or comments in the remaining 30 seconds.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


James Douglas Manly: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. In the debate today the New Democratic Party had one speaker. I would have appreciated at least the last 60 seconds in order to place a few comments on the record.


An Hon. Member:: Put the question.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Herbert):: Order, please. I intend to put the question. May I just tell the Hon. Member for Cowichan-Malahat-The Islands (Mr. Manly) that if there had been time remaining, he was the next speaker on the list. There was no time remaining. In fact, there were three more minutes, if time had not expired, for questions and comments.
[ Translation]
Order. It being 5.45 p.m., it is my duty to interrupt proceedings and to put forthwith every question necessary to dispose of the supply proceedings now before the House, under the provisions of Standing Order 62(9).
Therefore, the question is on the following:

The question is on the amendment. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the amendment?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


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


Some Hon. Members:: Yea.


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


Some Hon. Members:: Nay.


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


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


Mr. Speaker:: I declare the amendment lost.


Ramon John Hnatyshyn: Mr. Speaker, I think there might be a disposition to have the same vote apply on the subsequent vote in support of the motion.


Ian Deans: Mr. Speaker, that is exactly what I was going to say and I think that will be fine.


Yvon Pinard: Mr. Speaker, we agree, and if the offer extends to all other non-confidence votes between now and the end of the year, Progressive Conservative Members could stay away altogether.


Mr. Speaker:: Before I put the question, are there any Hon. Members who did not vote the first time and wish to be recorded as voting on this occasion? The Hon. Member for Sherbrooke (Mr. Pelletier) on a point of order.


Mr. Pelletier:: Mr. Speaker, I was in the House for the vote but I was paired with a Member from the Opposition so I would like to be-


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: Is it agreed that the vote applying to the amendment will also apply to the main motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. This House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 11 a.m., pursuant to Standing Order.
At 6.14 p.m., the House adjourned, without question put, pursuant to Standing Order.

Friday, May 25, 1984