1987-05-07

[Stage Direction]
[ Translation]

Mr. Doug Lewis (Parliamentary Secretary to Deputy Prime Minister and President of the Privy Council):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 106(8), I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the Government's response to Petitions Nos. 332-1534, 332-1540 to 332-1542 inclusive, 3321560, 332-1561, 332-1563, 332-1567, 332-1569, 332-1570, 332-1572, 332-1624, 332-1654, 332-1670, 332-1695, 3321702, 332-1709 to 332-1711 inclusive, 332-1724 to 332-1726 inclusive, 332-1730, 332-1732, 332-1754 and 332-1947.



MANAGEMENT AND MEMBERS' SERVICES


Mr. Marcel Prud'homme (Saint-Denis):: Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to inform you that the Committee on Management and Members' Services, of which I am chairman, had the privilege of your presence yesterday.
It was indeed a pleasure to have you with us and to be able to ask you a number of questions, and we are happy to say that the Standing Committee on Management and Members' Services adopted your items with very little debate, which reflects most honourably on you, Mr. Speaker, and I said that I would take advantage of every opportunity to express publicly our feelings of cordial friendship.


Mr. Speaker:: Thank you very much.
[Editor's Note: For above report see today's Votes and Proceedings.]


PETITIONS
Mr. Keith Penner (Cochrane-Superior):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 106, I have the honour to present a petition signed by Canadian citizens from Almonte, Arnpri-or, Renfrew, Pakenham, Smiths Falls, Lanark, Woodlawn, Dunrobin and Constance Bay, concerning a grievance by Fred Turner of Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, against the Government of Canada whereby Mr. Turner lost his authority to operate Turnair because of a minor licence violation. Widespread public attention has been drawn to this case of injustice. The petitioners therefore ask for and seek an independent arbitrator to be assigned to this matter to investigate the details of the case, to review and negotiate the offer from the federal Government with Fred Turner in order to establish an equitable settlement which better reflects the true nature of his loss.


Mr. Les Benjamin (Regina West):: Mr. Speaker, I have the duty and honour to present two petitions, the first signed by Canadians from Nepean, Kanata and the City of Ottawa, and the second signed by citizens of Yellowknife in the Northwest Territories, in which they humbly show that the operating records of an airline known as Turnair were seized by the Canadian Transport Commission as evidence in a prosecution of another unlicensed airline and Mr. Turner was a key witness and that the Government cancelled his operating authority for a minor licence violation and the CTC already had the information it needed.
Therefore the undersigned petitioners humbly pray and call upon the House to seek that an independent arbitrator be assigned to this matter to investigate the details of the case and to review and negotiate the offer from the federal Government with Fred Turner in order to reach an equitable settlement which better reflects the true nature of his loss. The petitioners humbly pray that in the name of natural justice and the equitable treatment of Canadian citizens this matter be dealt with forthwith by the Government.


Mr. Svend J. Robinson (Burnaby):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour of tabling several petitions signed by more than 1,000 residents of the Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean area.

May 7, 1987
Petitions
Your petitioners are opposed to the establishment of a target range in their region or anywhere else. They want the money to be invested locally in genuine development programs including job creation, education, health, social services and tourism. Mr. Speaker, they call upon Parliament to oppose the establishment of a target range for CF-18 fighters in the Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean area.
[DOT] (mo)


Svend Johannes Robinson: Mr. Speaker, I also have the honour to present a petition on behalf of residents of my constituency of Burnaby, as well as residents of New Westminster, Coquitlam and Vancouver. These residents call upon the Government even at this late date to recognize that its proposals to change the Patent Act relating to prescription drugs will increase drug prices for Canadian consumers and will severely restrict the ability of average Canadians to buy necessary prescription drugs. They hope that even though Bill C-22 has passed third reading the Government might finally come to its senses and withdraw these proposals which will have such a devastating impact on seniors, the poor and taxpayers.


Philip Derek Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. It just struck me that in late March I raised a point of order with respect to the presentation of petitions concerning Bills which were currently before the House. Today, we have had a host of petitions on Bills which have cleared all three stages of the House.


Leslie Gordon Benjamin: They are still before Parliament.


Philip Derek Lewis: I wonder when we might receive Your Honour's decision with respect to my point of order.


Svend Johannes Robinson: Mr. Speaker, I rise on the same point of order. The petition which I am tabling on behalf of these residents, who are so concerned about these proposals, calls upon Parliament to reject these proposals which will increase prescription drug prices. I do not sit in the Senate, and neither does the Hon. Parliamentary Secretary. In fact, I never want to sit in the Senate. The only opportunity I have to present these petitions which call upon Parliament to reject these proposals is here in this Chamber. I hope that the Government will recognize that Parliament is made up of more than just this House, at least until the Senate is abolished. As long as that is the case, it is entirely in order to call upon Parliament to reject these proposals.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Leslie Gordon Benjamin: Mr. Speaker, I rise on the same point of order. Surely, the right of petition, which goes back to 1066, remains inviolable for citizens of Canada. It is a long-standing practice of this House that even though legislation has been
passed citizens may still petition Parliament to change it or to repeal it. That has always been the case. These specious points of order of the Parliamentary Secretary are made in order for him to get up, to cry and to complain about something that is a fundamental right of every citizen of Canada and a duty, honour and responsibility of Members of Parliament to present.


Mr. Riis:: Mr. Speaker, I rise on the same point of order. It is not surprising that the Parliamentary Secretary would rise once again to attempt to restrict discussion on this Bill. I say that because the Government introduced closure at second reading. It introduced closure at committee stage and at report stage. It even introduced closure at third reading. It seems to be part of the same process-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I regret very much interrupting the Hon. Member for Kamloops-Shuswap (Mr. Riis). His point, of course, is a vigorous one and of much interest to the House, but he is straying from the point of order.
Perhaps I can assist the House by indicating to the Parliamentary Secretary and to all Hon. Members that 1 will be returning to the Chamber with a ruling on Tuesday.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, I have a petition dated April 19, 1987-


Mr. Fennell:: Why did it take so long to get it here?


Nelson Andrew Riis: That is really just a few days ago. The petitioners were anticipating that the Government would not impose closure on the last stage of the debate of Bill C-22. They, too, call upon the Government to recognize that the changes it has made to the Patent Act relating to prescription drugs will increase drug prices severely. They will restrict the ability of average Canadian consumers to buy necessary prescription drugs. Unfortunately, as of last night, it is too late, but the petitioners are asking the Government to reject these proposals in the best interests of Canadian prescription drug purchasers.


Mr. Don Blenkarn (Mississauga South):: Mr. Speaker, I have the duty today to present four petitions on behalf of residents of Canada. I do not necessarily support these petitions personally-[DOT]


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Donald Alex Blenkarn: -but the citizens involved are entitled to have their positions presented to this House.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Donald Alex Blenkarn: The first petition urges Parliament to stop all immigration into the country until unemployment has fallen below 250,000; that refugees from El Salvador, Chile and Guatemala be directed to countries of their political persuasions; and that penalties be implemented to deter illegals from entering Canada.
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Donald Alex Blenkarn: Mr. Speaker, the second petition urges Parliament to demand an end to human rights abuses in Commonwealth countries, especially Tanzania, Zambia, Guyana and Zimbabwe; to press for early elections in those countries that are not democracies; and especially to counsel Zimbabwe that the move to a one-Party state will result in cancellation of all Canadian aid.


Donald Alex Blenkarn: Mr. Speaker, the third petition urges Parliament to repeal those sections of the Customs Tariff Act which permit customs officials to act as censors over films, books, magazines or tapes imported by adult Canadians.


Donald Alex Blenkarn: Mr. Speaker, the fourth petition urges Parliament to establish a royal commission to investigate the E. Elerbert Norman case; to investigate Soviet penetration of Government in Canada; and to report these findings in a full and open manner to the Canadian people.


Mr. Felix Holtmann (Selkirk-Interlake):: Mr. Speaker, it gives me a great deal of honour this morning to present a petition on behalf of 100 constituents of my riding representing the areas of Woodlands and Lake Francis. They humbly petition the House to protect the postal service in their town. They ask the Government to allow the Post Office to remain open.


Mr. Vince Dantzer (Okanagan North):: Mr. Speaker, I too have a petition signed by well over 500 people from Kelowna and the surrounding area. It is a petition which I personally support. The petitioners pray and call upon Parliament to pass Motion M-37 which would allow unborn infants to be protected by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.



FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS


Hon. Tom Hockin (Minister of State (Finance)) moved: for leave to introduce Bill C-56, an Act to amend certain Acts relating to financial institutions.
Order Paper Questions


Mr. Speaker:: Shall the Minister have leave to introduce the Bill?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, Bill read the first time and ordered to be printed.
Mr. Speaker:: When shall the Bill be read the second time? At the next sitting of the House?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Philip Derek Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. There have been discussions among the House Leaders and the Bill which has just been introduced and read the first time is really a combination of Bill C-8 and Bill C-9, which are presently on the Order Paper. I think you will find that the House would consent to discharging Bill C-8 and Bill C-9 from the Order Paper, under those circumstances.


Mr. Speaker:: Does the Parliamentary Secretary to the Deputy Prime Minister and President of the Privy Council have the unanimous consent of the House to withdraw Bills C-8 and C-9?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.



FOOD AND DRUGS ACT


Thomas Hockin: that Bill S-6, (from the Senate) to amend the Food and Drugs Act, be read the first time.
Motion agreed to and Bill read the first time.


QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER
[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)
Philip Derek Lewis: Mr. Speaker, the following question will be answered today: No. 111.


Mr. Howie: May 7, 1987
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From January 1, 1986 to date, has any money been paid to apple producers in New Brunswick for crop assistance and, if so, how much?


Hon. John Wise (Minister of Agriculture):: Yes, $49,158. [Translation]


Philip Derek Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I ask that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: The question enumerated by the Parliamentary Secretary has been answered. Shall the remaining questions stand?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


Hon. William Rompkey (Grand Falls-White Bay- Labrador) moved:: That this House condemns the Government for its abandonment of our youth and its failure to provide adequate support for their education and training or meaningful employment and job opportunities, both temporary and permanent.
He said: Mr. Speaker, the motion before us concerns one of the most important, if not the most important, groups in our society today.
Let me begin by reading from the report of the Senate committee chaired by the Hon. Jacques Hebert who is well known in this Parliament and in the country for his concern for young people. The report of the Senate states:
The public hearings proved to be a disturbing experience for the committee members, as we were not only confronted with distressing facts and statistics, but also actually met the young Canadians grappling with complicated problems. It would not be an exaggeration to say that by the time the hearings ended, the attitudes of the Committee members had changed. We had realized that the situation for a great number of young people is intolerable and that we must convince the public of this.
Hence, this motion today. Sometimes we talk blithely about young people, about our children and our grandchildren.
Obviously there is an intrinsic worth for the young people in our society. We love them because they are ours and we want to see them have the best possible world.
However, another point must be made. It is that at this stage of Canada's life they have more than simply an intrinsic value to us as young people because Canada is moving from one kind of society to another. With the exception of parts of Ontario and Quebec, Canada has been a resource-based society. We have been harvesting the sea, harvesting the forests and the minerals from our soils, and transporting them sometimes in a raw state and sometimes in a manufactured state.
However, the day when Canada can depend on shipping out raw resources is fast coming to an end. The easy times are over for us in Canada and the tough times are ahead.
We are moving from a resource-based and manufacturing economy to an information economy and an information age in which we will have to depend more than ever on our young people.
While they have an intrinsic value for us, in the information economy toward which we are moving they will be much more important to us in the future.
Let us consider the statistics arising from the Senate report and other research into the state of young people in this country today. Young people are important to the future of Canada, yet 48 per cent of single people under the age of 25 in Canada today live below the poverty line. There are 100,000 young people with children who are living below the poverty line.
Youth unemployment in my Province of Newfoundland is 32 per cent; in Nova Scotia it is 23 per cent; in British Columbia it is 23 per cent; and the unemployment rate for young people in Alberta is 2.5 times what it was in 1980. Last year in Canada only 170,000 students could find summer jobs.
In order to go beyond those statistics and understand the distress that exists with our young people, one only need look at the enormous jump in suicides and attempted suicides among young people in the past number of years to realize that this problem is serious. In 1961, for example, the suicide rate among males between the ages of 20 and 24 was 9 per 100,000. In 1985, it was 30 per 100,000, which is more than three times the level of 1961.
I do not lay these statistics on the table as scare tactics or for rhetorical purposes, but to illustrate graphically that this problem is serious. It requires serious solutions, but what has been done?
It is true that all of this cannot be blamed on the present Government because no one is naive enough to think that this suddenly began in 1984. Certainly, however, the Government has a responsibility to bring in programs that will address this situation. Let us consider what the Government has done. Student debt loads from Newfoundland to British Columbia range from $14,000 to $24,000 upon graduation. Canadian students who depend upon the Canada Student Loans Program and the various provincial loan programs which complement it have debt loads of between $14,000 and $20,000 when they graduate. These young people have less ability to find jobs. They are growing in numbers and experiencing the kind of despair which I just described. It is completely unacceptable.
I say to the Government that the first thing we need is a complete overhaul of the Canada Student Loans Program. Instead of loading a debt burden upon the present generation, who cannot and should not have to bear the burden, we should
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be moving toward a bursary program. We should be investing in young people instead of loading debt upon their shoulders. We should be injecting money into the system so that they can make a contribution.
Student access is being limited in our universities. We are in danger of becoming a society which offers education to an elite group. There are more and more students in low income brackets who cannot afford and therefore do not have access to colleges and universities. There is a great danger in Canada today that we are offering the services of those institutions only to the elite.
What we have seen consistently over the past few years, in particular, has been a retrenchment in the funds offered for the support of universities and colleges. I am talking particularly about the Established Programs Financing which the Government-and we must lay it directly at its door-has deliberately and knowingly cut back.
I should like to refer to the background of this matter. There was to have been an 8 per cent increase in Established Programs Financing to the provinces. It was an agreement between the federal Government and the provincial Governments. The agreement was unilaterally abrogated by the Government of Canada. Instead, the Minister of Finance (Mr. Wilson) announced that there would be an increase of only 6 per cent.
What did it mean? It meant that somehow the provinces had to come up with the shortfall from their own funds. Can one imagine the Province of Newfoundland-and the Premier himself has admitted that it is on the verge of bankruptcy- finding close to an extra $200 million out of its own pocket? Can one imagine it digging down deep into its pocket to find money by 1990 which it does not have in order to make up for the shortfall in Established Programs Financing?
This means that the universities get less money and that post-secondary institutions have less money with which to operate. As a result, what do they do? The only thing available to them is tuition fees. Thus they start raising tuition fees to try to carry on their programs.
What does that mean? It means that only those people who can afford to pay get in. This is what I mean by saying that the policies of the Government are forcing upon the universities and colleges a process whereby we in Canada are becoming a group which offers education only to the elite.
Student access has a second difficulty. The students may try to find some other way of supplementing their income to help put themselves through university. One way of doing it of course is by having a job in the summer-time. However, fewer and fewer students are able to find summer jobs. This is in addition to their Canada student loans, which amount to an unbearable debt load, the tuition they are required to pay and inadequate housing.
We found that all across the country too few students had access to adequate housing, again because the universities and
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colleges did not have the budgets and no one else was building that housing.
Students, in their attempt to attain their own resources, always depend upon summer jobs. However, what has happened to summer jobs? They have been cut back.
Last year there were adequate funds under the Canadian Jobs Strategy, but this year there has been a 15 per cent decrease. The Government of Canada says that that is mainly because it cut out the census. However, it does not matter from where the money comes or to what the money is applied. A job is a job is a job. If we take away $30 million or 15 per cent from last year's program, it means that many fewer young people in Canada have access to summer jobs. I do not care whether it was for the census or whatever; the fact is that less money is available for young people to find summer jobs this year than there was last year, and the Government must answer for it.
The change in the Canadian Jobs Strategy has also created difficulties for community colleges. The private sector is now given priority in the use of funds under the Canadian Jobs Strategy. Across the country from Newfoundland to British Columbia community colleges and CEGEPs have less funds available to them now than they had in the past. For example, we were told by Algonquin College in Ottawa that it received about 50 per cent of the funds than it received last year. Why is this? It is because funds were offered to the private sector.
What did the private sector do? It said that it did not want to do training because it was not very good at it, and returned the funds. As far as I know, many of them were unused. The story we heard from institutions such as Algonquin and the British Columbia Institute of Technology was that they had available to them a little more than 50 per cent of what they had in the past, because of the emphasis on the private sector under the Canadian Jobs Strategy. This is something which the Government must address if it is to provide proper consideration for the funding of our post-secondary institutions.
The closing of student employment centres is also a backward step. I call upon the Government to reinstate them.
My colleague in the Senate, Senator Fairbairn, recently highlighted for us in a very dramatic and effective way another serious problem, that is, the problem of illiteracy. We must remember that we are talking about a society which is moving from a resource-based economy to an information economy; we must always bear that in mind. We are talking about a fundamental change in society. Yet, when we need people who can think better and think smarter than ever before, what do we have? We have one million adult Canadians who cannot read or write at all and four million more who cannot read or write well enough to function adequately in society. Senator Fairbairn referred to them as "our country's hidden shame", and she was right; she put her finger on it.
I see the Secretary of State (Mr. Crombie) across the way. I know he is working on a program. I count upon him as a

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gentleman and a politician with a distinguished record to develop a program which will address the problem. As I said, I know he is working on it, and I wish him well. However, I wanted to highlight the issue today as a serious problem.
For example, my own province has the highest illiteracy rate anywhere in Canada. Over 30 per cent of Newfoundlanders over the age of 15 years have less than grade 9 education, and the national figure is 22 per cent. We need a national program to address this serious national problem.
It is not enough, in any of these things, to say that education is a provincial responsibility. It is true, but it does not solve the problem. As the country moves into a new kind of society, we need a national policy to address a serious national problem. I call upon the Government to take the matter very seriously. The tide must be turned.
We must increase the funding we make available to our universities and colleges for research as well. The irony is that Dr. John Polanyi, after he received the Nobel Prize, advised Canadian students and researchers who wanted to follow a career which could come anywhere close to resembling his to move to the United States. What a shocking indictment of the research capabilities of Canadian institutions!
The first thing we need is an increase in funding to universities and colleges, not simply for core programs but for research capabilities as well. Second, we need a fundamental change in the Canada Student Loans Program that will stress not debt loads but an investment in young Canadians and a move from a loan program to a bursary program. Third, we need the reinstatement of the First Chance Program for young people, a guarantee that when young people finish their training and education, they will have available to them, at least in the beginning, a job.
We cannot guarantee them a job for life and no one should be guaranteed a job for life. Every person is independent and has the right to make his own way in this world. However, in the kind of society into which we are moving, I believe we have to bring education beyond simply grade 13 or a Bachelor's degree. I believe we have to tell people that we will start them off and given them the first chance in the market-place. We have to provide adequate funding for summer jobs and we have to have a national program for attack on what Senator Fairbairn called this country's hidden shame, and that is, the problem of illiteracy in Canada. Those are the things that must be done. We on this side call upon the Government to take this matter seriously and to address these very serious problems.
If I may, I would like to conclude by reading from the Senate report on youth. Its concluding paragraphs read as follows:
Our society appears only too happy that today's youth seem to have an infinite
amount of patience and are less demanding than previous generations. But
how long will their patience hold out? In other industrialized countries, it
seems to have been stretched to the limit. In fact, in several regions of Europe, patience has given way to exasperation and violence.
What we are seeing on Canadian campuses today is the beginning of the re-enactment of the spirit of the sixties. Bob Dylan, where are you? Perhaps Bruce Springsteen, I do not know, will be the new symbol of the eighties. I believe we are starting to see a regeneration of that kind of spirit on campuses now. The report continues:
Despite the economic recession from which we have barely recovered, Canada is one of the richest countries in the world. We have at our disposal the means by which to help our young people. The public and political will to remedy the situation must be displayed without further delay. Each Canadian community must assume control of its own affairs and put its imagination to work so that we may improve the present and future lives of our young people. Just as in the event of a major national disaster, we as Canadians must concentrate all our energy to solve this serious problem.


Mr. Charest:: First, Mr. Speaker, I wish to greet you personally.
From the outset I should like to commend my colleague for a speech whose tone was particularly appropriate to the topic and tell him that I am pleasantly surprised at the approach he took today. Quite frankly I was expecting something else, more like much more partisan remarks on the part of my colleague opposite. I should like to emphasize how grateful I am that he took such a constructive approach.
I should like to say that the issue covers a lot of ground, that in all likelihood we agree with most of what he has brought to our attention today. He pinpoints problems which every one of us has acknowledged as having become ever more significant in recent years. Mr. Speaker, this is why I want to stress the fact that my colleague has raised problems which the Government is likely prepared to view as being identified.
I have two brief questions for him.
First, I should like to ask him what is the position of the Liberal Party of Canada with respect to what they consider to be the most urgent issue now facing young Canadians. He did refer to some of them but I was unable to find in his remarks a clear indication of what the most important problem might be.
Second, perhaps he might tell me who should be included in the eventual quest for solutions to what the Liberal Party of Canada deems to be the most important problem, or again the five points he mentioned in his speech?


Bill Rompkey: Mr. Speaker, it is very difficult to highlight one particular problem that needs attention because I think that would be over-simplifying what is a complex problem. I would suggest to the Minister what he could do if he wanted to help those who are in the middle of their education and training now. I am not talking about those who are coming into the educational system or those who have gone through it and are still experiencing despair and disillusionment in their difficulty in finding job opportunities because job opportunities are something the Government can and should create for those people. However, if he wanted to help those who are in the
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middle of their education now, he could deal with what I think is the top priority for Canadian students.
If members of the Canadian Federation of Students were here in this Chamber today, I think they would tell us to change the Canada Student Loans Program so that students will not have to bear that excessive debt burden of between $14,000 and $20,000 on graduation. Basically, we should change the Canada Student Loans Program from a loan program to a bursary program. I think that is what they would ask and that is what I ask on their behalf today.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my hon. friend a question about his very excellent speech which outlined the nature of the problems facing students. One thing I thought was missing from the Hon. Member's speech was any identification of what the Government has done to solve the problems.
I as well as other Hon. Members have looked high and low through all of the brochures and files and the only thing I could come up with was Hot-100. I gave this booklet to my teenage son the other day so he could look through it and evaluate it because he is the person for whom it was designed. To summarize my son Nils' comment, he said: "Dad, I looked through this and I couldn't find anything in here that was of direct relevance to me as a 17-year-old boy.
Has the Hon. Member looked through Hot-1001 What is his view of this initiative which I suppose is the only one the Government has taken in the last two and a half years?


Bill Rompkey: Mr. Speaker, that is a question that is best addressed and will be addressed to the Minister when he speaks. It will be for him to put on the record what the Government has done or has not done.
Today's motion clearly indicates that this is a serious national problem which requires a serious national response and, in answer to the Hon. Member, so far we have not seen a serious, co-ordinated, comprehensive response from the Government on how it will deal with the problem of youth in Canada in the 1980s. I look forward to the speech of the Minister. Perhaps he can build on the booklet about which we have just been told and tell us exactly what the Government intends to do to address the problems we have identified today.


Mr. Stackhouse:: Mr. Speaker, I would like to refer to the reference that was made to members of the Liberal Party preferring a bursary program to the present loan program. That is precisely what the Liberal Party proposed the second to last time it was in opposition under the leadership of Mr. Pearson. He went to the young people of Canada in the early 1960s offering a program of 10,000 scholarships. Once elected, the Government did not deliver the 10,000 scholarships. It delivered the loan program, which it now does not want. The loan program we have was initiated under the federal leadership of the Liberal Party with the co-operation of the various provinces.
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The point I would like to make for the record is simply that I take it that the Liberal Opposition is now reverting to the position it held when it was in opposition previously. The fact that it did not deliver on that proposal when it became a Government, may suggest something about the credibility of its policy now.
There was another point made about not providing any job opportunities for young people. Statistics indicate that since 1984 not only has the total of new job opportunities increased dramatically but it has increased for young people. Tragically, the problem of unemployment remains largely a regional problem, and that is really what we should be addressing, not young people across the country, but rather how we can create greater job opportunities for all people in those areas which have not been able to come abreast of other parts of the country.
I would just like to throw one point into the discussion, and I hope some future speaker who has adequate time will take it up, that is, the quality of education and training in Canada should have a priority. If this country is to compete successfully throughout the balance of this century and into the 21st century, it is going to have to compete with a world which is increasingly better educated and equipped. We should be addressing ourselves to the challenge.
How can 25 million people, trying to live and function in the second largest country in the world use its resources, which are always limited however rich they are, to the best advantage? How can they most effectively be used to provide the training, research and development opportunities for young people which will enable them to compete effectively with the rest of the world?


Bill Rompkey: Mr. Speaker, the emphasis in the Member's speech was on conservative rather than progressive, I would suggest. The Hon. Member is debating the past. He is comparing apples and oranges. If he is comparing the 1960s with the 1980s, I do not know where he has been over the past couple of decades. Policies which worked in the 1960s are not the policies we need for the 1980s. We governed in the 1960s, yes, and far be it for me to downplay in any way the Liberal record of the 1960s.
I happen to be very proud of the record of the Pearson Government and the Governments which followed not only because of their policies toward young people but because of their policies toward the elderly and to other workers in society. But that was in the 1960s. This Government is governing in the 1980s, which is an entirely different decade. New approaches are needed for new times.
I suggest that new men are needed to implement the new approaches in new times. What we need today for our young people in the kind of society we live in are new and original ideas. What I said before is that if the Canadian federation of

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students could stand here today in this Chamber and tell the Government what they wanted, that is their position.


B. Keith Penner: Mr. Speaker, first, I want to commend my hon. colleague for his motion and for the quality of his speech. As the spokesperson for the Liberal Party on matters relating to post-secondary education, I wonder if the Hon. Member is aware of the numerous studies which have been undertaken in recent years which document very clearly the social, economic and educational disparities between the Indian people of Canada and non-Indian people? Is the Hon. Member aware that more young Indian people today are staying in school or going back to school and are graduating? Yet the Government of the day has decided to cut back on those programs. It has limited the number of places available in these institutions. To compound the problem, it has also restricted the amount of assistance to these institutions, which provide places for young Indian people to get post-secondary education.
What the Government of Canada has done at the present time is to throw out the principles of universal access and opportunity. What I want to know from the spokesperson for the Liberal Party is whether a Liberal Government would in fact restore those principles which were actively in place during the previous administration. Would these principles be restored? At the present time they have been crushed and thousands of young Indian people who are seeking selfdetermination and independence are losing that opportunity.


Bill Rompkey: It is always a pleasure to hear from the Hon. Member for Cochrane-Superior (Mr. Penner). Not only has he had the kind of experience that is very useful to us on this side but he is in every sense a Liberal. He knows as a Liberal that the first thing to do is to reach out to those people who need help the most.
The Hon. Member has put his finger on a dimension I neglected to mention, and that is>
the disadvantaged people in this country. The Hon. Member mentioned native people. I can only say to him in response that the record of the Liberal Party in the past is clear. I suggest that the record of the Liberal Party in the future will not fall short of what it was in the past.
Let me build on the Hon. Member's intervention, if I may, and point to other disadvantaged groups. Apart from native people, and the disabled, women in Canada are particularly disadvantaged by what is happening in the educational system today as the result of the cut-backs in university and college funding. One of the first things to go is part-time or continuing education. The frills are cut out. The physical education, the music and continuing education are cut out. Seventy per cent of all part-time students in Canada today are women. Many of them are from single-parent families. The problem is that women in Canada today who need that education more than anyone else because of the disadvantaged position they are in, are less able to fund their own education because a woman in Canada today earns 60 per cent of what a man earns. So there is a compounded disadvantage on the part of women in trying
to bring some equality to their own status. Apart from native people, women, I suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, particularly young women, are particularly disadvantaged by the situation we find ourselves in today. That is the kind of situation we have to address. It is serious and that is why the Government has to do something about it.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, first, I want to congratulate my hon. friend and colleague, the Hon. Member for Grand Falls-White Bay-Labrador (Mr. Rompkey), for providing us with this opportunity today to discuss what has to be one of the most critical issues facing the country. That, of course, is the future of our young people.
I am pleased to respond to the motion of the Hon. Member which reads:
That this House condemns the Government for its abandonment of our youth
and its failure to provide adequate support for their education and training or
meaningful employment and job opportunities, both temporary and
permanent.
I want to begin my remarks by saying that I, like the Hon. Member for Grand Falls-White Bay-Labrador, feel that the Government has in a sense turned its back on young people. I do not understand why it has done that. I want to spend a few moments explaining why I feel the Government has abandoned the young people and why it has failed to provided adequate financial support to develop their educational careers and their family futures.
In the last few weeks I have been touring the high schools in my constituency as well as junior high schools and elementary schools. I have talked to our young people, particularly those in graduating classes. There are hundreds of thousands of young people who are about to leave secondary school to begin their careers in post-secondary education and training. One common theme I have noticed in discussions with individuals and classes of young people is a growing sense of disillusionment and frustration about the fact that their future appears to be very uncertain. There is a fuzziness in terms of where the country is going, what opportunities there are for the future.
When most of us in the House of Commons graduated from high school or post-secondary institutions we had perhaps half a dozen jobs from which to choose. Now there are half a dozen young people competing for the one job available. That becomes woefully obvious when you look at the unemployment figures for young people. Today 500,000 young Canadians fall into the category of the unemployed. This does not include the
20.000	or 30,000 young people who have given up and are not now actively looking for work. They come from communities where the unemployment rate is from 30 per cent to 50 per cent. There is simply no point in going up and down the streets looking for work in an area where the unemployment level is so unbelievably high.
Those figures totally ignore native young people who are not factored into the formal statistics at all. In addition, there are
180.000	young people who have to be described as severely
May 7, 1987

underemployed. They may work for five hours a week at McDonald's or 15 hours a week in a part-time job with no security and no prospects for permanency.
Therefore, the actual unemployment rate for people between the ages of 15 and 24 is 23 per cent to 25 per cent. In other words, almost one-quarter of the young people of Canada are in an almost hopeless situation at the time of life when they ought to be developing themselves creatively and positively. They should be developing careers and starting families. Twenty-five per cent of young Canadian people are, for all intents and purposes, jobless. That is virtually an immoral situation. We should be spending day after day in the House of Commons searching for solutions to this national catastrophe. I think we would all agree that this is a serious crisis situation.
Yet it is the Opposition which calls for a debate to seek solutions for this. It is not the Government or the Minister of State for Youth (Mr. Charest) but the Opposition which calls for a special debate to address the plight of young people. That does not bode well in terms of how serious the Government is on this issue. If the Government were serious on this issue it would be doing something.
To be fair, I have to admit that the Government has done something. For example, it eliminated the Katimavik program and promised a new youth program in February of last year. That promise has not yet been kept. The budget for the youth Ministry was totally eliminated. The Minister of Finance (Mr. Wilson) slowed the rate of growth of transfer payments, which will result in the loss of $1.5 billion between 1986 and 1991 in post-secondary education. Funds for the International Year of Youth were eliminated and no new funds were allocated to continue this important work.
Yesterday in the House of Commons the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. Mazankowski) mentioned Challenge '85, '86 and '87. He said that Challenge '85 created 100,000 jobs. One would assume that in 1986 when the unemployment situation was worsening the program would create more jobs. However, the Deputy Prime Minister said that Challenge '86 created only 93,000 jobs. He went on to say that the funding for Challenge '87 will remain the same as last year, which is obviously woefully inadequate. As my friend, the Member for Grand Falls-White Bay-Labrador (Mr. Rompkey), indicated, not only is it inadequate, it is a move to facilitate jobs in the private sector. Although we applaud this, it is at the expense of jobs in the public sector. Non-profit organizations could put young people to work in meaningful ways for the summer.
I have experienced, as I am sure all other Members of Parliament have, the frustration of collecting hundreds and hundreds of Challenge '87 job applications, only to have half of them tossed out because there is no money and to have requests for 10 or 15 young people cut down to three or four young people. It tears my heart out to know that the one program which the federal Government has to assist young people during the summer, which is good as far as it goes, is so
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woefully inadequate. We could double, triple, or quadruple the funding.
It is important to recognize that we are discussing today the most important natural resource in our country. The Minister of State for Youth laughs when I say that the most important natural resource in this country is our young people. He may think the most important resource is coal, copper, platinum or uranium, but we believe that the most important natural resource is the people of Canada, and particularly the young people. We should invest in the development of that natural resource as we do in no other resource sector.
I know that when the Minister of State for Youth stands up he will say that there is no money to help young people, that all the programs to help young people had to be eliminated. I must remind the Minister that the Government thought it was appropriate to spend $9.5 billion to help the multinational oil companies. The Government thought it was appropriate to spend $1 billion to bail out two banks, which has never before been done on the face of the earth. The Government found it appropriate to spend billions of dollars to provide incentives for corporations to develop in central Canada. However, the Government cannot find the money to provide training, education, and job opportunities for our young people. That is the disgrace of it all.
The most dastardly blow of all was when we all received Hot-100, a quick guide to see what the feds are doing for youth. I challenge anyone to find something in this booklet which is available to really help young people. I have gone through it page by page as have my two sons. When I brought it home they got quite excited because they were not aware that the federal Government was doing anything to help young people and wanted to find out what it was doing. Those two young men went through this book page by page and when they finished they were disappointed. They made phone calls and found that a lot of these so-called programs had no money in them at all.
As an example, it talks about pension programs and a lot of university post-graduate degree programs which help some people. However, for 99.9 per cent of the young people needing assistance there is very little, if anything. I will not say there is absolutely nothing in here because there may be something which I have not found, but I look forward to hearing the Minister of State for Youth outline the programs in here which are in use today.
I looked through the report of Parliament which was an examination of the problems and issues facing Canadian youth between the ages of 15 and 24. There are pages and pages of recommendations, but I could not find any which have been implemented. Of all the recommendations that talk about ways to get young people back to work, none have been implemented. I wonder why Parliament bothered to do this if the Government is simply going to ignore the recommendations.

May 7, 1987
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In talking to young people across the country I have sensed their despondency. Records show that alcoholism, drug abuse, suicides and attempted suicides, and drop-out rates in schools and training programs are worsening. I say that with great reluctance but the facts demonstrate that conclusively. It is now only fair to ask what the solutions are.
My hon. friend from Grand Falls-White Bay-Labrador laid out a number of solutions as he saw them. They were good, thoughtful solutions and the Government should take action immediately. I want to propose some other solutions. They flow out of a very extensive task force which the NDP launched in 1985, chaired by the Hon. Member for Windsor- Walkerville (Mr. McCurdy). It travelled across the country from coast to coast. It visited major and minor communities, rural areas, high schools, technical schools, vocational schools and universities. The task force listened to 600 participants and received over 300 briefs. It resulted in a report which laid out all of the recommendations by the NDP in order to assist young people. I want to highlight some of them.
At the top of the list was a program called Youth Prospects which would provide a wide range of opportunities for young people. We felt it was appropriate to set aside ample funding so that young people could receive adequate support in developing their various skills. At a cost of about $6,000 a year they could choose from one of four options. They could undertake two years of job training, which would involve on-the-job training, classroom instruction, or a combination thereof. It would provide them with the necessary skills, expertise and experience to participate directly in the workforce after two years.
We also suggested a two-year entrepreneurialship program. We would provide seed money for young people to go out and develop a new business of one kind or another. This would help develop entrepreneurial skills, expertise and experience to assist them in creating jobs not only for themselves but for other young people as well.
We suggested a two-year program of life skills training. We recognize that a lot of our young people today lack some of the basic skills required to enter the workforce or continue with their education. This would help develop their literacy skills. It would help them to apply for jobs, fill out resumes and a whole host of other valuable life skills which, for a variety of reasons, some young people have not obtained over the years.
A fourth option was to provide, again, around $6,000 a year to assist young people to complete two years of post-secondary education. That could be vocational school, technical school, business school or secretarial school. It could mean one would go on to a college or university. Two years to develop those basic abilities and a sense of confidence which would encourage young people to go on with their training and education.
We suggested that program because at the moment the Government's support for students is in the form of loans more
often than not. If you want to complete your post-secondary education you can borrow $6,000, $7,000, or $8,000 year after year. That may be appropriate for a handful of young people, but for those in my constituency, where the unemployment rate is unfortunately in the 20 per cent range, it is simply impossible. They cannot even think about going on to technical school or university where the bill for the year might be $8,000 because they probably will not have even a summer job. We all know that only one out of three students is likely to obtain a summer job and the lion's share will be very low paid.


Bill Rompkey: In central Canada.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Those jobs will also tend to be restricted to central Canada where the economic forecasts are more healthy than in other parts of the country. I think we are all too well aware that of all the jobs created in this country last year, 96 per cent were in central Canada. If you are a young person seeking a summer job in Labrador, British Columbia, or central Alberta, you are going to have a difficult time because economic conditions in those parts of Canada are extremely difficult relative to central Canada.
We asked ourselves, why not provide a youth prospect fund and put dollars in the hands of young people so that if they take two years of job training, two years of entrepreneurial training, two years of life skills training, two years of postsecondary education, they will become a better person, a better citizen, and make Canada a better place? We would be investing this money in the future of our young people and therefore in the future of Canada.
In adding up the cost it would come to an additional $550 million in the first year. Compare that with the billions upon billions of dollars we give large corporations to do all kinds of things with. Compare it with the $1 billion we paid to bail out two banks. Compare it to the other things the Government spends money on. The money would put tens of thousands of young people back into school or in the workplace.
We say that is good. What are all those people going to do when they get their pay cheques? They will spend the money. It will be spent in their communities right across the country. It will help create more jobs. The various Governments will collect sales taxes as this money moves through the system. We calculate that the federal and provincial Governments would get the lion's share of that money back through improved economic conditions and the tax system. We are not talking about spending money, we are talking about investing in the most important natural resource Canada has, its young people.
I suspect that the Minister of State for Youth would really like to help young people. He would like to be doing a lot of things and perhaps implementing the suggestions offered by my friend and myself, steps that could be taken immediately to assist young people. I suspect that he personally would like to do that. However, he has to have the money. When he has no money in his Ministry, when his cabinet colleagues, particularly the Minister of Finance, refuse to give him the necessary
May 7, 1987

funds to develop those policies I am sure he would like to develop, it must be very frustrating for him.
In closing I want to say that I do not directly criticize the Minister of State for Youth although I must ask: Where is the money to help young people? I levy my criticism primarily at his cabinet colleagues who, for whatever reason, have decided not to provide the financial support to enable the Minister to invest in Canada's most important natural resource, its young people.


Jean J. Charest: Mr. Speaker, after the opening speech of the spokesman for the Liberal Party of Canada, I did take a few seconds to point out that his remarks had been rather positive, in the sense that they were not partisan, and I was surprised at this approach.
I was as much pleasantly surprised at the speech of my colleague from the Liberal Party as I am very little surprised at the tone of my colleague from the New Democratic Party. You know, we have become used to hearing the kind of remarks he made today in an extremely partisan context, in fact half-truths, hearsay, omissions. As usual, my colleague's comments are notable for what they fail to deal with, but still I would want to offer him an opportunity to enlighten us about two points which, I presume, reflect the position of his Party.
Here is the first question: I wonder whether he might tell us what he or his Party considers to be the most important problem facing young Canadians in 1987, and probably for years to come.
The second question is also relatively simple, Mr. Speaker. I should like to know whether he and especially his Party feel that in our search for solutions and our quest for a nation-wide consensus we, as federal Government, should at least make an attempt to include the provinces in this exercise.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased and encouraged to respond in kind to the question. Whenever I have heard the Minister of State for Youth make his presentations he always prefaces them with the same remarks. He says that I have been very partisan in my delivery-


Jean J. Charest: You always make the same speeches.


Nelson Andrew Riis: -and I make no apologies for being partisan. After all, this is the House of Commons. This is a House with 282 politicians in it. 1 thought that what we were actually supposed to do here was to make political speeches. The Minister says that he has heard this speech before. Yes, he has. I have given this speech before because I want to do two things.
First, I want to point out the severity and the crisis nature of the problem. Second, I want to offer a range of solutions to the
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problem so that the Minister of State for Youth might listen and actually do something about them. The last time I did that he did not act. I did it again today, and he has not acted. I hope that I will never have to give this speech again. I hope that this is the last time I will ever be encouraged to stand in the House of Commons and deliver, in a sense, a repeat of former comments. I hope the Minister will take some action after today.
I wish to thank my colleague from Newfoundland for providing us with an opportunity to discuss the issue of youth.
I would like to think that the Minister himself would provide such an opportunity. But, no, he remains mute. He never has a question, a statement or an initiative. He has nothing, which is what makes us so frustrated.
The Minister asks what is the number one issue facing young people today. I think that, unquestionably, it has to be the whole set of issues surrounding employment, the need for young people to feel secure in being able to enter the workforce at the appropriate time and to develop the kind of career and job options which will enable them to make the most meaningful contributions to society. I think that is the concern. When I talk to young people they ask: "Will I have a job? Will there be job opportunities when I finish university? Will there be a career for me when I finish my college course?" I think the main issue is in terms of young people being able to find meaningful employment in Canada.
I did not quite understand the Minister's second question. I think it was: Ought we to try to build a consensus between the provinces and the federal Government to deal with youth issues? Indeed, I think whenever possible that type of consensus building must take place, not only between the provinces and the federal Government, but between the provinces, the federal Government and the various organizations which represent young people, whether they be university students, college students, various youth groups, right down to the municipal level. When we consider that cities such as Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver have populations between one million and three million people and large numbers of young people who are jobless and having difficulties pursuing their post-secondary education plans, I think the municipalities have to be involved. I think that a consensus must be built between the federal Government, the provinces, regional Governments and local Governments.
[Translation\


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: The Minister of State for Youth (Mr. Charest) on a point of order.


Jean J. Charest: A point of order, Mr. Speaker. I simply want to be fair with my colleague, for he did indicate in his response that he is not sure whether he understood the question correctly.
So just to make sure that his answer is relevant, I would seek leave to repeat my question, with the agreement of my colleagues in the House.

May 7, 1987
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What I am interested in knowing is the following. If the federal Government is requested to design a national policy for youth, would it not be reasonable for the federal Government to seek provincial co-operation in that regard, especially in the context of the constitutional balance of Canada?


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, yes.


Bill Rompkey: Mr. Speaker, I wish to give the Hon. Member for Kamloops-Shuswap (Mr. Riis) a chance to elaborate on the last line of questioning. I think the Minister has put his finger on an important issue that we really have not addressed thus far, that is to say, how we go about solving the problem. The Minister has responsibilities. Education does come under provincial jurisdiction, that is true. However, I think that the Hon. Member for Kamloops-Shuswap in his answer to the Minister said that it really goes beyond the provincial Governments and the federal Government which have some real responsibilities and that there are groups in the country which wish to do something and which must be brought into the process to design not just a federal program. The distinction must be made that what we are talking about here is not just a federal program. What we are saying is that the federal Government has some responsibilities. The provincial Governments obviously have jurisdiction. However, there are groups of young people, university professors, teachers and all sorts of other groups which want to see a national-in quotes and underlined-approach to a serious national problem. I think that is what we are after.
I wish to ask the Hon. Member to elaborate in a minute on that point and to build into his reply one further consideration and to point out the important specific responsibilities of the Government of Canada. For example, I refer to the matter of foreign students in Canada.
There has been a drop of 43 per cent in the number of foreign students coming into Canada over the past five years. That is not the case in any other industrialized democracy with which we compete. Foreign students contribute to our economy between $600 million and $700 million per year, which is a straight injection of money into the Canadian economy, not to mention the public relations value they give us abroad in terms of trade and future consideration, as well as in terms of external affairs in the market-place once they graduate from our universities and go on to serve us in other ways. This can only be solved by the Government of Canada. It has the Department of Immigration-and I see that the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Bouchard) is here in the House. It is intriguing that the Minister of Employment and Immigration in his one department has the capability that we need to address the issue of foreign students in Canada. From talking to many students in Canada I know that all of them believe that we must have the presence of foreign students in our institutions.
Can the Hon. Member for Kamloops-Shuswap elaborate on this particular issue further, the issue of a need for a national
response? In particular will he focus on the problem of foreign students?


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to respond to the question of the Hon. Member. I would like to respond in three ways. First, I agree with the Hon. Member that we are not talking about just a federal program. We are talking about a national program, a national initiative to attempt to resolve the concerns and difficulties facing young people. We are talking about removing impediments and hurdles in order to allow them to get on to develop their lives as they ought to do.
Second, in respect of the whole matter of foreign students, one of the highlights of the task force on youth conducted by the New Democratic Party over the last year included a whole range of recommendations as to the role of the foreign student in our universities, colleges and technical schools, their diminishing roles, and steps that can be taken not only in their best interest but in the best interest of Canada in terms of linking up Canada more closely than ever with a whole set of growing and Third World countries.
I wish to end by referring to the point to which the Minister of State for Youth was getting, although I am not certain where his question was leading. As a Member of Parliament from British Columbia I have a great deal of concern when it comes to post-secondary education. When I look at the operating capital for our college and university system, including technical and vocational schools, I notice that when we look at the final budget, the total allocation of funds in the Province of British Columbia for post-secondary education, we see that its source is Ottawa. In other words, the federal Government is funding post-secondary education in the Province of British Columbia by 100 per cent. As a matter of fact, it is funding the province to the tune of 104 per cent. In other words, all of the money that Ottawa sends British Columbia for post-secondary education goes into postsecondary education and some of it is siphoned off for other uses. Yet the Province of British Columbia does not match one penny of the federal government contribution.
If the Province of British Columbia was doing what Parliament expected of it and what it had promised to do at one time, post-secondary educational opportunities in that province would be significantly enhanced. However, the province is not participating at all, and that is a provincial Government disgrace.


Jean J. Charest: Mr. Speaker, I truly welcome this opportunity today to speak to the House and to address the motion presented by the Hon. Member of the Liberal Party of Canada. I could not agree more with my two hon. colleagues, who gave the impression that we seldom have an opportunity to discuss youth issues in the House.
May 7, 1987

However, the Government does not decide what kind of questions will be asked during Oral Question Period, and I may say I have spent quite a few hours sitting in my seat and waiting for questions from the Opposition. For reasons they will know better than I do since it is their responsibility and duty to ask the questions, I have waited a long time for questions that never came. From time to time I do get a few, and I relish these moments, and I am particularly pleased today with the opportunity I am given to explain in the House and thus to Canadians what we have been doing for the past few months.

I think it is noteworthy that my two friends speak very strongly about this issue. The Hon. Member from the New Democratic Party says that this is one of the most critical issues facing the country, and he went on to say that youth are the most important natural resource in Canada.
Last night, while returning from consultations in Vancouver, British Columbia, the home province of the Member for Kamloops-Shuswap (Mr. Riis), I learned that there would be a debate on youth today. I cancelled a long-standing commitment to be in my own riding in order to be here because I think this debate is important enough to require my attendance today. I am pleased to be here.
I had planned to thank my official critics for their opening remarks, but I regret I cannot do that because it is not the case.
The tone of the speech by the Member from the NDP is particularly appropriate today. I want to share with him my own experience. When I was named to this portfolio in June, 1986, one of the first things I learned was that the debate about youth in this country was very partisan. I and all Members of the House will agree that the issue is political, but in the aftermath of the hunger strike by our colleague in the other place, the debate was very partisan.
Upon closer examination of the issue, and being a young politician myself, I discovered that if we want to be honest with Canadians, especially those young Canadians who suffer from a certain cynicism, according to the experience of the Hon. Member for Kamloops-Shuswap, I guess we must admit that all political parties at all levels have often used the issue of youth as a political vehicle.
I believe we can go even further and suggest that in some cases many politicians have been very paternalistic toward young people. It is an appropriate coincidence today that my colleague from the New Democratic Party said three times that the youth are the most important natural resource of the country. During my speeches all over the country I tell Canadians from all walks of life that politicians have been very paternalistic toward young people.
I tell them, with a smile, that they will often hear politicians say that youth are the future of Canada, as though there were a choice between youth and something else. I do not know to what politicians are referring when they say youth are the
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future of Canada because, of course, that is what they are. What else could happen?
There is another phrase that I always cite in my speeches throughout the country. I tell Canadians that the ultimate winner is when a politician says: "Youth are the most important natural resource of Canada". I say that to Canadians laughingly because 1 find it paternalistic and condescending. While I do not think politicians say that in bad faith, that single partisan characteristic of the debate is a major obstacle in identifying problems, developing a consensus, and designing solutions. It is an obstacle to recognizing the fact that the world has changed.
Let me move on to describe what we have done. One of my first objectives upon assuming this portfolio was to determine what was the most important problem facing young Canadian men and women. That is why I put that question to the two opposition Parties. However, I did not hear a clear answer. While the Government has found an answer, those Parties have much work to do.
In our effort to identify the most important problem facing youth, we examined the major studies and reports that have been published in this country over a number of years. I am referring to the Macdonald Commission Report, the Forget Report on Unemployment Insurance, the International Year of Youth Report, the Senate Youth Report, the report from the Province of Newfoundland, and more recently, the report of Ken Dryden, Youth Commissioner for the Province of Ontario. All of those reports, taken together, essentially converge to the same conclusion. It is that the most important problem facing young Canadian men and women today is the transition from school to work, particularly for young people who do not finish high school. That is the Government's conclusion, for the information of those Members opposite.
Having come to that conclusion, we proceeded to determine where Canada was headed. That is a very important consideration because the policy that is developed for young Canadians will not operate in a vacuum. It will have to work within a Canadian context as well as the larger world context.
According to 1984 statistics, Canada is second only to West Germany in our dependence on trade in terms of GNP. Therefore, if we choose to follow that course, as we have in our trade negotiations with the Americans and our negotiations at GATT, the natural consequence is that Canada will have to acquire, develop, and manage new technologies to support its position in the labour markets.
In order to pursue our course as a trading nation, and develop the new technologies to support that position, the last link in the chain is the development of labour market policies and human resources to acquire and develop the new technologies to support our position in the export markets.
Consequently, we went on to determine how the labour market in Canada is presently operating and found that there is a direct relationship between academic training and job security. More than half of those who were unemployed for six

May 7, 1987
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months or more had not completed high school. The unemployment rate of those who fail to complete high school is three times that of youth with post-secondary training. In the last year of the recession in 1984, 75 per cent of those who were unemployed did not graduate from high school.
In light of these statistics, we moved on to examine how the labour market has changed through the years. Let me explain how the labour market has evolved from the 1950s to 1987.
In the fifties a young person in Canada could attend high school, drop out before graduation, and find a good job in a resource-based economy or, in a manufacturing economy like that of southern Ontario, find a good job in the automotive industry. If we want to draw a comparison between how the world has changed from the fifties to the eighties, the difference is that there are fewer and fewer jobs in Canada for unskilled labourers. Inasmuch as we can predict the future, there will be fewer and fewer jobs for unskilled labourers notwithstanding the fact that the growth in jobs in Canada is in the service sector.
We then came to what was for me and for the Government the most troubling problem we witnessed in that context. In Canada there is a link between training, holding a job, and the changing labour market. Notwithstanding that, 30 per cent to 40 per cent of young Canadian men and women-and it is something which neither Party opposite raised today-drop out of high school before graduation. That is dramatic. It is a great loss to the country now and it will be an even more important loss to the country in years to come.
Over and above that, it means much personal hardship for some young people who just fail to realize that by dropping out of high school they may be dropping out, to a certain extent, of active participation in the Canadian labour market in years to come.
In that context we then looked at how other countries dealt with the transition from school to work. For example, we looked at the United Kingdom, France, Sweden, Finland, and West Germany, and we found that in many cases the mechanisms in those countries for the transition were more developed and more sophisticated. The apprenticeship programs in West Germany, for example, were much more generic. The student or person entering the program had a specific status which he kept with him throughout the system. The same does not apply in Canada.
We are sensitive to the fact that we cannot just take a system from another country and implement it here. There are historical, sociological, and cultural factors which must be taken into account. However, we can borrow on some of the examples all over the world.
There were systems which were closer to ours. For example, co-op programs are familiar to Canadians. It is something with which they are comfortable and for which I found unanimous approval. It is part of the mechanisms into which we can look.
Having done all that, perhaps my colleagues will understand why we would find, according to the constitutional balance in Canada, which does not necessarily apply in other countries, that education is first and foremost a provincial jurisdiction. It is that to a certain extent, and I say that with reservations. I do not want to speak as a lawyer, but I should like to give an opinion. In terms of educating young people from the entry level to the secondary level, it may be unequivocal provincial jurisdiction. Once they reach the post-secondary level, and we are dealing with adults in training, obviously the federal Government plays an important role.
The obvious conclusion is that if we want to develop a national youth policy in that context, having identified a specific problem and the emerging consensus, we would go to the provinces. Being respectful, and in the spirit of national reconciliation about which we spoke, we would first go to the provinces to ask them whether they agreed that it was the most important problem.
Part of the paternalism and the partisanship surrounding the issue is that although everyone says it is our most important problem and that the youth is our future, no one, until we decided to do it, went to the extent of identifying it and asking other Canadians to join in the consensus. If they agree that it is the most important problem, the natural consequences flow from it.
I should like to report to the House at this point in time that I have visited eight Canadian provinces in less than a month. To give an indication of how much I travelled, the airlines have lost my luggage at least four times. We are doing this as rapidly as possible. Half of everything which goes into the Canadian Jobs Strategy goes to young people between the ages of 15 years and 24 years, approximately. It is a ballpark figure, but on average that is what it will be. In fiscal 1986-87 it will have been approximately $720 million. The issue is not whether it will be a new program. The Hot-100 illustrates that plentifully; there are over 100 programs which apply to young people.
The issue is that we must change the system; that is the real issue.


An Hon. Member:: It is about time.


Jean J. Charest: Yes, it is about time. It is about time we sat down, if we are sincere and want to go beyond the partisanship of the debate, which is a real impediment to the finding of solutions in society.
Let me reiterate the fact that we have a sincere and real commitment to the issue. It is not enough to say that youth are the future of the country or that they are our most important natural resource.
There could be new programs for specific problems, but a new program with $10 million or $20 million will not change the fundamental problem. What is needed is a change in the system, and it will not happen overnight. However, it is to
May 7, 1987

what the Government is truly and sincerely committed under the leadership of the Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney).


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Bill Rompkey: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the analysis of the Minister, but I am not entirely clear on the impediment of partisan debate.
It seems to me that in what I said and what the Hon. Member for Kamloops-Shuswap (Mr. Riis) said we very clearly analysed the problems. As a matter of fact, I think the Minister said that in his reply.
However, I am clear on the problem which he identified. He made the link-and I would like him to make it clearer- between lost luggage and the lost generation. What he said to us is that we must change the system and that he has been going about doing that by consulting.
However, where do we go from here? What we are looking for today, and what Canadian youth will be looking for, are some specific answers to how we address their very specific problems.
The Minister asked those of us in the Opposition to provide specific answers. I think we gave them. One was to make a change in the Canada Student Loans Program. That was very specific. It could be done starting today.
I know that there are wider problems. None of us underestimate the difficulties in coming to grips with them. We all know what the Constitution says. We all know what are the impediments.
I want the Minister to go beyond what he said and to tell us the outcome of losing luggage and visiting so many people in so many days in a struggle to come to grips with the problems of this lost generation. What is the linkage between lost luggage and the lost generation? What was the outcome of his travels? What will be some of the approaches? How do we bring in the provinces? How do we bring the various players to a national consensus?
What we have now, compared with the situation when we were the Government of Canada, is a national Government of one stripe and most provincial Governments of the same stripe. In essence it should perhaps be easier now than it was before, at least one would think, to come to grips with the jurisdictional problem. However, 1 did not hear today even the broad outlines of what will be the approach-bearing in mind and granting what the Minister said-to coming to grips with the problems in the system.


Jean J. Charest: Mr. Speaker, I am not sure I understand the Hon. Member's question about the link between lost luggage and a lost generation. On the lost luggage side, I made that remark because I have been travelling a lot recently in this consultation process with the provinces. Airlines have had the opportunity, though not always through any fault of their own
Supply
but because of tight schedules, to send my luggage to places other than the ones to which I have been going.
On the lost generation side, I hope my hon. colleague is not among those who say that there is a lost generation. I find that a very unusual thing to say. That people would say there is a lost generation is an indication of failure. Man has been on earth for millions of years, and suddenly we are being asked to determine if one generation is better off than the previous one, a very unusual exercise.
Generations inherit problems from previous generations and civilization has the duty to do better than the preceding generation. Another unusual thing about the notion of a lost generation is that the premise of the assertion is that the previous generation found something. I do not know what it found, but I would be curious to find out.
We must recognize that the world has changed. Those who are consumed by the lost generation debate do not realize that the world and its problems have changed and are new. We have to face up to them.
The Hon. Member asked what we are doing to face up to those new problems. Perhaps he may have found by accident part of the answer for which he was looking. I told the Hon. Member what the most important problem is today and will be for the rest of the mandate, and I do not think I will find any disagreement with that.
Having identified the problem, we are trying to develop a consensus, to get the provinces to join with us in saying that this is the most important problem, and then looking at mechanisms to elaborate on training and education options that will be more viable for the 30 per cent or 40 per cent of young people who drop out. We should encourage young people to stay within the system because their training capability and transferable skills will be of paramount importance to their participation in labour markets in the years to come. The federal Government which already plays a very important role in apprenticeship training programs is willing to play an important and a leadership role in developing systems that will make the education and training systems of Canada more pertinent in the minds of the 30 per cent to 40 per cent of young people who drop out.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, the Minister makes it particularly difficult to ask hard questions. He is a very decent fellow and he makes a very thoughtful presentation about the problems faced by many young people.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Nelson Andrew Riis: That is an important first step. We have to know what the problem is and he has now identified the main problem plus a whole set of other problems. The Government has been in place for two and a half years, going on three years. I hope that this consensus-building which could take generations is not simply an excuse for inaction.

May 7, 1987
Supply
The question I want to put to the Minister is not intended to be a tough one. We all recognize that long-term solutions have to be sought and implemented and that that will take time. In the meantime, we cannot turn our backs on young people. There are steps that can be taken. We can amend the Canada Student Loans Program to provide more access to postsecondary education. We can increase the funding for Challenge '87 so that it will provide more than the inadequate amount it provided last year. We can do a whole set of shortterm things.
Would the Minister remind us what precise initiatives he has taken since he has been in his position of Minister of State for Youth? Can he name one thing he is proud of having accomplished? Perhaps what is more important, considering what I believe the answer will be, is what is the first concrete piece of evidence we will see of his personal initiative to assist young people?


Jean J. Charest: Mr. Speaker, let me tell the Hon. Member of a series of things. If we want to understand the important changes that have taken place in the Ministry for Youth in recent months, we have to go back to 1986 when the Ministry was transferred from the Secretary of State to the Department of Employment and Immigration, acknowledging thus the fact that employment is one of the most important problems facing young Canadians today. This put at the disposal of the Ministry for Youth one of the most important federal government departments with 27,000 people and a great deal of resources. That occurred in the spring of 1986.
Second, there was a designation of a full 25 per cent of the Innovations budget under the Canadian Jobs Strategy for youth-related projects, and we have exceeded that minimum target. The youth council that was requested was granted by the federal Government. The Hon. Member referred to his own Party's task force report on entrepreneurship. A $10 million initiative was provided for that in co-operation with the federal Government, the private sector and the non-profit sector in the form of YMCAs. There are nine centres across Canada, eight of which are exclusively for young people, helping people develop entrepreneurial skills.
Over three years, $10 million will be provided to this very innovative program under which the federal Government allots money on a set price per job basis in each region. Thirty per cent is allotted on the signing up of a young person, another 30 per cent is allotted when the course is terminated, and another 40 per cent is allotted a year after the young person has been in business. That is a very original funding formula of which we are very proud because it is result-driven. This was something that was suggested by a non-profit organization.
Another $2.9 million went to Youth Employment Skills to open four centres in Canada. We announced $180 million for Challenge '87. I know there has been some debate in the
House about that because it was $30 million for youth last summer because of the census but there is no census this year.
Approximately 70 per cent of those who benefit from summer student programs under Challenge '87 are postsecondary students. We are happy about that because we know they need the money to go back to school. However, those who suffer the most are those who have dropped out. For that reason, within the Challenge '87 structure, we doubled the budget of the work-orientation workshops component from $4 million to $8 million. That is something of which the Government is very proud. Work-orientation workshops identify potential drop-outs within the school system at the secondary level and offer them training during the summer. We found that 70 per cent of them go back into the school system and that those who choose not to go back at least do so in full knowledge of the consequence of their choice. That is something in which the Government takes a lot of pride.
I know that the Hon. Member's 17-year-old son did not find anything in the Hot-100. He mentioned in particular the reference to the Canada Pension Plan. I am surprised that Hon. Members would feel that we are wasting time by informing young people about the Canada Pension Plan. I believe about 100,000 young people benefit from the Canada Pension Plan. By looking through this book, a young person at le Salon International de la Jeunesse found information on the Canada Pension Plan and is now receiving benefits.
Perhaps this book is of no use to the Hon. Member's son, but it has been of some use to young Canadian men and women and those who work with them who want to know what programs are available for young people. What does the federal Government have to offer, to where does one write, and to whom does one talk? Those are the questions this booklet attempts to answer, and that is its only pretence.
We have announced a national forum on post-secondary education to be held in Saskatoon, which should answer a great deal of the-


Mr. Malepart:: What about jobs?


Jean J. Charest: -concerns expressed by my ... As far as jobs are concerned, the unemployment rate-


Jean-Claude Malépart: What is the unemployment rate?


Jean J. Charest: For the information of the Hon. Member for Montreal-Sainte-Marie (Mr. Malepart), Mr. Speaker, the unemployment rate among young Canadians has gone down by over 4 per cent since our Government assumed power. That, Mr. Speaker, is our greatest accomplishment.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please! It being 1 o'clock, I do now leave the chair until 2 p.m.
At 1 p.m., the House took recess.
May 7, 1987



COMMONS DEBATES AFTER RECESS

[Stage Direction]
The House resumed at 2 p.m.


Mr. Alfonso Gagliano (Saint-Leonard-Anjou):: Yesterday, in his statement to the House concerning the tax reform, the Minister of Finance (Mr. Wilson) failed completely to address the issue of small businesses, in spite of the fact that Hon. Members have repeatedly emphasized in the House that small businesses are responsible for over 70 per cent of all jobs created in Canada. Yet, in such an important speech, not once did he refer to them. Not a word, Mr. Speaker.
While carrying out its proposed reform of the corporate income tax system, will the Government make sure that small businesses continue to benefit from the present reduced income tax rate structure?
In its reform of the federal sales tax system, is it planning to exempt small businesses from value added taxes, national multi-stage sales taxes and business transfer taxes?
How could an industry which creates so many jobs in Canada ... If the Government helped each and every small business to create one job, we would end up with 750,000 more new jobs in Canada. The Minister of Finance just does not understand that this industry plays a vital and significant role in the Canadian economy, and he does not even mention it in making such an important speech. That is unbelievable!



FORESTRY


Mr. Albert Girard (Restigouche):: Mr. Speaker, from the time of the first settlement of this country until today forests have played a key role in the survival and growth of the Atlantic provinces. Forests occupy some two-thirds of our total land area. They provide over 50,000 direct and indirect jobs and account for $1.7 billion in exports throughout the region.
[ Translation]
Several of our communities depend entirely on our forest resources for their survival.
Our Government recognized the important role our forest industry plays in this area. Through its Canadian Forestry Service, it contributes $135 million, thereby assuming 60 per cent of the whole forest renewal and improvement costs under federal and provincial agreements. A significant amount is spent improving private woodlots, including those producing Christmas and maple trees.

We are committed to working with provincial Governments, industry, and small private landowners to improve our knowledge of forest dynamics and management through ongoing programs of research.



AIR TRANSPORT


Leslie Gordon Benjamin: Mr. Speaker, the Fred Turner case exemplifies the best and worst in human behaviour. Mr. Turner displays the patience of Job in his two-month vigil here on Parliament Hill. The understanding and charity he shows towards his adversaries who put him out of business disguise an inner strength and sense of purpose which has kept him going from office to office in search of justice. He seeks only to have an independent arbitrator assigned to evaluate his claim and mediate with the Government-simple natural justice and nothing more.
For over a year my colleagues and I have worked on this issue and allowed Mr. Turner to call upon our resources to put his case forward because we believe it is just. I also wish to commend members of the other two Parties who have taken up his cause, including those who were part of the Government at the time this wrong occurred. They have the courage to admit some responsibility.
Specific mention is due to the former Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Transport, the Hon. Member for Edmonton-Strathcona (Mr. Kilgour), who had the intestinal fortitude to stand up for Mr. Turner and has offered the resources of his office as well. This is the best in human behaviour. The worst can be seen in the Government that took his business and is now allowing Mr. Turner and his family to suffer.
The Government has released misinformation about the Turner case in the hope of diffusing his arguments and has refused independent examination of the facts so that the true extent of the wrongs will never be known. Cabinet Members have disgraced themselves in the eyes of fair-minded Canadians. Shame on them.

May 7, 1987



TAX REFORM


Mr. Bill Attewell (Don Valley East):: Mr. Speaker, many Canadians welcomed the announcement made yesterday by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Wilson) that a White Paper on a comprehensive tax reform package will be tabled in the House on June 18 of this year. The theme will be greater fairness and equity for individual Canadians.
Most Canadians will have more take-home pay after the changes. The personal income tax rates will decrease, there will be three brackets rather than 10, and less total tax dollars will come from individuals. The tax credit option will be more widely used since it is a fairer method. A tax deduction, on the other hand, is of more value the higher the income. Tax credits will be of direct help to senior citizens and lower-income families.
While corporate tax rates are expected to decrease, there will be a significant increase in the tax dollars from the business sector by shutting down certain preferences. Some business groups are not paying their fair share of taxes. A business transfer tax is also likely, we are told, and I urge the Minister to permit very few exceptions in order to minimize the paperwork and the complexity of the system.
Finally, I hope the provincial sales tax systems can be harmonized with the federal system to increase simplicity and fairness.



THE FAMILY


Mrs. Lucie Pepin (Outremont):: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to remind Hon. Members that across Canada next Sunday, May 10, will be Mothers' Day, a special day dedicated to all mothers, whether they are 20 or 80.
I would like to take this opportunity to ask the Government to move rapidly in helping many Canadian families, recognizing the work of all mothers, whether they work in or outside the home. It would be important that the Government help women who do full-time work at home, by offering them credits or access to a pension fund.
Many other mothers work outside the home, often because of economic necessity. For the latter, it would be important that the Government have quality care services, together with parent holidays and access to part-time, well-paid jobs.
This certainly would help many families worry less, both financially and in terms of their children's welfare.
I want to wish every mother a bright Mothers' Day, on which everyone recognizes their importance in Canadian society.



PORNOGRAPHY


Mr. Rob Nicholson (Niagara Falls):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate the Minister of Justice (Mr. Hnatyshyn) for tabling legislation this week which tackles the problem of pornography head on. For too long women and children have been exploited through violence and degrading pornography. This piece of legislation sends a clear message to those who profit through the exploitation of others. At the same time it continues to respect our freedom of expression.
I reject the comments of those who disagree with this Bill. I suggest that they produce a better definition of pornography. We would be glad to consider all suggestions that might improve the Bill.
Pornography touches all of us and I call upon all those who would like to see this blight removed to speak up now and support the Minister of Justice.



TELECOMMUNICATIONS


Mr. Ernie Epp (Thunder Bay-Nipigon):: Mr. Speaker, racism is being offered to the people of Alberta on telephone lines owned by the province. Every Sunday night the so-called Church of Jesus Christ Christian-Aryan Nations offers a new message to tempt listeners into racist views of the world.
The authorities have allowed this abomination to continue without interruption. The Alberta Government has refused to act and wants to maintain silence on the matter. Complaints by the League for Human Rights of B'nai Brith to the Canadian Human Rights Commission and the Commissioner himself have produced no apparent action.
Is the Government of Canada ignorant of this abuse of our telecommunications system? Has the Minister of Justice (Mr. Hnatyshyn) considered action and decided to do nothing? Does the Conservative Party of Canada as well as the Conservative Party of Alberta condone the racism of the Aryan Nations in western Canada? Surely the Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney) would expect speedy action if he were informed of these activities.
May 7, 1987



TAX REFORM


Mr. Dave Nickerson (Western Arctic):: Mr. Speaker, cashing in on the general dissatisfaction with an overly complex and burdensome tax system would seem to be a sure way for opposition Parties to score points. This was evidently the idea behind the NDP tax probe exercise, but it has obviously backfired on them.
Let us hear what tax expert and editor of the Canadian Taxpayer, Arthur Drache, has to say about the latest NDP tax probe report. He says:
It is a pity that the numerous technical errors leave significant questions as to whether those who drafted the document have the expertise to formulate tax policy.
He goes on to say: "This document is troubling for the shoddiness of its technical input". In short, Mr. Speaker, shoddy work from an incompetent Party.



CRIMINAL CODE


Mr. Bill Vankoughnet (Hastings-Frontenac-Lennox and Addington):: Mr. Speaker, Canada's criminal justice system is ignoring the rights of victims of violent crimes. While perpetrators of brutal attacks are freed after serving brief or part of brief sentences, their victims, who are often left physically and mentally scarred for life, are all but forgotten.
I urge the Minister to act quickly in drafting the appropriate legislation which would amend the Criminal Code by expanding the now meagre restitution provisions therein. I also ask the Minister to consider in his amendment the use of victim impact statements in the sentencing of violent criminals. An amendment of this nature could only serve to ensure that penalties for violent crimes are appropriate for the crimes committed and as precedence for due restitution for victims of violent crimes.
In addition, the Government should take steps to increase the power of the justice system in meeting the immediate needs and concerns of crime victims by increasing and enriching available government services for all victims of crime.



SOCIAL SECURITY


Jean-Claude Malépart: Mr. Speaker, after the statement made yesterday by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Wilson) on the matter of tax reform, I would urge Canadian families and senior citizens to look out and be prepared to fight. Hon. Members will remember that this Government-and I would like to recall the consultation it made in January 1985 with the Blue Paper, when senior citizens and families were misled by the same Minister of Finance who promised to fully reindex Old Age Security pensions, after he had cut them-promised at that point that family allowance cuts would not be used to reduce the deficit, misleading Canadian families once more.
I am warning the Minister of Finance there will be an allout war if this Government changed senior citizens' tax exemptions, if that is not completely transferred in respect of senior citizens. And also if the exemption for dependent children, if it is transferred for families with children, there will be an all-out war and the Minister will have to recognize his error once again, as he did on the matter of deindexing Old Age Security pensions.



GREATER USE OF GRAIN URGED FOR PRODUCTION OF ETHANOL

Mr. John Parry (Kenora-Rainy River):: Mr. Speaker, a year and five days ago the Standing Committee on Energy, Mines and Resources put forward its report, which was unanimous, to this House. It concerned a market for surplus Canadian grains which would provide an unparalleled economic opportunity for our farmers and reduce dependence on imports and fossil fuels.
This week the Western Canadian Wheat Growers Association is again urging federal and provincial Governments to take a serious look at ethanol production as a means of providing an alternative domestic market for western grains, diversifying the western economy, and developing value-added industries for western agricultural products.
The use of ethanol, an alcohol which can be produced from grain, as a replacement for lead in gasoline, could provide a domestic market for over eight million tonnes of Canadian cereal grain if 10 per cent ethanol were used to provide the octane requirements of Canadian gasoline. A three per cent ethanol and five per cent methanol blend, as currently used in Saskatchewan, Alberta and Manitoba, would consume almost six per cent of Canada's total cereal production.

May 7, 1987
Oral Questions
A window of opportunity is opening up. Allowable lead levels in Canada disgracefully still stand at 10 times the level allowed in the United States.
The Western Canadian Wheat Growers Association has recommended that the federal Government implement a program to provide the economic climate needed to kick-start the Canadian ethanol industry and provide a better environment for Canadians, including an accelerating lead phase-down program which would effectively eliminate lead in gasolines by 1990, and an environmental ban on the heavy metal octane enhancer, MMT, which has been banned in the United States since 1978.
The operations of the Western Accord and the supposed free market in refined petroleum products are being used to suppress a domestic Canadian industry which could serve the objectives of fairness for the farm economy rather than the objectives of the multinational oil industry.
The Government should not fund the MBTE plants. Instead, we must diversify, distribute jobs, and provide a market for Canadian farm production.



VOLUNTARY WORKERS


Mr. Bruce Halliday (Oxford):: Mr. Speaker, Governments should take note that voluntary community efforts can still raise funds for good causes without the help of tax dollars. Last Sunday afternoon I had the pleasure of opening the new headquarters building for the Woodstock and District Association for the Mentally Retarded. This new building, known as ARC Industries, provides employment facilities for 84 mentally-handicapped people and has a staff of 45. It complements a residence and school which were built some years ago.
The recent project began two years ago. Since then plans have been developed, and funds in the amount of over $750,000 were raised within the community. The single largest donation of $100,000 came from the Rotary Club of Woodstock. The balance was raised with smaller donations from groups and individuals in the area. At the time of the official opening there was only a minuscule $13,000 still owing on the project.
This amazing achievement is testimony to the fact that volunteerism is still alive and that, given a good project and imaginative and dedicated leadership, Canadians will respond to the needs of a community without financial help from Governments.



NATIONAL TOURISM WEEK


Mr. Fernand Robichaud (Westmorland-Kent):: Mr. Speaker, "Canada grows with tourism" is the theme of this year's National Tourism Week which will take place May 11 to May 17. I believe the theme is entirely appropriate considering that tourism generates over $22 billion in domestic revenues and provides over 600,000 direct jobs to Canadians. If properly nurtured it could employ over one million Canadians by the year 2000.

Mr. Speaker, tourism is one of Canada's major assets. Not only does the industry create hundreds of thousands of jobs, but tourism helps promote harmony and goodwill among the various regions of Canada. It is an asset for national unity.
Tourism also plays a leading role in promoting world peace, an objective which all Canadians have at heart.
I would be remiss if I failed to congratulate the Tourism Industry Association of Canada for supporting National Tourism Week, and I urge all Canadian men and women to participate actively in National Tourism Week.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Miss Aideen Nicholson (Trinity):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance. After two and a half years middle and low-income Canadians know that they have been the target of more than $22 billion worth of Conservative Government tax grabs. They are paying more sales tax, more excise tax and more income tax.
Yesterday the Minister announced that he would table his tax reform proposals in a White Paper in June. Can the Minister assure the House today that his reform will undo all, not just some, of his own huge tax grabs?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Hon. Michael Wilson (Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, one of the reasons personal income taxes are up is because we have 750,000 more people working and paying taxes, which contributes to personal tax revenues.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Michael Holcombe Wilson: We have made a number of adjustments to the tax system. A number of those changes have resulted in greater fairness in the tax system. We have a
May 7, 1987

minimum tax. We have removed a number of the tax gimmicks that have been used, such as the Scientific Research Tax Credit, carve-outs, and the rules on limited partnerships, all of which have made personal income tax fair play. So, yes, we will address some further problems in tax reform. My friend will be very much aware of these on June 18.


Aideen Nicholson: Canadians are paying more taxes because the Minister increased the rates. I do not know how he can call a 33 per cent hike in sales tax fair.


POSSIBLE INTRODUCTION OF CONSUMPTION TAX
Aideen Nicholson: Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Minister said that he may introduce a new consumption tax which he now calls a national multi-stage sales tax. The Minister knows that when New Zealand brought in its consumption tax the cost of living went up immediately by some 5 per cent. How much does the Minister expect the cost of living for Canadians to increase as a result of his new tax?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I think the Hon. Member is jumping ahead of herself. We will have a White Paper on June 18. This type of question will be addressed very clearly in the White Paper.


FEDERAL-PROVINCIAL SALES TAX INQUIRY
Aideen Nicholson: Mr. Speaker, last summer the Minister backed away from the idea of a value added tax in favour of a business transfer tax. We understand that in response to pressure from his cabinet colleagues, yesterday he backed away from the business transfer tax in favour of a national multi-stage sales tax, and said that some of the provinces were interested in it. Which provinces are interested in replacing provincial and federal sales taxes with a regressive new tax on every conceivable consumer item and service?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, again, I think the Hon. Member is jumping ahead of herself. We will be publishing a White Paper which will have a core proposal on a comprehensive multi-stage sales tax, as 1 indicated yesterday. At the last meeting of federal and provincial Ministers of Finance, a number of the provinces encouraged me to keep the option open of having either a federal and provincial tax of that nature, plus two federal only options of a business transfer tax or federal value added tax. These options are available to us, but they all centre around that core proposal of a comprehensive multi-stage tax.


LEVEL OF TAXATION
Mr. George Baker (Gander-Twillingate):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Finance. A couple of months ago, in response to a charge that he was the taxingest finance minister in Canadian history, he said:
What we have been doing here, John-
That is, John Ferguson of Southam News:
Oral Questions
-is to bring the level of taxation back to where it had been in the middle 70s.
Previous Ministers of Finance had let go of the tax reins and the level of
taxation as a per cent of income had gone down and down-
In bringing the level of taxation up and up, is it necessary to increase the worries of ordinary Canadians that perhaps even their food will be taxed? Will the Government tax even our daily bread? Canadians will never forgive the Government for that trespass.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I have made it very clear that tax reform is not designed to increase the amount of revenues that the Government of Canada would take as a per cent of the national income of the country. That still stands.


George Baker: It is obvious that the Minister is unwilling to say whether there will be a general tax on food.


TAX ON SNACK FOODS
George Baker: Mr. Speaker, we know that beginning on July 1, the Minister will bring in a tax on snack food. He will put a new tax on popcorn, nuts, icecream bars, granola bars, pretzels, cheezies, potato chips, and even popsicles.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


George Baker: Does the Minister of Finance not realize that Canadian children only have so much money for an allowance, only so much for recess time, and can only take in so many empty pop bottles to get a bit of change in their pockets? Will he cancel this sneaky summer snack attack?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, 1 can see that the Hon. Member will take off weight this summer.
I ask the Hon. Member to cast his attention back to my statement yesterday. I said that the result of tax reform will be that an overwhelming majority of Canadians will discover that they have more money in their pockets. They will be paying less tax. That is the objective of tax reform and the objective that I have set out very clearly. I think the Hon. Member will find that he will be very pleased with the results of tax reform come June 18.


SALES TAX OPTIONS
Mr. Mike Cassidy (Ottawa Centre):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Finance. He has committed himself to let Canadians know on June 18 his plans for tax reform. However, he now seems to be trying to fudge that by saying he will put forth three or four options, the value added tax, the business transfer tax, and a new national sales tax imposed in co-operation with the provinces if they agree.

May 7, 1987
Oral Questions
Will the Minister assure the Elouse that the Government will state which of the sales tax options it favours when it issues its June 18 paper? Will he also assure the House that necessities like food will continue to be exempt?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, again the Hon. Member is pre-empting the whole process. We will have a White Paper. In the White Paper there will be a core proposal on how we will move to a comprehensive multistage sales tax.
There are three means by which we can operate that tax, three ways by which we can facilitate it, three mechanisms that we can use. I have said that those are open for consultation.
The provinces have indicated that they are interested in discussing one. We will be consulting with the private sector on the other two, as well as on the national sales tax.
There are options open to us on how we proceed, and that is what will flow from the White Paper in June.
[ Translation]


INQUIRY WHETHER FOOD PRODUCTS WILL BE TAXED
Michael Morris Cassidy: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. After four of five answers the Minister has yet to indicate clearly whether food products will be taxed, even though a tax on food will cost the average Canadian family $300 in additional taxes on a basic life necessity. Can the Minister assure us and the House that such a basic necessity as food will not be taxable? Does the Minister quite simply intend to reduce income taxes while at the same time extending the sales tax to something as basic as food and daily bread?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I have told the Hon. Member and the other questioner that we are not going to pre-empt the process.
There are options, which I have set out, on the mechanisms we are going to use to implement that tax, some of which have the flexibility for exemptions. I think we must let the process run its course.
When the Hon. Member talks about the regressive nature of sales tax, I ask him to consider whether the current approach to sales tax without a refundable sales tax credit is the right way, or whether one with a refundable sales credit, which helps those with lower incomes finance the cost of sale tax, is a more progressive way of doing things. I think that is something we will be exploring again during the process of consultation.


Michael Morris Cassidy: Mr. Speaker, I always understood that a White Paper was a statement of policy and that if the Government wanted to put forward options, which it has had the chance to do over the last two and a half years, it could come
up with a Green Paper or possibly a Yellow Paper if it were scared of the reaction of Canadians to a tax on food.


PERSONAL AND CORPORATE TAXES
Michael Morris Cassidy: Mr. Speaker, is the Minister now intending to implement the proposals for personal and corporate taxes for 1988? Is it his real intention to hide behind these options and save the bad news on sales tax until after the 1989 campaign?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, it is a White Paper. I have made it clear yesterday, and I have said it again three times. I will say it once again for the Hon. Member-there will be one proposal on a comprehensive multi-stage sales tax. There are three mechanisms which we can use to implement that proposal. That is what we will be discussing with the interested parties following the release of the paper.
As far as the time is concerned, I think the Hon. Member will have to wait. The whole process of timing, consultation, legislation, and implementation will be set out at the time of the White Paper.


TAX REFORM
Alfonso Gagliano: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Finance. Yesterday he completely forgot about small business. In his remarks on the tax reform he did not say a word about it. Some 70 per cent of new jobs in Canada are created by small and medium-sized businesses, and if each such company is encouraged to create one more job, unemployment in this country will be drastically reduced. With respect to his tax system proposition as it applies to corporations, is the Minister committed to retain reduced tax rates for small businesses to encourage them to expand and create yet more jobs?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, the Government has never forgotten small business, unlike the Party of which he is a Member. We have never forgotten small business. In every Budget I have introduced in the House there has been something which has helped small business create jobs.
Perhaps the Hon. Member would care to reflect on the
750,000	jobs that have been created, an outstanding job-creation record. One of the reasons for that is that the
May 7, 1987

Government has supported the small business community, and that support will continue.


MINISTER'S POSITION
Alfonso Gagliano: Mr. Speaker, small businessmen are fed up with rhetoric from the Minister of Finance. They want action. Whether there will be a business transfer tax, a value added tax or a national multistage sales tax, small businesses will pay more. Will the Minister announce today that under the new tax reform, small businesses will be exempted from federal sales taxes so they can create new jobs? Stop kidding and tell people how it is.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I would be happy to invite the Hon. Member to meetings I have had with members of the small business community-


Alfonso Gagliano: I had them too.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: He says he did. Once in a while he does. If he would care to join me, he will see that what I am saying is not rhetoric.
My colleague just reminded me that John Bulloch, the President of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, has referred either to my last Budget or the one before that as being a block-buster Budget, a Budget that would help the small business community create more jobs. That is what the Government stands for.


EFFECT OF TAX REFORM
Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, my question is also directed to the Minister of Finance. The Minister of Finance knows only too well that since he has been Minister of Finance we have seen personal income tax rates increase. According to the comment he made yesterday, they will now decrease.
My question is very straightforward. Is the Minister of Finance prepared to say that after his tax reform package has been introduced, Canadians who pay personal taxes, federal taxes and excise taxes will actually be paying less federal tax, or will they be paying more?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, 1 am not quite sure I understand what the Hon. Member means when he says less federal tax. Could he explain that to me? He has made a very general statement.


TAX PAID BY AVERAGE CANADIAN
Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, 1 hope that this is not a supplementary question but I suspect that it is. After the tax reform the Minister has in mind, if an average Canadian were to add up the federal tax, the personal tax, the federal excise tax and the federal sales tax he or she pays, will the amount of money he or she will be paying be more or less than today?
Oral Questions


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, if I got everything the Hon. Member said, after tax reform the average Canadian-I think I will expand on what he said-a good majority of Canadians will be paying less tax.


AGRICULTURE
Mr. Maurice Foster (Algoma):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Deputy Prime Minister. Last night the Conservative Party filled only half the hall in Lethbridge, Alberta, and gave the Prime Minister a very cool reception. Since Tories are not willing to come out to meet the Prime Minister and are giving him a cool reception, will the Deputy Prime Minister change the tour so that ordinary farmers and representatives of farm organizations will have an opportunity to meet with the Prime Minister to tell him of their concerns? Not only will they fill the hall but they will give him a warmer reception.


Hon. Don Mazankowski (Deputy Prime Minister and President of the Privy Council):: Mr. Speaker, given the record of the Hon. Member, one would think he would rely upon better research than the news media for the background of his question. I just spoke to the Hon. Member for Lethbridge- Foothills who advised me that there were over 600 people at the function. It was an incredibly warm audience. There were eight or nine standing ovations. It was very typical of a southern Alberta warm welcome and the Prime Minister was very warmly received.


Maurice Brydon Foster: Mr. Speaker, it was probably the outdoor temperature, not the warmth of the group.


REQUEST THAT PRIME MINISTER MEET FARMERS
Maurice Brydon Foster: Mr. Speaker, we are told that the only farm meeting the Prime Minister is having during the entire four-day tour is with the President of the local PC Association and 15 hand-picked farmers in Saskatoon. Can the Deputy Prime Minister say why the President of the Saskatchewan Wheat Pool and representatives of other farm organizations like the NFU were not invited to this meeting? On a tour of this length, why is the Prime Minister not meeting with general farm organizations and with farmers, thousands of whom are wondering what his policy will be?


John Wise: Mr. Speaker, this Prime Minister has met more often and more frequently with farm leaders then any other Prime Minister in the history of Canada. Day after day, this Hon. Member rises to pose questions and I really do not know where he gets his information.
The Hon. Member should know that the Prime Minister will be meeting again with farm leaders either in the last week of

May 7, 1987
Oral Questions
May or in the first week of June before he leaves to take the message to the summit meeting on behalf of Canadian agriculture.
This time the Prime Minister wants to do something I like to do, and I am sure all Members in the House like to do and that is not only to meet with farm leaders on a regular and frequent basis but to have the opportunity once in a while to talk to farmers who cannot come to Ottawa on a regular basis. That is exactly what he is doing.


DEFICIENCY PAYMENTS-FARM CREDIT CORPORATION FORECLOSURES
Mr. Lome Nystrom (Yorkton-Melville):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Deputy Prime Minister. As the Deputy Prime Minister knows, the Prime Minister took his travelling road show to Lethbridge last night and was met with less than enthusiasm by staunch Conservative supporters.
Why did the Prime Minister not make two announcements last night, announcements western farmers want to hear now? Why did he not announce that there would be a sufficient deficiency payment for the 1987-88 crop year and why did he not announce the reversal of the lifting of the moratorium on FCC loans? Why did he not do that rather than give western Canadians another Trudeau-style lecture about Canada?


John Wise: Mr. Speaker, it is very obvious why the Prime Minister did not make those announcements when he was in western Canada. The Prime Minister is simply keeping the commitment my colleague, the Minister responsible for the Canadian Wheat Board, and I made when we met with farm leaders on March 5. A very strong warning was sent out at that time that indeed we do not need to send out messages that would encourage farmers to do certain things other than to plan their 1987 cropping patterns based on market signals. That was the message that was sent, and I have said that over and over again. If the Hon. Member does not have a copy of that press release, I would be happy to have the one in front of me copied and sent across to him for his information.


WESTERN DIVERSIFICATION PLAN
Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Mr. Speaker, since the Minister is obviously ignoring the wheat pools' recent call for a commitment on a deficiency payment now, perhaps the Deputy Prime Minister can tell the House why, when the Prime Minister made one of his very rare appearances in western Canada, he did not announce the Government's long-awaited western diversification plan? Why is the Government taking so long to announce its plans? Why is it so slow?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, very simply, if we had announced a plan without consulting with westerners, farmers, the energy sector and other groups as the Prime
Minister is now doing, the Hon. Member would have condemned our action. This Government consults. It works with the provinces and the industries.


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: With the wheat pools?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: It works with the wheat pools, and I must take exception, as I am sure the wheat pools will, to the cheap political opportunism in which the Hon. Member is engaged. The members of the pools indicated that, if it was convenient, they would be prepared to meet with the Prime Minister but that they have met with him on various occasions and will be meeting with him again. I wish the Hon. Member would stop using the wheat pools as a cheap political trick. It does him no good and it does the wheat pools no good.


REGIONAL INDUSTRIAL EXPANSION
Hon. Lloyd Axworthy (Winnipeg-Fort Garry):: Mr. Speaker, I had a question for the Minister of Regional Industrial Expansion, but in his absence I will direct it to the Deputy Prime Minister. The Deputy Prime Minister will recall that in February the Government announced a $45 million loan to Ford in order to help it purchase the Versatile Farm Implement Company in Winnipeg, based upon the condition that Ford would seek to preserve and guarantee the jobs of the workers.
Can the Minister explain why, as of May 2 when the deal was to be finalized, many of the management and clerical staff of Versatile had yet to be given any form of job guarantee? Ford refuses to provide any kind of assurance to those workers. Does the Government intend, as a condition of its loan, to require Ford to live up to the commitments it made at that time?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, there were some specific commitments and undertakings that Ford Motor Co. agreed to. I am not aware of any failure on their part but I will certainly undertake to make inquiries and get back to the Hon. Member as soon as I can.


PLANNED CLOSURE OF VERSATILE DEALERSHIPS
Lloyd Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, can the Minister say whether the Minister responsible or the Cabinet has authorized Ford's proposed plan to close down a minimum of 65 Versatile dealerships in western Canada even though that again runs contrary to the commitments made at the time of the loan to preserve the dealer
May 7, 1987

network? As the Minister knows, that network is extraordinarily important and valuable to the farmers of western Canada. Can we get the assurance that the Government will hold Ford to its commitment to maintain those dealerships?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: I am not aware of the allegations that the Hon. Member has made. However, clearly one of the conditions taken into account during consideration of this transaction was that there should remain a strong dealer organization. I think there was a fairly clear understanding on that part, but again I will make inquiries and get back to the Hon. Member.


EMERGENCY MEASURES
Mr. Benno Friesen (Surrey-White Rock-North Delta):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of National Defence. One item of the Government's mandate was to deal with the Emergency Planning Order which the previous Government left with us and which had a potential for serious civil rights violations. I would like the assurance of the Minister that that item will be taken care of so that the Canadian people do not have to fear any kind of civil rights violations in the future.


Hon. Perrin Beatty (Minister of National Defence):: Mr. Speaker, I have also had long-standing concerns about the Emergency Planning Order issued under the authority of the Royal Prerogative. I do not want to scoop the White Paper but I think my hon. friend will be receiving good news on that very shortly.


VETERANS AFFAIRS
Mr. Neil Young (Beaches):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Veterans Affairs. It concerns those Canadians, mainly from Newfoundland, who were held in a concentration camp in Algeria during World War II. Those veterans are being denied benefits as prisoners of war due to a technicality, as the Minister knows. The Minister has a reputation for giving veterans the benefit of the doubt if there is any dispute between them and the Department.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Neil Young: Given that reputation, and since there is absolutely no doubt at all that those Canadians were indeed prisoners of war, will the Minister assure the House and those
Oral Questions
veterans that they will have their claims approved by his Department?


Hon. George Hees (Minister of Veterans Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to compliment the Hon. Member for Beaches for, as usual, putting his question very simply and accurately. The present legislation does not permit us to pay prisoner of war compensation to veterans interned in a neutral country. However, I am very sympathetic to the idea of doing everything possible to deal with deserving cases. With that in mind my officials have been working on a solution to this problem which will be brought forward just as soon as possible.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


REQUEST FOR AMENDMENT OF LEGISLATION
Neil Young: Mr. Speaker, just before Question Period I spoke to Mr. Jim Templeton, one of those prisoners, and he tells me they have been waiting since 1976 for the amendments to be brought before the House. I ask the Minister to bring them in not "as soon as possible" but within the next couple of weeks. I can assure him that if he does he will have the full support of this Party in seeing that they are passed speedily by this House.


George Harris Hees: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member is well aware of what the Department of Veterans Affairs has been able to do to speed up the pension process greatly. I agree with him that this matter has been hanging fire far too long. I must also tell him it is one of those matters that was not brought to my attention earlier. Now that it has been I can assure him that I abhor delay just as much as he does and this matter will be brought forward and dealt with just as soon as it is possible to do so. I cannot do it any quicker than that.


TERMS OF ACT PASSED IN 1976
Mr. Brian Tobin (Humber-Port au Port-St. Barbe):: Mr. Speaker, my question is also directed to the Minister of Veterans Affairs. He can take another bow or two and the House will not mind. We are pleased with the tone of his answers today. It is much better than yesterday's answers by the individual sitting in for him.
The 1976 Compensation for Former Prisoners of War Act says that compensation can be paid to those Canadian servicemen who were held by a power engaged in activities against the Allies. Would the Minister not agree that Vichy France, which held those 22 Canadians at Laghouat, Algeria, was a power engaged in activities against the allied forces? Therefore, even under the terminology of the 1976 Act, these 22 Canadians ought to qualify for a pension under the Act.


George Harris Hees: Mr. Speaker, the country concerned has always been considered by this Government as a neutral country during World War II. For that reason it is impossible, I am advised, to pay this compensation. However, as I said to the Hon. Member for

May 7, 1987
Oral Questions
Beaches, now that the matter has come to my attention I am very sympathetic.
I cannot say why this matter was not looked after by the previous Government, why it went on as long as it did. I am sorry it did. I quite sympathize with the veterans concerned. I can assure them that this matter will be cleaned up just as soon as I can have it cleaned up.


INTERPRETATION OF ACT
[Stage Direction]
Mir. Brian Tobin (Humber-Port au Port-St. Barbe): Mr. Speaker, the House should note that General Charles de Gaulle did not consider Vichy France to be a neutral power. It did not stop him from arresting and prosecuting the President of Vichy France and putting to death many of the collaborators in that administration.
I want to join with my friend in the NDP in saying that this Party is prepared to see immediate passage of whatever amendments are required to ensure that these 22 Canadian servicemen, including seven from my province, are compensated. I believe the Government would be correct in interpreting the Act as presently written as saying those servicemen were held by a power engaged in activities against the Allies. I ask him to move as expeditiously as possible.
George Harris Hees: All I can
say once again is that the particular Government concerned was always considered by the Canadian Government to be a power not engaged in warfare with the Canadian Government. That is that. Having said that, I can assure him that I will do everything possible to see what 1 consider to have been a wrong done to these veterans over a long period of time is righted as quickly as possible.


LITERACY
Mr. David Orlikow (Winnipeg North):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Secretary of State I would like to direct my question to the Deputy Prime Minister. A discussion document which the Secretary of State has tells him and Canadians that there are many more functionally illiterate adults in Canada than the estimate we had of 5 million.
The paper says:
-competitiveness of the Canadian economy in the world market is threatened
when a large body of workers do not meet minimal requirements of literacy.
Is it not time that the federal Government got together with the provinces with a real program to attack this very serious situation which will have such adverse effects on all Canadians?


Hon. Benoit Bouchard (Minister of Employment and Immigration):: Mr. Speaker, speaking on behalf of the Secretary of State, I would like to point out that the question put by the Hon. Member for Winnipeg North is a relevant one, and that the Secretary of State is working very hard on this matter. In fact, tomorrow a meeting will be held in Toronto with agencies that are directly concerned with these issues, to try and identify various avenues that could be explored to find a solution to this very serious problem.


REQUEST THAT GOVERNMENT SET DEADLINE FOR ENDING ILLITERACY
David Orlikow: Mr. Speaker, the Minister knows that there are small programs in his Department and in those of the Solicitor General and the Secretary of State. He knows that those are only small programs and that the provincial programs are very small as well.
Is it not time that Canada does what some of the underdeveloped countries have done, that is, to set a target of solving the problem in 10 years? That will require a major joint effort by the federal and provincial Governments and funds to do the job. Is it not time to stop talking and start doing something?


Benoît Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, I am merely repeating what I said earlier. Obviously, all Canadians are aware of the urgency of the matter you are raising and realize that co-operation is essential, not only with the provinces but with all parties concerned. That is the purpose of tomorrow's meeting, and it is a matter the Secretary of State, in co-operation with the Minister of State for Youth, is giving very serious attention, and we expect to be able to provide some answers in the near future.


REFUGEES
Mr. Sergio Marchi (York West):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of State for Immigration and is with regard to the new refugee legislation which Rabbi Gunther Plaut, author of a government commissioned study on refugees, described as paramount to "building a Berlin Wall around Canada".
In answer to my question in the House yesterday the Minister said: "the first step is not a pre-screening. It is a first step to a claimant's right to demonstrate whether he has a personal fear of persecution".
May 7, 1987

Will the Minister now come clean and acknowledge that this answer was completely false, that a claimant from a safe third country has no right to present his claim, has no opportunity to prove and be judged on his personal fear of persecution, and will be refused entry to the refugee board and sent packing? Will he, for once, give Canadians the straight goods?


Hon. Gerry Weiner (Minister of State (Immigration)):: Mr. Speaker, I do not think the Member has read the Bill. In fact, he may not have even bought the newspaper which had a graph which clearly illustrated the steps. I would be happy to send it to him.
It is clear that in the first step the claimant is met by the adjudicator and a member of the independent Refugee Determination Board. They have two tests, the first of which is objective criteria. Does he have refugee status established elsewhere? Is he returnable to a safe third country?
Notwithstanding that, they listen thoughtfully because there is another low threshold discretion which allows them, if they believe there is even a slim chance that the life, limb or liberty of that person is at risk, to refer him to step two within 10 days to begin a hearing before the independent Refugee Determination Board.


Sergio Marchi: Mr. Speaker, the Minister should stop right now manipulating and misleading public opinion. He knows that he cannot have it both ways.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


EFFECT OF NEW LEGISLATION ON OTHER COUNTRIES
Sergio Marchi: Mr. Speaker, how does the Minister respond to the growing legitimate concerns and criticisms that since Canada is one of the first countries in the world to legislate a safe third country concept it will trigger other nations to do likewise, thereby jeopardizing an international solution to an international problem? What will he tell Canadians when the world's 15 million refugees, facing closed doors and no options, not only seek the back doors of countries but, in the process of their human desperation, tear the doors off the hinges?


Gérard (Gerry) Weiner: Mr. Speaker, I hear Canadians saying that we are finally cleaning up the mess which was left to us.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Gérard (Gerry) Weiner: Genuine refugees will benefit. We will curb the abusers. The frauds are out.
The Member talks of safe countries. The Cabinet will put forward a list at the appropriate time. We will have stringent criteria.
Oral Questions


Sergio Marchi: That's nonsense and you know it.


Gérard (Gerry) Weiner: We understand that it is a matter of life and death. We will seek the widest consultation and advice possible from all groups to ensure that we are informed of the human rights records of the country, its record of protecting all refugees and nationals of that kind.
I can assure the Hon. Member that we will be very careful with every individual and will have an agreement in place before we do anything.


DISASTERS
Mr. Ray Skelly (Comox-Powell River):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. Will the Government launch a judicial inquiry into the sinking of the fishing vessel Scotia Cape and the tragic loss of seven lives last January?


Hon. Thomas Siddon (Minister of Fisheries and Oceans):: Mr. Speaker, the Scotia Cape left the Port of Steveston, B.C., on January 28 and did not make radio contact as expected on February 5. As a result of that, the Minister of Transport has initiated a preliminary investigation as is his normal practice. That report has now been received by the Minister of Transport. It will be released and subsequent action will be taken when the Minister has had a chance to consider it carefully.


EFFECT OF FISHING QUOTAS ON VESSEL SAFETY
Raymond John Skelly: Mr. Speaker, will the Minister have his department launch an inquiry into how the quota system imposed by DFO and the openings and closings of fishing seasons possibly contributed to the loss of 14 lives on the coast of British Columbia last year and the loss of seven lives this year?


Thomas Edward Siddon: Mr. Speaker, at my request last autumn my department established a fishing vessels safety working group which is looking into the relationship between fishing practices and carrying practices, with regard to both gear and catch, in terms of any influence those practices might have on vessel safety.
I must point out that in the case of the disappearance of the Scotia Cape there was evidence of very extreme weather conditions in the area. Absolutely no evidence has been found to give us any indication of what might have led to that disappearance.

May 7, 1987
Oral Questions PORNOGRAPHY


REQUEST THAT BILL BE DIVIDED
Hon. Bob Kaplan (York Centre):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Government House Leader. The Government has seen the negative reaction to Bill C-54, the pornography Bill, not only from the Opposition but from all groups in the country which are deeply concerned about the serious issue of pornography. It is obvious that it will take a long time for the Bill to go through the House of Commons and the Senate.
Therefore, would the Government be prepared to divide the Bill so that we can move forward quickly with the tougher measures on which there is agreement; child pornography, violent pornography, and degradation pornography, and put aside for more consideration the portions of the Bill which are so controversial and unacceptable?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, I am somewhat surprised at the Hon. Member's assertion that this Bill is not a popular piece of legislation. I believe this is the first question about it which has been raised by the Opposition since it was tabled.
In response to his question about dividing the Bill, he may want to discuss that with the Minister, if he has not already done so. I think that would be more appropriate than engaging in negotiations with respect to House business on the floor during Question Period.


INQUIRY WHETHER GOVERNMENT PREPARED TO RECONSIDER BILL S DEFINITION OF PORNOGRAPHY
Robert Phillip Kaplan: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary is directed to the same Minister. Would the Government be prepared to reconsider its definition in the Bill of the term "pornography", which really identifies all sexuality as being pornography?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: If the Hon. Member has some definite opinions about the contents of the Bill, he will certainly have an adequate opportunity to express those during the course of the debate or during the hearings. In the meantime, if the Hon..Member has any suggestions, positive or otherwise, he may want to consider discussing them with the Hon. Minister of Justice.


Mr. Speaker:: I should advise Hon. Members that there will be a question and a supplementary from the Hon. Member for Nickel Belt followed by a single question from the Hon. Member for Don Valley East, and that will conclude Question Period.


REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT
Mr. John R. Rodriguez (Nickel Belt):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Deputy Prime Minister. Last November in 1986 the Deputy Prime Minister outlined the bare bones of a seven point economic recovery program for northern Ontario. On March 31, 1987, the Deputy Prime Minister said that the development of this policy "was in its final stages", and it would be announced "very soon".
Six months after announcing a seven point program, we still have no action. There are over 800,000 people in northern Ontario. One out of every six is unemployed. I want to know when are we going to see a real effort to strengthen and diversify the economy of this long neglected region of the country.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member is quite right. It has been a long neglected region of the country and this Government is intending to react in a very positive way. That process is ongoing and my answer is the same, it will be very soon.


John R. Rodriguez: Mr. Speaker, the people of northern Ontario are not prepared to think in terms of eons and eons for some action. God knows, we waited long enough for action from the Liberal Government, the predecessor to this Government, and we are not prepared to wait that long again.


Some Hon. Members:: Right on, John!


STUDY ON SINGLE-INDUSTRY TOWNS
John R. Rodriguez: There are over 100 single-industry towns scattered across northern Ontario. The advisory council to the Department of Employment and Immigration has recently done a study on single-industry towns. It has made some very valuable recommendations with respect to single-industry towns and how to diversify them. Has the Deputy Prime Minister seen this report? And has he integrated the report into the proposed economic packet for northern Ontario for which he says we are going to have to wait until "soon" to get a response?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, I genuinely appreciate the enthusiasm of the Hon. Member and I hope that when the package is unveiled he will be just as enthusiastic in his support.


John R. Rodriguez: When?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Yes, all of these matters are being considered. This issue is under the aegis of the Department of Regional Industrial Expansion, with a great deal of input from the Hon. Solicitor General, who knows and understands the area very well, I might add.
May 7, 1987


TAX REFORM
Bill Attewell: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Chairman of the Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs. Some members of the Opposition who have been asking questions today about tax reform are members of that committee. I think they are trying to instill fear and anxiety in the minds of Canadians.


Some Hon. Members:: Order!


Bill Attewell: I understand that the committee will be holding meetings across Canada after June 18 to hear the views of Canadians on the White Paper and ensure that the Minister's objectives of fairness, equity and simplicity are met. Could the Chairman confirm that this process is going to take place?


Donald Alex Blenkarn: Mr. Speaker, 1 have instructed the clerk of the Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs to call an in camera meeting to go over the process of having public hearings on tax reform after June 18 and through the late summer and fall. There is a great deal of work which has to be organized and co-ordinated for those hearings to be effective and I will be reporting on that matter to Members as we go along.


Mr. Speaker:: The Hon. Member for Ottawa-Vanier (Mr. Gauthier) could perhaps advise the Speaker if there is going to be the usual Thursday question.


BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Mr. Jean-Robert Gauthier (Ottawa-Vanier):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the question which it is customary for the Opposition to ask on Thursday with respect to the program for the days and weeks to come. I hope the Government has something put together so that we can be busier.


Philip Derek Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to advise the House that Friday will be an allotted day. On Monday the House will debate the motion of the Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney) respecting the Constitutional Accord. Tuesday will be an allotted day. On Wednesday, May 13, we will do the report stage of Bill C-37, the softwood lumber Bill and, if possible, we would like to complete third reading on the same day.
[ Translation]


Jean-Claude Malépart: Mr. Speaker, further to the Parliamentary Secretary's statement, I
Privilege-Mr. Berger
would like to ask him when Bill C-50 will be tabled in the House of Commons for second reading. Will it be next week?


Philip Derek Lewis: At the present time, Mr. Speaker, I am not able to answer that question. I am sure that if my colleague wished to discuss it with his House Leader and give us some indication of whether they will need more than one speaker and how much time we would need, we can put that into the hopper in consideration with the other Bills.


PRIVILEGE
Mr. David Berger (Laurier):: Mr. Speaker, my question of privilege, for which I gave you notice, relates to inaccurate or improper information which impairs the ability of the House to come to a judgment about matters put before it.
In answering a question in the House yesterday about the Government's proposed refugee determination system, at page 5796 of Hansard, the Minister of State for Immigration (Mr. Weiner) intentionally or unintentionally misled the House when he said: "the first step is not a pre-screening. It is a first step to a claimant's right to demonstrate whether he has a personal fear of persecution".
The Minister said that the claimant had the right to demonstrate whether he has a personal fear of persecution, that the first step is not a bar to his right.
I would ask you to note, Mr. Speaker, the use of the word "right", which in common parlance and in law means a power that a person possesses by law that he can assert. I would ask you, Sir, to note also the use of the words "personal fear", which indicate subjective criteria. It indicates that the claimant's personal feelings will prevail or be considered.
I would suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, that anyone reading this reply would assume that the claimant in all instances can present his case and have it judged on the merits. This is just not so. It is clear from the legislation that many claimants will be barred from presenting their personal cases if they fall into a certain category of claimants, namely, if they came to Canada from a safe third country. This will be an absolute bar to their claim. No discretion will be given to the adjudicator and the refugee board member who presides at the initial hearing. There will be no opportunity to present a case, and the Minister, I would suggest, is wrong to say that the claimant has a right to demonstrate a personal fear-


Philip Derek Lewis: Point of order.


David Berger: -or that there is an additional safeguard where a shred of evidence exists.


Philip Derek Lewis: Point of order.

May 7, 1987
Privilege-Mr. Berger


Mr. Speaker:: The Hon. Parliamentary Secretary on a point of order.


Philip Derek Lewis: Mr. Speaker, 1 listened for quite a length of time to a claim by the Hon. Member that someone has intentionally or unintentionally misled the House. I am not sure whether it is a point of order or question of privilege, but I do know one thing. It is definitely debate. If we are going to have a point of order, please get to the point. This is like saying that if we rule out innuendo in questions, that would be one thing, but we are getting more innuendo in points of order.


Mr. Guilbault (Saint-Jacques):: That's baloney. Just sit down.


Philip Derek Lewis: It is definitely debate. If we are going to have a point, then please get to it. If we are to rule out innuendo in questions, then it would be one thing. We are now getting more innuendo on points of order. This is obviously debate arising out of Question Period, which always take place in this House. I respectfully request that the Hon. Member come to his point and let us get rid of the debate.


Gérard (Gerry) Weiner: Mr. Speaker, for the benefit of the Hon. Member who raises the question of privilege, may I read Clause 48.1 of Bill C-55 to him since he probably has not read it. it would qualify the question of privilege-


Mr. Speaker:: The Parliamentary Secretary having listened, as I have been doing, to the comments is suggesting that this is more in the line of debate as to what the law is or is not, or what the Minister may or may not have said. I have seen the notice which comes in the form of a question of privilege. The Hon. Member suggests in his notice that something false has been put forward by the Minister in a statement that the Minister made in Question Period yesterday. It may or may not have been so, and it may or may not have been intentional. However, I would ask the Hon. Member to conclude his remarks as soon as he properly can, keeping in mind that the question that the Chair has to decide is whether something was put forth, intentionally, in an incorrect way, or whether there is merely an ambiguity or a disagreement between Members as to what the particular proposal might or might not mean. I would ask the Hon. Member for Laurier (Mr. Berger) to keep that in mind and to complete his remarks.
I will hear the Minister as soon as the Hon. Member for Laurier has concluded his remarks. I will invite the Hon. Minister at that time to make any statement that may clarify the situation or may meet any of the comments made by the Hon. Member.


David Berger: Mr. Speaker, thank you. 1 will conclude briefly. 1 was saying at the time that I was prevented from continuing my remarks that there will be no opportunity to present a case in the event that a claimant comes from a safe third country.
The Minister has been either intentionally or unintentionally inaccurate in saying that the claimant has a right to demonstrate a personal fear, or that there is an additional safeguard where a shred of evidence exists. I respectfully suggest, Mr. Speaker, that there will be no right and that no evidence will be relevant if the person comes from a safe third country.
In addition, the Minister has compounded his misleading statements by improperly changing Hansard by materially altering part of the answer that he gave in his answer to my colleague from York West yesterday. I have checked the "blues" and in the House yesterday the Minister clearly said: " ... the first step is not a pre-screening". I have also viewed the video that is available to Members of the House of Commons. The Minister very clearly uses the word "not" in his remarks. However, if Your Honour will look at Hansard for yesterday you will find at page 5796 the word "not" has been deleted from Hansard.
1 would suggest that what the Minister has clearly set out to do is to confuse the House to prevent it from coming to a reasoned judgment. This is a clear contempt of the House and its procedures. If you find, Mr. Speaker, that I have a prima facie question of privilege, then I am prepared to move the appropriate motion.


Mr. Speaker:: The Hon. Member for Laurier (Mr. Berger) is getting very close to making a charge, for which there is, of course, an appropriate way of proceeding. It is not under the present procedure. However, the Chair is certainly prepared to consider this matter on the basis that there is, for whatever reason, something misleading in the response that the Minister made yesterday.
The second question related to it is the suggestion that Hansard has been altered in such a way that that is adding to the confusion. I think we will just leave it at that.


Gérard (Gerry) Weiner: Mr. Speaker, I have no knowledge of what the Hon. Member is referring to in Hansard. My response today is the same as yesterday. Step one is not a pre-screening process. I had nothing to do with the word "not" being in or out. 1 repeat today: It is not a screening process. It is step one.


Mr. Speaker:: I think I can help all Hon. Members. The Minister's comment is accepted by the Chair, which disposes of part of the discussion. Perhaps the Minister could address the other part of the problem.


Gérard (Gerry) Weiner: Mr. Speaker, I based my answer on Clause 48.1 of the proposed Bill C-55. It states:
48.1 (1) A person who claims to be a Convention refugee is not eligible to have
the claim determined by the Refugee Division if
(a)	the claimant has been recognized by any country, other than Canada, as a Convention refugee and has been issued a valid and subsisting travel document by that country pursuant to Article 28 of the Convention;
(b)	the claimant came to Canada from a country that has been prescribed as a safe third country for all persons or for persons of a specified class of persons of which the claimant is a member and would be allowed to return to that country, if removed from Canada, or has a right to have the claim determined therein;
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Subclause (2) of Clause 48.1 states:
(2) Notwithstanding paragraph (l)(a), a person is eligible to have a claim determined by the Refugee Division if, in the opinion of the adjudicator or the member of the Refugee Division considering the claim, the person has a credible basis for a well-founded fear of persecution for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group or political opinion in the country that recognized the person as a Convention refugee.
1 think that clearly indicates that there is discretion on the part of the two officers who must agree. If one of them felt that there was a shred of doubt, a shred of fear on the part of that individual, then he or she is referred to a full hearing in front of the two-member independent refugee board in a nonadversarial fashion.


David Berger: Mr. Speaker, I thank the Minister for his answer. However, I respectfully submit that it confirms the point that I have tried to make. Subclause (2) quoted by the Minister-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. We are now getting into a debate as to what the provisions of a proposed Bill mean. I do not think that that is something I can entertain on a question of privilege.
As I understand it, the Minister has clearly stated that if there was a change in Hansard or if there was a change between what was said by the Minister and what appeared in Hansard then the Minister had nothing to do with it. As far as the Chair is concerned, that is the end of that question.
The second question the Chair has to decide is whether or not what the Minister did say was-and I am using the word brought to me by the notice of privilege-false. That is the point I will have to decide, and I will consider that as carefully as I can.
What I ask Hon. Members to realize is that when an issue comes down to one Member's interpretation or view of what a piece of legislation means as opposed to another Member's, then that is a matter of disagreement, something which happens constantly in this place and would not ordinarily be, in the absence of some intent to mislead, a matter of privilege.
I assure the Hon. Member for Laurier (Mr. Berger) that I have his point. I will consider it extremely carefully and report back to the Chamber.
If there are other Members who wish to give any assistance to the Chair, then I will certainly hear them.
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GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Rompkey:
That this House condemns the Government for its abandonment of our youth and its failure to provide adequate support for their education and training or meaningful employment and job opportunities, both temporary and permanent.
Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Resuming debate. The Hon. Member for Montreal-Sainte-Marie (Mr. Malepart).


Jean-Claude Malépart: Mr. Speaker, I welcome this opportunity to speak to the motion on Canadian youth presented by my colleague, and I would like to read the motion now:
That this House condemns the Government for its abandonment of our youth and its failure to provide adequate support for their education and training or meaningful employment and job opportunities, both temporary and permanent.
Mr. Speaker, I think I share the opinion of the three previous speakers, including the Member who spoke for the Liberal Party, the Member who spoke for the NDP and the Minister from the Conservative front bench. It is unfortunately true that the subject of youth is not discussed often enough in the House of Commons.
The Minister mentioned that he had expected some questions, but 1 would like to say to the Minister that if no questions are being asked about the particular portfolio for which he is responsible, and I may remind him that the Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney) appointed him to defend the interests of youth, it is up to him to raise the issue.
When a Minister says in the House that he is not getting any questions, instead of blaming the Opposition ... I mean, Opposition Members don't blame others for the fact that they don't ask any questions! Perhaps the Minister should look closer to home and ask himself whether enough is being done for people to sit up and take notice and show an interest in the issues.
Since 1984, I have had a chance to get more involved in issues concerning senior citizens. I would like to remind the Minister, and this is not meant as criticism, of the title, position, salary, and all the benefits involved. He was not appointed to defend free trade. He was not appointed to organize the conference on the Constitution. He was appointed to deal with youth issues on a daily basis. I think that is important, and I speak from my experience with senior citizens. Since the de-indexation of Old Age Security pensions, there has been considerable organizing among this group, and they have managed, in various ways, to force the House of Commons and the various legislatures to address the needs and

May 7, 1987
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concerns of the elderly, an approach that has been taken very effectively by our farmers, chambers of commerce, business, small businesses, multinationals and the trade unions.
We simply must-and I deplore that it is the case in this Parliament or the previous Parliament, under the Conservatives, the Liberals, the New Democrats, it does not matter- admit that in the provincial Parliaments as well, regardless of the fact that the NDP, the PQ or the Liberals may have been in office, the sad fact is that the Elouse of Commons or the legislative assemblies devote precious little time to youths and do not show enough concern for them.
Perhaps the explanation lies in the fact that everyone is young, but at one time or another all of us are in transition from youth to middle age and beyond. This may be why I never fail to recall that when the Lion. Member for Shefford (Mr. Lapierre) was appointed he was then the youngest Minister ever, and the same thing can be said about the new Member for Sherbrooke (Mr. Charest) when he was appointed Minister of State for Youth. Next year it will be someone still younger, a never-ending process which makes us suspect that in every Parliament it is always more of the same. Someone will point out that, because it is expected of him or her, an opposition Member is going to rise and move a motion blaming the Government for failing to show concern for young people. The benches are still in the same place, only individual Members have switched sides, and history repeats itself.
I suggest that Hon. Members deserve a word of praise for keeping the debate on a non-partisan basis so far. I would like to tell the Minister that on the basis of statistical data, we could certainly congratulate one another and brag about all the young Canadians who have jobs and all our promising young executives, lawyers and professionals generally. In life, no matter the colour of the Government of the day, there are always young people who function well and progress in their careers; the fact that Parliament is filled with people who were young once and that businesses are managed by administrators who were young once is proof of that.
I suggest there have always been young people who succeed, others who experience difficulties, and still others who fail miserably.
I would like to tell the Minister that it is not a matter of paternalistic attitude. I must admit that there are people who helped me when I was young and I am most grateful to them. I realize now that they might have been somewhat paternalistic in their attitude, but with hindsight, I realize that what they were doing for me was vital. I suggest that the Minister of State for Youth (Mr. Charest), our colleagues in the House of Common and all responsible people should play a vigilant and active role in this regard.
The Minister has listed and identified a series of problems. I think that, since September 4, 1984, the Government can be held partly to blame. We have had two Ministers, including one who was a complete failure and who was demoted. The new Minister took over this portfolio under difficult circumstances. The Ministry was moved from under the jurisdiction
of the Secretary of State (Mr. Crombie) to that of the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Bouchard). All these structural changes clearly show again that, while the Government might claim that young people are a great asset, it does not know what to do with them.
The Government does not know under whom the Minister of State should come. Within two and a half years, he has been moved from one Department to another.
What matters is not under whose jurisdiction the Minister of State (Youth) should be, or which seat he should occupy in the House, but to have a person who has at heart the interests of young people and who is aware that his or her task is not going to be easy. The same applies to the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Epp) and the Minister of State for the Status of Women. These portfolios are not easy, so that the individuals who accept these responsibilities must work very hard every day, to increase the awareness of their colleagues who are responsible for promoting the interests of other groups in our society. You have the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Wise), whose first responsibility at the Cabinet table is to make representations that are genuine representations made by farmers, that are meeting real needs. And the Minister of State (Youth) must ensure that in the course of each discussion, each budget preparation, each Throne Speech, each move, each legislation, youth priorities are included. He cannot rely on his other colleagues. Not because of a lack of competence or whatever, but simply because each one of them has his own responsibilities and youth must be defended, they must be defended more strenuously because of a tendency to forget them.
And when I refer to a tendency to forget, it is true that as the Minister suggests there may be a tendency to refer to them in the course of speeches, but in reality, in actual moves, they become less apparent in terms of action.
The Minister mentioned he identified the problem following studies that were commissioned. They have come to identify that the problem is caused by young people leaving school, the lack of education-the so-called school drop-outs.
I have a feeling they could have recognized that problem during their first year, because it is not new. Everyone knew about it. What people and I would like to hear-and I hope, I even am convinced the Minister will rise to tell us-is what concrete actions are taken. Not free trade that can create more jobs for more people and more people will have jobs, like Hygrade sausages. The more people eat them, the fresher they are, and the fresher they are, the more people eat them. What we want is specific concerns for that age group, the young in need.
Right now, when you look at newspaper reports, after those studies, half of the young transients attempted to commit suicide. This is serious. Even if they can boast of figures, 1,000 more jobs than last year were created, when we look at those headlines, the wording, the situations, there is no reason to be proud and it is dishonest to rejoice over achievements when there are still people in difficult situations.
May 7, 1987

According to an article on a study being carried out by the department of lowertown community health, thousands of young people, to survive, are involved in drug testing. In order to earn additional income, they agree to serve as guinea pigs for drug manufacturing companies. Confronted with such evidence, Mr. Speaker, in spite of the statistical data with which the Minister tried to impress me, this being the International Year of Migrants, there being 10 thousand migrants in the Greater Montreal area, most of them under 30 years of age, and a great many young people quitting school a few years before getting their diploma, I can understand why, today, instead of speaking to us, the Minister would rather travel around Canada. Yet, so that we may repeat it to the young people of our ridings, I would like the Minister to say: Have hope, for the Government is going to take such and such action. When I raise this issue, the Minister could reply: Challenge '87 or Challenge '86 were a continuation of what Liberals have done. They take a program, leave out the word "Summer", replace it with another, add three of four commas, and change the means of implementation, but the problem remains the same: It is the same scenario, only the package is different.
I think the time has come for the Minister to stop making speeches, recognize at last the need to help young Canadians and explain how the budgetary envelope which was earmarked for them will be spent. It is a fact that... I, for one, would fight the federal Government if it wanted to go over the heads of Quebec and the other provinces to impose an education or labour training program; I would stand up in the House to fight a Government which would attempt that, whatever its political stripe. But in order to convince the provinces to invest more to help these young people continue their education instead of giving up and joining the labour force, the federal Government, rather than making cuts in the equalization payments, should make money available to the provinces, to Quebec, to Alberta, to Vancouver, and say: Here is the situation. Now, we have a possible solution to remedy this situation and give an even chance to all young Canadians. We are going to put up the money and work together to try to help not only our young people of today, but those of tomorrow. It is possible that seven or more years ago, the Minister benefited from government-sponsored Summer Employment Programs. Which means, therefore, that what we do for our young people of today maybe useful again tomorrow, or five or 10 years down the line.
There is another aspect which I would like the Minister to ponder. Why do young people quit school so early? In my own working-class riding which includes a poor neighbourhood, it is often because their families are short of money. With respect to certain programs, I know that young people attending school cannot help but notice that some of their classmates come from families which are fairly well-to-do and whose parents can afford to spend a few extra dollars on clothes for their children, or others who are more on the ball and happen
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to know somebody who will give them part-time jobs so they can afford to go out now and then. These young people know that their parents cannot even give them pocket money. A family on social welfare is a good example. When somebody at school decides to organize a summer camp and proposes to charge $25 or $50 per child, well the two- or three-child family on social welfare finds itself in a rather ackward situation. Think in terms of a young boy or girl aged 16 or 17 who has to tell the teacher: I cannot go because my mother said we have no money.
So instead of telling the truth-indeed truth is hard to tell sometimes-they will come up with every kind of excuses and say: Well, I am not interested, it is not worthwhile. After a while you realize that you cannot keep up with the others, so you just stay away from them. Any secondary school student having a hard time keeping up with his schoolmates because his parents do not have enough money to help him will certainly not be very enthusiastic about enrolling in a junior college. He knows that his parents can barely afford to help him pay for a summer camp or a ski excursion in winter, so he does not expect them to pay his tuition fees and send him to university.
These young people too want to enjoy life a little, so they look around and simply decide to find a job. They hear about a place where help is needed, $4 an hour, minimum wages of course, but $4 an hour or a minimum wage of $200 a week is better than nothing at all. This is how some young people join the labour force, and after a while they lose any ambition to go back to school. Unfortunately we see that every day.
There is another problem which I would like the Minister to monitor very closely. The day before yesterday there was a coalition against discrimination concerning the provincial age limits with respect to social assistance. I think the Minister of State for Youth has a role to play. He knows that in Quebec, although a Liberal administration is now in office, this system was set up under the PQ Government. Young people in Quebec who are on social welfare get $200 less than a 31-years old. The reason why in Quebec right now, and in other provinces for that matter-and I hope the Minister will take upon himself at the next Cabinet meeting the mandate to ask the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Epp) to convene his provincial Governments and ask them to eliminate discrimination against the young. Let us look at the impact on a young man or girl who now gets $196 a month-$196 a month! Is there someone here or who is following this debate who can pay rent, buy clothing, buy food with $196 a month? No. But this is what we force them to do. This is what we are telling them, to do.
What is there for them to do?
Prostitution, and it is not for nothing that the Lafontaine Park area is full of young boy and girl prostitutes. Then there is theft. And drugs. And from there, in order to correct all those errors we are making or letting commit now, to solve them they will suggest: Good, let us impose capital punishment

May 7, 1987
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because that cannot go on, we will try and scare them. Not so! That is not the solution to help them, and we must start right now. I dare hope the Minister will say whether he intends to speak to his colleague, the Minister of National Health and Welfare, and ask him to convene the provincial Ministers in charge, including the Quebec Minister, and say: The Canadian Government is paying for 50 per cent of social assistance. But we would like or wish that discrimination to stop. Could you, within a short period of time, amend that so that there is no discrimination against the young, both in Quebec and other provinces that behave the same way.
I would also like the Minister to tell us what are the specific means of action. And I was somewhat expecting today, in view of the debate, that he would take this opportunity to say: Here, the Government would have liked to do something, but in view of the weakness of the previous Minister of State for Youth, and in view of the fact that I am just getting involved with my new responsibilities, which has taken some time, the problems have now been identified. This we know, that we know. Here is what a Government can do, in co-operation with provinces and with municipalities, and I invite opposition Parties to help us, to support us as fast as possible. First, in the short term this measure would be implemented as a way of saying that the No. 1 problem for the vast majority of young people is not employment creation, but training. The solution is in training, and that is where I would put the money . . . Training does not necessarily mean going back to school, because in many cases, young people who dropped out of ninth or tenth grade, even if you gave them the money-Mr. Chairman, I still have two minutes to go-even if you gave them the money, they would not want to go back to school, they dropped out for some good reason. There is a percentage of drop-outs, and I do not think that there is just one solution to bring about a fair and true answer to that problem. Those solutions include providing the necessary funds not only for those who want to go back to school, but also for those who would like to get on-the-job training, especially young people, and to provide funds that would help businesses provide them with that kind of training not just for six months, but for a longer period. The federal or provincial Government, or the federal Governement in cooperation with provincial Governments, would assume a 50 per cent share of the training expenses, but the company would make a commitment to keep that young man or young woman for a year, a year and a half or two years.
These are four or five solutions. What I would like the Minister to tell us now, however, is how we should deal with the problem of our young people. When I talk about the problem of young people, I am not talking about all the young people of Canada. It may be that three-quarters of them do not have any problem. They do not need us, and that is good for them. But our role is not to make legislations that will complicate matters for them. We should in fact make sure that every young man and every young woman in Canada can have the same opportunities as we had, the same opportunities to
succeed in life, not in the way that we think is better, but in the way that they would like to choose.
In this respect, we all know that in this time and age, and in former times, many young people managed just by themselves, and get along without any problem. Some of them could rely on their father, and they had no need of anyone else, because their daddy could give them everything they needed. For others, things were different. Governments must provide alternatives and some form of incentive or encouragement to those who need it most; if someone does not need any help, so much the better.
Mr. Speaker, my time is running out. I would like to conclude by congratulating my colleague for bringing up that subject. However, I cannot extend such congratulations to the Minister because I would have liked him to say: "Well! We are going to announce such and such a solution by such a date." I can tell the Minister that, even if Opposition Members don't ask him any questions, he can initiate a debate if he has anything interesting to say, he can introduce programs, he can table corrective Bills. He does not have to wait to be prodded by us. I hope that in his comments or questions we will have precise answers for the good of our young people.
Mir. Charest: Mr. Speaker, first of all, my compliments to the Hon. Member from Montreal-Sainte-Marie (Mr. Malepart). He tends to be quite forthright in his comments here in the House, but from the tone of today's debate you would think there must be something in the air, since Members have been so moderate in their comments compared with what we have come to expect. I must say I am very pleased.
I would first like to say a few words about the Ministry of State for Youth to put the creation of this ministry into perspective.
The ministry was created on very short notice in January 1984, at a time when youth unemployment was particularly high following the recession.
The Minister's mandate was two fold. It included speaking for youth in Cabinet, although I don't think the Minister was alone in addressing this particular subject.
The second part of the Minister's mandate consisted in coordinating the federal Government's activities directed toward youth. A ministry of state tends to represent a particular sector of the economy or a particular group within our society. We have, for instance, the Ministry of State (Forestry) and the Ministry of State for Mining. There is the Ministry of State for Status of Women and the Ministry of State for Youth. A Ministry of State is by definition attached to a senior department, and in this case, it was, I believe, the Department of the Secretary of State, or at least initially. During International Youth Year, a special fund containing $20 million was created and the money distributed over a period of 18 months across Canada, and that was as it should be. After International Youth Year, this temporary program was terminated, as expected, and people were left with the impression, and some wanted to give that impression deliberately, that the ministry
May 7, 1987

had become an empty shell. The fact is, Mr. Speaker, that the Ministry of State for Youth still has the same function. It has always been a ministry of state and it always will, and I have never heard the NDP or the federal Liberals say that we intended to make the Ministry of State (Youth) into something else. If I am mistaken, I wish they would say so today, and I think Canadians should know.
That being said, in the spring of 1986, the Ministry of State for Youth was transferred to the Department of Employment and Immigration, making available all the resources we find within this major department with more than 27,000 employees. My responsibilities include, for instance, the Student Summer Employment Program. I am also responsible for reviewing occupational training programs with the provinces, all of which involves a budget of $145 million annually. So the Ministry of State for Youth has specific responsibilities.
On another subject, Mr. Speaker, I may recall the basic principles that apply to youth employment, and I am referring to labour market conditions and how these affect young workers. The first principle is, that when conditions on the labour market are good and the economy is in good shape, young people have jobs. When the economy declines or is in bad shape, young people are the first to be out of a job, and when the economy recovers, they are the last to be called back. The answer is therefore that if we want young people to be able to enter the labour market, the economy must be in good shape. And I think all Canadians will agree that this Government has been able to deliver the goods in this respect. More than any other group in society, youth is particularly sensitive to the state of the economy, and it is therefore extremely important to allow for this factor.
Second, in 1985 the Government introduced its job strategy which is a tremendous step forward in the way we tend to treat young people, in fact all Canadians, on the labour market.
The job strategy has three fundamental objectives, at least I consider them to be fundamental. First, the emphasis is on training, which has not always been the case in previous programs.
Second, we feel that job creation should be the result of a partnership approach. We must seek other partners if we want to create permanent jobs in our society, and that is why we have also involved the private sector in some of our programs, since after all, most jobs are created in the private sector. However, if we want to go further than that, we have to explain to the private sector that it should include a training element within the job environment, if we want Canada to remain competitive in the years to come.
Third, the job strategy focuses on the long-term unemployed, in recognition of the fact that the problems are greater in this group.
What we must understand today. . . When we were planning our strategies, as I mentioned earlier, we looked at what was happening in Canada. The Hon. Member from Montreal-Sainte-Marie said:	Job creation is another
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problem. He is right, in that job creation was foremost in our minds when we decided to go ahead with our trade policy. Our reasoning was as follows: Canada is a country that exports and will create its wealth on the basis of the opportunities it has to do business on international markets. That is why we have embarked on negotiations with the Americans, and we are pursuing our initiative within the GATT system. That is how we see the situation. And having made that choice, we have to develop technologies to maintain our position on international markets. Third, we must develop labour market policies.
In 1987, the difference is that in Canada today, despite the present unemployment rate, we have jobs that cannot be filled because there are no qualified workers to fill them. All young people who will join the labour market in the coming years will need at least such analytic abilities and training as will enable them to remain in the labour force and change jobs-for indeed they will be expected to change jobs-and unless they do have such abilities the labour market will be closed to them, or they will simply have to accept unchallenging work.
The ultimate outcome of all this could very well be that many young people will be facing this kind of situation: employment opportunities might open up for them, but even then they would not be qualified simply because they lack the necessary basic training.
You referred to your generation or our generation and you say: We want the same opportunities. Indeed it is important to keep that in mind and make people understand that anyone belonging to the preceeding generations of the 1950s could quit school without a diploma and, in most cases, land a job in a country where, as a result of World War II, the economic growth was practically limitless until the 1970s. But the situation has changed drastically since then and today we have to come to grips with the new reality.
All such issues being considered, Mr. Speaker, we have to seek new approaches. The initial step has been taken: first identify the youth problem, which is the transition from school benches to labour market. That is the most urgent problem for this Government. Hopefully you will join us within the consensus we now see emerging in Canada. If that is the case, I would like him to say so clearly. This being said, we then turn back to the provinces and tell them: The education system should be enlarged, should be developped to provide more options.
Thirdly, young people should be encouraged to remain within the system, and in that respect, it might prove necessary to harmonize social policies which make it too tempting in some cases for young people to quit, to drop out. If it is too easy for young people to drop out of school and find themselves in a situation where they will somehow manage to survive, we may sometimes be doing them a disservice. However, we should not create a situation- 1 know I am taking too much time.

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Here again, we should not create a situation whereby when they drop out of school, we may not have done everything we could to keep them within the system.


Jean-Claude Malépart: Mr. Speaker, I wish to reply to the Minister. I would have liked him to stop to talk about the social situation. The PQ has indeed attempted, as the Minister just said, to create a social situation that would no longer encourage young people to drop out of school. So they decided to make cuts and to increase poverty. I feel the Minister should instead try to improve the situation and to make things better, while the socialist system system cuts off the heads, starts at the top and brings everything down to the bottom. I feel that we should have positive measures instead to keep young people at school rather than making cuts and hurting people who drop out.
In any case, the Minister has not provided us with the concrete answers I was expecting, as I think that we all agree that in terms of manpower training, we should allow young people to spend as much time as possible getting an education and a specialized training. However, the whole process depends entirely on the amounts that the federal Government is willing to give to the provinces. Suppose you give me a three million dollar budget for my constituency-and this morning, you were boasting about publishing your guide for youth, but I have brought mine which I published four years ago, the Guide des services aux jeunes, the Guide de recherche en emploi, Comment faire le Bureau d'action-jeunesse. So if you give me a three million dollar budget for my constituency, and if there are funds in every constituency to make sure that young people get more education, get more money, more specialized training, more training, we are going to solve part of the problems. However, we should also be concerned with employment creation, because it is not good enough to train those young people. We get young people with plenty of diplomas. So what we may have is just the opposite: Do we take him? He has a degree, but no experience. So he goes back to school, graduates in another field, and files another application. Sorry, you have no experience. So he sits for another degree! So now he is full of degrees up to here, and he is still unemployed, and so he comes to apply for a job. "My dear Sir, you have too many degrees, you know, you deserve more than this". But the guy has nothing, he is on welfare. There are lawyers on welfare, engineers, architects. And there are people in between. Because now, if you go full speed, they are being trained and trained, everyone wants to be overtrained. But the guy will say: I don't hire you, you are much too over-trained, you would steal my job away from me, you would become the boss. You are more qualified than I am. This way everyone will displace Members in this House.
But again, all that is intentions. We know what the problems are. But my view is that what is needed to solve those problems is money.
Unfortunately, this is what I would have liked the Minister to say. I would have liked him to tell us that his Government, apart from speeches, starting from next week, will double education funding, will give provinces, especially for manpower training, a special envelope for high-school dropouts. Well, if we injected the $20 million, and it is my feeling that that would not be too much, $20 million across the land for each province that wants to have a special program for youth to go back, either to school or the work place, specialisation, manpower training, well, I think we would all say hear, hear! We would pass that the same day, in half an hour. It would be a giant step, and we would bring the Senators here so that everything happened right away and everyone would be happy and would go and announce the good news in the constituencies. We would go and check, and we would go and shake the Minister's hand.
But what we have is more speeches, Mr. Speaker, and I would have liked and I dare hope that the Minister will not wait until an opposition Member blames the Government. It is my hope there will be a debate on youth for the reason that the Minister will bring in a policy that we will all be proud to announce and to hail.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I see the Hon. Minister would like to answer. Is there unanimous consent to allow the Minister to do so, and then recognize the Hon. Member for Montreal- Sainte-Marie in conclusion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Jean J. Charest: Mr. Speaker, I would simply like to give my colleague for Montreal-Sainte-Marie an opportunity to make a real contribution to the debate today, a contribution that could allow him today, that will allow me, as a Minister, and the whole Government to advance the matter and the debate- to tell us clearly today-whether he agrees with us that the most important problem that must be addressed by young Canadians is the transition between school and the labour market, especially for those who drop out of high school, and whether his party is ready to support that-


Jean-Claude Malépart: Mr. Speaker, in terms of co-operation, identifying the problem, my party will support someone who says there is a problem. Certainly it is transition. There are those who, because they are over-trained, have difficulty being hired for other jobs. In the case of other people, it is because they left too young, and still others because of lack of work experience. We agree, and my Party will be ready to support the Minister if he tables a Bill providing for $20 million funding. I said so and I repeat it, my party will support you within that same day, and if ever there is a Member who opposes, we will arrange it so it moves through. Don't worry about that. But the important thing is not identifying the problems, everyone knows the problems in Canada, this is what the people are fed up with. Everyone says: Agreed, there is such and such a problem. People say: "Is there anyone who is a "doer" and will propose solutions?" When voters put an X
May 7, 1987

beside your name or mine, it is because they think: "He is the one who will solve the problems." However, I have a feeling that some of them might not put an X beside your name next time, because you are not solving the problems. They will select someone else.
You are a lawyer. If a client comes to you and then you go back to him and say: "Do you think I should do this or that," I suspect the client will say: "If you don't know what to do, I'll get myself another lawyer."
The Minister has the job. He gets $40,000 more than I do plus a limousine to do that job. If he needs help, I can provide some, I know how to drive. Senior citizens know he is responsible, and so do those who take early retirement.
Speaking of early retirement, if he wants to help young people he should encourage that, because when a company agrees to retire some employees earlier it does not fire younger people.
So, he should try to influence his senior Minister. He should tell him: "Take it easy, don't go after early retirement too much, because it is my young people you are hurting."



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 66, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the Hon. Member for Ottawa-Vanier (Mr. Gauthier)-Royal Canadian Mounted Police-Tests for admission and selection of personnel-Government position, b) Official languages- Request that Solicitor General present report; the Hon. Member for Don Valley East (Mr. Attewell)-Canada Post Corporation-Delays in mail delivery; the Hon. Member for Capilano (Mrs. Collins)-Children-Program to combat sexual abuse.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Rompkey:
That this House condemns the Government for its abandonment of our youth and its failure to provide adequate support for their education and training or meaningful employment and job opportunities, both temporary and permanent.
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Mr. Lawrence I. O'Neil (Cape Breton Highlands-Canso):: Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise today to speak on this motion and to put forward the very impressive gains which the Government has made in addressing the needs of young Canadians. I must congratulate the Minister of State for Youth (Mr. Charest) for the job he is doing with this portfolio. Not only by virtue of his age does he have an acute understanding of the problems faced by young Canadians, but also by his own experience.
When speaking of the problems of young Canadians we too frequently tend to isolate them as specific to that group. In doing so we do a disservice to young Canadians because we proceed on a false assumption to adjust their problems. Are the problems faced by a 21-year old unemployed single Canadian that much different than those of a 31-year old single unemployed Canadian or a 41-year old single unemployed Canadian? I think that in some ways the situation of the 21-year old may be far more advantageous because with the passage of time an older worker's ability to gain a job is impaired. My point is simply that, as the Minister has stated, the problems of youth must be addressed within the total economic context of the management of the country.
When we speak of the need for responsible management of Canada's resources, full development of opportunities, and exploitation of our resources we are talking about increasing the wealth and Gross Domestic Product of the country. When we speak of the need for increased and enhanced trade with other countries we are talking about the need to contribute to this country's wealth and the need to create employment for older and younger Canadians. We are talking about increased employment opportunities generally.
Those who refuse to acknowledge that economic policies of general application do not have specific rewards for this sector of our society are incorrect. When a young person grows up in a family in which one or both parents are unemployed, the lack of stable employment, a good income, and opportunity for the parents results in less advantageous social and economic circumstances. That affects the ability of a young Canadian, upon reaching the age of 18 or 20, to make decisions to take full advantage of the opportunities presented to him.
The confidence of such a young Canadian is adversely affected. There can be no doubt about that. Psychologists have done a number of studies which clearly confirm that the socioeconomic circumstances in which young people grow up affect their level of ambition, the level of education ultimately achieved, and their aspirations.
When we speak of the national deficit we are not talking of something which is of no particular relevance to young Canadians. As the deficit grows the Government's ability to respond to the special needs of young Canadians decreases. Of that there can be no question. In order to implement specific programs for any group within our society we must have the resources to do so.

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With one-quarter of the national Budget going to pay interest on the national debt, we do not have the ability to make the type of response which I am sure all Members want. The Government is making progress in the reduction of the deficit, which is not of recent origin. Nevertheless, in our efforts to address the problems of young Canadians we are moving aggressively to free up resources in order to be able to increase opportunities for young Canadians.
Similarly, when we speak of interest rates we are talking about improving the general economic performance in the country. It is with a stronger and more vibrant economy that young Canadians will find their niche, their opportunities, and the chance to make their own opportunities.
The general economic performance in the country is far better today than it was several years ago. There is no argument about the problem and the need to respond to it. The Government is doing something about it. There can be no serious argument on that either.
Some will say that statistics can be used in a thousand ways. Perhaps that is true, but today I will cite some statistics which clearly measure the success of our initiatives. Since the recession the average unemployment rate for young Canadians has dropped from 19.9 per cent in 1983 to 14.8 per cent in March, 1987. That is an improved situation for thousands and thousands of young Canadians. The decrease in the unemployment rate was possible because of the improved economic and management policies of the Government.
The Government has given young Canadians the opportunity to finance their educations, to put some money in the bank, and perhaps to initiate a business enterprise. We are contributing to their personal development and their level of self-confidence. Youth participation is increasing rapidly as a result.
There are three more young people per 100 in the labour market now than there were in 1982. The situation for students has also improved. In the summer of 1986, 906,000 students were employed compared to 840,000 in 1985 and
715,000	in 1982. The unemployment rate has dropped accordingly. The situation for in-school youth is particularly good. Since January 1985, the employment of in-school youth has increased by 107,000 which indicates that more students both desire employment while in school and successfully obtain it.
A wide range of programs has been implemented under the very able direction of the Minister of State for Youth. Challenge '87 is a sensible program which gives young Canadians the opportunity to gain training while they work during the summer. Not only do they get money in their pocket, they get experience. If anything has been made clear as a result of the changing labour market it is that people who wish to continue to work must be prepared to upgrade and change their skills in order to respond to the changing market needs.
The Government has placed Canada employment centres for students on campuses. On May 15 I had the pleasure of opening two such centres, one in Antigonish and one in Port Hawkesbury in my riding. Through discussions with counsellors in previous years I have learned that these centres are an invaluable contribution to assisting young Canadians find employment. We also have a co-op educational program, which combines theory with practical training aimed at the initiation of students into the world of work. That is a total commitment of close to $5 million.
To address the particular situation of native students, let me say that we have the Native Internship Program at the secondary and post-secondary levels with a total financial commitment in the area of $2.3 million. These are but some of the programs in place responding to the specific needs of young Canadians. There is also the Job Entry program which was brought in as part of the Canadian Job-Strategy program. I can tell you, Mr. Speaker, from personal experience that that has resulted in considerable human benefit to my riding.
Many of my constituents have been out of work for a number of years after completion of their formal education. They are now at the point where for a number of reasons they cannot gain employment. The longer they are out of the workforce, the more difficult it is to gain employment. Our Government responded by implementing the Job Entry Program.
As part of that program, people who fall within this group are given training and counselling which included life skills. We take a person who may be demoralized and suffering from a lack of confidence, who knows very little about searching for employment, and we ask that person to participate in a program, for which he or she receives funding, whereby these weaknesses can be addressed for a period of months. As a result of this program there are people in my riding who have found employment. But for this program they would not have had that opportunity.
There are some very sensible and specialized programs to address the needs of young Canadians. The funding for the Challenge '87 program, which is a student employment program, approaches $200 million in 1987 despite the fact that our Government is suffering from rather severe financial pressure. I might add with some satisfaction that the resources under this program have been managed this year to reflect the needs of the regions of this country, the higher unemployment regions, where there is a greater need for this kind of funding. In some parts of southern Ontario, students can gain summer employment without the assistance of a program like this. In a riding such as mine, the incentives provided under the Challenge '87 program are a critically important part of the summer employment program. I congratulate the Minister for ensuring that the program is sensitive to the regional economies.
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That is, of course, in keeping with the total Government commitment to enhance opportunities in Canada's regions. Some people say that the Government is totally committed to private sector funding on some theological, philosophical or ideological basis. Nothing could be further from the truth. We look at our partnership with the private sector very pragmatically. It is viewed as the means to achieve the most impressive results for young Canadians. We look at the private sector, and the partnership with it, as an opportunity to create two jobs instead of one. There is nothing ideological about it. It is our experience and our conclusion that the private sector must be involved if we are to maximize the benefits which can accrue to young Canadians.
All of this is taking place within the context of a national reconciliation and ongoing consultation with the responsible provincial Ministers. As all Hon. Members know, we have a situation in this country today where federal-provincial cooperation is far more positive than it has been in recent years. Of course, the recent Constitutional Accord of April 30 is clear evidence of what is possible within a confederation when we have a positive relationship among the Governments which make up that partnership. This kind of co-operation extends to all facets of governing and the winners are all Canadians.
When it comes to designing training programs that cooperation is essential. The federal Government wants and requires the assistance and advice of the provincial Governments. Often they know the labour market situation in their own province better than the federal Government. We want to bring together that expertise. We want the provinces to put in a share of the financial resources which are required. We want them to participate in the decision-making process. All will benefit as a result of this.
What about the students at university? We hear so much about the difficulty experienced by recent graduates in finding employment. That highlights the need for a greater emphasis on training. It is no longer good enough to go to university and receive a Bachelor of Arts degree. Students must be trained as well as educated. As I said earlier, one must be prepared to go through a number of changes in one's training. Training is something which is not restricted to only those in their twenties. Training is something which all of us must be open to consider if we wish to continue to participate in an ongoing way.
There are problems we face in terms of financial management of a country, for example, low interest rates, and there are tremendous problems faced by young Canadians. As our Government moves on its path to economic revitalization, it is moving to address the needs of Canada generally and, within this context, the needs of young Canadians. We cannot separate the special needs of young Canadians. A new plant in my riding will hire someone 20 years old, 30 years old or 40 years old. If a plant is put in a riding such as mine, the unemployment problems of. all Canadians will be addressed. Let us give an opportunity to young Canadians to go to work and they will solve a lot of the other problems for themselves.
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We must give them the opportunity to be self-supporting and to find their own way in our society.
In closing, I would once again like to congratulate the Minister of State for Youth for the exemplary contribution he is making as a member of the Government. In his travels across the country I am sure he has developed a tremendous rapport with young Canadians.


John Edmund Parry: Mr. Speaker, I am glad also to have the opportunity to address this Opposition day motion today. This motion talks of the Government's failure to provide adequate support for the education and learning and for meaningful employment and job opportunities, temporary and permanent, for the youth of today's Canada. In examining that question it would be wise to look first at the over-all situation of the youth of today's Canada.
They are in a position, shall we say, of following and following fairly closely, what futurist John Kettle calls the big generation, the post-war baby boom generation as it is also known. Therefore, they are in a situation quite unlike that of any other generation in history except, of course, in societies or areas devastated by war, disease or famine, in that they are outnumbered by their elders.
This leads, and has led, to some very unfortunate effects in all dimensions of social and economic participation by the young people of today's Canada, the people who we might loosely take as being in that age range from teen-age to the late twenties. Of course, these problems come at a time when problems strike the young person very hard, when lessons are learned, not necessarily either consciously or deliberately, but when the formative years of that person's adult life are being experienced.
I recall how, as one of the leading edge of the baby boom of post-war Britain, I went into a workforce that was not prepared for the massive influx that it was experiencing. Because of that sort of transition I myself experienced unemployment on more than one occasion for periods of some months. I can think back to how devastating that was in my experience. I wonder how it must be for someone today, looking at a situation in which they are not only unemployed but in which they cannot take any comfort from the thought that it is in some way inevitable that they will eventually gain employment, which was a notion I could take some comfort in simply by looking at the statistics. However, the statistics today are far worse. They are statistics to which the Government should pay some attention and with respect to which the Government should offer some remedies.
The situation that we have today, and I will go into more detail in a moment, regarding the unemployment of young people is pretty steep. The odds against the unemployed person getting that first job are high. Those who do so are fortunate and those who lose that first job often have difficulty in getting a second. Today, young people are also subjected to remedies,

May 7, 1987
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to nostrums and to platitudes. It is in that context that I would particularly like to take exception to the remarks of the Minister.
I have the feeling that if the Minister really felt that he had a good word to spread, some good news to proclaim, then we would have had a lot more in terms of facts and figures and a lot less philosophy and examination of ideologies than we in fact heard from the Minister. While it is indeed a platitude that the youth of today's Canada are the future of Canada, nevertheless it is an idea that if we were ever to lose grasp of it, if we were ever to let go of it, we would be taking a very serious step in the wrong direction. 1 feel that it is inappropriate for the Minister to devote so much time and effort to condemning what he sees as platitudes. We acknowledge that they are platitudes, but God forbid that we should ever lose sight of the idea and of the priority which they encapsulate.
The youth of today's Canada are subjected to psychological pressures other than those I have mentioned. There shortcomings are being endlessly identified. They are, after all, treated by the media in the same manner as aircraft-we only hear about the ones that crash. Very few are offering them alternatives or, indeed, even offering to discuss the alternatives that the youth of today may see.
Unemployment among young people in Canada today is endemic. There are approximately 4.5 million Canadians between the ages of 15 and 24. Approximately 500,000 of those fall into the category of unemployed. That does not include some 20,000 or 30,000 who have stopped looking for work or the estimated 180,000 underemployed.
The Hon. Member for Cape Breton Highlands-Canso (Mr. O'Neil) suggested that the Government should take some credit for the reduction in the official, and I stress the word "official", youth unemployment figures from, I believe it was, 19.7 per cent to 14.3 per cent. However, the very preposition that he used in instancing those figures illustrates the falseness of their use as a claim for credit since, as he said, coming out of the recession-and those are the facts-we naturally expect that unemployment will fall. Unemployment has fallen over-all in Canada. It has certainly not fallen more for youth in percentage terms than it has for the over-all labour force. So, frankly, for the Government to make any claim of credit for a fall in youth unemployment is an illusion that would be even more dangerous if it really believed it.
The topic of discouraged youth is one which is of course very difficult to get a handle on, very difficult to get a grasp of; but there is a belief that there are large numbers of young people who are simply not reporting, in labour force terms. These are young people who have gone back to school or who have taken some other course of training or education, which they do not really have a commitment to, simply because they know that the prospects of getting a job are so poor.
I believe that if we were to add up those youth who are unemployed, underemployed, discouraged or, shall we say, misemployed, we might well find that one-third of Canada's
youth fall into that category. Yet what has the Government done? I am afraid that the answer is, precious little. To illustrate my point I will use some examples.
The Katimavik program was eliminated in February, 1986, and there has been nothing to replace it in the intervening 15 months. Some $1.5 billion was lost between 1986 and 1991 for post-secondary education. The budget of the Youth Ministry was eliminated. The funds for International Youth Year were also eliminated and no new funds were allocated for follow-up work. In terms of Challenge '87, some $30 million were set aside, in the sort of shell game that one cannot even run on the street any more, for the census, and the private sector orientation which, unfortunately, has led in many cases to employers simply covering with government dollars the training or additional hiring that they would have done from their own resources were the funds not available. Finally, the Canadian Jobs Strategy has been cut from $2.1 billion to $1.5 billion. The Canadian Jobs Strategy represents the investment that the country is making in terms of job development. It is an investment which, to a large degree, naturally, goes toward young people.
When we take into account the effects of inflation, we have seen the Government spend $3 on job creation for every $5 that was spent in 1984. That is not the sort of record that reflects credit. That is not the sort of record that will provide a hopeful future for today's youth.
We know-indeed it was raised in the House only yesterday-that young Canadians are discriminated against by the welfare systems in a number of provinces. Yet the Department of National Health and Welfare continues to pass funds on under the Canada Assistance Plan.
A statistic revealed just today is very telling in terms of the closing in, the shutting down, of opportunities for young Canadians. The following is a quote from a communique of the Public Service Commission of Canada dated with yesterday's date. It states:
The number of appointments of persons 24 years of age and younger decreased
from 1,836 in 1985 to 1,497.
That is a 20 per cent reduction in one year. Further on it
states:
The Public Service Commission considers this to be an area of significant
concern and is taking a hard look at its recruitment programs for qualified
young Canadians.
That is the picture we are getting in terms of federal government employment.
Katimavik is still unreplaced and the Challenge program is not upgraded to counteract the result of inflation, and indeed has been cut back during the Government's mandate.
Finally, to add insult to injury, there is the Hot-100 as it is called, "A quick guide to what the feds are doing for you". It could as well have been entitled "The federal program-Rag bag" because these programs are presented with absolutely no
May 7, 1987

attempt to target the audience or identify what programs might be relevant for an individual's requirements.
Let me give an example of how the programs are grouped. Listed in the Hot-100 is on-board service training with VIA Rail, as well as post-graduate education travelling programs to the People's Republic of China. That level of consistency typifies the efforts of the Government and the ministry.
If the objective had really been to produce publications and information systems that were useful to the youth of this country, the Government would have done it in a much more targeted fashion.
The New Democratic Party task force on youth was appointed in 1985 and travelled coast to coast. It released its report in February, 1986, and we believe that the youth prospects program as outlined by my colleague, the Member for Kamloops-Shuswap (Mr. Riis), would address many of the difficulties that today's youth face in Canada. In particular, we believe they would ease that transition from school to the world of employment that has been found to be so difficult. I know that many Members have spoken about the difficulties they experienced in that transition in the past. It is an important transition to which our effort should be applied.
The elimination of the youth Minister's budget was really a symptom of the problems the Government is failing to deal with in terms of programs to improve the employment and training opportunities for the youth of Canada. Much more serious is the cut-back in Established Programs Financing. Indeed, a news release by the Canadian Association of University Teachers states:
This legislation, if passed, will have the effect of restricting not only the
number of students but also the level of research that can be conducted by
university faculty. Universities will again become finishing schools for the rich.
That would be a terrible consequence if, in fact, that turned out to be the case. They state further on in the newsletter:
Post-secondary institutions, as every government study has shown, are in
financial crisis.
The Canadian Association of University Teachers very correctly point to the contrast between Canada and those societies which are putting more funding into post-secondary education, such as California and Japan. The percentage of GNP spent on post-secondary education declined from 1.35 per cent in 1977-78 to 1.24 per cent in 1985.
If the motives of social justice do not provoke concern about the quality of education in Canada, there is the clear message of superior economic performance that is being sacrificed on the altar of deficit reduction. Surely that should be something that the Progressive Conservative Government can understand.
In terms of the education and training components of the youth job prospects program which my colleague described earlier, our task force had a number of recommendations on post-secondary education. There should be stable funding, and funding increases should cover the cost increases. We should look at the possibility of returning to a 10-province standard and ensure the elimination of discriminatory practices against
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international students. The Hon. Member for Grand Falls- White Bay-Labrador (Mr. Rompkey) made some very telling points on the importance of that question.
The task force recommended an increase in both educational and employment opportunities by providing a longer term funding base and that tuition fees should be kept at approximately the current level. Most important, the task force recommends that the Government recognize the urgent need to provide all students in the secondary school system with both personal life skills and career counselling. Without that, the best system of education and training can produce less than superior results.
We placed a heavy emphasis on the importance of funding, particularly in smaller communities such as in my riding, of community organizations and non-profit organizations to provide services to youth and encourage the programs which increase the involvement and employment of young people in providing those services themselves.
Let me turn to the aboriginal youth, one group of young people in Canada in particular who are severely disadvantaged by the lack of involvement and support by the Government for programs designed to assist youth. They are part of a baby boom in this generation that occurred in the wider society in the last generation. Their numbers have led to an unprecedented crisis in the employment of young native people in this country, particularly on reserves.
Meanwhile, the Government has reduced job creation funds and redirected them to the private sector, which is generally almost absent on Indian reserve lands. To add insult to injury, the Government has cut out the housing labour component which used to be available from Canada Employment and Immigration Centres but is now absent under the Canadian Jobs Strategy.
This generation of aboriginal youth in Canada is the most highly educated ever. There has been almost a geometrical progression in the number who have taken advantage of postsecondary education and the funding assistance which is available to them as a treaty right for that education. We are faced with the unfortunate contrast of declining opportunities for employment, particularly in their home communities, with the burgeoning capacity of those native youth to handle the jobs and challenges that are available.
It appears that the Government has recently introduced a cap on the amount of funding that will be available for postsecondary education of native students. Indeed, some have been refused assistance. That was a regressive policy decision and one that was taken without an examination of the alternatives, except for the long term.
The alternatives for the short term should have been seriously considered and there should have been some consultation with national native organizations to ensure a degree of equity and understanding of what the Government's motives might be in making those cut-backs. That funding should be reinstated because the Government must have a policy of

May 7, 1987
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investing in the education of native youth so that they can not only face the challenges and perform in the wider society, but also perform effectively as members and ultimately as leaders in their own communities.
There is no single solution to community-based Indian education, but each community must be given consideration in the design of an education program because the majority of those who pass through that education program will continue to live in the community in which they grew up.
It is in that context that I am scandalized and extremely worried about the direction of the Government when I see some of the examples that are brought to my attention. For example, a school that burned down still has not been replaced after eight years and the students are still in temporary classrooms and accommodations. For the difference of a few tens of thousands of dollars, the takeover of a native education program by the band will be held up, even though the band has emphasized that that was simply the front end and did not represent the continuing operational requirement.
As a whole, the motion speaks of the need for greater government commitment and support to the youth of the country. That need is nowhere more evident than in dealing with the challenges before our aboriginal youth.


Jean J. Charest: Mr. Speaker, I should like to comment briefly on my colleague's speech and in the first place on the issue of our Indian people. I cannot let this day pass without mentioning and acknowledging that our young Indian and native people are facing special problems and that this Government recognizes the fact.

In the context of native youth, it is important to remind ourselves that to a certain extent the anticipated solutions centered around what was indicated in the Senate youth report as being first and foremost-the problem of self-government. When I assumed the portfolio of Minister of State for Youth, that was the context and the perspective in which the problems of native youth were set. That was the background. In that context we respected the constitutional process. We all know the outcome, and I think we all sincerely regret that that was the background upon which native youth problems were set.
We have now had the outcome of the constitutional conference. I have since met with native people and native representatives. In the consultative process we will deal with the problems facing native youth. We acknowledge that they are a special case. I want the Hon. Member to know that, and I want the House to know that our commitment to native youth is in that vein.
I should like to direct a couple of questions to the Hon. Member. Do the Hon. Member and his Party agree that the most important problem-and I think he has already said it; if
that is the case, perhaps he could re-emphasize it-facing young Canadian men and women today is the transition from school to work, particularly for young people who have not finished high school? Also, does the Hon. Member think and does his Party agree that provincial Governments should be involved in the attempt to design solutions and develop a consensus in Canada around these problems? Do they think that they should be included in that exercise or that at least there should be an attempt to include them in the elaboration of solutions?
All of this would take place, of course, in the spirit of respect we have for the constitutional balance and for the national reconciliation which the Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney) has been so successful in bringing forward.
I have another question for the Hon. Member, because the position of opposition Members on Katimavik has not always been clear. Is it the position of the New Democratic Party that if it were in government it would bring back Katimavik? If that is the case, I would be very interested in hearing it from the Hon. Member.


John Edmund Parry: In the first place, Mr. Speaker, I wish to thank the Minister for having given his support to our young native people. I think that under the circumstances, the future of our native youth is more jeopardized than that of any other group in Canada considering that the birth rate is much higher among native people than among average Canadians, considering also that in the context of self-determination and selfdirection or self-government as they like to say, but I think that relations between our youth and the authorities or the Government will improve. I hope that they will improve in the next few years and that this first generation of young native people will set those authority concepts in the context of native self-governing communities.
As for the questions which the Hon. Member directed to me on the transition between schooling and work, I am sure that the Minister has read the report published by our Party. Of course, we consider such a transition as the most important step in the maturation process of a young Canadian. Those are the reasons why we have advocated and described in our report a comprehensive and universal program to support such transition.

In so far as consulting provincial Governments is concerned, it is evident that in the design of programs it is necessary to do it within the context of Canada's federal society. If the Minister wants to be complimented on his efforts in this regard, I give it freely. I think it is entirely appropriate for him to do that.
In so far as Katimavik is concerned, my Party is not concerned that Katimavik be resurrected from the ashes as an article of faith. Rather, it is concerned that it was cancelled without any plans to replace it and without any indication from the Government about what were the deficiencies in
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Katimavik which led to it being terminated. The program was simply abolished. We did not obtain a clear idea of why, nor did we get anything from the Government which could be seen as a replacement for Katimavik.
When Katimavik was instituted, I was certainly one of those on whose lips the phrase "Barney's brown shirts" fell pretty readily. I was very skeptical of it originally. However, when I consider the work done by the youth in communities in my riding such as Fort Hope, Red Lake, Sioux Lookout, Fort Frances, Dryden, and Muskrat Dam I realize that some excellent things were accomplished by those who participated in the program. Nothing else has come along for the young people of Canada who are seeking work and life experiences to help them choose a career orientation which could replace the type of experience provided by Katimavik.


Mr. Terry Clifford (London-Middlesex):: Mr. Speaker, certainly it is a pleasure to have an opportunity to participate in the debate. When I heard of the motion of the Hon. Member for Grand Falls-White Bay-Labrador (Mr. Rompkey) last night, which referred to the abandonment of our youth and the Government's failure to provide meaningful employment and job opportunities, I could not believe that he was speaking about the Conservative Government. Therefore I called the Hon. Member for Sherbrooke (Mr. Charest) and said that I wanted to set the record straight.
The Hon. Member opposite and I shared a profession in education and a dedication to young people. Obviously we are seeing it from two different points of view today. From my point of view, our time in Government has been spent dealing with the issues faced by Canadian youth and showing a great deal of leadership. I will outline that in a few minutes.
I listened to the debate this morning and I could not help but wonder whether we were talking about youths or students in that there is a difference. When we are talking about the youth of Canada, we are not necessarily confining ourselves to students. As I am sure the Hon. Member knows full well, the studies have indicated-and he learned it as an educator many years ago-that 70 per cent of the young people about whom we did not talk this morning are the ones about whom we should be talking. Those 70 per cent who do not go on to receive post-secondary education become a very real factor in dealing with youth. That is compounded by the figures which show that on average, about 250,000 young people leave school each and every year. There are 250,000 youths every year with no kind of high school certification at all. That makes for a real problem and the Government has addressed that problem.
I would like to talk about some of the programs we have developed specifically to deal with the facts we found when we came into Government in 1984. The Canadian Jobs Strategy did not come about by accident. A lot of thinking was done about the problems faced by Canadian society and particularly young people. Several parts of that six-prong program are
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specifically designed to address youth unemployment problems, and the successes of some of them are legendary.
I believe there has been some mention in this debate of the Job Entry Program. One of the significant parts of this program is the co-operative education program. The Hon. Member opposite should know that giving young people experience in the world of work while still in the formal part of their educational program is very significant and is a high priority. That is exactly what co-operative education has done and its effects have snowballed.
I can recall 10 years ago seeing very little co-operative education in Canadian schools. Now there is not one respectable school board or post-secondary institution that does not have a co-operative education program. Clearly the Government has played a lead in this, not just with talk but with money. The budget has increased in the years we have been in Government and rightly so. Money is well invested when it is invested in keeping young students on the right track, learning about the world of work, so they can enter that world and prosper.
Another feature of the Canadian Jobs Strategy is the Job Development Program and it too has been wonderful. It has helped employers design and develop jobs to fit the marketplace as it evolves, and at the same time has brought on stream young people who can learn the jobs as they develop. We are seeing all kinds of new vocations and we needed a program that would develop those new vocations as the working society changes.
These young people are very fortunate to have a program like Job Development in which to become involved so that they can learn while they are working and while they are young and so that they can be part of a whole new series of job classifications. Again, I think clear leadership has been shown on the part of the Government.
There is another series of programs with which I have had a lot of personal experience and I would like to share a bit of this experience with the Hon. Member opposite. Some of these programs have affected perhaps not his riding but certainly his province. The programs to which I refer have done very well in the Maritimes. These programs are generally classified under the title Innovations. Under the Canadian Jobs Strategy, Innovations provides the opportunity to develop new solutions to the problems we face. There are two or three such innovations about which I want to talk.
The innovation with which I am most familiar is the SelfHelp Centre for Canadian Youth which started in London, Ontario. It was a local solution brought about by people who care about young people. These people came forward and made a submission to the forward-thinking Government under the Innovations plan, had it approved and went to work with the young people of the community. They found out over the past year that young people came in rather large numbers to this centre located in a kiosk in a busy shopping mall. The centre allows them to assess themselves, their abilities and

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capabilities in the work world, and to find out what they need to measure up. The centre provides help in resume writing and makes some young people realize that they should return to school for more training and development. The centre provides self-appraisal, something which is very important.
I daresay that as other Innovations programs have developed in other communities around Canada, we have found even more ways to help the youth. One program that has reached Newfoundland is the YMCA's Youth Enterprise Centre located next door to the Hon. Member in St. John's. There are eight such centres across the country established to help young people achieve self-employment by setting up their own businesses and subsequently creating spin-off employment for others. The concept of entrepreneurship and getting young people involved in small business is really what this country is all about. All economists and not simply those on the government side have said that the economic fabric of Canada and the jobs that will be created in the future will stem from small business. We are helping young people learn about this firsthand.
As the Hon. Member opposite knows, this is a kind of on-the-job education that many young people do not receive in the existing school systems. Once a youth enters the real hard world we all face, he needs these kinds of experiences. If the YMCA's Innovations program can provide that in St. John's, Newfoundland, and eight other centres in Canada, I say congratulations.
It does not stop there. These innovations are spreading across the country. Canadians are coming forward in large numbers from all areas of society wanting to help young people help themselves. The Youth Employment Skills Program, the Say Yes Program, was recently announced by the Minister in St. Catharines and has now spread to the West. I was in Winnipeg in March and I know this program has spread there. It is designed specifically to provide disadvantaged young people with a 12-week course in job-search techniques, work adjustment and academic upgrading and is followed by a series of job interviews arranged as a result of a supportive corporate network. All kinds of people from the private sector are getting involved and becoming part of the solution. Again, that is another step forward brought about by a far-reaching, far-thinking Government that developed a philosophically acceptable program like the Canadian Jobs Strategy.
There is always talk about the Challenge '87 program. Earlier in the debate I heard Hon. Members ask what we are doing in the way of summer employment for students. They asked what we are doing to get students on stream, thinking about careers and getting experience in their off-school time which, in the majority of cases, is the summer time. I think the summer employment program we have developed is getting close to being state of the art. It is very responsive to the needs that exist in the various communities across Canada and I think we should be recognized for that.
The fact that last year there were far more jobs in Toronto and southwestern Ontario where I am lucky enough to live
than there were students to fill them means that we do not need money from the Government. The private sector has clearly taken over by offering opportunities for young people to get on-the-spot experience. Let us not put money there, let us put money where it is needed.
The way the Minister has addressed regional disparities has been exemplary. The fact that there has been an allocation of 15 per cent more to the Maritimes is great because it is needed there. There must be opportunities for young people there and we have clearly taken that step.
As well, there are kids with tremendous learning difficulties and emotional instability problems. This group of people for whom it is hard to find work exists in our society as it does in every other society. I believe we have worked with them very well. Even our summer programs, for example the innovations in WOW, are outstanding. The Hon. Member knows these people have never been near a workplace before. They shudder, they do not have the inner strength to even know for sure whether they should be there or how to act. They need all kinds of support and development. This program supplies that, and 70 per cent of those people are gaining strength from that experience in the summer. They are not dropping out of school, they are returning as students and that is a tremendous track record. They are not going to be joining the street people. We do not want them there. We want them where they can learn and develop and be part of Canada as it becomes the leading nation of the 21st century. We are well on our way.
Where else do we see leadership? I cannot help but talk about a subject which is very dear to my heart, as I am sure it is to the Hon. Member opposite. He must have gone through this with these young people. Some of these people will get a high school graduation diploma but they want to get out and work with their hands. They want to contribute to society. Yet they need further training to reach certain skill levels and an apprenticeship program will give them that.
A lot has been said about how the apprenticeship program should be reviewed. 1 am sure the Hon. Member has heard it from his constituents as I have heard it from mine. The program needs a lot of changes because the nature of work is changing. The skills required are changing. So let us give credit where it is due and look at what this Government is doing about this very burning question which we hear from journeymen back home, who is going to replace me? They came to this country from other lands in the 1950s and 1960s thanks again to an initiative by a Conservative Government in 1957 which encouraged them. They came here and built our industry. Who is going to replace them? That is the big question.
Given the regional and educational differences in this country, the time for leadership is now. I am so happy to report that the Minister and our Government have set up a comprehensive review of apprenticeship training arrangements with the provinces and territories and we are committed to
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producing for 1988 and 1989 a revamped set of arrangements relevant to the modern job market. That is quite a commitment. We are doing something about a major problem.
I want the Hon. Member opposite to know that our caucus committees are hard at work solving the problems dealing with the effectiveness of existing programs and whether they meet skill needs. How do we increase the participation of women, natives and visible minorities? We have all heard about interprovincial mobility. There is 20 per cent mobility in any constituency in any given year so we must have some system of knowing that the skill levels reached in one province or one area will be acceptable and useful in another. Again we should get plaudits for getting this done.
In the appropriate areas of responsibility, the federal, provincial and territorial Governments, the employer and apprentices themselves, are funding this training. It cannot be just the federal Government doing it. We want people to help themselves and we are starting to see that.
Clearly we are seeing federal leadership. People are starting to notice. The young people are feeling better about themselves. They know that through these programs, whether they be in school or anywhere else, they are going to get a feeling for the realities of the world of work. These programs will give them self-confidence and career direction.
The examples I gave earlier about the Job Entry and Job Development Programs are just some of the ways we are reaching out. There is just no question about that. Look at reports like this one, "Innovations help young people finish high school". It says: "If I were offered a job today I would turn it down. I want to first finish the program because I know in the long run I will get a better job." This is a young person speaking in St. John's, Newfoundland. That is how they feel about the programs and opportunities provided by this Government as it reaches out across this land, to every nook and cranny, to help young people.
I think the situation is very clear. We have met the challenge. We are not stopping. I have given a couple of examples of our leadership role and we are nowhere near finished. The Minister has to be applauded by all Members of this House for caring as he goes across Canada and listens to the young people and sets the direction we are going to follow in the future.
This Government, like some of its predecessors, has vision. The Hon. Member opposite should think a bit about this. A former Prime Minister stood in his place here and talked about the road to the North and what it would do for Canada. At that time very few people could really understand the impact of that statement. We look back now and say it opened up the North. Look what this Government is doing with its policy concerning not only Arctic sovereignty but to have people live and work in the North. Look at the opportunities that will arise when that ice-breaker makes its roadway to the North. When we move into the far North that even the Right Hon.
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John Diefenbaker never even thought of, think of the opportunities.
We heard yesterday from the mayors of large cities about all the interesting innovations they have for their young people to renew the cities and urban areas of Canada. They are crying out to get involved with the young people. They have the ideas and brains to make these things happen. Given the kind of leadership this Government provides I just cannot understand a motion like this, and I hope all Members of the House agree with me today that this Government is clearly unparalleled in what it is doing for young people.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Questions and comments.


Bill Rompkey: Mr. Speaker, I certainly agree with the Hon. Member that we are looking at the problem from two different points of view. I agree with him on his last point, that certainly the policy of the Right Hon. John Diefenbaker with regard to the North was an entirely appropriate and effective policy. If only the present Government would give as much consideration to the North and the regions as that Government gave I think the country would be far better off. I fail to see how an ice-breaker is going to solve the problems of northern Canada.
I wanted to ask the Hon. Member to address the issue of the regions. He talked about the 15 per cent extra for the various regions, but is it not true that there is less money in the summer program this year over all than last year? Is it not true that there is 15 per cent less this year available for summer jobs than there was last year? We are getting 15 per cent more of 15 per cent less. In other words, there is less in the over-all program.
He also talked about the fact that we dealt with students more so than youth. I mentioned this morning that in this country today we have one million Canadians who cannot read and write. We have four million who are functionally illiterate. These are not students in the system. These are Canadians who could make a contribution. That is fundamental. The programs which were spoken about in the previous speech deal with symptoms, with people who are in the stream. We want to get at the fundamental inadequacies, of which illiteracy is one.
The second inadequacy is the systems of education which we have and the funding for them. Does the Member not agree that the $1 billion shortfall which will arise in Established Programs Financing for Canadian universities over the next five years will be a severe handicap for Canadian young people, whether or not they are students?
I would also like him to comment on the effect in his area, which I know is quite different from mine, of the skew in the Canadian Jobs Strategy toward the private sector. I may be hearing a different story than that Member is, but I am hearing from community colleges that as a result of emphasizing the private sector within the Canadian Jobs Strategy they have about 50 per cent of what they used to have to operate

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their core program. They are losing faculty to the private sector. They are losing courses which they used to operate as a result of the change of policy which came into effect in 1984 with the election of the present Government. Would the Hon. Member like to comment on those points?


Terrence (Terry) Clifford: Mr. Speaker, I certainly would like to comment on that. I am glad that the Hon. Member agrees with me about a previous Prime Minister, the Right Hon. John Diefenbaker. I think he missed the point. The roads to the North were of a different type than the roads which the icebreaker will build. However, they are roadways nonetheless, whether you are turning ice into navigable water or turning tundra into navigable roads. The principle is the same although the technology must be different.
I had the opportunity to spend quite a few days north of 60 during which time I interviewed exactly 200 young people. Of the 200 young people I interviewed 195 came from south of 60, most notably from the Maritimes, Quebec and Ontario. These young people were all under the age of 30, and one of the most moving experiences I had on that tour was that in every case they made the point that they were very happy in their work and that they found their role in life as Canadians very satisfying. I find that very interesting.
1 do not think that I, in southwestern Ontario, or the Member in Newfoundland, would find that kind of job satisfaction and life satisfaction with being Canadian. Perhaps there is something magical in the North. Perhaps some of the opportunities in the North will open up because of the bold move of the Government to be there, and to want to be there. I think we are to be congratulated on that and I will do it for myself if the Member opposite does not want to.
With regard to the 15 per cent, I think it is only fair. I and my caucus colleagues from Ontario and Quebec have no quarrel with the fact that the private sector in my section of Ontario has been very active and very eager to help young people. They pay more money as a reflection of what they expect in work. Why would students not respond and be a part of that?
Therefore, I have no quarrel with any region of the country, which needs it, receiving 15 per cent more. We just do not need it in my part of Ontario. I am sure my constituents would agree that it is best to use it where young people need it the most. If young people in Newfoundland need it as much as I have been led to believe, I am very happy that they are getting this extra opportunity.
I do not think we should be getting too upset about postsecondary financing when the projections for the next five years average 5.1 per cent for each year. That is clearly above the rate of inflation which the Government has been so good at controlling. There will be increased spending and we need not worry about inflation eating away at gains. These institutions are clearly way out in front, as they should be. We want them to be the very best in the world in order that our young people
are served as best as they can be, and that we have nothing but even more success in this country.
I hate to be so aggressive about this today, but this motion really upset me; we have worked hard and the record is clearly in our favour. It is not blemished at all.


David Orlikow: Mr. Speaker, I would like to put two questions to the Hon. Member. He is proud of the Government's record on youth employment. Despite the Government's claim that during its period in office 750,000 new jobs have been created, the fact is that there are still 1.25 million unemployed, the national unemployment rate is just over 9.5 per cent, and the rate of youth unemployment is almost twice that. Is the Member saying that he is satisfied with that record?
My second question is with reference to the satisfaction of urban municipalities. As I am sure the Member knows, the Conference of Mayors and Municipalities has estimated that to bring their sewer, water, road and power systems up to the standards at which they should be, because they are rapidly running down-


Mr. Fraleigh:: Why don't they look after them?


David Orlikow: The Member asks why they do not look after them. Obviously he does not realize that every city is facing very sharp increases in municipal taxes.
They have made a proposal to the federal Government, partly to bring their facilities up to the standards at which they should be, and partly to employ the hundreds and thousands of unemployed, of a program of rebuilding these facilities in which the federal, provincial and municipal Governments should share the cost. The federal Government has said that it cannot afford it. Is the Member satisfied with the answer given to the municipalities by the federal Government?


Terrence (Terry) Clifford: Mr. Speaker, in answer to the first question, I do not think we will ever be satisfied. If unemployment was zero per cent I still would not think I had done a good enough job. I would be worried whether we had created an opportunity for the next baby to be born to work and fulfill itself. No, I do not think we will ever vary from that. We will stay right on top of it.
However, a 4 per cent decrease is significant and should be recognized. I am not happy with it, but we are moving the right way. We should get some credit for that in that this country is so diverse and the opportunities are not all in the same place at the same time. I look forward to the day when we will see a rush of youth to Grand Falls-White Bay- Labrador for work opportunities.


Bill Rompkey: Not too many. Take it easy.


Terrence (Terry) Clifford: That is the kind of thing I like to see happening in Canada. I talked about what might happen north of the 60. There will be lots of opportunities yet. We will all keep our noses to the grindstone to help young people help themselves to
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get jobs and have life satisfaction in being Canadians. No, I am not satisfied, but we are working toward that satisfaction.
With regard to the plight of municipalities it is clear that they must work within the bounds of legislation. They must work with the provinces in which they are domiciled. It is clear that there must be a lot of work done. I applaud them for asking their young people for solutions. I always find that works when we ask some of these well-trained young Canadians. The Hon. Member opposite talked about these pressing social problems in the urbanized areas. I think perhaps if Hon. Members opposite would listen to their young, they might find some new ways of solving those problems. Clearly they have to work it out together within their legislation boundaries and their provinces. Let us see if they cannot come to some solutions first. The Government of Canada cannot solve everyone's problems.


Mr. Roland de Corneille (Eglinton-Lawrence):: Mr. Speaker, as a member of the Official Opposition, I am sometimes asked by my colleagues in the Government why it is that the Opposition is always criticizing. First, the Opposition criticizes because that is the role of the Opposition in a parliamentary system. Second, the Opposition has every responsibility to do so when the majority of the Canadian people no longer support the Government, according to the polls. Our 40 Members are undertaking to express the views and concerns of the Canadian people about their Government. Obviously, the people of Canada are not satisfied with the way in which the Government is conducting its affairs.
I must say it is our responsibility to remind the Government of what it has promised and that it has broken its promises. It is our duty to remind the Government where it has fallen short, where the people are dissatisfied and disillusioned, when people hurt and what their feelings are about the problems they face on a day-by-day basis. It is our duty to speak for the Canadian people. This is an Opposition day and for this reason-

-the subject matter before us today is as follows: consideration of an opposition motion:
That this House condemns the Government for its abandonment of our youth
and its failure to provide adequate support for their education and training or
meaningful employment and job opportunities, both temporary and
permanent.

That is our subject. It is about our young people. It is a subject which is probably the nearest and dearest to the hearts of the majority of Canadians, whether it is the young people themselves who are concerned about their own future or we as parents or grandparents. Therefore, let us ensure there is no mistake. Our young people are going through a very grave crisis right now. The Government does not seem to understand this and that explains why it is in such disarray and disfavour
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with the Canadian people. I suggest that the Canadian people are concerned about their young people above all.
Half of our single young people, are living below the poverty level. Unemployment in the Atlantic regions is somewhere between 25 per cent and 30 per cent for our young people. In British Columbia it is about the same. If we can imagine, Mr. Speaker, that one out of four, one out of three, one out of four or one out of five in various parts of our country cannot find work, we can understand the rate of suicide has skyrocketed. In the face of this ethos of pessimism, the problems of unemployment and poverty, no wonder the young people have such a feeling of despair and hopelessness.
We are not talking in a hysterical way about the situation. We are talking about the plight of young Canadians. If only members of the Government would understand that we are talking about Bill, Bob, Mary and Martha-real people. When we talk about statistics, we are talking about real people. We must call the Government's attention to this issue of real people. It must wake up. It must be concerned, not about statistics but about these real people. There are real people living in poverty. There are real people, young people, lined up in the bread lines. Young people are living in poverty. Young people are unemployed and young people, in great numbers, are feeling very despondent. This is reality. We are not trying to dramatize anything. We are trying to make the Government understand that this is real.
We have heard various people from the Government side, and the Minister of State for Youth (Mr. Charest) as well, lecture us that it is important that in an age of technological and trade competition we need a well-educated society, that our young people must be well trained in the technological sciences and be able to be competitive. I could not agree more with the those observations. However, it seems strange how over and over again we find that the Government tells us one thing, then practises something totally opposite.
Having told us today how important post-secondary education and the new technology is, we learn that in fact the Government has decided to put a cap on the amount of money to be spent on our native Canadian young people who want post-secondary education. The Government is going to put a cap on that amount. It may be a cap the Government feels is high enough, but what about the commitment of all administrations in this country that native peoples, Indians and Inuit, will have the right to have post-secondary education, whether it be in community colleges, universities or whatever? There should be no cap on the amount of money for that, because there is no higher priority for this country in terms of obligation. The young people from those areas and those backgrounds must be unquestioned and unchallenged in their rights. But the Government has apparently decided to place a cap on the amount of money which will be spent on the postsecondary education of those young people.
The Government may have an answer for that, but there are other things which are inconsistent. For example, is it not strange that the Government and the Minister of State for

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Youth and others have talked to us about the new challenge program for this summer. The Government is going to spend money advertising the importance of hiring young people this summer, the importance of private enterprise, and the fact that we must hire young people. That is a very laudable cause, but it is not very consistent with the way the Government carries out its own practices. We have just learned from the Deputy Minister that the number of Public Service appointments of people aged 24 years and under dropped to 1,497 down from 1,836 in the previous year. Barely four per cent of the 217,000 public servants are under 24 years of age. Imagine the Government lecturing us in this hypocritical fashion about its great concern for young people and cutting down on the young people serving in the Government.
At the same time the Government tells the private sector, "You should hire young people". This is hypocrisy. I know no other word for it. It is an incredibly hypocritical policy. How could the Government demand of the people of Canada that they should hire young people saying, "Do as I say, not as I do", while it cuts back the number of young people in our Public Service?
I would like to refer to something said by representatives of the Public Service Commission. They say that five years from now if the present trend continues we could have very few young people in the Public Service. That is hypocritical. Imagine the Government calling for others to hire young people when it does not do so it itself; when it is cutting down on the number of young people in its own service.
The next point I would like to make is that the Leader of the Official Opposition (Mr. Turner) pointed out in the House of Commons the other day that there was a grave problem of unemployment facing our young people. He asked a question of the Government. Quite rightly he was concerned about young people. He pointed out to the Government that the youth unemployment rate is up by 50 per cent in Manitoba this year as compared with 1980. He said that the rate was up 75 per cent in Saskatchewan, 81 per cent in British Columbia and 157 per cent in Alberta as compared to the figures for 1980.
What was the response when the Leader of the Opposition expressed his concern and said to the Government, "Please tell us what you are doing about this?" What response did he get from the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. Mazankowski)? He answered our Leader by saying that at the same time the youth unemployment rate has fallen from 18.3 per cent, nationally, to 14.8 per cent. Instead of dealing with the problem he told us that the rate has dropped. But dropped from what? He is comparing it with previous statistics of a few years ago in the depths of the recession. Instead of seeing that there is a problem and instead of admitting that in 1980 the situation for young people was very far better than it is today, the Government answered with statistics that tell us how much better it is now by, I think, 3.5 per cent than it was in the
depths of the recession. That is hardly the type of answer that will bring any type of satisfaction to Canadian people.
It is small wonder that the Government is in such disfavour with the people of Canada when they see that, indeed, statistics do not lie, but that liars can use statistics. This is not the type of answer of concern and feeling that should have come from the Deputy Prime Minister of Canada when asked about the grave difference in terms of employment between now and the beginning of this decade. At this rate throughout this decade there will be no hope. It is no wonder that there is a sense of despondency and hopelessness among so many young people. There are parts of this country where young people cannot really look forward to finding a job. Therefore they feel as if they are members of a lost generation.
When talking about youth unemployment we must remember that we are talking about human beings, individuals-our children. I am afraid that the Government has not appreciated the gravity of the situation. It has had a laissez-faire attitude, a simple slumping back and letting-things-happen approach. It thinks that if the whole situation with the economy improves statistically, then somehow that will trickle down to the young people. Instead of facing the problem and doing something in terms of programming and encouragement for our people the Government depends on a trickle down idea that somehow or other, eventually, if the economy of the country is good enough, everyone will come out all right.
We know that that is not the case. We know that while the economy is perhaps in good shape in the Golden Horseshoe, the area from which I come, and in certain parts of the country the opposite is the case. The west is hurting. It is hurting in terms of its farms, its energy industry and in so many other areas. The spinoff from the hurting in those areas also affects other industries as well. The west is in serious economic trouble. The same thing can be said about other parts of the country such as northern Ontario and the Atlantic region. So it is not good enough just to let things unwind, to let the universe unfold in that sense. It is important that the Government recognize its responsibilities and work actively on the subject of the problems that face our young people.
However, the Government has a record that is deplorable in this respect. It has closed down the Katimavik program, a program for young people that was achieving many things for them. After all, it was better than nothing. In fact, it was an excellent program. It was doing something for young people, something which the Government did not feel it needed. The Government closed down the First Chance program which worked to give young people the opportunity of finding that first job, after which they could then say, "I have experience", and then get another job and move on, to try to end the cycle of no job, no experience; no experience, no job.
The Government also closed 30 per cent of the employment centres on the campuses of the country. In other words, it cut out the vehicles for finding employment for young people as part of its program. That is hardly an enlightened approach to youth unemployment. It froze the student loan assistance
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rates. The Government froze funds which were going to research councils which in turn would find their way to the universities and our young people. The Government cut back on the post-secondary educational funding formula. I could go on with a list of the tragic cut-backs that have faced research and students across the country in ever so many ways.
The other day I addressed a question to the Secretary of State of Canada (Mr. Crombie). I asked him why it was that the Government still has not set up a system to help the young people in the remote parts of our country where the unemployment situation is so high. I was referring to Newfoundland and British Columbia, for example. I asked why the Government had not set up a system which would allow students to repay their loans after they found a job instead of within six months of finishing school. The Secretary of State admitted that the Government was thinking about this approach. Ele said that the Government was studying it.
But the Government has not moved to help to alleviate the problems facing young people so that they will feel encouraged to go to university. They think now, as do their parents, that they cannot go to university or community college if it means that when they have made loans they will have to start paying them back six months after getting out of school, whether they have a job or not. What the Government needs to do is arrange it so that when a person goes to school they can have the confidence of knowing that they do not have to start paying back their loans until they get a job. The Minister agreed that that would be a good idea, but nothing has been done yet.
I then asked the Minister why the Government did not arrange that when students start to pay back this money it be related to their salaries. A person starting in a first job may start at a very low salary. I asked the Minister about having an arrangement whereby after a student is out of university or college, after having made a loan, that he or she would know that the loan would have to be paid back at a rate based on that first year's salary. This is something that frightens parents. They are frightened about getting themselves into debt. They are frightened about having their kids going to school and within six months of getting out having to put the money up front, whether they have a job or not, having to pay back the money at a rate of interest which is not related at all to salary.
That is another example of the lack of sensitivity that the Government shows to the plight of young people. The Secretary of State admitted when I put this point before him that, indeed, the Government was thinking about it, too. As a result of this debate we hope the Government will stop thinking and start acting.
In the area of post-secondary education we had a task force that travelled across the country to hear about the problems facing those in the post-secondary community. We concluded, with regret, that what we found across the country was a tragic situation. Reading from the text-
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As a direct consequence of under-financing post-secondary educational and research institutions, teaching staff wages are frozen, facilities deteriorate, research activity is curtailed, morale is eroding, on-campus employment centers are closed down, foreign students are lost, scientists leave the country, libraries are undersupplied and laboratories become obsolete. Furthermore, post-secondary educational institutions are cornered into impossible choices to be made between accessibility and quality.
That is a brief summary of what we learned from 160 interviews with presidents of universities and community colleges throughout Canada, heads of faculty associations, members and leaders of student bodies including undergraduate, graduate and foreign students. The report was monochrome across the country, that the situation for postsecondary education is in crisis.
It is time for us to demand that the Government take steps now to face up to this situation and explore what it can do quickly and effectively to restore to our post-secondary educational community the quality which is required for our country.
[ Translation]


Mr. Della  Noce@: Mr. Speaker, having listened with interest to the Hon. Member who has just spoken, I find his negative comments rather sad, given that some speakers today have been quite positive in their comments, specially those addressed to the Minister, who made a brilliant presentation.
My colleague seems to indulge in his role as a member of the Opposition. He has wondered out loud himself why the Opposition should always criticize. It is the easy thing to do, as we all know, Mr. Speaker, and all the more so when one is in the Opposition. Lately, I met a colleague who is a member of the Opposition and I had the misfortune of asking how things were going. His answer was that, as always, everything was fine in the Opposition since the Government is always to blame. That sounds easy enough. I have not had the pleasure of first-hand experience, but it seems easy enough. Time will tell.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: Indeed.


Mr. Della  Noce@: Another thing I did not like about the comments of our colleague is that he does not seem to like private enterprise. He does not understand that some things must be left to private enterprise, and I presume that he himself has no confidence in private enterprise. He is probably not sitting in the right seat, maybe he should move three desks to his left.
I want to say that private enterprise is doing a very good job in this country. In my home province, in Quebec, it is thanks to private enterprise that young people could be saved. I ask the Hon. Member: Why always make taxpayers pay for everything in this country? The Government is always asked to pay. Why not let private enterprise take care of a few things? 1 have been

May 7, 1987
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in the private sector for 20 years. I hired young people in the summer, I gave them work, I taught them a trade. Never did the Government give me a cent, and I did not want it either. I never even asked. But I can tell you one thing, I gave them training, and young people were very proud, at the end of school, to come work for me. And in the small family business I owned, I used to hire three youths every summer, and I was proud to have them working for me because I was doing two things: Not only was I making them work, but I was also teaching them a trade. I see all those youths today, and they are very proud that they worked for me because they got training and today they carry on in the same field. I therefore ask my hon. colleague: Why always ask the Government to pay when private enterprise could do the job? Have you lost confidence in private enterprise? Or have you never had any confidence in private enterprise?


Roland de Corneille: Mr. Speaker, let me point out to the Hon. Member that I certainly have a great deal of faith in private enterprise. I am expressing a lack of faith in the Government, not private enterprise.
Perhaps the Hon. Member was not here when I began my speech. I pointed out that the role of the Opposition is, in fact, to speak on behalf of the people of Canada when they wish to express their dissatisfaction with the Government. Since some 75 per cent of the people of Canada are not supporting the Government and are critical of it, according to the polls, then our role is to try to speak on behalf of those 75 per cent. I suggest to him that many of those people who are critical, are dissatisfied with the plight of our young people today. I hope he will take that to heart.
Second, I was pointing out that the Government is hypocritical in asking private enterprise to hire more young people, as the Hon. Member did himself as an entrepreneur. That is great. However, the problem is that there is a state of "Don't do as 1 do, do as I say" when the Government admits that it has cut back on the number of young people it employs in the Public Service.
I have read the statistics into the record. They are not mine, but those given by Huguette Labelle who was using statistics from the Public Service itself. The projection from the Public Service is that the present direction of the Government will lead to a situation where "very few" young people will be working in the Public Service. Let the Government set the example.
The Government must also set the example as it applies to the handicapped and the disabled. We hear the same kind of double talk from the Government. We are told that 6 per cent of the people employed in the private sector describe themselves in some way or other as disabled or handicapped. We find that only 2 per cent in the Public Service describe themselves as disabled or handicapped. It is another case of "Don't do as I do, do as I say". The Government is not giving
as many opportunities for those who are disabled or handicapped as the private sector.
Indeed, I trust the private sector. I only wish that the Government would, itself, behave as well as the private sector.


Mr. Langdon:: Mr. Speaker, it is my sense as we consider this debate today that there is a tremendous feeling of urgency with which we in the House of Commons should be addressing the problems of young Canadians. The latest unemployment statistics I have show that the unemployment rate for March was 17 per cent, up from 16 per cent in February and an increase from March of last year.
Would the Hon. Member for Eglinton-Lawrence (Mr. de Corneille) agree that in order to create a positive environment with respect to a future for our young people it is necessary to have a set of concrete proposals as opposed to a set of laments about the failures of the Government?
While I agree with those laments about the failure of the Government, do we not need to establish a youth initiatives fund to let young people practise some of that entrepreneurship which has been so praised? Do we not need to give guarantees to the educational system with respect to their basic funding, which was not given by the previous Government or the present Government, so that they can have some sense of security?
Do we not need some training initiatives tied closely to the private sector? Do we not need community initiative funds to give communities the possibility of creating long-term jobs for young people and providing young people with a future? Do we not have to talk about a complete reorientation of our economic policies so that we move toward expansion in our economy and away from constrictions which have marked Governments for the last eight years and have created unemployment rates that are humanly unacceptable both to young people and to society as a whole?


Roland de Corneille: Mr. Speaker, certainly at this point in time the Government has a very real responsibility to abandon its laissez-faire policy, that is, the trickle down theory that if the economy is doing well it will eventually reach everyone. It should realize that it is not reaching the young people and that strategies are needed to bring about a change in the situation of despair faced by young people. It is incomprehensible that in a country as wealthy as Canada we should have a situation where our young people are facing such stark hopelessness.
Those of us in the House of Commons with families must admit that we are not suffering too badly. However, I wish members of the Government would ensure that Cabinet understands-and they know what is taking place in their ridings-the impact upon young people, the unseen. They should be the voice of the voiceless, not cower in submission and accept this unacceptable policy of the Government.
May 7, 1987

We had a first chance proposal when we faced the electorate in the last election. In fact the Liberal Government had put the program into effect because we realized that we needed to ensure that the cycle of not being able to obtain a job without experience and vice versa had to be broken. We knew that something had to be done, that some positive, activist steps had to be taken, in order to break the cycle.
I call upon the Government to take this kind of step, to swallow its pride, or at least to have compassion and realize that a passive policy is no longer good enough. We have reached a crisis situation. Waiting for the economy to pick up to get these people employed is not working; something must be done.
[ Translation]


Mr. Michel Champagne (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Agriculture):: Mr. Speaker, after listening to the Hon. Member for Eglinton-Lawrence (Mr. de Corneille), I think we can start entertaining some serious doubts as to the Opposition's integrity. Hon. Members were referring to a debate that was supposed to rise above political considerations, and I thought this was going to be the most charitable speech we would hear today. I thought it would focus on the problems facing our youth and on the commitments we made and what we accomplished since 1984, and I realized that in the final instance, the speech by the Hon. Member for Eglinton- Lawrence, my Liberal colleague, was negative in the extreme. He criticized the Government's failure to act.
Mr. Speaker, I can inform the Hon. Member that when his party was in power, and the Hon. Member for Eglinton-[DOT] Lawrence was talking about compassion, he did nothing, absolutely nothing. He never rose in the House to defend our youth when unemployment rates were as high as 21.3 per cent. Where is his compassion? When he talks about hypocrisy, he ought to know what he is talking about. Mr. Speaker, just what is hypocrisy, morally speaking? It is when the Hon. Member rises in his seat and claims that this Government, that our Minister of State for Youth (Mr. Charest), and never mind that they introduce programs that work, programs that give young people a chance to do something else than paint fences, programs that prove that Canadian young people are not a kind of disease that has to be isolated but a group that should be integrated in society and given its fair share and a chance to show what it can do. Tomorrow, they will be the decision-makers and not those hypocritical critics, Mr. Speaker, who are saying sort of virtuously that the Government did nothing.
Mr. Speaker, during the twenty years they were in power, they forgot to help Canadian youth. They abandoned youth, Mr. Speaker. All the departments did.
Today, Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member for Eglinton- Lawrence rose to preach a sermon on charity and what our youth policy should be. We have a Minister of Youth who had the courage to rise in his seat today to ask the Opposition whether it had any contribution, any solutions to offer. He said
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it would be a pleasure to work together with the Opposition. That was unheard of under the Liberals. They thrived on arrogance and refused to listen to the provinces and the Opposition parties. Bad mouthing their neighbour, that is what they were doing, including the Hon. Member for Eglinton- Lawrence.
Mr. Speaker, I cannot accept that in the name of Canadian youth, a Member such as the Hon. Member for Eglinton- Lawrence play small party politics. Mr. Speaker, when we look at the programs, I did not hear him say once that we put in place Challenge '85, '86, '87, we put in place the new Job Development Program, we put the accent on training, because it would be unthinkable for a responsible Government, a Progressive Conservative Government, not to provide training under our programs. It would be unthinkable, Mr. Speaker, to let the young wallow around the place in the hope that some day or other something will happen, there will be a breakthrough somewhere.
Mr. Speaker, we took our responsibilities, and when I hear the Opposition, when I hear the New Democrats suggest the Minister of State for Youth did not do this or that, I find it very hard to accept that they can use such terms, because youth does not merely involve the Minister of State for Youth. It involves all Canadians. It is also the responsibility of each Department. We can see that in the area employment and immigration, we can see that in the area of regional industrial expansion, thanks to lower interest rates that allow the young to start in business, thanks to small business loans at affordable rates. We could ask them where the interest rates were when they were in Government, when home mortgage rates went up to 22 percent, when Canadian people lost their homes, when they could not build to make the Canada of today and the Canada of tomorrow.
And they now dare accuse us of doing nothing for the young! The young also involve the Department of Agriculture. Stable interest rates, long-term dairy policies, capital gains exemption that enables young people to start up in farming, to integrate into the Canadian farming system, because there is in Ottawa a responsible Government that offers them alternatives, that gives them a chance to get involved rather than suggesting: We will put you on hold, wait for you to get older and if we are given the chance to do so, we will make room for you.
Canadian young people are following this debate today in the House of Commons and considering alternatives. The Minister of State for Youth has put forward some alternatives within the context of existing programs that were established in 1984. They asked opposition Members whether they had anything to say and they answered no, we have not. They said, to use the clever words of the Hon. Member for Eglington- Lawrence, that they are here to criticize the Government because that is the duty of the Opposition. That shows, Mr. Speaker, how mature opposition Members are.

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Mr. Speaker, that I cannot understand and to conclude, because I know that time is running out, I want to say that a responsible Government is one that makes room for its youth, that says to young people: You are going to get involved, we will give you the tools, we will not do as the Opposition, we will not spoon-feed you in the belief that what we are doing is good for you. We will provide you with the opportunity to be yourselves, to become adults, and to ensure that tomorrow's Canada is the one that you have chosen and not what we have tried to impose upon you.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: It being six o'clock, it is my duty to inform the House that pursuant to Section 12 of Standing Order 82, proceedings on the motion have expired.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION

[Stage Direction]
A motion to adjourn the House under Standing Order 66 deemed to have been moved.

Jean-Robert Gauthier: Mr. Speaker, again this evening I should like to raise certain questions which were asked in the House concerning official languages and which have yet to be answered.
As recently as May 5, two days ago, I asked the Solicitor General if he could do something to correct a situation within the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, a situation related to the RCMP aptitude tests which have been shown to be discriminatory towards francophones because the test translated from English was full of errors. As a result of these errors, successful francophone applicants had an average of 60 per cent, whereas the anglophone applicants' average was 70 per cent. So the RCMP hired more anglophones because francophones found it difficult to pass this selection test.
Admittedly, Mr. Speaker, this may have been due to an erroneous translation, but they kept the test and used it for five years. Since 1981 they knew the test was incorrect but they kept using it anyway, and RCMP officers themselves had to complain publicly before corrective measures were taken.
Mr. Speaker, this is not the first time in this House and in the Standing Committee on Official Languages that I single out some of the anomalies-and I am being polite-which exist within certain Government services. Faced with the RCMP inertia in taking action and responding satisfactorily to questions put to them, the day before yesterday, following the answer of the Solicitor General, I decided to write a personal letter to the Prime Minister, a letter which I sent to him and which, I hope, he has received and will answer. This letter, Mr. Speaker, is a summary of events since last fall with respect to official languages. I should like to remind the House that what I am saying now I consider as being very serious.
Last October 16 I asked a question in the House as a result of the publication of a document called Pony Express, a RCMP internal document. It was indicated in this document that they intended to reduce the 20 per cent francophone personnel quota to 14 per cent. Answering in the House, the President of the Treasury Board (Mr. de Cotret) assured me that this was not Government policy. I believed him.
On October 23, again in the House, I made public the contents of a letter confirming this agreement between the RCMP Commissioner and the Treasury Board official responsible for implementing the official languages policy. Mr. de Cotret, the Minister, responded by saying that it was only a discussion among officials, not a Government decision. Again I believed him.
On Wednesday, December 17, 1986, in the official languages committee, RCMP Commissioner Simmonds confirmed the objective had been lowered from its level of 20 per cent to 14 per cent. He said it might be 12 per cent. The next day, I pursued the matter in the House and asked if it was the RCMP Commissioner or the President of the Treasury Board who was telling the truth and which of them we should believe. About the situation, the Minister replied to me that on October 2, the day before, he had requested the Solicitor General of Canada to present him with an action plan on official languages for the RCMP. And I believed him, Mr. Speaker. I said to myself: "There will be action, the Minister told me there will be a plan. It seems as if the Solicitor General is facing a de facto situation. The RCMP will have to act." I thought things would change. Nothing changed. On January 30, French-speaking RCMP officers publicly denounced the conditions they were in. Even the Deputy Commissioner of the RCMP Quebec Division, Mr. J. Julien, was critical. He wrote in a long letter to Commissioner Simmonds that among the French-speaking officers in his division, and I quote:
The feeling expressed is one of rejection of Francophones by the Anglophone
majority and that Francophones' participation in the RCMP is marginal.
It is upsetting.
I questioned the Government twice, on January 30 and February 2. Ministers procrastinated and refused to answer my questions. Then, on February 3, the RCMP appeared before the committee where Mr. Julien confirmed the authenticity of his letter and comments. The RCMP high officials who were present closed ranks and refused to budge on anything.
Faced with all these delays and this ghastly situation, the Solicitor General does nothing. I was rather disappointed the day before yesterday and I told the Minister: If you cannot do your job and enforce the law which has been with us for at least 18 years, resign!
May 7, 1987

Last Wednesday, before a parliamentary committee, the Director of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service confessed quite candidly, probably knowing full well that he did not have to hear the consequences of his action, that his organization had never met the requirements of the Official Languages Act in two years, that is ever since its establishment. This also falls under the jurisdiction of the Solicitor General, Mr. Speaker. Both the RCMP and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service do, Mr. Speaker, and nothing is being done.
Yesterday, or the day before, I was told: There is a report forthcoming. I asked the Minister who told me: Yes, I have received and tabled the plan with the Treasury Board. I will act on these matters next week. Tonight, I ask the Parliamentary Secretary to confirm whether we can hope for any corrective action, urge the Government to do something and suggest, Mr. Speaker, that if the Minister is unable to act, he should be replaced with his Parliamentary Secretary. I know he would do something.


Michel Champagne: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member for Ottawa-Vanier (Mr. Gauthier) is much too kind. First of all, I must say he has raised a major issue, namely the linguistic duality within Canada and our institutions. I want to congratulate the Standing Committee on Official Languages which, over the past few months, has really tried to remedy the situation, shaking the tree to get rid of the bad apples.
Of course, as minister responsible for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the Solicitor General of Canada (Mr. Kelleher), knows just how important the French issue is within these two services. To raise it as radically as the Hon. Member for Ottawa-Vanier did might be somewhat premature, because one should look at the context as it is, and as the Hon. Member for Ottawa- Vanier and you, Mr. Speaker, know it has not occurred overnight. If the Commissioner of the RCMP and the Director of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service have felt the need and taken it upon themselves to hire more Anglophones than Francophones, it is because there was something basically wrong which had not been detected and which has been coming to light over the past few months thanks to the tremendous efforts of the Official Languages Committee.
Mr. Speaker, it is a series of facts and circumstances which is coming to light from day to day and which explains why the Solicitor General is truly concerned with the problems resulting from the French fact. To get to a solution, I am sure, because linguistic duality, the French fact, is and always will be entirely acceptable within the Canadian system, is and always will be worth fighting for within our institutions, as the Hon. Member for Ottawa-Vanier and French-speaking members of this House have always done. We must protect bilingualism. The Solicitor General will do so as much as he can and-something that should please the Hon. Member for
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Ottawa-Vanier-will always maintain a required decent minimum within our agencies.
I also commit myself to support my colleague from Ottawa-Vanier as well as all Members of this House as a democrat, as a Member respectful of Canadian laws, of both our languages, of both our founding peoples who will always be protected. I can assure the Hon. Member that the Solicitor General is well aware of the situation and will act as quickly as possible, even though he has already done so in several cases.


CANADA POST CORPORATION-DELAYS IN MAIL DELIVERY
Bill Attewell: Mr. Speaker, on March 20, 1987, in this House I asked the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Mr. Andre), who is also responsible for Canada Post, a question related to frustrations experienced by some of my constituents in dealing with the mail service. The Minister acknowledged the existence of problems and assured me that he is committed to finding some solutions.
I would like to praise the Minister for being very active in the past in seeking constructive and innovative measures in dealing with the situation, such as the appointment of a group to study the feasibility of third-party regulation.
More than anything, though, I strongly support the message conveyed through the Minister's actions that good service and not the reduction of the deficit should be the first priority of Canada Post. Considering the April 1 rate increase as well as the seemingly annual threat of yet another postal strike, I would like to make some comments on the matter.
I cannot stress strongly enough the important role that the Post Office plays in our lives. In my duties as a Member of Parliament I have dealt with problems experienced by Canadians with a variety of services such as those offered by financial institutions. As important as these are, the issues involved are often abstract and remote to most people. Service provided by the Post Office, however, is essential, tangible, and affects all of us in our most basic daily routine.
There are three groups of users of the Post Office on which I would like to concentrate. One is ordinary citizens involved in personal correspondence, the second is religious and charitable organizations, and the last is various business groups. During my term in office I have received hundreds of letters of complaints about personal mail delivery and only one-yes, one-complimenting Canada Post. Granted, Mr. Speaker, this is not a very scientific survey, but common sense suggests that there is something wrong. What is wrong?
According to the Marchment committee, which did a study for the Government last year, the most serious tangible problem is delay of service. Many of my constituents complain

May 7, 1987
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that there is no predictable time of day when the mail arrives and, at times, there is none for consecutive days.
The second group of immediate concern to me includes various religious and charitable organizations which require low-cost and efficient mail service to distribute their material. Two publications of the Canadian Church Press, namely The Presbyterian Record and The Canada Lutheran, have been denied second-class postal permits which are absolutely essential for their continued existence. The ground for this decision is that these periodicals are business and not religious. Mr. Speaker, if a church magazine is not religious, what is?
The subject of postal needs brings us to the third group affected by the Canada Post policies. Personal mail is important but it only constitutes about 8 per cent of the entire volume. By comparison, the lack of adequate service and the ever-increasing cost of mail service has a real negative impact on businesses, particularly small businesses.
To help put things into perspective, first-class business mail constituted about 4 billion pieces out of the total of 7.7 billion pieces handled by Canada Post last year. It contained various bills, invoices, tax slips, insurance documents, et cetera, which, given the obvious existence of deadlines and due dates, depend upon reliability of delivery within a reasonable period of time.
At the risk of sounding drastic, Mr. Speaker, promptness in such cases is a major factor in sustaining the economy and certainly the well-being and cash flow of enterprises involved. This is especially true of businesses which operate on performance margins directly related to postal rates.
Therefore, considering the volume of mail involved, even slight rate increases such as the one last month have a significant effect on profit margins. Furthermore, the lack of confidence has prompted many businesses to contact independent couriers for important pieces of mail, something which is an obvious additional burden on the costs.
I am strongly opposed to any rate increase without significant improvement in service, but I also realize that this is done because of the other major problems affecting Canada Post, poor productivity and the resulting deficit. For this the blame should be shared by labour and management. To begin with, the entire negotiating structure seems ridiculous in that there are eight unions and thirty bargaining units within the corporation. Not only does this prevent cohesive and coordinated bargaining but considering that unions tend to honour strikes across the country, one deadlock threatens to paralyse the entire system.
Given this, it would be instructive to look at some of the existing contractual provisions. For instance, in the letter carriers' agreement, full-time employees have the first right of refusal in replacing their colleagues who are absent on vacation or through illness. This means that a letter carrier who has completed his or her own shift, which incidentally can often be completed in three or four hours, has the option to
pick up his absent colleague's bag. This he will almost invariably do since one of the catches is that substitutes are paid time and a half. Considering that the contract prohibits hiring casual or part-time workers at straight time, there is an obvious incentive to maximize frequency of absence and diminish productivity.
Statistics strongly back up this notion. Last year the nonvacation absenteeism of Canada Post employees was 16.5 days per year, all paid according to contract. By comparison, the average for the rest of the economy, including truly hazardous jobs such as mining and steel manufacturing, was six days.
There is no doubt that part of the blame in this case should be attributed to management, which conceded irresponsible benefits during the last settlement. On the whole, the bargaining climate between unions and management is adversarial to the point of irrational spite. Labour, in particular, tends to assume an "us versus them" attitude and politicize any disagreements.
Obviously, in the short time I have I cannot say all that is wrong with Canada Post, nor can I provide the solution. However, I can offer some ideas. First, I believe that strikes affecting postal service are indefensible. Therefore, I have drafted a Private Member's Motion calling on the Government to make Canada Post an essential public service, thus prohibiting strikes. Aside from assuring Canadians that at least some service will always be available, this should help pre-empt in the future the kind of ridiculous concessions described earlier.
Naturally this is not a solution but only a small step. Beyond it, the entire negotiating atmosphere must be improved and de-politicized. In that sense, the Minister's initiative of setting up a team to study the possibility of a neutral non-government group involvement is a worthy idea. As for improvements in productivity under existing contracts, commitments announced in last fall's corporate plan, such as specific time targets for delivery, are constructive.
I would like to stress that the situation is nothing short of shameful and frustrating but not irreversible given our resources and know-how. Therefore, a commitment to improvement of service should be the number one priority of Canada Post in the immediate future.

Mlrs. Gabrielle Bertrand (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs): Mr. Speaker, I will try to respond to the concerns of my colleague and to those of all Canadian citizens.
Perhaps the single most important aspect of Canada Post delivery service is reliability, in other words the regularity with which the flood of mail is forwarded from the pick up point to the point of delivery.
In-depth market surveys indicate that postal service customers want to know how long it takes for first class mail to reach its destination.
May 7, 1987

The findings of the Marchment task force confirm those of the corporation.
All studies made suggest that postal service users are prepared to accept the following norms, provided they are guaranteed reliable service: two (2) days for delivery within the same city; three (3) days for delivery between major urban centres in the same province; and four (4) days for delivery between major urban centres in various provinces, that is from coast to coast in Canada.
The Corporation has set up a national control centre, which operates 24 hours a day, seven days a week, to monitor the efficiency of Canada Post by studying every step in the processing of mail, in accordance with the management plan of the Corporation. Canada Post has been introducing, since August 1986, a new color code. This system will enable managers of regional services to exercise a better control on our commitments. Each day of the week has been assigned a separate color and that allows the staff to determine precisely the priorities for processing and delivery.
The Corporation tries to meet its commitments related to processing and delivery of mail. It also emphasize the so-called "return program ". This is a program designed to correct mistakes due to a combination of factors, particularly errors in the postal code used by the sender, employees' mistakes and machine malfunctions. Canada Post has also bought 9,600 extra wire containers for intermodal railway service or for loading and unloading trucks carrying bulk mail, as well as
160,000	letter plastic containers for the safe transportation of mail.
The Corporation has a strategy which makes possible the sorting of all first class mail in 24 hours. That strategy is designed to make optimal use of facilities and machines, by distributing accumulated mail in order to reduce the number of items at rush hours and to increase it during slack periods.
To sum up, the facilities used by the Corporation and its network of means of transportation are being reorganized in order to process increasing amounts of mail on a more reliable and better monitored basis, through better management and a better use of equipment.


CHILDREN-PROGRAM TO COMBAT SEXUAL ABUSE
Mrs. Mary Collins (Capilano):: Mr. Speaker, on April 8 in the House I asked the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Epp) if he could advise me what progress he and the Government were making in terms of implementing social and educational initiatives to deal with child sexual abuse. These initiatives had been announced last year and, of course, we are urgently seeking their implementation. We are aware that the problem of sexual abuse of children is an extremely serious one. In fact, it has been estimated that four out of ten females and one out of ten males has been sexually abused before reaching the age of 18.
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I have been very pleased to be part of the legislative committee that dealt with Bill C-15 which sets out the legal framework dealing with child sexual abuse, which establishes new offences and penalties and which deals with the ability of children to testify in court. I hope that that Bill will very soon receive third reading and be enacted.
In addition to the legal framework, the Government has promised to take action in other areas as well. It has indicated that it will appoint a special adviser on child sexual abuse. This adviser would have responsibilities to deal with the social and educational issues. He or she would be supported by a committee of regional advisers who would seek out and bring forward ideas and input from the various regions of the country, as well as being representative of the many disciplines which have a strong interest and concern about this issue. I understand that this adviser has not yet been appointed. I urge the Minister and the Government to work as quickly as possible in this respect because I believe that this program needs the leadership which the adviser will be able to bring to it.
At the same time, the Government has also committed $20 million over a period of five years to focus national efforts on combating child sexual abuse. This complements other initiatives. In allocating these funds, I think it is important that the federal Government work closely with the provinces and non-governmental organizations in this effort.
I was pleased to hear that on April 14 the Minister of National Health and Welfare announced approval of $1.3 million in project funding as the first step of this five-year program. He also indicated that there were an additional 65 projects totalling about $3.3 million which were under consideration for the 1987-88 fiscal year. I was particularly pleased to see that of the $1.3 million in projects that were announced, about $350,000 in projects would be going to organizations in British Columbia that have played a leadership role in this field. Indeed, the question of child sexual abuse has been an urgent topic for the school system in British Columbia.
I want to comment on one specific initiative that is being undertaken by the British Columbia School Trustees Association. More than a year ago the association established a task force to advise the provincial Government and school boards on the question of child sexual abuse. Last fall they released an excellent report which deals with this issue in a forward moving and comprehensive manner. This report contained a number of concrete proposals for the provincial ministry of education.
Building on the experience gained from this exercise, and with project funding from Health and Welfare Canada, the British Columbia School Trustees Association will be sponsoring a meeting of national educational associations representing parents, teachers, administrators, trustees and provincial

May 7, 1987
Adjournment Debate
government officials to share information and develop goals concerning child sexual abuse.
I think the school systems of Canada are in an excellent position to effectively respond to the problem of child sexual abuse.
In the short term, efforts can be focused on prevention and raising community awareness of the problem. In the long term, our school system can educate the next generation against interpersonal relationships which encourage child abuse. Our schools can implement programs and follow up with research to ascertain the effectiveness of these programs.
By bringing together concerned parties from right across Canada, the forum organized by the British Columbia School Trustees Association can be likened to a springboard, to help develop a national strategy to deal with this very tragic problem.
This meeting, which is to be funded by the federal Government, will allow the participants to develop a comprehensive role for school systems of Canada which will facilitate implementation of programs at both the local and provincial level. It will help put in place an information sharing process, allowing for communication about the effectiveness of techniques to combat this ill and about the results of research.
It may also lead to joint projects among various jurisdictions so that the lessons learned from a program in one part of Canada can be applied to the efforts of another.
I applaud this initiative for it sets the groundwork for a coordination of efforts on a national scale in Canadian schools. I trust that the Minister of National Health and Welfare will continue to approve funding for worth-while projects such as this which complement the legislation introduced by his colleague, the Minister of Justice (Mr. Hnatyshyn), and will finally, I hope, start to deal with the root problems that are involved in the issue of child sexual abuse.


Mrs. Gabrielle Bertrand (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, first I want to congratulate the Hon. Member for Capilano (Mrs. Collins) for her dedication to such an important problem as child sexual abuse. I can see that she is very well informed on the subject and I wonder if she does not already know all the answers that the Department or myself would like to give her.
Mr. Speaker, in June 1986, the Government announced what steps it intended to take as a follow up to the recommendations of the Badgley Report dealing with sexual abuse of
children and also those of the Fraser Report dealing with pornography and prostitution.
In addition to the changes to the Criminal Code and the Canada Evidence Act which are presently being contemplated, the Government has announced a social and educational program which is to be implemented through the Department of Health and Welfare.
However, the Government has fully recognized that under the Constitution the provinces are responsible for health services and social services in Canada. As part of its strategy, the Government has also appointed a special advisor on childhood who will be reporting directly to the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Epp).
This special advisor shall be assisted by a committe of regional advisors which will promote the exchange of ideas between the various regions of the country and act as a forum for the numerous disciplines involved in the field.
It is expected that the special advisor shall be named shortly.
It is essential that the government appoint the best qualified individual and that no other obligation will prevent that person from taking up that position.
In June last, an announcement was made that the Department of National Health and Welfare will spend $20 million during the next five years to implement social and educational measures in order to provide guidance and define the objective of the national strategy to control sexual violence against children. In order to develop a program making the best use of funds in accordance with the government's commitment, the Department has undertaken consultations with provincial officials and non-governmental organizations. According to the Department, it would not have been worthwhile to develop that program too soon without having sufficient outside input, especially those of individuals and organizations which are primarily responsible for the provision of those services.
Therefore, the Government remains committed to support effectively that important program and it will reconsider responses at governmental level to the problems of sexual abuse of children as the program evolves.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: The motion to adjourn the House is now deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly, this House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 11 a.m., pursuant to Standing Order 3(1),


[Stage Direction]
The House adjourned at 6.31 p.m.
[Stage Direction]

Friday, May 8, 1987
[Stage Direction]
Prayers