1987-09-21

Mr. Chris Speyer (Cambridge):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour this morning of laying upon the Table the report of the Special Joint Committee of the Senate arid House of Commons, reporting on the 1987 Constitutional Accord.
I want to make two brief comments with respect to the report. Our report concludes that the Accord is an historic act of national reconciliation between French-speaking Canadians and English-speaking Canadians. It is supported by 11 First Ministers representing all major political Parties in the country.
It had its origins in promises made to Quebecers during and after the Quebec referendum of 1980. We believe that its detailed terms have to be looked at in light of this great purpose and objective but we have also reached a conclusion, after reviewing 301 written briefs and hearing 131 witnesses over five weeks of testimony, that these detailed terms are in fact good, and good for all of Canada.
I would also like to point out the tremendous debt that we owe to the committees' directorate at the House of Commons, Mr. Eugene Morawski, Miss Elizabeth Kingston and Andrew Johnson, for the prodigious effort they extended on behalf of all the committee in allowing us to have this report ready for today. I do not want to neglect the many people who helped them, such as typists, translators and others. We owe a great debt to the Committees Branch.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


PETITION
Mr. Dan Heap (Spadina):: Mr. Speaker, it is my honour and duty to present a petition from a number of residents of the City of Toronto who object to Bill C-55 on the ground that it will have the likely effect of excluding from Canada many people who have arrived asking to make refugee claims who are in fact real refugees according to the standards of law.
It points out that there was a better system proposed by the Standing Committee on Labour, Employment and Immigration, which has widespread support from religious, legal and other public groups in Canada. Therefore, they request the Government and Parliament to withdraw Bill C-55 and substitute for it legislation embodying the principles of fair and quick oral hearings of claims of refugee claimants before a refugee board that is independent of the Immigration Commission and universal access to such hearings for every applicant in Canada, and the right to appeal on the basis of fact. In duty bound, your petitioners will ever pray.

[DOT] (mo)


QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER
[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered Orally are indicated by an Asterisk.)
Hon. Doug Lewis (Minister of State and Minister of State (Treasury Board)):: Mr. Speaker, Question No. 169 will be answered today.


Mr. Howie: During 1986, in (a) New Brunswick (6) Newfoundland (i) did the number of RCMP persons deployed decline and, if so, for what reason (ii) how many persons were deployed and what amount was paid to the Government for their services (iii) what rate per person was charged for police services?


Hon. James Kelieher (Solicitor General of Canada):: (a) &
(b)	(ii) During fiscal years 1985-86 and 1986-87 the number of RCMP regular members in provincial policing duties in New Brunswick and Newfoundland declined by 14 in each province. The reasons for decline are the Royal Newfoundland Constabulary and the New Brunswick Highway Patrol

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Immigration Act, 1976
assuming responsiblity for duties which had previously been performed by the RCMP.
(ii)	For the fiscal years 1985-86 and 1986-87, the numbers in New Brunswick declined for 296 to 282 and from 448 to 434 in Newfoundland. The Province of New Brunswick reimbursed the Government of Canada $13,372,120 and $14,522,551 respectively. The Province of Newfoundland reimbursed Canada $22,503,206 and $23,641,324 respectively for the same periods.
(iii)	A rate per person is not struck, in relation to total police services in the Provinces of New Brunswick and Newfoundland.


Mr. Speaker:: The question as enumerated by the Minister of State (Mr. Lewis) has been answered.


Douglas Grinslade Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I would ask that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.


Mr. Speaker:: Shall the other questions stand?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from Friday, September 18, consideration of Bill C-55, an Act to amend the Immigration Act, 1976 and to amend other Acts in consequence thereof, as reported (with amendments) from a legislative committee, and Motion No. 4 (Mr. Jourdenais, p. 9105), Motion No. 6 (Mr. Marchi, p. 9104), Motion No. 7 (Mr. Heap, p. 9104), and Motion No. 9 (Mr. Heap, p. 9104).
Mr. Speaker:: I have a brief further preliminary ruling to present to the House.
On Friday, September 18, 1987, the Chair made a preliminary ruling in respect of the motions on the Notice Paper in amendment to Bill C-55, an Act to amend the Immigration Act, 1976 and to amend other Acts in consequence thereof. Following consultations with the Hon. Member for Spadina, (Mr. Heap) the Chair will now make a definitive ruling on the grouping presently before the House.
Motions Nos. 4, 6, 7 and 9 will be grouped for debate but voted upon separately. Motions Nos. 5, 8, and 10 will be dropped, as it is not the Hon. Member's intention to proceed with them.
Motions Nos. 11, 13 and 14 will be debated together. There will be a separate vote on Motion No. 11. An affirmative vote on Motion No. 13 obviates the necessity for a vote on Motion No. 14, however, a negative vote on Motion No. 13 requires a
separate vote on Motion No. 14. Motion No. 12 will not be selected as it is similar in substance to Motion No. 11.
Should debate be completed on Motions Nos. 4, 6, 7 and 9, the House will then proceed with Motions Nos. 11, 13, 14. The next grouping to be put to the House will be Motions Nos. 27, 29 and 34 which will be debated together but voted on separately.
I should advise Hon. Members that consultations are continuing on the remaining motions in amendment and the Chair intends to give a final ruling at three o'clock this afternoon. Thus, the House will now resume debate on Motions Nos. 4, 6, 7, and 9 which were proposed to the House last Friday.
1 want to express the appreciation of the Chair to the Hon. Member for Spadina for his co-operation in the consultations since Friday, and to some other Hon. Members who have made representations. As I say, there will be further consultations taking place between now and a little later in order to be sure that we are making rulings which are fully understood by all Hon. Members.


Mr. Jourdenais:: A point of order, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Speaker:: The Hon. Member for La Prairie (Mr. Jourdenais) on a point of order.


Fernand Jourdenais: Mr. Speaker, I am simply seeking clarification. I did not hear Motion No. 15 being called. You called Motions Nos. 11, 12, 13, 14, 27, 29 and 34, but I did not hear you call Motion No. 15 which was supposed to come up for debate after Motions Nos. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8-motions debated last Friday-and I should like to know what happened to Motion No. 15.


Mr. Speaker:: As I said earlier, I expect to make a ruling on the other amendments this afternoon, including Motion No. 15.


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: Mr. Speaker, 1 simply cannot remember from Friday's debate, which was somewhat hurried in several ways, what action we took on Friday on Motions Nos. 4, 6, 7 and 9, specifically whether I spoke to any one of them. I think I probably did. However, because of the uncertainty about the ruling, I am not quite sure how it is ruled.


Mr. Speaker:: Perhaps I can assist the Hon. Member for Spadina. We are resuming on Motions Nos. 4, 6, 7 and 9, and I think the record will show that on those motions grouped for debate the Hon. Member has in fact spoken.


Mr. Marchi:: Mr. Speaker, with respect to Motions Nos. 4, 6, 7 and 9, are you saying we are addressing them collectively or are we going individually? I would like to speak to Motion No. 6, particularly, but I am not sure whether we are on Motion No. 4 or are taking all four motions as one cluster.
September 21, 1987


Mr. Speaker:: I thank the Hon. Member for his question. Perhaps I can reread the preliminary ruling. Motions Nos. 4, 6, 7 and 9 will be grouped for debate but voted upon separately.


Sergio Marchi: Mr. Speaker, I would like to address Motion No. 6 which was presented as an amendment under my name on behalf of my Party.
Essentially the intention of Motion No. 6 is to remove the prescreening process and allow the refugee claimant to go directly before the refugee board. This was one of the key amendments we put forward for discussion at report stage. There are essentially three overriding principles, three overriding amendments that every witness wanted this Parliament and this Government to make, namely, amendments to prescreening, to the safe country concept and to the appeal mechanism.
Our prescreening amendment is our first amendment, that is, if we are going to establish a refugee board and put in place a refugee board that is distinct from the immigration program and immigration flow, in order to deal specifically and with a great deal of expertise on refugee claims, it would be our contention, and the contention of every single witness who came before us and who wrote to us, that we should provide accessibility to that refugee board.
Anyone who comes to this country and claims to have a reason to fear going back to one's country, should have legitimate grounds to be assessed by the refugee board. Therefore, many groups and many witnesses have found it very dangerous to place around that refugee board a barrier, a wall. That wall is defined by having a prescreening.
On the one hand, the Government is saying it is putting in a refugee board which is a new and improved processing, with which I would agree, but at the same time it is saying it is going to have a prescreening which is going to determine who will be able to access the refugee board. We believe very strongly that this is the wrong procedure.
If we are going to provide for a refugee board, we should allow the refugee board to make the determination on who is properly a refugee or non bona fide refugee. Regardless of the answer of the refugee board, this House and this Parliament would at least be assured, and have some satisfaction and comfort in knowing that the refugee board, which is mandated to deal with refugee matters, has given a ruling rather than two officers at the border crossing. The two officers at the border crossing will say, "Let us hear part of your story, but do not give us all your story because that will be part of a complicated hearing before the refugee board". If you, Madam Speaker, were a refugee claimant and were coming to this country-God forbid, because no one would want to be a refugee-you would not want to give only part of your story in order for one of the two officers to get a taste of whether you merit or do not merit a further hearing. A real claimant fleeing persecution would want to put all the facts and all the
Immigration Act, 1976
circumstances on the table in order to convince those two officers clearly and profoundly that, indeed, the protection of this country was required.
What groups have argued quite legitimately and logically is that we would be adding another burden of bureaucracy at the front end of the system. Rather than having each claimant appear at one hearing of the refugee board we would be asking refugees to do it twice. We would be asking them to do it once at a prescreening and then, if the person is approved, they will have to do the same in front of the refugee board.
From the point of view of accessibility and of ensuring that the two officers in the predetermination process do not rule against a legitimate refugee who will be sent packing back to his or her country in the face of danger, and also from the view of expediency and time, it makes more sense to have one hearing. It makes more sense to have a hearing done quickly and fairly. That is why we moved Motion No. 6. We did so in order to remove the prescreening process and to allow claimants to go directly to the refugee board.
We believe that that is the proper, just and most effective manner of trying to deal with claimants who arrive on our doorstep. We cannot allow a newly created refugee board to be diluted by two officers at some border-crossing where in fact they will make the most important determination. What is the use of having a refugee board if two officers at the border are going to refuse access to the board to a refugee claimant?
If we really want to deter abuse and discourage people from making frivolous claims, then I suggest that a one-hearing process directly to the refugee board, which would take less time, is the best disincentive to people making fraudulent applications. If they know that they can make it once at the prescreening process and drag that on and then perhaps go into another hearing before the refugee board, then that will not deter people as much as saying, "You have one hearing and one hearing only. It is before the refugee board. If you are turned down you have an appeal, yes, but the refugee board hearing is what really counts".
We have submitted this amendment in the hope that the Government will remove the prescreening process, reduce the time for hearings and allow maximum security for the safety of individuals without having to undermine the integrity and the effectiveness of the refugee board through a prescreening process.
This is one of the three very fundamental changes that have been advocated by organizations which were basically split into two camps. Members of one camp said that there are so many fatal flaws that the Bill is unamendable. They suggested that the Government withdraw the Bill and go back to the drawing board. The other camp advocated the following. Members of that camp said, "If you are going to allow Bill C-55 to stand on the books, then we urge you to change three essential items, namely, the prescreening process, the safe

September 21, 1987
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country concept and the appeal process". They said that the appeal had to be beefed up, the safe country concept eliminated, as well as the prescreening process. They said, "If you make changes in those three areas, then the Bill will be acceptable and we can move on with the reform that has been waiting for three years. However, if you do not change these three areas in a substantive and meaningful way, any other changes become almost academic." They said that if we did not offer protection for refugees at a prescreening and if we wish to orbit them by safe country and if we do not want to offer them a proper appeal, then what is the use of crossing the t's and dotting the i's on page 41 of the Bill?
Those are the three basic tenets of the Bill. If those are not changed the spirit of the Bill will not be changed and the other amendments that we can dither over and spend lots of time on will become meaningless in comparison to the other three areas. We therefore strongly advocate that the Government show some movement in these three areas.
Motion No. 6 addresses itself to one of those three areas, namely, the elimination of the prescreening to allow for maximum safety of the individual and to allow the individual to take part in one hearing which would reduce the time that we have to have refugees in the system. Reducing the time will give more fairness, clarity and add a disincentive to those who wish to make frivolous claims.


Ms. Margaret Mitchell (Vancouver East):: Madam Speaker, I rise to speak in favour of Motions Nos. 7 and 9 as presented by my colleague. 1 understand that he has spoken in detail to these motions.
We have a great concern that the Bill will not give a fair hearing to individuals. It provides for a hasty process with only an adjudicator and a member of the refugee board to talk quickly to people at the port of entry. We feel it is important that there not be this hasty method of excluding people from a fair hearing with proper legal counsel and the opportunity for appeal. Therefore, we are asking that the recommendation in the Bill for an inquiry at the port of entry be changed and that this matter should go directly to the refugee board for processing.
As I have said several times in speaking to the two immigration Bills, I fail to see why the Government has not paid heed to the recommendations of the Standing Committee on Labour, Employment and Immigration, the all-Party committee of the House which recommended an efficient, effective and more streamlined method of processing refugee applications. In essence, as I understand it, that is what we are suggesting here. We want people to have the chance of a full hearing. We do not want it to be delayed unnecessarily. We want maximum administrative efficiency, something which we do not have now in government procedures. We do not want people to be turned back at the port of entry.
I am particularly concerned about the port of entry in my province where many Latin American people arrive, coming from the United States. We know that if they are left in the
third country, in this case the United States, they may very well be deported since there is certainly not as much acceptance and sympathy there for people coming from countries where there is considerable upheaval.
In speaking in particular to Motions Nos. 7 and 9 moved by the Hon. Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap) we ask that they be accepted.
Hon. Warren Allmand (Notre-Dame-de-Grace-Laehine
East): Madam Speaker, I rise to speak in favour of Motion No. 6 put forward by my colleague. The purpose of this amendment is to eliminate the prescreening that is provided for in the Bill. We want to eliminate it because it denies to refugee applicants universal access to the refugee determination process.
Under the prescreening provision in the Bill those who will sit on that hearing will decide whether or not the applicant comes from a safe country, and I say "safe country" parenthetically. If they decide that an individual or individuals come from a safe country then they are denied a full hearing on their claim for refugee status and sent back to that safe country.
Prescreening is wrong because it is almost impossible to provide a universal definition of what is a safe country. A Salvadoran coming from the United States to Canada and claiming refugee status, who was sent back to the United States because the United States was considered a safe country, could very well be returned to El Salvador where his life would be in danger. Therefore, the United States is not a safe country for the Salvadoran.
On the other hand, for a refugee coming to the United States from Poland or Czechoslovakia, the United States may very well be a safe country for that Polish or Czechoslovakian person, and they would not be sent back to Poland or Czechoslovakia.
The problem with the safe country concept is that conditions change in the refugee world instantaneously from day to day. What is a safe country today may change overnight due to some revolution or some massive movement of people, and that country would not be a safe country tomorrow. As I previously stated, a country may be safe for refugees from some countries but not from other countries.
Consequently, through this amendment we are moving that the prescreening be eliminated, and that the person be sent to a fast, efficient hearing on his full claim as a refugee as quickly as possible. In general terms that was proposed by the report of Rabbi Plaut, who considered this matter for more than a year. He was appointed by the previous Liberal Government, and he reported to this Government. He strongly recommended that there be universal access to the refugee determination process, and that there be no prescreening where a certain group is eliminated before they have an opportunity to prove their full case.
September 21, 1987

Having received the report of Rabbi Plaut, the Standing Committee on Labour, Employment and Immigration reexamined this whole matter and heard witnesses. I was a member of the committee. The members of that committee, Liberals, NDPers, and Conservatives unanimously recommended that there should be universal access to a refugee determination process that would be fast, fair, and efficient.
That provision in the Bill flies in the face of what was recommended by the Plaut Commission, and by the unanimous report of the Standing Committee on Labour, Employment and Immigration. This amendment should be supported. We should follow the recommendations of Rabbi Plaut and the standing committee, and almost every refugee support group in the country, the churches, and so on, who are universally opposed to this provision of prescreening. That provision should be eliminated, and we should provide for a fair, fast, and efficient refugee determination process that would be open to all applicants. That is what is proposed by this amendment, and I would ask the House to support it.


Mr. Jim Manly (Cowichan-Malahat-The Islands):: Madam Speaker, I wish to speak briefly in support of this series of amendments, particularly Motion No. 9, which would eliminate the prescreening process and allow refugees to appear directly before a refugee board. The prescreening process at the border is specifically designed to eliminate a large number of claimants. That type of fine mesh being applied before claimants have the opportunity to appear before a refugee board will eliminate legitimate refugees.
The purpose of this motion is to open up the system to ensure that people who are legitimate refugees have the opportunity to appear before a refugee board, and that they are not summarily dismissed by some kangaroo type court that takes place before they have a chance to get into the country, and before they have a chance to appear before a refugee board and receive some semblance of due process.
The prescreening process is particularly directed at people from Central America, from countries like El Salvador and Guatemala. At the present time in the United States these people are targeted for removal. A small percentage of people have attempted to claim refugee status in the United States from countries like El Salvador, where everybody knows there has been widespread oppression and violations of human rights. A miniscule number of refugees have applied to get into the United States and be accepted as landed immigrants or as refugees. The American Government is planning to return these people to what is almost certain death or torture. By having this prescreening process in place, the Canadian Government is playing right into the hands of the Americans.
I urge Members on the opposite side to look at this situation, take account of what is happening to Central American refugees in the United States, people who have a genuine and legitimate claim to refugee status, and not allow this type of prescreening process to be placed in Canadian law which will deny refugees a decent hearing with some semblance of due
Immigration Act, 1976
process. I urge Members opposite to give this some consideration and not just follow blindly in how they are told to vote, to think of the implications for Canada's refugee policy. If they do, I am sure that they will support this motion.


Mr. Benno Friesen (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Employment and Immigration):: Madam Speaker, I wish to say that I certainly respect that members of the Opposition have the right to oppose both the Bill and its concept. In doing so, I wish to say that it is not very good for them to use language like "kangaroo type court" when referring to provisions in the Bill. That does not serve the purposes of good debate. It is designed to inflame and caricature an honest process. I hope that when Members disagree, which they are entitled to do, they do so on a solid, cogent, argumentative basis and not use this type of language.
When my friend, the Hon. Member for Notre-Dame-de-Grace-Lachine East (Mr. Allmand) spoke of the safe country concept, I wonder if he has paid any attention to the amendments that we have brought forward in the Bill. He stated that there is no possibility of universal application of the safe third country concept. He has completely ignored what the original Bill stated, and the amendments that we have brought forward.
If the Hon. Member checked with the Hon. Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap), he would find that, although the Hon. Member for Spadina may not accept the amendments we brought forward, we have certainly gone a long way in redefining the safe third country concept in order to ensure the security particularly of Latin Americans in the United States. I hope the Hon. Member will be careful that when he speaks to a measure he speaks to it from an informed position, and not in the manner he has at present.
It is true the amendment moved by the Hon. Member for York West (Mr. Marchi) would eliminate prescreening. This Member has always spoken about dealing with those people who would defraud the system, who are bogus claimants. If this Member has talked about anything, it is that. At the same time he talked about genuine refugees. I ask Members opposite how we know that they are genuine refugees until they have gone through the system? It seems to me that Members opposite are asking for us to give legitimacy to prejudging on the part of the claimant, or the people who are sponsoring the claimant. We do not know if they are genuine claimants until they have gone through the system.
The Member brings forward a motion that would eliminate prescreening. I wish to read to Members a list of the people that he wishes to have direct access to the refugee system and would not be prescreened, as he calls it.
The following people would have direct access to the refugee system: war criminals; terrorists; persons convicted in Canada of serious criminal offences; persons guilty of espionage; people who are already recognized and protected as refugees in

September 21, 1987
Immigration Act, 1976
another country; a person who has already claimed refugee status in Canada before-once, 10 times, 100 times, or 1,000 times-and has been denied; people coming from safe third countries; and people who have no credible basis for claiming refugee status.
These are the people that those who sponsor and support this motion want to have direct access to the refugee process. That is unacceptable; we cannot do that.
On the one hand they say that we must clean up the system so that it will work. On the other hand they bring in a motion which will clog up the system and make sure that it will not work.
If there is one thing we must protect in Canada, it is a system in which people can have confidence. We must make sure that bogus claimants are eliminated quickly and that the refugees which the system determines are real refugees will find protection in Canada and the security they deserve. This motion would destroy that, and we cannot allow it.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Is the Elouse ready for the question?


Some Hon. Members:: Question.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: The first question is on Motion No. 4. Mr. Jourdenais moved:
Motion No. 4
That Bill C-55, be amended in Clause 14 by striking out lines 20 to 37 at
page 11 and substituting the following therefor:
"45.(1) Subject to subsection (5), where a person who is the sub-".
Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt this motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: All those in favour will please say yea.


Some Hon. Members:: Yea.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: All those opposed will please say nay.


Some Hon. Members:: Nay.


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


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Pursuant to Standing Order 114(11), the recorded division on the motion stands deferred.
The next question is on Motion No. 6. Mr. Marchi moved: Motion No. 6
That Bill C-55, be amended in Clause 14 by striking out lines 39 to 45 at page 11 and substituting the following therefor:
"tion refugee, the person shall, as soon as is practicable, have the claim referred to the Board for a determination."
Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


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


Some Hon. Members:: Yea.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: All those opposed will please say nay.


Some Hon. Members:: Nay.


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


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Pursuant to Standing Order 114(11), a recorded division on the proposed motion stands deferred.
The next question is on Motion No. 7. Mr. Heap moved:
Motion No. 7
That Bill C-55, be amended in Clause 14 by striking out lines 39 to 45 at page 11 and substituting the following therefor:
"tion refugee, the inquiry shall be concluded and the adjudicator shall take the appropriate action pursuant to Sections 32 and 32.1."
Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the said motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


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


Some Hon. Members:: Yea.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: All those opposed will please say nay.


Some Hon. Members:: Nay.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: In my opinion the nays have it.
September 21, 1987

And more than five Members having risen.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Pursuant to Standing Order 114(11), a recorded division on the proposed motion stands deferred.


Mr. Gray (Windsor West)):: Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I understand that a number of motions are before us. It is the wish of the Official Opposition that if its amendments cannot be carried by voice vote, there be recorded votes on them.
Rather than have us go through this interesting and somewhat archaic procedure of shouting out the yeas and nays and then rising for each of the remaining motions, I wonder whether it would be the disposition of the Elouse to agree to have the same results in respect of the three motions Your Honour has put to us so far apply to the others.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: I thank the Hon. Member for Windsor West (Mr. Gray) for his suggestion. There is one motion remaining in this grouping, Motion No. 9, standing in the name of the Hon. Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap). Mr. Heap moved:
Motion No. 9
That Bill C-55, be amended in Clause 14 by striking out line 29 at page 12 and substituting the following therefor:
"claim by notifying an immigration officer who shall refer the claim to the Refugee Division."
Do I have unanimous consent of the House to defer the division on this motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Therefore, the recorded division on Motion No. 9 stands deferred.
I should like to refer to the next group of motions to be debated. Motions Nos. 11, 13, and 14 will be debated together. There will be a separate vote on Motion No. 11. An affirmative vote on Motion No. 13 obviates the necessity for a vote on Motion No. 14. However, a negative vote on Motion No. 13 requires a separate vote on Motion No. 14.


Sergio Marchi: Motion No. 11
That Bill C-55, be amended in Clause 14 by striking out lines 46 to 49 at page 12 and lines 1 to 11 at page 13 and substituting the following therefor:
"47. Every person who claims to be a Convention refugee shall be referred to the Board for a hearing on the claim.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Dealing with Motions Nos. 13 and 14, they were before the House on Friday, but I will reread them for the benefit of Hon. Members. Mr. Heap moved:
Motion No. 13
That Bill C-55, be amended in Clause 14 by deleting proposed Sections 48, 48.01,48.02, 48.03, 48.04, 48.05, 48.06 and 48.07 at page 13 to 23 inclusive.
Immigration Act, 1976


Sergio Marchi: Motion No. 14
That Bill C-55, be amended in Clause 14
(a)	by striking out lines 15 to 19 at page 13
(b)	by striking out lines 21 to 23 at page 13 and substituting the following
therefor:
"shall determine whether the claimant should be permitted to come into
Canada or to remain therein and whether the claimant is eligible to have the
claim determined by the Refugee Division; and".


Sergio Marchi: Madam Speaker, as I understood you, the only motion before us for debate at this time is Motion No. 11.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Motions Nos. 11, 13, and 14 will be debated together.


Sergio Marchi: I thought Your Honour said that Motions Nos. 13 and 14 were debated on Friday.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: They were introduced, but they are now part of a different grouping following the new ruling made by Mr. Speaker earlier this day.
We are now debating Motions Nos. 11, 13, and 14, and there will be a separate vote on Motion No. 11. The Hon. Member for York West (Mr. Marchi) has the floor.


Sergio Marchi: Madam Speaker, I will begin with the words of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Friesen) who said a few moments ago that he was highly offended by the use of some words by some Hon. Members and he threw out the words "kangaroo court". He said we should not be using terms such as "kangaroo court". Then he proceeded very quickly to suggest that because we were moving Motion No. 6 in order to delete the prescreening clause, that somehow myself and other members of my Party and those who support Motion No. 6 were, in his words, in favour of criminals, terrorists, killers and other individuals. That is a highly irresponsible statement and it puts the debate into the gutter. His stand is very hypocritical to say the least. He suggested that the words "kangaroo court" were the wrong words but suggested that somehow he has a monopoly on virtue and that other Members of Parliament are in support of those various classes of individuals. Not only is that irresponsible, it is highly inaccurate. There is not one Member of Parliament, not one Canadian in this country, who is in favour of the number of different types of individuals which the Parliamentary Secretary had the temerity to suggest.
Motion No. 11 is similar to Motion No. 6 which was rejected by the Government. Motion No. 11 reads:
-by striking out lines 46 to 49 at page 12 and lines 1 to 11 at page 13 and
substituting the following therefor:
"47. Every person who claims to be a Convention refugee shall be referred to the Board for a hearing on the claim."

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Immigration Act, 1976
That is our amendment, Madam Speaker. It does not say that we are in favour of possible criminals or terrorists. It does not say, as the Parliamentary Secretary advocated, that we would be judging the person to be a legitimate refugee. How do we know a person is a genuine refugee if we do not have a prescreening, he asked. The Parliamentary Secretary is trying to imply that because we do not want a prescreening we are suggesting that the person is a bona fide claimant.
Once again, this reflects a misunderstanding on that side of the House. It is even more worrisome when we hear that from the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Immigration, because by deleting the prescreening we would not be passing judgment on the individual claimant. We would be changing the process by which a judgment on the individual is rendered.
If we allow the prescreening to stand, we are giving the authority and power to the prescreening officers to keep a person out of the country for whatever reason. Perhaps the officers had a rough morning and perhaps they misjudged and misread the individual. The new refugee board will not have a chance to render a decision on a person who is turned away.
Couple that with Bill C-84. The person coming in on a boat will not even touch shore, but that is another argument. The Member is trying to suggest that we allow the prescreening to prejudge. We say that is wrong. We have a court and a system of justice which says to the Supreme Court judges, the various other justices in the different courts, "You be the arbitrators. We will create the laws but you adjudicate any rights or wrongs." We are not telling someone to go to the Supreme Court but that we might prejudge him or her first and send in a written analysis. That is a different system, of course, but it is the same principle.
What we will have is a refugee board and a prescreening process that will or will not allow that person to go to the board. This is a prejudging. If the person is allowed to go to the refugee board, the two officers and the evidence they collected at the beginning of the process can be used against the claimant at the board. So much for the Government saying that it is a non-adversarial role, because that is not true. The Government has to decide whether it is adversarial, like in a court of law, or it is non-adversarial. It should be nonadversarial and refugee board members should be allowed to make the determination.
If I were a claimant, those two officers and the information they collected at the border could be used against me at the board by a government official or government lawyer. If the Government wants to have a refugee board make the determination and the Minister has said that the board has the integrity, the knowledge, the expertise and the structure to make a fair, effective decision-with which I and my Party agrees-why is it necessary to build a Berlin Wall, as Rabbi Plaut suggested, around the refugee board by designing a prescreening process? Those forces are not pulling in harmony but in opposite directions. Motion No. 11 suggests that the
prescreening be deleted to allow a claimant to go to the refugee board.
Let us have the assurance that whatever decision is rendered by the refugee board we can be satisfied that the decision was properly made. We do not want to question ourselves. We do not want nightmares and we do not want to think about whether we should have left the decision to the refugee board of the lady from El Salvador. We do not want to wonder whether she had a little more to say which the prescreening would not allow her to say, or whether we made a mistake. If we have, and if we do make a mistake, that mistake can be fatal. Why should we have that on our conscience as a Parliament and as a country?
Would it not be better as a progressive country, as a privileged country, to afford protection for an individual and allow his or her story to be heard at the refugee board hearing? Why at the border crossings must we say to the claimant, "Look, don't give us all your story, just a bit, so we can get a taste of what you are fleeing. We will know whether you are right or wrong and we will either send you to the refugee board or send you packing".
If you were a claimant, Madam Speaker, would you want to give a little bit of your story or would you want to give all the facts and circumstances? Obviously you would want the latter.
I would. If you go to a court and the judge says "I have only an hour. I know you have been fighting this prison term for 20 years of your life, but just give me enough facts and I will make a decision on that". That is not the way it works.
The refugee claimant will want to tell his or her story. We ask nothing more. The claimant asks nothing more. Why have an individual give just a little bit of the story at the prescreening stage? This process will take more time and it will create another bureaucratic level. We will have two hearings instead of one and that will encourage more frivolous claims. Logic dictates that you have one good hearing before one competent body, namely, the refugee board. What is so wrong with allowing claimants to go through the system and to be judged by those who should judge them and not by an immigration adjudicator who has enforcement on his or her mind because of the duty of those officers?
We do not want to pass judgment on who is genuine or not. We are not in favour of the drug traffickers and terrorists the Parliamentary Secretary mentioned a few moments ago coming into the country. We are in favour of a legitimate process to render a legitimate decision. With the prescreening the Government is making a predetermination and prejudgment. Therefore, it is wrong and we hope that the House realizes that and will vote in favour of Motion No. 11.


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: Madam Speaker, I rise in support of Motion No. 11 and, since they are grouped together, in support of Motions Nos. 13 and 14.
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The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: If I may have the attention of the House for a moment, I think an explanation should be given at this time.
Motions Nos. 13 and 14 were introduced on Friday and the Hon. Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap) as well as the Hon. Member for Calgary West (Mr. Hawkes) and the Hon. Member for Laurier (Mr. Berger) spoke on those motions. However, they did not have the opportunity to speak on Motion No. 11 as it had not been introduced at the time. Hence, the Chair will consider this to be a new debate and Hon. Members who would like to participate in debate on Motions Nos. 11,13 and 14 may do so. The Hon. Member has the floor.


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: Madam Speaker, as it happens, I will use my 10 minutes to concentrate on Motion No. 11, but my remarks will cover the others as well.
Motion No. 11 is the attempt to correct the error the Government made in establishing this unfortunate system of screening and particularly the notorious concept of a safe third country. Apparently this is a concept invented by the Canadian Government. It has no standing in law outside Canada. There are no agreements in force between Canada and any other country in this respect. There may be some bilateral agreements between France and Germany or countries like that, but there is no standard concept of a safe third country.
More than 40 witnesses spoke to the committee during the 44 and a half hours of hearings. The Government waited until those witnesses had finished speaking before it introduced, during the clause by clause hearings in the committee, an amendment to the safe third country clause.
That clause had indicated that a person is not eligible if the claimant came to Canada from a country other than the country of the claimant's nationality or where the claimant has no country of nationality, the country of the claimant's habitual residence that has been prescribed as a country that complies with the United Nations Convention on the Status of Refugees either universally or with respect to the persons of a specified class of persons of which the claimant is a member. In other words, we would comply with the Convention for all people or only for people from country jc if a certain claimant happens to come from country x.
That was the way the clause read in the morning. Then the Government changed its mind and brought in a different clause in the afternoon. Now the Government only wants to comply with Article 33 of the Convention rather than the entire Convention.
This is typical of the way the Government conducted the hearings on this long, complicated and highly controversial Bill. We went through the Bill in about seven days. Over 40 witnesses appeared before the committee and the committee had about two days to handle all the amendments that could be put in that time. Some of the amendments were changed more than once by the Government itself, a Government which
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has all the resources the public and Opposition would like to have to study this kind of Bill.
There are two major faults with the Government's amendment. The Hon. Parliamentary Secretary tried to suggest that I was favourable to it. He did not actually say that I supported it, but he certainly gave the impression to some that I was favourable to it and I wish to correct that impression.
Even though witnesses and the Opposition asked that the Convention be respected, this amendment does not respect the Convention. First, it leaves out such limited tests as the Government had included in its original draft. One such test is whether or not a person can make a refugee claim in the country to which we send him back. That test is not included in the Bill any longer. The Government can send a claimant back even if it does not think that the person can make a refugee claim there.
Article 33 of the Convention is the article dealing with nonrefoulement or not returning a refugee to the country from which he is fleeing. However, there is nothing in this clause to say that we must pick a country which complies with the right of a refugee claimant to make a claim. If we ship him back to country x, country x might say that it does not like the colour of his eyes and it will send him back to his home country without finding out whether or not he is a refugee. Country x may feel that if Canada did not want to put the claimant through the refugee claim system, why should it. Canada so far has been a leader; not the Government but the people of Canada got the Nansen Medal last year for good treatment of refugees. If Canada does not want to give this guy a chance to make a claim, why should country x? It might ship him back to the country from which he is running without even learning that he is a refugee. It will try to cover its own guilt and our guilt in that way.
The second thing wrong with this amendment is that Canada did not sign just Article 33 of the Convention, it signed the whole Convention and there are a lot of obligations under the Convention. If we send a person to a country that does not honour those other obligations we are abandoning those parts of the Convention.
Article 16, for instance, provides that a refugee shall have free access to the courts of law when in the territory of contracting states. Article 17 provides that a refugee be able to earn wages or be gainfully employed. There are so-called refugees in Germany who are not allowed to earn a living. Germany does not comply with that article of the Convention.
Another article of the Convention indicates that all contracting states shall accord to refugees lawfully staying in their country the same treatment with respect to public relief and assistance as is accorded to their nationals. Many countries who have signed the Convention do not comply with that article. There is a similar article dealing with labour legislation and social security. Canada signed all those articles of the Convention, not just Article 33.

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We must ask how a person will be treated in the country to which we send him back, even if we think that that country complies with the non-refoulement article only, the only one for which the Government has shown respect. It has shown contempt for the other 40-odd articles of the Convention which we signed 20 years ago.
On the surface, the Government's amended version appears to be better. The Government has persuaded Canada's Ambassador to the United Nations to say on the radio this morning that since the Government has fixed the Bill up, the UN might like it better. I do not think that Canada's Ambassador to the United Nations knows any more than he did the last time he opened his mouth and was properly criticized for not knowing what he was talking about on this point.
In administration, this clause may actually turn out to be worse than the one it replaces because there is no guarantee that when a person is shipped back to country x he will have a chance to make his refugee claim there and no guarantee that he will have the rights of refugees, other than non-refoulement, which the convention requires and which Canada should require.
We heard warmhearted statements from the Minister last spring that we would only send refugees back to countries that would give them the same treatment that Canada gives them. That is a lot of malarkey. The Government abandoned that along with many other of its promises. We will send them back without knowing how the country will treat them. The Government is pulling a shameful dodge with Clause 14, Section 48.01 (l)(a). I hope that Members will instead support Motions 11,13 and 14.


Mr. Jim Hawkes (Calgary West):: Madam Speaker, it was a bit of a surprise to hear the Hon. Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap) supporting Motion No. 11 because he was in attendance during all 55 hours of hearings, the clause by clause study, and certainly most, if not all, of the hearings which took place in the fall of 1985, and a lot of the hearings and visits in between. I think the Hon. Member does understand this very complex Bill and how particular amendments might affect it.
I have read Motion No. 11 more than once. I am not surprised that the motion was moved by the Member for York West (Mr. Marchi) because he did not attend all the hearings. In fact, he was at about 10 per cent of them and missed the entire clause-by-clause study. The moving of this amendment is not a discrepancy from past behaviour. This particular amendment puts us in the exact situation in which we are today. It creates an impossibility to remove; it effectively wipes out the removal decision. It provides the opportunity to reenter the system again and again.
This motion would do another very important thing. Because the Government has a concern for legitimate refugees and an understanding of the fear and trepidation with which many true refugees arrive at our border points, through this Bill they
will be provided with a barrister and solicitor. Right from the moment that they face any significant decision, such as a denial of entry to this country, and through all of the eligibility and credibility stages to learn whether they are legitimate refugees, they will have counsel. This amendment would take that counsel away. It would eliminate the protection which is provided to claimants by the decision of the state to provide a barrister and solicitor. I am not sure that that is what the mover of the motion intended, but that would be the impact.
We heard a lot from the Member for York West about the need for a single hearing. That is consistent with the advice which we received from many groups, to decide as many issues as possible in a single hearing. It is possible to decide in a single hearing whether a person is a refugee deserving of the protection of Canada. However, there is another decision which must be made in every case, that is, whether the person is entitled to enter Canada or should be removed from Canada. The advice of the committee was that the two issues should not be mixed.
Motions Nos. 11 and 14 in combination indicate the emergence from the Liberal Party of Canada of a new thought which no one has recommended. These two motions together clearly say that refugee board members should be making immigration decisions about who is eligible to come into this country and who is not, who should be removed from this country and who should not. They are saying that the people appointed to the refugee board, because of their sensitivity to countries with specific conditions around the world and to the true plight of refugees, to hold a non-adversarial hearing and encourage people to tell their story about persecution and torture, should suddenly be made enforcement officers making expulsion decisions.
That is the consequence of Motion No. 14 and it is consistent with Motion No. 11. The Liberal Party of Canada wants refugee board members to become policemen on immigration matters. I hope that that is unacceptable to all Members of this Chamber. It is inappropriate.
Through this Bill we are proposing that we decide, at a single two-person oral hearing, whether a person is admissible to Canada, should be removed from Canada, and has any basis of a claim to the protection of Canada. If there is any possibility that the person might need the protection of Canada, the Government says that they should go forward to the refugee board, made up of compassionate and knowledgeable Canadians, where they should have a non-adversarial hearing to determine whether or not they need the protection of this country.
However, all cases where there is no evidence of the need for the protection of Canada will be dealt with in a single hearing. Under the scheme of the Bill the adjudicator alone, in the presence of the refugee board member, will make the removal and admission decision, which is an immigration decision. The refugee board member or the adjudicator will send that person forward for a full refugee board hearing. We will not be asking

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the refugee board member to become an expert in Canadian immigration law. We will not ask the refugee board member to become a policeman of inquiry. That is totally inappropriate and totally inconsistent with the role that we will ask them to play in Canadian society.
By voting down these amendments we retain the right of all claimants to have a barrister and solicitor represent them at the inquiry, to meet with them subsequent to inquiry if there is a removal order issued, to prepare the legal documentation, and to apply for leave to the Federal Court of Canada. Surely that is an important principle. Surely we support the provision of counsel in order to protect the rights of the claimant under the Canadian Constitution and Canadian law.
It should be crystal clear to all Members of the House that these amendments were not well thought out and their implications were not well understood. The consequences of the adoption of these would indeed be a tragedy for the legitimate refugees who come to our shores.


James Douglas Manly: Madam Speaker, I want to speak briefly in support of Motion No. 13 which would delete Sections 48, 48.01, 48.02, 48.03, 48.04, 48.05, 48.06, and 48.07 from the Bill.
I want to speak particularly about the concept of a so-called safe third country because there is no safe third country that will be safe for all people. People who apply for refugee determination status require that they be heard on the merits of their individual case rather than being lumped together to be shipped back to some country with which we happen to have good diplomatic relations.
I want to draw the attention of Members opposite to the very serious difficulty of declaring that some country is not a safe country for individual refugee claimants. For example, how will we indicate that the United States is not a safe third country for refugee claimants from El Salvador or Guatemala? It is not a safe country for them, but how will we be able to indicate that without getting ourselves into some diplomatic brouhaha with the United States? We are treading very dangerously in respect of our relationship with the United States today and will presumably always need to have some account of our diplomatic relationships with the United States. The Government is building itself a diplomatic time bomb with this concept of a safe third country. It will either face diplomatic embarrassment at some point or there will be a less than fair process for refugee claimants.
Perhaps I can make this more clear by referring to the Government's response to the Standing Committee on External Affairs and International Trade. Last spring the standing committee made its report on official development assistance and said that the Government should establish a grid regarding human relations, and that development assistance should be tied to human relations. In its response, the Government indicated that this was a very dicey step to
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take because it did not want to become too public in stating the human rights situations in other countries.
If that is true with regard to Third World countries to whom we might be thinking of giving development assistance, it would be even more true in terms of dealing with powerful nations like the United States, with whom we are less than equal.
According to previous regulations, there are some 18 or 19 countries to which we would not return any refugee claimants. With this concept of a safe third country, we do not know that those safe countries will not return refugees to these countries to which we previously said people should not be returned.
I want to quote an E-mail correspondence we received from the General Secretary of the Canadian Council of Churches concerning Bill C-55. Mr. Donald Anderson states:
We appreciate government work to try to improve Bill C-55. Unfortunately our deep concerns remain. How can we know if a person claiming to be a refugee needs our help if we do not hear their problems? Each person claiming to be a refugee should have a right to have their individual circumstances assessed and their case decided on its merits before competent independent decision-makers. To us, this is the intent of the Convention and Protocol.
Immigration programs may legitimately choose who comes on humanitarian grounds and may set priorities on countries they may come from. We understand the attractiveness of this approach.
Bill C-55 provides for exclusion of people not on the basis of their individual circumstances, but by a political Cabinet decision that the country they transited before arriving in Canada is deemed to adhere to Clause 33 of the Convention, that is, it is deemed the transit country will not return the person in any manner whatsoever to a country where he or she may face persecution. This is a far shot from our obligation to give an individual who arrives in Canada a fair hearing of his or her claim to need our protection.
Also, there is no meaningful appeal to any of the critical decisions made which can remove claimants from Canada in proposed inquiries or hearings.
We cannot accept legislation which sets aside a claimant's right to just procedures in the name of administrative convenience.
We urge you to reconsider, to abandon this Bill C-55 and to speedily replace it with one conforming with the principles of allowing every claimant a hearing on the merits and a meaningful appeal. There are alternative processes we can surely all support.
I urge Members opposite to think very carefully about this entire concept of a safe third country which, in fact, has absolutely no validity whatsoever in the facts of the situation.


Hon. Lloyd Axworthy (Winnipeg-Fort Garry):: Madam Speaker, during the entire process of this legislation, second reading, committee stage and now, I never quite understood how the Government deals with the fact that this law we are considering contravenes Canada's signature to the UN Convention dealing with refugee matters. That Convention requires that Canada provide the opportunity for a claimant to be given the chance to present his or her case in front of an independent tribunal to determine its merits. Yet this Bill clearly precludes certain classes of people from making that claim. That is a clear contradiction of an international obligation, to say nothing of the intrinsic transgression of the rights of the individuals involved.

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It is a very serious undertaking for a government to knowingly and clearly contravene that kind of international obligation. It must be for reasons of great emergency of state that we would so clearly go back on our word and commit this kind of incredible retraction from an undertaking to an international statement made by the Government of Canada on behalf of Canadians.
The Government has never been prepared to say why it is doing so. We know that much media attention has been given to the fact that certain Sikhs arrived on our shore and the House was recalled because of a crisis. However, that still does not explain Bill C-55. It does not explain that there is a clear alternative to the methods being chosen.
The motion points out that it did not have to be done this way. It did not have to automatically preclude large numbers of people from being given the opportunity to present their case. We have pointed out in this House many times that if they happen to come from a so-called safe country, that is an automatic exclusion regardless of the merits of the case. Yet we know there is no such thing as an absolutely guaranteed safe third country. Look at the statistics.
The previous speaker to me talked about the United States.
I think we all admire it as a democratic country with an open political system based upon a constitution and bill of rights, yet we know that at the present moment, if one is a refugee claimant from Central America, one's chances of being accepted into the United States refugee determination system is about 3 per cent or 4 per cent as compared to being a claimant from eastern Europe where one's chances of acceptance are around 50 per cent or 60 per cent. The conclusion one must draw from that simple statistical analysis, therefore, is that there is a high degree of political judgment being applied in the refugee system of the United States. For Central Americans it is not a safe third country.
I can speak from personal experience with respect to many of those who are involved in the sanctuary movement, the very movement about which the Pope spoke in San Antonio last week in an appeal to the United States Government to legitimize the sanctuary movement. We in Canada were, up until now, accepting refugees in that sanctuary movement because those people knew their chances of an opportunity to be heard in the United States were virtually nil. We are now excluding that class of people. By the way, when that class of people made claims under the sanctuary movement and appeared before the refugee advisory committee, a large proportion of them were accepted as bona fide refugees.
We have had historical experience since 1982 of Central Americans in the sanctuaries of the United States being given access to our refugee claim system and being accepted as bona fide refugees. We now have a Bill in the House which will exclude that class of people from even making a claim and
having it heard. Clearly that is a contradiction of our obligations under the Act. The case evidence is before us.
It is very hard to have any justification for this, and we have heard none from the Government. It has evaded any commentary on that central point. It is no wonder that every single organization in this country, every single reputable group working in the field of refugee matters, such as the Canadian Bar Association, church groups and aid organizations, and every single international organization, including the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and Amnesty International, every group which has knowledge, and respect and credits in this area, has condemned this part of the Bill. Yet the Government stands in the face of that kind of evidence and refuses to acknowledge that it has made a mistake in this particular area and refuses to find any way of trying to make a correction.
The amendments before us are simply to respond to the historical evidence, the treaty evidence and the testimony of all those who have come before the committee to say the Government has made a mistake. It is a grievous and terrible mistake. Do something to correct it.
It is hard to fathom when there has been such a weight of argument why there is such obduracy and insensitivity to this matter. It is really hard to fathom, unless what the Government is really saying is that it now believes we should no longer accept the UN covenant on refugee matters in terms of universal right of access to determination. I say that because during the debate on this Bill earlier the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Epp) rose to say that he does not believe in it. He is not the Minister of Immigration but he is a member of Cabinet and, therefore, provides us with some suspicion that perhaps what he was saying reflects a much broader point of view.
If that is the case, the Government should say so. It should clearly say it is abandoning its international commitment and tell it to the United Nations Commission for Refugees. The Government should at least have the honesty to admit that it no longer will adhere to that basic fundamental principle which we have adhered to as a country for 20 or 30 years. At least we would then have it out in the open. At least we would know what we are dealing with, rather than trying to slip it in by the back door. That is why these amendments are very crucial. If it is simply a matter that the Government has made a mistake, then it still has an opportunity to correct that mistake. However, if the fact is that it is fundamentally changing its commitments, and this country's commitments on refugee matters, at least it should have the guts to say so.


Hon.   Chas. L. Caccia@Davenport: Madam Speaker, there is a tendency around here to believe that interventions made in this House are of a partisan nature. That is quite understandable. After all, this is a partisan place. We therefore tend to look at interventions by government Members as being proGovernment and the Opposition as being in opposition for the sake of opposing. That is why I would like to put on record
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instead the opinions, not of the Opposition, but of groups which appeared as witnesses before the committee when the Bill was studied. I would like particularly to put on record the statements and comments which were made on the particular question of prescreening by groups that felt the clause before us ought to be amended.
No one could accuse the Canadian Bar Association of being a body of wild-eyed radicals whose intent it is to disturb the system or to create dangerous situations. That is why it is important to know what it said in committee when it appeared on August 31.
The Canadian Bar Association said that the screening process and the lack of discretion for the immigration adjudicator and member of the refugee division concerning access criteria prevent a complete evaluation of claims and do not comply with the Convention in allowing refoulement without inquiry on the merits? In other words, the Canadian Bar Association came down with the suggestion that the review be carried out by two members of the refugee division and in favour of what is commonly described as full universal access. It was suggested that, it be done through at least two members of the refugee division, people who are knowledgeable on matters relating to refugees.
On August 28 the Immigration Appeal Board, another institution that you know, Madam Speaker, is well established across the country because it consists of Government-appointed Canadian citizens, also expressed its disagreement with the way the Bill is written. It said that the immigration process should not interfere with the refugee determination process because particular situations, as the Hon. Member for York West (Mr. Marchi) so well articulated in his speech, might be penalized.
Let me put on record what the Refugee Status Advisory Committee said on the same date. It said there is danger in not evaluating all the proof during the screening process and that there is danger in denying access to the genuine refugees.
On September 2, the Coalition for a Just Immigration and Refugee Policy said we should not limit access to the determination system. All these organizations came down in favour of full universal access by way of an alternative process.
What did the Mennonite Central Committee have to say on September 2? It said that the screening process, the one being proposed by the Government and which we are attempting to amend today, will not permit an individual evaluation. This is a group of people which, as everyone knows, has had considerable experience in the field of refugees. It is a group which consists of thoughtful Canadians who have taken to heart the whole matter of refugees over many years. They have a considerable record of performance and experience in this regard. They also said that the short timeframe and the burden of proof on the claimants make access to the determination system very difficult. At that time they assumed that that
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timeframe would be 72 hours. Granted, things may not have been expressed at that time very clearly for them to make that point. However, they went on to ask this. Why not give a universal hearing on the merits before members of the refugee division? Here again we see the emphasis being placed on the refugee division.
On September 3 Rabbi Plaut appeared before the committee. He was in favour of full universal access. He said that the screening process consists of a hearing but with the disadvantage of not hearing all the evidence, as the Hon. Member for York West put it a short while ago. Rabbi Plaut went on to say that, nevertheless, it will take almost as long as a real hearing. This is why we are baffled by the apparent insensitivity on the part of the Government to accept an approach by all those who have appeared before the Committee with credentials and with the intention of improving the quality of the legislation to make it work better.
Pierre Duquette appeared before the committee on September 3. He said that screening will be as long as a full hearing but will not have the advantages of a full hearing.
The witnesses to whom I have referred were not put up by the Liberal Party of Canada. They are individuals or members of organizations who came forward on their own.
The Hispanic Congress on September 3 made the comment that the period of 72 hours is too short.
On September 4 an interesting observation was put on the record by Professor Angus who said with respect to the timeframe that if it were as short as 48 hours or 72 hours then that would clearly be open to a challenge under Section 7 of the Charter. I am sure that the Government does not want this Bill to be brought before the Supreme Court on a Charter challenge. This is another reason we have difficulty in understanding why these amendments are not meeting the favour and support of the Government.
On September 8 the Canadian Council for Refugees made the comment that it is not fair to preclude people from making claims. That is the Council's interpretation of how the Bill as proposed by the Government would work.
The non-governmental groups stated on September 8 that immigration officials should not be involved in any refugee matters. That is the same point being made by the Immigration Appeal Board and the Canadian Bar Association.
Again on September 8 we find that the National Association of Women and the Law stated that, in essence, screening should be eliminated.
The Canadian Jewish Congress on the same day said that screening is done partly by an immigration official as proposed in the Bill. The Congress stated that this confusion of immigration and refugee issues is unfortunate, which is what the Hon. Member for York West and others have been saying for many, many weeks. The Congress went on to indicate that it

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would be preferable to have refugee division members handle this particular phase of the process.
On September 8 John Frecker of the Law Reform Commission of Canada said that where there is as much concern expressed about procedures as there has been about the access tests, we would do well to take a second look because legal challenges might well tie the system in knots. Why do members of the Government, in particular the Parliamentary Secretary, not address this particular comment? It would be interesting to have on record their assessment as to whether the Bill would not be eventually tied up in knots in terms of legal challenges.
John Frecker went on to say that there is an alternative. It is that it is possible to have a hearing by one refugee division member only.
Before concluding may I draw to your attention, Madam Speaker, what the Canadian Employment and Immigration Union said on the same day as Mr. Frecker. Representatives of the union said that adjudicators have had no involvement before this time in refugee issues, which is one of the reasons this amendment is now before the House, and therefore they would have to be carefully trained. This is why if we run through the testimony given we will see that the evidence is strongly in favour of refugee division members handling this particular process, this particular link in the totality of the chain of the process.
You can see what is motivating us, Madam Speaker. It is not just a partisan opinion. It is the process itself that has generated this amendment. There was a consultation with interested parties in committee. Nevertheless, that consultation did not seem to produce any result from what are credible sources of competent groups in the country.


Mr. Ernie Epp (Thunder Bay-Nipigon):: Madam Speaker, I appreciate this opportunity to say something in support of Motion No. 13 which would amend Clause 14 of Bill C-55 by deleting a series of proposed sections, all of which are designed to create barriers to access for persons who may have more than valid refugee claims but who will, if the Government has its way, be prevented from having any access to Canada's refugee determination process.
I want to join with others in the opposition Parties, and in particular with my good friend, the Hon. Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap), in opposing the Government's intention. It is of course the Hon. Member for Spadina who has put forward Motion No. 13.
We have before us a fundamental question of humanity as it will operate in Canada's refugee determination system. We have here a fundamental proposal by the Government to deny Canadian humanity in the application of the law. In considering that possibility, while I see government Members sitting silent while we in the Opposition speak to the importance of Canadian humanity, I want to consider what is involved with this particular proposal.
Its essence is a proposal to allow a couple of persons, one of them an immigration officer, to ask very limited questions. They will ask not whether someone is actually a refugee or has a valid refugee claim to put forward, but whether the person has come from a country which is not itself the country from which he or she has escaped, whether this is a safe third country, as the jargon goes, to which such a person might be returned. They will ask if there is any credibility to the claim that the person is making in terms of the country involved, not the person himself or herself.
Then two possibilities will be considered. Did the person come from a country with which we have good relations and to which that person may be sent back because he or she will not suffer in that country; or is the person conceivably making a claim to being a refugee in a country with which we again may well have good relations and which we do not wish to regard as productive of refugees?
The last years have given us good reason to recognize that the individual experience of persons in various countries including, tragically, sister nations of the Commonwealth can be such that they have every reason to put forward a claim to being refugees. In fact, they are in danger of their lives; they may have suffered severely in their bodies; they may have experienced torture or psychological terror of a most serious type.
Immigration officers who are quite unsympathetic to the claim of persons from that country generally, may deny them the opportunity to put their claim forward. That is the chief concern with the motion put forward to delete all those provisions and raise a barrier to a person who wishes to put a refugee claim forward to the Canadian authorities and the established refugee determination process. This is an attempt to raise a barrier against refugees and against the whole spirit of Canadian humanity which has opened our door to refugees in the past, and which did so quite triumphantly in the summer of 1986. Suddenly this past summer it was slammed shut as the Conservative Government saw an opportunity to turn its back on Canadian humanity and come up with extreme legislation which could only pander to some of the worst tendencies that exist in Canadian minds and hearts, and begin playing to Canadian prejudice.
The consequence of the proposal in Bill C-55 is a rejection of our commitments to the United Nations, to the community of nations to which we have been joined since the end of the Second World War. It is a rejection of our commitments under the Convention, and under the UN Charter of Rights. This charter states that every person who, in his or her experience has been forced out of their society or country for fear of life and safety, has a right to have their claim to refugee status considered. Under the UN Convention which we joined with other nations to ensure safety for refugees, those particular commitments are being denied in this Bill.
September 21, 1987

It seems a light matter to Conservatives across the country, and to those whose prejudices are pandered to by this legislation, to deny our international commitments. What can we say of a government which is committed to observing the law and upholding it, when it sets out to deny the statement of the Supreme Court of Canada, and to flout the decisions of the Supreme Court of this country which has declared that anyone who is within our borders has the right to have a claim to refugee status considered? What can one say of a government that will do that? What right does it have to make law when it does not know how to observe the law, and when it finds new devices to raise barriers, play to prejudice, and create the worst tendencies in this country?
If there is any question of that being rather strong language, surely those who scanned the half page of an advertisement in The Globe and Mail last week know that it is true. The questions asked and the argumentation put around those questions by this so-called Immigration Association of Canada were attempts to incite the prejudices that exist, and those feelings that immigrants who are coming to this country, particularly refugees from the southern hemisphere, are changing the nature of our society and we should do something to end that.
It is often forgotten that this country is, in a particular sense, a country resulting from the arrival of refugees. Canada is bilingual because after French-speaking settlers and immigrants from France had settled for more than a century and a half in the St. Lawrence Valley, the colony of Upper Canada was created in response to the arrival of refugees who had lost the war for the British Empire in North America, and those who had been defeated by the American colonies assertion of their own independence. The arrival of refugees in what became Upper Canada, later Ontario, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia, was the first of many experiences of the arrival of refugees.
In fact, in a sense I am here because in 1926 my father and his family came to Canada as refugees from Soviet Russia. They were fleeing a system of government which had threatened the lives of members of the family, and others of the community. In Canada they found a safety for which they were devoutly grateful, and for which I am devoutly grateful.
With those Canadian traditions, I find it profoundly offensive that the Government should raise barriers and pander to prejudices which exist in some Canadian minds. In the era of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms we have been doing our best to remove them from Canadian public life and lessen, if not end entirely, their impact on employment, services to individuals, and so on. The Government which did all too little in the way of achieving progress in employment equity is here in the immigration area explicitly playing to those prejudices.
On the one hand we may say that this is something that bureaucrats in Immigration have been seeking, because they
Immigration Act, 1976
have been talking to their opposite numbers in other countries of the European community, and countries where similarly grim attitudes have come into play. Those countries have often experienced far more in the way of population movement, and the appearance of refugees than Canada. At this point Canada may be the last country that still wishes to maintain principles of humanity. At least, many of us in this country do, whatever the Government thinks. Surely, it is not fair to blame those in the Immigration Service who have been listening to others and thinking about ways in which the Canadian system could be tightened up. In our system of parliamentary government, it is never fair to blame the officials or the bureaucracy for what is happening. The buck stops on desks on the other side of the House.
Quite explicitly, I wish to say that last January when the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Bouchard) made comments about his home district of the Lac-Saint-Jean area and spoke of it as untouched by immigration and other realities, the controversy aroused a good deal of noise in the House and little attention in the country, because there were people who did not believe that the Minister of Employment and Immigration actually meant that. Since I made the charge at the time and asked him to withdraw those comments, I have long since been convinced that he did mean what he said.
The Minister of Employment and Immigration is quite happy with what is happening these days, and he is encouraging this Immigration Association of Canada, led by someone who had a leading role in the immigration service in years past and who is now out of the Public Service. The Minister is quite happy to encourage attitudes opposed to immigration, opposed to the appearance in Canada of refugees-having some type of a lily-white Canada in which people from the southern hemisphere are not wanted, particularly those from Central and South America where too many countries still have repressive regimes threatening people with danger and forcing them out of their borders. The Canadian Government does not wish to respond to that situation, and it is giving us this type of legislation.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: On a point of order, the Hon. Member for Calgary West.


Frederick James (Jim) Hawkes: Madam Speaker, it is quite inappropriate in the Chamber, and one of our long-standing traditions, that Members do not deal with the issue of motivation. I feel that the Hon. Member is being particularly sleazy in dealing with the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Bouchard), and ascribing motivation to that Minister. It is totally inappropriate behaviour in the Chamber.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: It being one o'clock I do now leave the Chair until two o'clock.
At 1 p.m. the House took recess.

September 21, 1987


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The House resumed at 2 p.m.


James Douglas Manly: Mr. Speaker, in the Central American peace process the Government of Nicaragua has shown further evidence of good faith by lifting its ban on the publication of La Prensa.
Nations find it very difficult to maintain full freedom of the press when, like Nicaragua, their independence is threatened by war from outside.
Prior to its closure in June, 1986, La Prensa had been giving its support to the American-financed Contras who were waging war on their own people. Even as she announced the reopening of her paper, Violeta Chamorro said that she would print information even if it endangered the security of the Sandinista Army.
If Canada were at war, we would neither expect nor want to see freedom of the press carried to such an extent that newspapers would print information which could endanger the Canadian Armed Forces. By reopening La Prensa, therefore, Nicaragua is taking a great leap of faith in the peace process.
The Reagan administration in the United States now has an obligation to show similar evidence of good faith by stating clearly that it will not provide any Contra funding while the peace process is on track.



THE HOMELESS


Mr. Jean-Robert Gauthier (Ottawa-Vanier):: Mr. Speaker, in addition to drawing public attention to the deplorable living conditions of more than 40,000 Canadian men and women, the Canadian Conference on the International Year of Shelter for the Homeless, which took place in Ottawa last week, will have made us fully aware that the situation is critical and that concerted efforts must be made to try to remedy it.
Unfortunately the Conservative Government did not get the message. Once again it has been unable to show the leadership required to implement concrete measures designed to solve the problems of these thousands of men, women and children who live under difficult and even miserable conditions.
Over the past year more than 1,000 persons have slept on streets and sidewalks in my riding of Ottawa-Vanier, while
11,000	youths aged 15 to 24 have been without work. A great many people were on social welfare rolls, including most of the 19 per cent of single-parent families that, as we know, are among the most destitute in our society. By contrast, during the last three years of the federal Liberal Government, 765 subsidized housing units were built in Ottawa-Vanier alone, but in the past three years since this Government took office only 270 such units have been built.
By refusing to offer a helping hand to the needy, the Conservative Government shows its inability to live up to the mandate given to it by Canadians, men and women alike, both rich and poor.

*
* *



VIA RAIL


Mr. William C. Winegard (Guelph):: Mr. Speaker, a few days ago I met a large group of Air Canada pilots at the Rotary Lobsterfest in Guelph. We ate lots of lobster, but we also spent considerable time talking about Air Canada.
It is becoming increasingly clear that members of the staff of Air Canada want the company privatized. They do not want 10 per cent turned over to the private sector, or even 50 per cent; they want 100 per cent turned over to the private sector. They want new aircraft, new spirit, and new opportunities.
Let us agree to let them have those opportunities. Let them lead the way in turning this Crown corporation into a private enterprise. They deserve the chance.



TREATMENT OF PASSENGERS WAITING TO BOARD TRAINS

Mr. Reginald Stackhouse (Scarborough West):: Mr. Speaker, VIA Rail is suffering intense competition from airlines, bus lines, and auto transportation, yet it insists upon putting the convenience of its policies ahead of the comfort of its passengers.
Hundreds of people regularly line up in stations at Toronto, Ottawa, and other cities, often for an hour, before being allowed to board trains that are standing empty in the stations.
In contrast, passengers may comfortably wait seated in trains long before they leave stations at London, Paris, Rome, and New York.
If VIA wants business, it will find success from a tried and true formula-put the customers first.
September 21, 1987



INTRODUCTION OF ANTI-SMOKING LEGISLATION

Ms. Sheila Copps (Hamilton East):: Mr. Speaker, it was only a few short weeks ago that we heard the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Epp) wax eloquent about what he called the toughest anti-smoking legislation in the western world. He was going to introduce a clean air environment for federal employees. He was going to introduce restrictions and a ban on advertising.
However, what do we now hear through the grapevine? Unfortunately the Minister felt the heat, and he is apparently considering getting out of the kitchen. The Minister says that he does not know whether he will proceed with the legislation because he is getting too much heat from the back-benches of the Conservative Party.
I want to tell him that we on this side of the House feel that anti-smoking legislation has been a long time coming and that he should continue with the legislation.

I should like to tell him that if he is not prepared to stand the heat generated by the political issue which non-smokers' rights have become, we are prepared to do just that and we ask that he table forthwith the anti-smoking legislation instead of heeding the advice of his Party's back-benchers who are dead set against such a measure.



HISTORIC EVENTS


Mrs. Shirley Martin (Lincoln):: Mr. Speaker, last night I had the pleasure of joining with 1,100 Canadians of Italian heritage in celebrating the seventy-fifth anniversary of St. Anthony of Padua Church, the first Italian church in Hamilton, Ontario. It was established to serve the spiritual needs of immigrants from Italy working in the steel mills of Hamilton. Those steel mills are still contributing to the growth of our area as are the descendants of those first immigrants.
The Italian community brings a rich, cultural heritage to Canada of which it can be justly proud. But first and foremost, Mr. Speaker, these people are Canadians and this was amply demonstrated last evening. Yesterday's tribute was not only to St. Anthony's Parish but to the great contribution that Canadians of Italian heritage have made and continue to make, not only to the growth of the Hamilton area but, indeed, to all of Canada. I am pleased to join in this tribute.



PUBLIC SERVICE


Mrs. Marion Dewar (Hamilton Mountain):: Mr. Speaker, yesterday Canada grieved at the tragic loss of an extraordinary woman, a woman who worked steadfastly for the rights and dignity of Canadian working men and women. Aileen Manion, who was the first woman elected to the Executive Committee of the Public Service Alliance of Canada, died yesterday at her home here in Ottawa.

In her role as vice-president of the Public Service Alliance, Aileen was personally involved in the struggle for equal pay for work of equal value, presenting her union's first equal pay case to the Human Rights Commission. Ms. Manion devoted long hours to issues faced by her union members and was instrumental in establishing educational programs for union representatives.
Her loss will be deeply felt by all of us in public service and by the working people whose causes she championed.

Mr. Speaker, on behalf of all Members of this House, I would like to extend our deepest sympathy to the family and friends of Ms. Manion's family and friends.



ENVIRONMENTAL AFFAIRS


Mr. Stan Darling (Parry Sound-Muskoka):: Mr. Speaker, in the wake of the National Acid Precipitation Assessment Program report issued in the United States last week, I call upon all Canadians to demonstrate outrage and disappointment with its content. To echo our own Minister of the Environment (Mr. McMillan), the report is incomplete and unacceptable to a fault. Fortunately, there are many U.S. politicians with vision and verve who continue to strive toward acid rain abatement.
In a letter addressed to me on September 9, Congressman Robert C. Smith of New Hampshire said that over 140 members of the U.S. House of Representatives are calling for a reauthorization of the Clean Air Act of 1987. In addition, the Chairman of the U.S. House Science, Space and Technology Subcommittee on Natural Resources is enthusiastic to have our own Special Committee on Acid Rain appear to present Canada's case.
It seems the life-threatening depletion of the earth's ozone layer could be the best friend acid rain abatement ever had.

September 21, 1987
We now have proof that international transboundary agreements to preserve the environment are attainable. A similar agreement for acid rain must be forthcoming in North America before we drown in our own industrial excrement.



HOUSING


Mr. Cyril Keeper (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, the International Conference on Shelter for the Homeless has come and gone without any action being announced by the Government. We would have expected a whole plethora of announcements to deal with multi-problems that were dealt with at the conference. Maybe the Government just lacked ideas and did not know what to do. I would like to give the Government suggestions for at least one area.
Let us take the area of housing for urban native people, an area crying out for action. Is the Government not aware that the infrastructure is in place to deliver housing? We have some 80 urban native housing corporations across the country which are presently delivering 1,000 units. Why does the Government not double that number, add another 1,000 new units, in order to deal with this crisis in housing? This would show that the Government is putting a priority on the needs of people and that it is ready to act and not just talk.
It is time for action, Mr. Speaker. I wish the Government would put a priority on the question of the homeless in Canada and recognize that it can do something concrete and immediate for urban native people.



REGIONAL ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT


Mrs. Lise Bourgault (Argenteuil-Papineau):: Mr. Speaker, last Friday, the Minister of Employment and Immigration travelled to Papineauville, in my beautiful constituency, to announce the participation of 19 municipalities to the Community Development Program.
Thanks to that program, a business assistance centre will be set up as early as November 1, 1987, with $1.5 million funding to help provide businesses with local technical and advisory services, and also with financial assistance in the form of loans of up to $75,000. Moreover, a community development assistance committee made up of 12 Members will receive a $200,000 subsidy to realistically appraise the opportunities for development and diversification of our rural economy.
Mr. Speaker, this is another example of this Government's success in fighting unemployment, especially among the young, and a further example of this Government's commitment to private entreprise.
Thanks to that program, the Petite-Nation area can take up the challenge of full employment and ensure its economic and social development. This is one of the best news the Papineauville area has received over the last decade, and this was made possible by a Conservative Government!



U410)   FARM CREDIT CORPORATION NEED FOR ADDITIONAL FUNDING

Mr. Maurice Foster (Algoma):: Mr. Speaker, last week a poll was made public which indicated that 33 per cent of grain farmers and cash-crop farmers are expecting to have to leave their land within two years. This is a devastating poll which was carried out across the country. It comes at a time when the Government has not taken any action to replace the financial security and position of the Farm Credit Corporation.
The Farm Credit Corporation went into a negative equity position of $124 million last April and the Government has failed to act for six months. How can the Farm Credit Corporation, which is designed to help Canadian farmers who are in financial difficulty, help them when in fact it has been allowed to go broke and no action has been taken by the Government for six months?



THE ECONOMY


Mr. John A. MacDougall (Timiskaming):: Mr. Speaker, since September, 1984, the Government has followed an economic renewal program that has shown great results across the country. The litany of successes includes the creation of
907,000	jobs with over 88 per cent of these full-time, an unemployment rate down from 11.7 per cent to 8.8 per cent, interest rates at their lowest in years, housing starts at their highest level in eight years, consumer spending and confidence up, and investors enjoying a return to a stable economic environment.
With our responsible policy of deficit reduction, Canadians have seen the deficit fall from a record $38.3 billion in the last year of the Liberal administration to $29.3 billion this fiscal
September 21, 1987

year. This will be the first consecutive three-year decline in the deficit in three decades.
Most important, our responsible fiscal policies have allowed the Government to protect better our existing levels of social programs and promote the Canadian standard of living for future generations. In short, the Government's actions have restored the confidence of Canadians and of the world in our economy.



DEPARTMENT OF EMPLOYMENT AND IMMIGRATION


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: Mr. Speaker, The Ottawa Citizen has reported today that whereas the Government acknowledges that, of 24 enforcement officers in the Toronto region, 10 have been removed over the past year or so, cutting the force to 14, the President of the Canada Employment and Immigration Union local estimates that there are hundreds of criminal immigrants who are going uninvestigated simply for lack of person-hours to do so.
The Government, the Minister or the administration have ordered another internal inquiry into the allegations that were made about mail openings and other problems raised with the post office, but this series of internal inquiries which the union calls witch-hunts will not solve the problem. It will not solve the problem because it allows senior management and regional management to cover up their mismanagement at the expense of any whistle-blowing employee, of whom two have already been fired in the Toronto region. They were fired because they asked to have clear instructions about their work and could not get clear instructions, or could not get instructions that complied with the laws they were supposed to carry out.
I call upon the Government to admit that it cannot solve this by cover-ups through internal departmental inquiries, and to appoint an independent inquiry into the allegations being made of mismanagement in the Toronto and Ontario region in the Canada Employment and Immigration Commission, particularly with respect to immigration.



FISHERIES


Mr. Dave Nickerson (Western Arctic):: Mr. Speaker, a few years ago the Canadian sealing industry was all but ruined by the activity of Greenpeace and similar organizations. Now,
Oral Questions
with the assistance of government, the northern sealers are striking back.
The National Research Council of Canada has helped to fund the Koomiut Co-op of Pelly Bay to study the use of seal oil as a furnace fuel. The test project would use 1,000 seals. Blubber will be rendered into fuel oil, skins will be used for leather, some meat will be used for human consumption, and all the waste products will be ground up for dog food. Take that, Greenpeace!



PRESENCE IN GALLERIES OF FORMER MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT

Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I am pleased to inform the House of the presence in the Galleries of Mr. Leonel Beaudoin, former Member for Richmond from 1968 to 1979.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Right Hon. John N. Turner (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, yesterday John Paul II fulfilled his own promise to our native peoples by visiting Fort Simpson. While he was there he urged upon all of us aboriginal self-government. I think parliamentarians ought to ask ourselves whether we will fulfil our own promise to our native peoples.
Will the Prime Minister agree to place self-government at the top of the agenda for future constitutional discussions as recommended by Liberal Members in our minority report? Will he agree to pursue the issue of self-government until it is achieved?


Right Hon. Brian Mulroney (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, at the most recent First Ministers' Conference I proposed an amendment which would have recognized the right of the aboriginal peoples of Canada to self-government. Not only did I propose it, I fought for it very actively at the First Ministers' Conference on aboriginal rights. I fought for it very actively, and it was almost achieved, in 1985 at the First Ministers' Conference.
It is very much a priority of the Government of the people of Canada. We will keep trying until such time as we have achieved this fundamental objective.

September 21, 1987
Oral Questions


MEECH LAKE ACCORD-REQUEST FOR AMENDMENT
John Napier Turner: Mr. Speaker, 1 find it difficult to understand why the issue of aboriginal self-government would have in any way impeded a constitutional accord.
Will the Prime Minister agree to ask his provincial counterparts to review and amend the Accord to reinstate, at the top of the agenda, the issue of aboriginal rights and self-government at all future constitutional conferences until the issue is disposed of, recognizing the inherent constitutional rights of our native people?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, I think it would be evident to anyone concerned about the well-being of the aboriginal peoples that one of the principal reasons for Canada's failure in this regard at federal-provincial conferences was the fact that Quebec was not part of that process. It is my judgment that had Quebec been there the results in 1985 and 1987 would have been clearly different.
One of the great benefits of the Meech Lake Accord, once it is completed and with Quebec at the table, will be to put the partners of Canada in a much better position to ensure that the aboriginal peoples finally secure that degree of justice to which they are entitled. That is another very important reason why I hope all Members will support the Meech Lake Accord.


ABORIGINAL PEOPLES-PROMOTION OF GOVERNMENT AND POLITICAL AUTONOMY-GOVERNMENT POSITION
John Napier Turner: Mr. Speaker, it is hard to understand how recognizing and putting back on the agenda the rights of our native people can threaten the Constitutional Accord. The native people cannot wait indefinitely.
Since the Prime Minister will be meeting the premiers in the coming weeks, could he not ask them to take this opportunity to promote native self-government and to provide our native people with the territory and the resources required to give real meaning to this initiative?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, for my part, the rights of the native people are still on the agenda. They have never been excluded from this agenda, despite the fact that we did not succeed at the last federal-provincial conference in meeting the basic requirements of the native people. One of the major reasons for this was the exclusion of Quebec in 1981. Quebec had a very impressive record as far as protecting the rights of the native people, but it was excluded from the constitutional process. One of the major components of the Meech Lake Accord would be to have Quebec rejoin the constitutional family, and its presence at the constitutional table would have a very positive impact on the future of the Canadian native people and their basic rights.
I therefore believe that even though I have stated publicly that, for my part and for the Government, the issue of our
native people remains on the agenda, we have a better chance of succeeding in meeting our fundamental objective if Quebec sits at the constitutional table.


CONSTITUTIONAL REFORM-SCHEDULING AND MECHANISM
Mr. Keith Penner (Cochrane-Superior):: Mr. Speaker, my question is also directed to the Prime Minister. As the Prime Minister knows, the aboriginal leaders of Canada have called for a renewed constitutional process. That process is to deal with treaty and aboriginal rights. The Pope, when he was in Fort Simpson, was very supportive of this demand. I want to add my gratitude to His Holiness for keeping his promise to return to Fort Simpson and for calling for dignity and equity for Canada's aboriginal peoples.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


B. Keith Penner: Is the Prime Minister prepared now to take steps immediately to develop, along with the aboriginal leaders, a schedule and a mechanism for completing the unfinished business of aboriginal constitutional reform? I am not asking for vague generalizations from the Prime Minister, but am asking for something very specific, that a schedule and mechanism be put in place immediately.


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, my intention to complete the unfinished business in regard to native peoples, who were left in a situation of neglect for more years than this country should even bear to mention, begins today with the tabling of the Meech Lake report. Its conclusion will provide for Quebec's return to the Constitution and that will have a very important beneficial effect on the capacity of Canada to deal fairly with the native peoples, as it ought to have dealt with them. I have made it very clear that my objective and the objective of my Government is that degree of justice for native peoples.
It happens that we inherited a situation which almost precluded that objective. Parliament is now in the process of redressing this injustice. I am satisfied that given Quebec's quite impressive record over many decades in dealing with its own native peoples, its presence at the constitutional table as a full partner will have a most beneficial effect in favour of justice on behalf of the native people.


FUNDING OF ABORIGINAL ORGANIZATIONS
B. Keith Penner: Mr. Speaker, let me try another specific question. The Prime Minister knows that funding to enable aboriginal organizations to pursue constitutional reform has been cut. Aboriginal leaders have called for a restoration of those moneys. Today the Constitutional Committee, which tabled its report, supports that request. Is the Prime Minister now prepared to restore this funding so that preparatory work for successful constitutional negotiations for aboriginal people may continue? Is he
September 21, 1987

prepared to make the announcement this week that the funding has been restored so that what he says he wants to accomplish can have a possibility of succeeding?


Hon. Bill McKnight (Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development):: Mr. Speaker, the commitment of this Government and that of the Prime Minister to making Canada whole again under the Constitution of Canada will always and continually reflect the needs of the aboriginal people of Canada.
I draw to the Hon. Member's attention that on August 6 the Prime Minister wrote the four aboriginal leaders in Canada. In his letter he said:
-once it is clear to me that conditions are conducive to a successful
aboriginal constitutional conference, I will not hesitate to convene First
Ministers for discussions around this issue.
We have had artificially imposed deadlines in the past which, unfortunately, did not lead to success. To impose another artificial deadline on something as important as aboriginal self-government in Canada at this time I think would be counter-productive.


PRINCIPLE OF SELF-GOVERNMENT FOR NATIVE PEOPLEHOLDING OF CONFERENCE-GOVERNMENT POSITION
Hon. Edward Broadbent (Oshawa):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Prime Minister. He stated he agrees with the principle of self-government for native people. All Parties here in the House endorse this concept. In this context the Prime Minister made a positive reference to Mr. Bourassa of the Quebec Government.
My question is quite simple. The Government of the Province of Quebec is very sympathetic concerning the needs of native people. All Parties here are in agreement. Would the Prime Minister be prepared to get in touch with Mr. Bourassa and the other premiers and convince them that a conference on this objective should be included in the Accord?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, the idea of a conference on such an objective is quite acceptable. I said so publicly. I even predicted after the failure of the last federal-provincial conference on native rights that, despite that failure, we would ultimately be successful in securing a degree of justice in favour of native people. That has already been done.
What is missing is an important player around the table, keeping in mind the political realities which prevailed. As a result of the intervention of First Ministers in Edmonton, we deemed appropriate to conclude the Meech Lake Accord which, I should think, will have a very beneficial impact on the
Oral Questions
lives of native peoples within a foreseeable future in Canada. I know I can count on the support of my hon. friend in this respect.


REQUEST FOR AMENDMENT OF MEECH LAKE ACCORD
John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, I totally agree with the Prime Minister's desire to have Quebec there. We all welcome that distinct possibility right now with the adoption of this Accord. I want to address my question to the Prime Minister in the context of assuming Quebec is going to be there. It is the one province that has already accepted the Accord.
Does the Prime Minister not think it is desirable to improve the Accord by adding a limited number of amendments that are consistent with it, particularly in this instance on the important question of the principle of self-government, including the idea of a commitment to a particular conference? Why can the Premier of Quebec and the other Premiers not be asked to initial and support this kind of limited amendment that is totally consistent with what they have already agreed?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, I do not think that is required. I have already stated on behalf of, I think, all parliamentarians, that there is going to be a conference. We are going to deal again with the absence of justice for our native peoples. I have made that very clear.


Mr. Tobin:: Justice delayed is justice denied.


An Hon. Member:: Where were you for the last 20 years?


Martin Brian Mulroney: I indicated, Mr. Speaker, that clearly we would want to try to create conditions as propitious as possible for success, to lend themselves to success on behalf of the native peoples. They have been let down too often in the past for us to try again without a reasonable assurance of success.
It is my judgment, and I may be wrong, that the native peoples of Canada stand an infinitely greater chance of success with the Confederation having been completed by Quebec being present at the constitutional table in their behalf. With Quebec there I think we can state with a good measure of conviction that at that point in time we can deal, probably successfully, with this historic and legitimate grievance on behalf of the native peoples of Canada. That would be my undertaking to the House of Commons.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!

September 21, 1987
Oral Questions CONSTITUTION


MEECH LAKE ACCORD-EQUALITY OF WOMEN
John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, in dealing with another area of concern I want to ask the Prime Minister the following question. Although it is certainly not my view that the distinct society clause in the Accord threatens sexual equality rights, or any other rights provided in the Charter, as the Prime Minister knows there have been expressed concerns to the contrary. Since out of an abundance of caution in other areas amendments were accepted, if I can put it this way, between Part A and Part B in the development of the Accord, will the Government consider appropriate wording for the same reason to help obliterate those concerns about the equality impact on women, in particular, that have been expressed?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, people will have to vote up or down on this, yea or nay, in favour of the Meech Lake Accord. It is our judgment, and it appears to be the judgment of the parliamentary committee, that the overwhelming weight of the evidence sustains the view that individual rights of this kind are not negatively impacted by the inclusion of the reference to distinct society. That is my view. That is the view of the Government.
I know that there are views at variance with this, and they have been respectfully considered by the parliamentary committee. As I understand it, it is the judgment of the parliamentary committee that in the national interest we ought to proceed and that fundamental assurances can be given as to the protection of those rights without any changes being made in the wording of the distinct society clause. We believe that one cannot have it both ways. One has to be for or one has to be against. But one cannot be on both sides of a fundamental issue.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


FISHERIES
Brian Vincent Tobin: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Prime Minister. This morning the Premier of Newfoundland telexed the Prime Minister asking him to confirm an allegation that Canada's chief negotiator in the Canada-France fish talks, Yves Fortier, held a secret meeting with French Prime Minister Jacques Chirac last week during the two days of negotiation in Paris. The Premier says that the Canadian negotiating team, including Newfoundland, was unaware of the secret meeting and unaware of the matters discussed during that meeting.
In light of last January's agreement between Canada and France signed behind Newfoundland's back, an agreement for which the Prime Minister's Government apologized, can the Prime Minister today absolutely assure the House that no secret meeting took place in Paris and that no secret deal has been made once again behind Newfoundland's back?


Hon. Thomas Siddon (Minister of Fisheries and Oceans):: Mr. Speaker, I can assure the Hon. Member that no such secret meeting, as he characterizes it, took place in Paris. There was a courtesy call, for lunch, I believe.
I might say that had members of the delegation from his province hung around they would have been told that such a meeting was occurring, as the other delegations were.


REQUEST THAT TALKS BE SUSPENDED
Brian Vincent Tobin: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary question is directed to the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. Is the Minister telling the House of Commons that the only meeting that took place was a lunch meeting with all the Canadian delegation present? Or is he denying that a private meeting occurred between Canada's negotiator and the Prime Minister of France? He knows that in light of the history of this Government's bungling of these talks, and in light of the history of its apology for one secret deal, no private meeting is acceptable to all members of the Canadian team. I ask him to confirm or deny that a private meeting took place.
If such a meeting took place I ask him to suspend Canada's chief negotiator and to suspend these talks until common ground can be found between the Government of Canada and all of the partners in ensuring a fair and equitable fish treaty between Canada and France.


Thomas Edward Siddon: Mr. Speaker, this line of reasoning is ludicrous coming from a member of the Party that created this problem in the first place, and who sat for years, along with his colleagues, and did nothing about it.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Brian Vincent Tobin: Answer the question!


Thomas Edward Siddon: Mr. Speaker, we sincerely regret the fact that the Premier of the Hon. Member's province has chosen to withdraw from this process.


Brian Vincent Tobin: Was there a meeting, yes or no?


Thomas Edward Siddon: We are trying to rectify a problem that results from 20 years of neglect and indecision on the part of the Government of which the Hon. Member was a part.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!
September 21, 1987


THE CONSTITUTION
Ms. Audrey McLaughlin (Yukon):: Mr. Speaker, my question is addressed to the Prime Minister. The Accord suggests, for the first time, that unanimity will be required for the establishment of new provinces, particularly in relation to the Yukon and the Northwest Territories. Given the obvious injustice of this and the comments found in the report of the committee, will the Prime Minister undertake to contact Premiers to work toward redressing this injustice?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, I do not have to contact the Premiers. I think that they are acquainted with my strong views and the views of my colleagues in regard to moving along, as quickly as is possible, the right to provincehood of the people of the territories. This is very much a front and centre issue with us. We want to work very carefully and closely with all the people involved in this regard.


FEDERAL, PROVINCIAL, AND TERRITORIAL CONSULTATION
Audrey Marlene McLaughlin: Mr. Speaker, given that the report of the Constitution Committee states that there will be considerable discussion with the provincial Legislatures and provincial Attorneys General, will the Prime Minister undertake to assure residents of the territories that equal consultation will take place with the Ministers of Justice and the territorial Legislatures to continue the constitutional review?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, the position of this Party and of this Government in regard to provincehood and legitimate rights for the Yukon and the Northwest Territories is well known. We believe that the Meech Lake Accord is another step along the road of nation-building which will ultimately and happily, we think, conclude with all Canadians being represented in this process, along with rights for native peoples. Only then will the Government be pleased with the process.
In regard to consultation, I would be delighted to give my hon. friend the assurance that the historic degree of consultation that I have undertaken as Prime Minister, and which my colleagues have undertaken, which has changed the atmosphere of federal-provincial relations from one of confrontation to one of genuine co-operation, shall be actively pursued and maintained with the Yukon and the Northwest Territories.


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


COST OF WELFARE FOR REFUGEE CLAIMANTS IN TORONTO
Mr. Alan Redway (York East):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Employment and Immigration. The Minister is aware that Metropolitan Toronto has asked the Government to pay at least a portion of the $1.5 million a year which it costs it to process welfare payments for refugee claimants. Bearing in mind the fact that refugees are a matter of federal rather than local jurisdiction, will the Minister assure the House that the Government will grant that request? Surely the Minister does not expect Canadians to foot these bills out of their property taxes.


Hon. Benoit Bouchard (Minister of Employment and Immigration):: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member asks a good question. It seems to outline some of the confusion that exists in Ontario with respect to what the Government of Canada has to support in terms of the cost for social welfare recipients, especially those who claim welfare. Some 50 per cent of the cost is paid by the federal Government, while the other 50 per cent is paid by the province. Any agreement between the provincial level and the municipal level has to be decided between both parties.
The federal Government does not have the right to interfere in a decision concerning the share of costs between municipalities and a provincial Government. Any complaint at that level has to be dealt with at the provincial level. The Canadian Government respects this commitment and pays 50 per cent of the cost.


CANADIAN SECURITY INTELLIGENCE SERVICE
Hon. Bob Kaplan (York Centre):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Solicitor General.
We all know that the RCMP and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service have deliberately been given overlapping mandates. It is the responsibility of the Minister to see that jurisdictional issues that arise between them are settled.
The other day the Minister told us that he had set up a liaison committee between the two services to end what he called "the state of confrontation" that existed during the time of his predecessor, the present Minister of National Defence.
Will the Minister tell the House if that committee has done any effective work? Have any issues been resolved between the two services? If so, what issues have been resolved? It is obvious that national security is threatened by the confrontation that continues to exist between the agencies.

September 21, 1987
Oral Questions


James Francis Kelleher: Mr. Speaker, let me say at the outset that never at any time did I accuse my predecessor, nor would I, of not having carried out his duties in a proper and efficient manner. Indeed, he did discharge his duties properly and efficiently.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Blackburn (Brant):: That's because he is not a lawyer.


James Francis Kelleher: Shortly after assuming office in July, 1986, I immediately had meetings with the then head of the RCMP and CSIS. I sat down and discussed liaison problems with them and the exchange of information.


An Hon. Member:: They weren't listening, Jim.


James Francis Kelleher: On August 14, by written direction, I set up liaison committees and liaison officers, which has gone a great length to eliminate and minimize problems between the two services.


GOVERNMENT POSITION
Robert Phillip Kaplan: How does the Minister then explain the problems in the service which continue to result from a lack of clarity on the part of the Government about what product it expects the Canadian Security Intelligence Service to deliver, and what assistance is it to receive from the RCMP in doing its job?


Mr. Beatty:: 1 guess it must be a problem left to us by you.


Robert Phillip Kaplan: You left it to us.


Mr. Rossi:: You stand up and answer. You know all about it.


James Francis Kelleher: Mr. Speaker, 1 can only repeat that in my opinion both services are carrying out their duties properly, efficiently, and are working together.


Derek Nigel Ernest Blackburn: Efficiently! Wait a minute.


James Francis Kelleher: If the Hon. Member has specific instances of non co-operation and non-liaison, then I would appreciate receiving them. I will attend to solving them immediately.


FISHERIES
Mr. John R. Rodriguez (Nickel Belt):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans.


Derek Nigel Ernest Blackburn: Good luck!


John R. Rodriguez: 1 am fishing.
I wish to quote some comments which were made in an emergency debate in this House on January 28 by the Minister responsible for Newfoundland in this Government's Cabinet:
It is our fishing industry, it is our life in Newfoundland the same as the
wheat fields are the life of Saskatchewan, or oil and gas might be the life of
Alberta. That is why the Government of Newfoundland and the industry and
union representatives should never have been left out of this last week.


Mr. Hees:: Louder, John, louder.


An Hon. Member:: Can't hear you, John.


John R. Rodriguez: Now, Mr. Speaker, I have their attention. Now they agree, and the Minister was right. The northern cod stock is vital to the life of the people of Newfoundland. It is an extension of the people of Newfoundland.
Therefore, my question to the Minister is this. How does he reconcile what government representatives have said in the House, and what the Prime Minister put out in the statement issued by the Minister of Transport with respect to the importance of northern cod stocks-how does he reconcile those statements with the give-away of the northern cod stocks to France to the detriment of the best interests of the people of Newfoundland?


Thomas Edward Siddon: regret the fact that the Hon. Member did not quote a particular statement in order that I might focus on the essence of his allegation.


John Edward Broadbent: He did.


Derek Nigel Ernest Blackburn: Are you deaf?


Thomas Edward Siddon: I can assure the Hon. Member that the Government, unlike either of the two Parties opposite, believes in sincerely seeking solutions to difficult problems, solutions which often require difficult and protracted discussions.
I can assure the Hon. Member that I am absolutely confident that when a package is arrived at, under the capable leadership of Yves Fortier, the result of that solution will be good for the people of Newfoundland and Labrador, the fishermen, and all whose interests are affected.


RESULT OF TALKS-PROVINCIAL AGREEMENT REQUESTED
John R. Rodriguez: In light of the fact that we have experienced Liberal Governments which negotiated away the natural resources of the provinces behind the backs of the Premiers of the provinces, this Government is doing it right in front of the eyes of the Government of Newfoundland.
My supplementary question to the Minister is this. In light of what the Minister has said, is he prepared to give an assurance to the House, and to the people of Newfoundland, that no agreement will be entered into between France and Canada with respect to fisheries off the East Coast of Canada
September 21, 1987

until the Government, the fishermen, and the industry in Newfoundland have given their agreement to it?


Thomas Edward Siddon: Mr. Speaker, I think that I hear the Hon. Member suggesting that one province should have a veto over a matter which is of such national importance as this.


John R. Rodriguez: You are giving it to them in the Meech Lake Accord.


Thomas Edward Siddon: I can assure the Hon. Member that in the spirit in which we have entered into continuing consultation with all affected parties, including my colleagues, the Atlantic Council of Fisheries Ministers, we are confident that the approach being taken here will prove to be acceptable to the fishermen-


John R. Rodriguez: You are washed up.


Thomas Edward Siddon: -and the people of Newfoundland and Labrador. It will end for all time an unhappy boundary dispute which must be resolved in this way, and in this way alone.


LITERACY
[Stage Direction]
Hon. Warren Allmand (Notre-Dame-de-Grace-Lachine
East): Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Employment. During the past two weeks we have had several reports indicating the critical state of illiteracy in Canada. There are over four million adults who are functionally illiterate. This represents 24 per cent of the Canadian population. Few of those people will continue to find work, or even qualify for training programs.
In these circumstances how can the Government be satisfied with a $1 million secretariat and a symposium as a solution to this serious problem? Is it not time, for the good of the country and these individuals, that we have a five-year national literacy program with set goals and adequate funding to reduce these shocking figures substantially?
Benoît Bouchard: Last week, Mr. Speaker, within the context of the Unemployment Insurance Act, I replied to my colleague the Hon. Member for Nickel Belt. Let us say first of all that the Secretary of State currently carries out a number of studies, but intends, together with the provinces, to develop a number of mechanisms in connection with this issue. Essentially, the people who are collecting unemployment insurance
Oral Questions
benefit overpayments are entitled, especially under Section 39, when the costs of these courses are paid-
[Editor's note: A child is crying in the Galleries]


An Hon. Member:: As they say, the truth comes out of the mouths of babes.


John Edward Broadbent: Even the child does not agree.


Mr. Nystrom:: There goes another disenchanted voter, Brian.


Mr. Speaker:: The Chair has no intention of fixing responsibility for that outcry.


Benoît Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, this is almost the same tune as I am used to hear from the other side.
But here is what I mean to say to my colleague. Under the Unemployment Insurance Act, there are mechanisms available to people taking training courses supervised by employment centres which entitle them to collect benefit payments, I think that my honourable friend will understand that, within the limits of the current legislation and funding, we are unable- we do wish we could, but we are prevented from doing so not because of a lack of will but because of the lack of available financial resources-to assume the overall financial responsa-bility for people already collecting unemployment insurance. The door would then be wide open to abuse, something, I am sure, my honourable friend would not want to happen.


GOVERNMENT POLICY
[Stage Direction]
Hon. Warren Allmand (Notre-Dame-de-Grace-Lachine
East): Considering the gravity and size of this problem, the measures announced by the Minister and the Secretary of State are not adequate. There is no sense of urgency.
On behalf of these over four million Canadians, I plead with the Minister to reconsider his answer and to think about a national literacy program to reduce this awful situation in Canada.
Benoît Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, that is what I have just said in my answer. Before putting together programs. . . You did it yourself for years but you failed, because of a total lack of consultation. My colleague, the Secretary of State, is in consultation with the provinces, and will set up mechanisms, but as for the employment's strategy, it will work, because we will take into account the provinces' opinions.

September 21, 1987
Oral Questions


AGRICULTURE
Mr. Vic Althouse (Humboldt-Lake Centre):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Prime Minister or his deputy. A recent poll of farmers confirmed that many farmers lacked confidence in their future, with 59 per cent seeing no improvement in their condition in the foreseeable future.
Since the poll confirms the prediction of FCC that between one-quarter and one-third of farmers will be squeezed out in the next few years, will the Government now acknowledge that it is contributing to this low confidence level by its continued refusal to make a solid and detailed commitment to deficiency payments in the coming year?


Hon. Pierre Blais (Minister of State (Agriculture)):: Mr. Speaker, I believe the Government and every Member in this House are aware that agriculture is going through a bad period internationally, and not only here in Canada. That recent poll has merely brought to light the importance, as it has indeed been done by the Prime Minister for over a year now, of impressing upon world powers the urgency of putting an end to the price war that seriously affects wheat producers not just here in Canada but elsewhere in the world. To that end, Mr. Speaker, I think the Canadian Government did everything it could do last year when it injected $1 billion, something absolutely unheard of, that is almost four times more in deficiency payments as had been done in the past. The Minister of Agriculture has been meeting with farm leaders during the last few weeks, and in this recent poll, as the Hon. Member has failed to mention it, the Minister of Agriculture is shown as being approved by 60 per cent of Canadians who wholeheartedly support the Minister of Agriculture's commitment to the interests of farmers.


SUBSIDIES ISSUE
Victor Fredrich (Vic) Althouse: Mr. Speaker, do the Minister and the Government not recognize that part of the very lack of confidence in the future of farmers was due to the Government's call, through the Prime Minister at the Venice Summit, for a subsidy-free world, at the very time when this generation of farmers is depending upon subsidies to get them through?


Pierre Blais: I think, Mr. Speaker, that since the Prime Minister's meetings with foreign leaders at the various summits, including the Tokyo and the Venice Summits, we have put agriculture on the agenda of the major powers. We are all conscious that this war must be scaled down. We are doing every possible effort, including in our negotiations with GATT. I think the interests
of Canadian farmers-farmers know that this Government is always there when farmers need it.


FARM CREDIT CORPORATION
Maurice Brydon Foster: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Prime Minister and concerns the serious situation in agriculture. We are seeing the greatest exodus of farmers from the land since the 1930s. A full 33 per cent of grain farmers and cash crop farmers expect to be off the land in two years.
The Government has allowed the Farm Credit Corporation, which is there to help farmers, to go into debt to the tune of $124 million for the last six months. How does the Prime Minister expect the Farm Credit Corporation to help farmers stay on the land when the Government itself has allowed the FCC to go broke?


Pierre Blais: Mr. Speaker, it is still somewhat amazing to hear such words coming from a Member of the previous Government under which interest rates hovered between 14 per cent, 15 per cent and 18 per cent, and which we have brought down to 10 per cent and 11 per cent. Those were very positive aspects for farmers. We also applied a program based on the costs of commodities, something which had never been done by the previous Government, and about which we consulted the Canadian people that helped thousands of Canadian farmers. We will continue monitoring that sector very closely with respect to interest rates. You may be assured of that!


FARM FORECLOSURES
Maurice Brydon Foster: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question. I would point out to the Minister that the Government has raised the FCC rate of interest twice this summer, at a time when farmers are in the worst financial crisis in years.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Maurice Brydon Foster: I would also point out that, according to the FCC's own report, the Government expects to seize the farms of 6,000 farmers, involving 2.2 million acres, over the next two years.
Why do the Minister and the Government not bring in programs to keep these farmers on the land rather than seize 2.2 million acres of land and thousands of farms over the next two years?
September 21, 1987

Why do they not take some action by bringing in some reforms and assistance to keep farmers on the land?


Pierre Blais: Mr. Speaker, I wish the Hon. Member would look at what we have been doing since we came to Government; he would see that we have set up a Farm Debt Review Committee, that we have kept interest rates under constant review and that they have been brought down significantly over the last three years-and you should be able to recognize that they were reduced to a significant point-this is a whole lot more than what you did when you were here, when interest rates were much higher.
We have no lessons to receive in that area, far from that. Concrete steps were taken.


AIR CANADA
William C. Winegard: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of State for Privatization and relates to my comments earlier in the day about Air Canada.
I should like to ask the Minister whether it is still her intention to privatize Air Canada. If the answer to that question is yes, as I hope it is, I should like to know if it is also her intention to ensure that the employees of Air Canada are given an opportunity to purchase a significant percentage of the shares?


Hon. Barbara McDougall (Minister of State (Privatization and Regulatory Affairs)):: Mr. Speaker, let me say that what I have said about Air Canada to date is that it is under serious review. I have not said that it is my intention to privatize it. I have said that it is under review. That review is continuing.
I might point out that it took Britain five years to get to a big privatization. We are moving much more quickly on ours. We have done 11.
However, in answer to the second part of the Hon. Member's question, let me say that the employees of Teleglobe and of FBI in Newfoundland, who are very happy shareholding employees, are a good example of the kind of thing we would want to do in the future.
Oral Questions


CANADA POST CORPORATION
Cyril Keeper: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister responsible for the Post Office.

Mr. Speaker, Canada Post has already started advertising for strike-breakers. In view of what happened during the last postal strike, has the Minister not learned that the hiring of strike-breakers probably will create violence on the picket lines? Has the time not come to act in a more civilized way and abandon this policy of hiring strike breakers?

Hon. Harvie Andre (Minister of Consumer and Corporate
Affairs): Mr. Speaker, my position on that is very similar to the position expressed by the Hon. Member's colleague, the Hon. Member for Yorkton-Melville, who said on June 18 of this year, when discussing whether to allow the Post Office to continue operating during a strike: "it is a very tough issue because you have two conflicting realities. The postal workers must be treated fairly and justly but other Canadians must continue to receive their mail".
That is a pretty good description of the situation. The position of the Government is very clear. The social responsibility of the Post Office is something we ask of management. We expect both sides to obey the law, and it is illegal, contrary perhaps to the position of the New Democratic Party, to use violence in pursuit of objectives in Canada.


Cyril Keeper: Mr. Speaker, I must say that I resent the implication that the NDP is advocating anything that is illegal.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Mr. Speaker:: The Hon. Member will put his question, keeping in mind the time.


GOVERNMENT RESPONSIBILITY
Cyril Keeper: Mr. Speaker, what I would like to know from the Minister is whether he and his Government are capable of learning from experience. Does he not think that a Government has more responsibility, a responsibility beyond condemning violence and, in fact, a responsibility to put in place policies that will avoid violence, that will ensure we can have negotiated settlements which people can understand? Does he not think that Canadian society has a measure of civilization and that we do not stoop to the level of-


Mr. Speaker:: The Hon. Minister.
Hon. Harvie Andre (Minister of Consumer and Corporate
Affairs): Somewhere in that tirade, Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member did say that we should seek a negotiated solution. On

September 21, 1987
Immigration Act, 1976
that point I am in absolute agreement. I can hear the Elon. Member. Will the Hon. Member be reasonable for a moment?
I would hope that both Parties will have an opportunity, based on the conciliation commissioner's report which we expect in the not too distant future, to find a negotiated settlement. In the meantime it does no good whatsoever and no good purpose is being served, either for the union or for the public, for the New Democratic Party to suggest that under the threat of violence one must capitulate and say that there is no alternative. That is wrong, bad policy, and the New Democratic Party knows it.


FISHERIES
John Napier Turner: Mr. Speaker, 1 have a question for the Minister of Fisheries following up on a question posed by a colleague from Newfoundland. Was there or was there not a private meeting between Maitre Yves Fortier, our chief negotiator in the fisheries dispute, with the Prime Minister of France, Jacques Chirac?


Thomas Edward Siddon: Mr. Speaker, I thought I answered that question when I responded to the Hon. Member's colleague.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


Thomas Edward Siddon: It is my understanding that Monsieur Fortier paid a courtesy call on the Prime Minister of France. It was an opportunity for lunch, as I understand it, and 1 don't know whatever general discussions but there was no element of those discussions which could be characterized as being secret. In fact, members of the delegation of all participating provinces and the industry who were present in Paris on Monday were fully advised as to the nature of that meeting.


NATURE OF DISCUSSION
John Napier Turner: Mr. Speaker, would the Minister be good enough to tell us what was discussed at that meeting if it was not the fishery? Why wasn't the rest of the delegation informed or invited? Why particularly was the delegation from Newfoundland not informed that there would be a private tete-a-tete between our chief negotiator and the Prime Minister of France?


Thomas Edward Siddon: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Right Hon. Leader of the Opposition why he and his Party and colleagues to his left are constantly looking for some negative sinister motive in everything that is done.
I would tell you, Mr. Speaker, and assure this House that anything discussed among the negotiators and with the benefit of the provincial and industrial representatives was discussed for the benefit of the fishermen and the people of Newfoundland and Atlantic Canada.


Mr. Speaker:: I regret that the following will be the last question. The Hon. Member for Scarborough West.


NORTH ATLANTIC TREATY ORGANIZATION
Reginald Francis Stackhouse: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Defence. Among the good news in recent days has been the possibility of an agreement to remove short and medium-range missiles from Europe, but the flipside of that welcome announcement is the effect on NATO's capability to deter Warsaw Pact aggression.
Will the Minister advise the House what consideration NATO members are giving to closing the conventional arms gap between the Warsaw Pact and NATO?


Henry Perrin Beatty: Mr. Speaker, as the Hon. Member points out, a very significant agreement was reached, one that was welcomed by all of those with interests in Europe and who want to see a long-term agreement to promote peace.
However, left untouched were a number of important areas, such as conventional imbalances between East and West where the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact maintain an advantage of two or three to one at the present time in chemical weapons and a range of other areas. We are hopeful that progress can be made in these areas, in addition to being able to reach deep cuts in terms of strategic weapons, which will leave the world a safer place.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of Bill C-55, an Act to amend the Immigration Act, 1976 and to amend other Acts in consequence thereof, as reported (with amendments) from a legislative committee, and Motion No. 11 (Mr. Marchi, p. 9119), Motion No. 13 (Mr. Heap, p. 9105), and Motion No. 14 (Mr. Marchi, p. 9105).
Mr. Speaker:: I would ask the co-operation of the House because it is my duty and obligation to make a final ruling on the groupings and admissibility of the various motions or, in
September 21, 1987

common parlance, on the amendments that have been brought before the House at report stage of Bill C-55.
I regret to advise that the ruling is fairly lengthy because of the great number of motions. Hon. Members have been extremely co-operative with the Table in assisting to bring about a ruling which not only upholds the procedural niceties but tries as much as possible to give to Hon. Members who are moving motions the maximum of free speech on these important matters.
I am now ready to make a final ruling on the motions on the Order Paper put forward in amendment to Bill C-55, an Act to amend the Immigration Act, 1976 and to amend other Acts in consequence thereof.
To recapitulate the debate so far, a division has been deferred on Motions Nos. 3, 4, 6, 7 and 9. Motions Nos. 5, 8 and 10 have been dropped by the Hon. Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap).
Motions Nos. 11,13 and 14 are now before the House. That grouping will be followed by debate on Motions Nos. 27, 29 and 34 which will be debated together but voted on separately.
Motion No. 12 was not selected as it is similar in substance to Motion No. 11. That was the situation at one o'clock today. Now to continue.
Motion No. 1 is similar to a motion moved in committee and ruled out of order in that it attempted to define the rule of the adjudicator by way of amending the interpretation clause which, of course, is contrary to our procedural practice. I concur in the decision of the committee chairman and must similarly rule this motion out of order. The Hon. Member is referred to Beauchesne's Fifth Edition, Citation 773(10). In addition, this motion is attempting to amend the parent Act, the present Immigration Act of 1976, by introducing definitions which are not in that original Act. As Speaker Lamou-reux said on June 11, 1970, it appears that the amendment seeks to go beyond this Bill to amend the Act itself. In other words, it has sought to make a change which would not only affect the Bill before us but as well the Act which the Bill itself seeks to amend. I regret to say that in most circumstances this motion and amendment cannot be accepted.
Motion No. 2 will not be selected as a similar motion was debated and negatived in committee. In this regard, I thank the committee member, the Hon. Member for Calgary West (Mr. Hawkes), for bringing this point to the attention of the Chair on Friday.
Motions Nos. 15, 16, 28 and 46 were debated and decided in committee. Consequently it is my view that they ought not under the circumstances to be selected or proposed to the House.
Motion No. 17 will be debated and voted upon separately.
Motions Nos. 18 and 21 will be debated together, with an affirmative vote on Motion No. 18 obviating the question being put on Motion No. 21. A negative vote on Motion No. 18 will require the question to be put on Motion No. 21.
Immigration Act, 1976
Motions Nos. 19 and 20 will not be selected for debate. A motion substantially the same as Motion No. 19 was disposed of in the legislative committee. Motion No. 20 is similar, and neither motion will be selected for debate.
Motions Nos. 22, 23, 24 and 30 deal with the concept of a safe third country and will be debated together but voted on separately.
Motions Nos. 25, 31, 32 and 33 will be grouped for debate but will be voted on separately. All of these motions deal with the concept of a credible basis for a refugee claim. After consultation, the Hon. Member for Spadina has agreed to drop Motions Nos. 26 and 36.
There will be a separate debate and vote on Motion No. 35.
Motion No. 37 standing in the name of the Hon. Member for Spadina and Motions Nos. 53, 57 and 70 standing in the name of the Minister sponsoring the Bill will be grouped for debate but voted on separately. Motion No. 69 will not be selected as its content is covered in Motion No. 70.
Motion No. 41 will not be selected as its content is covered in Motion No. 40 which will be debated and voted separately. Motions Nos. 43 and 44 will be grouped for debate but voted separately.
Motions Nos. 45, 47, 48 and 49 all deal with Clause 14 and will be grouped for debate but will be voted on separately.
Motion No. 50 will not be selected as it was debated and negatived in the legislative committee.
Motion No. 54 is similar to Motions Nos. 55 and 56. Thus Motion No. 54 will not be selected as it is the same as Motions Nos. 55 and 56 and was placed on the Notice Paper later. They will be debated together and a vote on Motion No. 55 will be applied to Motion No. 56.
Motion No. 58 standing in the name of the Hon. Member for York West (Mr. Marchi) is the first in a series of amendments which attempt to introduce a new concept into the Bill, a concept which was not contemplated in the Bill as read in this House a second time. When the Bill was last before the House, it provided for limits on the number of steps in the process of refugee determination. Here, however, the Hon. Member is attempting, through a series of amendments, to prolong this clearly limited process.
As all Hon. Members are aware, the consideration of a Bill at the report stage is now a more formal repetition of the committee stage with the rules of debate which are proper when the Speaker is in the chair being applied. According to Erskine May, Twentieth Edition, at page 549, the proceedings at report stage should not therefore amend the Bill in a manner destructive of the principle of the Bill.
The proposals calling for a definitive role for the Deputy Chairman of the Convention refugee determination division in the refugee determination process appears to the Chair to go beyond the principle of the Bill. It is clear from all of the

September 21, 1987
Immigration Act, 1976
authorities, Beauchesne, May and Bourinot, that amendments which attempt to go beyond the scope or principle of a Bill are out of order. I regret to have to inform the House that I cannot put Motion No. 58 to the House. 1 must add that there are 10 other motions attempting to reach the same or a similar object. Therefore, Motions Nos. 38, 39, 42, 51, 52, 62, 63, 64, 66, 71 and 72 are out of order and will not be put to the House for debate.
It might be helpful to Hon. Members and also to the public if the Chair made an observation here. The Chair is bound by procedural laws. It may very well be that Hon. Members or members of the public may think that certain amendments that have been put forward at report stage are of such substantive importance that they ought to be debated and put to the House. The position the Chair is in, of course, is that it is not for the Chair to rule on whether the purport of the amendment or its substance is worthy of debate. It is for the Chair to decide whether, within the procedural rules set for the admission of amendments at report stage, the amendment is procedurally acceptable.
The second thing I would like Hon. Members to consider, and I also say this for the benefit of the public, is that while the admission or otherwise of an amendment or a motion is bound by the procedural law and that is what the Chair must decide, the Chair also has a discretion in grouping the amendments for debate. That is a less exact science.
In this case, given the number of amendments and especially given the concerns of the spokespersons for Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition and the New Democratic Party, the Chair has tried to extend some particular latitude in trying to have a grouping which will enable Hon. Members to give as much time for debate, explanation and persuasion of those amendments as is appropriate. I think I must say that the Hon. Member for York West and the Hon. Member for Spadina have given exceptional courtesy and co-operation to the Chair in this regard.
Motions Nos. 59, 60 and 61 are dependent on or consequential to Motion No. 58 and therefore will not be put to the House.
Motions Nos. 65 and 67 will be debated together but voted on separately.
Motions Nos. 68, 73, 74, 75 and 77 will be debated and voted upon separately.
Motion No. 76 causes the Chair some procedural difficulty. The motion attempts in part to amend another Bill that is still susceptible to amendment in the legislative process. Bill C-58 was just last week referred to a legislative committee for review. It appears to the Chair that Part (c) of this motion goes too far in the way of amending Bills by amending a parent Act, the Act which is already on the statute books, and a Bill which has not yet been adopted by the House. Therefore, the Chair will only propose to the House parts (a) and (b) of Motion No. 76. The revised Motion No. 76 will be debated and voted on separately.
I hope the Hon. Minister of State (Mr. Lewis) will understand the difficulty the Chair has been in on this particular ruling. That motion is a motion that was brought in by the Government. On Friday last the Hon. Minister of State raised a point of order concerning the moving of amendments in committee. The thrust of his comments was that motions or amendments ought to be put while the committee is still sitting and if the opportunity to do so there is not taken, then the question of whether or not they should be accepted at report stage is one the Chair should consider.
I can say that the Standing Orders do not empower the Speaker to force Members to move amendments in committee. Nevertheless, the Minister is correct in that the Standing Orders do state in part:
The Speaker-will normally only select motions which were not or could not
be presented in committee.
I would hope Hon. Members would take note of that. As I say, there is nothing in the rules which absolutely forbids the moving of motions or amendments at report stage just because they were not necessarily moved at committee stage. The rules indicate that the practice of moving amendments or motions earlier in committee is preferable, but it is not an absolute rule. I thank the Hon. Minister of State for drawing this point to the attention of all Hon. Members.
On Friday last the Hon. Member for Edmonton-Strath-cona (Mr. Kilgour) raised the issue of Parliament pronouncing twice upon the same issue in the same Session. I have given careful consideration to the Hon. Member's comments. The Hon. Member was referring to Bills C-55 and C-84. Just to clarify for the benefit of all Hon. Members, let me quote Beauchesne's Citation 701(1):
There is nothing in the rules and no precedent to prevent the setting down of
more than one bill or motion dealing with the same subject.
While it is true that the House should not be called upon to decide the same question twice in the same Session, nothing prevents the House from dealing with the same Act more than once. It is a distinction which is perhaps a fine one but I hope that the Hon. Member for Edmonton-Strathcona will accept that the Chair has given the matter careful consideration. I thank the Hon. Member for raising the issue and for allowing the Chair the opportunity to clarify the matter.
I want to thank all Hon. Members who made themselves available for consultations. The House will now resume debate on Motion Nos. 11,13 and 14.


Frederick James (Jim) Hawkes: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I thank you for the thoroughness and completeness of your ruling. It will, I think, be very helpful to us.
Re-reading the motions, I find that in Motion No. 57 there is a Clause (b) which is substantially the same as the motion I moved, Motion No. 65. I would be quite happy to stand my proposed motion down in favour of Motion No. 57. It covers more topics but the wording is identical except for one word. It
September 21, 1987

is not a substantive change and it might make things go a little bit quicker if that were to happen.


Mr. Speaker:: I want to thank the Hon. Member for Calgary West (Mr. Hawkes). I will consider, shortly, what the Hon. Member has proposed and perhaps come back to the House in a few minutes. I want to look carefully at the motions referred to. I think Hon. Members will understand that the Chair, perhaps not the Table officers, and perhaps not even all Members, cannot remember the details of 77 motions off the top of the head. Considering the complexity, I know the Hon. Member would give the Chair several minutes at least to reflect on the suggestion.
The House will now resume debate on Motions Nos. 11,13 and 14.


Mrs. Sheila Finestone (Mount Royal):: Mr. Speaker, I rise to support the amendment presented by the Member for York West (Mr. Marchi) which I think is a fair and sensible recommendation. It considers the barriers to refugees being granted true access to a fair system of hearing in this country.
The danger we are facing, through a tightening of the screws, is that we will not permit legitimate refugees, who are coming here to seek a safe haven access to the system. Under this proposed streamlining we will require applicants to deal first with two people, an immigrant adjudicator and a member of the refugee board.
I think we are asking the member of the refugee board to take on a burden which is unfair to put on any human being, that is, to say yea or nay in a potentially life-threatening situation. The Government cites the independence of these gatekeepers. I think the refugee board should determine what kind of safeguards should be put in place for Canada. How much responsibility should rest on the shoulders of one person?
Canada has enjoyed growth and development, economically, socially, politically and culturally, because we were open and hospitable and accepted refugees who came to our shores and were able to grow and develop away from the lifestyle of terror which they fled. No one flees without good reason.
Canada has had a very proud record. We have shown compassion toward the plight of refugees seeking haven in Canada. Canada accepted 37,149 Hungarians in 1956-57, 11,943 Czechoslovakians in 1968-69, 7,069 Ugandans in 197273, 700 Cypriots in 1975, 9,000 Vietnamese in 1975-78, 9,000 Poles in 1982, and thousands of others from Iran, El Salvador, Lebanon, Sri Lanka and Guatemala since then.
Canada has taken in over 360,000 refugees since the 1950s with yearly quotas of about 12,000. In 1986 we admitted 12,146 government-sponsored refugees and 5,067 privately sponsored. In August, 1984, the refugee backlog was 11,538 cases. It grew to over 20,000 in May, 1986, and stands currently at approximately 23,000 cases. I recognize that that is why we are studying this situation.
Immigration Act, 1976
We were awarded the prestigious Nansen medal as a people who were open and receptive. We are now faced with a very difficult situation. I think it is a good idea to make changes, however, we must look intelligently at the amendments which are being moved.
When a refugee states that he desires to claim refugee status, who does the initial interview and says yea or nay to him? There are two people standing at the gatepost, acting independently of any refugee panel, saying that they can or cannot come in.
What are the restrictions? If there is any question, that is the end of the story. If he says that he has come from the United States he is immediately judged as having come from a safe third country. Are these safe third countries truly safe in all instances? Should we be demanding that another country take up our own responsibilities to these people? Are we responsible for the administration or a change of heart of a safe third country? I think that would be interfering with their right to manage. Who will determine whether a safe third country is still safe at the last moment?
I think the Cabinet has taken unto itself a very dangerous responsibility. It will make a list of countries to which claimants may be returned. It will seek the advice of the U.N. High Commission in drawing up that list. What will happen to these people whose lives are put in jeopardy if that list becomes outdated? I do not think this is what Canadian people want. It is not what refugees should expect and it is not what immigrants who came to this country and helped to build it think is right or fair.
I hope that we will give very serious consideration to a proper refugee system. There should be a first appeal to the refugee board on points of fact. The Federal Court should hear the appeals, not only on points of law but on points of fact. We will then have a truly fair and open hearing of the concerns of refugees who come to our shores. We must not only choose from the refugee camps those people whom we wish to integrate into our society. We must also be open to those who arrive on our shores and those who arrive on planes, trains and buses at our frontiers across the land. I urge the support of this amendment.


Benno Friesen: Madam Speaker, I would like to respond to a number of the representations which have been made. The Member for Winnipeg-Fort Garry (Mr. Axworthy) said that one of the things he has not been able to understand is that the Government would bring in a measure which contravenes-and	I emphasize the	word
"contravenes"

the Convention. I listened carefully to that because the representative of the United Nations Human Rights Commission was before the Committee.
Knowing that that charge had been levelled at the Government a number of times I asked Mr. Van der Veen the

September 21, 1987
Immigration Act, 1976
following question: "Do you contend that Bill C-55 contravenes the convention?" Mr. Van der Veen answered: "No, we do not". That is on page 4:70 of the committee proceedings held only two weeks ago. Yet the Member for Winnipeg-Fort Garry persists in circulating the notion that the Bill contravenes the Convention. I underscore the fact that the UNEIRC has said that it does not. It is pernicious for Members to keep circulating something which has been denied.
I will respond briefly to the quotations which the Member for Davenport (Mr. Caccia) read from the proceedings. They are accurate quotations and I have no objection to them except that they were all made before the amendments were introduced, and many passed, in committee. Therefore, while the quotations may have represented legitimate concerns of those organizations at the time-and I suspect some of them have a mind set such that they are still their concerns-I think the Member for Davenport would concede that the Government introduced substantial amendments in committee to deal with the kinds of concerns that some of those people raised at the time.
I recall the words of my friend, the Elon. Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap), who I agree worked very hard in committee. One of his principal concerns was the safe third country concept. That is another issue we addressed in committee. The Member for Spadina now says that the amendment is not adequate because we did not take a universal approach to the Convention. We introduced the concept of Article 33 of the Convention. That is the basic concern of people. It deals with the whole notion of refoulement or the danger that refugees might face if they were returned to another country which could then, in turn, bring them back to the country where their lives might be in danger. That is the notion with which Article 33 deals.
The Member for Spadina then asked about the whole universal application of the Convention because refugees who go back to Germany are not allowed to work, may not be allowed full access to the court system and do not have access to the social security system.
The principle in Section 48 concerns refoulement or the notion that one could be in danger of being sent back to the country where one fears persecution. It has nothing to do with these other concepts.
Last year, the Federal Republic of Germany had a budget allocation of $1.3 billion to take care of refugees in Germany. One hundred thousand refugees came to Germany last year. One witness came before the committee and complained because those refugees whom Germany was clothing, housing and feeding were not given the food from their own culture. I do not know if we are supposed to supply a menu, but that was the nature of the types of complaints. The fact that they were safe in Germany was not enough. They also wanted their own local menu from the country from which they came. That
would be nice if it were possible, but try that with several hundred thousand people.
I suggest to the Hon. Member for Spadina that the question is one of refoulement. Canada honours the entire Convention. Refugees in Canada are given opportunities to work. Refugees in Canada are given protection by the courts, and refugees in Canada are protected from refoulement. If they are not permitted to remain in Canada, when they are sent back to the country from which they came immediately prior to their entry to Canada they will be protected from being sent back to the country where they face persecution.
I say categorically that those Central Americans who live in the U.S. are protected under this Bill from being sent back to El Salvador or Guatemala. This Bill protects their security.
I hope Members opposite will accept the fact that while the Bill was in committee it was amended to make sure that the drafting itself would be so precise as to protect those who fear persecution.
Let me make one final point. I refer to the fifth report tabled by the Standing Committee on Labour, Employment and Immigration. It is Issue No. 46, page 46:7 where it states:
It should be noted that it is the policy of the UNHCR that the practice whereby refugees leave their country of protection and enter other countries irregularly to seek asylum should be deterred. The UNHCR has stated that refugees may be returned to a country which has previously protected them against refoulement and will allow them to remain under minimum recognized standards until a durable solution is found. Provided these conditions are met and due consideration has been given to Canada's policy of family reunification, the Committee believes that Canada should be allowed to return Convention refugees to countries which have previously protected them.
That statement was endorsed by the committee. The Member for Spadina and the Member for York West (Mr. Marchi) were on that committee. Having dealt with that issue, I hope they will now accept the thrust of the Bill and recognize that the amendment they have put forward under this motion contradicts the Bill and we cannot accept it.
Hon. Warren Allmand (Notre-Dame-de-Grace-Lachine
East): Madam Speaker, while we in the Liberal Party support this amendment and oppose this Bill, I want to make it clear again that we support action to weed out phoney refugees. That is why we have generally supported from the beginning the recommendations of the Plaut report and the recommendations of the Standing Committee on Labour, Employment and Immigration. Both those reports made recommendations to correct the abuses which now exist, but they also recommended strongly that we have a system that is fair, efficient and provides universal access to the refugee determination process.
Those recommendations that are contained in the Plaut report and in the Standing Committee report are not in this Bill. That is why we oppose the Bill, while supporting reasonable measures to weed out phoney refugees.
We do not support this Bill because it goes too far in many areas. In its attempt to set up a system to weed out phoney refugees it has put forward a preliminary hearing process. This
September 21, 1987

morning, I used the old term "safe country". It is no longer called a safe country, but amounts to the same thing. It is a slight improvement, as the Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap) pointed out, but it is still part of a preliminary process of selecting refugees before they get a full hearing on their application for refugee status.
The Bill as reported from the committee now states in Section 48.01(1):
A person who claims to be a Convention refugee is not eligible to have the
claim determined by the Refugee Division if
(b) the claimant came to Canada from a country-that has been prescribed as a country that complies with Article 33 of the Convention-
Several Members have pointed out that this wording is still vague. The Parliamentary Secretary seems to believe that it is satisfactory and will ensure that all legitimate applicants for refugee status will get through and have a full hearing. However, some people have suggested that such countries as Chile may be considered to be a country complying with Article 33 of the Convention. There could be others. There is no absolute process for ensuring the safety of people who would be returned to these countries.
The Liberal Party stands for universal access to a fair, efficient, effective method for determining refugee status, that is open to all those who feel they are refugees. Send them back if they are found to be phoney refugees after they go through that process, but it is unacceptable to have a preliminary process to weed out people before they have a full and fair hearing. That is why we have made this amendment. That is why we will persist in opposing this Bill as long as those provisions are in it.
The Plaut Commission was before the Government, I believe in late 1984 or early 1985. It goes back at least two years. Yet it took the Government until May 5 of this year to table this Bill. Even then, although the Government controls the business of the House, it did not put it forward for debate until a few days before the summer adjournment. Then it recalled us in the middle of summer to deal with the Bill because there was a so-called crisis on our shores. The Government has been derelict all along. Several Members on this side of the House-and I recall rising several times myself-asked the Government to proceed with the recommendations of the standing committee or with the Plaut report, but no action was taken month after month. Finally the Government produced the Bill and it did not even bother calling the Bill for debate.
On the basis of the landing of, I believe, 157 people on the shores of this country, the Government declared it a critical emergency and rush us all back to deal with this Bill and with Bill C-84, which we dealt with last week, because the matter had to be dealt with in an urgent way. But the Government had ignored the recommendations of the committee and the Plaut Commission over several years.
Immigration Act, 1976
The Hon. Member for Mount Royal (Mrs. Finestone) referred to some of the statistics. However, the numbers of refugees and immigrants coming to our shores in recent years are not large compared to those who came in past years. During the Hungarian revolution we had over 50,000 refugees, who have all now settled in this country and are making a grand contribution to it. Because of the situation in Czechoslovakia, in Uganda, and because of the Vietnam situation when the boat people arrived, a great many more people have come to this country, and those people have settled in and integrated into our society and, on the whole, are contributing very well. Of course, in all groups of people there are some who will perhaps break the law. However, they are a very small percentage of those who have come. These people who are the target of this Bill are no different from those who came in the past and were accepted by this country.
The subject was brought home to me this summer when I travelled to Israel and visited the Holocaust memorial. During my visit I learned again with great emphasis how several countries in the 1930s turned back boats of immigrants fleeing from Nazi Germany. These people were seeking refugee status to come to safe countries, but they were turned back. Of course, we learned after the war that many of those people were sent to the ovens and were annihilated.
Let us not put in place measures which could lead to the same situation. Let us make sure that this country, which won awards for its humanitarian refugee policies, allows those who apply for refugee status because they are fleeing from countries where there is political, religious and racial persecution at least to have a chance to demonstrate their case fully. If they cannot demonstrate their case, we can send them back, but at least we should give them a chance for a full and fair hearing.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Is the House ready for the question?


Some Hon. Members:: Question.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: The question is on Motion No. 11 standing in the name of the Hon. Member for York West (Mr. Marchi). Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Pursuant to the suggestion made by the Hon. Member for Windsor West (Mr. Gray) this morning, shall the Chair conclude that the recorded division shall be deferred?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: The next question is on Motion No. 13 standing in the name of the Hon. Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap).

September 21, 1987
Adjournment Debate
Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Shall the recorded division be deferred?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: As the Chair cannot presume the outcome of the deferred division on Motion No. 13, the question, of course, cannot be put at this time on Motion No. 14.
The Chair has examined a suggestion made earlier by the Hon. Member for Calgary West (Mr. Hawkes) with regard to Motion No. 65 standing in his name on the Notice Paper. Since the Hon. Member wishes not to proceed any further with Motion No. 65, it will, therefore, be dropped. Therefore, Motion No. 67 standing in the name of the Hon. Member for York West (Mr. Marchi) will be debated and voted on separately.
The next grouping of motions for debate will be Motions Nos. 27, 29 and 34.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: 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 York East (Mr. Redway)- Employment-Job creation in Toronto area; the Hon. Member for Burnaby (Mr. Robinson)-Canadian Security Intelligence Service-Indian Cabinet Minister-Knowledge of presence in Canada. Request for parliamentary inquiry; the Hon. Member for Ottawa-Vanier (Mr. Gauthier)-Official languages- Right to use official language of one's choice. Right to use official language everywhere in Canada-Opportunity to put pressure on Albertans.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of Bill C-55, an Act to amend the Immigration Act, 1976 and to amend other Acts in consequence thereof, as reported (with amendments) from a legislative committee.
The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: We will now proceed with the next grouping.


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: Motion No. 27
That Bill C-55, be amended in Clause 14 by striking out lines 12 to 17 at page 15.
Motion No. 29
That Bill C-55, be amended in Clause 14 by striking out lines 36 to 50 at page 15.


Fernand Jourdenais: Motion No. 34
That Bill C-55, be amended in Clause 14 by striking out lines 15 to 19 at page 16.


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: Madam Speaker, we have three motions here, Motions Nos. 27, 29 and 34, which have been grouped by the Speaker for debate. I wish to mention briefly what they are and then comment. In Motion No. 27 we call for deleting paragraphs on page 15 which were introduced by the Government during the last couple of days of the committee meeting. The first paragraph is actually a little ambiguous. It is the second two paragraphs I am moving to delete.
The first paragraph says that a claimant who is in the country solely for the purpose of joining a connecting flight to Canada shall not be considered as coming to Canada from that country. There is no logical objection to that clause but there is a hook in it, as I found after having more time to consider it. However, I shall not be opposing that clause because, taken in isolation, it seems useful and fair. The trouble is that we will not be able to take it in isolation, not with what is going on at Pearson Airport and the immigration proceedings there. It is subparagraph (b) that I propose to delete. It states:
(b) a claimant who comes to Canada from a country shall be considered as coming to Canada from that country whether or not the person was lawfully in that country.
Paragraph (4) states:
(4) For the purposes of paragraph (l)(b), where a person who has come to Canada in a vehicle seeks to come into Canada without a valid and subsisting passport or travel document issued to that person and claims to be a Convention refugee, the burden of proving that the person has not come to Canada from the country in which the vehicle last embarked passengers rests on that person.
What I am concerned about in the paragraphs that I have read is a person who has escaped from El Salvador from the death squads and the bombing of civilian villages by the air force that the American Government supplies, pays, arms and directs, and that person has escaped into the United States where it is possible, of course, sometimes to hide among the

September 21, 1987

lower-paid and usually not quite white-skinned population. However, the American Government has tightened up its laws and is chasing those people out. It has deported many thousands of them back to El Salvador where some have already been killed. Thus some of them try to come to Canada.
The Minister is busy trying to prevent them from coming to Canada. He does that in this way. First, he does so with the regulations which were brought in in February and, second, with this legislation. So when the Minister states, "a claimant who comes to Canada-shall be considered as coming to Canada from that country whether or not the person was lawfully in that country", he means that if the person was hiding in the United States he will be considered as coming from the United States. This is so regardless of the fact that the United States was not willing to give him any protection, did not know he was there and most likely would not have given him protection if it did know. That country now deports 98 per cent of the Salvadorans who claim refugee status. However, we will treat him as though he had been coming to Canada from the United States for the purpose of sending him back to the United States. That is the meaning of that clause.
The next clause in the Bill is similar. If he comes on a bus from the United States but says that he came across the United States as fast as he could from Mexico or Central America, then we will say, "Prove that you did not come to Canada from the United States". Of course, he will not be able to do that. In other words, he will be treated as if he came to Canada from the United States. We have never had a straight answer from the Government as to whether it will return Salvadorans to the United States under its present practices. The Government hints that it might not do that, but there has been no firm assurance that it will not do it. Those two paragraphs are judiciously worded so as not to make very plain what it is the Government is doing. But that will be the effect of them.
The first paragraph turns out to be not as good as appeared at first. Part of my reason for saying that is simply that it means that anyone who stayed in the country any longer than just to join a connecting flight to Canada by implication may be considered to have been living there in the sense that that is a safe country and he has protection. We would have a right to send him back there because we do not want to be bothered with him here. That is a fully valid possible interpretation of subparagraph (a).
It is reinforced by the information and the instructions that are being given to the immigration staff at Pearson Airport, and perhaps at other points in Canada. They are required to fill out a form with information from each refugee claimant arriving. They are asked what countries they have been to, and so on and so forth. The sixth question asks this question. "Did the claimant seek or receive the protection of any of the above countries?" At this point he will have already mentioned that he has been in this country and that country. He is then asked, "Okay, did you receive protection there?" The responses are yes, no, or unknown. There are four classes of answer as to
Immigration Act, 1976
what kind of protection they received. The first is refugee claim pending, which means that he made a claim and has not had an answer. The second is refugee claim rejected, which simply means that he made a claim but was turned down. The third is refugee claim accepted, which is obvious. He was accepted there but is leaving. The fourth is de facto protection. Therein lies the trap. It is a trap, and a very well planned one at that, by the same people who planned this legislation. They have issued instructions to staff in this regard. One of the instructions is printed on a mimeographed sheet distributed to the staff. It pertains to a section called "Third Countries- Protection", and refers to the question numbered 6 to which I referred. The document states:
6. Protection is defined as either the granting of de facto asylum or formal refugee status, whereby the claimant is not in danger of involuntary return to a country in which he or she has a well-founded fear of persecution.
If in effect he can be considered to have been allowed to be there, even though he was not officially and formally granted protection, then we will say that he has de facto protection. This is the Government's plan.
The final stage of it is contained in a copy that was made of a handwritten instruction in the immigration office at Pearson Airport. It is a handwritten instruction added to the mimeographed instructions. The handwritten instruction states, "deemed de facto protection if person admitted as visitor legally transiting en route even without visa through any country en route". So if he is legally transiting en route, he can be classified as having de facto protection. If he is classified as having de facto protection, then it is clear that the intent of the administration under this Government is to send him back there.
All we get a chance to debate in Parliament is the legislation. We do not get a chance to debate the regulations.


Benno Friesen: Yes, you do.


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: We do not get a chance to debate the instructions that are written with respect to interpreting regulations.
The Parliamentary Secretary says that we do get a chance to debate the regulations. He may be referring to the fact that if the committee is willing to meet to look at the regulations within the 30 days while they are Gazetted, then we get a chance to debate them in committee. That is not in Parliament. The fact is that these instructions to interpret the regulations are normally not even available to our eyes. But when somebody fortunately makes them available, we understand the weasely way that this law is intended to be used by those who framed it, that is to say, the task force on refugee determination that drafted the law steered it through Parliament and through committee with very selectively incomplete information to the opposition Parties.


Fernand Jourdenais: Madam Speaker, fair, fast and efficient are three words which scare me when I

September 21, 1987
Immigration Act, 1976
look at Bill C-55. Fair, 1 doubt; fast, yes, everybody will be turned back at our borders; efficient, a moot point about which I still entertain some doubts. I have been asking myself this question for three months: Do we accept, do we want to accept refugees, yes or no? Do we still want to be party to the Geneva convention, yes or no? If so let us change the system, let us switch to a faster, more effective and better system, but definitely not Bill C-55.
Of course, when I rise in the House to debate Bill C-55 I feel vibrations in the House, and I would hope no one is trying to influence me with these vibrations to make me change what I intend to say. I introduced amendments to this Bill. Had the decision been left to me alone, I would have scrapped Bill C-55. Had I been selected to sit on the legislative committee I would have worked very hard to change it, set it aside, have it reconsidered by the committee of the House. But we do have this Bill before us and we simply must amend it to make it fair, fast and efficient. I said last week, last Friday, that Bill C-55 now under study does not reflect the ideas expressed in the fifth report of the Standing Committee on Labour, Employment and Immigration. Above all I did not say it did not faithfully reflect the report, but that roughly 80 per cent of the ideas or suggestions expressed in the fifth report are not included in the Bill. For openers, the fifth report of the committee of the House does not say anything about a prescreening test. In addition, Section 45 prohibits the claimant from requesting refugee status at any time during his hearing before the adjudicator.
As I recall, it had also been suggested that a new division to be called the Refugee Division be created. Bill C-55 does this, but we have still kept a representative of the immigration services, an adjudicator who would have to rule before the claimant can present his arguments and explain why he claims refugee status. This claimant, who will probably be very nervous and afraid of being deported quickly or imprisoned, could forget to mention that he is claiming refugee status. If he does, after the investigation, he will no longer have the right to come back and say: Yes, I wish to claim refugee status, but for whatever reason, be it nervousness, fear or apprehension, I did not do so at the time of the hearing.
As I recall, the Fifth Report of the Committee suggested that there be two levels of selection. Last Friday, the former Chairman of the Committee on Labour, Employment and Immigration, the Hon. Member for Calgary West (Mr. Hawkes), who, I am sure, knows this report by heart, accused me of making erroneous statements. As he is very familiar with this report, I am certain, or at least I hope so, that when the Hon. Member said that the Hon. Member for La Prairie (Mr. Jourdenais) had made erroneous statements, he probably meant that I had simply omitted to say that Bill C-55 included at least 20 per cent to 25 per cent of the recommendations contained in the Fifth Report of the Committee. The report also recommended universal access, which is not included in
Bill C-55. Any claimant can present his case individually in person and will not be judged by an adjudicator, as I said earlier, but by a member of the new Refugee Division.
Bill C-55 was intended to be fair, fast, just, and efficient. [Translation]
"Efficient" is a very big word. Those who believe that this is possible are not living in the real world. This is indicated by the fact that there are 77 amendments at the third reading stage.
I am sorry, but I do not recall the term for the stage before third reading. There are 77 amendment motions, and over 300 non-profit organizations dealing directly or indirectly with refugees have indicated that they disagree completely with this Bill. Could they all be incompetents, Madam Speaker?
Many say that it is unconstitutional and I cannot help wondering and thinking especially when I know that the Canadian Bar Association says the same thing. And in spite of that, we continue to want to enact this Bill.

As you know, Madam Speaker, in my riding of La Prairie I was democratically elected. As a matter of fact, I was elected twice during the same election. It is a long story, and I do not wish to take the time that I have on debate to explain that to Members. Any time after the debate anyone may come and ask. I wish to tell my colleagues that I was elected to represent the people of Canada, of Quebec, and of my riding, and to take different positions following my conscience. That is the reason I am presently speaking.
In my riding there are more than 40 different nationalities. One-third of the population is non-French or English speaking. There are Greeks, Italians, Poles, Indian, Chinese, Egyptian, Vietnamese, and many more.
In my riding, I have never heard anyone who is Canadian-born say that those refugees in my riding are terrorists or not good for Canadian society.
I really enjoy people from the different cultures. Two weeks ago, without flying anywhere, I attended two different weddings. One was Indian and one was Chinese. How great it is to live in a riding where there are so many different cultures and heritages! It is good to learn from them and to speak to them, except when they talk about Bill C-55. Many of those people are refugees themselves, and they are afraid that some members of their family will not be able to join them, that because they ran away from their countries they will not be accepted here because there is no longer universal access.
Madam Speaker, has my time expired? I see that you are impatient.
Motion No. 34 is very simple. We must delete the text because it states that whoever will judge the refugee present
September 21, 1987

before him should take an example of people who were previously refused. I think you call it-
[ Translation]
In legal parlance, this means that the ruling would have to be based on the precedents.
I believe that Section 34 should be completely eliminated.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Before recognizing someone else, I simply want to say to the Hon. Member for La Prairie (Mr. Jourdenais) that 1 was not showing any impatience, but that 1 simply wanted to indicate to him that he had only 30 seconds left and that his allotted time was nearly expired.


James Douglas Manly: Madam Speaker, I am pleased to be able to speak briefly on Motion No. 29 which would delete the last few lines on page 15.
It is very important that we understand the process that is taking place here. We are attempting to take a bad Bill and perhaps make it less bad. It is a slow and painful process because Members on the government side are refusing to accept any positive change suggested at this report stage.
I was impressed when I heard the speech of the Hon. Member for La Prairie (Mr. Jourdenais). In the last two years the Hon. Member has spent a great deal of time looking at this subject. As a result of having spent that time, he has reached certain convictions and ideas that he feels are absolutely essential to the process. Yet the Government absolutely refuses to pay attention to the types of things recommended by the Hon. Member and the committee which he chaired.
I know that the Hon. Member is not alone in the Conservative caucus and that there are other people who think as he does. 1 just wish that there were other Members who had the gumption to get up and speak as he does; then perhaps we would see some real change and movement on this particular Bill.
We are concerned with the fact that this clause allows the Government to say that a claimant who comes to Canada from another country shall be considered as coming to Canada from that country, whether or not the person was lawfully in that country.
This means that the Government can return somebody to a third country as being a safe third country, even if the person has no right to stay in that country. What a travesty that is for a refugee policy!
A few weeks ago I spoke with an American worker who works with refugees in that country. She said that in the area where she worked a great many families were involved in giving some refuge or some sanctuary to people from Central America who did not have legal standing in the United States. The United States is very restrictive in terms of the kinds of
Immigration Act, 1976
people to whom it will give refugee status. If one comes from El Salvador, for example, one can forget it. She is working with a number of American families who are involved in providing sanctuary, yet changes in American law introduced in the last few months impose very severe penalties upon anybody who has someone living in his home or who gives work to someone who does not have legal status in the United States.
These people had a natural desire to come to Canada, and this refugee worker was helping some of them do so. Canada's refugee policy should be open to them, at least to give them a hearing. Many of them, not all of them, were genuine refugees. As all Hon. Members acknowledge, we need to eliminate the abuses and to speed up the process. We agree with that, but we must have an open system so that genuine refugees can come here and get a hearing.
With the law as we see it today, we are saying that we will return such people to countries like the United States even if they have absolutely no standing in the United States, even if they are not legally allowed to remain in the United States. However, we claim that by doing that we are complying with international covenants. That is a sham.
Canadians who are genuinely concerned about the refugee policy can only be ashamed that the Government is taking such action. On that basis, I simply appeal again to government Members to consider the example of the Hon. Member for La Prairie, to consider the rather silent voices of other Conservative Members who have very serious reservations about this legislation, and to support this amendment. At least let us try to make a bad Bill a little less bad.


Frederick James (Jim) Hawkes: Madam Speaker, 1 should like to deal with two or three issues raised in the debate and then with the motions.
The Hon. Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap) read from a handwritten note-I think that was the characterization of it-from the Department. Maybe it is time in this country that the attempt, for example, to take handwritten notes from one union member to another union member and characterize them as government policy was exposed by members of the Press Gallery. Surely, with 27,000 employees in a Department, the Minister cannot be held accountable for a handwritten note which goes from one employee to another. To bring it up in this Chamber in that fashion is a bit of sophistry, and 1 think it should be laid bare for what it is. It simply cannot go on.
When unions choose to join a particular Party and, internal to their functioning on the job, to write each other notes, the Government cannot and should not be held accountable by this Chamber or by the press of the country.
I come to the Hon. Member for La Prairie (Mr. Jourdenais). In my intervention last week I indicated that I thought upon further examination that he might not want to

September 21, 1987
Immigration Act, 1976
continue to reinforce some of the statements he made during his intervention on Friday. 1 see that I was mistaken. He brought to our attention today his deeply held conviction that the fifth report of the standing committee is not incorporated in Bill C-55.
I went over it again on the weekend and find in it time after time after time recommendations of the committee, or in some cases Rabbi Plaut's recommendations, over those of the committee. Bill C-55 is built upon the Plaut report and the committee's report.
For people to stand up in this House and say that anybody in need of protection will not have access to this system, is either to try to deceive Canadian people or to demonstrate that they have not read the Bill. It is either a deliberate attempt to deceive or to show that they have not read the Bill.
An inquiry starts with the need to determine whether or not persons are admissible to Canada. If their desire to be admitted to this country is on the basis that they are Convention refugees, they say it; that is the reason; they have counsel; and the hearing must be adjourned until the refugee board is brought into the hearing. That is universal access. Anybody who claims to be a Convention refugee has his or her case dealt with by a refugee board member.
There are conditions of eligibility. If the Hon. Member from the New Democratic Party who just spoke had been in committee and had heard the witnesses whom the committee brought from New York to tell us about world-wide conditions and American conditions, he would have seen the piece of paper, which is an exhibit before the committee, that laid out the legal situation for anybody in the United States of America whom the Government of that country was trying to send back to his or her country of origin.
Those of us on the committee who are familiar with the current Canadian condition reached the conclusion that the American condition might even be more complex, longer lasting, with more loopholes for a clever lawyer to exploit. It is not an easy thing to remove somebody from the United States of America.
They have had a Charter of Rights for a lot longer than this country has had, embedded in their Constitution. They have legal processes. They are at least of the kind of quality which exists in our mosaic. Their Charter requires it, their system of government requires it, and people have it.
To stand in this Chamber time after time and say that the only country in the world which gives these rights, these protections, these legal safeguards, to refugee claimants is Canada is nonsense. People should spend a little more time at organizations like the United Nations to see what other countries do-to see what Scandinavian countries do and to see what France does.
France is viewed world-wide as a country with, in many ways, the best protection for refugees. It takes people whom I am sure this Parliament and this country would not want.
They took Duvalier from Haiti. I am sure there would have been quite an outcry in this Chamber and this country if we had tried to bring Duvalier here.
The Hon. Member for La Prairie seemed to be bothered by my remarks the other day. He and I were in discord in the month of May. I was in discord with members of the committee about some things on which I felt I was right and on which committee members were wrong. Committee members voted to uphold the point of view expressed by the Hon. Member for La Prairie, and I resigned the chairmanship of the committee so that I could speak in this Chamber as an individual on things that I believe in.
I believe the Member from La Prairie inside and outside of the Chamber comes dangerously close to expressing his personal opinions as if they were the opinions of the committee. I think a careful examination of the opinions of committee members would reveal that they are not, that, in the majority, members on the standing committee are clearly supportive of Bill C-55 because it is designed to get the job done.
We are dealing with Motions No. 27, 29 and 34. Motion No. 27 suggested by the Hon. Member for Spadina would create the following situation if Members were to approve it. No departure notice or removal order can be issued in this country without a refugee board member and an adjudicator. The removal of that clause would encourage everybody who had been given a deportation order to disappear for a few hours, days or weeks. In other words, do not obey the removal order. All of a sudden a person would have the right of reentry into the refugee system. Is that what we want? These people would have been through an inquiry and an actual determination hearing if there was credibility to their claims. Simply by disappearing upon the issuance of a removal order a person would have the right of re-entry. That is what Motion No. 27 is all about. I suggest that we should defeat it and defeat it resoundingly.
Let us go now to Motion No. 29. There is a slight practical problem with the suggestion that we eliminate the words which the Member requests. Actually quite a few lines are involved. Thirty-seven million visitors come into this country annually. In the absence of these words we would be saying to our civil servants, when people destroy all their documentation, papers, airline tickets and everything else, that they, the civil servants, will have an obligation to prove where the people came from. The situation is absurd. People do not come without tickets, and to prove where they came from they simply have to submit their ticket. If people choose to destroy their tickets, are these the refugees about whom we are concerned or are they bogus claimants, people who are trying to abuse our generosity? The words must stay as they are. We cannot transfer the obligation to trace the history of 37 million visitors a year to a few civil servants at border points.
September 21, 1987

Now we come to Motion No. 34 suggested by the Hon. Member for La Prairie. That motion lays an obligation on the Crown, the adjudicator and a refugee board member to make sure that entered into the record before making a decision on credibility are the facts of the refugee board's hearings. If we find that 10 per cent of the people who make a claim from a certain country are refugees or 80 per cent, 2 per cent or 90 per cent, that percentage must be entered on the record before a decision is made, and one must conclude that the requirement to put that on the record is in the interest of the true refugees. We have had close to 8,000 claimants from three countries which do not produce refugees, 3,500 from Portugal. That fact should be on the record to deter abuse. We do have refugees from Guatemala, El Salvador and Afghanistan. That factor should be on the record to protect the legitimate refugees and to make sure that their claims go forward to a full oral hearing.
The presentation of that evidence lies at the heart of the ability of the adjudicator and the refugee board member to discriminate between those who might be refugees and those who clearly abuse the system. The thrust of the amendments with which we have dealt up to this point are to provide bonuses to abusers. Nothing that has been suggested has very much to do with the protection of legitimate refugees. It enables people to abuse the system better over a long period of time. I recommend that the House vote against all three amendments.


Mr. Don Boudria (Glengarry-Prescott-Russell):: Madam Speaker, I had the pleasure of listening to the remarks made by the Hon. Member for Calgary West (Mr. Hawkes) which provoked me not only to speak at this point but also to research just what the Member had contributed in the past toward committee reports and other such reports on issues involving refugees. I came across Issue No. 46 of the Standing Committee on Labour, Employment and Immigration, minutes and proceedings of evidence before the standing committee, and I have here the fifth report which is included in that document in which there are four recommendations.
It is my duty to bring to your attention, Madam Speaker, that the Hon. Member for Calgary West just happened to be the Chairman of the committee at that time. Today we hear the harsh criticism by that member on the beliefs of the Hon. Member for La Prairie (Mr. Jourdenais), who just happened to take away the job of chairman of the committee from the Member for Calgary West. I am sure though that that has nothing to do with the criticism we are hearing today. Having said that it has nothing to do with it-and you would not want me to suspect otherwise, I never would in any case being the non-partisan individual that I am-I want to put on the record some of the recommendations from the fifth report of the standing committee. First:
1.	It is the Committee's strongly-held conviction that Canadians do not
want people sent back to countries where they may be persecuted.
Immigration Act, 1976
Remember who was chairing that committee, Madam Speaker. It was the Member for Calgary West. As far as I can see, that was a unanimous report. The Member for Calgary West certainly did not vote against that recommendation. Let me come to recommendation No. 2 which reads:
2.	Every person in Canada who wishes to claim that he or she is a Convention refugee should have an unqualified-
Note the word "unqualified".
-right of access to a formal process that will adjudicate the claim.
It goes on:
3.	All Convention refugee claimants should have their case decided at a non-adversarial oral hearing.
4.	The decision-maker in the formal process shall have the power, in addition to declaring an individual to be a Convention refugee, to recommend to the Minister that specific individuals who are not within the strict definition of Convention refugee, nevertheless should be considered for landing on compassionate and humanitarian grounds.
Obviously the Member for La Prairie was inspired by the excellent chairmanship provided at the time the fifth report was tabled in this House. As a matter of fact, I would say the Member for Calgary West was the mentor of the Member for La Prairie, who brought these excellent recommendations to us today by way of his amendment.
But what has happened to change the heart and mind of the Member for Calgary West, who himself had such excellent views in the past as we see reflected today in the motion of the junior Member of the House, the new Member for La Prairie, who listened attentively to his former Chairman and learned all those things so well, so well that he brought them to the attention of this House by way of a recommendation? I wonder about that. However, I believe that it has nothing to do with the fact that the Hon. Member for La Prairie took away the job of the Hon. Member for Calgary West when he took over as Chairman. I would never suspect that. Far be it from me to even suggest something like that. I know that the Hon. Member for La Prairie's name was taken in vain today on several occasions by the Hon. Member for Calgary West, obviously for reasons other than the unlikely one I have suggested.
I want to congratulate the Hon. Member for Calgary West for the views he held when this report was tabled in the House some time ago. I cannot help but wonder what caused him to change his mind and his convictions.
I am glad that someone still believes those strongly held views formerly held by the Hon. Member for Calgary West. That person is the Hon. Member for La Prairie who was inspired by the positive views the Hon. Member for Calgary West held in the past. I hope that some day, the Hon. Member for Calgary West, under the excellent chairmanship of the Hon. Member for La Prairie, can once again relearn what he knew so well from the person to whom he taught it in the first place.

September 21, 1987
Immigration Act, 1976


Sergio Marchi: Madam Speaker, it is always difficult to follow a speaker of such eloquence as is the Hon. Member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell (Mr. Boudria), but I will try nonetheless.
I would like to direct my attention to two motions, Motion No. 29 presented by the Hon. Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap) and Motion No. 34 presented by the Hon. Member for La Prairie (Mr. Jourdenais), who is the Chairman of the Standing Committee on Labour, Employment and Immigration. Both motions are very important. They deal with the very concern we all have about Bill C-55.
Motion No. 29 proposes to delete a paragraph that would suggest that a claimant who comes to Canada from a country shall be considered as coming to Canada from that country whether or not the person was lawfully in that country. That paragraph is used to define who cannot be considered for a claim under the refugee board and to define what a safe country means.
It is a very crucial paragraph because, essentially, it says that if a person comes from a country that supports and respects Article 33 of the Convention, the non-refoulement article, then for the purposes of this Bill, even though that person may not have enjoyed any kind of status while coming through that safe country, he will nonetheless be deemed to have resided in that country. That will formulate the basis for calling that country a safe country.
Unless we delete that paragraph, Canada and Parliament will be condoning the sending of individuals into orbit. We would not be taking our responsibilities seriously. Rather than ensuring that an individual would not go to a country where he could face persecution, we would be sending him to such a country if that person did not enjoy status in the country to which we returned him. That country will obviously not respect any claims made by an individual who does not have status and could as well send that person into orbit.
That paragraph undermines one of the two commitments we made under the Geneva Convention. First we are committed to seeking individuals from refugee camps in order to allow them to resettle. The second commitment is not to send back to a country a person who may eventually face persecution in that country.
Either the Government supports its commitments under the Geneva Convention or it does not. If it does not support them, let the Government say so loudly and clearly. Let it use the front door rather than some clauses hidden in the bosom of Bill C-55 to undermine the very Convention we signed in the 1950s.
A country does not show leadership when it tolerates and promotes the sending of individuals into orbit and the passing of the buck to another country. An officer at the border may ask a person from which country he came last, and if the person says he came from the United States, without batting an eyelash, the officer will send him back to the United States.
This will occur without even determining whether or not it is safe for an El Salvadoran to go back to the United States, given the number of refugee claimants who get deported from the United States back to that Central American country.
If the Government wishes to implement a safe country concept, then let it determine what "safe country" means. Let us have guarantees with those countries, as the Minister of State for Immigration (Mr. Weiner) mentioned repeatedly in the House during Question Period. If we are not prepared to determine what "safe" means, then I do not think we should legislate a safe country concept.
Motion No. 34 presented by the Hon. Member for La Prairie is also significant. The motion proposes to delete the paragraph which reads as follows:
(b)	the disposition under this Act or the regulations of claims to be Convention refugees made by other persons who alleged fear of persecution in that country,
That paragraph will allow officers to make a determination based on the experiences of other individuals from the same country. Again, that is a complete shift from looking at individual circumstances in favour of looking at generalities. I do not know what other piece of legislation operates in that way.
Disability claims and workers' compensation claims do not generalize based upon the class of worker or the community from which an individual comes. There is no suggestion that if a person is of Italian background and lives West of Yonge Street, we can generalize about what kind of claim he will present. There is no suggestion that if an individual comes from a certain cultural background, he will have a certain bias toward one thing or another because seven out of 10 previous cases told us that. We do not judge an individual's claim, whether it be for workers' compensation or disability benefits, on the collective claims from particular communities, so why should we do it in this legislation?
No one is suggesting that we are in favour of illegitimate claims. We are all in favour of deterring those who want to run around our regulations, but it would be highly discriminatory to give authority and powers to two officers to make a judgment on an individual claim based on someone else's story. If an individual from Uganda once made a frivolous claim and then another Ugandan came to make a refugee claim, why should his claim be marred by the previous one simply because both claimants came from the same country? I think it is very dangerous to have in the heart of our legislation a paragraph providing that previous claims can somehow affect the outcome of an individual's claim. That is not the basis of the Geneva Convention. The Geneva Convention is clearly founded on the merits of individual circumstances. That is why we will have a refugee board. If we planned to allow collective accounts to determine individual claims, we would have no need for a refugee board.
September 21, 1987

I suggest it would be very prudent for us to pay close attention to these three amendments, particularly Motions Nos. 29 and 34 which speak to the commitment which we have as a nation to the Geneva Convention. I do not think we would be very well advised to move away from those commitments and support the orbiting of individuals as though they were pinballs in a pinball machine. No one wants to go through life that way. No one appreciates being bandied about, unable to find a home.
As a privileged society we have a responsibility to ensure that these people do not become the pinballs of the international community. If we play pinball with refugees, the problem will not go away. We will not make life easier in our country for coming generations. The problem is an international one and the solution, therefore, is also an international one. If we play pinball with refugees, in the year 2000 the Member of Parliament for York West will still be dealing with this unsolved problem.
Let us take this opportunity, keep in mind the international commitment under the Geneva Convention, and do what ought to be done. Let us give leadership to other countries. Let us not send the message to other countries that Canada has enacted Bill C-55, thereby giving them cause to say that if Canada did it they can do it. If they do it as well, we will have an international corridor of locked doors, all sending refugees to the next door down the hall where they will receive the very same response. At the end of the corridor will be one hell of a frustrated and desperate human being who will resort to anything to save his or her life and who will give more business to the immoral immigration consultants who wish to reap immoral profits from human desperation.
Let us hold our heads up high. If the Government wants to break the Geneva Convention, let it do so in a courageous way rather than through the back door.


Mr. Steven W. Langdon (Essex-Windsor):: Madam Speaker, it has been a long time since I have had a sense of uncertainty and unhappiness in speaking in the House of Commons. I still cannot believe that the Government is going to do what it intends to do. Over the past three years I have come to know that the members of the Government are, for the most part, honourable Members of this House committed to thinking issues through and considering them with rationality.
I cannot believe that those same Members are pushing through the House of Commons a major and fundamental change in the way in which our country will treat some of the poorest and most unfortunate people in the world. They are pushing it through with no deference to the many people who would have liked to have made contributions to the committee discussions but were told that these measures had to be rushed through because we were dealing with a national emergency brought upon us by 174 Sikhs.
Immigration Act, 1976
There will be a reckoning in the country for what the Government is doing. That can be foreseen in the words of the woman from Nova Scotia quoted in the Globe and Mail this morning who said that they decided that they would make peanut butter sandwiches and try to act like human beings. That is what the House of Commons, in one of the most fortunate, richest, and largest country in the world, should be doing. We should be looking at the desperate plight of people throughout the world. Instead of trying to create a very difficult system for refugees to penetrate, we should be looking at the circumstances which face people throughout this world and exercising charity, humanity and openness.
I can tell Members of this House about things I have seen in this world. I have seen refugee camps in Somalia where people are forced to eke out a bare subsistence for families far larger than the average family in this country on an acre and a half of land. I could talk about the plains of Nepal where people have been forced onto the most difficult agricultural lands imaginable to try to provide for themselves the barest necessities. I could talk of people throughout the countries of western Africa who live in a claustrophobic closeness which makes it almost impossible for them to get the barest of necessities. I could talk about people in the Kisumu area of Kenya where the average land holding of a family of 20 is two to three hectares. It is no wonder that throughout the world people are trying to better their lives, just as my ancestors tried to find a part of the world for themselves where they could see a future rather than nothing but desperation.
One could talk about Ethiopia and Namibia and what has been created there by government oppression. One could talk about the devastation created by South Africans in southern Angola.
The point is that ours is a country of tremendous opportunity and potential. We should be welcoming many of the people in the world who are facing the kind of desperation which we can barely imagine. It is the kind of desperation which we saw in Ethiopia and which made my constituents weep and help to send boatloads of grain to those refugees. The spirit of this country is not reflected by the miserly, Scrooge-like attitude brought to the House by the Government.
Rather, one sees in this country a tremendous generosity of spirit in the ordinary person. It is a generosity of spirit which leads us to give great contributions to development, to missionary efforts and to provision of food whenever there is disaster in any part of the world. That is the real Canada. That is the Canada which the Government has forgotten to the point where it is lost in a fog that leads to this kind of legislation, which proposes tricky, sneaky and nasty ways of keeping people out of this country.
At the very least, these people should have a chance to apply to a refugee determination board. At the very least, those who

September 21, 1987
Immigration Act, 1976
have made their way to this country should have a chance for a fair hearing which this country has traditionally offered refugees. Yet the clauses which my colleagues seek to amend do not provide that fairness. I urge the House, at least in these small areas, to show some of that generosity of spirit and sense of fairness which exists among the real people of Canada.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Is the House ready for the question?


Some Hon. Members:: Question.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: The question is on Motion No. 27 standing in the name of the Hon. Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap). Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: All those in favour of the motion please say yea.


Some Hon. Members:: Yea.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: All those opposed please say nay.


Some Hon. Members:: Nay.


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


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Pursuant to Standing Order 114(11), the recorded division on the proposed motion stands deferred.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: The question is on Motion No. 29 standing in the name of the Hon. Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap). Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: All those in favour of the motion please say yea.


Some Hon. Members:: Yea.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: All those opposed please say nay.


Some Hon. Members:: Nay.


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


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Pursuant to Standing Order 114(11), the record division on the proposed motion stands deferred.

The question is on Motion No. 34 in the name of the Hon. Member for La Prairie (Mr. Jourdenais). Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt this motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some Hon. Members:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Shall the recorded division be deferred?


Some Hon. Members:: Yes.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Agreed.

The next motion is Motion No. 17.


Hon. Frank Oberle (for Mr. Weiner) moved:: Motion No. 17:
That Bill C-55, be amended in Clause 14
(a)	by striking out line 19 at page 14 and substituting the following therefor:
"(b) in the case of a claimant who is the subject of an inquiry caused pursuant to paragraph 23(3)(c), the claimant came to Canada from"
(b)	by striking out lines 19 to 24 at page 17 and substituting the following therefor:
"48.03(1) Where a removal order is made against a claimant who has been determined not to be eligible to have a claim determined by the Refugee Division on the basis that the claimant is a person described in paragraph 48.01(b), but"
(c)	by striking out lines 19 and 20 at page 20 and substituting the following therefor:
"but for the removal order, eligible to be granted landing."
(d)	by striking out line 24 at page 20 in the English version and substituting the following therefor:
"for the removal order,"
(e)	by striking out lines 11 to 15 at page 21 and substituting the following therefor:
"reason other than the removal order; or
(e)	the person was determined to be, but for the removal order, eligible to be granted landing."
(f)	by striking out line 27 at page 21 and substituting the following therefor: "order, the person is"
(g)	by striking out lines 40 to 42 at page 21 and substituting the following therefor:
"adjudicator shall
(a)	confirm the order made against that person; or
(b)	quash the order made against that person and take the appropriate action under section 32 with respect to that person."
(h)	by striking out lines 11 to 17 at page 22 and substituting the following therefor:
"previously made."
September 21, 1987

Mr. Benno Friesen Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Employment and Immigration): Madam Speaker, this motion brings forward several government amendments which are designed to update a number of clauses as a result of the work done in the committee. Some of these amendments are consequential.
In Clause 14(1), this amendment will clarify that the safe third country limitation on eligibility to make a refugee claim is only applicable at the port of entry where, in the original Bill, the adjudicator and refugee board member dealt with the issue of "returnability", they could have quickly concluded that a person already admitted to Canada would not, in all likelihood, be able to return to a country where the person had no ongoing ties of citizenship, nationality, or permanent residence.
Now that the issue is dealt with after the inquiry, we need to avoid the anomaly that those claimants subject to an "inland" inquiry would be ordered removed from Canada, and then would be readmitted into the refugee determination system, because they had originally come to Canada from a country that complies with Article 33 of the Convention, but where that country has no continuing obligation to take them back.
The amendment confirms in law what we all recognize in fact that to return to a "safe" third country is only relevant at the port of entry. The amendment puts the subsection 48.03(1) into a syntax that corresponds to similar provisions elsewhere in the Bill. The amendment also drops a reference to departure notices because the concept of "safe third country" has been limited in law to the port of entry.
Further references to departure notices in Section 48.05 are deleted in amendments to paragraphs (c) and (f). Because the concept of "safe third country" had not been limited in law to the port of entry, it had been necessary to include in Section 48.05 reference to the possible existence of a departure notice. Departure notices can only be issued at "inland" inquiries, and therefore all references to departure notices are being deleted as a consequence of the amendment to paragraph 48.01 (l)(b).
Paragraph (g) is a technical amendment that clarifies the role of the adjudicator who determines, at an inquiry reopened for the purposes of Section 48.05, that the Convention refugee cannot be landed and does not have a right, pursuant to Subsection 4(2.1) to remain in Canada.
The adjudicator may confirm the earlier order, or where more serious allegations are raised at the inquiry, the adjudicator may replace an exclusion order with a deportation order. This is likely to be a relatively rare occurrence since only those who pose serious security or criminality risks, who are unwilling to support themselves and their families, or who have medical conditions which pose a danger to Canadians or which impose an excessive demand on Canadian medical and social support facilities, will not be landed. Even those Convention
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refugees who are ordered removed under this provision are protected against refoulement by subsection 55(1) of the Act.
Since we have clarified that the safe third country concept is only applicable at the port of entry inquiry, there is no longer a need to distinguish between the processes for adding new allegations against the person at the port of entry or inland.
Since the Act requires, at the port of entry, that the adjudicator canvass all potential reasons for inadmissibility, there is no requirement for a direction from the Deputy Minister.
The requirements to inform the person of the new allegation and to provide the person with an opportunity to explain or respond are contained within the principles of natural justice which are always applicable to immigration inquiries.


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: Madam Speaker, when I saw this motion on Friday, I read it over several times, looked up the references contained in it as far as I could find them, and tried to understand it. We did hear on Friday about the undesirability of motions being moved at report stage which might have been moved in committee. Presumably this is one to which that might have applied. Fortunately, not only for the Opposition but for the Government, the Speaker did not apply that rule as vigorously as the Minister of State seemed to feel should be done. Therefore this comes in not only after the committee but in report stage.
I studied the amendment to understand what would be the impact and on whom. A few minutes ago, the previous speaker and his colleague, the Hon. Member for Calgary West (Mr. Hawkes), were kind enough to give me some comments as to what the section means, even to show me some of the notes. I decided that I would probably not understand the notes and, having heard the Parliamentary Secretary read them, my opinion is confirmed. I assume the Hon. Member understands what he read, although by the way he read it, I was not convinced. However, I will make the assumption. I think the Hon. Member has confidence in whoever wrote the notes.
Fortunately, I am in a comparable position. I was able to consult last night with a representative of the Canadian Bar Association on this subject. He is recognized as very competent even by persons who disagree. That representative of the Canadian Bar Association said this one is fine, whatever it is doing. He seemed to understand it probably as well as the person who wrote it.


Benno Friesen: Or read it.


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: If not as well as the person who read it or the person who heard it read.
I will be supporting the motion and recommending that we all support it.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Redway):: Is the House ready for the question?

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Some Hon. Members:: Question.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Redway):: The question is on Motion No. 17 standing in the name of the Minister of State (Immigration) Mr. Weiner. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: The next grouping for debate are Motions Nos. 18 and 21.
The first question is on Motion No. 18.


Sergio Marchi: Motion No. 18
That Bill C-55, be amended in Clause 14 by striking out lines 19 to 29 at page 14.
Motion No. 21
That Bill C-55, be amended in Clause 14 by striking out lines 20 to 29 at page 14 and substituting the following therefor:
"a country that the Refugee Division considers to be a safe third country for the claimant and would be admitted to that country, if removed from Canada, or has a right to have the claim determined therein;".
He said: Madam speaker, Motions Nos. 18 and 21 represent an attempt on behalf of our Party to address the second major concern of three. First, we moved amendments unsuccessfully on prescreening. Motion No. 18 would have the effect of deleting "safe country" as a concept and as a fundamental piece of Bill C-55, and it really infringes upon the latitude that the two officers can have at the border crossings.
Motion No. 18 would suggest that the safe country concept be deleted. Motion No. 21 assumes the Government will stick hard and fast to the safe country concept, and, therefore, Motion No. 21 suggests that if the safe third country concept is going to be advocated by the Government, the Refugee Division should be given the responsibility of drafting such a safe country list to ensure that individuals will in fact be guaranteed their safety rather than have the Cabinet charged with the responsibility of drafting such a list.
Of the two motions our Party would obviously support Motion No. 18 which, if accepted, would make Motion No. 21 redundant.
Why is it that the Government wants to implement a safe country concept? Why is it that it wishes to have most of those individual claimants deported or orbited back to what it calls a safe country? Why is it that the Government has not provided a definition of "safe"? Why is it that the Government refuses to answer this question with respect to a Salvadoran who comes from the United States to Canada and is sent back to the United States? Would the United States be a safe country for that Salvadoran given the reality that most of those individuals are deported from the United States because of its foreign policy vis-a-vis Central America? Why is it that the
Government refuses to answer this question with respect to a Tamil who passes through Great Britain and is returned to Great Britain? Would that Tamil be in danger of his life or would he not? Would Great Britain be deemed to be a safe country?
Why is it that the Government refuses to answer questions with respect to what will happen given internal strife in some countries which are perhaps on our safe country list today and which tomorrow may have a revolution? The next day we may get individuals coming to us from that country. What will happen with those people given the fact that the list will have become out-dated because of the new internal pressures in that so-called safe country?
Those questions were not answered at second reading. Nor were they answered in committee. We are now looking for some of the answers here on the floor of the House of Commons. It seems to me and to a great number of people in the country that the imposition of a safe third country concept is really a nice way of saying that we wish to send our responsibilities off to someone else. It is synonymous with saying, "Let someone else deal with that person. Let some other country try to come to grips with that problem. We do not have the fortitude to do so".
Such a move will have serious repercussions throughout the world. It will have very serious repercussions in terms of our commitment to the Geneva Convention. If we cannot satisfy ourselves in returning a person to another country that we call safe that indeed his physical safety will be protected, then are we not guilty of contravening the Geneva Convention? Are we not guilty of contravening a responsibility we have as a country to try to spend our energy and time to ensure that that person will enjoy either safety or entry into another country's refugee determination system? Instead we have the safe country concept as the centre-piece of Bill C-55.
Every witness who came before the committee on Bill C-55 advocated the removal of the safe country concept. They suggested that we have a responsibility to allow the claimant to make his or her story before a refugee board, that we are not talking about months and years for the claim to be heard and decided upon but rather that the refugee board be the ultimate arbiter of the case. If the refugee board rules against the refugee, then so be it. At least we will have been assured that the process offered the refugee the ultimate opportunity to present his or her case.
But through the safe country concept we would be prejudging. We would be predetermining. We would be sending forth a judgment without having taken the time or the energy to listen to the circumstances of an individual. At the very heart of the refugee determination system are the merits of the individual's circumstances. We cannot base those judgments on the collective circumstances of someone else who came before that person. Nor can we make a predetermination based on the country that that person may have stopped in for a number of hours or a period of days or weeks.
September 21, 1987

Motion No. 18 is an attempt to do away with sending off the problem to someone else. It is saying, "Let us allow that human being who has a story to be told to appear before the refugee board and allow the board to make its determination rather than hide behind this safe country concept saying that some other countries of the world have already done it, why should we not do it?"
It was Canada which won the Nansen Medal, not other countries. It was Canada that was awarded the Nansen Medal for the first time in the history of the award. It was awarded to a country and to a people rather than to an individual. That says something about Canada. It says that we have been offering leadership to the world until today. If that is the case, then why should we take second-best? Why should we follow the worst instincts or the mediocre instincts of societies rather than improving on our record by offering leadership and inspiration to other countries? If the safe country concept were adopted by other countries which subscribe to the Geneva Convention then we would render that Convention null and void. In the end it is the actions and not the rhetoric that will speak to whether we support as a community the Geneva Convention.
I tell you, Madam Speaker, in all seriousness, that if countries such as Canada, Great Britain and the United States of America were to legislate safe third country concepts, then the Geneva Convention on Refugees will not be worth the paper on which it is printed. It will be but an agreement on paper written in the fifties with no relevance, strength or morality for the eighties. That is the reality.
Let the members of the Government come out from behind the curtains of the safe third country concept and tell us what they are really doing. It is synonymous to making the system more efficient by limiting the number of people within it. It is analogous to a hospital saying that it will become more efficient by limiting the number of patients that it treats. Of course that can be done. If there are fewer patients then there are more beds. If there are fewer patients then they will receive more attention from individual doctors. But in the case of a hospital, if a patient is sick and requires attention there is no way that efficiency can be maximized by excluding the sick from the hospital. Either a bigger hospital is needed or more hospitals are needed. That is how we make the sick healthy. In this system if a person is a legitimate refugee or wishes to make a legitimate case, then let us take our responsibility seriously rather than putting the problem off on someone else.
Motion No. 21 states that if the Government is to have a safe country list then let us have the refugee division formulate that list based on its knowledge and credibility. Let us depoliticize the drafting of such a list. Cabinet will be receiving international and diplomatic pressures from a host of allies and friends to be put on the list regardless of whether or not their human rights record merits such a place on the list.
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Therefore, we are saying that if there is to be a safe country list, let the refugee division suggest that list. Let them live according to the standards of those lists. Let them change the list accordingly, rather than having Cabinet in some room on the third floor decide among our friends and allies who should and should not be on that list.
I venture to place a bet with the Speaker of this Chamber that the United States, Great Britain, and many other countries that do not deserve to be on the list for a number of classes of individuals will be on the list if this legislation becomes law.


Frederick James (Jim) Hawkes: Madam Speaker, I wish to respond to the Hon. Member for York West (Mr. Marchi). I think it is a bit presumptuous to say that all of the witnesses were against the safe third country concept. It is especially presumtuous when the Hon. Member attended 10 per cent of the hearings, given the hours we spent in committee, and there was no substitute replacement. It is a lot of reading, and I doubt very much if the Hon. Member has had the time to read the 55 hours' worth of testimony.


Sergio Marchi: That is pretty presumptuous of you.


Frederick James (Jim) Hawkes: It is simply not true that all the witnesses rejected the concept. Certainly, the standing committee's report in November, 1985 went out of its way-


Sergio Marchi: Name names.


Frederick James (Jim) Hawkes: The record has been read in earlier today. The UNHCR is very concerned about the orbiting phenomenon of refugee claimants. There is a certain absurdity to people having claims in two, three, or four countries at the same time. There is a certain absurdity in a person being rejected by a country with high standards, whether or not that person is a refugee, and that person keeping going in a series across approximately 100 countries that are signatories to the Convention.
I hear hollers across the Chamber to name names. The Chairman of RSAC and a professor from York University, were not happy with the drafting. The Mennonite International Committee, Amnesty International, the UNHCR were before the committee. None of them were happy with the original drafting of the concept. The committee listened and probed and brought forward substantial amendments which were adopted in committee. In looking through the motions that we are in the process of debating one will find more. The House just approved Motion No. 17, which further modifies the original drafting of the concept. Intuitively and in a common-sense manner, it is a very important concept which lies at the heart of the Bill.
There are some 12 million plus refugees, and some estimates suggest there are as many as 80 million economic migrants in the world today. The generosity of Canadians has been

September 21, 1987
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recognized by the Nansen Medal. Our spirit of generosity is recognized the world over as being of a very high order.
Who should that generosity go to? I suggest that we owe that spirit of generosity to those who do not have protection. None of us like the concept that someone who is in a camp in West Germany is a refugee claimant. Is a person better off in a West German camp than he or she would be on the Cambodian border, or than they would be in a camp in other countries of the world, or than the three million Afghans in Pakistan? Do Members wish to stand in the House and say that the people with no resources who are in refugee camps in Pakistan are less deserving than people who make their way to West Germany and are in that situation?
It is an inescapable fact that the people who need our protection most are to be found in those border situations and not in West Germany, Denmark, Sweden, or Great Britain. Surely we are part of an international community where we have some faith and some trust in other countries.
There has been no suggestion, except for some amendments proposed by some witnesses, that would have determined a safe third country simply to be a signatory to the Convention. That would include over 100 nations. I would quarrel with that type of amendment. We are talking about a determination by Cabinet that a country that goes on the list will, in practice, fulfil its obligation to non-refoulement of refugees in either a direct or an indirect manner, in other words, that it will provide the type of protection that we in Canada provide.
We are attempting to say to people around the world that, if you are in one of those countries and you fit the classification, you should not waste your money on bogus consultants, or board a leaky boat with people who may not have the proper credentials to captain those boats. Do not risk the North Atlantic in winter. There will be no advantage for you in arriving on Canadian shores. Presently you are in a protected situation, see it through.
This nation goes one step further. It says to all of those people in all of those countries that they have a right to approach a Canadian embassy and ask for resettlement in Canada. They will be given special consideration. If their economic needs are such that they have to learn the language and get settled, we do have a sponsorship program. We have an unlimited capacity in this country; the limitation is only put on by the generosity of Canadians. Sponsorships can come from social organizations to bring refugees to Canada from the refugee camps in Europe and in other places. But we tell them to take their place in line, argue their case in that situation that their needs are greater than someone else's.
By putting this provision in our law, essentially we are saying that we will protect the domestic resources to enable them to be used to deal with legitimate people in need of protection. This clause deals with the reality that indeed they have achieved prior protection. They are outside their country of origin and they are in a country whose system we value.
When this concept was originally introduced in the House, I wondered about the wisdom of Cabinet being the final arbitrator of the list. During the 55 hours of testimony I listened to many people, and I came to the conclusion that that was probably the only way it could be done.
We are part of an international community. It is our Government, Cabinet, and Ministers who speak for our nation as they talk to other nations. Members will see in the motions before us that at the heart of the redrafting of the safe third country concept is the stipulation that a person can only be returned to a country they came from that is on the list. If they came from France, they can return to France. If France does not wish to admit them, they can go forward in our system. Where is the tragedy in someone who was safe in France being returned to France? Surely the resources we save with speedy removal back to safe situations for a limited number of people are resources which we can take, use, and redirect to people who need our help. Why should we allow people who do not need our help to get it?
It is a bit like a situation where, because of a crisis, a community is cut off from food supplies and we have extras. If our next door neighbours have more than we have, should they get a share, or should that share go to those who need it, those who do not have it? That is all we are talking about in terms of the safe third country concept. If one already has protection in a very safe situation, I say. "Please stay there and do not come to Canada; we will give our resources to people who need our help".


Abram Ernest Epp: Madam Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to say something in support of Motion No. 18 that would strike out the section in Bill C-55 dealing with the safe third country concept, to which the Hon. Member for York West (Mr. Marchi), as proposer of the motion, and the Hon. Member for Calgary West (Mr. Hawkes) have spoken, of course on opposite sides of the question.
The Hon. Member for Calgary West has been endeavouring to make a reasonable argument for this as an acceptable measure and a humane measure. Of course he ignored the fact that this is only one provision of a Bill, which has been recognized by the vast majority of organizations concerned about refugees, designed to exclude from Canada, to keep from our shores-and that of course is in the literal sense-to keep out of our airports, and to keep from our ports of entry persons who could conceivably be kept from coming to Canada.
The concept of a safe third country is one of trying to force on other countries what the Canadian Government is not prepared to have Canada do. It is a matter of trying to force other countries to accept a burden, while at the same time, by its very actions, indicating an unwillingness in the case of the Canadian Government and suggesting an unwillingness on the
September 21, 1987

part of the Canadian people to bear that same burden. We have here a potential for quite a shuffling of people or a business in human freight, sending people back and forth. Humane persons-and Canadians have demonstrated their humanity over the years and had that recognized in the awarding of the Nansen Medal for our dealings with refugees-would not want to see that happen.
Unfortunately, the reality of our time is that in the prosperous countries of the industrialized world-or at least we saw it that way not very long ago-there is this same kind of reluctance to allow refugees to arrive or to stay. Tamils came to Canada from Europe more than a year ago because they were afraid of losing their refuge in Europe. One does not have to read very much of the news out of Asia in the last while to know that they might have very real reason to fear for their lives in Sri Lanka. To cite only the incident of a year ago, the present Government handled it in a proper and humane way, as Canadian people wanted it handled.
Some northern European Governments, just like the American Government, are not Governments which have been very friendly to those who have been forced into fleeing their countries because of the actions of repressive regimes. When we have right wing Governments that are unhappy about the appearance of these particular refugees, we begin to see a situation, very clear in the United States, in which persons from Central American countries, particularly from El Salvador, are no longer necessarily safe in the United States. If the Canadian Cabinet is allowed to make this decision, surely it will be subject to all diplomatic pressures that operate on the Canadian Government. In the case of the United States, that is quite obvious as far as the pressure on the Canadian Government is concerned. We have a Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney) whose heart seems half American and who is very, very interested in the warmest possible relations with the United States.
If in the defence of lives it becomes necessary to make a hard judgment which says that our nearest neighbour, this great power to the south of us, is not interested in protecting the lives and safety of people who have fled from Central or South America, what will the Canadian Cabinet do in making its assessment? Will it in fact make the tough assessment that the United States of America is not a safe third country? Similarly, with European countries, does one really want to come to those brutal assessments?
Economically, 1987 is far from the misfortunes we knew as Canadians half a dozen years ago with the interest rate depression of the early 1980s. As economic activity picks up thanks to stable interest rates, as economic activity particularly in some parts of Ontario brings us close to fears of demand pressures and the inflationary potential developing again, government private Members are ready to boast about the fact that Canada anticipates a higher growth rate than is true for other OECD countries. That is more a commentary on the misfortunes in which they live than an expression of how really well we are doing. These are differences of a few tenths of a
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percentage point which have us ahead of the others. We know that Canadian prosperity in the past has often been based upon immigration, on large movements into Canada, on settlement developments, and so on.
To be bringing forward a Bill in which the safe third country proposal is part of trying to fend people off, to push them back to Europe, to the United States, or to wherever it may happen to be, just to keep them out of Canada at a time of such prosperity, such a response to the refugee situation is quite untrue to the best impulses in Canada and to the actions of past decades, initially with European refugees and then with other refugees which justified Canada receiving the Nansen Medal.
I speak in support of Motion No. 18 in particular, with perhaps less support in my own mind for Motion No. 21, assuming that earlier motions, particularly Motion No. 13 standing in the name of the Hon. Member for Spadina (Mr. Heap), would take care of all this.
Speaking strongly in support of this motion is speaking for all the best impulses in Canadian life; is recognizing Canadian traditions, Canadian history, and Canadian potential; is wanting to take advantage of our economic strength; and is recognizing that refugees who drew themselves to the attention of repressive regimes in many cases are people with the fine sense of integrity, principle, and political freedom which would make them the very best kinds of Canadians if they were able to come here.
I speak very strongly in support of Motion No. 18 in particular. I call upon government Members, if they have any sense of these principles at all and want to build a stronger and better Canada rather than play to the worst tendencies which exist in some Canadian hearts, to support this particular motion.


Hon.   Chas. L. Caccia@Davenport: Madam Speaker, it is important in debating the motion that has been so eloquently explained to you and to the House a few minutes ago by the Hon. Member for York West (Mr. Marchi) to put on the record some views, not of Members of this House, but of individuals and organizations who appeared before the committee. I am doing so because it is important for the House to hear and to have on record non-partisan views by individuals who take the question of refugees very seriously. The subject is approached in an objective manner by people who have been in the field of refugee resettlement for years if not decades and who have come forward because of a deeply-felt and genuine concern for the manner in which the Government is approaching Bill C-55.
I will start with the Refugee Status Advisory Committee which appeared before the standing committee on August 28.
Mir. Friesen: Was this before or after the amendment?

September 21, 1987
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Mr. Caccia:: The Parliamentary Secretary is so ignorant of the matter before us that he is asking whether a statement was made before or after the amendment. Evidently there is an amendment before us because it was not accepted in committee. What kind of wool is the Member trying to pull over the eyes of Members of this House by these silly interventions? Is the Parliamentary Secretary so ignorant of the matter before us that he has to wonder whether something is before or after the amendment?
There is an amendment before us. It is the one we are debating and it was made necessary by the insensitivity of the Government and the Minister whom he represents. The Minister is not here to defend the Bill. He is again hiding behind the skirts of the Parliamentary Secretary because he does not have the guts to fight for this Bill or Bill C-84. Is that enough of an answer?


Jean-Robert Gauthier: Yes.


Charles L. Caccia: Let us deal with the Refugee Status Advisory Committee, which stated on August 28, 1987:
Nothing guarantees protection to the claimant in these countries.
The advisory committee was commenting on the notion of safe third country, a notion which we reject. The advisory committee said that nothing guarantees protection, and went on to say that there could be risk of diplomatic embarrassment in making reference to some incident in 1983.
Let us move for a moment to the Canadian Bar Association, certainly not an organization devoted to radical changes in Canada or to the promotion of extremist views. On August 31 it stated:
The safe third country list system is not a workable concept because it
denies-
An important observation is that it denies:
-evaluation on a personal basis.
The association also commented on the safe third country notion by saying:
Nothing guarantees protections to the claimant in these countries.
Let us turn now to the Inter-Church Committee which appeared before the committee on September 1. It insisted:
All applicants should receive a hearing on the merits.
Applicants should not be judged on the matter of whether or not they had a safe third country to go to. The Inter-Church Committee also commented that:
Readmission to the safe country is problematical.
It is assumed that safe countries will readmit but there is no evidence that
this is the case.
That is an important consideration, Madam Speaker. Let us look at what the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees said. He insisted that the exception of the particular clause which we adopted earlier:
-should apply to all who claim that the safe country is not safe, whether they have been recognized as Convention refugees or not.
This would provide a safety net for some exceptional cases. It is nevertheless an important consideration. The United Nations Commissioner for Refugees went on to say:
-there should be an exception when people fear for their safety in that country.
A person not permitted to return to the safe country should be allowed to enter Canada's refugee system.
We had the Halifax Refugee Assistance Group which appeared before the committee on September 2. This group made the point:
It is objectionable not to examine the claimant's case on its individual merits.
That is something which the Hon. Member for Calgary West (Mr. Hawkes) ought to remember. It is objectionable what he is proposing in the Bill. Individual merits are important. Our immigration and refugee systems have been based on that main pillar of considering individual merits, which is something that the Government is now forgetting.
On September 2, the Mennonite Central Committee said:
The safe country is arbitrary and subject to political influences.
No notice can be taken of individual considerations; it is dangerous to generalize situations.
That is why we are putting forward this amendment, because without putting it forward we would allow a generalization, a blanket application, of a safe third country without looking at the history of the individual, the merits of the case and the options which the individual may or may not have available.
Rabbi Plaut on September 3 noted:
Diplomatic imperatives will be present when the list is being compiled.
He said that the list would be politicized:
This list won't be subject to any evaluation.
How do you like that, Madam Speaker?
Pierre Duquette on September 3 made some interesting remarks. He said:
Almost all accepted refugees in Canada wouldn't have passed this test.
It might well be that a study of this nature, if carried out, would reveal that those who have been admitted so far would not have passed the test.
The Hispanic Congress on September 3 said:
That criterion is dangerous because it doesn't guarantee real protection to refugees.
Danger of political criteria influencing the list.
This criterion doesn't allow any evaluation of individual cases-
The congress was speaking of the safe third country. A number of organizations came forward more or less saying the same thing. The Montreal Refugee Coalition said:
Danger of political factors relating to list-making.
September 21, 1987

-the lack of discretion-
Then we have the Nanaimo Immigrant Settlement Society which raised a very strong signal of the violation of the United Nations Commissioner for Refugees. There are scores and scores of individuals who took the trouble either to appear or to write in opposition to this safe third country notion. Perhaps I might be allowed to quote the Canadian Jewish Congress, which stated that there are no guarantees against subsequent rejections. It said:
If we are to return people, they should have some status in that country.
The Government has decided through a subterfuge to remain distant from its commitments to the United Nations Convention on Refugees. That is what the Government is doing without admitting it, without coming clean with Canadians and with the United Nations as to its intentions. In other words, the Government is doing something through the back door, by way of an amendment to one piece of legislation, hoping that somehow what it is doing will go by unnoticed, that it will get away with it, or that possibly it will not be challenged in the higher courts. That practice is an objectionable one, and must be put on the record. It has to be said that if the Government has the intention of reneging on Canada's commitments to the United Nations, particularly in regard to refugees, then it had better come out in the clear and say it openly to everyone so it can be judged for its actions.


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: Madam Speaker, I rise to speak in support of Motions Nos. 18 and 21. I support Motion No. 21, particularly because it includes a test which, while it would not be enough to make the original safe-country clause satisfactory, does make it better than the clause that has replaced it in one vital respect.
Motion No. 21 provides that if a person is to be returned, he would be returned to a country that the refugee division considers to be a safe third country for the claimant. The people who are experts in refugee matters, not the people who are experts in external affairs, would be making that decision. Furthermore, it provides that the refugee would be admitted to that country.
The clause the Hon. Member for Calgary West (Mr. Hawkes) likes so well does not assure us that a person will be admitted to a country. Later on, there is a clause which deals with what to do if a person is not admitted to a country. That is very nice if the person who is not admitted to a country is sent back to Canada. We have no assurance that that will happen.
There is nothing in the Bill about an agreement, an arrangement or a guarantee, all of which words the Minister has used since May to sell this Bill to the public, to deal with people who are chucked back to a certain country. There is only the requirement that the country be in compliance with Article 33 of the Convention, an article which provides that the country will not send the refugee back but does not provide that it will
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give a person a chance to claim refugee status. It does not provide a refugee the right to be returned to Canada or the right to claim refugee status in the country to which we have sent him.
In that respect, the clause moved by the Hon. Member for York West (Mr. Marchi) is better than the Government's clause. We could have moved an amendment that would have referred both to the Convention and to the right to return or to make a claim, but the Government did not want it that way.
We heard a very moving speech made by the Hon. Member for Calgary West. Oh, yes, he got to me, he really moved me. He said that people in Afghan or Pakistani refugee camps or people in refugee camps in Cambodia or Thailand are more needy than people in refugee camps in western Europe. He is right. They are more needy, from everything I have heard. I have not visited those camps, but some Hon. Members have and they probably know that. I believe that those people are more needy, but then the Hon. Member for Calgary West went on to make a little skip in logic and say that if we shut out the people from western Europe, of course we will take the people from refugee camps in Southeast Asia or Pakistan. That is a lot of pure boloney from Calgary West.
The fact is that Canada has taken in very few Afghanis. All kinds of crocodile tears are shed over the Afghan people who were invaded by the Soviet Union. I opposed the invasion of Afghanistan when I was on city council before I was a Member of Parliament, and I do now oppose the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union. We hear all about the poor Afghan people, but at least until very recently, less than 100 Afghan refugees were accepted into Canada.


Benno Friesen: Say why, Dan.


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: The Hon. Member wants to know why. The reason must lie with this Government's overseas selection policy. It is not because people came from western Europe, it is because, for example, of medical criteria.
There was a complaint from the Mennonite Central Committee this spring about a family of Kampucheans who were in Thailand and had waited there for years. This family was finally selected to be relocated to Canada. A couple of days before they were to board the airplane, a young son of the family was found after an X-ray to have a spot on his lung. There was a possibility that he had TB, and of course the whole family was not allowed to come to Canada. Of course, they would have had a chance to do so later on.
What happened not much later was that the young man hanged himself because he was an impediment to his family's chances of getting to Canada. In this case, the policy of the United States would have been much more generous. The family would have got to the United States if they had been scheduled to go there and the young man would either have been X-rayed again to find out if he really had TB or he would have been treated for TB. In our countries, TB can normally be cured in half a year.

September 21, 1987
Adjournment Debate
Canada is not selecting the neediest refugees overseas, contrary to what the Hon. Member for Calgary West has suggested. The Hon. Member for Calgary West took part in the discussion in committee, not only with the Mennonites but also with the B'nai B'rith. At that time, the Hon. Member made this same moving plea about helping the neediest, but the witnesses present who had been working with refugees contradicted him. He forgot to tell us that when he made his speech. The witnesses said that our policy as now applied is not helping the neediest.
The policy for selecting refugees overseas that is being used at the present time is not to help the neediest. If we were helping the neediest, we would not have turned down the Chileans who were in Buenos Aires last February. These Chileans were found by reputable witnesses to have been the subjects of persecution, imprisonment and torture by the police in Chile for union acitvities. I do not refer to the entire planeload of Chileans, but some of those people who were turned down could show strong evidence of a strong need for refugee protection.
Argentina is not a completely safe country for Chileans for two reasons. First, we have to read the papers every day to see if the Argentine Government still exists or if the generals have taken it over again. Second, the Chilean secret police operate in Argentina and not for the health of Chilean refugees.
When I asked the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Bouchard) in the House if he would look at the evidence provided by a reputable Canadian lawyer from Montreal in that matter or if he would meet with him, he said to have him send the evidence down to Buenos Aires. He knew that those in Buenos Aires would continue to turn those people down because need on the part of a refugee is not the chief criterion at which Canada looks. In choosing refugees through our overseas offices, Canada now looks at economic benefits or maybe political benefits for Canada.
While I agree with the Hon. Member that we should help the neediest, I do not agree with him that the Bill does that. The Bill leaves us with a great uncertainty about what will happen when we send a person to a certain country because the Government has taken away even the slim guarantees that existed in the original Bill about the right to return and the right to have a claim determined. The policy of the Government is not to shut out western Europeans in order to help the Asians, but to shut them both out.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION

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

Alan Redway: Madam Speaker, like many of us who were elected for the first time to the House of Commons in 1984, I ran for Parliament as a result of the great recession of the early 1980s. You will recall those times very well, Madam Speaker. Those were the times of 20 per cent interest rates, record inflation, record bankruptcies, and national unemployment rates of an average of 12 per cent. Of course, there were pockets of higher rates of unemployment in various regions of the country, but the national average was a horrendous 12 per cent.
I believed at that time that there was no reason a country like Canada should have such unemployment levels. I believed that I had to try to do whatever I personally may be able to do. It was for that reason that I decided to stand for Parliament, to put aside the position I then held and try my best to do something about the horrendous levels of unemployment with which we were faced at that time.
You will remember, Madam Speaker, that other Canadians felt the same way as I did. The issue in the election campaign was the economy and jobs. That issue has not really disappeared. It has been with us ever since the early 1980s. It has been a constant theme. Public opinion polls indicate that unemployment continues to be one of the major issues in the country.
What has happened to the unemployment situation since September 4, 1984, when the Government was elected? As you know, there has been a dramatic increase in the number of Canadians employed and in the number of jobs in the country in the past three years. We have had an increase of almost one million new jobs, 907,000 to be exact. National unemployment levels have fallen from near 12 per cent to 8.8 per cent in August. In the Province of Ontario, where I am from, unemployment is now down to 5.8 per cent, which is very encouraging to say the least.
I am sure that when you ran for office you were concerned, as was I, about the national picture, but were even more concerned about your own local community, as was I. I am pleased that the unemployment situation in Metropolitan Toronto has improved dramatically. The unemployment rate has fallen to below the 4 per cent mark which would traditionally be considered full employment in any economy. Fortunately, at the moment we actually have jobs going looking for people even though everyone cannot find the exact job they would like to have.
It is because of this improving job situation that I was most disturbed when I heard the Leader of the NDP indicate that 95 per cent of all jobs created in Canada since September, 1984, had been created within a radius of 160 kilometres of Metropolitan Toronto. I ran for office because I was concerned about unemployment in my own community. However, I was certainly concerned about unemployment across the country and wanted to see full employment throughout the country.
September 21, 1987

It seems to me that in the last three years there has not just been a growth of employment in Metropolitan Toronto and within 160 kilometres of Metropolitan Toronto, and in Ontario, there has been growth of employment across the country. It is my impression that 46 per cent of the new jobs have been created in Ontario, but after all, Ontario has approximately 40 per cent of the total labour force.
It is my impression as well that about 54 per cent of all the jobs have been created elsewhere across the country. In the last three years, for instance, it is my impression that more jobs have been created in Atlantic Canada than had been created in the previous six years. It is my impression that in the last year alone, three times as many jobs were created in your Province of Quebec, Madam Speaker, as was created in the past five years in Quebec. It is my impression as well that right now the unemployment rate across this country is lower in all provinces than it was at the time the Government took office some three years ago.
I am interested in the fact that in August, the Statistics Canada "help wanted" index reached its highest level ever. I understand that "help wanted" advertising in Atlantic Canada is up some 72 per cent, to its highest level in 20 years. In Quebec it is up some 85 per cent, and in Ontario it is up 154 per cent. In the prairie region, it is up 51 per cent and it is up 83 per cent in British Columbia.
I believe those figures reflect the fact that employment has not just been created within an area around Metropolitan Toronto, but right across this country.
That impression has been reinforced by a recent article in The Globe and Mail. I want to quote briefly from it:
In June, 1984, opposition leader, Brian Mulroney said that "tens of thousands of jobs would be created soon after the election of a Conservative government. He was roundly criticized in the media for this extravagant prediction and told to be more realistic. The media were wrong.
In fact, we have seen that they were wrong because almost one million jobs have been created in those three years. The Globe and Mail went on to say:
The Conservatives would get all the blame if the economy were lagging, but are reaping little of the credit as Canada leads the industrialized world in economic growth. This is unfair, because federal policies on deregulation, deficit control, privatization, foreign investment, tax reform and free trade are very much part of the environment in which jobs are appearing and incomes are rising.
My impression has been reinforced by this article in The Globe and Mail. My impression is that job creation in Canada has not only been in Metropolitan Toronto and nearby, and in Ontario, but right across the country. If I am wrong-and I do not believe I am-I hope the Parliamentary Secretary will tell me so tonight.
Mr. Benno Friesen Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Employment and Immigration): Madam Speaker, first, I am happy to know that the Hon. Member has raised that question on behalf of his constituents. I can understand why his
Adjournment Debate
constituents would be confused by the statistics given by the Hon. Member for Oshawa (Mr. Broadbent), the Leader of the New Democratic Party, when he said that 95 per cent of the jobs that were created were within a 160 kilometre radius of Toronto.
I recall very vividly, just after the last Budget, the same Member for Oshawa being interviewed on television. He said that he had just received information regarding companies that had paid income tax and found out just before the Minister of Finance (Mr. Wilson) had tabled his Budget that last year
60.000	companies had not paid tax.
Naturally, the first impression would be that that is shocking. What he did not say was that most of those companies had not made money last year. In fact, probably a lot of them had lost money last year, and obviously, if one does not make money or one loses money, one does not pay tax. The Hon. Member for Oshawa overlooked that piece of information when he gave us those statistics.
The same holds true in the statistics he gave with respect to the improved employment picture in Canada. It is just totally wrong to say that 95 per cent of the jobs were created in and around Oshawa.
The Hon. Member for York East (Mr. Redway), who just asked the question, was absolutely right in the perspective he gave. There have been, since this Government was elected,
907.000	jobs created in Canada. It would be ludicrous to say that 95 per cent of those 900,000 jobs would be in and around Oshawa. That just makes no sense at all. It is true that many of those jobs were created in Ontario. We are happy for the Ontarians who have got those jobs and we want to make sure the rest of Canada benefits in the same way. However, Ontario also has 38 per cent of the labour force as of September 1984. Therefore, just to see a larger number of workers employed does not mean there has been a statistical growth in the way the Hon. Member for Oshawa indicated.
Metropolitan Toronto has accounted for 15 per cent of all the jobs created in the last three years, from August 1984 to 1987. When this Government was elected, the gainsayers all said that was not going to happen. Actually, we can be very proud of what has happened. I spoke to a Member from Calgary the other day. That Member said that all the drilling rigs will probably be employed this winter because the Government has removed the PGRT and has provided incentive in the oil industry.
There have been 35,000 jobs created in Atlantic Canada,
123.000	jobs in Quebec, 162,000 jobs in Ontario, 15,000 jobs in the Prairies and 22,000 jobs in British Columbia. I think that while we want to see more jobs created in the regions, we can be very proud of what has already been done.
With the continued impetus to the economy given by the incentives programs, both in western Canada and in the

September 21, 1987
Adjournment Debate
Maritimes, we will see more jobs created. The federal Government is discussing with the provincial Governments and the private sector ways to promote the Western Economic Diversification.
1 commend the Hon. Member for raising this point in the House so that we can correct the record. The distortions given in the statistics left with us by the Leader of the New Democratic Party really do no service to the country at all.
[Translation}


OFFICIAL LANGUAGES-RIGHT TO USE OFFICIAL LANGUAGE OF ONE'S CHOICE. RIGHT TO USE OFFICIAL LANGUAGE EVERYWHERE IN CANADA-OPPORTUNITY TO PUT PRESSURE ON ALBERTANS
Jean-Robert Gauthier: Madam Speaker, I hope I will have as much time as the previous speaker!


Mr. Prud'homme:: He hopes to have as much time as the previous speaker!


Jean-Robert Gauthier: Last June 30 I asked the Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney) a question concerning the right to use the official language of one's choice everywhere in Canada, and especially before the provincial legislatures and before the courts. 1 will recall the facts for those who might have forgotten them.
On April 7, 1987, Alberta Member of the Legislative Assembly Leo Piquette was denied the right to speak or the right to express himself in French before the Legislative Assembly. Some time later, on June 26, the Committee on Privileges of the Alberta Assembly made a decision and requested Mr. Piquette to apologize for having questioned the authority of the Speaker of the House and spoken French before the Alberta Legislature. In addition the committee recommended that any Member wishing to address the House in a language other than English first obtain the agreement of the Speaker of the House.
Madam Speaker, I raised objections at the time and I am still raising objections because I sincerely believe that any Canadian, whoever he may be, with a Charter of Rights, with an official declaration stating that French and English are the official languages of the country . . . Madam Speaker, I believe that this constitutional right enables us to use French or English, to express ourselves freely and without restraints before the courts and before a provincial legislature.
1 realize that this right is not recognized in practice everywhere, that there are restrictions, but we all work toward eliminating this resistance, and this is why, as everyone knows, Madam Speaker, I often refer in this House to basic inalienable rights which should be guaranteed to all Canadians by our Constitution, because we of the minority, who must work hard to survive in this country, whether in this province or elsewhere, need to have our rights protected and promoted. I know that the Parliamentary Secretary will tell me that, under
the constitutional amendments proposed to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms in the Meech Lake Accord, the provinces would have to protect the official language minorities, that js the French-speaking minorities outside Quebec and the English-speaking minority in Quebec. However, I believe that it is still more important to realize that it is essential for the survival of this country to promote French-speaking minorities because we are submerged in an English-speaking sea in North America and we are being conditioned every day by American television, books, films, music, and so on. I am not the only one to say so. During the weekend, I read a newspaper article in which certain English-speaking groups were saying that it was time for the Canadian anglophones to become aware of this Americanization and that they had to be able to assert and defend their Canadian identity.
This phenomenon has also been noticed elsewhere. Madam Speaker. European countries are complaining about it. Countries such as France, Britain, Germany and Japan are facing a major cultural upheaval. As we know, China has also opened its doors to the United States and it will now be subject to American influences too. If these countries are influenced by the English-speaking North American culture when they are so geographically distant from the United States, how much more so are we influenced by it, we French-speaking Canadians outside Quebec, in Ontario or elsewhere? We need the political will to guarantee our survival, but first of all, we need constitutional guarantees to ensure that the survival of the minorities and their rights will not depend only on this political will.
Indeed, the Prime Minister recognized this fact in his answer to my question on June 30, and I quote:
We are going to work together with the Federation des francophones hors Quebec and the provincial Governments, and with language minorities wherever they happen to be, to promote-
-and I emphasize this word-
-to promote their rights at all times.
That, Madam Speaker, is a political will and indeed this commitment by the Government is incorporated in Section 40 of the Official Languages Act and I quote:
Commmitment to enhancing the vitality of the English and French linguistic minority communities in Canada.
Madam Speaker, that is a legal obligation that is set out in the Official Languages Act. It is not a constitutional obligation. It is not the same thing because an Act can always be amended while a Constitution is more difficult to amend, it is a much more reliable safeguard and that is what we are aiming at, we of the French-Canadian diaspora. Francophones would like to see their rights spelled out in the Constitution just as Anglophones from Quebec are entitled to expect that their rights be also guaranteed by the Constitution.
Madam Speaker, I am happy that the Federal level has given a commitment to promote the vitality of linguistic minority communities in the Official Languages Act that was introduced, as we will recall, on June 25, 1987. However, I
September 21, 1987

must stress once again that I deplore that the Prime Minister did not have the courage to enshrine in the Constitutional Act, 1987, the obligation for the federal Government to promote linguistic duality. That is why we in the Liberal Party have suggested an amendment to the Meech Lake Accord which would bind the federal Government to promote linguistic duality for minorities while allowing provinces to make that obligation binding upon them by passing a resolution in the provincial legislature if they wish to do so.
We do not want to impose this on anyone, but we are simply saying that, first of all, the federal Government should not only preserve, but also promote this duality, and that, when they deem it appropriate to do so, the provinces should have the right to follow suit simply by passing a constitutional resolution.
I can see some problems, Madam Speaker, because people are always telling me that we are moving toward this objective gradually and that we shall reach it eventually. However, as you will recall, Madam Speaker, we recently had a provincial election in Ontario during which we went through some difficult times. Certain groups attacked bilingualism in Ontario and the Leader of the Conservative Party, Mr. Grossman, stated firmly and as regressively as possible that Ontario would never be bilingual under a Conservative Government.
What can I say, Madam Speaker? The democratic process, and I am happy about this, rejected Mr. Grossman and he had to admit defeat. I am not saying that he lost everything on the language issue, but he certainly did not show an open mind about it.
In the case of Alberta, I asked the Prime Minister what he did to try to convince our friends in Alberta that a Member of the provincial Legislature had the right to speak in his own language, which is one of the official languages of this country. I do not know what the Parliamentary Secretary will reply. I do not know whether he did something, whether he wrote or whether he took any other action. But I should like to think that in this country of ours, in any legislature in Canada- provincial and here of course where it is spoken, as it is in Quebec and in New Brunswick-I should like to think that in Ontario, in Manitoba and in all western provinces where there are francophones who wish to express themselves, they would have the right to speak in French or in English if they wish, whenever they feel like it and without wondering whether they will be allowed to do so. And if they do, for Heaven's sake do not ask them to apologize for that, as Mr. Piquette was asked to do!
Madam Speaker, I want to conclude my brief remarks by saying to the Parliamentary Secretary: Well, 1 should imagine we will be talking about the official languages in the near future. We have had in this country experiences which resulted in progress in this field. Let us hope that in Alberta, let us hope that elsewhere in Canada-recently in New Brunswick
Adjournment Debate
we heard about Lynn Levesque who had a deplorable experience with bilingualism when she applied for a job in a post office. We have had examples such as APEC, the Association for the Protection of English Canada, which has been acting up and would have us believe that everything is in danger, that the French power is taking over.
Madam Speaker, I think we are making some progress, and the case of Mr. Piquette is another example which can be a lesson to us. We must take measures, we must take action, we must tell the legislatures: Be generous, be patient, do not worry, we are not threatening you when we speak French in Canada.


Mr. Murray Cardiff (Parliamentary Secretary to Solicitor General of Canada):: Madam Speaker, on June 30 during Question Period, the Hon. Member for Ottawa-Vanier (Mr. Gauthier) directed a question to the Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney). It concerned what is now commonly called "The Piquette Affair", which pertained to the use of the French language by a Member of the Legislature in the Province of Alberta.
The Hon. Member asked the Prime Minister if he was prepared to take action, and "call the Premier of the province to put pressure on his Alberta cousins and friends, so they will finally understand, once and for all, that French and English are the official languages of this country . . . and that it is unthinkable that a Francophone should suffer any restrictions in Alberta, any more than an Anglophone would in Quebec?"
The Minister of Justice (Mr. Hnatyshyn) has requested that I elaborate on the questions raised by the Hon. Member, in light of the new legislation on official languages contained in Bill C-72, and tabled on June 25 of this year.
Neither Bill C-72, nor the Meech Lake Accord contemplate any measure that could deprive a provincial legislature of any degree of its sovereignty. The tools that the federal Government has at its disposal in matters that fall within the jurisdiction of a provincial legislation are reason, suasion, and good example.
What the historic achievement of Meech Lake and the important measures contained in Bill C-72, an Act respecting the status and use of the official languages of Canada, demonstrate, is the will of the Government to advance the equality of status and use of French and English throughout the country, to promote the linguistic rights of all Canadians in a spirit and a framework of co-operation with the provinces.
For example, according to Subparagraph (d) of Subsection 42(1) of Bill C-72, the Secretary of State can take measures to "encourage and assist provincial Governments to support the development of English and French linguistic minority

September 21, 1987
Adjournment Debate
communities generally and, in particular, to offer provincial and municipal services in both English and French and to provide opportunities for members of English or French linguistic minority communities to be educated in thier own language".
I can assure the Hon. Member that the Minister of Justice, like the Prime Minister, is deeply committed to this renewed spirit of federal-provincial co-operation, and that he will be
urging all Parties to support and swiftly pass this important piece of legislation.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: 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 6.25 p.m.


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36 Elizabeth II

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Available from Canadian Government Publishing Centre, Supply and Services Canada, Ottawa, Canada K1A 0S9.
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Tuesday, August 11, 1987
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Prayers