1989-09-26

Mr. Albert Cooper (Parliamentary Secretary to Government House Leader):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 106(8), I have the honour to table in both official languages the government response to five petitions.
[Editor's Note: See today's Votes and Proceedings.]



NUCLEAR WEAPONS ECONOMIC CONVERSION ACT


Mr. Dan Heap (TVinity-Spadina) moved: for leave to introduce Bill C-256, an act to provide for the conversion to civilian uses of technologies and skills used in the nuclear weapons industry.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House that the hon. member shall have leave to introduce the bill?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of this bill is to prepare for the termination of contracts for the production, repair, modification, storage or handling of materials used for nuclear weapons by encouraging the conversion of technologies and skills developed in or used in those nuclear weapons contracts to projects that serve the civilian sector and by preparing for the employment of individuals whose jobs may be lost by the termination of those nuclear weapons contracts.
I move that this be adopted.


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


Mr. Patrick Boyer (Etobicoke-Lakeshore)moved: for
leave to introduce Bill C-257, an act respecting referen-dums and plebiscites in Canada on questions of public importance.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House that the hon. member shall have leave to introduce the bill?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Patrick Boyer: Mr. Speaker, we have in Canada an Elections Act which permits the holding of general elections as required. We do not have enabling legislation to permit the holding of referendums or plebiscites when required in the national interest. This legislation would be the enabling law for that purpose.
I think it is important to complete the panoply of democratic instruments at our disposal by having such a law enacted by this House, and that is why I introduce it at this time.


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


Patrick Boyer: for leave to introduce Bill C-258, an act respecting the establishment of the Centennial Flame Research Award to publicize the contributions to Canadian public life of persons with disabilities.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House that the hon. member shall have leave to introduce the bill?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Patrick Boyer: Mr. Speaker, there is a Centennial Flame out in front of the Parliament Buildings and every year tourists who come here throw coins into it. I learned some months ago that all of that money is collected and simply goes into the Consolidated Revenue Fund. I felt

Routine Proceedings
that there might be something more appropriate and symbolic that could be done with it. The purpose of this bill is to establish a fellowship using the proceeds from that which are collected annually, a fellowship to be administered by the Speaker to provide research into the contributions made to the Parliament of Canada and the public life of Canada by persons with disabilities.


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


Mr. Benno Friesen (Surrey-White Rock) moved: for leave to introduce Bill C-259, an act to amend the Parliament of Canada Act (privileges and immunities).


Mr. Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House that the hon. member shall have leave to introduce the bill?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Benno Friesen: Mr. Speaker, the members of this House have had undying privileges and immunities which we need to protect, but the public outside of this Chamber also has rights and privileges, civil rights and rights to privacy. This bill is designed to address those rights and to amend the immunities and privileges of the members of this House.


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

['Agreed.']
Albert Glen Cooper: Mr. Speaker, there have been discussions among the three parties of the House and I believe you will find unanimous consent for the following motion:
That, on Wednesday, October 11, 1989, His Majesty King
Hussein I of Jordan address members of the House of Commons
and Senate, in the Commons Chamber, at 11 o'clock a.m.; and
That His Majesty's address and customary related remarks by the
Prime Minister and Speakers of both Houses be printed as an
appendix to the House of Commons Debates of that day and form part
of the records of this House, and shall be televised according to the
House guidelines.


Mr. Speaker:: Does the hon. parliamentary secretary have unanimous consent of the House to move the motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

Hon. Herb Gray (Windsor West):: Mr. Speaker, I am rising to present a petition on behalf of a number of citizens of Windsor, Ontario. This petition humbly prays and calls upon Parliament to reject the proposed goods and services tax.
In tabling this petition I want to note that several weeks ago the Liberals began a national campaign to enable Canadians to have their say directly as part of the parliamentary process through signing petitions.


Mr. Hawkes:: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I would like to call the attention of the House to the fact that the House Leader for the Liberal Party is going way beyond what our Standing Order say members are entitled to do in the presentation of a petition. I think it is obscene.


Mr. Speaker:: I think I had better deal with this right away. I regret the hon. member's comment. I do not think that is necessary.
There are a number of petitions coming in this morning and they will deal with matters of great importance to the country. There is, however, a rule that those introducing the petitions must do so in a brief manner and cannot stray beyond appropriate comments. I say, of course, with regret that the hon. member for Windsor West is perhaps going beyond that. I anticipated an interruption, and it has been made. I ask all hon. members to comply with the the practice in the House.
September 26, 1989


Herbert Eser (Herb) Gray: Mr. Speaker, with respect to the point of order, I had simply wanted to conclude and explain that the petitions we were tabling today were in response to requests by large numbers of Canadians to have their say directly as part of the parliamentary process by signing petitions.
We were beginning today to table petitions in conformity with the rules. We have very large numbers of petitions. We do not intend to try to table all of them today, but for days and days to come we will be giving Canadians a chance to plug directly into the parliamentary process to express their opposition to the government's goods and services tax.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Herbert Eser (Herb) Gray: Mr. Speaker, the government through the party Whip has just shown its contempt for the views of ordinary Canadians.


Mr. Speaker:: I am afraid I am going to have to be strict here. I know the hon. member for Windsor West is rising on the same point of order as the hon. member from the government side rose on. I can allow some leeway, but I think this is getting into debate and I am going to move strictly to petitions.


Herbert Eser (Herb) Gray: Mr. Speaker, I give you notice now that I respectfully ask you to request the Whip to withdraw the term "obscene", as I think it is a contempt of Parliament to say that a member in carrying out his parliamentary duty on behalf of Canadians when it comes to tabling petitions is doing something obscene. I think this is unparliamentary and it is an insult to the people of Canada, and I ask that you rule that the hon. member should withdraw his words.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Frederick James (Jim) Hawkes: Mr. Speaker, I would be very happy to withdraw any remark which the House Leader of the Official Opposition finds offensive. I do think that respect for Parliament requires all of us, and especially people charged with additional responsibility such as House Leaders, to respect the traditions of the House and the rules of the House, and I would hope that we will do so.


Herbert Eser (Herb) Gray: This gentleman is the last person to give me, of all people, lectures on parliamentary traditions.
Routine Proceedings


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Calgary West has I think withdrawn the word which has been complained of, and again, I would ask that hon. members get on with presenting their petitions.


Mr. Riis:: Mr. Speaker, before I present my petition I would like to rise on another point of order, and that is regarding the processes of having our petitions certified.
I think all members would have found that there is an incredible backlog at the moment in the office where the petitions have to be certified. I want to make the point that this is in no way a reflection on the people involved in the office that certifies our petitions, but many of us have had petitions in for at least three weeks and are still waiting for them to be processed.
Perhaps I would ask you, Mr. Speaker, and your office, to examine the problem and see if there is not some action that can be taken to rectify it.
We have an obligation to present the petitions that are signed by our constituents as soon as possible. To have them sitting in some office for three, four or five weeks is not acceptable.


Mr. Speaker:: I take seriously the intervention of the hon. member for Kamloops, and I know that other members have had the same problem.
I would advise the House that four more people have been assigned to deal with the petitions and, as the Hon. House Leader of the Official Opposition made clear in his earlier remarks this morning, there are going to be a lot of petitions. We will make every effort that we can to ensure that they are expedited as efficiently as possible.
The point is well taken, and I say to other hon. members, including the hon. member for Windsor West, that we will try to move these petitions as quickly as possible. It is not lack of concern for the importance of the subject matter or for the numbers; we are doing the best we can. If we are still having difficulty in a day or two, I would expect hon. members to make representation to me and I will see what we can do.


Herbert Eser (Herb) Gray: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate your comments, and to assist the House, when the the government Whip rose to his feet I was simply trying to explain that we have a large number of petitions and why we have such a large number of petitions, but to assist the staff of the House we did not intend to try to table them all at one time.

Routine Proceedings
Rather, because of their volume, representing the feelings of so many Canadians, we were going to try to space them out over a period of time to assist the House and yet, at the same time, do our parliamentary duty. If the Whip for the government had simply allowed me to complete my remarks, we would have made a lot more progress than we have so far in the work of the House.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: Before we proceed, I think I am still correct that the hon. member for Windsor West did not yet present his petition. In the spirit of Parliament, I would not want to see a distinguished member of this place let this slip by, despite the fact that he, of course, on the basis of other duties which he occupies, had to take a part in the recent exchange.


Herbert Eser (Herb) Gray: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate your fairness in this regard.
Actually I have to say, to be fair about it, the petition I was presenting has been accepted by the House because one of the clerks has received it, but now that you are giving me this opportunity I am delighted to rise to my feet to present another petition from a number of people in the Ottawa-Vanier area.
[Translation\
-they speak French and they humbly pray and call upon Parliament to reject the proposed goods and services tax.


Mr. Speaker:: Just to assist hon. members, since there are a lot of petitions we might as well concentrate on what the rules are.
I am reading from the Annotated Standing Orders, page 111:
Several conditions apply to the presentation of petitions in the House during Routine Proceedings, the most notable of which is the prohibition on "debate on or in relation to" petitions presented in this way noted in Standing Order 36(7). In 1986, the Speaker issued guidelines which not only reiterated the provisions of Standing Order 36(7), but also invoked the practices which had evolved on the. manner of presenting petitions:
When presenting a petition during Routine Proceedings, the Member may make a brief summary of the Prayer of the petition, state the parties from whom it comes andthenumberof signatures it contains, but may not make a speech or enter into debate on or in relation to the petition. The Member should also indicate that the petition has been certified in order, pursuant to the Standing Orders.
The Members should also note that they will be given the floor only once in a sitting to present all of their petitions.
It has long been deemed irregular for the Speaker to present a
petition-
That is not applicable.
I do ask for the co-operation of members, and I make quite clear that there are a great many petitions and that in the interests of those who have signed these petitions we should move with dispatch. We can do that best by sticking to the rules.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, it is indeed an honour to present a petition pursuant to Standing Order 36 that has been certified correct on behalf of a number of Canadians who point out at some length the unfairness in our tax system.
They are of course concerned with the recent decision to initiate this general sales tax of 9 per cent on every Canadian. They are simply asking the government to have some understanding in terms of the tax burden that citizens already face, the fact that it is so unfair and that this 9 per cent simply makes it more unfair.
That is the first petition.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, I have a second petition signed by a number of western Canadians who are very concerned that the government has decided to curtail a good deal of VIA rail passenger service.
Again, I point out at some length all of the reasons that they feel this is a rather stupid idea. They are simply calling upon Parliament to maintain the existing VIA network, and they are calling upon Parliament to ensure that VIA equipment is upgraded to allow them to compete in the transportation market. They want to guarantee VIA sufficient support to carry out its mandate, which is of course to provide passenger rail service in the country.
September 26, 1989


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, I have petition on a totally different topic having to do with the legislation before the House today dealing with the forest industry.
These petitioners are from British Columbia. They are concerned that the government seems to be dragging its feet on signing the federal-provincial forest resource development agreement.


Mr. Oberle:: You're dragging your feet about this tax.


Nelson Andrew Riis: The minister now is dragging something else.
The petitioners are pointing out that they need to receive a signal from this government that it will continue to take the forest industry seriously.
The fact that it has been dragging its feet and is not prepared to make any commitment has encouraged them to sign this petition asking it to smarten up, basically.


Mr. Bill Domm (Peterborough):: Mr. Speaker, I have the privilege of presenting petitions to the House today, certified by the clerk, pursuant to Standing Order 36. Despite the statements made here today, we have had
72.431	such petitions certified without difficulty through the help of the Speaker's office.
Today's petition contains 7,135 signatures. It calls on the Government of Canada to revise the extradition laws which would allow the Minister of Justice to order the extradition of fugitives, either immediately or after they have been dealt with fully by the Canadian penal system, not having to wait until they have served all of their sentences.
I am pleased to present these petitions, most of which came from Ontario, and this brings the grand total to
72.431	petitions.


Mr. Len Hopkins (Renfrew-Nipissing-Pembroke):: Mr. Speaker, I have a petition signed by a number of people in the Windsor area. They ask the government to rescind its 9 per cent sales tax and to come forth with a policy that is fair to all Canadians. They petition this House to be heard and humbly pray that the government is listening to this petition.
Routine Proceedings
I have another petition, which I will present at the same time with your permission, Mr. Speaker. This petition is also from the Windsor area. The petitioners ask the government to rescind its 9 per cent sales tax and to bring forth a fair system for all Canadians, and they feel that the government is being unfair to the middle and lower income people of this country.
The petitioners ask the government to look again at its whole tax system and to bring forth a fair system for Canadians, and indeed, to rescind this 9 per cent sales tax which they look upon as the ruination of the economy of Canada and of the middle and low income people of this country.


Hon. Roger C. Simmons (Burin-St. George's):: Mr. Speaker, I rise to present a petition on behalf of a number of Canadians. I think this moment is particularly significant as I believe these people and I, who of course have signed the petition, are going to be some of the signatories of one of the largest petitions in Canadian history ever to come before this Chamber when the throngs of petitioners now out there in the shopping malls get a chance to sign their names to voice their opinions on this particular issue.
The prayer of the petitioners is that Parliament reject the proposed goods and services tax. I hope Parliament will hear that prayer.


Hon. Ralph Ferguson (Lambton-Middlesex):: Mr. Speaker, I present a certified petition to the House of Commons on behalf of those residents of Canada who now avail themselves of their ancient and undoubted right to present a common grievance to this House.
These Canadians strongly oppose the new goods and services tax that is an unprecedented tax, a tax grab from the pockets of Canadians, which will hit them not only with higher taxes but with higher inflation, higher interest rates and higher unemployment.


Mr. Cid Samson (Timmins-Chapleau):: Mr. Speaker, it is a privilege for me to rise on behalf of the good residents of the riding of Timmins-Chapleau. I have a petition, duly certified, dated May 3 of this year-not the summer but May-from the good residents of Timmins-Chapleau opposing the goods and services tax which has been put forward by this government.
The petitioners humbly pray that the government will review the goods and services tax to ensure that there is no taxation on goods and services such as loans, the arts and other non-luxury items among other things. It is my pleasure to present this petition.

September 26, 1989
Routine Proceedings


Mr. Bob Horner (Mississauga West):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36, I have the honour to present petitions which have been certified by the clerk.
The hon. member for Peterborough mentioned that there have been 72,431 names. Here are 4,318 more signatures which call on the Government of Canada to revise the extradition laws which would allow the Minister of Justice to order the extradition of fugitives either immediately or after they have been dealt with fully by the Canadian penal system.
I have the honour to present this petition.
OPPOSITION TO GOODS AND SERVICES TAX [Translation]


Mr. Jean-Robert Gauthier (Ottawa-Vanier):: Mr. Speaker, it is my duty to present a petition on behalf of a number of residents in the riding of Ottawa-Vanier, who humbly pray and call upon Parliament to reject the proposed goods and services tax.
The Conservative Government wants to force a new and universal 9 per cent tax on goods and services on Canadians. The tax will be hidden in the sale price. It will not be fair to consumers and will put small businesses to considerable expense.
Mr. Speaker, petitioners strongly object to the proposed goods and services tax which they feel constitutes an unprecedented attack on the incomes of Canadians and would not only raise the level of taxation but also subject Canadians to higher inflation, higher interest rates and a very high unemployment rate.


Mr. John Harvard (Winnipeg St. James):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 361, too, have a petition. I am happy to present it on behalf of a number of Canadians who are concerned about the proposed goods and services tax and who call upon Parliament to reject the tax.
I also have a second petition duly certified by the clerk, and this petition, too, is signed by a number of Canadians who want no part of the tax. They feel that it will cause
higher inflation, higher interest rates and higher unemployment.


Ms. Beth Phinney (Hamilton Mountain):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour and privilege to present a petition signed by the residents of Hamilton Mountain.
The petitioners have spoken out overwhelmingly against the Conservative government's proposed 9 per cent goods and services tax. The petitioners humbly pray and call upon the House to reject the Conservative government's 9 per cent goods and services tax proposal.


Mr. Scott Thorkelson (Edmonton-Strathcona):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present petitions which have been certified by the clerk, pursuant to Standing Order 36.
This petition, which contains 5,088 signatures, calls upon the Government of Canada to revise the extradition laws. This would allow the Minister of Justice to order the extradition of fugitives either immediately or after they have been dealt with fully by the Canadian penal system.
This brings to over 80,000 the number of petitioners' names that have been presented in the House of Commons calling upon the government to do this.


Mr. Iain Angus (Thunder Bay-Atikokan):: Mr. Speaker, I have a petition signed by 40 residents primarily of Victoria and Vancouver which has been certified by the clerk of petitions.
The petitioners point to the value of VIA Rail and the importance of not only maintaining, but increasing the service and the operation. They call upon Parliament to maintain the existing VIA network, upgrade the equipment and guarantee VIA sufficient support to carry out its mandate to provide passenger service.
I also have petitions bearing 5,000 names that have been forwarded to me by Canadians from across the country. Unfortunately they are not in a form that allows us to table them here so I will be passing them over to the Prime Minister to let him know how the people of Canada feel about his policies.


Mr. Stan Keyes (Hamilton West):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour and duty, pursuant to Standing Order 36, to present to the House a petition on behalf of the constituents of Windsor West, Ontario. In fact, thousands of constituents in my riding of Hamilton West add their voice to these concerned Canadians who have signed petitions calling upon the government to reject the proposed goods and services tax.


Mr. Rey Pagtakhan (Winnipeg North):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to rise and present to this House of Parliament on behalf of many concerned Canadians, like the residents of Winnipeg North, a petition confirmed by the Clerk, pursuant to Standing Order 36 with respect to the government's proposed goods and services tax which, if allowed to pass, will harm most Canadians including the petitioners who now seek a remedy from this House to reject the proposed GST, perhaps best to be known as the "Gouge and Squeeze Tax."


Mr. Eugene Bellemare (Carleton-Gloucester):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour and privilege to present a petition signed by Canadian citizens, pursuant to Standing Order 36. The attached petition is certified correct in form and content and co-signed by myself.

Mr. Speaker, this summer I had the privilege of drafting a petition and sending it to all Canadian ridings, to the presidents of riding associations and to the members of my party. I have started to receive copies of this petition which it is my privilege to present. The petition is against the Government's proposed legislation regarding the GST, in other words, the goods and services tax.


Mr. Guy H. Arseneault (Restigouche-Chaleur):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour and the privilege of presenting this petition, which conforms to Standing Order 36.

It is a petition, Mr. Speaker, which was duly signed by a number of Canadians who are opposed to the government's goods and services tax because it is going to cause serious and unfair hardship to low and middle-income Canadians. I have the honour of presenting this petition.
Routine Proceedings BACKLOG OF REFUGEE CLAIMANTS


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: Mr. Speaker, I have a petition from a number of residents of Toronto, Willowdale and Etobicoke who are concerned that because of underfunding and mismanagement of the refugee program in Canada, a number of people in the backlog are being denied work permits. Therefore, they petition this House to ensure that all those who have claimed refugee status will get immediate work authorization and that when they are considered on humanitarian and compassionate grounds, those grounds will include the presence in Canada of relatives, the successful establishment of the claimant and the circumstances of war or oppressive governments and natural disasters in their home countries.


Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: I have also a petition of about 250 names from Canadians living in Toronto, Kingston, Regina, several cities of Ontario, British Columbia and the prairies.
They are concerned for the Innu people and the low level flights and other military air training carried on, or planned to be carried on, in their area. Therefore, they ask Parliament to support the request of the Assembly of First Nations and of the Innu of Labrador in stopping all NATO and NORAD low level flight training in Canada, opposing the establishment of NATO operations in Canada such as at Goose Bay, and redirect Canada's NATO and NORAD funding towards enabling Canada's aboriginal peoples to regain control of their lands and their livelihood, promoting sustainable development for all Canadians.


Mr. Jack Iyerak Anawak (Nunatsiaq):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour of presenting a petition pursuant to Standing Order 36, signed by average Canadians who are objecting to the GST, otherwise known as the general suffering tax.


Mr. George S. Rideout (Moncton):: Mr. Speaker, I have the pleasure, pursuant to Standing Order 36, to present this petition on behalf of citizens of Canada who are opposed to the goods and services tax. I think we all realize that Canadians are opposed to this tax, and it is with pleasure that I present this petition.


Mr. George Proud (Hillsborough):: Mr. Speaker, I rise pursuant to Standing Order 36 to present this petition signed by many Canadians opposing this goods and services tax. I have the honour now to present this petition.

September 26, 1989
Routine Proceedings


Mrs. Christine Stewart (Northumberland):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour and privilege of presenting, pursuant to Standing Order 36, a petition signed by several Canadians who object to the proposed legislation referring to the goods and services tax. Thousands of people spoke to me in my riding in opposition to this proposed legislation and begged that something be done to demonstrate on their behalf here in the House, and I am pleased today to be able to present their objections to this proposed legislation.


Mr. Bob Speller (Haldimand-Norfolk):: Mr. Speaker, I rise also under Standing Order 36 to present a petition by a number of Canadians who are concerned about the goods and services tax. They are concerned about the tax of the government opposite and they feel deeply betrayed by this government.
They humbly pray and call upon Parliament to reject the proposed goods and services tax.


Mrs. Diane Marleau (Sudbury):: Mr. Speaker, it is my duty and indeed my pleasure to present a petition that was gathered in Sudbury in my riding. It was gathered with the help of a number of senior citizens who are extremely upset with the proposed goods and services tax. Would you please accept this petition on their behalf.


Mrs. Shirley Maheu (Saint-Laurent):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour and the pleasure, pursuant to Standing Order 36, to present to you a petition from some constituents of mine who live in a part of Cartierville that lies within my riding. They are deeply concerned about Government Bill proposing a tax.
They ask:
That Parliament reject this new tax on goods and services.

And as well, Mr. Speaker, I have a petition under Standing Order 36, also from the Saint-Laurent part of my riding. The citizens are concerned because they feel that it will cause serious and unfair hardship to low and
middle-income Canadians and they also humbly request Parliament to reject the proposed goods and services tax.


Mr. Lawrence MacAulay (Cardigan):: Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise in this Parliament today. I wish to present a petition on behalf of the citizens of Canada who oppose this goods and services tax. This tax will create a large burden on small business, agriculture and fisheries.


Mr. Ron MacDonald (Dartmouth):: Mr. Speaker. I too rise today in accordance with Standing Order 36 to present a duly certified petition to the Parliament of Canada from a number of concerned Canadians. They are concerned about the excessive taxation regime of the government opposite, who since 1984 have on 31 occasions raised taxes. But mostly they are concerned about the proposal for a new goods and services tax and humbly ask this Parliament to ask the government to reject this regressive tax.


Mr. Joe Comuzzi (Thunder Bay-Nipigon):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour and the privilege today to present a petition pursuant to Standing Order 36. It is properly certified, I advise, Mr. Speaker, by the clerk. It is signed by several hundred petitioners from my adopted city of Windsor, Ontario. It gives me great pride to indicate their opposition to the proposed goods and services tax, or as my friend properly indicated, general suffering tax.


Mr. Bob Wood (Nipissing):: Mr. Speaker, it is an honour and a privilege to rise today to present a petition, pursuant to Standing Order 36, on behalf of the people of Nipissing which takes in the cities of North Bay, Sturgeon Falls, and Mattawa. The petition deals, of course, with the unfairness in our tax system. We call upon the Conservative government to reject the proposed goods and services tax.


Mr. Fred J. Mifflin (Bonavista-TVinity-Conception):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on this occasion to present a petition in accordance with Standing Order 36, duly documented and certified by the clerk. This petition is from Canadians who are worried, upset and disillusioned by this unprecedented tax measure and they humbly pray and call upon Parliament to reject the government's proposed goods and services tax.
September 26, 1989


Mr. Brian L. Gardiner (Prince George-Bulkley Valley):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour and duty to present two petitions today, and first of all, to remind members of the number of trees that will be cut down to print today's Hansard.
My first petition, Mr. Speaker, calls upon the government to live up to its original pledge to support VIA Rail, to abandon plans for further cuts to VIA's budget and to provide the necessary resources to allow VIA to operate as a modem, effective transportation company rather than a museum.
This petition is signed by residents of Smithers, Houston and Telkwa in northern British Columbia.


Brian L. Gardiner: My second petition concerns the subject matter that we are dealing with today, the forest legislation. This is a petition signed by residents of northern British Columbia; Fort St. John, Dawson Creek and Prince George, urging this government to review the forest resource development agreement with the province of B.C. because of its contribution to the reforestation of our lands in B.C.


Mr. Jim Jordan (Leeds-Grenville):: I have the honour to present a petition under Standing Order 36, along with hundreds of thousands of other ordinary citizens, objecting to the 9 per cent goods and services tax. The petition has been duly signed, endorsed and signed by the required number of petitioners. It is a pleasure to present this.


Mr. Maurice A. Dionne (Miramichi):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour and privilege to present a petition pursuant to Standing Order 36, on behalf of numerous Canadians, protesting this terrible gouging tax which is about to be imposed upon us.


Mr. Peter Milliken (Kingston and the Islands):: Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to present a petition signed by 30 residents of the city of Ottawa who object to the goods and services tax that has been proposed by this government. The petitioners urge the Parliament of Canada to reject the tax.
Routine Proceedings


Mr. Fernand Robichaud (Beausejour):: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise to present to this Hon. House a petition from people in the Ottawa region.
These people of Ottawa, just like the people in Beausejour, object to this taxation project because they worry that this new tax will cause great and unfair hardships for low-and middle-income families.
They humbly ask Parliament to reject this new tax. [English]


Ms. Albina Guarnieri (Mississauga East):: Mr. Speaker, on behalf of concerned Canadians I have the privilege and duty to present a petition under the provisions of Standing Order 36, duly certified by the clerk.
This petition expresses the outrage and betrayal felt by Canadians at the government's latest proposed initiative of imposing the goods and services tax.
The petitioners humbly request that their plea be heard and that this government reject this regressive tax.


Mr. Dennis Mills (Broadview-Greenwood):: Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the senior citizens of my riding and all the small businesses, I have the honour to present a petition under the provisions of Standing Order 36. The petitioners call on parliament to reject the goods and services tax as they do not want to be turned into accountants and bookkeepers.


Mr. Joe Fontana (London East):: Mr. Speaker, I am honoured to present a petition under Standing Order 36, on behalf of Canadians who clearly implore this government to cancel its proposed goods and services tax, a tax which will hurt every man, woman and child in this country.


Mr. Rex Crawford (Kent):: Mr. Speaker, I am honoured today to present a petition pursuant to Standing Order 36 on behalf of concerned Canadians of Ottawa-Vanier who are not in favour of the goods and services tax. The petitioners humbly request the House to reject this bill.


Mr. Robert D. Nault (Kenora-Rainy River):: Mr. Speaker, it gives me great honour and pleasure to stand before you and present a petition under Standing Order 36 on behalf of the residents of Kenora-Rainy River and those tourist operators who know that in 1991 there will no longer be any jobs for them.
It gives me great pleasure to ask the government opposite to consider not imposing a tax that will do severe harm to the tourist industry of Canada.

September 26, 1989
Routine Proceedings


Ms. Mary Clancy (Halifax):: Mr. Speaker, it gives me great honour today to rise in the House to present a petition pursuant to Standing Order 36 on behalf of a group of concerned Canadians.
The concerned Canadians strongly oppose this new goods and services tax and, on behalf of them, I humbly pray and call upon Parliament to reject the proposed goods and services tax.


Ms. Ethel Blondin (Western Arctic):: Mr. Speaker, I rise in the House today, pursuant to Standing Order 36, to present a certified petition on behalf of concerned Canadian citizens, specifically the constituents of the riding of Western Arctic, who oppose the proposed goods and services tax which will create an onerous burden on small business and which will cause serious and unfair hardship to low and middle-income Canadians.
Northerners cannot afford to have an increase on transportation, communications, and other basic goods and services in an area already burdened with an extremely high cost of living.


Mr. Maurizio Bevilacqua (York North):: Mr. Speaker, I rise to present to Parliament a petition duly signed and certified pursuant to Standing Order 36 from the residents of the federal riding of York North.
The residents, workers, seniors, students and business persons strongly oppose this proposed 9 per cent goods and services tax which they feel will have negative social and economic impact on their lives.
The opposition is based upon the fundamental economic and social realities that this tax will increase inflation, increase unemployment, increase interest rates, and is a nightmare to administer. On their behalf I urge this Parliament to reject the proposed tax.


Mr. Maurice Foster (Algoma):: Mr. Speaker, it is my honour to present a petition on behalf of many Canadians who are very concerned about the goods and services tax. They believe it is a tax grab that has an adverse effect on tourism and that it will be a nightmare for small business to administer. Therefore they humbly pray and call upon Parliament to reject the new proposed goods and services tax.


Mr. Don Boudria (Glengarry-Prescott-Russell):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36 it is my honour and privilege to present to the House a petition calling upon the Government of Canada to reject the proposed GST, or goods and services tax, or grief and suffering tax. This petition is signed by 30 residents of the great constituency of Windsor West, so ably represented by our veiy distinguished, honourable and learned colleague sitting immediately in front of me.


Benno Friesen: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present two petitions from constituents of mine. The first one, with about 120 signatures, reads: "Whereas the RCMP has a long and honourable tradition known and admired around the world, and whereas the distinctive uniform is recognized and respected by the public and other police forces in Canada and other countries, we see no merit, or value, or reason to allow changes in the RCMP uniform or dress code."
It goes on to address their disagreement with the proposed changes to the RCMP dress code.


Benno Friesen: I have a petition with about 40 signatures from a group of citizens in the Newton area of Surrey who disagree strongly with the government's proposal to deal with the $50,000 ceiling of retired people and withhold OAS payments.


Mr. Jesse Flis (Parkdale-High Park):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36,1 too have the honour of presenting petitions from Canadians who oppose the government's proposed goods and services tax. The petitioners claim that the proposed new tax will create undue hardships on low and medium income families and on small businesses. The petitioners are, in plain language, asking this government, telling this government, to scrap the GST.
Since I am the last one presenting a petition today, Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate you on the efficient manner in which you accepted these petitions from right across Canada on this important topic.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!
September 26, 1989


QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER
[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk)
Albert Glen Cooper: Mr. Speaker, the following questions will be answered today: Nos. 53, 64, 85, 88, 92, 94, 95, 98, 99, 101, 103, 104, 105, 107, 108, 110, 116, 117, 118, 119, 120, 121, 123, 124 and 125.


Mr. Volpe: For the Canadian Jobs Strategy programs in the regions of Hamilton, Kingston, Peterborough, Sault-Ste-Marie, St. Catharines-Niagara and Thunder Bay, what is the (a) number of applications (i) submitted (ii) approved (b) amount of funding (i) requested for proposed programs (ii) provided for approved programs (c) break-down of the type and number of participants in approved programs (d) number of (i) proposed (ii) approved programs within the different occupational sectors, as defined in detail by Statistics Canada (e) impact rate for the approved programs within the specific occupational sectors?


Hon. Barbara Jean McDougall (Minister of Employment and Immigration):: The reply to the subject question for fiscal year 1988-1989 is below.
(a)	(>)*	(ii)Hamilton	369	369Kingston	210	205Peterborough	119	116Sault Ste Marie	171	164St. Catherines / Niagara	206	200Thunder Bay	350	350(b)	(*)	(ii)Hamilton	4,423,496	4,103,598Kingston	1,829,622	943,534Peterborough	678,224	433,365Sault Ste Marie	2,236,440	1,753,470St. Catherines / Niagara	2,576,224	2,272,398Thunder Bay	1,480,985	1,503,091(c)	[DOT][DOT]Total number of participants	Wom- en	Na- tives	Dis- able d Per- sons	Visible Mino- rities	Yout h	Social Assistance RecipientsHamilton	854	201	24	43	55	128	186Kingston	317	66	3	7	8	31	38
Routine Proceedings
Peterborough	181	23	6	8	9	27	19Sault Ste Marie	488	150	63	24	7	140	210St. Catherines / Niagara	575	117	13	19	10	65	80Thunder Bay	578	87	106	9	9	92	74(d)	Not available(e)	Not available
* Applications entered in the data base comprise only those which have been submitted by the Region to National Headquarters for approval.
[DOT][DOT] Participation under the various target groups are not added to form this total as one participant could be a representative of more than one target group.


Mr. Whittaker: For (a) Veterans' hospitals (b) prisons under the authority of the government (c) Armed Forces bases (i) what is the total consumption of fruit products (ii) in what locations are they purchased?


Albert Glen Cooper: am informed as follows:
(a)	Insofar as the Department of Veterans Affairs is concerned, the total consumption of fruit products for the fiscal year 1988/89 and locations they are purchased are as follows:
Ste. Anne's Hospital:
(i)	Total $252,752.00; (ii) Breuvage Moccomat Limitee; Produits Star Appetizing; Dellixo Inc.; Les Aliments Trois Freres Limitee; Metro Richelieu Inc.
Rideau Veterans Home:
(i)	Total $35,374.72; (ii) Fine's Fine Foods; Slipacoff's Saskatoon Veterans Home:
(i)	Macdonald Consolidated; Pride Beverages Limited; Sunspun Products Limited; Scott National Products; Kawanis; Real Canadian Super Stores; Palm Dairies; Canadian Safeway
(b)	Insofar as the Ministry of the Solicitor General is concerned, the total consumption of fruit products in dollar value by region for federal institutions for the fiscal year 1988/89 is:

September 26, 1989
Routine Proceedings
(0
Fresh	Canned	Fruit	Region	Fruits	Fruits	Juices	Total$	$	$	$Atlantic	39,118.84	14,886.94	13,806.16	67,811.94Quebec	106,560.00	76,576.00	48,000.00	231,136.00Ontario	104,331.00	124,805.00	10,221.00	239,357.00Prairies	86,880.30	85,639.94	23.158.60	140,294.40Pacific	53,702.40	63,434.40	23,157.60	140,294.40Total	390,592.54	365,362.28	146,458.82	902,413.64(ii)	All fruit products are bought through food product suppliers in the regions where the institutions are located. Standing offers are established through Supply and Services Canada. A small portion of the fruit products, such as seasonal fruits are purchased through local suppliers.
Locations:
Atlantic: Moncton and Halifax; Quebec: Montreal and Quebec City; Ontario: Toronto and Kingston; Prairies: Winnipeg, Regina, Saskatoon and Edmonton; Pacific: Vancouver, Victoria and Abbotsford
(c)	Insofar as the Department of National Defence is concerned:
(i)	The exact quantity of fresh fruit consumed by the Canadian Forces in a given year cannot be specified, but it was estimated at one million kilograms during fiscal year 1987/88. Data is unavailable for fiscal year 1988/89. In addition, Canadian Forces personnel will consume some 134,000 cases of canned fruit products over a typical one-year period. This data applies to Canadian Forces units in Canada only, as overseas units do not normally receive Canadian food products.
(ii)	Fresh fruits are purchased through regional offices of the Department of Supply and Services. The purchasing period does not correspond to the Government's fiscal year, nor does NDHQ have any ready means of capturing the precise dollar value of the purchases. Canned fruit products are procured annually through national contracts, awarded on the basis of lowest tender, by the Department of Supply and Services. Both fruit producers and fruits distributors bid on these contracts. It is not possible to specify the location of these purchases, as a distributor may acquire produce
from several sources. The total dollar value of these purchases was $2,429,697.


Mr. Kindy: To the knowledge of the government, what is the overall cost to all levels of government of the (a) incarceration of (b) prosecution and defence of (c) court proceedings involving (d) meetings and negotiations with United States officials concerning (e) government hearings concerning (f) person-hours involved of all agencies concerned with (g) all other expenses incurred with regard to Charles Ng in Canada?


Albert Glen Cooper: The following Departments were requested to provide information:
Department of Justice
It is not possible to estimate the costs, person hours and all other expenses expended on the Ng case. The case is ongoing and costs are continuing to be incurred on a daily basis.
Canada Employment and Immigration Commission
No direct costs have been incurred by the Commission with respect to Mr. Ng. The Commission's only involvement has been in keeping abreast of the case and the responding to of representations.
Department of External Affairs
There have been no direct expenses incurred with regard to Charles Ng in Canada. The Department did respond to letters from the public concerning the case but the cost factor is relatively negligible, as it involved only about 20 person hours. The Consulate General in San Francisco also expended about 30 person hours replying to inquiries from the American public.
Correctional Service of Canada (CSC)
Based on the average annual cost of maintaining an offender in a maximum security institution, the overall cost of incarceration from the date of admission to a federal institution, December 17, 1985 to May 16, 1989 is $206,753.18.
CSC cannot calculate individual person hours required for the maintenance and control of an offender due to the number of institutional staff involved. An inmate incarcerated in a federal correctional institution is involved with his case management officer, may require to see the physician, is seen by the psychologist and/or psychiatrist, is escorted by correctional officers, etc. All institutions are manned on a 24 hour basis.

All these factors and others from part of the above average annual cost.
Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP)
To the date of the question, the RCMP has recorded 2,426 hours and expended $26,023.15 (excluding salary costs) in relation to the Charles Ng proceedings/investi-gation. Expenses continue to be incurred; however, they are not captured in a manner that provides a breakdown by activities as requested.


Mr. Nystrom: 1.	Did any (a) corporations (b) individuals claim as a business expenses any contributions made to any agencies, organizations or individuals working in support of the Canada-United States Free Hade Agreement and, if so (i) what number (ii) what was the value of each claim (iii) what percentage of each claim has been allowed?
2.	Did any (a) corporations (b) individuals claim as a business expense any contributions made to any agencies, organizations or individuals working against the Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement and, if so (i) what number (ii) what was the value of each claim (iii) what percentage of each claim has been allowed?


Hon. Otto John Jelinek (Minister of National Revenue):: 1. and 2. The Department is aware, through the routine audit program examination of the books and records of corporations and individuals carrying on business, that claims have been made as business expenses for contributions incurred in support of or to oppose the Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement.
These expenditures would not necessarily be specifically identified in the financial statements filed with the income tax return. Further, there is no special audit program directed at business expenses in support of or against the Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement. These business expenses are reviewed in the normal course of audits of taxpayers books and records. Accordingly, no aggregate statistical information is available.


Mr. Caccia: For (a) the Daishowa pulp and paper mill in Alberta (b) the Alberta Pacific Forest Industry pulp and paper mill in Alberta (c) Repap's expansion of Manforest's pulp mill in The Pas, Manitoba (d) the Husky heavy oil upgrader in Lloydminster (e) the Vancouver
Routine Proceedings
Island Gas pipeline (f) the Oslo oil sands (g) the Hibernia off-shore oil development (h) Phase II of the James Bay hydro development
(i)	has the project been submitted to the environmental assessment and review process and, if so, at what stage of the process is it and if not, on what date will it be submitted (ii) on what date will the assessment be completed (iii) will the results of the assessment be made public?


Mr. Lee Clark (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of the Environment):: (a) (i) Yes, initial assessment has been conducted and completed by the Department of Western Economic Diversification.
(ii)	Initial assessment completed on March 7, 1989.
(iii)	Yes.
(b)	(i) Yes, a cooperative Federal/Alberta Environmental Assessment and Review Process (EARP) was announced in July 1989.
(ii)	The Environmental Assessment Board plans to hold hearings this autumn and complete the assessment in late 1989 or early 1990.
(iii)	Yes, if applicable.
(c)	(i) No, the sale of the mill does not trigger the EARP. However, discussions are underway with Manitoba regarding Repap's announced expansion plans.
(ii)	Unknown.
(iii)	Yes, if applicable.
(d)	(i) Yes, initial assessment was completed in August 1987 by the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources.
(ii)	Initial assessment completed in 1987.
(iii)	Yes.
(e)	(i) Yes, it was reviewed under B.C. Utilities process and Energy, Mines and Resources is conducting its assessment of the proposal under the Environmental Assessment and Review Process.
(ii)	Unknown.
(iii)	Yes.
(f)	(i) Yes, currently under preliminary initial assessment by the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources.
(ii)	Unknown.
(iii)	Yes.

Routine Proceedings
(g)	(i) Yes.
(ii)	Public review completed and panel report published in December 1985.
(iii)	Yes, December 1985.
(h)	(i) No.
(ii)	Discussions are underway with Quebec on a joint federal/provincial assessment process. Guidelines for environmental studies will be issued to Hydro-Quebec this fall. Earliest completion of the assessment process would be the end of the 1990.
(iii)	Yes if applicable.


Mr. Manley: 1.	Are directions being given to assessors or auditors within Revenue Canada Thxation to ensure that amounts paid for advertising for or against the Canada-United States Free Hade Agreement, or to umbrella organizations such as the Canadian Alliance for Trade and Job Opportunities or the Pro-Canada Network, are identified and, if so, what are they?
2.	Is Revenue Canada Thxation applying any criteria in order to determine the deductibility of such amounts and, if so, what are they?
3.	Have any such expenditures been declared by taxpayers to date and, if so what total amounts (a) have been declared (b) have been
(i)	allowed (ii) refused on assessment?


Otto John Jelinek: Business Expenses-Contributions in support of and against the Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement
1.	There is no special audit program directed at business expenses in support of or against the Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement. These business expenses are reviewed in the normal course of audits of taxpayers books and records.
2.	The Income Tax Act does not specifically deal with the deduction of these expenditures. The Department applies normal expenditure deductibility criteria. Deductions from business income are limited to the extent that they are incurred for the purpose of gaining or producing income from a business and are reasonable in the circumstances. Consideration is given to the facts and circumstances of each individual case. The Department's general views are expressed in Interpretation Bulletin IT-487.
3.	The Department is aware, through the routine audit program examination of the books and records of corporations and individuals carrying on business, that claims have been made as business expenses for contributions incurred in support of or to oppose the Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement. These expenditures would not necessarily be specifically identified in the financial statements filed with the income tax return. Further, as there is no special audit program directed at business expenses in support of or against the Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement, no aggregate statistical information is available on these claims.


Mr. St-Julien: 1.	Are there polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) storage sites in the constituency of Abitibi and, if so, (a) in what number (b) what is the frequency with which these sites are checked to ensure they comply with health and safety guidelines?
2.	Have any of these sites failed to pass inspections and, if so, (a) which sites (b) on what dates (i) did they fail (ii) will they be tested?
3.	Are PCBs in Abitibi being transferred for destruction and, if so, (a) to what location (b) by what means?


Walter Leland Rutherford (Lee) Clark: l. Yes.
(a)	There are fifteen private industrial plants that store PCB waste in the constituency of Abitibi.
(b)	Environment Canada inspects these sites once every two to three years to verify the inventory under 3(1) of the Chlorobiphenyls Interim Order (PC 1989-296, 23/02/89). Environment Canada also provides advice in accordance with existing codes of practice. The provincial government conducts an annual inventory under its hazardous waste regulations and applies the provisions of the federal government's Storage of PCB Wastes Interim Order in keeping with the concept of equivalency of provisions.
2.	No cases of noncompliance have been detected by Environment Canada with respect to the inventory.
3.	To our knowledge, no PCBs covered by the inventory were shipped for destruction.


Mr. MacWilliam: Has the government taken any action to review the reverse-onus procedure found in Chapter 35, Part II, Section 8, sub-section 4 of the Motor Vehicle Transport Act, 1987 and its impact on the nature of the transport industry in Canada and, if so, what action?
September 26, 1989


Hon. Benoit Bouchard (Minister of Transport):: Procedures are now in place to evaluate the impact of the reverse onus provisions, among other things, of the Motor Vehicle Transport Act, 1987 (MVTA). Specific provisions in Canada's new transportation legislation ensure that an assessment of the effectiveness of the legislation be made on a continuing basis. For example, the National Transportation Act requires that annual reviews be completed by May 31 of each year. In addition, a comprehensive review will be completed in 1992.
The National Transportation Agency (NTA) has recently completed the review for 1988, including the sections on new entrants, expansion and consolidation. These of course reflect the effect of reverse onus procedures.
Furthermore, additional monitoring procedures, under the auspices of the Canadian Council of Motor Transport Administrators (CCMTA) and performed by Transport Canada, the NTA, Consumer and Corporate Affairs and provincial agencies are being put in place.
These procedures will examine the effect of "reverse onus" on a province by province basis to determine if, by 1992, sunsetting of "reverse onus" is in the best interest of both shippers and carriers.
Sufficient time has not yet elapsed, nor sufficient data collected, to enable a substantial analysis of "reverse onus" to be accomplished. However, by 1990 some initial trends will have been established.


Mr. Allmand: 1.	On the occasion of the launching of the annual Hire a Student campaign by the federal minister for Youth in Ottawa, on Wednesday, May 10,1989, were (a) T-shirts (b) buttons (c) balloons purchased and, if so (i) from what persons were they bought (ii) what person printed them (iii) what number were left over (iv) what price did the government pay, including the price of printing?
2.	Were any other costs to the government involved and, if so (a) in what amounts (b) for what purposes?
3.	Were any other promotions like this one (a) held anywhere in Canada during the Hire a Student Campaign (b) cancelled after May 11, 1989 (c) held for any other Job Development Program (d) planned for, and cancelled after May 11, 1989?
Routine Proceedings


Hon. Jean J. Charest (Minister of State (Youth) and Minister of State (Fitness and Amateur Sport) and Deputy Leader of the Government in the House of Commons):: 1. (a) Yes.
(b)	Yes.
(c)	Yes.
(i), (ii) & (iv)
-3,500 French first T-shirts were produced and printed by Dome Advertising Ltd., Regina, Sask. at a cost of $15,653.45.
-6,500 English first T-shirts were produced and printed by Dome Advertising Ltd., Regina, Sask. at a cost of $29,280.86.
-130,000 100,000 English and 30,000 French buttons were purchased from and produced by Maison Basilieres Inc. of Montreal, Que. at a cost of $13,712.00.
- 10,000 Balloons were purchased from H.A.S. Novelties Ltd. in Ottawa, Ont. at a cost of $1,330.03.
(iii) None.
All materials distributed at the national launch of the Hire-A-Student campaign were also produced for national promotion and distributed to all 450 Canada Employment Centres for Students across the country. The Centres used the T-shirts for staff identification and in their promotional activities. Cost savings were achieved by centralized ordering of national quantities.
2.	(a) Yes.
There were other costs amounting to $30,588.15 for a contract to Continental Golin/Harris Communications Ltd.
(b) To create national awareness for Hire-A-Student, Continental Golin/Harris Communications was retained to organize, produce and orchestrate a national launch in Ottawa. (M.P.s from all three political parties took part in the event, along with representatives of C.P. Hotels and the Ottawa Construction Association, the sponsor for the National Capital Region's Youth Action 89 program. In addition, Dave Smith, owner of the Place Next Door restaurant donated 1,500 hot dogs for the event. As a special part of the promotion 120 rugby shirts with the Hire-A-Student logo printed on the front were produced to be worn by M.P.s participating in the event.)

September 26, 1989
Routine Proceedings
3.	(a) Yes.
Of the 450 Canada Employment Centres for Students (CECs-S) operating this year across the country, more than 60 were officially opened with the participation of Members of Parliament from all three federal parties. In addition, almost all of the remaining centres were opened by way of a less formal open house where student staff invited the community into their offices. Student staff of these offices have continued to hold events to profile their activity throughout the summer. As well, Award of Merit certificates produced by the government of Canada were given to Hire-A-Student sponsors at the end of the summer.
All CECs-S received promotional material for staff and guests to assist in creating a dynamic, energetic and professional atmosphere. The Hire-A-Student campaign is part of the Challenge program.
Opposition members, the Honourable Bill Rompkey (Labrador) and Mr. John Rodriguez (Nickel Belt) have hosted official openings and many others participated in open houses to assist in raising community awareness of the 1989 Hire-A-Student campaign. The government appreciates the ingenuity and energy of all students and the support of all members for their efforts.
(b)	No.
No official openings were cancelled before or after May 11, 1989. On occasion, obligations prevented a member from attending an event, in which case the CEC or CEC-S manager would officiate at the opening on the M.P.'s behalf.
(c)	No.
(d)	No.
See answer b.


Mr. Kaplan: Has the government set up a Special Federal Inquiries Unit of the
Royal Canadian Mounted Police and, if so (a) on what date was it set
up (b) what is its mandate (c) what continuity of personnel has it
enjoyed (d) what number of cases has it established?


Hon. Pierre Blais (Solicitor General of Canada and Minister of State (Agriculture)):: (a) 1985
(b)	The Branch deals with high profile cases involving crimes against the Government of Canada and serious crimes committed by public officials. Pursuant to a Treasury Board Directive, it also investigates cases referred by the Auditor General or federal departments and agencies where losses of public funds are suspected to be of criminal origin.
(c)	The Branch started as a unit of four personnel. Two additional people have been added. Three of the initial group were transferred and their positions filled with new members.
(d)	The unit has opened 65 investigational files to date.


Mr. Assad: 1.	Does the government intend to grant a produce quality allowance to Quebec sheep and lamb producers?
2.	Is the government in a position to assure the Federation of Quebec Sheep and Lamb Producers that the pilot project which has been under consideration for eight months will be implemented?


Hon. Donald Frank Mazankowski (Deputy Prime Minister, President of the Privy Council and Minister of Agriculture):: 1. Yes, Agriculture Canada has worked in conjunction with the Federation in developing regulations regarding this specific type of product.
2. The pilot project has an implementation date of September 15, 1989.


Mr. Assad: Is the government aware of the existence of a pilot project involving the Federation of Quebec Sheep and Lamb Producers, in which a sum of $100,000 each was invested by the Quebec Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and the Union des producteurs agricoles du Quebec and, if so, what has become of the project?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Yes, Agriculture Canada is aware and the project is being undertaken in conjunction with the Federation. Training of staff is presently being performed and administrative preparation is now occurring with an implementation date of September 15th, 1989.


Mr. Harvey (Edmonton East): Is there a Canadian consulate at Kiev in the Ukrainian S.S.R. and, if not (a) for what reasons (b) will the government open one within the next two years and, if not for what reasons?


Right Hon. Charles Joseph Clark (Secretary of State for External Affairs):: At the present time, the Canadian Government does not have a consulate in Kiev in the Ukrainian S.S.R. We have an agreement with the Soviet authorities which will allow us to establish a consulate in the Soviet Union. We plan to open this consulate in Kiev, but because of financial constraints, we have not been able to advance our plans at this stage.


Ms. Mitchell: Will language and citizenship training programs be available for immigrants after April 1990, when the CILT program is no longer funded and, if so, which ones?


Albert Glen Cooper: am informed by the Department of the Secretary of State of Canada and the Canada Employment and Immigration Commission as follows:
The decision to terminate the Citizenship and Language Instruction Agreement and the Language Textbooks Agreement as of March 31, 1990 is part of the Government's overall deficit reduction strategy which, in a time of fiscal restraint, involves making very difficult decisions. Language training for immigrants is a shared federal-provincial responsibility. There are a number of alternative programs that will continue to provide language training for adult immigrants despite the cancellation of CILT.
On the federal level, the Canada Employment and Immigration Commission has two programs to meet the language training needs of immigrants. Under the Direct Purchase Option of the Canadian Jobs Strategy, CEIC purchases language training seats from provincial educational institutions to provide English or French training so that immigrants who need such language ability can access the labour-market. In the past six fiscal years (from 1983/84 to 1988/89) 70,745 training seats were provided for immigrants and refugees at a cost of some $321 million. This is an ongoing program that will continue beyond April 1990.
Routine Proceedings
Under the Settlement Language Training Program (SLTP) non-governmental, voluntary organizations are funded to provide up to 500 hours of community-based instruction in coping language skills to immigrants not immediately destined to the labour-market, primarily immigrant women with child-care responsibilities. Since the program's inception in 1986 some 8,500 persons have received language training for a cost of $4.5 million. The SLTP is continuing to operate in 1989/90 as a pilot project with a budget of $3.5 million.


Ms. Callbecle: To the knowledge of the government, for each year since 1984, have fares on Marine Atlantic ferries between Borden, EE.I. and Cape Tormentine, N. B. increased, and, if so (a) in what amount (b) what percentage of Marine Atlantic's revenues do these figures represent (c) what are the fare increases, if any, for (i) cars (ii) passengers (iii) trucks and what percentage of revenues do these figures represent?


Benoît Bouchard: 
Mr. Milliken: Is the government aware of reasons for any large number of white cedars north and west of Ottawa dying during the spring of 1989 and, if so, what are they?


Mr. Michel Champagne (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of State (Forestry):: The Forest Insect and Disease Survey, Forestry Canada, has reported damage to cedar trees in areas north and west of Ottawa and in particular from Ottawa-Hull to Brockville and vicinity.
The browning of cedar foliage is the result of two years of severe damage caused by an insect called the cedar leafminer, last year's drought, and winter drying or "winter kill".
Feeding by cedar leafminers has caused severe browning of the foliage and often subsequent twig, branch, or tree kill. Fortunately, however, severely injured trees will often produce new foliage later in the growing season. On individual ornamentals the infested twig tips can be pruned and destroyed in early spring.
"Winter kill" is characterized by tips of twigs or entire foliage turning yellow or brown in early spring.
Also, two years ago, there was a bumper crop of cedar cones which are retained by the trees and gives a brown appearance when viewed from a distance.
Cedar trees should recover if watered during dry weather. However, in natural forest conditions some mortality may occur.


Mr. Milliken: Has the government promulgated any environmental regulations or guidelines governing the kinds of chemicals that may be sprayed or otherwise deposited on roads or road allowances and, if so, are any substances prohibited pursuant to them and, if so, which ones?


Hon. Lucien Bouchard (Minister of the Environment):: Environment Canada's only regulation relating to the spraying of substances on roads is the chlorobiphenyls (PCB) interim order, which prohibits the application of any liquid containing more than 5 ppm by weight to a road surface. There are no federal guidelines governing the application of substances to roads. Normally, this activity is addressed by the provincial government.
September 26, 1989


Mr. Gardiner: Does the government estimate that new jobs will be created to administer the proposed goods and services tax and, if so, what number?


Otto John Jelinek: Taxation
It will be necessary to create new jobs in order to administer the Goods and Services Tkx Credit program. Unfortunately, it is not possible to give a reliable estimate of the number of jobs until such time as draft legislation is available.
Customs & Excise
The Goods and Services Tax has a much larger client base than the current Federal Sales Thx. As a result it will be necessary to establish additional jobs to administer the tax.
The number of staff required for this tax are dependent on the number of vendors involved, the complexity of tax and other such factors. Until details of the tax and the draft legislation are made available it is not possible to speculate on the number of resources required.


Mr. Robichaud: 1.	How many (a) full-time (b) part-time employees are presently employed in the Superannuation Branch of the Department of Supply and Services at Shediac, New-Brunswick?
2.	Does the government intend to reduce the number of (a) full-time employees (b) part-time employees (c) person-years at the Shediac office?
3.	If so, (a) how many jobs or person-years will be cut (b) when will those cuts be made (c) which subdivision of the Superannuation Branch will be affected (d) which activity will be affected?
4.	Has a plan been set up to provide assistance to affected employees and, if so, what is it and, if not, is such a plan being considered?


Hon. Paul Wyatt Dick (Minister of Supply and Services):: 1. At the end of June 1989, (a) 396 full-time (including 26 Leave Without Pay and 38 casuals) and (b) 25 part-time employees were employed by the Superannuation Branch, at Shediac, New Brunswick.
Routine Proceedings
2.	This fiscal year, the number of person-years in the Branch was reduced by 6. The planned reduction for fiscal year 1990-91 is 5 PY's. The budgets for future years are not known at this time. The number of part-time and full-time employees will be adjusted as required to meet our allocated budget.
3.	(a) Six person-years have been cut for this fiscal year, (b) Two were absorbed in Support and Management Services through regular attrition. Exactly when the other four PY's will be cut is unknown because a final decision is pending, (c) While a number of proposals have been put forward, no final decision has been reached and this matter is still under review, (d) This cannot be determined until the review mentioned in 3 (c) is complete.
4.	The Superannuation Branch management is committed to make all possible efforts to place the incumbents of affected positions in other available positions. The Treasury Board Departmental Workforce Adjustment Policy would apply to the affected employees. The policy includes provisions to help the employees such as priority status, re-training for other positions, etc. As well, all provisions of the applicable Collective agreements will be adhered to.


Mr. Keyes: Since 1984, has the government carried out investigations to determine whether any chemicals or toxins have been leaching into Chedoke Creek at Princess Point from the Kay Drage Park in Hamilton and (a) if so, have they discovered any and, if so (i) what are the types of chemicals or toxins (ii) what is quantity of each chemical or toxin found in the Creek in parts per million (iii) has the government undertaken to contain the chemicals or toxins from leaching into the Creek (b) if not, is the government prepared to do so at the earliest opportunity and report back as to its findings?


Lucien Bouchard: a) No test was performed, b) The federal government does not plan to carry out such tests, as these activities fall under provincial jurisdiction.


Mr. St-Julien: On or about June 13, 1989, did a landslide occur betwen mileage points 106 and 107 on the Chapais subdivision, between Miquelon and Chapais and, if so, on what date (a) was CN advised of the landslide (b) did CN managerial staff take photographs of the landslide (c) did CN employees go to the area between mileage points 106 and 107 to repair CN's track?

September 26, 1989
Routine Proceedings


Benoît Bouchard: The
Canadian National Railway Company advises as follows:
On June 5th, 1989, it was discovered during a regular CN track inspection of the Chapais subdivision, that the roadbed at mileage 106.20 had been eroded by heavy rainfalls.
(a)	The incident in question was immediately reported by the inspection officer.
(b)	On June 6th, CN management took photographs of the site and evaluated extent of damages.
(c)	Cost of needed repairs was evaluated at $10,000 and the time to complete work and restore train service, if needed, was estimated to be less than 48 hours. Train movement being nil, at this time, it was management's decision to delay repairs until service requirements justified the restoration of train operations.


Mr. St-Julien: On or about February 20, 1989, was VIA Rail forced to cancel a passenger train (No. 135) at mileage point 82.4 on the La Tbque subdivision, between Montreal and Senneterre, because of a problem with engine No. 6504 and, if so (a) what was the cause of the problem (b) what was the number of passengers carried on the train (c) how much time did the train remain in La TUque (d) how many taxicabs were dispatched by VIA Rail to Quebec City, Hervey Junction, Garneau, Shawinigan and Montreal (i) for what number of passengers and (ii) at what cost (e) how many buses did VIA Rail rent to transport the passengers (i) to which destination (ii) at what cost (f) what was the cost to VIA Rail of meals and rooms provided to passengers in La TUque?


Benoît Bouchard: Via
Rail Canada Inc. advises as follows:
(a)	to (f) At 23:15 on 20 February 1989, train number 135 en route from Montreal to Senneterre with 66 passengers on board advised the dispatcher from mileage point 82.4 on the Lac St-Jean subdivision that locomotive 6506 was experiencing a problem due to blown fuses.
At 23:55 the locomotive was shut down at mileage point 87. CN called to obtain a crew and replacement
locomotive from Fitzpatrick, as the train was stopped in a remote area with no road access. The only locomotive available was facing the wrong way and it was estimated that it would take two hours to turn it around and put it in service on account of the heavy snow in the yard. The rescue locomotive departed Fitzpatrick at 02:00 and arrived at mileage 87 at 03:15, where the situation had deteriorated because boiler problems had developed on locomotive number 3542. At 04:30 the steam generating unit shut down.
Via contacted the La Tuque station to inquire about accommodation and food for passengers, 44 of whom were bound for Weymount and 12 for Parent. At 06:05 the train arrived in La Tbque, but steam power was still unavailable.
Two buses were chartered from nearby Chevrette, one bound for Weymount, at a cost of $544, and the other for Parent, at a cost of $533.
The 10 remaining passengers headed to remote areas beyond La Tuque were given the option of staying in La Tuque at Via's expense until the next frequency (two days later) or being taxied to their points of origin: Grand'mere, Shawinigan, Hervey and Heberville. All passengers opted to return home. The fares for the five taxis totalled $720. Also breakfast was served to all passengers at a cost of $287.


Mr. Young (Beaches-Woodbine): Since 1984, did UNIGEC of Chicoutimi, Quebec, make any applications for project funding to the Canadian International Development Agency and, if so (a) what was the title of each project (b) what was the nature of each project (c) what was the location of each project (d) what was the amount of funding requested for each project (e) what service was UNIGEC to provide to each project (f) on what date were the applications made (g) on what date were the applications approved or rejected (h) if rejected, what were the reasons given for the rejection (*iti*ro) subsequent to any of the applications being made, did any person or persons make an intervention with respect to the application, and if so, what is the name of such person(*ros) and what was the purpose of the intervention?
September 26, 1989


Hon. Monique Landry (Minister for External Relations):: No.


Mr. Young (Beaches-Woodbine): Since 1984, did UNIGEC and Anthony Pau and Associates make a joint application for project funding to the Canadian International Development Agency and, if so (a) what was the title of each project (b) what was the nature of each project (c) what was the location of each project (d) what was the amount of funding requested for each project (e) what service was UNIGEC and Anthony Pau and Associates to provide to each project (f) on what date were the applications made (g) on what date were the applications approved or rejected (h) if rejected, what were the reasons given for the rejection (i) subsequent to any of the applications being made, did any person or persons make an intervention with respect to the application, and if so, what is the name of such person(s) and what was the purpose of the intervention?


Monique Landry: Yes.
UNIGEC and Anthony Pau and Associates
(a)	Wind Energy Development Study, Qibei County, Yunnan Province, China.
(b)	Engineering feasibility and technology options analysis.
(c)	Qibei County, Yunnan Province, China.
(d)	$205,107.
(e)	Project administration services and participation in the engineering study with Mr. Pau.
(f)	October 9, 1987.
(g)	CIDA conditional approval given October 24, 1988, with a deadline February 24, 1989 for the signing of commercial contracts with the Chinese client. Conditional approval is standard Industrial Cooperation Program (INC) practice.
(h)	The two firms were unable to reach a contractual arrangement within the above time frame stipulated by CIDA. As such, it was not possible for CIDA to continue to offer support for the study.
(i)	Yes. Mr. Greg Giokas, Special Assistant to the Minister for External Relations and International Development asked that CIDA issue a letter to the consortium outlining the conditions that had to be met before a contribution agreement could be signed.


Mr. Young (Beaches-Woodbine): Since 1984, did Anthony Pau and Associates of Toronto, Ontario, make any applications for project funding to the Canadian International Development Agency and, if so (a) what was the tile of each project (b) what was the nature of each project (c) what was the
Routine Proceedings
location of each project (d) what was the amount of funding requested for each project (e) what service was Anthony Pau and Associates to provide to each project (f) on what date were the applications made (g) on what date were the applications approved (h) if rejected, what were the reasons given for the rejection (*iti*ro) subsequent to any of the applications being made, did any person or persons make an intervention with respect to the application, and if so, what is the name of such person('ros) and what was the purpose of the intervention?


Monique Landry: Yes, two applications were received by CIDA, Industrial Cooperation Program (INC).
Anthony Pau and Associates
(a)	(i) a wind energy demonstration project.1
(ii) a Canadian Project Preparation Facility engineering study proposal.2
(b)	(i) the engineering study, purchase and installation of a wind turbine.
(ii) an engineering analysis of wind conditions and technology options.
(c)	both projects were located in Yunnan Province in Southwestern China.
(d)	(i) $500,000 (ii) $99,000
(e)	(i) engineering analysis, equipment purchase, equipment installation supervision and results evaluation.
(ii) engineering analysis, study of technology options.
(f)	(i) discussions in late 1986.
(ii) proposal was received in CIDA on February 8, 1987.
(g)	they were not approved
(h)	(i) a meeting with Mr. Pau was held in late 1986 to explain to him that the CIDA Industrial Cooperation Program could not support the equipment supply and demonstration project idea since the Program had no mandate to fund equipment purchases.
(ii) the engineering study proposal was received February 8, 1987. In June 1987, CIDA wrote to Mr. Pau communicating the results of the CIDA Professional Services evaluation of the engineering study proposal and suggestions as to how it needed to be strengthened in order to be approved.
(i)	No
1 The wind energy demonstration project application was submitted in 1986, but was never formally reviewed as it did not meet the basic criteria of the Industrial Cooperation Program.

September 26, 1989
Routine Proceedings
2 (i) refers to the wind energy demonstration project throughout the text.
(ii) refers to the Canadian Project Preparation Facility engineering study proposal throughout the text.


Albert Glen Cooper: Mr. Speaker, if Questions Nos. 83, 91, and 113 could be made Orders for Return, these returns would be tabled immediately.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House that Questions Nos. 83, 91, and 113 be deemed to have been made Orders for Return?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Mr. Kindy: 1.	For each year since 1970, what was the total received by any company or corporation in tax breaks or remissions?
2.	For each year and, in each case, what was the name of the company or corporation and the amount of the tax break or remission obtained by (a) regulation (b) Order in Council (c) negotiation?
Return tabled.


Ms. Copps: For each year since 1985, has the government purchased styrofoam cups, plates, trays or bowls for use in government offices, cafeterias, agencies or institutions and, if so (a) what number of each item was purchased (b) at what cost (c) who were the manufacturers (d) did any of the items contain chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and, if so, what percentage of the (i) cups (ii) plates (iii) trays (iv) bowls contained CFCs?
Return tabled.


Mr. Kaplan: Were any of the current members of the National Parole Board appointed by Solicitors General and, if so, for each Solicitor General what is the (a) name (b) background, in brief resume form, of each appointee?
Return tabled.


Albert Glen Cooper: Mr. Speaker, would you be so kind as to call Starred Questions Nos. 86 and 87.
Mr. Speaker, due to the length of the responses I ask that they be printed in Hansard as if read.


[Stage Direction]
*Question No 86-Mr. Rideout:
1.	Has the Department of Regional Industrial Expansion made any studies of th economic impact, both locally and on the province of New Brunswick, of a closure or reduction in service at CFB Moncton?
2.	Were there full consultations within the government with regard to the possibility of a closure or reduction in service at CFB Moncton?
Albert Glen Cooper: I am informed by the Departments of Regional Industrial Expansion and National Defence as follows:
1.	No.
2.	Consultations were conducted within the constraints of budget secrecy.


[Stage Direction]
*
Mr. Rideout: 1.	Did the government rely upon particular facts or reports in deciding to announce a $100 million refurbishment for CFB Moncton in June 1988, and, if so, which ones?
2.	Were any steps taken by government staff following this announcement and, if so, what were they?
3.	Did the government rely upon any particular facts in deciding to close CFB Moncton and, if so, which ones?


Hon. William McKnight (Minister of National Defence):: 1. Yes, in 1983 a comprehensive survey of CFB Moncton infrastructure was carried out as part of the Base Development Plan. This study recommended the construction of a new 5 Canadian Forces Supply Depot (5 CFSD) to replace present inadequate and widely dispersed facilities. These findings were supported by the recommendations of the Depot Modernization Task Force (DMTF) created in 1985 to analyse deficiencies in the . Canadian Forces Supply System. The proposal to replace 5 CFSD Moncton was formalized with acceptance of the projet submission by the Construction Priority Screening Committee (CPSC) in February 1986 and reaffirmed by a review of DND infrastructure carried out in June 1988. The estimate of $100 million reflects the projected cost to construct and equip a stand alone depot.
September 26, 1989

2.	Yes, Defence staff is continuing with the development of a Statement of Requirements initiated in January 1987, an evaluation of the options to reorganize CFB Moncton into a more efficient posture initiated in May 1988, and the finalizing of a Program Development Proposal (PDP) to achieve Departmental and Treasury Board approval for the project.
3.	Yes. (a) The reductions in the base support functions will permit overall personnel reductions of an estimated 77 military and 139 civilian. Attendant savings have been estimated at approximately $100 million over the 15 year planning period.
(b)	The reductions to the base and the lease costs for the proposed new depot facilities will result in net additional operations and maintenance costs estimated at $90 million over fifteen years. These additional costs, however, will make it possible to avoid substantial capital construction expenditures.
(c)	One-time costs for personnel relocation, retraining and other benefits have been estimated at $1.5 million. Potential costs relating to the disposal or removal of existing facilities have not been estimated, nor have potential revenues from the sale of excess properties.


Albert Glen Cooper: I ask that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.


Mr. Speaker:: Shall the remaining questions be allowed to stand?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from Monday, September 25, consideration of the motion of Mr. Mulroney that Bill C-29, an Act to establish the Department of Forestry, to amend the Forestry Development and Research Act and to make related amendments to other Acts, be read the second time and referred to a legislative committee.
Government Orders
Mr. Charles-Eugene Marin (Gaspe):: Mr. Speaker, I shall continue this morning with my speech on Bill C-29 creating a Department of Forestry, since I had to interrupt it yesterday because of time at five o'clock.
Among the initiatives which the partners can accomplish with the Department's leadership and participation is the development of the highest standards of intensive forest management for Canada's productive forest lands. Based on these standards, management plans can be developed which respect the important ecological role of forests, good conservation practices, and multiple use of the resource. The Department must take a leading part among the partners in developing a consensus about how sustainable development can be achieved in every region of Canada.
The Department can assist in developing a national inventory of the forest resource because we know accurate information is a key element of good management. We need this reliable database. It must contain site-specific information. To be meaningful, it will have to be developed according to agreed-upon standards. Without this kind of information, we cannot do the careful, rational and effective planning which will be necessary if we are to maintain our competitive edge. A federal department of forestry is essential in working with its provincial and private sector partners on this task, and in making such a database accessible to industry, government, and non-governmental public interest groups in every part of Canada.
We on the government side are well aware of the constitutional division of power and provincial prerogatives regarding forestry, and a new Department of Forestry in no way violates these principles. Our way of doing business is cooperation. We are already working with our partners within the framework of the National Forest Sector Strategy which finds implementation in Forest Resource Development Agreements between the federal and provincial governments.
In Quebec, those agreements were used in particular to finance site preparation, regeneration and tending activities over more than 650,000 hectares of land. At least 45,000 private woodlot owners have benefitted over the last four years and each year an average of 600 projects are carried out on Crown lands. We are now in a position to examine the last generation of agreements and to review what has been accomplished through this type of public management. Long-term goals and forest management standards are defined. More than $1.1 billion have been allocated for reforestation and forest management at the national level.

Government Orders
Federal resources committed for renewal and regeneration were strictly reserved to deal with the current backlog, not for lands currently being harvested which are 100 per cent the responsibility of the provinces and the industry.
The Minister has already announced that these accords, some of which are currently being renegotiated, will encourage the provinces to extend their planning timeframe toward more distant horizons as is befitting of a resource which takes eighty years of more to renew.
There is another task involving the provinces and private sector which the new Department can fulfill. It can develop manufacturing technology to add greater value and increase the variety of our forest exports.
The forest products industry must focus its attention on this task if it is to realize its potential for growth and expansion.
Canada's prospects in the paper and paperboard sector are strong. New technologies can keep our pulp production high. Solid wood products will remain a major component of the industry, expecially in panels and reconstituted boards. And the greatest opportunities open to us are in the value-added products.
We in Quebec, for example, have a major development opportunity in production of printing and writing papers, products which need inexpensive energy and abundant hardwood resources.
Since most of the products of Canadian forests are exported, it is a federal Department of Forestry which is needed to help industry and the provinces on a nationwide basis coordinate and accelerate efforts to keep Canada competitive in a rapidly-changing global marketplace which is constantly shifting beneath our feet. This means sharper marketing, focusing on specialty products, increasing product quality, shifting emphasis to a new mix of products. That brings me, Mr. Speaker, to the fourth mandate, the fourth task of the proposed Department of Forestry, namely to keep Canada on the cutting edge of research and development so that we can keep on top. The task is not ours alone. The private sector must also allocate more of their own resources for research. Our industry spends 60 cents on research for every $100 of wood we sell, while the Americans spend over four times that amount. One American company alone spends over 60-million U.S. dollars annually, which is comparable to Forestry Canada's entire research budget.
But it is not just increased spending: the research we do must become better focused, better coordinated, and become target-oriented. Our federal forestry labs and labs to which we contribute already are considered world leaders in certain critical areas that show best promise.
We can show, Mr. Speaker, by own example in research conducted or sponsored by a federal department of forestry that forestry research and development is regarded as a national priority.
By the way, Mr. Speaker, the Federal-Provincial Forest Resource Development Agreements have contributed to some 70 university research and other projects in the province of Quebec.
If we act and spend wisely, the dollar value of our forest exports could rise 55 per cent above current levels over the next twenty years, if, among other things, we emphasize new products and markets, and if we develop the technologies that will allow us to utilize our special Canadian advantages.
In addition to all these tasks, the new Department of Forestry will have special responsibilities in directing the management of federal forest lands, again setting an example with respect to sustainable development and multiple use of forests.
If we can show with federal lands that sustainable development pays off, that it is an investment in the future which pays handsome dividends, then perhaps we can influence those in the industry who act as if there is no tomorrow.
September 26, 1989

Last of all, Mr. Speaker, as its sixth task, a federal Forestry Department will be of great assistance to the other government departments having involvement with forests and forest issues. I can think of at least nine departments which are involved with significant aspects of forestry in their mandates, and it is vital that there be a lead Department to develop cooperative arrangements within the federal Government.
First, there is Environment Canada and Parks Canada, which have an interest in forest policy which might have an impact on wildlife or migratory birds or the effects of forests on the atmosphere and climate.
Second, agriculture and forestry have had a strong relationship in Canada over the last century.
Third, where it is requested to do so, the Department of Forestry could assist the First Nations of Canada with regard to forest management on their lands.
Fourth, the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development has other responsibilities as well which relate to forest management.
Fifth, there are Department of National Defence lands on which the Department of Forestry can demonstrate state-of-the-art forestry practices.
Sixth, a cooperative liaison with the Department of Industry, Science and Technology can keep forestry in the picture when it comes to research and development, industrial planning, regional development, and aboriginal economic development programs. And there is that all-important area of international trade, where access to export markets is of the highest importance to our economic well-being.
Seventh, Fisheries and Oceans understand very well the impact of forestry practices on the fisheries. Energy, Mines and Resources has an interest in biomass energy development. The Atlantic and Western development agencies are involved in ensuring that forestry reaches its full potential in economic development and employment in those parts of Canada.
In summary, then, Mr. Speaker, by introducing this Bill to establish a Department of Forestry, the federal Government is positioning itself to accelerate Canadian forestry's ability to fulfill its full potential in Canada's future.
Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, I have attempted to set out six of the major essential functions which the new Department could fulfill. This Bill is a further indication of the priority which forestry has for the Government. Indeed, over the last four years, this Government has increased the federal investment in forestry by 300 per cent.
As I mentioned when I began, Mr. Speaker, I wholeheartedly support this Bill, and I urge my colleagues to make this House unanimous in passing this Bill without delay.


Brian L. Gardiner: Mr. Speaker, is there a question and answer period following this speaker now?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Yes, there is. The hon. member for Carleton-Gloucester.


Eugène Bellemare: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member for Gaspe is to be commended for supporting the creation of a new department of forestry as proposed by the Government in Bill C-29. The Hon. Member spoke at length about reforestation, and I was glad to hear what he had to say on the subject, since our Canadian forests are the lungs of our environment. The Hon. Member had a lot to say about the United States and was lavish with his praise. He also praised what was being done in the province of Quebec. However, although I may have missed parts of his speech, I did not hear him refer to the other nine provinces. He seemed to be concentrating on the province of Quebec. I was also disappointed that he had nothing to say about the Gaspe area, his own riding where I am sure forests and a forestry industry exist.
My question to the Hon. Member is as follows: What kind of activities are we seeing in the other provinces at this time? Where is the Government going to make improvements, and above all, how does it intend to go about improving forestry activities in Canada if it is already faced with budget cutbacks and federal personnel cuts?


Charles-Eugène Marin: Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the Hon. Member for his kind words about my speech. Obviously, I spoke mainly about the province of Quebec, because I am better acquainted with the situation in that province. Of course the federal Government, through its new department, will be active in all other provinces as well. I may remind the Hon. Member that the riding of Gaspe is part of the province of Quebec, and so what I said about the province of Quebec, also applies to the riding of Gaspe.

September 26, 1989
Government Orders
I may remind him that in Quebec, 94 million hectares of land are covered with forest. That is probably why I concentrated on my own province. Its forestry industry includes 8 pulp plants, 49 paper mills, 121 sawmills, 4 plywood plants and 10 particle board plants. I think he will realize that the importance of this industry was one more reason for me to talk mainly about my own province.
In Quebec, forestry is responsible for 229,000 jobs, which means one out of thirteen. Sales of forestry products total 10.8 billion. Mr. Speaker, I think I had good reason to be somewhat partial to the province of Quebec, and I can assure the Hon. Member that when I say Quebec, I also include the riding of Gaspe.


Mr. Kilger:: Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to the remarks of my hon. colleague from Gaspe. Given that the department of forestry received an 11.9 per cent cut in its 1989-90 budget, that 47 person-years were trimmed from the department, and that the new forestry department to be created by Bill C-29 does not have control over its own funds, in having to go a multitude of other departments and agencies, I would submit that the government is creating a department of forestry but not in the fullest sense. I humbly recognize this bill as being a modest beginning.
I would just like to ask the member for Gaspe, if he could possibly look ahead to the not too distant future, next year, whether the department of forestry would have greater autonomy by having its own budget. Would it be allowed to mature into a department that would have the fiscal resources it requires to protect and serve one of Canada's most precious natural resources?


Charles-Eugène Marin: Mr. Speaker, obviously, if we had been able to create a full department we would have done so.
The purpose of the Bill before the House today is to provide a framework. In fact, the department's authority will be quite considerable at the level of co-ordination. Later on, with the help of nationwide consultation, we will be able to give the Minister what the Hon. Member suggested and perhaps suggest a number of other aspects
the Government might consider, to give the department greater responsibility.


Michel Champagne: Mr. Speaker, I listened attentively to my colleague from Gaspe (Mr. Marin) and I must say that his speech in general is very well thought.
One of our colleagues in the Opposition raised the subject of the Eastern Plan, saying that Dr. Marin, the Hon. Member for Gaspe, did not talk enough about it. Mr. Speaker, I know very well from a visit I made with the Forestry Minister this summer what people told us about the Eastern Plan; they were very glad to have the federal Government participate in a forestry program and they urged the federal Government to pass a bill to set up a full-fledged department as soon as possible.
Mr. Speaker, if it is possible, I would like to ask my colleague from Gaspe to describe the federal Government's involvement in quater detail and also to describe the reason those concerned want a full-fledged department, one that will really look after forests throughout the country, instead of going through a junior minister. So I would ask my colleague from Gaspe to give us some explanation of this.


Charles-Eugène Marin: Mr. Speaker, for someone, who did not want questions, I am doing very badly.
It is quite obvious that our experience over the past few years in eastern Quebec with the plan known as the Eastern Plan has been wonderful and this forestry program, we spent $40 million recently on private forests alone. On public forests, under the Canada-Quebec ERDA agreements, we spent a great deal of money-$150 million. Obviously, if every region could develop at this rate-the advantage is that all these funds, these programs must come under a federal department.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The period for questions and comments is over. Debate. The Hon. Member for Cochrane-Superior (Mr. Belair).


Mr. Reginald Belair (Cochrane-Superior):: Mr. Speaker, before starting my speech, I would like to thank the Hon. Member for Restigouche (Mr. Arseneault) and congratulate him on the excellent speech he made .yesterday. It was very well researched and contained a lot of information that will certainly be useful in the years to come.
September 26, 1989

Bill C-29 will also have a major impact on my constituents. I would like to mention that my riding has four paper mills operating at top capacity and also a large number of sawmills which will be able to take advantage of what the new Bill has to offer.
Ever since Jacques Cartier set foot on Canadian soil, the lumber industry has played a very important part in our country's economy and still does. A century ago, there was practically nothing in the way of regulations that applied to the forestry industry. At the time, the Crown, through the provinces, gave individuals tracts of land which they worked very hard to clear, using the wood for the construction of buildings on their property.
Briefly, these people farmed the arable land they had cleared during the summer and worked as loggers during the winter, supplying saw mills and pulp and paper mills with the raw material they required.
At the time there was no advanced technology. In other words, tools and means of transportation were primitive, and that is why clearcutting forests was not as serious a matter as it is today. What I mean to say is that when forests were clearcut, the bare expanses were not as readily visible as they are today.
The forest was also a source of food, which shows how important it was at the time and still is today. Aboriginal people living on reserves depend on the forest, especially for their hunting grounds and trap lines.
The situation has changed today. The speed with which our forests are being cut has a dramatic effect on the Canadian Government's future vision and policy.

The forestry industry provides one in ten jobs in Canada directly or indirectly. In fact close to 800,000 people work in the industry, 350 communities depend on it, and huge chunks of income tax are paid to the federal government. Therefore it should only be fair that a lot of that money be put back into Canada's forestry to ensure its economic stability.
Yesterday the minister outlined the department's history which I do not intend to repeat today. Please allow me one comment.
Government Orders
It should be noted that since the turn of the century the department was bounced around on nine different occasions which explains its lack of continuity, competence and national involvement. There should be a strong federal presence to provide the much needed leadership. In this case it is better late than never for the federal government to impose its presence. Indeed, the creation of a department of forestry is a step in the right direction.
One cannot argue the generalities the bill offers, except in clause 6(c) where it only refers to the promotion of the forest industry but does not include enforcement.
I whole-heartedly encourage the minister to pursue the idea of hiring inspectors to oversee and supervise forest management. For example, he has mentioned that in Canada there is approximately one inspector for every
450,000	hectares of forested land, whereas in the United States there is one for every 15,000 hectares of forested land.
What I am saying is that it is not enough to advocate a forest management policy. It has to be enforced. The question is how.
The department does have the leverage power through the forest resource development agreements to impose its conditions on the provinces, namely in the area of reforestation and silviculture.

We have a lot of catching up to do. Canada's productive forests cover a total area of 220 million hectares.
Over the years, 12 per cent of those lands have not been satisfactorily restocked. We are looking at an increase of 200,000 hectares or nearly 1 per cent per year. Granted, 88 per cent has been reforested satisfactorily.
However, it means that next year, it will be 13 per cent and the year after, 14 per cent, and so forth. We cannot let a situation like this develop. We must act instead of constantly blaming the provinces. It is the only way to enforce the rules of sound forest management, as described in subsection 6(c).

September 26, 1989
Government Orders

Not enough emphasis can be put on silviculture and reforestation. Harvested land must be restocked. The notion that our forests are inexhaustible is totally false. This is where the concept of sustainable development is universally accepted. It is the means by which we can save our forests and prepare for tomorrow.
Subsection (d) of Clause 6 deals with sustainable development. In very simple terms it means ensuring that in 50 years to 100 years from now there will still be trees to harvest in Canada. We can no longer take for granted that our forests will exist forever.
As the minister is saying in The Green Ghetto, published in October of 1983, "The federal government must begin by putting its own house in order. Federal forest lands have the poorest inventories, the worst neglect of regeneration, and virtually no protection from fire and insects." Mr. Speaker, co-operation between the provinces, the federal government and the industry is a must.
I would go so far as to propose that the federal government enact strong legislation to lead the companies involved in clear cutting to reforest any area that has been harvested. If stiff penalties are the only way to get the message across, then let us not be afraid to impose them. Our future needs to be protected because jobs depend on it. The survival of those 350 communities previously mentioned should benefit from the vision that we, as legislators, have today. The minister's view in The Green Ghetto fully supports the statement, "Rapid action is needed just to protect the industries and their employees. Without significant improvement in our forest performance we will not only forfeit opportunities to expand, we will suffer rapid and painful deterioration".
Sustainable development should also be promoted because some regions depend on forestry as a means to develop and promote tourism. One example comes to mind. A few weeks ago I visited the town of Tofino, British Columbia, with my hon. colleague from Hamilton East. We were greatly impressed by the scenery. It is easily understandable why the local residents express such a strong desire to keep their surroundings intact. Indeed, Mr. Speaker, 57 per cent of the town's population depends on tourism. Can you imagine the devastating effects of clear cutting the steep hills that sculpt the background? Erosion of the top soil to the bedrock would undoubtedly prevent any regeneration. It spells
disaster. The spectacular sight it offers today would disappear forever.
I maintain that there is room for compromise, especially if forest companies across Canada would agree to selective harvesting, intensive reforestation and preservation of specific areas where nature would be forever stripped of its assets.
Another fascinating example would be the preservation of the Carmanah Valley with its prestigious spruce grove. These trees took 300 years to 400 years to grow; it would be a shame to destroy all of that within a few days.
Clause 7 of Bill C-29 stipulates that the minister should:
(a) promote co-operation,-with the governments of other
countries-
Co-operation, though, should not be a giveaway as it is the case with the softwood lumber issue. The government via the forestry minister has acknowledged that the 15 per cent export tax on softwood lumber is terribly hurting the industry in Ontario and in Quebec. If I were an American, I would also be very reluctant to terminate the softwood lumber deal struck in December of 1986.
The forestry department should indeed stand up for the industry and demand that the deal be abolished. Failing the Americans doing so, the forestry department should request a hearing at the bilateral procurement board and take it from there. We should not go down without a fight when so many jobs are at stake.
Subclause 7(b) refers to the possible creation of a national data bank of forestry. According to the last Auditor General's report, "there is little information to assist Parliament in making judgment on the national Canadian forestry service program priorities as to how successful CFS has been in meeting its objective".
It is clear that with the rapidly growing importance of the industry such a bank is a must.

Bill C-29 does not mention unemployment in the forestry industry. Together with the Department of Employment and Immigration, the new department should set up a new training program for workers who have been laid off as a result of mechanization and advanced technology. It is alarming to note, Mr. Speaker, that in the forestry industry's logging and transportation sectors alone, unemployment increased in 1987, rising to 22 per cent. This is extremely high if we consider that at the time the national average was 8.9 per cent.
September 26, 1989

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I could not conclude my remarks without referring to the desperate situation which is currently unfolding in the rain forests of the Amazon. Western leaders are creating a dependency by forcing Third World countries to blindly exploit their natural resources, namely forests.
It is hopeful that Canada will remain sovereign in its exploitation of its natural resources. A strong forestry department is the only insurance against the forceful hand of other industrialized countries.
The new department should have a clearly stated national responsibility for federal leadership in forestry matters, research and technology transfer, forest resource development agreements, forest resource data, industry marketing, trade and employment and public awareness.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The hon. member has another five minutes left so he does not need to rush through his speech.


Réginald Bélair: I thought Your Honour was letting me know that my time was over.
To conclude, Bill C-29 has its weaknesses. I would like to think that the government in next year's budget will allocate the necessary funds to allow the department to completely fulfil its mandate and to exercise its responsibilities toward the most significant single industry in Canada.


Eugène Bellemare: Mr. Speaker, I would like to commend the member of Parliament for Cochrane-Superior on his speech in support of Bill C-29, that is, the establishment of a ministry of forestry. I thought his subjects of tourism, forest industry and especially employment and job training were tres a point.
He mentioned also about the depletion of trees. I wonder if he would elaborate on the importance of reforestation vis-a-vis the environment.


Réginald Bélair: Indeed, it is a pleasure for me to answer that question. Reforestation, of course, is the major component of this new concept that has been thrown around for the last couple of years, namely sustainable development.
From the beginning of the century until the early 1960s, reforestation was not a major aspect of the forestry industry. For the last 20 years, companies and governments have started to realize that if there is not a very strictly adhered to program of reforestation, in 20 to 50 years from now there will not be trees to harvest in Canada.
Maybe I should be more specific. Now, most of the companies are within 50 to 100 miles from their plants. In 20 to 50 years they will be 200 miles from their plants. It is going to be extremely expensive for them to harvest and bring the product back to either the sawmill or the pulp and paper mill.
If we are going to endorse sustainable development, reforestation is a must. It is a major factor in ensuring the industry's future.


Mr. Worthy:: I would like to ask a question of the member for Cochrane-Superior. Actually, I would like to ask several, but I probably will not have time for that.
He was talking about that beautiful part of Canada, British Columbia. I do not happen to live in that actual area, but I have spent some time working there. There are beautiful stands of trees. Any one of us would stand in awe at what nature has wrought.
There are many, many groups of people advocating the preservation of such lands. But there are also many groups and many people whose jobs and livelihood is dependent on the forest industry. For example, the leadership and the membership of the IWA in British Columbia are very concerned that proposals to preserve these beautiful trees will also be taking their livelihood.
I wonder if the member would suggest how he would approach that situation.


Réginald Bélair: I thank the hon. member for his question. Indeed , I addressed the same issue briefly in my speech.
What I saw in B.C., and I am going to use your words, was awesome. We have met with some environmentalist groups as well as with people from the industry. This is why I mentioned in my speech that there is still room for compromise.

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I will come back to the same two examples I gave to you. In Tofino, the hills surrounding the town itself are absolutely beautiful. Right now there is a possibility that a company which has a tree farming licence may strip those hills completely, clear cut them of all wood. So, if you are on one side of the issue, can you imagine promoting the tourism industry and having those stripped hills to show to the people?
On the other hand, this is where the compromise could be. What if the companies strip only the side of the hill which is not visible to the tourists. That would be number one. In that manner it would not affect the tourism industry. There is also the possibility of selective harvesting. This would mean that one tree could be cut and one left to make sure that those steep hills do not erode. It is a very simple matter to say that if there is no topsoil on top of that bedrock it will not be able to grow another tree. If a hill is clear cut, then forget it, it is impossible to reforest that particular area.
At the same time, we could talk about sustainable development. The industry and the workers have to realize that today, yes, there are trees to harvest. But the way it is going now, in 20 or 50 years there will not be anymore trees to harvest and, therefore, some jobs will be lost. So now is the time to sit down and try to reach a compromise depending on each and every specific situation.


Guy H. Arseneault: Mr. Speaker, I just want to make a few comments. I could not resist listening to the fine question from a member on the government side. That is one of the weaknesses of the bill. Bill C-29 does not address some of those issues. It provides for conflict all the way throughout.
There is a problem with a logging road in northern Ontario. There are problems in B.C. Environmentalists and industrialists are at odds with each other. What is the government doing about it? Nothing. It is just sitting back doing nothing about it. Bill C-29 should make the Forestry Department a little bit stronger.
My hon. colleague for Cochrane-Superior mentioned in his speech the replacement of jobs because mechanization and advanced technology is putting people out of work. What is the government doing about it? Bill C-29 does not address any of those issues.
Sustainable development is the key to the future. We hear the government preaching about the environment time and time again. What is it doing about it? It is mentioned briefly in passing in Bill C-29. The government talks about how important this bill is, how it was first on the order paper yesterday. It was promised in 1984 and there have been a lot of Order Papers since 1984. We have been waiting for this bill.
We support a strong Forestry Department. This is what the industry needs; this is what Canada needs, a strong Forestry Department.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The hon. parliamentary secretary has a fast short question. I will entertain one more question and then it is tout fini.


Mr. MacDougall:: Mr. Speaker, with regard to the comments by the hon. member for Restigouche about northern Ontario and logging roads, I would just like to make it abundantly clear that it is a provincial matter, not a federal matter, and it has to be dealt with by the province of Ontario.


Michel Champagne: Mr. Speaker, this is a comment for the Hon. Member for Restigouche. I believe that by tabling this Bill, the Government wants to strengthen the position of the department of forestry so that it can negotiate with other departments that are indirectly involved in forestry.
The Hon. Member for Gaspe pointed out earlier that there were at least nine departments that were either directly or indirectly involved in forestry. I am thinking, for instance, of the National Research Council which has a budget of $38 or $39 million for certain programs, money that is spent mainly on forestry research.
I would like to point out to the Hon. Member for Restigouche that since 1984, the federal Government has not acted unilaterally to force its vision on the provinces and on the industry. We have consulted with each province and all parties concerned. And this is exactly what the Bill tabled by the Minister of Forestry is intended to do: achieve a degree of co-operation, harmony and development that will be far more rational and more effective, instead of acting unilaterally as suggested by the Liberal Member for Restigouche.
September 26, 1989


Réginald Bélair: Mr. Speaker, I have a brief comment. Under the Constitution Act, 1982, natural resources including forests are a provincial jurisdiction. From an environmental point of view, this does not mean in any way that the federal government should divest its responsibility for the forestry sector. The industry needs us and national parks need the federal government. We should take our responsibilities also.


Mr. Jim Fulton (Skeena):: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have an opportunity to speak on bill C-29. It is a piece of legislation that has been an awfully long time coming. I can recall on August 30, 1984, during the election, the present Minister of Forests was quoted in the Prince George Citizen as saying that a full forest ministry would be be initiated with legislation immediately after the election. But this is only five years later, so it has been a while coming.
There are problems with the bill. I know it is going to be amended in committee. I am hopeful that the minister will see the light and see that there are areas of the bill that are very much in need of being properly beefed up because the bill shows little sign of a holistic, ecological approach to our forests. We have had for several centuries, in some areas of this country, all kinds of investment on the extraction side, on the manufacturing side, and on the technological side of the harvesting and manufacturing of products from our forests.
There has been little effort and certainly little money, either by the forest companies or by the provincial or federal governments, on the biological side. That is why we face the crisis that we do, which is something that has been identified by everyone from the Auditor General to the Science Council of Canada, to the Canadian Institute of Forests, and many other organizations from coast to coast.
I predict-it is awful to have to predict such things- but I predict that in 10 or 15 years from now in this Chamber, there will be another debate about whether or not to use the peace, order and good government constitutional powers of the Government of Canada, of Crown Canada, to invoke an entirely new approach to Canada's forests because of the crisis we have in our
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atmosphere. I do not think the Government of Canada or governments around the world are yet taking seriously enough the problem with the whole carbon cycle and the dramatic impact that healthy growing forests have in reducing that crisis.
Let me take a quick look at the bill, before going on to one of my favourite documents entitled The Green Ghetto authored in 1983 by the present Minister of State for Forests, soon, I presume, to be the full Minister of Forests. What concerns me, is that the bill is awfully thin gruel, when one thinks of the size and value of this industry to this nation. One in 10 Canadians is directly or indirectly employed by it. It is our largest source of balance of trade.
The federal government, under Liberal governments and under Conservative governments, continues to return less than five cents out of every dollar taken from that sector. You cannot find another sector in the Canadian economy taxed in the way any of those areas are that get such a low rate of return from government, whether it be provincial governments or federal government.
One thing we have seen in recent months is the dramatic drive by the forest giants. There are only four major companies left in British Columbia. They pretty well control the whole of the forest land base in B.C. It is a similar situation right across the country. Certainly it is in New Brunswick where a very small number of companies control about half of the land in the province.
They have attempted to take hold of the words "sustainable development" and to change that in the public mind to mean "sustained development", sustained harvesting, without ever dealing and yielding to the biological reality of what sustainable yield really is in terms of the ecological wholeness of our forests, whether deciduous or coniferous forests anywhere in this country.
That section has to very clearly be expanded to send a signal, not just to provincial Crown authorities, but to the forest companies, both private and public sector, right across this country, as to what sustainable development really means. We know that even when one goes to the third page to clause 9 and finds what the minister has agreed to have in there through his legal draftspersons in relation to inventory.

September 26, 1989
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There is not an accurate, adequate inventory, not only of our regional forests, but certainly not of our national forests. That has to be one of the fundamental roles taken on. I know the minister believes very strongly in proper, adequate, understandable, sound inventories. I would hope that he would be very co-operative in committee in seeing that that section is properly amended.
Let me deal for a moment with The Green Ghetto. I am sure you have read this document by my friend from Prince George-Peace River. It certainly makes good reading. This was written a couple of years ago but I will quote from the introduction which states:
Over the next two decades millions of people will work in forest related industries while millions more will use the forest for recreation and escape. But, on our present national course, by the end of those two decades, the jobs will be vanishing, leaving hundreds of communities with no other industry, and boaters and campers will find their activities confined to increasingly crowded "forest ghettos" called national or provincial parks. Disputes between industrial and environmental interests could become bitter. The social ramifications of reduced government services in provinces presently dependent upon forestry tax revenues will also be considerable.
Those are prophetic words, Mr. Speaker. That is exactly what has happened. In my home province of British Columbia, over the last five years, 25,000 jobs have been lost in the forest sector and we did not hear a peep out of Ottawa as to what could or should be done. We have had a $300 million jointly shared FRDA, made up of $150 million in federal funds and $150 million in provincial funds. The province wants to sign a five-year FRDA for $1 billion. But, as the minister knows, the actual amount put forward for forestry for the whole of Canada is down in the estimates. It is down, not up. I certainly have not heard the kind of remarks from the Minister of Forestry that one would expect from someone who published such a prophetic statement and has seen so little action in the last five years, entirely under a Conservative government, in terms of money going out there.
So what is going on is a bit of a shell game with the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Forestry saying, "Well, maybe we will sign a 10-year agreement. We will see if we can fool the public. We are only going to put up a little money so we have a $300-million FRDA over five years. Let us do one over 10, so at least we can have a $300-million FRDA over 10 years", or perhaps it is something a little bit more.
It is clear, contrary to what the Minister of Forestry has said in B.C. in my own riding, that there are not adequate numbers of trained technicians for intensive forestry, to get out there and to husband the forests. In fact, there are. People have been preparing themselves very well right across British Columbia and right across this country under the existing FRDAs to actually get into the big expenditure years which we have all expected. Certainly, I trust the minister will be signing a $1 billion FRDA prior to March, 1990 when our existing FRDA runs out.
Page 2 of this document known as The Green Ghetto states:
There are dozens of measurements of forestry activity by which our performance can be compared to other nations. One simple one is the number of foresters currently managing our forests. In 1982 Dr. Marcel Lortie, Professional Forester, estimated that only about 500 professional foresters were engaged in "on-site forest development. While our chief competitors (the United States, Sweden and Norway) have approximately one forester to every
15.000	hectares (34,000 acres) of land, Canada has one for every
450.000	hectares (1,111,000 acres). Moreover, as we improve, so do they. "If, in 10 or 20 years, Canada has attained the ratio of
15.000	hectares per forester-the ratio in these countries will have increased to around 10,000 hectares-per forester."-He noted that some countries practice even more intensive management - i.e. Czechoslovakia, with one forester to every 300 to 400 hectares (750-1,000 acres).
I have not seen much sign, Mr. Speaker, in relation to the expenditure plan we have, that there is any plan at the national level for a serious new body of professional foresters to conduct an inventory. You cannot run a popcorn stand unless you know how much popcorn you have. You cannot run a tire store. You could not be a farmer. But here is the federal government touting this new act, but without putting the financial muscle forward and saying: "Yes, we are going to take an inventory; we are going to do something serious about fires."
Almost as much land was burned so far this year as was harvested in this country. The military were never mobilized. Some comments were made by the Minister of Forestry years ago about the need for a broader base in terms of water bombers and the sharing of high-level aerial infra-red photography so that we can locate those fires before they start to spread. The technology is available now to isolate, through various forms of photography, areas that are having problems with disease or with insect infestations. We have to get much more serious about putting in the money that needs to be put into the largest industry in this country so that we can protect the forests that are there and manage them properly because they have been horribly mismanaged throughout all of Canada's short history.

At page 7 The Green Ghetto further states:
In 1983, the Science Council of Canada warned "The forests are essential to our social and economic well being; yet we have allowed them to degenerate to a dangerous point. We have been felling, selling and shipping timber for so long, and at such a rate, that today a 23-billion dollar industry is facing economic stagnation."
I am not going to quote too much of it, but at page 8 The Green Ghetto further states:
Almost 12 percent of our productive forest land is now in this dismal condition, and each year 300,000 hectares (half a million acres) are added to the backlog. If properly stocked this land alone could sustain Canada's harvest for about 30 years.
Again, let me deal with my own province about which I know the most in terms of forestry matters. The professional foresters in that province, through the ministry of forests, say that the sustainable yield in British Columbia is about 57 million cubic metres a year. The harvest this year, including private land that is being harvested, will come very close to 100 million cubic metres. COFI, the Council of Forest Industries in B.C., has predicted that we could harvest 166 million cubic metres.
As Dr. Bill Reese pointed out in B.C. this week, in a public meeting that I attended, the over-harvest that is going on in British Columbia is an over-harvest of almost 100 per cent. Professional foresters say 57 million cubic metres can be harvested and have sustained yield and we are cutting almost double that.
What does that mean, Mr. Speaker? We know about the fall-down effect. We know that our "nsr"-not satisfactorily restocked-lands are growing, not shrinking. We have the government playing coy, playing a shell game about how much money is going to go into the next phase of FRDA. We need to plan in British Columbia. We need to know what sites we are going to intensively manage; what areas we are going to get into seriously dealing with the existing soil erosion; what areas we are going to have to deal in a serious way with the kinds of undergrowth that have come up that are keeping the kinds of timber that are most suitable for those sites from growing back.
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When I say holistic forestry, we are so far behind countries like Sweden that not only replant marketable, merchantable species of timber, they are also now planting seed grasses for songbirds; they are planting willow for moose. In Sweden, three times as many moose were harvested last year as were taken in the whole of Canada, and Sweden has less moose habitat than the province of British Columbia.
When we are talking about the forest we have to realize that we should not only harvest it and then just go in and plant a few coniferous or deciduous trees that are good for today, but we have to be forward looking now. The greenhouse effect has started. There has been a one degree Celsius change. We know how long it took the forests to move back up all of North America following the last ice age. It is a veiy slow rate of movement. We have to recognize that some of the sites that we are presently planting with certain kinds of species, will not likely even survive to maturity if the greenhouse condition continues at the rate that it is.
There is no sign that the Government of Canada, the Government of the United States, or the Government of the Soviet Union, the three largest producers of carbon into the atmosphere, are likely to dramatically reduce the amount of carbon going up in that cycle. That is why I make such a dire prediction that the next major debate on forestry in this chamber will be to use "pog" power: peace, order and good government, in relation to the severity of the crisis in our forests throughout the world.
On page 28 of The Green Ghetto, it states:
Not since Nero has there been so much fiddling, while so much
burned.
Well, nothing could be more true this year, Mr. Speaker. If you look at the amount of money spent and the number of people, and the amount of equipment mobilized to fight the forest fires that went on in this country, it is absolutely pathetic, if not criminal, that the governments in this country are so pathetically inclined to deal with fire and so pathetically inclined to deal with disease. It is something that this bill should be seriously addressing because it is in the nation's interest. If the provinces will not do it, I believe very strongly in a strong national government that takes these kinds of things on.

September 26, 1989
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Here is what the minister had to say just five short years ago: "In addition to the water bombers, Canada needs high altitude aircraft with infra-red scanning equipment to detect fires as soon as they start". We still do not have one.


Frank Oberle: Yes, we do. Lots of them.


James Ross Fulton: "Lots of them", says the minister. I would like to see the hours they flew while those fires were going on.
The Minister also stated: "Extraordinary work is being done in this area around the world today, but it is expensive and more shared cost programs will be needed if we are to have the technology available here in Canada."
Here is the ending. This is how the minister, while he was a private member, ended his report:
The paper was intended to show that our national policy has been to avoid decisions, allowing neglect to make the choices for us. Years of indifference have restricted the number of options now available and we are close to a time when it will not make any difference what we do.
Prophetic words, Mr. Speaker, because that is exactly what has happened over the last five years. Forestiy has been neglected at the federal level, at levels that will have incredible burdening consequences, not only upon our generation but upon generations yet to come. Let us look at why I say that.
Every year between 200,000 and 400,000 hectares are being added to what is called "nsr" land, not satisfactorily restocked land. One-eighth of Canada's productive forest land has deteriorated to the point where it can no longer regenerate productive forests. What happens is that the very thin topsoil, as other members have talked about, is often eroded following the kinds of forest practices we have allowed to go on to this point.
In 1983, 350 million seedlings were being planted annually in Canada. In Sweden, a country smaller than Alberta, 400 million seedlings are planted annually.
Sir John A. Macdonald, on June 22, 1871, 128 years to the day that this bill was introduced in June of this year, had this to say, and I quote:
The sight of immense masses of timber passing my window every morning constantly suggests to my mind the absolute necessity there is for looking into the future of this great trade. We are recklessly destroying the timber of Canada and there is scarcely the possibility of replacing it.
Again, prophetic words. Again, a Conservative, but in 128 years the Conservatives have not come forward with policies to deal seriously with forestry in this country.
We heard questions posed by a B.C. member and we hear them often from the minister. Why are we facing crises such as those in Temagami, Carmanah, the Stein, and the battle that went on over South Moresby? Only 2.6 per cent of this entire nation is adequately protected in conservation areas. The Prime Minister is quick to go to the United Nations and state that we adopt all of Prime Minister Brundtland's recommendations, and the World Commission Report, but that means we have to set aside 12 per cent of the lands in this nation for conservation purposes.
If you look at British Columbia that means we have to double the amount of land, parks, and ecological reserves in that province. We have to settle aboriginal title in the whole province of British Columbia. There needs to be a much broader, forward-looking, land use management strategy at the federal level to say what lands are going to be necessary to deal with the conservation strategy, to deal with the issue of aboriginal title, to deal with the crises we are facing in terms of marginalizing so much land that could and should be productive forest land.
Forestry can be and should be the bulwark of Canada's economy, but it soon will not be because of the irresponsibility and incompetence in both the private sector, and in what we obviously should have been doing in legislatures which simply has not taken place.
Even this year the Auditor General for Canada reported that "lack of adequate forest management has much depleted the forest resource. Significant shortages of wood are reported at the local level in every province. Restocking of productive forest lands has not kept pace with the harvest."
Those are the words of the Auditor General. So we have the Science Council of Canada, and the Auditor General, the minister in his former incarnation as a true believer in what could and should be done, but now he is having to deal with a cabinet who have recklessly kept him on the back burner. Why has he not been given a full ministry, and a deputy with long, sharp teeth, and a budget that can actually deal with these kinds of things? What kind of a reckless Prime Minister would keep a minister like that hidden away behind the curtain for so

long? Why has there not been debates in this chamber on forestry? Why are we not taking the kinds of proper approaches that we should be? Where is the billion-dol-lar FRDA that should be signed some time this month? Why is the minister playing the shell game about a 10, or a 20, or a 50, or a 300-year FRDA to try and cover the fact that his colleagues are being cheap and are chiselling the money away so that Michael Wilson can have $7 million to advertise the GST in The Globe and Mail?


Some Hon. Members:: Shame, shame!


James Ross Fulton: We know his voice is not being heard yet, but from this side of the House we will speak up for the forests and encourage him to come forward with the kind of legislation that every professional forester in this country wants to see. They are waiting; they are listening. Those 400 single-industry towns are waiting to see whether the minister can deliver anything other than a small chicken egg. The seeds of revolution have been sown in this country in relation to our forests. We have to conserve. We have to properly treat our forests.


Mr. Speaker:: I regret that the hon. member's time has expired, but he still has 10 minutes for questions and comments.
It being one o'clock I do now leave the chair until two o'clock this day.
At 1 p.m. the House took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The House resumed at 2 p.m.

Mr. Gilles Rocheleau (Hull-Aylmer):: Mr. Speaker, on September 6 this year, an article in the newspaper La Presse reported some comments I made about the PQ candidate in the riding of Chapleau which were also quoted by two of my colleagues yesterday here in the House.
These comments were labelled as being racist, and I am very sorry if anyone's feelings were hurt. That was certainly not my intention, and it was certainly not the purpose of the private conversation I had with the journalist in question, and I apologize, Mr. Speaker.


THE LATE PAUL ANTHONY JOHNSTONE
Mr. Peter L. McCreath (South Shore):: Mr. Speaker, last July 30, Nova Scotia and Canada lost an outstanding citizen with the sudden death of Dr. Paul Anthony Johnstone.
Dr. Johnstone came to Canada from his native Jamaica 22 years ago. He became one of the pioneer leading figures in the fields of multiculturalism and human rights in this country. Indeed, his work at home and abroad contributed significantly to the position of leadership that is attributed to Canada internationally in the field of multicultural education.
At home in Atlantic Canada he was known as the father of multicultural education; indeed, as a prophet in our time. As executive director of Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission Tony Johnstone was one of Canada's very few, if not only, black deputy ministers. His contributions to intercultural and interracial understanding of our country was profound. He will be greatly missed by those of us who knew him, but all Canadians present and future are the beneficiaries of his work, his leadership and his contribution.


PROPOSED GOODS AND SERVICES TAX
Mr. Jack Whittaker (Okanagan-Similkameen-Merritt):: Mr. Speaker, this morning the finance committee heard from One Voice, the national non-profit organization for seniors. Since August, One Voice has been contacting every major Canadian seniors' organization to hear their reaction to the proposed goods and services tax. What it learned is that seniors organizations in Canada are opposed to the goods and services tax.
Why, Mr. Speaker? Quite simply seniors do not trust this government. They do not trust a government that promised to protect universality and yet has introduced a clawback on old age security pensions that will each year deny more and more seniors their rightful entitlement to universal social benefits. They do not trust a government that promised to make the tax system fairer yet has introduced a consumption tax that hits hardest at seniors on fixed income who will be forced to pay more and more of their income on basic necessities.

September 26, 1989
Seniors in Canada have learned that they can count on this government for only one thing, and that is the continued erosion of their income security.


CYSTIC FIBROSIS RESEARCH
Mrs. Edna Anderson (Simcoe Centre):: Mr. Speaker, this summer's news that a team of scientists at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto has found the fatal gene defect that causes cystic fibrosis is great news for all Canadians.
Led by Dr. Lap Chee Tsui, this medical team has made what someone called one of the most significant discoveries in the history of human genetics. Finding this gene holds out the prospect of an assault on cystic fibrosis from an understanding of its cause, the basic genetic defect, and its discovery will lead not only to diagnostic testing for carriers but also to the perfection of prenatal testing for the disease.
Our thanks to Dr. Tsui and his team for their dedication and hard work. Godspeed for their continued success.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
Jesse Philip Flis: Mr. Speaker, on June 5, 1989 we rose in this House to unanimously condemn the Chinese government for the use of brutal and excessive force against its own people in Tianamem Square. Within one month, the government approved approximately $230 million in loan money to the Government of China.
Since 1985 we have been hearing about the leadership role our country is taking with respect to economic sanctions on South Africa, and yet this year we see that our imports from that country have jumped up by an incredible 62 per cent.
These are only two in a series of inconsistencies that are giving our country a reputation not of credibility but of hypocrisy.
As Canada prepares to take up its seat as president of the United Nations Security Council, I urge the secretary of state to take this opportunity to prove that we are deserving of the position by reversing the trend and starting to honour our promises and to live up to our commitment.


THE ENVIRONMENT
Mr. Stan Darling (Parry Sound-Muskoka):: Mr. Speaker, environmental concerns form without a doubt the most serious concerns of all parliamentarians in the world. Every nation on this planet is affected and could be permanently damaged if we do not deal with these problems soon. I have on one or two occasions voiced my opinion on what we should do to combat acid rain, so I am very happy to see other members finally coming on side. Canadians from across the country can be pleased at the recent emphasis everyone in the House is placing on the environment.
I rise today in order to praise a colleague from across the floor. The member from Broadview-Greenwood is to be commended for his efforts at the recent Conference on the Environment held in Toronto. All parties were present and even though all the problems of the world were not solved, we did take a few more steps in that direction. Every world class conference like this only helps us as Canadians show the world we are facing up to our responsibilities. This will only help in our negotiations in the future. To all those involved in the conference I say congratulations.


CANADA-U.S. FREE TRADE AGREEMENT
Mr. Steve Butland (Sault Ste. Marie):: Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak about the now deceased spirit of free trade. Spirits are elusive and invisible. Canadians caught the spirit but the Americans have effectively killed that spirit.
I want to tell the House that the American steel industry is harassing the Canadian steel industry. Rulings two weeks ago imposed 100 per cent punitive duties against Sysco Steel and 39 per cent against Algoma Steel. If the ruling is upheld by the disputes mechanism panel, Canadian steel rails will be effectively excluded from the American market.
September 26, 1989

Everyone agrees the ruling against Algoma Steel was unwarranted, unjust, irrational, even stupid, but it is true. And what does the minister say? Absolutely nothing, not even a press release that his staff prepared. There is no guarantee that the ruling will be overturned, suggests the minister.
In conclusion, if the ruling is upheld we hope that the trade minister will join with Algoma Steel, probably all Canadian steel producers across this country, and with me and my colleagues, not only to bury the spirit of free trade but also the body of the free trade agreement.


WEST COAST FISHERIES
Mr. Stan Wilbee (Delta):: Mr. Speaker, the Progressive Conservative government has maintained a very strong commitment to the management of our west coast fisheries, a commitment that has been demonstrated very well this year by the record levels of Fraser River sockeye both caught by our fishermen and returning to the spawning grounds. The estimated horse-fly run of sockeye to the Fraser this year was over 18 million, the best since 1913. Over 11.7 million fish were caught and approximately 5 million fish were allowed to spawn to ensure that an excellent run will appear four years from now.
The Fraser River is a major beneficiary of the government's Salmonid Enhancement Program with over $42 million being spent on the west coast this year on salmon enhancement. Hundreds of British Columbians, including many school children, are involved with local salmon enhancement funded by the government. Successful management requires co-operation of the government, fishermen, industry, native groups and all British Columbians.
I congratulate the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans and his staff for their outstanding work in the area of fisheries management and salmon enhancement and tell him that the fishermen who work the mighty Fraser River in my riding of Delta are looking forward to even better runs in the future.
5. O. 31 VIA RAIL


Elizabeth  (Beth) Phinney: Mr. Speaker, as the associate critic for the disabled, I was outraged to discover that a disabled veteran was recently forced off a VIA Rail train beside a highway in the middle of nowhere after accidentally sleeping through his stop. The constituents of Hamilton Mountain and I-in fact all Canadians-are very concerned about this incident. That this shocking event took place at all shows how cut-backs to VIA Rail are affecting its employees.
I find it hard to believe that this incident would have occurred with a contented train crew. We all know that staff at VIA Rail has done its best to provide excellent service to Canadian travellers for year, so when a 76-year-old blind man is victimized I think we can presume that quality service including service for the disabled is now being derailed by anxieties over employment security at VIA Rail.
The disabled in this country are already being burdened by this government's cut-backs. Need they suffer more?


CANADA-U.S. FREE TRADE AGREEMENT
Mr.   Brian@: Mr. Speaker, I would like to highlight the impact of the free trade agreement on a very important area of the Canadian economy, that is, investment in Canada.
Canadians were told by the pessimists that free trade would cause investment to dry up and that our industries would close their doors and move to Alabama or Georgia to take advantage of inexpensive labour.
In the riding of Elk Island we can see that the opposite is happening. In Elk Island we see a $300 million new development in advanced industrial materials, a proposed $600 million expansion in the petrochemical industry, a new $60 million plant to produce environmentally friendly pulp industry chemicals, and a new pharmaceutical chemical operation. There is more, much more to come in the future. It is a future made brighter by free trade, a future that will mean more investment in Canada.

September 26, 1989


IMMIGRATION
Daniel James Macdonnell Heap: Mr. Speaker, when 174 East Indians landed at Nova Scotia two years ago, the Prime Minister and the Minister of Employment and Immigration launched an hysterical campaign, calling it an invasion threatening our sovereignty. Yet, when a rich businessman brags about buying a visa for $200,000, we don't hear a peep out of our brave Prime Minister or any of his ministers.
The Globe and Mail has again exposed a scandal of so-called investor visas for rich people who are not seriously interested in investing in Canada and may not even live here when they get their visas.
This Tory government issues thousands of these visas, over 3,000 in 1988 alone, while it deports seven times as many people to poor countries as to rich countries.
I call on the government to stop the investor and entrepreneur visa programs, investigate these rackets, close the loopholes and revoke the visas got under false pretensions. After all, if the minister deports penniless refugees when she does not believe their stories, why welcome rich cheaters? They are not the kind of people who build our country.


PROPOSED GOODS AND SERVICES TAX
Jack Iyerak Anawak: Mr. Speaker, the government's proposed goods and services tax is totally unacceptable to the people of the north, as my colleagues from this side of the House already know.
The people of the north already bear the burden of this country's highest cost of living. The food price index in Yellowknife is approximately 35 per cent higher than in Edmonton. Spence Bay has a food price index 96 per cent higher than Yellowknife. Living costs in the Keewa-tin range from 50 per cent to 70 per cent higher than the supply base of Winnipeg. Kitikmeot residents face costs that are 70 per cent to 139 per cent higher than Edmonton. The cost of transportation is the greatest factor in our higher cost of living. We simply cannot absorb an additional 9 per cent tax on necessities that are already many more times expensive than in southern Canadian cities.
This unfair tax will punish northerners in ways the government has obviously not thought about. I remind the government that a northern income cannot purchase what a southern income can. The government must reconsider. It must give special attention to the effects of this tax on northern Canadians. I invite the Minister of Finance to go to the north to see for himself.


LIBERAL PARTY OF CANADA
Mr. Felix Holtmann (Portage-Interlake):: Mr. Speaker, I have some sad news to report. The previously announced Liberal leadership stakes have run amok. They refuse to break from the starting gate. Race officials are now searching Canada's bushes looking for suitable entries.
The also-rans are just snorting that the $1.7 million entry fee will be for the rich and famous only. There is new speculation that the losers of the socialist turtle derby presently being run and difficult to follow will be invited to enter the gate of the Liberal leadership stakes. That disenchanted fans are calling for an inquiry and now the bookies are refusing all bets. Where is a dark horse when you need one?


CANADIAN INFRASTRUCTURE
Mrs. Beryl Gaffney (Nepean):: Mr. Speaker, as the co-chair of the national Liberal task force on Canada's infrastructure I spent the last two months meeting with Canadian officials and environmental groups in several Canadian cities to find out the severity of problems with regard to deteriorating roads, bridges and sewers.
The actual statistics in all regions of the country indicate that the problems are far worse than ever could have been anticipated. With virtually no money to repair them, roads are deteriorating at an alarming rate. Raw sewage is being pumped into our rivers and oceans. Historically the federal government has always been involved, along with the provincial and municipal governments, in the cost of financing Canada's infrastructure. The federal government should share in the cost of construction and separation of sewers. Our beaches must once again be used for recreation and swimming, not for waste disposal.
Canadians realize that a healthy environment is the foundation of steady economic growth. When will this government commit to resuming its traditional role with
September 26, 1989

the provinces and municipalities in saving our cities and towns.


ROYAL CANADIAN MOUNTED POLICE
Mrs. Louise Feltham (Wild Rose):: Mr. Speaker, in western Canada the RCMP uniform is a symbol of our heritage and must be preserved in respect for our forefathers and as a legacy for the future. It is imperative that we retain the distinct heritage and tradition of the RCMP by maintaining the uniformity of their dress code, with all the recognizable colour and trappings that have had such great historical value for this country.
I strongly urge the Solicitor General to undertake the necessary steps required to declare this uniform a national symbol of Canada.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Right Hon. John  N.@: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Prime Minister. He will undoubtedly know that on CBC Newsworld last night the Minister of Finance laughed when asked about taxing food. He said the reason he refused to answer the question put to him yesterday in the House of Commons was because it was "a little parliamentary ploy by the opposition". He went on to say that to answer questions about a tax on food, and I use his words again, "just starts down that slippery slope".
We know that the Minister of Finance has already broken his word by putting a $2.5 billion tax on fast food and restaurants.


Mr. Wilson (Etobicoke Centre):: Broken my word?


Mr. Turner (Vancouver Quadra):: Well, he intends to do this.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: You better check that, John.


John Napier Turner: Yes, indeed. And he is unable to define, even after two years, what the definition of basic groceries is. We know that he is now
Oral Questions
playing a game in refusing to say to the House of Commons whether or not he is going to expand that tax on food.
I ask the Prime Minister if he will give a solemn, unequivocal undertaking to the House of Commons and through us to the people of Canada ruling out any tax on food.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I suggest to the Leader of the Opposition that he check his words very carefully as to me breaking a promise. I said very clearly in December of 1987 that we would not tax basic groceries. He is now twisting what I said to his political benefit. He knows that that is true.
What we have put forward to the Canadian people is a proposal in the technical paper, which is a very well balanced and carefully structured proposal. This involves the goods and services tax, plus a number of fairness features, as part of that over-all tax system. Those fairness features include the exemption from taxation of basic groceries. It involves a very generous refundable tax credit. It involves a reduction in the middle income tax rate, a housing rebate and a payment to small business to offset the cost.
We in the government feel very strongly about that balanced package, but it is very important that we allow the finance committee to operate by not ruling out this or any other of the specific items which the Leader of the Opposition or the Leader of the New Democratic Party ask us about because as sure as we are standing here, it will be on food today, tomorrow it will be something else, then the next day it will be something else. Before we know it, the chairman of the finance committee will be saying: "What are we meeting for?" We say that there is a very important role for the finance committee.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Napier Turner: Mr. Speaker, we are already asking that very question, but I believe that today we got the answer. Despite the fact that the Minister's intentions were kept under wraps, it would seem that he does want to put a tax on food.

September 26, 1989
Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, on June 23, 1987, while making one of his more insulting comments, the Minister of Finance told the Hon. Member for Laurier-Sainte-Marie that there would be no tax on food, and he accused the Member of scaring senior citizens and the poor by talking about a tax on food.
I want to ask the Minister of Finance why he doesn't have the courage to say again today what he said to the Hon. Member for Laurier-Sainte-Marie two years ago. Why is he playing cat and mouse with the tax on food? Why doesn't he act on the recommendations made this morning before the Finance Committee by senior citizens, and refrain from putting a tax on food? Why doesn't he say quite frankly: There will be no tax on food here in Canada?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, there is no game of hide and seek here. Our proposal is on the table and it is very clear. I think that the hon. member has pointed out precisely why we should not get into commenting on individual items that come before the finance committee.


Ms. Copps:: Like food.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Yes, on food. He pointed out this morning, on food, that there was a group before the finance committee that said: "Don't tax basic groceries". Last week there were others who said: "Jhx basic groceries".


Some Hon. Members:: Who?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: All of them. Last week they said: "All food".


Some Hon. Members:: Oh. oh!


An Hon. Member:: Nobody said that.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. minister.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, the point that I want to make is that we will hear, in the course of the debate before the finance committee over the next few weeks, people commenting and making proposals on all sides of this.
It is not the responsibility of the government to comment day by day on these individual items. There will be a report by the finance committee and when that
report comes out the government will respond to it. Until then, we will not be responding to individual statements that are made before the committee.


John Napier Turner: Mr. Speaker, we are putting questions to the Minister of Finance on very important issues before the House of Commons. We receive answers that are either ambiguous or contradictory to those he has made earlier to the House.
Since he won't answer on food, I want to put a question to the Prime Minister on one of his priorities, on education.
The Prime Minister, through the Minister of Finance, plans to put the first ever federal sales tax on newspapers. He plans to put the first ever federal tax on books, including university students' text books. Further, most students will not be eligible for the low income sales tax credit since it is only available to people who make more than $6,100 per year.
Will the Prime Minister explain why, for the first time in Canadian history, there will be a tax on education, a tax on learning, a tax on literacy, a tax on instruction in this country? I thought that education and literacy were among his top priorities.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, let me clarify one thing that the Leader of the Opposition has just said. Students will be eligible for a $275 sales tax credit. That is very clear.


Herbert Eser (Herb) Gray: All students?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: The Leader of the Opposition obviously has not read the document. It is $275.
The proposal that has been put before the House is a proposal with a very broad tax base. We have taken the decision as a government that we should not be in the position of making choices or influencing choices of individual consumers.
We have put forward that tax proposal with a very generous refundable sales tax credit so that low income people will not be disadvantaged by this. They will be protected by that credit.
We have also provided for exemptions for educational services, for libraries so that those entities will not be subject to additional tax as a result of the GST.
September 26, 1989

Oral Questions


VIA RAIL
Maurice Adrian Dionne: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Transport. The minister knows full well that his proposed action on VIA Rail flies not only in the face of reason but common sense and public opinion as well. It is patently obvious that the people of Canada want VIA Rail and they want it enhanced and improved.
Will the minister commit himself to give a reference to the Standing Committee on Transport and then use that committee report to modernize and enhance VIA Rail, to make it a modem transportation system, rather than trying to decimate it and wipe it off the face of the earth?


Benoît Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, I will obviously not make that commitment. We have considered many proposals. We have looked at many possibilities for VIA Rail and as soon as it is possible to make the announcement we will do it. But we will not return to the report of the committee.


Joseph R. (Joe) Comuzzi: Mr. Speaker, we have in Ottawa today over 50 mayors and municipal leaders from across Canada. They will be faced with the responsibility of providing alternative means of transportation when VIA is cut.
My question is to the Minister of Transport. It will cost $1.4 billion in severance and unemployment benefits to cut VIA, and it will cost $7 billion and even more to provide additional airport and highway facilities.
These figures are from the review on VIA Rail that the minister commissioned for $4 million. Will the minister refer to the business plan, the report on VIA Rail, and his recommendations to the transport committee for an interval and in-depth analysis before any move is made on VIA Rail?


Benoît Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, my colleague can think what he likes about the option we will choose for VIA Rail; it is not necessarily what we will do, but again, I do believe that we did consult. We recently met with the provincial ministers. We met with the Union of Municipalities. I met with the mayors of cities like Ottawa, Toronto, Montreal, etc. I think that we are now in the process of making a decision and, again, I do not intend to refer in any way to the Transport Commission or Committee.


PROPOSED GOODS AND SERVICES TAX
Hon. Edward Broadbent (Oshawa):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Finance. Yesterday when I attempted to get the minister to clarify the government's position on the taxing of food, simply to recommit the government to its own promise on the subject, the minister said I was playing a parliamentary trick. It is rather bizarre for a cabinet minister to say that someone who wanted the government to be honest about its policy was committing a parliamentary trick.
In light of what he has just said in the House, that he had no intention to respond to statements that were made in the committee or within recent memory in the House of Commons, would he respond to a commitment he made in the election last year on this subject, which was unequivocal, in a public debate and discussion on this matter on television. When one member from my party indicated opposition to a food tax, the Minister of Finance then responded on behalf of the government: "So have we, so have we", in response specifically to the commitment that there would be no tax on food without exception.
I want to ask the minister today: does he stand by that commitment that he made to the people of Canada in the election campaign last fall?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, we have made that commitment in the document itself that is presented to the House of Commons.


John Edward Broadbent: Then, is the House correct in understanding that if the government proceeds with this new sales tax there will be no new sales tax in any shape or form on food in Canada, as the minister said last fall publicly? Will he give us a clear answer to that? Yes or no? That is the issue.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, that is responded to in the document itself. Let me just make sure that what the leader has just said is taken accurately. We have made a distinction in the document between basic groceries and processed prepared foods. Those prepared foods, as we have said, will be taxable. They will not be tax free as will basic groceries.

September 26, 1989
Oral Questions
We will also have further discussions and consultations with the food industry to decide precisely how that is done, whether it is because of the establishment where they are purchased or whether it is because of the nature of the product itself. Those consultations still must take place.


John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Minister also indicated that with the sales tax credit system, this sales tax would not impact negatively on seniors and other people. But would the Minister confirm today that in spite of this credit, 570,000 seniors will be hit harder by this tax?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: On the contrary, Mr. Speaker, I will not make that statement whatsoever because we have put into the sales tax system a number of very important elements that address themselves directly to the needs of senior citizens. The $275 per adult credit I think is available to some 80 per cent of senior citizens in full. In addition to that, the exemptions that have been put in the new system, including the exemption on medical devices, on basic groceries, on health care, on prescription drugs, on non-profit homemaker services, on meals on wheels, all those types of items, are specifically designed to address the needs of senior citizens. For that reason, I totally reject what the hon. member has just said.


Mr. Douglas Young (Gloucester):: Mr. Speaker, just a few weeks ago war was declared on workers and consumers in Canada when the minister announced his goods and services tax.
The Minister of Finance says that workers in this country must accept lower wage settlements regardless of what is happening with the cost of living increases that will occur as a result of the GST or Canadians will face higher interest rates, higher inflation, higher unemployment.
The minister says we have to have "wage and price moderation." My question to the Prime Minister is very simple. Will he explain to the workers of Canada what "wage and price moderation" means?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I know that the Hon. Member will admit to the House today, as he has done on other occasions, that he believes that it is important for us to move from the existing federal sales tax to the multi-stage, value-added type of tax that we have, the goods and services tax. The key here is how we make that transition. We have set out very clearly in the technical paper how we believe that should be done to achieve the economic benefits that all the observers, all the economists say are there, provided we have a proper transition, a non-inflationaiy transition.
We believe that if business people and people in the labour sector will exercise moderation, then we will have that transition. We have said that if that is so, there will be a 2.25 per cent one time only increase in inflation, but because of the low-income tax credit and the middle-income tax reduction, the after tax impact of this is only 1 per cent. I do not believe that this is too much to ask of Canadians, both on the business side and on the labour side, to accommodate in terms of achieving those longterm benefits.


M. Douglas Young: Mr. Speaker, in the technical papers the department keeps referring to wage and price moderation. The question is very simple. Does the Prime Minister and his Minister of Finance really believe that workers across this country are just going to lie down and accept this vicious attack on their standard of living?
We are asking the Prime Minister what his response is going to be when Canadians say: "This is not fair, we cannot survive, our families cannot survive". The government is not being moderate but it is asking Canadians to be moderate. I am asking the Prime Minister what his response is going to be when the workers across this country say no to the goods and services tax.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I think one of the first places that we could start exercising moderation is with the language that we use in the House of Commons. The hon. member has referred to the goods and services tax as being a vicious attack. I have just set out the fact that the vicious attack that he talks about is an impact on people's income of 1 per cent. Surely that is not a vicious attack.
September 26, 1989

Let me go on to say that families earning less than $30,000 are going to be protected from the impact of inflation and that they will be better off after the change from the existing sales tax system to the new sales tax system. Surely that is a basis on which Canadians can show moderation.


Hon. Jean Lapierre (Shefford):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance and I will try this time in French to obtain a clear, precise answer.
Can the Minister of Finance assure me that he intends to exclude food from the tax permanently or not?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, we have set out very clearly and very concisely what the proposal is for sales tax reform. It is set out in a technical paper. There is an overview paper that covers the broad parameters of what we are proposing to do. We have set that out as government policy.
If I am going to be asked to comment on every specific element of that particular paper and say if we are absolutely committed to this and this and this, then there will be no work whatsoever for the finance committee to do. The hon. member would be the first to be up on his feet saying: "Why are you pre-empting the work the finance committee is about to do on sales tax reform".


Jean-C. Lapierre: Mr. Speaker, I wish to put a supplementary question. I think that you can tell the Finance Committee right away not to waste its time considering a tax on food, and I think that all the members of the Committee would be prepared to admit that. So I ask the Minister of Finance once again: Stop evading the issue. Will you tax food or not? Are you changing your mind and going back on your election promises? That is the question!


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I do not know how many times I have to answer the same question. I have answered that question to him, to the Leader of the New Democratic Party and to his leader. Surely the answer is clear. It has not deviated from one to the other.
Oral Questions VIA RAIL


Iain Francis Angus: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Transport. When the government found mayors and reeves across the country who supported the dismantling of Canada Post, it bought newspaper advertisements to herald the fact. I have in my hand a list of over 300 municipalities that have passed resolutions calling for full public hearings on any cuts to VIA Rail. Will the Minister of Transport listen to that request and ensure that there are full public hearings before any cuts are made?


Benoît Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, I have as much respect for municipalities as my colleague could have. That is the reason why I met with the Canadian Federation of Municipalities last June for more than one hour as I did also with the mayors of major cities in Canada. I will do what I have to do.
I believe, however, that the time is coming to make a decision and I will not postpone the decision about VIA Rail. As soon as the decision is made, it will be given and I will not change the timing of the decision.


Iain Francis Angus: Mr. Speaker, the minister has had on his desk a request from the mayor of Saint John, New Brunswick, and the mayor of Mississauga which I communicated to him on September 15, for a meeting with a delegation that is here in Ottawa today. This delegation is from Atlantic Canada and from the Windsor-Quebec corridor. They would like a bit of time to talk with the minister about why it is wrong for the government to dismantle VTA Rail. Will the minister either meet with them privately, today or tomorrow, or will he join others from the transport committee in the Railway Committee Room at 3.30 p.m. to hear their appeal?


Benoît Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, when I met with the Canadian Federation of Municipalities in June, the mayor of Saint John, New Brunswick, was there. When I met with the mayors of major cities, the mayor of Mississauga was there, I listened to them and I repeat: as soon as a decision on VIA Rail is made, there will be an announcement. Until then, I have no intention of holding further consultations.

Oral Questions


FISHERIES
Peter L. McCreath: My question is for the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. Under the minister's direction, Canada has followed sound conservation practices with respect to the harvesting of fisheries resources on Georges Bank. Unfortunately, the groundfish that inhabit the waters over the bank do not know that it is to their advantage to stay on the Canadian side of the line. Far too many are taken by the devil-may-care. irresponsible attitude of the Americans on the other side.
Given that it is unacceptable for Nova Scotian fishing boats to be tied up while Americans rape the fishery in Georges Bank, what actions are being taken to see that these resources are properly protected?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Hon. Thomas Siddon (Minister of Fisheries and Oceans):: Mr. Speaker, I believe I heard the question.
The hon. member is right to be concerned about what is perhaps the most abundant groundfish resource in Canadian waters. It is divided by a boundary between Canada and the United States. The determination of The Hague line boundary some years ago brought great benefit to the Nova Scotia groundfish fishery in particular, and we insist that Canadian and American fishermen alike abide by our regulations and our enforcement measures.
It is a fact that the resource is much richer on our side of the line because we manage it well. We will continue to manage that resource well and we cannot tolerate over-fishing of the Georges Bank groundfish resource in any form it may take.


PHARMACEUTICAL INDUSTRY
Mr. Jim Peterson (Willowdale):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the right hon. Prime Minister. On June 19 of this year in Halifax, Nova Scotia, the Prime Minister was his usual very eloquent self.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


James Scott (Jim) Peterson: He said:"Either we ride the crest of the technology wave into the 21st century or we exhaust ourselves in the rip-tide of history".
In light of the government's complicity in the take-over of Connaught by the government of France, will the Prime Minister admit to us now that his Halifax words were as hollow as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal?


Hon. Tom Hockin (Minister of State (Small Businesses and Tourism)):: Mr. Speaker, the question of the merging of Connaught with another company is currently before Investment Canada. The hon. member knows that no decision has yet been made. Confidentiality provisions of the Investment Canada Act prohibit me or any minister from discussing that in this House, but I will tell the hon. member that the decision on that matter, as in all other matters, will be the same, that clear net benefit to Canada must be evident, and it will not be accepted unless it is evident.


James Scott (Jim) Peterson: Mr. Speaker, the government is missing the point. Even Investment Canada has said that Connaught is the strategic flagship for Canada's biotech industry.
What France needs surely Canada needs even more, and that is the point.

Even with the Government's promises regarding the sale of Connaught-and we know what to expect from this Government when it comes to promises-the question is quite straightforward: The French Government needs Connaught to secure France's technological future. Why are you helping them to achieve that goal?


Thomas Hockin: Mr. Speaker, the question is wild and confused. We are not having a bid by the Government of France. We are having a bid by a company that is chartered in Europe that is going to merge with the Canadian company if it is approved by Investment Canada. That is what is before the House. For the hon. member to go from there into histrionics is really not called for at this time. Wait for the decision of Investment Canada.
However, I would advise the hon. member that Investment Canada not only will make sure there is clear, direct benefit for Canada on any decision of this sort, but in fact it will continue to encourage foreign investment
September 26, 1989

in Canada which has been running at about $3 billion a year from the United States, whereas Canadian investment in the United States has been running at $4 billion a year. Our investment around the world is strong. We believe in proper investment around the world including this, as long as there is net direct benefit to Canada.


CANADIAN ARMED FORCES
Mr. Joe McGuire (Egmont):: Mr. Speaker, it has come to my attention that the 414 Electronic Warfare Squadron stationed at North Bay, Ontario, which, according to the Budget papers, was supposed to go to Ottawa will now remain in the best location for it, North Bay, Ontario. I am very happy that the people of North Bay will not have to go through the same ordeal that the people of Summerside are now going through. Now that the Minister of National Defence knows the cost of transferring the 413 Search and Rescue Squadron from Summerside to Greenwood, will he apply the same standard used at North Bay and leave the 413 squadron at its best and most economic location at CFB Summer-side?


William Hunter (Bill) McKnight: Mr. Speaker, the change in 414 was a change in the number of aircraft included in that squadron. That meant there was an additional cost for infrastructure which was not identified at the time of the Budget because of additional aircraft being placed in that squadron.
If we can get to the question to which I am sure the hon. member would appreciate an answer, the relocation of 413 to Greenwood will serve the maritime region, will continue to provide search and rescue services to the province of Prince Edward Island and will continue in the most cost-effective and operationally effective manner in the best area of Atlantic Canada, that of Greenwood, where it was located in 1968.


Joseph Blair (Joe) McGuire: Mr. Speaker, I believe the Minister knows that 80 per cent of the rescue operations which have taken place over the past year have taken place in the general area of CFB Summerside in the gulf, while 20 per cent of the rescue operations took place in the new location which is Greenwood, Nova Scotia. I cannot understand how he can say that Greenwood, Nova
Oral Questions
Scotia, is a better operational base than CFB Summer-side.
Since the decision to close the base has not yet been reversed, I would like to direct my supplementaiy question to the Minister of Fisheries. In view of the fact that in six months' time, the tracker surveillance which does 600 of the 900 hours of surveillance presently being done in Atlantic Canada will be gone, would the Minister of Fisheries tell the fishermen of Atlantic Canada who will be doing the fishery surveillance in Atlantic Canada? What is the projected cost of this surveillance and where will the surveillance operation be based?


Thomas Edward Siddon: Mr. Speaker, I should remind my hon. friend and colleagues that the decision to end the tracker service was a decision taken by my colleague, the Minister of National Defence, because of the obsolescence of the aircraft. I can assure the hon. member that a full replacement surveillance capability will be installed before the trackers are removed, and I will have further details on that within the next few weeks.


PROPOSED GOODS AND SERVICES TAX
Ms. Dawn Black (New Westminster-Burnaby):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Finance. The Minister has said repeatedly that no Canadian family with an income of less than $30,000 a year would be worse off because of his new tax. Our figures from Statistics Canada indicate clearly that
300,000	two-parent families with children are going to end up paying more in taxes than they will get back from the credit.
How can the minister justify picking the pockets of poor Canadians with this very unfair tax?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, there are a number of elements in that calculation. The hon. member has mentioned one. She has mentioned the goods and services tax credit. There is also the reduction in the middle-income tax rate. There is also the permanent increase in indexation related to the one-time only inflation impact that we expect from the tax. Those combined are what is behind the statement I made as to the impact on families earning less than $30,000.

Oral Questions


Dawn Black: Mr. Speaker, none of that has anything to do with the sales tax. The only way that the government can come up with these figures is by cooking its own books.
Would the minister confirm today that 300,000 Canadian families with children will be worse off when this tax is instituted? That is the bottom line.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: No, Mr. Speaker, I will not say that. The hon. member referred to sales tax. The whole point I have been trying to make to this House is that it is not a sales tax, it is a sales tax system. It involves the goods and services tax, the goods and services tax credit, the reduction in the middle-income rate, the housing rebate, the payment that is made to small business to help offset the compliance costs plus the exemption on groceries. All of these are designed to provide very clear benefits that will improve the competitive position of the Canadian economy, that will allow us to get on with reducing the deficit, and also that will improve the fairness of the tax system, particularly to those low-income people to whom the hon. member has referred.


DAIRY INDUSTRY
Maurice Brydon Foster: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Agriculture. It concerns the crisis that faces the Canadian dairy industry today as a result of the yogurt and ice cream decision.
Last year the Minister of Agriculture promised dairy farmers across the country that they had nothing to fear from the free trade deal because he would be protecting the underpinning of marketing boards by transferring ice cream and yogurt and similar dairy products from the tariff list to the import control list.
We now know that this was not provided for in the free trade deal. The United States challenged it immediately and the challenge has been sustained.
I want to know why the government misled Canadian dairy farmers by saying that it would protect the marketing boards, when in fact it has not.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is inadvertently, I am sure, misleading the House when he makes that suggestion. This has nothing to do whatsoever with the free trade agreement. It has everything to do with GATT.
As a matter of fact, Article 11 was enshrined in the free trade agreement to ensure that supply-managed systems would be protected now and in the future. This is a GATT ruling. It was a very narrow ruling based upon an interpretation of like product. The panel determined that yogurt and ice cream were not like products and therefore did not impede the maintenance of the supply-management system for raw milk.
We have taken exception to that particular ruling. It has to be ratified by the total council. We have met with the industry and have worked out a strategy wherein we intend to pursue this with all the vigour that we can. The Minister of International Trade and the Minister of Agriculture are seized with this issue in consultation with the dairy industry. I think that the dairy industry is fully satisfied with the actions that we have taken to date.


Maurice Brydon Foster: This is not a GATT problem. It is a problem created by the free trade agreement. The minister knows that.
The Minister of Agriculture promised Canadian dairy farmers that the underpinning of supply management would be protected by the transfer to the import control list. It has not worked. The Americans have challenged this and that challenge has been sustained.
When will the minister and the government live up to their commitment to Canadian dairy farmers to protect their supply-management system? He knows that the entire supply-management system is in jeopardy because of this decision.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, of course we are concerned by the GATT panel decision, and it is a GATT panel decision, not a free trade decision. The hon. member should make it very clear. The hon. member is a fair-minded man. The underpinnings, as contained under Article 11 of the GATT are enshrined in the free trade agreement. Article 11 is in fact the underpinning of supply management and it is in place both in GATT and in the free trade agreement. We are going to defend it. We are going to defend it on behalf of the farmers of Canada, the dairy farmers, chicken farmers and all of those who are desirous of maintaining supply-management systems in this country.


OLD AGE SECURITY
Mr. Dave Dingwall (Cape Breton-East Richmond):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the right hon. Prime Minister. Last week members of the Prime Minister's own caucus stated quite clearly that universality is a thing of the past. In September of 1989, the National Council on Welfare stated:
The clawback on child and elderly benefits is the most significant
change in federal social policy in a generation because it marks the
end of universality, a fundamental and long-standing principle of
Canada's system of social benefits.
I ask the Prime Minister to explain the fairness in dismantling the old age security system and the family allowance system, thereby ending universality and replacing it with a tax grab on young families and senior citizens of a 9 per cent GST.


Hon. Perrin Beatty (Minister of National Health and Welfare):: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member's premise in the question is simply untrue. The old age security system has not been dismantled in Canada, nor are we undermining the basic principles that underscore the family allowance or the old age security systems.
There is a fundamental principle here though and it is that the government believes that when Canadians are being asked to do something about the federal deficit, those of us who can afford to do so should be asked to cany the highest share of the burden. Those people who are most in need of assistance should be the ones who should be receiving the most.
The position taken by the opposition is that the wealthy should be immune from being asked to carry these burdens. What they are saying is that the top 4 per cent, in the case of senior citizens, should receive all of the benefits instead of being asked to cany some of the burden in trying to ensure that Canada's social programs can be maintained. We believe they are wrong.


David Charles Dingwall: Mr. Speaker, I remind the Minister that his own appointed National Council on Welfare said on page 7 that a social program that delivers benefits to everyone and then collects them back from some recipients is not universality.
Oral Questions
That is very clear from your own people you appointed to the welfare council. I say to the minister that you are discriminating against one-earner families-


Mr. Speaker:: I would ask the hon. member to put the questions through the Chair and to keep in mind the time.


David Charles Dingwall: My question to the minister is this: Why are you discriminating against one-earner families? You have a one-earner family-


Mr. Speaker:: I am sorry. The Hon. Member for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca has the floor.


FISHERIES
Mr. David Barrett (Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Fisheries. It concerns a recent free trade dispute panel hearing on a GATT decision that was opposed to Canadian fish landings in the province of British Columbia.
The minister promised the House that every effort would be made by the Government of Canada to protect the west coast fisheries against U.S. attempts to stop landings in Canada. The Inside U.S. Trade Today statement says that the Canadian Government has lost its first appeal to the free trade panel.
I want the minister to stand up and tell the fisheries people in British Columbia that no jobs will be lost and that the ministry is prepared to end the free trade agreement if this deals goes through.


Thomas Edward Siddon: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is dreaming in Technicolor if he thinks he will get my positive response to that question.
In fact, we have put in place new landing regulations in order to enhance our ability to conserve and properly manage our west coast salmon stock. A free trade panel was established at the request of the United States to review these measures. That panel has not yet reported and, until they do, no further discussion or comment is appropriate by a member of this government.

September 26, 1989
The Late Dan McKenzie


David Barrett: Mr. Speaker, is the minister suggesting that Inside U.S. Trade Today and spokespersons out of the U.S. Department of Trade are incorrect in their interpretation that the panel has already met and the Canadian position has been totally rejected? Are you saying that you have not had a report to that effect in your office?


Mr. Speaker:: Perhaps the hon. minister heard the question and could respond.


Hon. John C. Crosbie (Minister for International TVade):: Mr. Speaker, the answer to that is yes, it is incorrect.


THE LATE DAN MCKENZIE
Mr. Speaker:: It is my unhappy duty to advise the House that in view of the recent death of one of our very recent colleagues, there will be some appropriate statements given at this time.


Robert Nesbitt Horner: Mr. Speaker, I rise today as we all pay tribute to the memory of a man who has been a symbol of dedicated service and continuing commitment to the constituents of the federal riding of Winnipeg-Assiniboine.
The people of Winnipeg-Assiniboine will miss Dan McKenzie greatly. It didn't matter which party was popular at election time, Dan always came through with flying colours because of his proven record of speaking out for the grass roots right across Canada.
The loss is hardest however for his wife Marion and children, Karen and John. We offer them our most sincere condolences.
Dan will be remembered as a member of Parliament who anyone could call on any time they needed help in dealing with government matters. He would respond to their requests in a straightforward manner. There was no hedging or dodging the issues with Dan McKenzie.
He often endangered his own political future in the pursuit of satisfying his constituents. Dan never wavered when he spoke in the House of Commons. He never gave a thought to the political consequences that might result from his frank and honest statements on actions of government. He could always be counted on in the House of Commons to add to the debate and often bring
a message that reflected the views of ordinary blue collar Canadians in coffee shops, taxicabs and pubs.
Parliament was greatly enriched and as a result Canada served better because of the contributions Dan made in the House of Commons. Parliament needs more outspoken men and women prepared to stand up for the concerns of ordinary people.
In my relatively short time as a member of Parliament, my life has been enriched by the contributions of Dan McKenzie. I am proud to count Dan as a friend and colleague. I am sure Dan will always be remembered as one of the few outspoken members.
All of these qualities were clearly evident to the people of Winnipeg-Assiniboine when they elected him first in 1972 and sent him back to this House with enthusiasm at each subsequent election.
All members of Parliament express their condolences to his constituents who will miss the tradition he had established. More particularly, we offer our sympathy to his wife Marion and to John and Karen. May he rest in peace.


William Henry (Bill) Domm: Mr. Speaker, I too rise today in the House of Commons to pay tribute to Mr. Dan McKenzie who passed away suddenly on August 15, 1989.
Dan was not only a colleague; he was also a friend. When I was first elected in 1979, Dan was already a veteran on the Hill having been elected as a member of Parliament first in 1972.
I remember fondly his willingness to help out us new kids on the block, as he used to call us, in any way he could. As the years went on and as Dan and I worked on a number of issues together, it became very obvious to me, and I am sure other members of this House, that Dan McKenzie was no ordinary member of Parliament.
He was a true spokesman for his constituents of Winnipeg-Assiniboine, often risking his own political future to ensure that the views of his riding were well represented in this House. To say that Dan was an outspoken Member of Parliament is indeed an understatement. But when he spoke out, it was on issues of importance to his constituents. At the same time Dan always held a great respect for this House, recognizing the honour and privilege it is to be able to stand here and serve this country.
September 26, 1989

A letter which appeared recently in a local newspaper really sums up what I feel best describes Dan McKenzie, and I quote:
-when all was said and done he was nothing short of a hero. If I could write his epitaph it would say, "he stood tall on principle when it was unfashionable to do so-Courage is easier to pronounce than it is to display-
To his wife Marion and two children, Karen and John, I would like to offer my sincere condolences and I would like to express on behalf of all colleagues of this House of Commons what I hope is their wish for happiness for the remaining family. Thank you very much.


Hon. Jake Epp (Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to pay tribute on behalf of colleagues in the House and particularly the Manitoba Conservative caucus members, the caucus in which Dan served for many years and a caucus he chaired for some period of time.
Dan McKenzie was elected as the Member of Parliament for Winnipeg-Assiniboine in 1972, a year when a number of us from that province came to this House. Prior to that Dan had been an employee with Manitoba Telephone Systems. As well, he had been a member of the Winnipeg city council. Dan was elected in 1972 and held that seat continuously until 1988 when he chose not to offer his name for election.
As has been mentioned, Dan held many firm views. Those views were often in the issues which dominated the agenda of this House through those years. Those firm views were often very controversial, and I think for the record it is also important to note that he often was in a minority, both within our caucus and also within the House, on a number of those issues. But as has also been mentioned, he held those views not only firmly but consistently.
We can all take a look at our careers here and at that for which we will possibly be remembered. Dan will be remembered for two things, I believe; first of all, service to his constituents. I think he taught a lot of us the value of service to constituents, and he did that not only with pride but tenaciously. I recall as Minister of Health if there was an issue relating to pensions or family allowance, Dan would be at my doorstep immediately looking after the interests of his constituents. It was I think in that service in which his political success also lay.
The Late Dan McKenzie
Additionally, I think Dan will be remembered for his loyalty to Canada's armed services and particularly the membership he held in the Royal Canadian Legion. He spent many happy hours with his colleagues reminiscing not only of that war service but also the country as they saw it develop.
So may I, on behalf of all of us, extend our condolences to his widow Marion and to his children.


Rey D. Pagtakhan: Mr. Speaker, I too rise as my party's regional whip for northern and western Canada, from where the deceased member, Mr. Dan McKenzie came, so that I may also convey my colleagues' and my family's profound sympathy and condolence to his family, to his wife, to his children and to his many friends for his service to the constituency and for his service to our country.
Death is the one chapter in the human journey that erases barriers and differences among people, even when we have differed. I am honoured to convey my colleagues' deepest sympathy to his family for the great loss.


Mr. Bill Blaikie (Winnipeg Transcona):: Mr. Speaker, both as a Member of Parliament from Winnipeg and as a member of the New Democratic Party, I would like to join with my colleagues in remembering the life and work of Dan McKenzie.
Those of you who knew him, and you are many, will know that Dan was a very partisan guy, and I have no illusions that he belonged to my fan club or I to his. We often disagreed. I can imagine, if it is in the nature of things for people to know what is said after them, what Dan might be thinking about the fact that I am even on my feet.
I think, however, it is appropriate to remember the things that unite Members of Parliament in this institution, even though we disagree, and sometimes quite vociferously, with each other. I can remember many occasions on which I would receive mail from Winnipeg in which people would write: "You and Dan McKenzie are the only two sticking up for us," and these kinds of things. What did it refer to? Well, it referred to Dan's concern about veterans and pensioners. It is in that respect that I think so many Members of Parliament have come together and have worked together.

September 26, 1989
Government Orders
Despite all the differences, I think we are called upon to respect each other as members of Parliament and members of this institution and to take cognizance, as we are here today, when one of our colleagues has died.
On behalf of my colleagues, I extend our condolences to Dan's family and recognize the work which his constituents recognized time and time again in re-electing him.


Mr. Speaker:: I ask hon. members to rise for one minute of silence.
[Whereupon the House stood in silence].



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Mulroney that Bill C-29, an act to establish the Department of Forestry, to amend the Forestry Development and Research Act and to make related amendments to other acts, be read the second time and referred to a legislative committee.
Mr. Speaker:: When the House rose at one o'clock p.m., the hon. member for Skeena had completed his speech. The question and comment period following the hon. member's speech is now available to members, otherwise the Chair is prepared to recognize hon. members for debate. The hon. minister on questions and comment.


Frank Oberle: Mr. Speaker, I will not want to prolong the debate, having had a chance yesterday to say my piece, but I would be remiss if I did not thank the hon. member for Skeena for the incredible service that he has given to my work. As he and others know, us authors sometimes have difficulties getting our works recognized. The hon. member has quoted liberally and extensively from my publication entitled The Green Ghetto and I will send him another copy with my autograph. Incidentally, it is used widely throughout the country for fund-raising purposes. If the hon. member wants to use it for that purpose, he has my permission.
What I do not appreciate is having my record and that of my party mixed up with that of the previous Liberal administration. The hon. member was quite wrong when he said that nothing happened after The Green Ghetto was published and after the Progressive Conservative government came into being in 1984.
A lot happened, as he knows, in our province. The forestry resource development agreement was entered into which spent three times as much money as we ever spent before; $300 million. Quite an impressive record. One hundred and sixty-four million trees were planted in British Columbia; 137,000 hectares were planted;
871,000	hectares put in a management regime were surveyed. That is an incredible success story. We committed $31 million to a research facility in UBC, quite an impressive record.
Not only that, but the Prime Minister, immediately after the cabinet was appointed in 1984, appointed a minister of state for forestry who was immediately made responsible for filling the promise that was made previously, to organize and co-ordinate the activities of the federal government in forestry and to set in motion what we did in 1960 under the Right Hon. John George Diefenbaker. You have a full federal department of forestry.
If the NDP had their way what they would be doing, I suppose, would be shutting down all the industry. There would not even be enough paper left to print their protest placards. They would have to carve it all in stone plates again. All I want to tell the hon. member is that it has been a long time since Moses, and a lot has happened.
I do want, in a positive way, to appreciate the positive attitude that he brought to the debate. I know I can rely on his support as we begin to go on to even bigger and better things.


James Ross Fulton: The minister sounds like he is quite keen on Bill C-29. I guess he did not listen too carefully, but he is right on one point. I was interested in listening to the Liberals in the House today talking about where they really stand on this issue because during the 1984 federal election their current leader in fact came to Prince George, British Columbia, to a community dependent on forestry, and said that the Liberals were against, and I guess would continue to be against, a full department of forests. So I will have to listen with interest to how they try to set that part of that record straight.
September 26, 1989

Government Orders
As to the minister's remarks that an NDP government would shut the industry all down and so on, I know the minister knows better than that. That is basically what has happened to his shop, under the present Prime Minister. He has not been given the levels of funding that there should be at the federal level. As a matter of fact his budget has been cut by $28 million since last year. Of course there is no money there for the next phase of FRDA. As they say it is going to have to come from, western diversification.
As you will recall from this morning, Mr. Speaker, I pointed out rather well the shell game that the minister is trying to get into with his friend Dave Parker from B.C. although I think Dave Parker has the minister cornered now. The provinces are very clear. They are prepared to enter a $1 billion, that is a one thousand million dollar, five-year FRDA. The premier is on the record and the Minister of Forests is on the record. It would be irresponsible of the minister not to make sure that $500 million comes forward from the federal level so that we see that kind of a five-year FRDA go ahead.
I do not object to British Columbia putting more money in. The minister has quite correctly time and again in B.C. pointed out that with the replacement stumpage regime for the 15 per cent unnecessary countervail brought in by the Conservative government on behalf of the United States, many hundreds of millions have been collected. Stumpage in many areas such as the minister's own riding has gone from around $1 a cunit to anywhere from $7 to $20 a cunit that is being paid. So stumpage has gone up dramatically and Victoria has a great deal of money.
When the minister talks about the department and talks about where this bill is going to take us, I think we should keep in mind that there are not enough foresters and there is not enough technical equipment with the minister's department to complete an adequate inventory of what our forests really are.
The minister should keep a few things in mind. The same amount of forest in recent years has been lost to fire, insects and disease as has been harvested; something Canadians should be reminded of time again. Half of the harvested forest in Canada is not regenerating properly. There you have another half. We are already down to almost a quarter of the quality forest lands that we have.
The backlog of not satisfactorily restocked land is 25 million hectares. That is probably a very conservative estimate of what it is in this country now. Because of the GATT demand in every region of the country it will exceed supply by 1995, only five years from now. For every dollar generated by the forest industry in tax revenue, only five cents is returned. Of course, that is the combined return of the federal and provincial governments. That is not much of a return in terms of any other industry in the country.
Let us look at some of the other things the minister touched on in his question to me. In relation to inventories, the last inventory of Canada's forests was published in 1986 and prior to that in 1981. I hope the minister is not suggesting that we will not have another inventory nationally published until 1991.


Frank Oberle: Next year.


James Ross Fulton: The minister is on the record now. He says it will be published next year, a complete inventory. That will be the tabling of the inventory.
I would point out to the minister that the problem with the current inventory information system being used by the federal and provincial governments is that some of the physical count information on which the inventory is based is 40 years old and the average on which the entire inventory is based is now almost 15 years old. We are dealing with terribly antiquated systems, terribly antiquated base information.
Even the latest information includes some startling facts. Fifty-five million hectares of forest land in Canada is not yet inventoried. We have never had a professional forester look at it. There is a total of 453 million hectares of forest land in the country. Over 500 million hectares of forest land in Canada was idle as recently as 1976 because it had just been burned over, and 200,000 hectares were gobbled up by pests.
We know that the Auditor General reminded the government what needed to be done but it looks like so far, and I would like to stress this point, the minister has been losing the battles in Cabinet. One thing I like to do from this side of the House is, through debate and through the minister, remind those reckless colleagues in cabinet, and in particular, the reckless Prime Minister.

Government Orders
I am sure if a reporter stopped the Prime Minister outside of the House today and asked him what is the largest industry in Canada, he would get it wrong. He would suspect that it was something other than forestry. He might think it was Gucci shoe sheds, or he might think it was agriculture-not a bad mistake to make but terribly erroneous.
He certainly has not recognized his responsibility fiscally in terms of the support he should be giving to the full ministry of forests in terms of budget, staff, technical equipment and funding for universities and inventories. It simply has not been done.
Let me give another example. I know you are interested in factual examples so that the people of Canada know just how badly this Conservative government is handling forest issues. Let me use my own province as an example. Between 1979 and 1987 the annual cut volumes increased in B.C. by 20 per cent while employment dropped by 25 per cent. The minister did not have much to say about that while he was speaking yesterday. Since 1950, in B.C. volume cut has increased 400 per cent and employment over all, over almost 40 years, by 22 per cent.
In 1950 B.C. had 2.64 jobs for every thousand cubic metres harvested. In 1986 the same thousand cubic metres produced only nine-tenths of one job. By contrast, California creates 5.2 jobs per thousand cubic metres harvested and Sweden generates 2.7 jobs per thousand cubic metres of wood harvested.
I am sure my friend from New Brunswick or my friend from Quebec, who sit on the forestry committee, would very much like to see this legislation amended so that we could get some kind of tie between areas that are harvested and the rate of reforestation, the kind of mixed ecological, biological reseeding and tending that should go on in those areas. We would like to see it tied to value added. I certainly trust that the government side will assist in properly amending this legislation which really needs to be amended.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: There is no other member I would love to listen to more, if there was more time and we would be able to give him more time.


Mr. J. W. Bud Bird (Fredericton-York Sunbury):: Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak this afternoon on Bill C-29, legislation to establish a new department of forestry in Canada.
I would like to just take a moment to make a point that the hon. member for Restigouche, the Liberal critic for forestry, commented on this morning when he criticized this bill as merely establishing the department of forestry. I would like to point out that this bill, which re-establishes the department of forestry in 1989, follows on the heels of the first department of forestry which was established by a conservative government back in 1960. A New Brunswicker by the name of the Hon. Hugh John Fleming was the first Minister of Forestry at that time.
I would like to make the point as well that in 1966 the department of forestry was diminished into a department of forestry and rural development and then in 1969 it was further diminished into the department of fisheries and forestry. Then in 1971 the Liberal government placed it under the jurisdiction of the department of the environment where it resided until 1984 when this government reappointed a minister of state for forestry and proceeded in the directions that we now are establishing with this bill.
I think that history reveals that it has been conservative governments, both the conservative government in 1960 and this conservative government in 1984 and 1989, that have acted to recognize, through a full department of forestry and a full minister of forestry, the very great importance of this resource and all it represents to Canada; a total of $40 billion in annual shipments,
800,000	jobs, capital expenditures of $6.4 billion, and all that flows from those facts and factors.
I would also like to take a moment to comment on some of the words of the hon. member for Skeena in his remarks. I think he also should be congratulated for recognizing the contribution of The Green Ghetto which our present Minister of Forestry authored several years ago and about which the hon. member for Skeena spoke with some disparaging inference. I would just like to say that for all of the wonderful factual words the member for Skeena delivers to this House, few, if any, have ever led to anything concrete, positive and creative, nothing to be compared at all to the creation of The Green Ghetto which has led the hon. Mr. Oberle through his years in this House to the point where he is now about to become the first full-fledged Minister of Forestry for Canada in almost three decades.
September 26, 1989	COMMONS DEBATES	3933
We have heard how vital the forestry sector is to Canada. I would like to speak about what a giant of an industry it is in Atlantic Canada. In New Brunswick the forest sector provides 38,000 jobs, that is one out of every seven jobs in the province. The forest industry has been an integral part of New Brunswick's way of life since the late 18th century. Today the economic importance of the forest is immense to our province.
The value of all forest products shipped within and outside New Brunswick total $1.9 billion per year, representing 40 per cent of all our manufacturing shipments and 47 per cent of the province's total exports. It accounts for 7.4 per cent of our gross domestic product. Close to half of New Brunswick's extensive forests belong to the provincial Crown and are harvested by leasing to forest companies.
Again, the hon. member for Skeena made a disparaging remark about the New Brunswick legislation and the New Brunswick approach to forestry. Again, he has missed the facts of the situation because in the management legislation pertaining to the Crown forests in New Brunswick, the New Brunswick Crown Lands and Forest Act, the structure, the system and the approach is established as the best example toward sustained forestry and sustainable development in all of Canada and has been acclaimed by experts throughout Canada and North America in those respects.
I would suggest to him that he go to New Brunswick and check his facts. He will find an approach to sustainable development that is well out in front of many of the experiences that obviously he has had. I would urge him to read the Dr. Baskerville paper on sustainable development in New Brunswick forests which I have sent to him and which he obviously has not read, or at least has not remembered. I think he will agree, when he has apprised himself of those facts in that paper and all the facts on the ground in New Brunswick, that the New Brunswick Crown Lands Act is a model of government legislation toward sustainable development in forestry in this country.
The federal government in recognition of the contribution which New Brunswick makes to forests and forestry has just recently completed the new federal co-operation agreement for forestry, an agreement that will commit $91 million between the federal and provin-
Govemment Orders
cial governments to forestry over the next five years in New Brunswick with a federal contribution of $50 million. That new agreement will have a special emphasis on the 36,000 private woodlots which are such an integral and important part of forestry in New Brunswick.
In that respect, Mr. Speaker, again in recognition of the deep commitment which our present Minister of Forestry has to forests throughout Canada, to the private woodlots of Canada, I would like to emphasize the action which he has taken this spring and summer in New Brunswick where, in anticipation of the delays and extensive changes required through the new co-operation agreement structure of federal-provincial financing which has been a fact of life in this year, 1989, he made a $2.5 million commitment to the private woodlot producers in New Brunswick. He assured them-literally putting his neck beyond the ground that most ministers would be prepared to cover-that he would provide to them the kind of ministerial assurance that would permit them to bank their activities for almost a whole year's work in reforestation and silviculture in anticipation of the agreement which now is about to be signed. For that I would like, on behalf of all New Brunswickers, to extend sincere appreciation to the minister for the commitment he has made and for the commitment he has delivered.
I would now like to go on to Nova Scotia where the forest sector is also an economic mainspring. In Nova Scotia, the value of all forest shipments approach $825 million per year. That constitutes 17 per cent of all manufacturing shipments in Nova Scotia, and represents 2.8 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product of that province. It constitutes 24 per cent of the total provincial exports, and a total number of 17,000 Nova Scotians are employed in the forest industry.
One of the big features of forestry in Nova Scotia is that it is in many respects a family affair with about 76 per cent of the forests in Nova Scotia being privately owned. One of those energetic parts of the entire forest industry in Nova Scotia is the Christmas tree industry. Nova Scotia's Christmas tree industry mainly uses balsam fir. About a third is cut by big operators with 500 to 2,500 acres in holdings, another third by medium-sized operators with lots averaging 100 to 400 acres and the remainder from small woodlots of less than 100 acres.

September 26, 1989
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The people of the industry have that old Nova Scotia virtue of self-reliance. The industry benefits from research and technical assistance on disease and insect control. But the men and women in the industry in Nova Scotia are not looking for grants or hand-outs. In fact, they have conscientiously and publicly refused anything that smacks of a subsidy.
There are about 2,500 Christmas tree growers in Nova Scotia, Mr. Speaker, and most are woodlot operators who do other kinds of growing. About 95 per cent of the crop is exported to the United States, representing a $30 million economic activity annually, providing 500 fulltime jobs and up to 3,000 part-time jobs.
Every year these Nova Scotians cut and ship 1,750,000 Christmas trees. They make and ship upwards to 300,000 wreaths, and about 50,000, 25 pound bails of brush. The Christmas tree business and the Christmas tree forest industry is a big thing to Nova Scotia. The federal government has recognized the value of forestry in Nova Scotia. Over the past five years it has contributed a total of $57.7 million toward forest management and renewal with a new agreement now in the latter stages of negotiation.
In Prince Edward Island, Canada's smallest province, a lot of woodland during the 1920s and 1930s was cleared for farming. The stands that were left were allowed to decline and have become overgrown with white spruce, poplar and white birch. These are species with limited commercial value. They are now overly mature and susceptible to disease and insects.
These stands are now being replaced by stands of more commercially useful species such as black spruce, white pine and eastern larch. The plan is to manage these new stands on a sustainable basis.
What is happening to the old stands that have been cleared away? That wood is being used in an interesting biomass conversion project. It is, in fact, chipped and fuels Charlottetown's district heating system which heats much of the city's downtown core. This was the first such system in the entire country and is an example of the creativity of islanders.
The forestry sector is important to the island. It employs 2 per cent of the labour force and generates $1.4 million in exports.
In Newfoundland, the forest industry provides 10,000 jobs. It represents 6 per cent of the total labour force. One in eighteen workers depend on forestry. Exports alone come to $372 million, or 25 per cent of all exports from the province.
Again, federal-provincial co-operation have been the watchwords. Since fiscal year 1986-87, the federal government has contributed $24.6 million toward forest management and renewal under the Canada-Newfound-land Forest Resource Development Agreement.
This year, the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency signed a $53 million agreement with Newfoundland to benefit Labrador; $6 million of which involves the development of the forest industry in the Goose Bay region around the upper and lower Churchill Falls.
Forestry Canada is co-operating in that initiative. It is working with the provincial Forestry Department in Newfoundland to accomplish some specific things: first, to carry out a forest inventory of the region; second, to establish a forest management program for the region; and, lastly, to perform an environmental sensitivity analysis which will allow us to cut in a way that is reconcilable with the principles of sustainable development.
This region of Labrador, where there is almost no cutting now, is a region that will help Canada meet the anticipated jump in world demand for our forest products. The program in Labrador is an example of federal-provincial co-operation.

But Mr. Speaker, there is a lot more. This is just a sample of what sustainable development will be like. We can see how Canadians are facing up to the trade challenges of the next century as they prepare to increase their productivity while preserving the environment.
There is an important message in that program. Before making major cuts, we must analyse any relevant data to minimize the impact of operations on the environment and to ensure optimum economic spin-offs for the regions.
September 26, 1989

That approach will meet the future needs of Canadians. Through federal-provincial co-operation, we will decide on the best course to follow before taking action.

I have tried to show how important the forest sector is to Atlantic Canada. What we do in Atlantic Canada is a mirror, a model for the rest of the country. In a region where most economic activity flows from nature's gifts, every initiative that protects nature will be enthusiastically embraced.
Others have talked about the need to ensure environmentally sustainable economic development. There is not an Atlantic Canadian for whom that notion does not have special meaning. How can we extend that model and pursue that concept in a national manner across Canada? How can we bring ten provinces and two territories and the federal government to some semblance of a common approach? How can we motivate industry to participate in a consistent manner with all jurisdictions? How can we exert a parallel influence on private industrial land and smaller woodlots? How can we establish sustained development in all of Canada's forests?
The federal government recognizes that most forests are provincial responsibilities. It realizes that each jurisdiction will probably have its own unique options to consider. But there can be an integrated approach and a common commitment to the principles of sustainable development in our forests.
For example, the Council of Provincial Resource Ministers is certainly one avenue for this approach. In particular, I believe the new federal department of forestry should have a binding role to play, to be the glue in the process, much in the same manner as it has consistently provided research and development assistance to the provinces in such areas as forest biology, fire control, and insecticide and herbicides treatment. The Canadian Forest Service can build on the New Brunswick model and the Labrador model to help the rest of the country in specific ways; first, by co-ordinating technological practices with regard to such things as forest inventories and geographic information systems. It is a fact that consistent forest data is difficult to obtain for all 10 provinces in any integrated manner.
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The federal department of forestry can help to develop common methods for analyzing management problems. The federal department of forestry can write model specifications on both environmental and developmental goals for adoption by each province within their respective jurisdictions leading to sustainable development.
The Government of Canada could help set an example with more sustained development of its own lands. This might necessarily require extensive consolidation for forest management responsibilities among such departments as Forestry, Environment, Indian Affairs, Energy, Mines and Resources, and the Department of National Defence.
As well, industrial development and international marketing functions for forest products might well be integrated eventually within the new department of forestry so that the concepts of finished product and added value would be in context and harmony with the state and the management of the resource itself.
Sustained development demands that we marry the end uses to the available resources. Such a transfer of these responsibilities from the present Department of Industry, Science and Technology would provide the forestry minister with a vital and consistent linkage to the forest industry and would extend his opportunities for influencing industrial participation in the process of sustained management of our forests right across Canada.
The present administration of federal-provincial forestry agreements should be intensified under the forestry minister, preferably on longer-term schedules to match the nature of the forest resource than is the case for the present five-year cycles. His influence in terms of a national program for sustained development can be made to reach Canada's private woodlot owners who are among the primary beneficiaries of the funding agreement.
In these and other ways, Mr. Speaker, the federal minister of forestry can play an important guiding role for sustained development in Canada's forests. It seems a special opportunity that, at almost the same moment in history when the concepts of sustained development have come to the fore of public consciousness about our forests, the federal government has given rebirth to a national department of forestry.

September 26, 1989
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Our job now is to pass this legislation to create this department of forestry, and then to embark upon the road that the standing committee on forestry has already anticipated when, on May 31, we reached agreement in principle for an approach to a list of the kinds of examinations to help to develop on a national basis in Canada, hopefully to assist the minister of forestry and the staff of the department of forestry, in building, flowering and flourishing their future role on behalf of this most important of Canada's resources.
I would like to read two or three of the subject areas that we propose to address to the new department of forestry in terms of promoting public awareness of and support for the significance of Canada's forest resources in all aspects: economical, environmental, ecological and recreational. They are co-operating with provinces and industry to develop the highest standards of intensive forest management on a multiple use and sustainable development basis for all forest lands in Canada; co-operating with the provinces and industry to develop the highest potential of manufacturing technology and add-ed-value utilization for Canada's forest resources; maintaining and expanding the research and development activities of the Canadian Forestry Service, by directing intensive management of federal forest lands on a multiple-use sustainable-development basis; and co-ordination and co-operation with all of the other government departments-Environment, Parks Canada for wildlife, migratory birds, pesticides, herbicides, and so on.
They also include co-ordinating with Agriculture with respect to herbicides and pesticides, with Indian and Northern Affairs, with Fisheries and Oceans, with National Defence, with International Trade, with Industry, Science and Technology, with Energy, Mines and Resources, with the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency and the Western Diversification Fund. In all of these manners the new department of forestry can help to lead the way for the enhancement and the sustainabililty for for the long, long-term future of Canada's forests.
We should now be ready in all areas of Canada to do something about sustainable development in our forests. With Bill C-29, when we get it passed and passed quickly, when we get this new department alive and in action, we will take a big step forward. Now let us get on with the job.


Réginald Bélair: Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate the member from Fredericton on his speech. There are a number of issues that the member forgot to address-I do not know if it was intentional or not-namely, the decrease of 11.9 per cent budget dollars for this year's forestry department.
Would the member not agree that if we are going to have a strong forestry department in Canada that at least we should have the budget to support it?


John Williston (Bud) Bird: Mr. Speaker, I think that in due course we will have the budget to support it. I have some figures here that I would like to use to respond to the very legitimate question.
As I said in my remarks, we, on the Standing Committee on Forestry and Fisheries of which the hon. member is a member, discussed the fact that this legislation was the beginning. It was to give rebirth to the structure of the department of forestry. It is really a very short piece of legislation and does not have the encompassing purposes which we will some day see the department of forestry co-ordinating in the near term and perhaps in due course fully conducting on behalf of the Government of Canada.
The Main Estimates, however, for 1989-90 do not take into account the resources which have been negotiated as part of the process in establishing the new department of forestry. In addition to those figures I am told that 35 person years and $1.7 million have been transferred from Agriculture Canada. As well, the new Department will receive an additional 30 person years and $2.3 million in operating funds this year with an additional 30 to 45 person years in 1990. Forestry Canada this year has received $2.5 million in additional funding for research and development. This will increase by another $5 million next year. Forestry Canada has also received 37 person years for this year to help wind down the recently expired forestry agreements.
So there have been some significant numbers and person years not contained in the Main Estimates that are at work in the transition from Forestry Canada to the new department of forestry at this time. As I say, in terms of developing and broadening the influence, the scope and the impact of this department over future years in the subject areas that we have discussed on the Standing Committee on Forestry and Fisheries I see that it will grow in significant stature, influence and in the impact it will have on Canada's forestry sector and in the creation of our best example of sustainable development.
September 26, 1989


Brian L. Gardiner: Mr. Speaker, I listened with a great deal of interest to the comments of the member from Fredericton, who is also a member of the forestry committee, as well as to some of the earlier comments made by the member from Skeena, who I think has brought forward a very enlightened view about forestry from a biological perspective. His concerns that he certainly had both as a forestry critic and currently as our party's environment critic are well known.
I have two questions for the member. The first one concerns his wrap-up comments. He suggested that this Bill needs some work and that we are to do some studying for the flowering role that we anticipate from the department. In light of the fact that it has taken some five years for this government to finally introduce this legislation based on a commitment made during the 1984 election campaign, I am wondering if this government's definition of a flowering role is as immediate as the definition prior to that. Will it take five years for us to see that?
Second, I am interested in knowing the member's comments in terms of the representations that have been made to the committee and earlier when this legislation was introduced to the hon. government House Leader inquiring about the opportunity for the forest committee to have a chance to travel the country to hear Canadians' views on this legislation. The Canadian Institute of Forestry, which I believe is monitoring the debate today, has called for that. I wonder if the member from Fredericton would join with us in supporting that call from the CIF.


John Williston (Bud) Bird: Mr. Speaker, with regard to the first question, this bill merely establishes the department of forestry. While I use the word "merely" I do so advisedly because it is in reality a very profound commitment, a very profound creation of a full-fledged federal government department. That must be accomplished before we can start to address the purposes that it will serve in the future. As I said earlier, Liberal governments over a period of almost 15 years dismantled the federal department of forestry which was established in 1960. This
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government over the past five years has delivered on its commitment. It has delivered on its commitment to create a department of forestry.
That is the starting point we must have in order to pursue the purposes which the hon. member from Prince George has proposed and referred to subsequently, that being the opportunity for the standing committee to travel the country to hear from the Canadian Institute of Forestry and from the forestry sector broadly, to hear all who are interested in forestry and the environment, about the kinds of purposes which the federal department of forestry can ultimately fulfil. Yes, I would support such a mission by the Standing Committee on Forestry and Fisheries. I have already indicated I would support it.
In fact, I did inquire of the government, as we had committed to do, about the prospects of having this bill referred to the Standing Committee on Forestry and Fisheries. I have been advised that the government would prefer to see it dealt with in the normal legislative committee format that it has quickly offered to ensure that every member of the standing committee who wishes to participate on that legislative committee will be invited to do so. So I think we have delivered on the spirit of the undertakings which we unanimously agreed to in the Standing Committee on Forestry and Fisheries.
I would urge the House and particularly the members on the standing committee, to support the referral of this bill to a legislative committee and to support the passage of the bill as quickly as possible. Then let us take this new department of forestry and go on the road across Canada as a mission to determine how we can best use that department to influence sustainable development in forestry for the good of all Canadians.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: There is a minute and a half left.


Peter L. McCreath: Mr. Speaker, I would like to compliment the hon. member from Fredericton on his most comprehensive address. I am not at all surprised that he would provide a comprehensive address in view of the fact that he has extensive experience in the field as a former minister of natural resources in New Brunswick.

September 26, 1989
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I particularly appreciate his comments with respect to the Christmas tree industry in Nova Scotia, a $30-million industry which sees approximately 1.75 million trees exported annually from our province. I would like to advise all members that two-thirds of those trees come from my South Shore riding.
Some of the things that we are looking forward to in our forest products industries on the South Shore are the possibilities with respect to marketing and, indeed, with respect to research. I wonder if the hon. member might just expand on his remarks with respect to what he sees as the role of this new department regarding marketing and research.


John Williston (Bud) Bird: Mr. Speaker, presently there is a veiy extensive overlap among many federal government departments with respect to forestry. I mentioned them in my remarks. With respect to marketing and research, and I presume research in marketing and research in commercial activities, a great deal of that presently is in the terms of reference of the Department of Industry, Science and Technology and the Department of International Trade. Certainly, the Canadian Forestry Services had a great deal to do as well with the preparation of the stock and the silvicultural preparation of the trees for marketing. I think there is an integration of activity required there. I believe that those are the kinds of things that our standing committee and others can help to influence favourably upon the future of the new department of forestry once we have it established and under way.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Before giving the floor to the Hon. Member for Algoma (Mr. Foster), it is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 38, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the Hon. Member for Parkdale-High Park (Mr. Witer)-External Affairs- Crisis in China-Mandate of United Nations-Evacuation plans for Canadians in China; the Hon. Member for Thunder Bay-Atikokan (Mr. Angus)-Transportation-VIA Rail services-Government position; the Hon. Member for Cape Breton-East Richmond (Mr. Dingwall)-Health-Thalidomide-Ihsk Force report-
Compensation for victims-Request for early announcement.



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[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Mulroney that Bill C-29, an act to establish the Department of Forestry, to amend the Forestry Development and Research Act and to make related amendments to other acts, be read the second time and referred to a legislative committee.
Maurice Brydon Foster: Mr. Speaker, I am especially pleased to have an opportunity to speak on Bill C-29, the government's bill to establish a department of forestry. I say to the minister, even though he is five years late that we support the initiative, albeit five years down the pipe. We think that forestry is the most important industry in the country, that a department of forestry, if it is adequately funded and provided for with the minister having control of all the factors relating to forestry, can have a tremendous impetus for good in this country. It is our number one industry. It is bigger than the petroleum industry. It is bigger than the automobile industry. It employs more people.
More important, Mr. Speaker, it is the key industry in many of the northern areas of this country where there is no chance, or very little chance, of establishing an automobile plant such as we have in southern Ontario. So it is an industry that is really on the move.
Through the 1970s and 1980s, when the Liberal government was in office, we put in place massive programs to upgrade. I think of my own constituency of Algoma where we provided some $25 million along with the province of Ontario to upgrade the Eddy Forest plant in Espanola to bring it into line with modem environmental demands. It increased efficiency and improved the productivity of that plant.
We provided assistance under the Department of Regional and Industrial Expansion to put in place the most productive sawmill at Naim Centre, part of the Eddy industry, which produces today over 200 million board-feet of lumber, an amount unheard of in eastern Canada only 25 years or so ago. It certainly has the largest productive capacity in eastern Canada.
September 26, 1989

Those programs were good. The several hundred million dollars which the former government put in place spawned investment by the private sector of $1.6 billion to modernize and update that industry. There is no question about the importance of this industry. What a tremendous contribution it makes in terms of jobs and technological development. The beauty is that it is a renewable resource. It is not like a mine where you dig the mineral out of the ground once and it is gone. If we properly husband the forest resources of our country; if we provide the research back-up, if we provide the tools for reforestation and research, it will continue to be the most important industry in our country, not only in jobs but export, balance of payments and so on.
This initiative of Bill C-29 can be very important and very productive. Unfortunately, if you look at this bill, look at the rhetoric of the Minister of Forestry, then look at the budget, and look at what the government has done in the past four years and how long it has taken them to do it, you cannot be sure of that. Some people in the industry say: "Look, when I am dealing with a trade problem, I want to deal with the Minister for International Trade. When I am dealing with a tax problem, I want to deal with the Minister of Finance". So, although the bill is there, the department will be there, it will only be effective if the minister has clout, if the minister has the power in the cabinet, if the minister has the influence of the Minister of Finance to ensure that things happen in this industry and if there is that over-all power to co-ordinate the activities that are necessary for the forest industry.
Let us just look at a few of these items. It is very unreassuring. I, along with the Member for Cochrane-Superior, and four or five other members of our caucus from northern Ontario, were members of a task force last winter which travelled across northern Ontario and talked to the forest industry. One segment of that industry, the softwood lumber industry, is in peril of being destroyed. It is a very important industry with tremendous resources in this country. We are very productive, we could compete with the world. Certainly, we can compete with the United States. It is in terrible jeopardy because it was a pawn in the free trade negotiations.
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In December 1985, the government gave to the United States, as part of the negotiation of the free trade deal, an export tax that was not indexed to the value of the Canadian dollar. Therefore, that industry's exports to the United States have been reduced from 34 per cent of the American market to 26 per cent. Many plants in northern Ontario have shut down. Many are on short shift. Many having given up selling softwood lumber to the United States. The government has implemented other programs for transportation which have been very harmful to the industry. The industry is under at least a 30 to 35 per cent disadvantage from what it was before the export tax went into place.
We recommended to the minister that the export tax be renegotiated immediately so that that industry could continue to prosper, or if the government in the United States refuses to negotiate that they unilaterally rescind the tax and let the chips fall where they may. The industry is being wiped out in any event. If the Americans were to countervail, it probably would not be any worse than the existing situation which makes it almost impossible for northern Ontario mills to operate.
I was delighted and pleased because the Member for Cochrane-Superior drew to my attention a press clipping from the Ottawa Citizen of July 27 in which the Minister of Forestry said that the government was reviewing the 15 per cent export tax because it had just been pointed out to him that there were over 100 layoffs in Renfrew County alone as a result of this. Speaking about the Americans, the minister said that we will present them with a proposition to test the ground before we send them a termination notice. I am delighted that at least the minister has admitted that there is a big, serious problem with the export tax. It has caused layoffs in northern Ontario, and people have been laid off. It is causing serious problems right across the country. What we want to see is the minister either complete that negotiation or give the termination notice.
This is where we get back to the whole question of clout. The minister says this, and the minister is an honourable man. Even though he is not in the House this afternoon, he is still an honourable man and I am sure he means it. I suspect that if the minister goes to his friend, the Prime Minister, or to the Minister of International Trade and tells them that he is going to unilaterally terminate the export tax agreement, they will politely tell him to buzz off. I do not think the minister has the

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clout to make that kind of decision. I hope he has, because I think that is the right move. Otherwise we are just knuckling under to the United States and our industry is being wiped out.
You can imagine what a reduction of 8 per cent of the United States market does, because that is a very vast market in the United States. It seems to me that we are big losers. I hope that the minister has the kind of clout that he needs to have a successful Department of Forestry and that he will move to remove that export tax because it is crippling northern Ontario.
The second area where I see that the whole question of strength and prestige of the minister is important is in the forestry agreements. For the past five years, we have had a forestry agreement in the province of Ontario, $150 million, shared by the two levels of government, designed to carry out the necessary reforestation and the necessary research to provide for sustainable development in the production and reforestation of our province.
Regardless of how gloriously the minister talks about these agreements, he has not been able to get the money to reinstate them. That is literally a tragedy. It is not just a tragedy for five years, or ten, or fifteen years. It is a tragedy into the future because it is important that those forestry agreements be maintained.
If we look at the arrangements, we cannot be confident that we are going to have a department and a minister with the necessary clout. For those forestry agreements, the funding comes down through the Department of Regional Industrial Expansion from the ACOA agreement and the Western Diversification Agreement and it just does not seem that the minister is in control. If he were, then those forestry agreements and the funding would be coming directly from his department and not through the Department of Regional Industrial Expansion.
In Ontario we have the FEDNOR agreement and the funding there comes from the Department of Regional Industrial Expansion. We are told that the assistant deputy minister for that department is not even located in Ontario. He is located in Montreal in the province of Quebec.
Yet we have, in Sault Ste. Marie, the Great Lakes Forest Research Laboratory, one of the largest institutions in the country for research and the implementation of the Forestry Agreement is carried out from that laboratory. Surely we want the co-ordination for those agreements to be coming from the Minister of Forestry and not coming down through the Department of Regional Industrial Expansion.
If we look at the minister's funding, last year when the government brought in its spending estimates in the budget, it was indicated that the government would be spending in the 1988-89 fiscal year $9.9 billion, the largest budget in the history of Canada as far as the federal budget of $142.9 billion is concerned. There was an increase there of $9.9 billion dollars across the country. Yet, if we look at the Department of Forestry we see a decrease of $28 million.
That does not give anyone confidence that the creation of a Department of Forestry is going to be very powerful. If you remove the funding, regardless of all the names and all the rhetoric from the minister, but do not actually provide additional funding, or do not even give the minister the power to establish the forestry agreements, which, after all, are the agreements which really touch the forests and result in trees being planted, and new hybrid breeds being developed that touch on the whole forest industry and if they are all controlled by the minister of Regional Industrial Expansion, the minister responsible for ACOA, or the minister responsible for Western Diversification, it does not sound as if the minister has much ability to co-ordinate the activities of the department.
We are not only talking about a reduction in the forestry agreements. We are not only talking about a reduction in the budget of the Department of Forestry. We are talking about a reduction in the number of person years, a reduction of 47 person years. It does not sound like a department that is going anywhere if it is being reduced in the number of person years. Regardless of how fancy are the names we give it as a new Department of Forestry, which we are all pleased to see, we want to see the cash. You cannot really be effective unless you have the funds to carry out the responsibility.
September 26, 1989

Forestry has gone down by some 11.9 per cent in its budget. At the same time, other resource related departments, for example, Energy, Mines and Resources, has gone up by 22.9, almost double. It has gone up by twice as much as the Department of Forestry has gone down.
We are pleased to see a Department of Forestry created. We would certainly like to see a strong department with a minister with clout, to not only do the things that need to be done for this industry, but to co-ordinate what is going on already. Otherwise, we will be going over to the Minister of Regional Industrial Expansion to find out what he is planning to do with the department and with these forestry agreements.
What we are concerned about is the government's attitude with regard to ERDA agreements-economic and regional development agreements-and that we are gradually going to be seeing a winnowing down. We will have a minister of departmental status and all this, but he will essentially be a little secretariat effectively running six labs across the country. That is not what we want. We want a minister who controls forestry agreements, controls the labs, has influence in cabinet, has influence on decisions with regard to finance, with regard to matters relating to export trade and with regard to manpower and research. There is simply no evidence that this is what we are going to get with the creation of this department.
First of all, it has taken five years to create it and it is not created yet. All the decisions with regard to export tax, forestry agreements, budget, and manpower, militate against this. We support the bill. We hope that it will be beneficial, but we want to see action. We want to see the government put its money where its mouth is. This is a key industry for us. It provides opportunities for our country in many different ways and it should be supported more than it has been by this government for the last four years.
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BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Before I recognize members for questions and comments, I believe the Hon. President of the Privy Council has a point of order.
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Mr. Lewis:: Mr. Speaker, I rise to designate formally as opposition days, or allotted days, Thursday, September 28, and Monday, October 2. It is my understanding that there is a motion which will probably run the two days and it has been designated in that manner for the convenience of the opposition.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Is it agreed?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Agreed and so ordered.


Philip Derek Lewis: I appreciate the technicality, Mr. Speaker. So that there is no misunderstanding, that is a government prerogative, I believe, to designate it, and while I am sure my hon. colleagues would agree with me, I do not want to find they disagree the next time.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: Before we leave that point, Mr. Speaker, the minister also alluded to the debate of one motion that could take two days. That is a prerogative of the opposition to decide, and we will probably give notice to the House, as is required by the rules, tomorrow by five o'clock as to what the motion will be and whether it will take two days to debate. There is a lot of interest in it, Mr. Speaker.




[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Mulroney that Bill C-29, an act to establish the Department of Forestry, to amend the Forestry Development and Research Act and to make related amendments to other acts, be read the second time and referred to a legislative committee.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: On questions and comments, the Hon. Member for Cariboo-Chilcotin.


Dave Worthy: Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Algoma had some serious things to say and I think he delivered them in a serious manner. I have to take exception to some of his comments, but I would like to mention a couple of comments right off the bat. He talked about the government attitude. I was in the forest industry for many years and I can tell you that the government attitude over the last four years has been a one thousand per cent improvement over what it was formerly. There have been many things done in co-operation with industry and with the provinces.

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Some of his colleagues this morning, when talking about the forestry bill, said that the first thing they want to do is bring inspectors into the provinces as policemen to enforce what they think should be done with industry and the provinces. It is exactly that kind of action which created such a problem in prior years with the provinces and with the industry.
A typical answer-and I am distressed by it-is that they seem to want to dictate from Ottawa what the solutions are and then they want to take all the money they can and throw it up against the wall and see if it will stick. Their concrete suggestions so far are to throw more money at the bill. Have they not been listening to the people in Canada and what they have been saying? They are saying: "Please, government, don't spend more money unnecessarily."
There is nothing wrong with trying to achieve excellence, even in government. A small, trim, efficient forestry department can do far more than an inefficient, large government bureaucracy. They should be taking their energies, their expertise, and leading this nation in the forest industry. They can do that. The dollars should primarily come from industry and from the provinces where most of the benefit goes. What it requires is a co-operative government and leadership.
The point that I have to-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: This is questions and comments.


Dave Worthy: I have a question about free trade. He said in December 1985,that this government, as part of its free trade negotiations, gave away the memorandum of understanding. That is absolutely and totally incorrect.
I was one of the forestry executives who heard about the collaboration between industry, provincial governments, and the federal government. The industry spent millions of dollars lobbying Ottawa. It recognized the threat to the forest industry with the countervail. In fact, when it was finally resolved, the Conservative government went to the industry and said: "What shall we do? These are the options." It was industry that said: "We
have to accept." It was our unions that said: "Yes, we have to accept." And it was our provincial governments that said: "Yes, we have to accept that. The deal that we can get there is better than the other options."
I would like to know why, in spite of the facts, you misrepresent so terribly the actual situations of the free trade deal and the memorandum of understanding.


Maurice Brydon Foster: I would be delighted to respond to the hon. member for Cariboo-Chilcotin. I had a telex from the vice-president of the Canadian Forest Industries Council in December, 1986-1 am sorry I said 1985, it was actually in 1986-in which they totally denounce the cave-in of the Government of Canada on the export tax. The industry is variously represented to have spent between $4 million and $10 million fighting the United States countervail threat, as they did in 1982. They are absolutely opposed-and I do not know who he talked to, unless it was some of his Tory friends-to the cave-in which the government did on that agreement. Clearly the industry was opposed to the government knuckling under. If the United States had imposed the countervail duty, it had every opportunity at the International Trade Court or under the GATT to oppose it and would have done so successfully.
Now we are left with an industry which is in terrible straits, at least in northern Ontario. It is my understanding that the level of the stumpage charge is extremely heavy for that industry to carry in B.C. In my opinion, the government knuckled under because the Prime Minister was so hell-bent on getting a free trade deal that he would agree to anything with the Americans.
The member talks about funding, throwing money at a problem. What all of the provinces are asking and all the industry is asking the federal government to do is to continue the federal-provincial forestry agreements that they have had for the past five years. The federal government is unilaterally wiping them out so that the kind of reforestation that needs to take place, the kind of research that needs to take place, is simply not going to occur. I think that that is a tragedy. It is a tragedy for areas like mine in northern Ontario. It is a tragedy, I am sure, for many areas in B.C. and I do not see that as interference.
September 26, 1989

I have met with federal and provincial people. The management teams that have been put together on those forestry agreements imply no unreasonable interference. It is a co-operative operation in any event. The federal government generally has the laboratory and research capacity more in its bailiwick, or at least in Ontario it has a great deal. They have combined in places like Sault Ste. Marie at the Great Lakes Forest Research Laboratory. They have the MNR labs there now.
It is a case of the federal government abandoning those forestry agreements, cutting the provinces adrift, and short-changing the whole industry now, but more important, short-changing the industry for that research in the future because research is a long horizon. We have to do it now if we want the results at the end of the term, whether it is five years or 10 years.
I completely reject the member's comments in that regard from my experience. We want to see this bill passed, but we want to see the wherewithal dedicated whether it is from External Affairs, going to the proper minister, the Minister of Forestry.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Questions and comments are now terminated. On debate, the hon. member for Okanagan-Shuswap.


Mr. MacWilliam:: I have a question for the Hon. Member for Algoma. He chastises the government for not previously establishing a forestry industry, something which I am in agreement with, but also indicates his strong support and the support of his colleagues for beefing up a separate Department of Forestry, putting some teeth into it, giving it some clout. I want to remind the hon. member that on August 1, 1984, in Prince George, his leader, the Hon. Member for Vancouver Quadra, in fact, outrightly rejected the concept of a separate forest ministry. In large bold print in the Prince George Citizen it stated: "Turner rejects forestry ministry". I would like to ask the member, in view of the past position of his Party and his leader-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I would like to bring to the attention of the hon. member that he is now on debate. There are no more questions or comments. I will allow this short question. The hon. member's time has expired as far as questions and comments are concerned and I was giving the floor on debate to the
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hon. member. I will allow a very fast question to the hon. member, but that will be off your time.


Lyle Dean MacWilliam: Just a quick question, Mr. Speaker. It was my understanding I was on a question rather than on debate.
I would like to ask the hon. member, in light of this information, why he and his colleagues decided to do this flip-flop on the issue. I am sure they do not want to be charged as being guilty of political opportunism.


Maurice Brydon Foster: As I said, I think it is important just what commitment the government has. The government has no commitment to the industry, as it has shown with the export tax of 15 per cent, which is decimating the industry. It is withdrawing the funding for the modernization and upgrading of industry, and that is what industry in my part of the country is saying is happening. If it is cutting the budget, obviously that is not a very good arrangement.
What we want to see is a Department of Forestry that has a minister who has the power and the political influence in the cabinet to put in place the renewal of those agreements, who has the power to prevent the sell-out of the softwood industry, has the influence in the Department of Regional Industrial Expansion to have programs to modernize and upgrade the industry.
We see, as I mentioned when I spoke, that back in the 1970s and 1980s the government had massive programs to modernize and upgrade the pulp and paper industry to put it in a competitive position, to meet the environmental concerns, to be innovative, and so on. That is the key thing. If we are setting up this department, and we agree with it, then it is important that the department and the minister involved have these powers and this kind of influence in the Government. If they do not, then of course it is irrelevant.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The hon. member for Okanagan-Shuswap on debate.


Lyle Dean MacWilliam: Mr. Speaker, I am going to rise to support the general principle of the bill although I believe, as do my colleagues, that there needs to be a number of amendments made. It does have a few inconsistencies, a few weaknesses, a few warts.

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We will be making a number of these amendments and this will be outlined at a later stage of debate by my colleague, the member for Prince George.
I would like to say that over the years the responsibility for forests has been shuffled in and out of, I think, nine different departments to where it currently resides in the Department of Agriculture. That seems to be a rather strange place to tuck a responsibility that has as its mandate the largest industry right across this country. I think as a result of this there has been a lack of continuity in direction.
Back in 1984 the Prime Minister had proposed some strong support for forestry but it took an awful long time for this government to finally come to its senses to realize the critical situation that our major industry in Canada was facing. To understand and address some of those priorities we needed to develop a separate ministry. I think it is something that is long overdue. We support the spirit of the legislation and we believe that we do need a strengthened department of forestry that can address some of the serious concerns affecting this industry.
I believe that we need strong leadership in a number of areas, such as regional forest resource development, national forestry research in pollution control, in wildlife conservation and in parks and recreation. I do believe that by strengthening and developing a separate ministry for forests, a separate department of forests that we can go a. long way toward realizing those goals.
However, what does concern me somewhat is in order to do that you also need to strengthen the level of funding for the department. What concerns me is that we have seen a department created without the financial clout necessary to do the job.
As a matter of fact, in 1989-90 we will be seeing funds available for regional forestry programs actually reduced by the sum of about $24 million. It appears those will now be funnelled not directly into the Forestry Resource Development Agreements, the FRDAs, but through the Western Diversification Programs making, I believe by extension of the argument, even less money available for those extremely important reforestation programs, not only in western Canada, but throughout this country.
I would like to turn to the FRDA agreements for a moment and talk about some of their impacts generally, specifically referring to British Columbia and my area of B.C. which is in the Okanagan-Shuswap.
Historically, the FRDA agreements were negotiated with the provinces because of the recognition that our forests across Canada needed on-going management in order to sustain and to increase our forest resources. Those agreements were started about five years ago and a number of them were signed with provinces across Canada. Six of them have now expired, and many of those have not been renewed.
In British Columbia we still do have an active FRDA program but it does expire in March of 1990. The B.C. government and the forestry industry is looking for a significant increase in funding to these programs which is currently at a level of about $300 million.
If you go back to the Pearse report of a few years back, Dr. Peter Pearse, Resource Economist from the University of British Columbia, in fact stressed that the need for funding for forest renewal was much, much greater than that. There is significant reason for us not to be cutting back on the funding for reforestation programs but to be extending it. Now we see that funding source being depleted. A $24-million cut for the western provinces and funnelled through western diversification. Now it seems that the minister of forestry is going to have to go cap in hand to the minister responsible for regional economic development to try to obtain funding for those very important agreements. We do not believe that to be correct. We believe that those agreements need the full level of funding that has presently been committed in order to sustain the amount of work that has already gone on in restocking those NSR lands, those not sufficiently restocked forest lands. To cut back on those agreements at this point is going to endanger the work that has in fact already been done.
With a strengthened department of forests which this legislation suggests, we have a lot of opportunity to strengthen those kinds of reforestation programs. What concerns us is that although we have created this department, the commitment to the FRDA programs for reforestation does not seem to be there.
Let us consider what is at stake if these programs are cut back or if they are cancelled. British Columbia provides over half of Canada's softwood lumber. We have about $13 billion per year in shipments of forest products from the province. That amounts to about
247,000	direct and indirect jobs, supporting 126 communities. Those are 1988 figures. That amounts to about $530 million of tax revenue to Ottawa. We in British Columbia are already experiencing, and have for some time, a fall down in our annual allowable cut because we are simply running out of mature timber to harvest.

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We have seen the closure of mills in my constituency and in a number of other areas throughout the province. Fletcher Challenge in Lumby and in a number of other areas in the province has closed its operations. Why? The reason it says is: "Gosh guys, we just do not have enough good timber available to us. We are running out of timber."
The reforestation programs through the FRDA agreements have the mandate to replenish those timber supplies so that we can lessen the fall down in the future. If we cut back on those FRDA agreements at this point, that program is jeopardized, future jobs are jeopardized in British Columbia and, in fact, right across Canada.
In addition, when we experience a significant fall down in our annual allowable cut, whether it be in the Okanagan or anywhere in the province, the Government of Canada experiences a significant decline in its taxation revenues. We should consider that in terms of setting economic priorities.
The importance of FRDAs to British Columbia, of course, is essentially for the protection and preservation of our forest resources not now, but for future generations, so that in 10, 20, 50 or 80 years' time we still have trees to cut, we still have jobs for people to go to. That will be supported by tree planting now, by weeding and thinning programs, by forestry research and by using integrated methods of resource management that are available through those forest resource development agreements.
I would like to turn to the concept of forest management. This is something I think that this strengthened department of forestry could well look at in terms of strengthening its mandate and some of its priorities, at least in British Columbia. There is the control and growth of alder and aspen trees in regenerating areas that have been disturbed by harvesting, and the planting of trees that are valuable as commercial species, such as Douglas fir and western hemlock. These are elements of the reforestation program that are so vital through the FRDA agreements.
If those agreements are cut back or perhaps, God forbid, cancelled, the work that has gone on over the past five years will be wasted.
I took the opportunity to see a number of FRDA programs in my area in the Okanagan. We toured with a number of forestry and local political officials and saw the kind of work that has been done in our area respecting the provincial-federal FRDA agreement. I must say that I think all of us were duly impressed with the kind of regeneration taking place in those NSR lands.
That program for regeneration has to be nurtured over the next 15 to 20 years to ensure that those seedlings are able to grow into a mature forest. If we were to cancel those programs now the overgrowth of alder and deciduous plants would simply wipe out many of the seedlings that are now healthy and viable plants growing into our future forest products.
It is very critical that we continue to nurture these FRDA programs through the injection of federal funds and through the injection of provincial funds to ensure that the groundwork that we have laid over the past five years does not simply vanish. What a false economy that would be: $300 million dollars of federal investment would be simply wasted if those programs are jeopardized.
In British Columbia, before the FRDA agreement with B.C. was signed around 1985, there were approximately 738,000 hectares of land that qualified as NSR land. This land was lying fallow. It was not sufficiently restocked and had been logged over.
I fly over much of the province many times during the course of the year. I am continually amazed as I fly back and forth over our province of British Columbia, a province that is responsible for half the annual harvest in this country, at the amount of land that lies clear cut, eroding and bare, the top soil being washed away.
I am not sure how accurate it is- I would assume that it would be well within range-but somebody estimated that the NSR lands currently in our province amount to a 200 mile strip that is 50 miles wide. That is a strip 50 miles wide extending from Vancouver all the way past the city of Penticton in the Okanagan. That is the significant damage done to our resource in the past years

September 26, 1989
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without a proper restocking program. I submit that these FRDA programs are chipping away at that. We have in the past five years reduced that backlog by some 185,000 hectares. We are making gains and slowly recovering those NSR lands, putting them into production for future harvesting programs. But it is going to take time. It is going to take a long-term financial commitment from this government, one that I am afraid this government no longer sees as being a major priority.
I submit, once again, that we are developing a strengthened department of forestry with this legislation. Along with that we should be making the kinds of financial commitments we must make to ensure the future of our forests in B.C. and in Canada to ensure the future of our industry and to ensure the future of jobs for Canadians.
In terms of British Columbians, the FRDA programs have allowed 500 permanent jobs and 15,000 short-term jobs to be created. Our sustainable harvest, since the development of those programs, has increased by some
600,000	cubic meters each year.
We have had an increase in our Gross Domestic Product of about $56 million a year, and also an increased habitat for wildlife. They are valuable programs. We need the continued funding. Let us not give up on them now.
I want to talk for a moment specifically about the FRDA as it applies to the Okanagan-Shuswap. It is part of the interior British Columbia that my constituency is located in, and the Okanagan-Shuswap is part of the Kamloops forest district. We have a regional total of about 6.7 million hectares, an area that is larger than Nova Scotia.
The Shuswap-Okanagan Forestry Association has been calling for some time now for a commitment, both federally and provincially, to replenish the fall down in the timber supplies through tackling the NSR lands and developing the appropriate reforestation and silviculture programs that we now see through the current FRDA agreements.
During that FRDA tour that I was talking about in regard to my area, there were a number of sites that we looked at. We went to about five through the Lumby, Enderby and Vernon areas. Those five sites indicate the
kinds of problems that the Shuswap-Okanagan Forestry Association had been and still is talking about, including the need to replenish our forest stocks. We saw the impact of the FRDA agreements in terms of the kind of work that is being done. We saw the results of the research, the silviculture programs, the weeding and thinning programs.
Those programs are successfully reducing that backlog of NSR lands in our area. People are proud of that. People want to see it continued. The Shuswap-Okanagan Forestry Association wants to see it continued. The forestry companies throughout the Okanagan want to see it continued. They want to practise responsible forest management. We need that financial commitment and we need to maintain it over the next decade, over the next 20 or 30 years to ensure that those goals are met.
I think a strengthened department of forestry can be mandated to look at environmental initiatives that are required in forest management: wildlife conservation, the development of parks and recreation areas. I think that a strengthened department of forestry is going to need to provide real leadership in this area and in areas of habitat conservation, and particularly in areas of resource management conflicts.
Out in British Columbia we have had ongoing problems for some time, largely because of the actions of our provincial government over the past 20-odd years, and partially as a result of the failure of both the federal and provincial governments at resolving some of our native land settlement claims. Areas like the Carmanah, the Stein, and the Stikine,. We all know that South Moresby, the Spatsizi Plateau, and the Kutzimateen are all areas, that, if not actively under contention in terms of resource-used conflict, will be in the future.
It is important that a strengthened ministry of forestry be mandated to work co-operatively with the provincial governments at trying to overcome some of these problem areas. I think it is clearly evident, given the importance of the forestry industry to the Canadian economy, that the prime mandate of a federal department of forestry should be to provide leadership in the areas that are impacted by our forest resource so that we can maintain this resource, so that we can protect it and replenish it for future generations.
September 26, 1989

I support this bill. I must admit that it has weaknesses and my colleague from Prince George-Bulkley Valley will be making a number of very wise and judicious amendments at a later time that will, hopefully, strengthen many of those weaknesses. The bill does not satisfy all the concerns.
It needs substantial amendment but it is a start, and based upon our long-term commitment as New Democrats for the development of a strong forestry ministry at the federal level, we are going to be supporting this bill.


Peter L. McCreath: Mr. Speaker, I would like to compliment the hon. member for Okanagan-Shuswap for his support of this bill and I would assume that he would join with me in commending and complimenting the Minister of State for Forestry for the leadership and initiative that he has shown in bringing this bill before the House.
I do want to raise a question and perhaps I misunderstood but I do have a great deal of interest in forestry because included within my own South Shore constituency is Queen's County, Nova Scotia, which, as you may know, is known as the forestry capital of Canada.
I want to raise the question of FRDAs. We are very pleased in Atlantic Canada with the success that we have recently achieved with the signing of two very significant Forest Resource Development Agreements, one a $45 million agreement announced last Friday by the minister responsible for the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, and a $91 million agreement announced for the province of New Brunswick.
It has been our experience in Atlantic Canada that these FRDAs have worked extremely well. One of the reasons they have worked well is that the provinces themselves identify the priorities within resource development areas. It is clear that in Atlantic Canada forestry is recognized as a major area for economic development and it is a major priority with our provincial governments but it is also a priority that has, and I think quite properly, been recognized by this government.
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There was some discussion about the length of time taken to reach the agreements, but I think it is important to note that right at the beginning of the process the minister made it clear that there would be new forest resource development agreements. Again, I commend him. That was very helpful to us, unlike, I might say, in 1982 under the previous government when the last agreements expired and there was no indication as to whether there would be new agreements. As a result, people were laid off and we lost some very valuable people in our industry. That has not happened this time because the minister made it clear right from the beginning that there would be agreements. I think the process works extremely well and I would like to compliment the government on it.
Perhaps I misunderstood my friend opposite but I assume that he also supports this very valuable initiative in the way the federal and provincial governments work together. I assume again that he is joining with me in commending the minister of forestry for his initiative in bringing forward this excellent bill.


Lyle Dean MacWilliam: Mr. Speaker, I think my hon. colleague had mentioned that Nova Scotia had received about $91 million in terms of the renewed FRDA and I am pleased for Nova Scotia that it did receive that commitment. I want to point out that Nova Scotia is, in fact, smaller in terms of land mass than the Kamloops forest district.
If you break the regional or provincial FRDA for B.C. down, which is $300 million, the appropriated amount for the Kamloops area, the interior, was only $30 million. If we are looking at $30 million for an area that is in fact larger than what the member opposite is indicating for Nova Scotia, which has $91 million. I would submit that in the interest of regional equity the member would support my suggestion that the FRDA for British Columbia be at least tripled.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Michel Champagne: Mr. Speaker, I listened attentively to my New Democratic colleague and I am still surprised to hear him say that the Minister has no power regarding the ERDA agreements. I must remind him that clause 9 provides that "The Minister may, with the approval of the Governor in Council, enter into an agreement or arrangement with any person, body or government respecting any matter related to the powers, duties and functions of the Minister." I think that is extremely clear and shows how much responsibility the Forestry Minister will have for such agreements.

September 26, 1989
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Furthermore, my colleague from the Maritimes raised a very important point when he mentioned that agreements had been renewed, one with Nova Scotia and another with New Brunswick. What we have to look at, I think-and my colleague should give the Minister responsible, the Forestry Minister, credit-what we have to look at is what was there before and what is there now. Take New Brunswick for example. New Brunswick had a five-year, $77-million agreement which was extended for $91 million. So when my colleague from the New Democratic Party wonders and is concerned about the Government's real intention to continue the federal-provincial agreements, I think we have an excellent argument to show how conscientiously the Forestry Minister seeks to renew these agreements and to continue to work with the provinces to further develop the forestry sector. The Forestry Minister has already said several times that talks with his provincial counterparts were going on. You know that the agreements with British Columbia expire in March 1990.
So some things can be explained, there are agreements, negotiations are going on now, and I am convinced that the Forestry Minister... And I am convinced, if my colleague from the New Democratic Party lets me finish, that the Minister will negotiate as best he can in the interest of British Columbia, in the interest of his province and in the national interest. Since our colleague raises those questions, I would like him to answer the question for us because the Canada-British Columbia development agreement has yielded excellent results. He mentioned them himself, for which I thank him, and I just ask my colleague for the good of forestry in Canada to support the Bill, to support the Minister's negotiations and to let British Columbia, like any other Canadian province, benefit from these agreements and share the benefits with its people.


Lyle Dean MacWilliam: Just to clarify, Mr. Speaker, the constituency is Okanagan-Shuswap. I thank the member opposite for his remarks, but I suggest to the member that you can conclude all the agreements you want to, but if the funding is not there, the agreements are not worth very much.
With the funding being allocated through western diversification, I submit that the minister is going to have to go cap in hand to the minister responsible for the appropriation of funding through western diversification to ask if the money is available. That money which supposedly is earmarked for forestry will also be in competition with moneys for the tourism industry subsidiary developments so we are competing for the same dollars.
In addition to that, there is $24 million less going into western diversification, it is my understanding, for this fiscal year than there was before. I submit to you that if the pie is getting smaller and it is divided into more pieces nobody will get more or a larger piece of the pie. I do not know what that means in terms of the forestry resource agreements out west. That is what we are concerned about. We are very concerned that it means less money to go around in terms of those reforestation initiatives, and that spells trouble for the industry in British Columbia.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Comments are now terminated. I had said Kamloops-Shuswap and the former House Leader of the New Democratic Party, I know, appreciated that name very much. I regret that the hon. member's riding does not have the name Kamloops-Shuswap. It is Okanagan-Shuswap.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: It being 5 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of Private Members' Business as listed on today's Order Paper.



PRIVATE MEMBERS' BUSINESS


Dawn Black: moved:
That, in the opinion of this House, the government should refuse funding to groups that are actively working against women's equality as guaranteed in The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and in international agreements signed by Canada, such as the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women.

She said: Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak to a motion that I am introducing before my colleagues in the House, and I will read it again even though you have read it:
That, in the opinion of this House, the government should refuse funding to groups that are actively working against women's equality as guaranteed in The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and in international agreements signed by Canada, such as the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women.
I am distressed that I have cause to bring this motion forward. It really seems unbelievable that it is up to a private member of this House to have to inform the government that women's equality must be worked for and not undermined. In this day and age, one would expect that the Government of Canada would not be actively using its financial resources against equality for women.
I am referring to a particular incident in which this government used funds that are reserved for equalityseeking women's groups. The government granted $21,212 to REAL Women for a conference it held last April. This group has over the years opposed many rights the women of Canada have been fighting hard for. My motion is directed against any further funding to groups that work against women's equality. I will explain why it is important to refuse funds to such groups, and I will use last April's incident as an example.
It is evident to me that the government tried to hide its funding decision from the public and from interested members of Parliament. I tried to get the co-operation of the office of the Secretary of State which granted this funding to answer basic questions about the process and the reasons the decisions were made.
The Secretary of State's office gave me the runaround. They gave us phone numbers of people to call, people who told us nothing but who simply referred us back to the Secretary of State's office. This office refused to discuss the funding, saying only that the decision was consistent with women's program funding guidelines, but even the briefest look at women's program funding guidelines will tell anyone that this group did not conform to the guidelines. In fact, it is because this group does not conform to the guidelines that it was repeatedly refused women's program funding in the past.
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I had to do what I did next because my efforts in dealing with this Secretary of State's office as a member of Parliament were really completely fruitless. I applied as a private citizen under the Access to Information law to obtain the necessary documents that would allow me to see how this decision could possibly have been made. I paid the fee and I filled out the forms. Every effort was made to stall my request. The Secretary of State had a thirty day deadline to respond to my request. It asked for an extension.
I finally received the document only a few days before the conference in question was due to take place. The process I had to undergo to obtain basic information about that funding decision was really shameful. The public has a right to know that its money is being used inappropriately, that its money is being utilized to undermine the hard earned rights women have won over the past century.
The report I received of this government-funded conference told me that in one workshop, the credibility of every female Supreme Court justice was questioned simply because they were women. Madam Justice Bertha Wilson, an experienced and respected judge, was touted as an example of the affirmative action gone awry.
People who think women are incompetent are certainly entitled to their opinion, I suppose, but to have the Government of Canada paying for such a forum in the name of equality is outrageous. It is absolutely outrageous.
Another workshop funded by the Canadian government in the name of equality for women was one in which a male psychiatrist claimed that children in child care would grow up to be partial psychopaths. It is really difficult to see how this statement, which has absolutely no credibility, has anything to do with the equality of women.
Also, in the child care workshop, the audience was told by the workshop leader that women must be nurturers because of their potential to breastfeed. The Conservative government, in defending this funding on the basis that it did meet equality criteria, obviously does not have the first clue as to what equality really means. I will endeavour to explain it.

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A part of equality is that men and women have the freedom to do what they, as individuals, are best at and what they wish to do. Many women in a free and equal society will choose to nurture small children; some women will choose not to do this. Many men are capable of nurturing and helping children grow into well balanced, responsible adults.
Women should not be forced into nurturing, nor should men be forced away from it. That is not equality nor is it reasonable or realistic. Why does the government defend rigid sex role stereotyping as a different perspective on equality? It has nothing at all to do with equality.
Another workshop leader in a workshop on pornography said that universal day care would lead to a greater pornography problem because of working mothers. First, I would like to clarify for the government and for anti-equality groups that every mother is a working mother. Raising children is work. Second, I would like to explain to the government that pinning the ills of society on women who work outside the home is an abdication of our collective responsibility to deal with social problems in our country.
In the 1800s, movements arose to deal with society's problems. These were slavery, child labour, extreme poverty and exploitation, high illiteracy, high infant mortality and alcoholism among others.
Some of our social problems have changed. However, the fact remains that we must continue to organize ourselves into progressive movements for change such as the women's movement. We cannot sit back and blame one particular group in our society such as women in the paid labour force for all that is wrong in our world today. Not only is that terribly unfair but it is really not at all useful.
I ask myself why this government is defending its funding of workshops which claim that everything bad is the fault of women in the paid labour force, saying that this is equality. Blaming women is not equality. It is anti-equality.
There was a workshop on the United Nations Charter of Equality for Women to which Canada is a signatory. The essence of the workshop was that the charter was not in favour of "true equality" because it encouraged women to participate in the paid work force.
Another theme of the conference was hatred, lies and intolerance of homosexuality. Again, is this somehow connected with women's equality? The government was unable to explain how out and out lies about lesbians and about gay men are related to furthering equality for women. Yet this government paid for it to be said and paid for it to be promoted.
The conference was openly anti-feminist. One workshop leader told her audience that she hoped REAL Women will be able to counter the effects of the feminist movement. Again, the government stood by its decision to fund this conference dedicated to countering the effects of the women's movement.
The effects of the feminist movement, for the record, include women's right to vote, a married woman's right to own property, the right not to be sexually harassed in the workplace, the right not to be sexually harassed by a stranger, by an acquaintance or by a husband, the right to be included in the Constitution as a free and equal being, equal wages for equal work, and the right to disseminate information about birth control. That right was illegal before 1969. These are the proud achievements of the women's movement over the past century in Canada.
Today the women's movement is fighting for homemakers' pensions, for equal pay for work of equal value, for an end to the economic barriers that all women face, for good quality child care and for women's rights to control their own bodies and their own lives. The women's movement has not only lobbied for these rights but continues to provide services for women, services which include information, counselling for abused women, self-defence courses and support for pregnant women and for new mothers. These are the groups from which the Secretary of State has withdrawn funding to give to an anti-equality group.
October 18 is the sixtieth anniversary of Persons' Day. This is the day that women officially became persons in Canada, thanks to the efforts of many women but especially of Nellie McClung, Emily Murphy, Henrietta Muir Edwards, Louise McKinney and Irene Parlby. Sixty years after women obtained legal status as persons in Canada, our government is funding groups that want to turn back the clock, groups which are afraid of the future.
September 26, 1989

It is understandable that people fear change. It is confusing to many people when they are no longer faced with rigid sex stereotypical roles. They are unsure of what to do or how it is that they should behave. Women at home are justifiably claiming their right to respect and recognition for the valuable work that they do. I worked at home long before I became a politician and I know what it is to raise three children on one income and to try to make ends meet. I cannot advocate a step backward in time, giving up rights that I and so many women before me have fought for and won.
I believe in a woman's right to choose, to choose whether she will raise children at home, whether she will enter the paid workforce, to choose what to do with her life and with her body. These are the ideas that the women's program is supposed to promote; positive, forward-looking strategies so that women and men may have more choices about their own lives.
This issue of choice is an important one in this debate. I have here a memo from the Secretary of State to the Vancouver Status of Women, one of the many valuable organizations whose funding has already been cut, concerning funding of a particular position on abortion. I will read it into the record.
Just a quick reminder that Secretary of State Department funding may not be used for any activity which takes a position on the issue of abortion.
This does not, of course, preclude your organization from forming, holding or sharing an opinion, belief or point of view, or taking action if it so wishes. Rather, this requires that these be done with funding other than that provided by Secretary of State Department.
To avoid any problems with current or planned activities, I again ask each organization to ensure that it understands and adheres to this policy. I would also ask each organization to ensure that if any activities are undertaken, your organization is certain it can clearly and unequivocably demonstrate that resources other than Secretary of State funding are used.
Vancouver Status of Women is a women's group which provides information and other services for women and is pro choice. REAL Women is a self-proclaimed prolife group. Vancouver Status of Women and all equalityseeking women's groups are prevented from using Secretary of State money to promote a point of view on abortion. Yet Secretary of State has funded an anti-abortion workshop at the REAL Women's conference.
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At the conference, a workshop was led on anti-choice interventions at the Supreme Court level. I want to know, did Secretary of State make REAL Women clearly and uneqivocably demonstrate that resources other than Secretary of State funding were used to print up the materials which were used in the workshop or any posters that mentioned the workshop?
Why is it that the Secretary of State is applying a stricter standard to equality-seeking groups than to anti-equality groups? Why is it that the Secretary of State is clamping down on pro-choice groups in favour of anti-choice groups? Is this to promote the government's view on the abortion question, that we should have an ineffective law to restrict abortion but do nothing to help mothers or do anything to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies? Is this part of a cohesive government strategy to silence pro-choice groups while promoting anti-choice groups?
I note that it is taking Revenue Canada a year to decide on the charitable tax status of the Eveiywoman's Health Clinic which provides a range of medical and counselling services including abortion. A group called Human Life International already has charitable tax status with Revenue Canada. This is the organization that sent horrific postcards to all members of Parliament. It showed decapitated foetus heads dripping with blood. The same group sent MPs a series of anti-choice articles as well as anti-child care article entitled "Daycareism and Socialism in Sweden".
Why is Secretary of State withdrawing a significant amount of funds for equality-seeking groups and at the same time granting new funds to anti-equality groups? What is this government's agenda for the women of Canada?
A curious thing about this whole incident of funding an anti-equality group is that it shows how very little power the minister responsible for the status of women seems to have in determining the government's policy on women. When I questioned her in committee, she did not wholeheartedly support this funding. Yet I have copies of letters written from the Secretary of State's office to outraged women's groups which wrote to the minister to complain of anti-equality funding. These letters say that the decision to fund REAL women was completely consistent with the women's program equality criteria.

September 26, 1989
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It is difficult to argue with the minister who clearly does not understand what equality means. More to the point, what is evident is that the minister responsible for the status of women, who has a better idea of what equality means, was either not informed of the funding or was not listened to when she explained that such a conference did not promote equality for women.
One argument I have heard in favour of funding anti-equality groups is that they present a different perspective and that all perspectives must be respected. However, the mandate of the Secretary of State's women's program is not to fund womens' organizations, it is to fund equality-seeking womens' organizations.
The Secretary of State's complete disregard of the women's program guidelines leaves the door open to all sorts of really bizarre funding decisions. If the government is going to override its own guidelines and fund anti-equality groups, what will it fund next through the women's program, apolitical women's organization such as bowling leagues, the ladies auxiliary at the Ku Klux Klan? Who else is going to receive money previously earmarked for groups promoting equality between women and men in our society?
This government should really be ashamed of itself. It can no longer even pretend to support the equality of women in our society. It is imperative that this House support the motion to refuse funding to groups that are actively working against women's equality.
The women's program was a victim of the last budget in April. It was cut by 15 per cent. I received letters from every region of Canada. These letters expressed shock at this attack on an already under-funded program and under-funded groups. These groups have served women and communities across Canada on shoe string budgets. These women's groups often provide a service that the government would have to pay a lot more for if their functions were to be taken over by the government.


Patrick Boyer: Mr. Speaker, this is the second day that Parliament is back in the fall session and we have before us a motion that shows clearly to the House and the country the line of reasoning and the kind of thinking for which members of the New Democratic Party are famous, for which reason all of us can be
thankful that they remain in opposition and have no prospect of forming the government. A fundamental principle of this country is the rule of law, not the rule according to the whim and subjective judgment of individuals.
What we are talking about here are criteria that are set out under which groups in this country can apply for funding. If they meet those criteria, they receive the funding. To say that beyond that there should be bureaucrats, politicians or others who can look in detail at what is said at a particular conference and, on the basis of that, should not allow the grants to go forward when those groups have met the qualifications is to say that the rules and the criteria are not applicable. This is, in effect, another face of the same question of universality which always has members of that party up on their hind legs barking. It is saying that when there are criteria established for grants then all who meet those criteria universally qualify.
Let me give an example of what the problem is with this subjective approach the New Democratic Party is now putting before us this afternoon. In 1985, I was chairing a committee of the House, the Parliamentary Committee on Equality Rights, made up of members of all three parties. We held hearings across the country and we held hearings in the city of Toronto at a downtown Toronto hotel. While we were in the process of holding our hearings, elsewhere in that same hotel NAC convened a press conference to condemn the process by which we were proceeding, to make criticisms of our committee and to generally take a great opportunity for grabbing some headlines through a petulant outburst that I thought was quite unwarranted.
The fact is that a few months later, a report was tabled entitled Equality for All. It contained 75 recommendations unanimously supported by all three parties, recommendations dealing with the equality of women, maternity benefits, armed forces, immigrant women, health issues relevant to women and so on. If I was taking the subjective standard of the member opposite, I would have said that NAC, using money provided by the federal government to launch that criticism of our committee and its workings, was at that time working against the interests of women's equality. That is exactly the reason that we do have rules that set those criteria and we do not indulge in the kind of subjective approach that is being taken here.
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Another example is the Ontario case of election financing being provided to all political parties which registered. The Communist party registered in Ontario and qualified under the Election Finance Reform Act of Ontario for public funding. A lot of people in Ontario did not like the fact that their tax dollars were going to fund the Communist party. However, the same point applies. Because it met the criteria, it qualified for the funding and it received it. It was not up to government officials or bureaucrats to get subjectively involved and say: "No, only these main-line political parties will qualify and we do not like the smell of the Communist party. We do not like what they stand for, and therefore, they are not going to get the funding". No, if you set up the rules, they apply to everybody. Either you fund all the groups or you do not fund any of them.

Mr. Speaker, I would also like to say a few words about our Government's record on women's equality.
Our Government has every reason to be proud of what it has done to improve the status of women.
For instance, we could look at our Employment Equity Act, the steps we have taken to fight family violence and sexual exploitation of children, our announcement that we intend to increase parental and maternity benefits, the measures we took to ensure that alimony and custody orders are carried out and our decision to improve training opportunities for women.
We have developed programs to encourage women entrepreneurs. We have taken steps to help women farmers and we have opened all trades and professions in the Armed Forces to women.
In co-operation with the provinces, we have looked at women's training needs and their health concerns, and we have also looked into better ways of harmonizing women's work and family responsibilities. Our Government has appointed a record number of women in key positions in federal departments and agencies, the judiciary and the diplomatic corps.
All these achievements are irrefutable proof of our commitment to improving the status of women in all sectors of Canadian society. Furthermore, Mr. Speaker, these achievements were the result of a joint effort. In all its initiatives to enhance the status of women, our Government sought the active of participation of the
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provinces and territories, business and labour, the volunteer sector and, more importantly, women themselves, whether in groups or as individuals.
Our Government is very conscious of the remarkable contribution of women's groups to the development of our country.
As pioneers, women cleared land, established families and communities and took an active part in developing the country's social, economic, political and legal structures. They found their place in factories, offices, hospitals and schools, doing their share to strengthen and expand the Canadian economy. Today, women in increasing numbers are playing this essential role in our society.
Today, as in the past, despite all their domestic and family responsibilities, their careers and community involvement, women still find the time and energy for individual or collective action aimed at improving our society.
By the end of the last century, women united around common causes and formed organizations to fight for such issues as women's suffrage, temperance, abolition of child labour, and better working conditions and social justice for all.
Today, hundreds of women's groups continue this tradition of social struggle and involvement in areas such as family violence, sexual exploitation of children, employment equity and equality rights.
Our Government supports and encourages the work being done by women's groups.
During our previous term, Mr. Speaker, women and women's groups took an active part in developing government policy. Although the Department of the Secretary of State's Women's Program is the main source of financing for women's groups, the federal Government also helps these groups in other ways.
For instance, Mr. Speaker, women's groups have set up a number of projects thanks to the Child Care Special Initiatives Fund, created in December 1987 to promote innovation in daycare. In response to government initiatives to deal with family violence announced last June, women's groups have submittted projects for helping women who are victims of family violence, especially Native women, handicapped women and women who are immigrants or belong to visible minorities.

September 26, 1989
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In Canada today, women and women's groups know that the concept of equality goes beyond the absence of discrimination.


Mary Catherine Clancy: Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of this motion, but before I return the debate to the motion from whence it has diverted for the last 10 minutes, I would like first of all, through you, Mr. Speaker, to apologize most humbly to the hon. member for Etobicoke-Lakeshore for the uppity nature of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women for having the temerity to exercise its right to free speech when his committee was holding hearings in the city of Toronto.
May I further say that it is an edifying experience for the women in this House to be lectured to by the hon. member on the subject of how well off we are today. I hesitate to speak, of course, for my female colleagues on the other side of the House, but I can say for those of us over here that we just love having this gentleman telling us how lucky we are. I hope he might come some time to my constituency again and I can introduce him to large groups of women who perhaps may disagree with him. However, let us get back to the motion at hand.
I particularly support this motion in its reference to the declaration on the elimination of all discrimination against women, and I would like to note one of the articles of this. I quote:
Discrimination against women, denying or limiting as it does their equality of rights with men, is fundamentally unjust and constitutes an offence against human dignity.
And this is what we are talking about here today. We are not talking about how well off we are because we are not well off, not even those of us who have had the nerve to invade the sacred chambers normally inhabited by men. We are not well off, and women in this country are not well off. Working and fighting in the battle for gender equality is sometimes very depressing. I may say never more so than during the time I had to listen in the last 10 minutes.
The cuts in funding to hard-pressed women's groups are a travesty. One of those groups, I might mention, is the Canadian Congress of Learning Opportunities for Women, one of the most prestigious and respected groups that is doing a superb job of work for the advancement and for the equality of women in this country.
It is interesting about CCLOW. Do you know that CCLOW has written three times asking to meet with the Secretary of State. Does it have an appointment? Not yet! Has it had an answer to any of its letters? Not yet! But that is okay, we are well off and we do not need CCLOW to meet with the Secretary of State. As yet, no answer to three requests to meet. Yet the Secretary of State gives funding to REAL. I refuse to refer to it as "real". If that is "real" then the rest of us are extremely imaginary.
It is time for someone to get real around here and I say it is this government. This is the 20th century. You may have to be dragged kicking and screaming into it, but it is here. As a matter of fact it is almost over, so you had better hurry up.
The concept of family in this country has changed. The nuclear family with father working and bringing home the bacon and mother living in a rose-covered cottage and caring for the children is not the norm any more. Good or bad, it is not the norm.
The economic exigencies of modem life demand that women work outside the home. They have always worked inside the home, contrary to the belief of some people I have spoken to lately, but now they must work outside the home. The number of women who have the luxury of the choice to stay at home is getting smaller and smaller. Most people realize this, but some do not.
Women do not work for a lark and they do not work for a hobby, they work to survive. They work to support themselves, they work to support their children, they work to support aging relatives and so on and so on. Mainly they do this work for 35 per cent less money than men, and mainly they work in job ghettos.
But I will tell you a secret. Maybe we had better have water! Where are the pages? Just be ready with water Some women actually work in this country because they like to. They want to work, they enjoy it! And indeed these women manage to do a good job in the workplace. They manage, through some superhuman ability, to run their houses, to bring up children who do not turn into
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young offenders, or drug addicts, or murderers, or even politicians. These women manage to keep all these balls in the air and they do it on less money and less time than anyone else has ever been asked to perform such herculean tasks with.
They do it without proper benefits, in the main. They certainly do it without adequate child care, and they do it in many, many cases without a real chance of promotion. They do it also with the reality of sexual harassment. It is not a pretty picture and, unfortunately, it is often a picture without much chance of advancement.
The declaration on the elimination of all kinds of discrimination against women refers to dignity. Let me tell you, it is an assault upon the dignity of Canadian women for the government to fund groups that do not believe in the principle of equality.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mary Catherine Clancy: It is an assault on this dignity when groups who oppose pay equity, oppose child care and oppose the full inclusion of women at all stratas of society, are given credibility through government support.
There is no doubt that individual Canadians have a perfect right to believe that women should stay at home. Indeed, women who freely choose to work at home deserve our respect and also our support, but no one has the right to say that women must stay at home. No one has the right to deny women in the workforce the action necessitated by 2,000 years of patriarchal sexism, which will bring them to true equality.
There is an old Chinese principle that says women hold up half the sky. Actually it was Mao The Tung who said it and I think he was being a little conservative, probably for the one time in his life. Millions of women in this country carry the burden of home and workplace, provider and nurturer.
It has been 22 years since Canada signed the declaration on an end to all forms of discrimination against women. It has been five and a half years since the Charter of Rights and Freedoms came into force in Canada and sadly, unhappily, we are not much further ahead, in spite of the litany that I heard from my friend opposite.
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Women have been patient but this patience is wearing very thin. Dignity means human, legal and civil rights. It means fair payment. It means fair opportunity. To a government that funds groups that deny these rights to women, I say, through you, Mr. Speaker, be warned by their works you shall know them. Cuts to groups that work for gender equity, combined with funding to groups who want to return us to the Dark Ages will be remembered.
I would like to close my comments a little early and quote a male poet if I may. If you think women won't remember that no action has been taken, I remind you of the words of John Donne "for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee".


Mrs. Monique B. Tardif (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Supply and Services):: Mr. Speaker, first of all, I may say I listened with great interest to what my colleague, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. Boyer), had to say. By recalling various projects that were also instrumental in promoting and improving the status of women in Canada, I feel he made a contribution towards achieving the objectives we have in mind, and I must say I appreciate that very much.
I listened earlier to what was being said by my colleague from the Liberal Party, and I find it hard to believe that today, in Canada, there are people who do not realize that the status of women in this country has made significant progress in the last ten years.
We need only look around us to realize that more and more, Canadian women are taking their rightful place, not the place of others but the place they deserve in various activity sectors.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to look at what is happening in education. Today, Laval University, which I happen to know best because it is practically next door . . .the statistics reveal that at Laval University in Quebec City, 52 per cent of the student population is female and I think this reflects what is happening across Canada. Mr. Speaker, this is indeed an improvement. My point is that if we want to achieve women's equality in employment and in all other areas, we first have to ensure that all women are entitled to a real education and to the same education as the population of Canada as a whole. Personally, I am proud of these figures, and I think that over the years we will see the results as our society evolves even more rapidly.

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Mr. Speaker, Agnes MacPhail, the first woman to be elected to Parliament nearly sixty years ago, would probably be very proud to see that her pioneering efforts have bom fruit and that women are getting closer and closer to the common goal they have set for themselves, namely, equality on all fronts.
Mr. Speaker, if we look at the election held yesterday in Quebec, 121 candidates were fielded by the various political parties. By the end of the day, 22 women had been elected to the National Assembly. In one riding, people knew even before the results were announced yesterday that they would have a woman representing them in the National Assembly. In the riding of Kamou-raska-Temiscouata, three women were represented the various political parties: the Liberal Party, the Parti Quebecois and the Green Party. I don't think anyone protested the fact that all three candidates were women, three women who I am sure are trying to promote the status of all women and who do so despite their philosophical differences which, of course, we must respect.
A large number of Canadian women have reached the higher echelons in management and take part in the decisions that concern them as women. They constitute a group of first-rate spokespersons for all Canadian women.
Conversely, I believe that the women's movement's fundamental objectives of social, legal and economic equality are now shared by the vast majority of Canadian men and women.
This does not mean we can sit back and feel that women's equality is now a fact. On the contrary, we must intensify our efforts to pursue and attain the freedom we are seeking, as members of a society that respects the rights of each and everyone.
True to the spirit of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the Canadian Government tries to ensure that all Canadians participate equally in all aspects of life in this country. It recognizes the importance of promoting full participation by women in our country's political, social and economic life, and it has shown a strong commitment in the form of various initiatives.
The Government's main priorities with respect to the status of women are largely defined in a document entitled: Dimensions of Equality: A Federal Work Plan For Women. Its objective is to promote women's equality and remove barriers that limit their potential. The Women's Program, created almost 16 years ago, has drawn much of its inspiration from this work plan.
Since 1973, the Women's Program, which comes under the Department of the Secretary of State, has supported the initiatives of a large number of organizations dedicated to improving the status of women.
The Royal Commission of Inquiry On The Status of Women was right to recommend creating this kind of program.
Today, as a major federal program, it offers consulting services, information and financial assistance to groups that work for women, whether they are at home or on the labour market.
One of the goals of the Women's Program is to make governments, large institutions and the general public familiar with women's views on the burning issues of the day. And I wish people would not discriminate against the concerns of women generally. This makes the program an invaluable tool for all Canadian women.
During its first term, the present Government also placed special emphasis on women with special needs. And if you do not believe that handicapped women have special needs, you would do well to go back and see your constituents!
For example, the Secretary of State Women's Program gave financial assistance to the Disabled Women's Network to enable it to conduct a major national survey of the concerns of handicapped women. I think that is important; they are indeed very special needs and those people must be looked after.
In short, in 1987-88, the program financed nearly 750 national and regional projects which all contributed in one way or another to advancing the status of women in Canada.
Mr. Speaker, we have accomplished much in very little time. Of course, we firmly intend to continue in this way.
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The record of our accomplishments on women's issues is most favorable, but I believe that women deserve most of the credit. We must also point out the sustained efforts of all concerned and hope that governments, institutions, unions and the private sector will continue to work together to make the necessary changes to our national life to promote justice and equal opportunity for all Canadians, men and women, individually and collectively.
Mr. Speaker, it is in this spirit that the Government undertakes to meet the formidable challenge of equality between men and women.


Ms. Langan:: Mr. Speaker, fortunately, or maybe unfortunately, the member has concluded now, but my point of order was to ask you to rule on relevancy because not once did she address the motion.


Ms. Lynn Hunter (Saanich-Gulf Islands):: Mr. Speaker, before I begin my speech in support of my colleague's motion I would like to point out that the members opposite have sent a rallying cry today for the feminist movement. As the feminist movement has always been fuelled by anger, you have given us more fuel for that struggle today in your comments.
I think the motion that my colleague has presented in the House also speaks to the kind of anger that the women of Canada have voiced against this government's actions in funding anti-equality groups. Not only on this side of the House but before the Health and Welfare Committee the Minister responsible for the Status of Women is quoted as saying that she was "damn mad" about that and that she was going to find out. We have not heard anything more, but I can assure you that feminist anger is not necessarily a politically partisan anger. It is an anger throughout this land for people who fund anti-equality.
When the Royal Commission on the Status of Women was brought forth 22 years ago it was for the promotion of equality and we will not be satisfied until that equality is attained, we will not be quiet, and we will not even be polite.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


Lynn Hunter: This is not a free speech issue. This is an issue on fighting for the kind of equality that we demand. We have a proud history in my party. The first woman member of Parliament, Agnes Macphail, was a member of my party. That long history of fighting for women's equality is something that we on this side, in this party, will be determined to continue, unlike some of the other people in this House.
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We will not be satisfied with funding for band-aid solutions, the kind of solutions that the parliamentary secretary was alluding to in his talk. We are talking about funding for the real root causes against discrimination against women.
How will these groups do it with a 15 per cent reduction? They will have to go out and fund raise again. I am sure that is the concerted intention of the government, because the more energy groups put into fundraising the less they do in effecting real change in their communities.
I had the honour this year of writing a letter of support for a woman in my community who has spent her life working for the equality of women. Ms. Kay Armstrong has now just been selected to be one of the recipients of the Person's Award. This kind of lifetime work is what we, in my party, support.
The parliamentary secretary made his speech-I am careful now in my choice of language, Mr. Speaker, because I want to remain parliamentary but to say that I was offended by it is to understate somewhat.
This motion goes to the very heart of what this government talks about when we speak about deficit reduction and about cutting to the bare bones. We have to discriminate on what kind of money we spend. We have to target the use of funds wisely in order to achieve government objectives. So this is why it is not consistent to fund anti-equality groups if the government is sincere in its intention to promote the equality of women. This is why my colleague has put this motion forward. If you are sincere in wanting to cut the deficit and make your use of government funds more effective and if you want to promote the equality of women, the two things do not jive. You cannot have both. It is a shame that this government does not seem to have the real basis of understanding.
Prior to being elected I was active in a women's group in my community and I was privileged to be selected to talk on the funding issue to the standing committee which travelled across Canada. That message came through over and over again. When you are talking about a 15 per cent reduction for women's groups that are struggling for equality you are talking about reducing funds for women's centres that are working on sexual assault, you are talking about rural women who have very, very little opportunity for getting these kinds of resources in small communities. You are talking about women in major urban centres that have been on the vanguard of trying to see the whole infrastructure that discriminates against women.

September 26, 1989
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When you are talking about that 15 per cent reduction you are talking about the real effects, the struggles we are trying to identify. It is child care issues, it is housing issues; all of these issues these women are trying to solve. The women's program is one of the most effective, efficient operations in trying to get the real structures of society changed. They get very good value for their money.
A number of my friends work in women's centres and they work for very little money. I am talking about an annual income of probably $22,000 or $23,000 a year, if they are lucky. They work many long hours for those salaries. So when you are talking about a 15 per cent reduction you are talking about cutting those salaries, cutting their efficiency and their ability to do their work.
This is why we find it so offensive that this government has decided to give a grant for the anti-equality group. It is just so inconsistent with all the government's intentions. I know that this government has a little problem with consistency, but this is one of the most blatant examples of it. The government is trying to talk out of one side of its mouth saying one thing and out of the other side saying another.
In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, I just want to reiterate that the members opposite today have helped us enormously because they have fuelled that feminist anger. I know a number of journalists have now said that feminism is the new "f" word. Well, if that is the way they think of it, they can be assured that there are those women on this side of the House who are willing to say it over, and over again.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Benno Friesen: Mr. Speaker, the member for New
Westminster-Coquitlam has brought forward a motion which objects to the fact that the federal government has recognized the existence of an organization known as REAL and it has funded it, for one event, to the tune of $21,000 over against something like $11 million that was given to other women's groups and organizations. Now I do not know if that is a threat to the other organizations
but I do not understand why $21,000 is seen as such a threat, at least as indicated by this motion.
I listened to the remarks of the hon. member from New Westminster. She referred to the inequality that this organization proposes. And then I remembered seeing the masthead-you can understand I have not been active in that organization-of some of their literature and I see lawyers in the leadership and doctors and teachers and other professional people. I cannot imagine that the leadership of that organization considers itself to be in any way unequal to any other women's group and certainly not unequal to any men. They have made it and they have done very well. They have made it because they are good. I do not think they see themselves as being unequal to anyone, because they are professional people, whatever walk of life they are pursuing.
It is characteristic, however, of the New Democratic Party in its approach to life that it espouses causes of such things as tolerance, understanding and broadmindedness. NDP members really believe that if you happen to agree with them. They tend to be tolerant and broad-minded if you agree with them. But let anybody be different from them, let anybody cross swords with them, let anybody espouse a cause that argues with them and pretty soon we have names like Fascist and Klu Klux Klan coming up in the debate and somehow the tolerance and the understanding, all that goal seeking on the part of the New Democratic Party, somehow evaporates very quickly if somebody disagrees with them.
I happen to believe that there is some merit in this motion. I think perhaps groups that fight for the wrong causes, perhaps even in their definition, should not be funded. I recollect that when this organization put forward its conference there were demonstrations against it by other women's groups funded by the federal government. And I am saying to myself, if these women's groups are being funded by the federal government to fight for equality for women, which is a legitimate cause because we know that there are areas of inequality in the workplace and so forth, should they be using that funding to fight other women's groups who do not agree with them?
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An Hon. Member:: Don't patronize us.


Benno Friesen: You see, I happen to put forward another point of view and so right away I am patronizing. Please, I thought we were all equal in this chamber.
So here we have women's groups who fight other women's groups but they do not want the other women's groups to get funds because they say that they are unequal. I tend to think that perhaps there is some merit in this motion and that the minister ought to pay some attention to it.
The other thing that bothers me about the remarks is that I thought they were somewhat inaccurate. I have read some of the literature of this organization and I recall very clearly that they support day care, perhaps not in the formula that the hon. member wants to see it. I remember reading that they-


An Hon. Member:: Oh, oh!


Benno Friesen: You can see the approach they take. This is equality of opinions here, you see. I recall that they believe in homemakers' pensions, perhaps not in the formula that some of the other women's groups suggest but they believe in it. Yet we were told in the chamber here that they do not support those causes. If we are going to debate these issues, we at least should be accurate.
I thought that the base definition of equality was that it suggests that we are equal even though we are not uniform, even though we are different we are equal. Surely in a world of diversity of ideas, in a country where there is a free flow of ideas, there ought to be room for diversity of opinion among women's groups. Surely that ought not to threaten the equality of any of those groups and certainly should not cause other women's groups to inveigh on the integrity and the viability of such groups that have a different point of view.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I regret the hon. member's time has expired.
Adjournment Debate
The time provided for the consideration of Private Members' Business has now expired. Pursuant to Standing Order 96(1) the order is dropped from the Order Paper.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION

[Stage Direction]
A motion to adjourn the House under Standing Order 38 deemed to have been moved.
EXTERNAL AFFAIRS-CRISIS IN CHINA-MANDATE OF UNITED NATIONS/EVACUATION PLANS FOR CANADIANS IN CHINA
['The motion to adjourn the House is now deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly, this House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 2 p.m., pursuant to Standing Order 24(1).']
Jesse Philip Flis: Mr. Speaker, I note that you noticed me first this time.
On June 5, 1989, we passed a motion in this House unanimously condemning the government of China for the murder of hundreds of Chinese students in Tiananmen Square.
Two days later, on June 7, I asked the Secretary of State for External Affairs what action he has taken to persuade the United Nations Security Council to intervene directly as the crisis, though internal, posed a potential and imminent threat to global peace and security.
On both occasions the Secretary of State assured this House that the situation was being treated very seriously by the government and, in fact, that relations between China and Canada would not be "business as usual", until the Chinese government put, and I quote the Secretary of State:
-a stop to the senseless killing and adopt a course of dialogue with the people of China.
These are Minister Clark's own words.
He went on to say that all events that were planned in the immediate future had been deferred or cancelled, that the signing of certain memorandums of understanding had been postponed, that nuclear co-operation consultations that were supposed to be ongoing had been suspended, and that visits were being deflected. In other words, everything was put on hold until such a time as the government of China would take some action to justify why in the light of recent events we should continue relations with that country.

September 26, 1989
Adjournment Debate
Well, as we all know now, this was not to be. Within two months of these assurances, the government decided to go ahead with a $1 million loan for the sale of Canadian telephone equipment. Within two months of these assurances the government decided to go ahead with an additional $130 million loan for a hydroelectric project in China. Within two months of these assurances the government decided to go ahead and send a federal civil servant to a conference run by the Chinese government in the month of November.
All this was after a reported private meeting that the Secretary of State had with the Chinese foreign minister during the July conference on Cambodia. We must also remember that while this private meeting was going on, the House was in recess and the Prime Minister and Mr. Clark were still spewing forth about the tough action that the government was taking against China.
We are now hearing from China's new consul general in Toronto that, and I quote his words: "Both countries' foreign ministries have met and that the Canadian government has expressed its willingness to restore normal relations between the two countries". This is a man who, in the same breath, justified the murder of those students in Tiananmen Square and the ongoing executions by the very fact that they are different concepts of human rights depending on different ideologies.
This kind of action from a country that prides itself on its reputation for leadership in human rights issues all over the world is abhorrent. When the loss of lives is ignored in the interest of a dollar, it is time to re-examine our priorities. It is in the interest of the dollar that this government has decided to turn a blind eye to the atrocities that still continue in China today.
The Secretary of State for External Affairs claims that it would be far more dangerous to stop all relations with China. What he means is that it would not do Canada any good financially to stop relations with China. Our trade with China and the virtually untapped market that is in China may forever be closed to us if we were to be firm and to insist that our continual relations would depend vastly on a change in the attitude of the Chinese Government.
This type of inconsistent and contradictory behaviour brings to mind the future of those Chinese who are still here in Canada. One begins to wonder what the definition of turmoil is to this government. The Minister of Immigration has assumed that no Chinese nationals will be sent back to China while there is still turmoil in their homeland. If the government is so willing to maintain its relationship with China under the present circumstances, how long before it decides either that things have returned to normal or that it cannot afford the wrath of the Chinese government with which it needs to do business so desperately?
It is ironic that the Secretary of State is on a five day visit to the United Nations Assembly, with human rights at the top of his agenda. I hope for his sake that he is not asked to respond to his government's handling of this particular situation.
After much lobbying Canada got its seat on the Security Council. To date we have been shy to use our position to address any crisis that has occurred since then. I am thinking of the China crisis, and the Syrian-Lebanese crisis.
On October 1 of this year we will be presiding over the council for a period of one month. I would question whether for this government all these accomplishments are really anything more than exercises in diplomatics and public relations.
Over the last few years the United Nations has developed into a body that has gained wide acceptance and admiration because it is able to wield great influence. Therefore it gets things done. I sincerely hope the question of China is still on the agenda and, if not, that this government will push to have it put on the agenda as the number of arrests and executions continue to mount. I know that the parliamentary secretary has to reply on behalf of the minister. My criticism is not addressed to the parliamentary secretary, but at the way his government handled this situation. I know of his interest in human rights around the world. He knows that human rights violations have no borders. I know if he were the Secretary of State for External Affairs he would have handled it differently.


Patrick Boyer: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Parkdale-High Park is a thoughtful and experienced parliamentarian. Although this is a sensitive and, in many ways, a difficult issue I am glad that he has raised it.

At the conclusion of the debate in this House, the Secretary of State for External Affairs put forward a resolution which was adopted by all parties. It gave expression to three guiding principles that would try to frame Canadian policy in relation to China, following the tragedy of June.
The three basic principles that the Secretary of State outlined were these. First, to preserve existing links to the extent possible; second, to focus on people-to-peo-ple exchanges; and, third, there would be no support from Canada for the military and propaganda apparatus of China.
Now, it is very clear that in this matter we are walking a fine line. It is not an easy matter or always a black and white, simplistic matter to say we are expressing our condemnation of the Chinese regime and those actions. At the same time, we want to see China not revert into isolation where, unfortunately, it was for a quarter of a century, and that the links that have patiently been developed between our country and China not all be jeopardized at the same time. So it is clearly a difficult tight rope or fine line that any government of whatever persuasion would be walking. That, I think, was reflected in the unanimous resolution passed here.
I can say that the Secretary of State has publicly expressed the view that the two subsequent actions to which the hon. member has referred are consistent with the criteria that he has set out.
The further and final point I want to make is that the member referred to an official of the Chinese Government who had referred to a return to normalcy in Canadian-Chinese relations. Those were the Chinese official's words. That was his interpretation. That was in his interest to state, but that does not reflect the position of the Government of Canada. It does not reflect the position of where the government is going on this.
Chinese in this country, the students particularly, the guarantees that were given by the government stand. There will be no mass returning of people or of individuals who participated here. What was committed by the government stands as government policy.
Adjournment Debate



[Stage Direction]
REPORT-COMPENSATION FOR VICTIMS/REQUEST FOR EARLY ANNOUNCEMENT
David Charles Dingwall: rise today with regard to a question posed to the Minister of National Health and Welfare on April 20, 1989.
On that particular occasion I requested of the minister responsible for health and welfare that a commitment be made and a subsequent decision thereafter be made in terms of providing compensation to those individuals who were affected with the thalidomide drug some time ago. On that occasion, the minister indicated to the House and to members present that no decision would be forthcoming until a comprehensive review could be undertaken.
I rise tonight to underline the seriousness of the request, the importance of compensation to those courageous young men and women who have been affected with this particular disability.
Some time ago the report of the thalidomide task force indicated the following: "The responsibility of the federal government to provide compensation for the victims of thalidomide was admitted in a statement made to a special committee of the House of Commons on January 29, 1963; by the Minister of National Health and Welfare, the Hon. J. Waldo Monteith. The minister at that time said: It is our job to ensure that these victims are cared for in the best possible manner. . .and that their needs are met to the fullest possible extent we can devise".
That was a statement which was made by a previous minister of the Crown. The Government of Canada, and particularly the Department of Health and Welfare, have been seized with this particular issue for so many years, in fact, 26 years. Recently, a task force report which was submitted to the minister in February outlined veiy clearly why they believe, as victims, and the organizers as well, that the Government of Canada ought to share in some of the responsibility for this particular, what I deem, disaster.
Unfortunately, this government, as well as previous governments, have not moved very quickly. Yes, it can be said of the present administration that it only received the report several months ago and is not in a position to make that decision. We should reverse the situation for a moment. We should ask ourselves: "What are these victims doing? What sort of lifestyle are they enjoying in 1989? What are the demands made of them in every day living, from housing, to medicare, to education and

Adjournment Debate
training?" Their marketability in terms of the job market must also receive careful consideration. I believe more so it requires action by the Government of Canada. These are men and women who, because of no fault of their own, have had to put up for some many years with the effects of this particular drug.
I am perfectly well aware of the arguments which have been made by legal counsel for the Government of Canada that to admit liability in some way would be setting a precedent. I do not argue on the basis of legal precedent. I argue on the basis of a moral responsibility that the Government of Canada must have towards its citizens regardless of where they live and indeed the circumstances in which they do live.
The International Commission of Health Professionals supports the Canadian thalidomide victims' claim and has done so. In fact, a statement of claim has been submitted to the Subcommittee of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights for its determination.
So this issue has now transcended, if you will, Canadian boundaries and is in the hands of the United Nations for a decision as to what it believes to be appropriate. I would like to ask through you, Mr. Speaker, to the parliamentary secretary, as to whether or not an affirmative decision can be made forthwith in order to provide the necessary compensation to alleviate some of the harm and some of the difficulties that these individuals have been confronted with for so many years. Second, is the minister prepared to stop putting preconditions in terms of compensation, and would he meet again, as he has in the past, with the organizers and the thalidomide victims to discuss in detail as to how compensation is provided and how it ought to be administered over an extended period of time?
In conclusion, I wish to say that this particular issue has received the support of many of my colleagues on this side of the House. I name two in support of what I am saying here today. My colleague from London East, as well as my colleague from Dartmouth, are both very supportive, as is our entire caucus, to the idea of providing the necessary compensation. I suggest, however, to the parliamentary secretary responding on behalf of the minister that that response is long overdue. I would hope that he will provide us with some positive news as to when the compensation will be forthcoming.


Mr. Ross Belsher (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Transport):: Mr. Speaker, many of us in the House remember the shock and sadness that accompanied the birth of the thalidomide babies around the world in the early 1960s. This unhappy event represented a profound challenge to the understanding and endurance of the medical and scientific communities and ultimately to the spirit and well-being of the thalidomide victims themselves.
At that time the federal government arranged with the provinces a cost-shared plan of assistance and support to thalidomide victims and their families. The program addressed not only the medical needs of the children but also the economic, psychological and social impact of the tragedy on those affected and the enhancement of rehabilitation services. The federal government was able to stimulate these co-operative efforts through four programs: national health grants, national welfare grants, the medical rehabilitation crippled children's program and the hospital insurance program.
The government pursued the recommendations of an expert committee established in 1962 to examine the habitation of congenital anomalies with thalidomide and funded professional training for clinical rehabilitation workers, the establishment of regional prosthetic research and training centres and schools of prosthetics.
As the issue of financial compensation from the drug manufacturers developed, the government offered families of thalidomide victims whatever assistance they might require in presenting their cases to the company. A number of families took advantage of this offer and received settlement through this route.
In 1988, the War Amputations of Canada gathered together for the first time a number of Canadian thalidomide victims and out of this meeting grew the Thalidomide Victims Association of Canada and the Thalidomide Task Force. The task force prepared an extensive report of the Thalidomide tragedy and submitted its work to the Department of National Health and Welfare on February 14, 1989.
The government's review of the positions and perspectives presented by the task force began immediately. Central to the current issue is the task force's request for financial compensation on behalf of all surviving thalidomide victims in Canada.
On March 30, the Hon. Minister of National Health and Welfare met with representatives of the task force and the Thalidomide Victims Association in Toronto. The meeting provided all participants with an opportunity to exchange ideas and views. Several members of the task force and the association described the needs and
September 26, 1989

aspirations of thalidomide victims in eloquent terms. The minister explained the process by which he and his officials are attempting to address their concerns and their requests, and those of other groups of Canadians who have represented their cases to the government.
This first meeting was an occasion to learn but the process is by no means complete. There has been substantial correspondence between the minister and the task force aimed at keeping open the lines of communication. We are confident this process can lead toward a shared appreciation of a basis on which extraordinary assistance can be extended.
Adjournment Debate
It would not be true to the spirit of this process to prematurely speculate on the outcome, but thalidomide victims and others with requests now before the government need to be assured that their needs and concerns are being heard and considered with the utmost importance.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The motion to adjourn the House is now deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly, this House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 2 p.m., pursuant to Standing Order 24(1).


[Stage Direction]
The House adjourned at 6.21 p.m.
[Stage Direction]
Wednesday, September 27,1989