1989-10-18

Ms. Beth Phinney (Hamilton Mountain):: Mr. Speaker, millions of Canadians over the last few hours have been watching with horror the results of yesterday's disastrous earthquake in California.
We realize that in the days and months that lie ahead Californians will be faced with a monumental clean up effort. We want those involved to know that they have the encouragement and support of all Canadians. Our sympathies lie with all Americans suffering as a result of this tragedy.
Through the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the President and the American Government were able to respond to this tragedy within a few minutes. This tragedy would have been even more devastating had it had not been for the established support systems and the thousands of ordinary and trained civilians prepared to respond quickly.
Mr. Speaker, today Canadians need some answers. What kind of emergency measures organization do we have? Do we have trained emergency personnel? Do we have strong municipal infrastructures?
Specifically, would we be able to respond to a disaster in any region of Canada with the same speed and expertise as the Americans have shown in the past few hours?


PERSON'S CASE
Mrs. Edna Anderson (Simcoe Centre):: Mr. Speaker, 60 years ago today, on October 18, 1929, the women of Canada were formally recognized as persons by the British Privy Council. The Person's Case, as it has become to be known, is the chronicle of the efforts of five courageous Alberta women who persevered against a host of legal and social obstacles to win acknowledgement that Canadian women are indeed persons and are therefore eligible to be summoned to the Senate.
Last week six Canadians were honoured by our government for their dedication to the principles of equality and the individual's right to self-determination.
I congratulate this year's recipients: Kay Armstrong of Saanichton, British Columbia; the Honourable Ellen Fairclough of Hamilton; Dorothy Inglis of St. John's; Helen Levine of Ottawa; Alphonsine Par-Howlett of Westmount, Quebec; and Caroline Robins of Saskatoon.
Their efforts reinforce the significance and the relevance of the Person's Case as an important episode in Canadian history.


VIA RAIL
Mr. Bill Blaikie (Winnipeg TVanscona):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to call the attention of the House and the government to an effect that the VIA Rail cuts are having on a particular group of people, a group whose needs have not received that much attention in the entire debate about the VIA Rail cuts.
I am talking about people who have cottages on the CN main line from Winnipeg to Farlane. These are people who used to be served by a special train on the weekends through the summer and who some years ago had that service incorporated into the Winnipeg-Ca-preol line.
The service of the Winnipeg-Capreol line as a result of the government's proposals is now to be incorporated into the transcontinental service. Some remote communities like Rice Lake and Winnitoba have absolutely no road service whatsoever. The needs of these communities cannot be met in any other way except by a train that

October 18, 1989
stops at all those places and goes down at times when people normally want to go to their cottages.
The transcontinental train will not do that. It will leave on a Saturday night and come back on a Monday morning, which is totally useless.
Mr. Speaker, the forest fire that swept through that country a year ago was less of a threat to those peoples' investments than this government is proving to be.


Mr. Louis Plamondon (Richelieu):: Mr. Speaker, on October 18, 1929, the women of Canada obtained legal status as persons. Their long legal and political struggle opened the way for a host of initiatives to promote the status of women in Canada. One of these and perhaps the most important one was the appointment in 1970 of the Royal Commission of Inquiry on the Status of Women, which contributed toward achieving full equality of men and women in this country.
The federal Government's commitment at the time, which was to enable Canadian women to realize their ambitions and their full potential, is still appropriate today, and the Government fully subscribes to that commitment. It was in this perspective that the Government published a document entitled Dimensions of Equality, which appeared in 1986 and was subsequently reprinted. The document contains a federal work plan for women's equality. Mr. Speaker, the anniversary we are commemorating today must remain forever inscribed in the memory of all Canadians, as a tribute not only to our pioneers but also to all those women who proudly followed in their footsteps.


SENATE REFORM
Miss Deborah Grey (Beaver River):: Mr. Speaker, democracy is not about singulars or plurals or contrived technicalities. It is about a principle and a belief in a
spirit that goes beyond partisan politics and personal agendas.
On Monday night 600,000 Albertans marched to the polls in the belief that Parliament must be fully democratic, not half democratic. It is no longer a matter of claiming to support democracy or claiming to support Senate reform. Senate reform has already begun. Either we in this House are fighting for it or we are fighting against it.
I urge the Prime Minister to join in this movement by confirming without delay Stan Waters' election to the Senate of Canada. This is a minimum test of his willingness to listen to Alberta. Other tests will come later as Albertans wait for action on the constitutional and fiscal policies on which they have sent a clear message.
Mr. Speaker, make no mistake. If the Prime Minister and his party ignore this election, they will make Mr. Waters a symbol and it will be my party that benefits. If they accept this election and act, Mr. Waters will be a senator and we all will gain.



Mr. David Walker (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, once again an idea that will revolutionize Confederation has come from the west. After decades of academic discussions and government reports, Senate reform is becoming a reality.
Whether this government will take heed of this fact or not is the only question left. Yesterday we saw in this House a government led by the famous Deputy Prime Minister from Alberta, in complete disarray. It is obvious it does not know what to do. While that is not a surprise it brings the issue of Senate reform into urgent focus.
The west has constitutional needs that must be addressed. We have been patient, but patience has not advanced the cause of Senate reform one bit.
Because of the success of the Alberta Senate election Manitoba is now considering using the election process to nominate senators. I am proud to say that the Liberal party in Manitoba has been on record for many years endorsing the Triple E Senate proposal. This govern-
October 18, 1989

ment should stop wondering what to do and accept the will of the Alberta electorate.
There is nothing more powerful than an idea whose time has come. Senate reform is here. It is happening whether the Conservative party wants it or not.


AUTOMOBILE LEASING INDUSTRY
Mr. Felix Holtmann (Portage-Interlake):: Mr. Speaker, independent car dealers from across Canada have established an excellent record of service to Canadian customers. In a business in which there is real competition, automobile dealers have served Canadian transportation needs by both selling and leasing cars to the satisfaction of their customers.
Over the past few years we have seen a quiet but persistent pressure from chartered banks in this country to allow them to enter the automobile leasing field. These banks wish to deal directly with customers for lease requirements. The pressures a large financial institution would place into the automobile leasing industry would have a negative effect and be totally unfair to the large investments dealers have made.
Banks must not be allowed to enter the automobile leasing business. I will continue to stand up for the car dealers across Canada and urge this House to oppose the intrusion into the car business by the banks of Canada.


PERSON'S CASE
Ms. Dawn Black (New Westminster-Burnaby):: Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate the sixtieth anniversary of the Person's Case; 60 years ago today women became persons under Canadian law. It is ironic that today the Conservative government is threatening to take away women's legal rights. A new law on abortion will open the floodgates to invasive legal cases such as the Daigle case. A new law will provide a basis for a series of court challenges just at the time when the Supreme Court is shutting down current legal avenues available.
We will once again see women dragged before the courts and publicly humiliated. In 1989 we are facing another legal equality crisis. Raising the legal status of the foetus over the legal rights of women to make decisions about our own bodies would be a giant step
backward for women's legal equality. Women will not be persons unless we have legal control over our own bodies and our own lives.


DENE THA' BAND
Mr. Albert Cooper (Parliamentary Secretary to Government House Leader):: Mr. Speaker, today is a very special day for Chief Harry Chonkolay of the Dene Tha' Band in northwestern Alberta. Today Chief Chonkolay will be appointed to the Order of Canada to commemorate 50 years as chief of that band.
Harry Chonkolay was elected chief of the band on June 17,1938. During the 51 years he has served as chief, the band has seen many changes from its traditional way of life. He has given valuable and inspirational leadership to his people in their transition from a hunting and trapping society to one in step with modem times.
Chief Chonkolay has always stressed the importance of education and at the same time promoted the traditional values of his people, their language and their culture. He has served his people with integrity, dignity and dedication.
All one has to do is spend a few minutes with this man to recognize the wisdom and knowledge that he has obtained during his years as chief of the Dene Tha' Band.
This remarkable man is visiting us here today in the House of Commons.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


THE ENVIRONMENT
Hon.   Chas. L. Caccia@Davenport: Mr. Speaker, in 1986 the Department of the Environment wrote a pamphlet for public information entitled Storm Warning. It was suppressed by the then Minister of the Environment, Mr. McMillan, and the Minister of National Health and Welfare. When Storm Warning was finally released, its message was ignored.
Here is a sample of the message in Storm Warning:
Even the most careful person can be exposed to toxic substances
through the food chain.
In Storm Warning the various threats to health posed by toxic chemicals in the Great Lakes region are set out. Last week, three years later, the present minister of

October 18, 1989
Oral Questions
health announced that he wants a health study into toxic contamination in the Great Lakes region.
Instead of proceeding in 1986 to take preventive measures, three years later the government proceeds with a study which could delay action until its completion in 1994. When the health of Canadians is in danger, and despite earlier warnings, this government wasted three years before acting. What a sham.


Mrs. Gabrielle Bertrand (Brome -Missisquoi):: Mr. Speaker, 60 years ago today, Canadian women won a major battle in their struggle to augment their political rights.
Today marks the anniversary of what is referred to as the person's case. Because of this historic ruling, Canadian women were legally recognized as persons. They also obtained the right to be appointed to the Senate.
Full political rights for women did not become a reality without a hard struggle by groups of Canadian women, and especially one particular group, later referred to as the Famous Five. They were: Emily Murphy, Nellie McClung, Louise McKinney, Irene Parlby and Henrietta Muir Edwards.
Thanks to their courage and determination, the lives of all Canadian women have been enriched.
As was the case with much of the history of Canadian women, the person's case was forgotten for 50 years. In honor of the Famous Five, the Persons Award was established in 1979 to acknowledge exceptional contributions toward improving the status of Canadian women.
Last week, the Governor General gave the Persons Award to six women whose commitment to defending the rights of women and improving the status of women has been a source of inspiration for us all.
On this anniversary, I ask you to join me-


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I am sorry to interrupt the Hon. Member but her time has expired.


Right Hon. John N. Turner (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, I hope you will allow me a certain latitude in the rules to express our deep concern and sympathy to the people of San Francisco and the Bay area as a result of the severe earthquake that struck last night.
We would encourage our government to give whatever help we can practically render to our good neighbours.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


John Napier Turner: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Finance.
The provincial Finance Ministers have declared that a new federal sales tax on top of their provincial taxes would be terribly complex and impossible to administer. The federal Minister of Finance has accused the provincial Ministers of indulging in petty politics. He said, and I quote: "I know better than they do what the effects of this tax will be". That was a very modest statement by our Finance Minister.
Mr. Speaker, in this connection, I would like to quote from a document entitled Sales Tax Reform, published under the authority of the Hon. Michael H. Wilson, Minister of Finance.
I quote at page 48: "Without a common base, little tax simplification would be possible-the system could become more complex-this layer of complexity would be compounded and spread across the country-if all governments were to have different tax bases, the system would be a national tax in name only. Effectively, it would be unworkable."
I mention this because it is exactly what the provincial Finance Ministers said yesterday.
How can the federal Minister accuse the provinces of petty politics when they are only repeating what he himself said in a document he tabled in the House of Commons?


Hon. Michael Wilson (Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, while I do not have that page 54 in front of me
here-


Mr. Gauthier:: You wrote it.
October 18, 1989


Michael Holcombe Wilson: -I think the quote the hon. member is referring to is that if you are going to have a national sales tax you have to have a common tax base, but the point of the matter is that my first choice had been a national sales tax. We have been working on that since early 1987 to try to achieve a national sales tax. Unfortunately that was not achievable.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: Because you failed.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: We have decided that we must go ahead. Because the existing federal sales tax on manufactured products is not working, as my friend I am sure would agree, we must change to a goods and services type of tax.
The point that I am making-and I have done this on many occasions-is that if the provinces want to come together and put forward a proposal that they can agree on, that the premiers agree on, we will talk with them.
Until they are off the wicket of simply opposing, simply saying that this tax is not good enough, this proposal is not good enough, without taking the responsibility of putting forward an alternative that we can talk about, there is nothing for us to meet and to talk about.


John Napier Turner: Mr. Speaker, the provincial ministers of finance were saying yesterday only what the minister in his document to Parliament had said quite categorically on June 19, 1987.
We have in this House, of course, a trade minister who has not read the trade deal. We have a fisheries minister who has not read the decision on salmon and herring. We now have the Minister of Finance who does not remember what he put in his document. I would be glad to let him have a copy so he can remember exactly what he said.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Pass the document over, John.
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John Napier Turner: Mr. Speaker, I can say parenthetically that no wonder we have a government that does not really worry about putting a 9 per cent tax on reading. None of them read.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Napier Turner: Mr. Speaker, I want to again quote the Minister of Finance from last night. He said that his counterparts, the provincial finance ministers, are "trying to cloud the issue so they could increase their own taxes". Those were his words.
Where does the man who has increased taxes in this country 31 times since he became minister, who is now trying to impose a 9 per cent tax on everything that moves, get off by telling the provincial ministers of finance that they are now trying to increase taxes?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, just in response to the cheap shot that the hon. member took-


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Michael Holcombe Wilson: -I have read that document precisely as I have read every other document that has been put out under my signature. When the hon. member reminds me of something that was put out two and one-half years ago, no, I do not remember every word of that.
The hon. member has raised a specific question about the provinces wanting to use this as a way of hiding their own intentions of raising taxes. That is very clear. They are making it quite clear that they want to raise taxes and they are going to use, they say, the GST as a reason for doing it. Mr. Speaker, I can be quite categoric. There will not be a reason for the provinces to raise their taxes based on the goods and services tax, based on the way they are raising taxes today.
We have been quite up front about raising taxes, but we have also been very up front about controlling government spending. We have a government spending record where we have increased government program spending by 3.6 per cent. No other province over the same five-year period has a spending record as good as that. The average of the provinces is a 6.4 per cent increase compared with our 3.6 per cent increase. The province of Ontario had a 9.5 per cent increase. This is

October 18, 1989
Oral Questions
an example of how well we are controlling spending on this side of the House.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Napier Turner: Mr. Speaker, it is a flagrant example of the pot calling the kettle black. Tax up front? An invisible tax, secret from the consumers of Canada.
The Minister of Finance said last night, and I want to quote him again: "Provincial ministers of finance are trying to set themselves up to raise taxes, and they shouldn't do it". "They shouldn't do it", he says. Then in a pious way he said: "We all serve one taxpayer and they are trying to set up that one taxpayer so that they can increase taxes". Those were his words.
This man who is trying to make a tax grab in the amount of $29 billion, a larger tax grab than all the provincial income taxes put together, all the territorial taxes together, is accusing his provincial counterparts of a tax grab. This man who is going to force on the people of Newfoundland a total over-all sales tax rate of up to 26 per cent is saying that other people are trying to raise taxes.
If this Minister of Finance really believes that it is wrong for his provincial counterparts to raise taxes as he said last night, why is it not wrong for him to impose the largest tax grab in Canadian history? If they shouldn't do it, why should he do it?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, let me be quite categoric. This goods and services tax is replacing an existing tax.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: Nonsense.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: He says "nonsense", and he is saying that I have not read the document. Maybe he should read the document once or twice.


John Napier Turner: How about revenue neutral?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Would you like to just listen to the answer?
Some $24 billion dollars will be raised from this tax; $18.5 billion will be used to replace the revenues from the existing tax; $5.5 billion will be put back into the tax system through a goods and services tax credit, through the reduction in the middle income tax rate, and through
the automatic indexing that is required under the terms of existing Canadian law, so it is not the tax grab that the hon. member refers to.
The point that I was making is that for the provinces to use the goods and services tax as an excuse for raising their taxes is unwarranted, because there will not be a reason based on the goods and services tax for them to increase their taxes. They should not use that as a basis for them to raise their own taxes.
The other misinformation the right hon. leader of the opposition is using is to say that Newfoundland will have to go to a 26 per cent sales tax. That is nonsense. There is categorically no reason absolutely whatsoever. If Mr. Kitchen wants to discuss that with me, I would suggest he give me a phone call and find out the true facts as to what the impact of the sales tax will be before he makes those unwarranted statements.


Hon. Jean Lapierre (Shefford):: Mr. Speaker, today the situation is as honeless as ever. The Minister of Finance is trying to tell us that he is right and everybody else is wrong. Yesterday, the provinces said: "Unacceptable". They will have no part of it. I want to ask the Minister of Finance, who supposedly is part of a government of national reconciliation and is now about to carry off a unilateral coup unique in Canada's history and in our tax system, what justification he has for introducing this tax, when all provincial ministers are telling him they want no part of it and when the Canadian public says he is wrong? Who supports the Ministerof Finance, aside from a few backbenchers who won't listen to their constituents?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I want to make it absolutely clear that there is no basis for the provinces to raise their taxes. That is quite clear, if they use the GST as an excuse to raise their own taxes.
Now the hon. member is saying: "Are we doing something unilateral"? We spent two years of consultations with officials, with the ministers, talking about a proposed national sales tax. The provinces do not want that national sales tax. It is quite clear from the display of comments that we heard at the premiers' meeting in
October 18, 1989

August and at the finance ministers' meeting yesterday that the provinces do not want to participate.
The federal government must move ahead, because all sides of this House agree, and if hon. members opposite have forgotten, Liberals and New Democrats signed the finance Committee report twice in the last Parliament saying that we have to move to a new sales tax. I will remind the member from Ottawa-Vanier of his comments. We must move to this tax. The provinces do not have to move to the tax. That is why we have to move ahead, and the provinces know that.


Jean-C. Lapierre: Mr. Speaker, there is a consensus at least on one thing among Canadians, among all provincial Ministers and all members on this side of the House, and that is that the Minister of Finance didn't do his homework. Canadians want taxes that are visible, neutral and fair. Unfortunately, the proposals presented by the Minister of Finance do not pass that test. Consequently, I would ask the Minister of Finance, considering the unanimous rejection of his proposals, whether he has the courage to withdraw them immediately.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, the answer is no. We have put forward a technical paper for further consultation. The finance committee is holding hearings right now. We are having consultations with various groups that want to meet with us to see whether there are ways of improving the document. But for him to suggest that we are going to withdraw this, I say to the leader of the Liberal party, where are you on this debate?


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Oh, yes, they say: We are against it. But ask us to put up an alternative? Oh, no, we would not sully our hands by putting up an alternative. All we are going to do is-


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Michael Holcombe Wilson: I say to the Leader of the Opposition, get into the ballgame. Put some facts on the table and quit just opposing.


Hon. Edward Broadbent (Oshawa):: Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Finance has made a statement that not only
Oral Questions
would the provincial treasurers, without exception, disagree with but all Canadians who have been following this tax debate, except his own back-benchers, will disagree with it.
He has just said that provinces do not have to worry about a negative impact because of this tax. He knows that this reduction in income tax that he has just alluded to is going to cost the provinces. The impact on inflation is going to cost the provinces. Allowing for some increases in wages and salaries related to inflation is going to cost the provinces.
According to figures that have been produced, Manitoba claims it will cost it $70 million, New Brunswick $145 million, Newfoundland $85 million. We heard from the Minister of Finance for Newfoundland today, saying that the only way he could cope with it is to cut services in an already poor province, or increase taxes. He said it is going to go up to a net effect of a 25 per cent sales tax.
I want to ask the Minister of Finance why he is putting this unfair burden particularly on the poorer provinces of Canada?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, there is no unfair burden being put upon poorer provinces of this country. As I have said before and I will repeat again, they will not be negatively affected by the introduction of a goods and services tax.
Further to that, the poorer provinces of the country, because they have proportionately more low-income people, will get a greater share of the goods and services tax credit. That works out to $275 per adult, $100 per child, and it works out for residents over-all to $170 per capita in the GST credit. The province of Newfoundland will be a proportionately greater recipient of that than say the province of Ontario.


John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, I do not need to remind the Minister of Finance, but I will. This government has already, in terms of the poorer provinces, cut back on regional development programs, cut back on health transfer payments, cut back on VIA Rail, which is particularly bad for the lower income provinces, and now a GST impact that he has not denied. I challenge him to produce his own figures. Because of its impact on inflation, because of the income tax change, he is hitting the provinces again. If you consider almost every aspect of this government's policy, including the GST, it is the

Oral Questions
poorest provinces in Canada that are getting it in the neck, and I want the Minister of Finance to justify that.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, it is hard to justify something that is not happening. I have said that the poorer provinces will be proportionately greater beneficiaries of the goods and services tax credit. Equalization payments during our term of office have increased a good deal faster than the rate of growth of normal federal-provincial transfers.
The poorer provinces of this country receive 40 per cent to 55 per cent of their revenues, depending on the province, directly from the Government of Canada. That is something that clearly demonstrates the ongoing support which this government has for the poorer provinces of this country.


John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Finance suggested a few minutes ago that this new sales tax would have no negative impact on the provinces, specifically the poor provinces. He said so, but everyone else says the opposite! Not only the Opposition but all the provinces and experts outside the Government!
If the finance minister does not agree, would he give the House of Commons the figures which tell a different story? That is the challenge I make to the Minister of Finance.

Mr. Wilson (Etobicoke Centre) Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is using figures I have not seen. I presume, from what he has said, that they have just been released. I am going to have a look at those figures and I will be in a position to comment on them after I have seen how the provinces have developed those figures.
It is clear in the economic analysis that has been done by the Government of Canada that the Atlantic provinces, the prairie provinces and British Columbia have an economic benefit. The economic impact is greater for them than for the national average, but all provinces, including the provinces of Quebec and Ontario, benefit from the introduction of this tax, but it is the provinces that are farther away from central Canada that have the greatest proportion of benefit.


FISHERIES
[Stage Direction]
Mr. Francis G. LeBIanc (Cape Breton Highlands-
Canso): Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Fisheries. Yesterday the minister told the House that his government would wait 30 days before announcing whether it will accept Monday's free trade panel ruling on landing requirements for west coast salmon and herring. Yet in his press release he declared that the panel accepted the legitimacy of Canada's position on the use of these landing requirements, even though the panel obliges Canada to permit over-the-side sales of unprocessed fish, something which the landing requirements were put in place to prevent.
If the minister considers this sell-out a victory for Canada, why is he now saying he will take 30 days to review the decision? Otherwise, will he stand up now for Canadian jobs and reject this ruling?
Hon. Thomas Siddon (Minister of Fisheries and
Oceans): Mr. Speaker, it happens to be the opposition members who have been using the term "victory" to describe this panel finding. In fact, if the hon. member and his leader would read the finding-because I think perhaps they could use some reading lessons-they would learn that in no less than 10 places in this document, Canada's sovereignty under Canadian fisheries legislation is fully accepted as the primary means of managing and conserving our fishery stocks, which is precisely what I said yesterday.
Mr. LeBIanc (Cape Breton Highlands -Canso):: My
supplementary question is for the same minister. So it is not a victory. We are clear about that.
How does the minister reconcile this answer with statements by the government leader in the Senate that, "the government accepts the finding and intends to work within the context of that finding", and by U.S. trade representative Carla Hills, who said yesterday, "We fully expect Canada will promptly comply with the panel ruling"? Who speaks for the government on this issue? Is it the minister of fisheries, is it the Senate government leader, or is it Carla Hills?


Mr. Siddon:: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member should know that it is the Government of Canada that speaks for Canada on this issue. The government received this panel report on Monday. Under the Free Trade Agree-
October 18, 1989

ment, there is provision to review it and analyse it over a 30-day period before taking a position.
If the hon. member will check the transcripts of the government Leader in the Senate, I believe he will find that the government leader in the other place will be clarifying his statement and correcting it because the government has not yet decided what position will be taken in the disposition of this report.


Mrs. Coline Campbell (South West Nova):: Mr. Speaker, the minister of fisheries must be a slow reader if it takes 30 days.
Yesterday the minister told this House the panel finding "clearly recognizes Canada's right to management of fish stocks-, in accordance with our sovereign rights". What he does not say is that those rights extend only as far as the United States permits.


Mr. Epp:: You're reading, Coline.


Coline M. Campbell: Yes, Mr. Speaker, one has to read because one wants to remember what is being said in this House. The Minister of Finance sometimes forgets.
On the west coast, you have the U.S. telling us that our conservation for herring and salmon is a restrictive trade. On the east coast, the U.S. is passing legislation to conserve its lobster fishery against our own lobster fishing industries.
I ask the minister, where is the victory in being accorded a sovereign right when it cannot be used to keep jobs in Canada-and they laugh over there-or to stop the U.S. from controlling our natural resources which are so important to our jobs here in Canada? This is a laughing matter to those people over there.


Thomas Edward Siddon: Mr. Speaker, here we have another member of the opposition who does not read. If the hon. member would search her memory channels she would learn that it was the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade talks which decided that our old processing regulations were discriminatory in that they wanted special treatment for the Canadian industry that was denied the American industry. Because we export 80 per cent of the fish, particularly that from her own constituency, to the United States, we have to play by those rules. But I must say that this panel finding, the consensus of a panel on which three Canadians sit, suggests that the sovereignty
Oral Questions
of Canada's right to manage and conserve the fishery stocks of Canada takes precedence over all other considerations.


Coline M. Campbell: Mr. Speaker, the minister does not understand. We have agreed, we have a sovereign right to our natural resources. Surely free trade did not take that away from us.
I am saying that that minister does not understand that there are no countermeasures for what they are telling us is a restrictive trade. In the lobster area, the impending legislation before the U.S. government is going to be a restrictive trade.
What countermeasures, aside from diplomatic talks, is the minister going to present to the U.S. to protect the many thousands of lobster fishermen who begin their season with a complicated free trade agreement which has no countermeasures for us to resolve that dispute?


Thomas Edward Siddon: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member should know, and if she does not, perhaps she should pick up a newspaper and read, that the-


Mr. Peterson:: How condescending. What a pompous approach.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. Will the Minister
proceed?


Thomas Edward Siddon: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for South West Nova knows full well that there is proposed legislation before the U.S. Congress and House which would extend, in an extra-territorial fashion, United States conservation considerations and make them applicable to Canadian lobsters being exported to the United States. The hon. member knows that Canada has strongly protested any such proposed legislation because it would intrude upon our sovereignty to manage our lobster fishery according to our criteria, and it would violate in fact the principle of the free trade agreement.


PRESENCE IN GALLERY
Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I wish to draw to the members' attention the presence in the gallery of the Hon. David E. Wilkinson, Speaker of the House of Assembly, Legislature of Bermuda.

October 18, 1989
Oral Questions


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


FISHERIES
Mr. David D. Stupich (Nanaimo-Cowichan):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. Yesterday, the minister touted Canada's great success in that the free trade panel, he claims, upholds Canada's sovereign right to control our own resource as long as we let the Americans tell us how many of our fish we can land.
I have been concerned about our status as a sovereign nation under the free trade deal, but I was very surprised to learn that a minister of the Crown shared my concerns.
The government has had the preliminary report in hand for 33 days, 27 days remain. In the time coming, is the minister confident that he can come up with a plan for landing, identifying and counting 80 per cent or 90 per cent, or whatever percentage, of each of the continual many runs of salmon of each of the species?


Thomas Edward Siddon: Mr. Speaker, certainly I am absolutely confident that we can do that because that is my responsibility under Canadian fisheries legislation.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Thomas Edward Siddon: In fact, Mr. Speaker, we still have about 27 days to carefully read this report. If the hon. member would read paragraph 7.40, for example, he would find that the Canadian prerogative takes proportion over any percentage of fish which might be accessed by sea by the Americans in that it it says, and I quote: "Though any such proportion would have to be determined on the basis of the actual data and management needs of each fishery or group of related fisheries, the panel was of the view that the 10 to 20 per cent range referred to earlier could provide appropriate guidance". So, the numbers of 10 to 20 per cent are subject to our conservation and management requirements.


EMERGENCY MEASURES
Dawn Black: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National
Defence in his capacity as lead minister for emergency preparedness. In view of the terrible disaster yesterday in San Francisco, can the minister explain why, in 1986, his government cut back on a 12-year earthquake prediction research program within Energy, Mines and Resources?


Hon. Bill McKnight (Minister of National Defence):: Mr. Speaker, I think all members of the House would want to express sympathy to the families of those people in northern California who lost their lives, as well as to the other families who are there.
With regard to the hon. member's question, throughout government we have taken efforts to constrain spending and to bring about a rational approach to spending by the departments, particularly the departments to which the member refers.
With respect to emergency preparedness, I can inform the hon. member that next week, Tbesday through Thursday, in co-operation with the Government of British Columbia, there will be an emergency preparedness symposium held in British Columbia. I see the leader of the New Democratic Party laughing, Mr. Speaker. I would suggest that he knows, and his colleagues know, that the municipal and provincial governments have lead roles in emergency preparedness. They are the first on the ground. They are the first to react. We co-operate with them as a national government. We provide the expertise that we can provide. We have a training program and provinces have training programs. Located just some 30 miles from where the hon. member sits is one of the best emergency preparedness training programs for municipal and provincial bodies at Am-prior, supported by Emergency Preparedness Canada.


EAST GERMAN REFUGEES
Mr. John Reimer (Kitchener):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Employment and Immigration. For over 200 years, German speaking people have emigrated to Canada, making them the third largest ethnic and language group in Canada behind the English and French. In view of recent events with the thousands of people leaving East Germany and that many Canadians of German origin are anxious and willing to help some of these people come to Canada, is the Govern-

ment of Canada prepared to open our doors to some of these East German refugees?


Hon. Barbara McDougall (Minister of Employment and Immigration):: Mr. Speaker, I think that all of us in this House have been touched by what we have seen in East Germany in recent weeks and months.
My officials and I have been in contact with the representatives of the German Canadian community. I will be meeting with the German Canadian Congress on October 26 and we will be discussing with them how the German Canadian community might assist with East Germans who may want to come to Canada.


ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE
Hon. Bob Kaplan (York Centre):: Mr. Speaker, my question today is for the Minister of Justice.
As he knows, last week, at least 500 elected municipal officials met in Montreal at an international conference to discuss crime prevention. They raised the idea that prevention is at least as important as repression.
At the end of the conference, they issued a statement criticizing the federal government both for its lack of support for prevention projects and for its lack of leadership.
I ask the Minister of Justice how he will answer. [English]


Hon. Doug Lewis (Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada):: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my colleague's comments. I was at the very same conference.
The federal government has been very actively involved in crime prevention. We are conducting surveys and studies. We are getting information on crime prevention policies and comparing these with the ones that exist in Europe, Australia and the United States. We were an active partner in the planning of the very conference that my friend was at.
We have provided the national drug strategy, the proceeds of crime legislation. All of these are part of an
Oral Questions
ongoing program of crime prevention which we think, according to the latest statistics, is succeeding.


Robert Phillip Kaplan: Mr. Speaker, despite the Minister's statement, as he must know, the Canadians who were at the conference saw that the federal Government's participation was much less than that of other countries, especially from Europe.
I want to ask the Minister, since the Government transferred responsibility for prevention from the Solicitor General to Justice without transferring any funding, why not increase the funding, restore the funding that the Solicitor General had for prevention, instead of transferring responsibilities with no transfer of funding.


Douglas Grinslade Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I reject that categorically. We organized the convention. We had most of the displays there from Health and Welfare and Solicitor General. The Solicitor General and I were both there and participated in the program. There was hardly any participation or displays from the municipalities. We were there. We were there in spades.


HEALTH AND SAFETY
Mr. Stan Keyes (Hamilton West):: Mr. Speaker, for an investment of $10 million a year, the Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety has provided cost-free, unbiased, impartial information for a decade, and in the process, has saved the Government of Canada hundreds of millions of dollars a year in health care costs. Certainly what we are dealing with here is an ounce of prevention for a pound of cure. In fact, it is a good business practice.
My question is for the Minister of Labour. Why is this government gambling with a good investment of Canadian taxpayers' dollars?


Hon. Jean Corbeil (Minister of Labour):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to answer the hon. member that the Government of Canada takes no chances with the wonderful work done over the years by the Centre for Occupational Health and Safety. A while ago, in accordance with the director of the centre, we asked that a plan for financing the centre from non-government sources be drawn up, since the government has invested $60 million in this centre over the last 10 years. And I am

Oral Questions
very pleased to tell the hon. member opposite that about two weeks ago, the Board of the Centre rejected as inapplicable the plan submitted to it by the Director and asked a task force from the centre to prepare another plan to present to the Minister of Labour for meeting the objective we set for the Centre, namely to continue its excellent work but with funds from sources outside the federal treasury.


Stan Kazmierczak Keyes: Mr. Speaker, I heard the minister say, "absolutely no risk", and yet this occupational health and safety centre, internationally recognized, has been built on trust between government, business and labour, and under a deal where they are going to find financing privately, labour has threatened to withdraw its service. There is risk, I want to remind the minister.
Given that for a decade, the Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety has paid for itself hundreds of times over, and given the potential of increased health care costs and losses in productivity, will the minister reinstate funding and admit that he has made a mistake?


Jean Corbeil: Mr. Speaker, there is absolutely no risk that the centre will be closed because there are ample opportunities for the centre to find financing in the market-place. There are all kinds of avenues that have been considered by the council of governors and the proof of the pudding is in the fact that they have agreed to prepare a plan themselves to present to the Minister of Labour indicating that the plan can find the financing from other than the treasury of the federal government.


CHILD CARE
Ms. Joy Langan (Mission -Coquitlam):: Mr. Speaker, yesterday, child care workers in Manitoba staged a day of protest outlining their anger at their status under the Tory government of that province.
Today is Person's Day, and is significant in that a woman's status and equality are very much dependent on her economic freedoms. Economic freedoms depend on the availability of safe, quality, affordable child care.
Would the Minister of Finance acknowledge that the Status of Women depends on the federal government and take the lead in supporting child care by providing adequate funding?


Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, as the hon. member well knows, the federal government shares in the funding of child care through the Canada Assistance Plan, an open-ended plan that the provinces can take up as they see fit. We are always there with them in providing that operating funding.
Having said that, we did have child care legislation in this Chamber. It was held up in the other place and did not pass. Since that time, the Prime Minister, the Minister of Health and Welfare and I have all been working very hard in assuring Canadians that we will have new child care legislation in this country. But I would encourage the provinces, in the meantime, to use the Canada Assistance Plan.


Joy Langan: Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. Minister of Employment and Immigration. In view of the fact that she now speaks on behalf of the Minister of Finance, possibly on this 60th anniversary of Person's Day, a day that is important to both of us as women, the minister responsible for the Status of Women might be prepared to finally go on the record in cabinet and publicly in support of additional funding for much needed child care.


Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, I think that every member in this House knows how much I care about this issue, whether it is Person's Day or not. As a member of this government, I can say we worked very hard on the legislation the last time. I was very proud of that legislation. If we had not run into problems in the other place from those people, we would have child care in place in Canada today.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: We will close Question Period with one question from the member for Cape Breton-East Richmond and one question from the member for Parry Sound-Muskoka.


Mr. Dave Dingwall (Cape Breton-East Richmond):: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the same minister. I can inform the House that Canadians are not overly impressed with the concern that this government is showing with regards to the child care issue.
October 18, 1989

Child care workers in this country earn 30 per cent less than the average industrial wage, 50 per cent less than a teacher at the elementary level and 30 per cent less than animal care workers on government farms.
Will the minister inform the House what leadership role the Government of Canada is taking to ensure that the remuneration for child care workers in this country is increased, thereby adding significantly to the quality of child care which I believe is the objective of all members of this House.


Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, it certainly is a primary objective of this minister and of this government. He knows full well that the issue he is talking about, which I think is a very important one for the workers themselves and for the children of Canada, is a provincial jurisdiction.


FISHERIES
Mr. Stan Darling (Parry Sound-Muskoka):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. The minister is well aware of the serious situation concerning the huge increase in lamprey eels in the Great Lakes. I contacted him, and I know of others who have also contacted him. It is serious as far as the tourist industry, the sports fishing and commercial fishing industries are concerned.
I am wondering if the minister has been able to get any funds to look after this very serious situation.


Thomas Edward Siddon: Mr. Speaker, the members of the House will be pleased to learn that Canada is increasing substantially its contribution to the work of the Great Lakes Fisheries Commission. The Great Lakes Fisheries Commission was created in 1955 because of the heavy decimation of the Great Lakes fish stocks by the sea lamprey. In 1990, Canada and the United States will be jointly funding this work to the tune of $11.5 million. The Canadian share is being increased by 40 per cent.
I am pleased to report that the work of the hon. member for Parry Sound-Muskoka and other members from the Great Lakes area in all parts of this House have enabled us to make this very important contribution to a very worthy program.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!
Routine Proceedings



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 32(2), I have the honour to table in this House, in both official languages, the annual report to Parliament on future immigration levels, 1989.


ORDER IN COUNCIL
Douglas Grinslade Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to table in both official languages a number of Order in Council appointments which were made by the government pursuant to the provisions of Standing Order 110(1). These are deemed referred to the appropriate standing committees, a list of which is attached.


NATIONAL MUSEUMS OF CANADA
Mr. Jim Edwards (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Communications):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the Annual Report of the National Museums of Canada for 1988-89.


INTERNATIONAL ASSEMBLY OF FRENCH-SPEAKING PARLIAMENTARIANS PRESENTATION OF THIRD ACTIVITY REPORT OF CANADIAN SECTION
Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I would like to table, in both official languages, the third report of the activities of the Canadian Section of the International Assembly of French-Speaking Parliamentarians.
[Editor's Note: See today's Votes and Proceedings.]

October 18, 1989
Petitions


PETITIONS
Jean-Robert Gauthier: Mr. Speaker, I have the duty to table a petition signed by several constituents, message to the government to the effect that the present manufacturers' sales tax has already been increased by the federal government from 9 per cent to 13.5 per cent in less than five years, that the Conservative federal government wants to impose on Canadians a new general 9 per cent tax on goods and services, that this tax will be hidden from Canadians and will be applied virtually to everything they buy, that the imposition of this new general goods and services tax will cause serious and unfair hardship to low and middle-income Canadians and that the imposition of this tax will create an onerous burden on small businesses. Wherefore, the undersigned petitioners humbly pray and call upon this Parliament to reject the proposed goods and services tax.


Hon. William Rompkey (Labrador):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present a petition on behalf of almost 2,000 people in the community of Happy Valley-Goose Bay, Labrador. You will understand that out of a population of 8,000, that is a sizeable portion of the adult population.
Their prayer is that Parliament will do everything within its power to help the Canadian forces base at Happy Valley-Goose Bay, Labrador, become a NATO training centre.


Bill Rompkey: Mr. Speaker, I would like to present a further petition on behalf of some 700 fishermen in Labrador, who reject the cuts in unemployment insurance and propose more meaningful reforms. They call upon the Parliament of Canada to support them, particularly in regard to the extension of the benefit period on the Labrador coast until the end of June, and to concentrate on a labour force development strategy combined with a full employment policy and an effective regional development policy.


Mr. Gilles Bernier (Beauce):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to table a petition signed by 2,500 people from the federal riding of Beauce who ask the Government to continue to be concerned about the problem of the ozone layer and pollution in general in Canada and to protect the forests and wildlife.
With pleasure I table this petition from people in Beauce.


[Stage Direction]
Mr. Benno Friesen (Surrey-White Rock) Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present 66 petitions, accounting for over 1,500 names, circulated by an organization called "Give Life, Canada", from Lower Sackville, Nova Scotia. These names have been submitted from all over British Columbia. The petition reads in part: "At the present time there is no law in Canada protecting the life of a pre-bom child from conception to birth. We, the undersigned, believe in the sanctity of human life from the moment of conception and believe that human life is a gift given by God and that it is unique and special. We believe that there is a need for a just law which safeguards the right to life of the pre-bom to be protected through their growth process to birth." It contains several other points, and it goes on to say: "Wherefore, the undersigned humbly and pray and call upon Parliament to formulate and legislate a law to protect life from conception, a law which seeks to save the life of both mother and child".
Hon. Ralph Ferguson (Lambton-Middlesex):: Mr. Speaker, I rise today under Standing Order 36 to present two petitions on behalf of the constituents of Lambton- Middlesex. They are exercising their ancient right to petition the government to maintain and upgrade VIA services across Canada and to offer the Canadian people an alternative to highway congestion and airport delays.


Mr. Bill Vankoughnet (Hastings-Frontenac-Lennox and Addington):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present a petition certified correct as to form and
October 18, 1989

content from citizens in Emestown Township, who call upon the government to exercise its constitutional right and disallow Quebec's Bill 178.


Mrs. Marlene Catterall (Ottawa West):: Mr. Speaker, I have the privilege of presenting today a petition on behalf of residents of two apartment buildings in Ottawa West, which are largely occupied by retired senior citizens of this community. The petitioners object to the imposition of the new goods and services tax which will cause serious and unfair hardship to low and middle-income Canadians and an onerous burden on small business. The petitioners pray and call upon Parliament to reject the proposed goods and services tax.


Mr. Gilbert Parent (Welland -St. Catharines-Tho-raid):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present a petition on behalf of some of my constituents with regard to the goods and services tax. This despicable tax is opposed by the signatories on this petition, as we in the Liberal party also oppose it. We would hope that the Conservative government would come to its senses and do the right thing by withdrawing this tax or even the thought of imposing this tax on Canadians.


Mr. Jesse Flis (Parkdale-High Park):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36, I have the honour to present a petition on behalf of the residents of Park-dale-High Park who object to the Conservative government imposing on Canadian taxpayers at least 31 new taxes or tax increases.
The petitioners object to the present government increasing the federal manufacturers' sales tax from 9 per cent to 13.5 per cent. They also object to the government's imposition of the new general 9 per cent tax on goods and services, and stress that this will cause serious and unfair hardship to low and middle income- Canadians. They are also stressing that the imposition of this tax will create an onerous burden on small business. The petitioners humbly pray and call upon Parliament to reject the proposed goods and services tax.


Jesse Philip Flis: Mr. Speaker, I have a second petition to present on behalf of Canadians. They are objecting to the elimination of VIA Rail's existing routes and thousands of jobs. The peti-
Petitions
tioners are complaining that the rail passenger service is the safest and most environmentally friendly mode of travel and should not be cut. They call upon Parliament to urge the Government of Canada not cancel, in whole or in part, rail passenger services in Canada.


Mr. Eugene Bellemare (Carleton-Gloucester):: Madam Speaker, I have the pleasure to present a petition signed by more than 1,000 citizens, most of whom live in the riding of Carleton-Gloucester.

This petition is against the goods and services tax as proposed by the present government. It gives me pleasure to support this petition.


Douglas Grinslade Lewis: On a point of order, Madam Speaker, there have been discussions among the parties. I think you would find that there would be unanimous agreement, after all the petitions have been submitted, to revert to Statements by Ministers in order that the Hon. Minister of Employment and Immigration may make a statement, and to allow the opposition parties to reply.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Is there unanimous consent?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: We will finish with the presentation of petitions and then revert to the statement of the hon. minister.


Mr. Joe Comuzzi (Thunder Bay-Nipigon):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, pursuant to Standing Order 36, a petition signed by the people of Montreal with respect to the discontinuance of VIA Rail lines between Montreal and Toronto and Toronto to Windsor in what is commonly referred to as "the corridor". They petition the government to rethink its position with respect to VIA Rail, and to come to its senses and provide passenger train service for people who require it.


Mr. Larry Schneider (Regina-Wascana):: Madam Speaker, I have the duty, pursuant to Standing Order 36, to present to the House a petition duly certified by the clerk of petitions and signed by 152 of my constituents.

October 18, 1989
Petitions
The petition deals with the preservation of the distinctive heritage and tradition of the RCMP uniform.


Stan Kazmierczak Keyes: Madam Speaker, I have the honour and duty, pursuant to Standing Order 36, to present to the House a petition on behalf of 95 constituents on Queenston Road in Hamilton. The petitioners humbly pray and call upon the government to reject the proposed goods and services tax.


Stan Kazmierczak Keyes: Madam Speaker, I also have the duty to present a petition, duly certified by the clerk of petitions, which 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.


Mr. Jim Jordan (Leeds -Grenville):: Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure, in accordance with Standing Order 36, to present a petition on behalf of citizens across Canada objecting to the government's cut in VIA Rail. I can attest to the propriety of this petition as to form and content and it is a pleasure to present it.


Mr. Mac Harb (Ottawa Centre):: Madam Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36, I have the privilege of presenting in the House today a petition on behalf of Canadians who object to the cuts at VIA Rail.


[Stage Direction]
Mme Shirley Maheu (Saint-Laurent-Cartierville):
Pursuant to Standing Order 36, I have the honour and the privilege of tabling 17 petitions from Canadians from 1'Ile-Perrot to Repentigny, in which the petitioners object to the universal tax on goods and services, a tax that would result in serious hardship and be unfair to low and middle income Canadians.
[Stage Direction]
I also have six additional petitions from Canadians who are worried and are asking the government to withdraw the tax which will be hidden and will be applied to virtually everything they buy.
Mr. Joe Fontana (London East):: It is an honour to present to this House a petition containing hundreds of names. It calls upon this government to rescind its action with respect to VIA Rail. These hundreds of names are in addition to the thousands and thousands that have been presented to this House so far.


Joseph Frank (Joe) Fontana: Also, Madam Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36, I would like to present to this House petitions from people in my home city of London asking the Minister of National Defence and this government to reverse their action in closing CFB London.


Mr. Rod Laporte (Moose Jaw-Lake Centre):: Madam Speaker, I rise today to present a petition duly endorsed by the clerk of petitions. It is a petition signed by a number of producers from western Canada who are concerned with the government's handling of the Canadian Wheat Board. In particular, they are very concerned about and critical of the fact that oats was removed from the jurisdiction of the Canadian Wheat Board without prior consultation with the Canadian Wheat Board advisory committee or with major farm organizations in western Canada.
They are concerned about the future of marketing boards and believe that orderly marketing of farm products should not be weakened but, in fact, strengthened. They therefore petition the House and the government to place oats and barley under the Canadian Wheat Board Act and give them the same protection as wheat.
{Translation]


Mrs. Sheila Finestone (Mount Royal):: Madam Speaker, in accordance with Standing Order 36, this petition has been duly certified, and it is now my duty and, in fact, a great pleasure to present the views of hundreds of
October 18, 1989

Canadians who strenuously object to the proposed goods and services tax which constitutes an unprecedented attack on the incomes of Canadians by obliging them to pay higher taxes and increasing inflation, interest and unemployment rates.


Sheila Finestone: Madam Speaker, it is my privilege to respond to the call of constituents who avail themselves of their ancient and undoubted right to present a grievance with respect to VIA Rail. They state that the Government of Canada has decided to eliminate many of VIA Rail's existing routes and thousands of jobs, with which I agree. They state that the people of Canada deserve a high quality passenger rail service including modernized equipment and a rapid rail system throughout the corridor, that annual subsidies provided by the Government of Canada to VIA Rail are not disproportionate to subsidies required for a highway infrastructure and airports, that several rural communities rely exclusively on rail passenger service, and that the tourism industry in Canada relies on rail passenger service. It is environmentally friendly and therefore the petitioners ask the Government of Canada not to cancel part of VIA Rail.


Mrs. Beryl Gaffney (Nepean):: Madam Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36, I am pleased to stand here and present a petition with over 100 signatures with regard to the goods and services tax. These petitioners all reside in my constituency of Nepean and they are strongly opposed to the new goods and services tax that this government is proposing.
The feel it will cause serious and unfair hardship to low and middle income Canadians and they ask this government to rescind its decision and not move ahead with the GST.


Beryl Gaffney: In addition, Madam Speaker, I have a petition with regard to the clawback and it signed by 50 senior citizens in my riding of Nepean. These seniors are very concerned with this proposal of the government and how it will hurt them in their retirement years. They ask the Government of Canada
Petitions
to abolish the clawback of the old age security and reaffirm its commitment to universality.


Beryl Gaffney: In addition, Madam Speaker, I have a petition on VIA Rail signed by 155 petitioners, also in my riding of Nepean, who are very concerned with the government's cut-back of VIA Rail. They ask that the government rescind its decision, and they humbly pray and call upon Parliament to urge the Government of Canada not to cancel, in whole or in part, the rail passenger services in Canada.


Elizabeth  (Beth) Phinney: Madam Speaker, I have a petition, certified correct, pursuant to Standing Order 36, from many Canadians who want VIA Rail service improved and expanded. These petitioners humbly pray and call upon Parliament to urge the Government of Canada not to cancel, in whole or in part, rail passenger service in Canada.


Mr. A1 Horning (Okanagan Centre):: Madam Speaker, I have the honour of presenting to the House of Commons six petitions from residents of my constituency, totalling 205 names and stating that at the present time there is no law in Canada protecting the life of the pre-bom child from conception to birth. They call upon Parliament to formally legislate a law to protect life from conception, a law which seeks to save the life of both mother and child.


Edward Allan Horning: I also have a second petition with 36 names which opposes Quebec's Bill 178 and asks Parliament to pass a resolution of the House of Commons urging the Governor General in Council to give full force and effect to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and by the exercise of this constitutional power, to disallow Bill 178 in the province of Quebec.


Mr. Francis G. LeBlanc (Cape Breton Highlands- Canso):: Madam Speaker, it is my honour, pursuant to Standing Order 36, to present a petition signed by thousands of constituents in my riding of Cape Breton Highlands-Canso who decry the fact that currently there is no legislation to protect the unborn.
To express the depth of their concern, they want Parliament to know that they are anxious for a new law to be put in place which will protect the unborn from the

Petitions
moment of conception onward and urge Parliament to introduce this legislation as soon as possible.
I want to underline the depth of their feeling on this issue. There are thousands of names on this petition and it is the second series of petitions which we have on this question.


Mr. Lyle Kristiansen (Kootenay West-Revelstoke):: Madam Speaker, I rise pursuant to Standing Order 36 with a petition on the subject of VIA Rail. It is one of a long series of petitions on the same subject from my constituency. This one is signed by constituents of mine from Revelstoke and Castlegar, British Columbia. There are a number of other signatures from persons as far afield as Nanaimo, B.C.; Calgary, Alberta; Hamilton, Ontario; and Aldergrove, British Columbia; who were passengers on the VIA Rail system, on an over-crowded Canadian line of the VIA Rail system, when they signed these petitions.
The petitioners object strongly to the proposed cuts to the VIA Rail budget and ask in particular that Parliament act to maintain VIA Rail's present national network, to upgrade VIA Rail with new equipment and to give VIA Rail a sufficient budget to maintain a national mandate for passenger service.


Lyle Stuart Kristiansen: Madam Speaker, I also have a second petition, this time on the subject of the Forest Resource Development Agreement. Half of the petitioners are constituents of Kootenay West-Revelstoke and the other half of the signatories come from the riding of Prince George- Peace River, the constituency of the minister responsible for forests.
In this petition the undersigned state they encourage the Parliament of Canada to renew this important agreement with British Columbia and thereby provide for a renewed commitment to restocking our forest land, advancing forestry research, promoting silviculture and assisting the forest industry in developing the new products and markets that will provide us with forestiy jobs of the future.


Mr. Peter Milliken (Kingston and the Islands):: Madam Speaker, I am pleased to present a petition, pursuant to Standing Order 36, by persons across Canada who object
to the government's policy of cutting VIA Rail. They indicate in their petition that these cuts are unfair, that it is a policy that is not to be countenanced in Canada because it destroys one of the very basic industries upon which our country was founded. They call upon Parliament to reject any cuts in VIA Rail and for the government to avoid any cancellation of any train service across this country.


Mr. Ross Harvey (Edmonton East):: Madam Speaker, I rise under the provisions of Standing Order 36 to present several copies of the same petition signed by Albertans from Medicine Hat, Redcliff, Grande Prairie, Beaver-Lodge, Sexsmith, Winterbum, St. Albert, Stony Plain, Sherwood Park, Fort Saskatchewan, Ponoka, Lacombe, Wetaskiwin and, of course, the great metropolis of Edmonton. The petitioners call on the government to support VIA Rail, to abandon plans for cut-backs and to provide the necessary resources to allow VIA to operate as a modern effective transportation company.


David Walker: Madam Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 361 rise to present a petition on the issue of VIA Rail and the cuts to VIA Rail. It is signed by 60 people living throughout Canada who were on the train when we were doing our crosscountry task force and agree that together they would like to see that the VIA Rail cut-backs be changed, that existing routes and thousands of jobs not be eliminated. Canada deserves a high quality of passenger rail service including modernized equipment and a rapid rail system. They agree that the rail passenger system is the safest and most environmentally friendly mode of travel.
They ask that Parliament reconsider this decision and support VIA Rail.


Mr. Lyle Vanclief (Prince Edward-Hastings):: Madam Speaker, I too rise today to add even more names to the list of Canadians who are requesting that the government rescind its decision on the changes to VIA Rail.


Mrs. Christine Stewart (Northumberland):: Madam Speaker, I present petitions today signed by constituents in my riding of Northumberland. They come from the villages of Colbourne and Campbellford and for the most part represent farmers and small business people. They want the government to understand that they are not wealthy Canadians, that they do not have margins of profit that can sustain the proposed goods and services tax. They want the government to know that they will have to go out of business if this tax goes through. They
October 18, 1989

urge the government to withdraw in its entirety the goods and services tax proposed.


Mr. Bob Speller (Haldimand-Norfolk):: Madam Speaker, I rise under the provisions of Standing Order 36 to present a petition by a number of people in the towns of Simcoe and Brantford who are very concerned about the way VIA Rail is going to be cut in their towns.
They pray that this government to cancel these cuts from VIA Rail.


Mr. Gilles Rocheleau (Hull-Aylmer):: Madam Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36, I once again rise in the House on behalf of 4,577 petitioners who signed 154 duly certified petitions. Your petitioners, residents of the riding of Hull-Aylmer, humbly pray and call upon Parliament to reject the Conservative government's proposed goods and services tax, a tax that is invisible, regressive, complex and unfair to all Canadians.


Mr. George S. Rideout (Moncton):: Madam Speaker, I rise pursuant to Standing Order 36 to lodge with you a petition requesting the government to change its decision on VIA Rail and to reinstate this most vital service to all Canadians, particularly to the people in my riding.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: As was agreed earlier, we will now revert to Statements by Ministers and recognize the hon. Minister of Employment and Immigration.
Statements by Ministers IMMIGRATION


Barbara Jean McDougall: Madam Speaker, I appreciate the unanimous consent for me to make a statement this afternoon.
I want to point out that the decision to increase planned immigration to Canada in 1990 from 165,000 to
175,000	immigrants as per the reports I tabled, an increase of 15,000 over the previous year's planning range, is a decision that is in keeping with the blueprint outlined in the Speech from the Throne.
The 1990 level was determined after consultations with provincial and territorial governments, as well as with non- governmental organizations, and represents a consensus which has emerged during our consultation process of the past several years.

The immigration levels this government has established, Madam Speaker, reflect a constantly evolving balance among many elements-family reunification, protection of genuine refugees, as well as labour market needs. All of these factors must be carefully weighed before we determine what level is best for Canada and the people who settle here.
We are now about to begin a series of consultations with government and service organizations to establish a longer-term plan for immigration levels and the balance among all of these categories.
Family reunification remains the cornerstone of the current immigration program and in 1990 Canada plans to admit 61,000 immigrants with close relatives in Canada-spouses, unmarried dependents and older parents.

This is 4,000 more than the 1989 target and reflects the expected demand of sponsorships for relatives of people now living in Canada under the expansion to the family class that we had introduced earlier.
Also in 1990 about 13,000 refugees will be admitted from abroad under government sponsorship. Within this

October 18, 1989
Statements by Ministers
global target the number accepted from Southeast Asia puts us on track to meeting the commitment that I announced in Geneva this summer to resettle 16,000 Southeast Asian refugees by 1992.
In 1990 we expect the private sector will sponsor the admission of some 13,000 refugees also as a continued expression of its commitment. In all, Canada will resettle some 26,000 refugees during 1990. Another 7,000 people are expected to be landed as refugees during 1990 after having been examined under our new refugee determination system.
Finally, 3,000 to 6,000 people with family ties to Canada will be admitted under special humanitarian measures.

These increased immigration figures reflect a broad consensus that emerged through consultations among national non-governmental organizations and regional, local and community groups over the past few years.
As all members of this House are aware, our immigration levels have increased every year since this government came into office. Immigration is currently around the post-war annual average.
But Canada needs to plan its immigration levels for more than a single year at a time, since levels decisions have an impact on many federal and provincial government departments as well as on agencies that help immigrants settle in Canada.
It is now time to re-evaluate the situation and prepare a comprehensive plan for the 1991-1995 period.

In preparing this plan, we will ask our consultative partners to take into consideration demographic movements, Canada's current and projected population size, where people choose to live, and related social and economic trends. The motivation behind the extensive consultations that I am launching in November 1989 is to continue to March 1990.
In expanding our consultations we will draw on a wider range of views in formulating immigration policy for the medium term. I intend to be personally involved in these consultations, because I want to emphasize that I attach considerable importance to this exercise.
We will ask experts on economic, social and demographic trends in immigration to contribute up to date information and data to our discussions. We will invite representatives from all levels of government, as well as from business, labour, health, social services and education, to make their views known in a series of multi-disciplinary dialogues.
One of the objectives of these consultations is to dispel myths about the effects that immigration has on Canada and to develop a broader dialogue on immigration.

I am sure that this dialogue will convince us even more that immigrants make a valuable contribution to Canada, that they enrich our society and our economy and that they help us maintain our tradition of tolerance which is envied by all.

I am confident that this exchange of views and information will assist the government in formulating the specific number and mix of immigrants that Canada should plan to admit during the 1991-1995 period in accordance with the government's general intention to increase immigration levels. I am looking forward to a constructive dialogue on the impacts of immigration, an important component of the economic and social development of our country.


Mr. Sergio Marchi (York West):: Madam Speaker, I am very pleased on behalf of my colleague, the associate critic on immigration, the member of Parliament for Scarborough West, and my colleagues in the Liberal party to respond to what in essence was a very poor, unimaginative and uncreative blueprint if one can call it that. I say that for four reasons.
First, the increase in the announced levels for next year is only marginal and substantial at the very best. Not only does it keep with the past increases-for instance, last year it was 25,000-but it loses its impact particularly at a time when all the so-called experts are calling for an additional number of immigrants into Canada, and a substantial number.
Therefore it does not address the world realities or the needs of Canada because we have an ageing population and a dwindling birth rate. We have an out-migration of some 70,000 people a year and therefore we need to constructively and positively harness energies and engage Canadians in a debate on how we face this looming
October 18, 1989

crisis of population and population decline in this country.
We do not need a short-term five-year plan. What we need is long-term vision that will try to harness the viewpoints of all Canadians. What I would suggest to the minister is to appoint a royal commission so that it may once and for all try to tap into the views and the feelings of all Canadians, of all Canadian groups and entities from all regions of this country; so that we may look at immigration positively as opposed to leaving the important decisions for the year 2000, only to be faced with insurmountable challenges at that particular time which will only perhaps incite some kind of backlash across this country.
The second problem with these announced immigration levels is the issue of family class within the Tory agenda of immigration. Under successive Liberal governments the family class and assisted family class levels comprised approximately 50 per cent of our over-all immigration policy. It was clearly a cornerstone of Liberal immigration policy.
Under five successive years of Tory administration, we have seen the family class levels slip. Last year it was at 32 per cent; this year it is at 36 per cent. Business as usual.
What we are seeing is that the difference between the traditional levels of 50 per cent and some mid-30 range is causing a great deal of frustration among the many Canadian families we meet every week in our constituency offices, because they cannot sponsor quickly enough or successfully enough family reunification programs.
Therefore I reiterate that the Tories have failed to upgrade the family class level to its proper and traditional place, something that Canadians from coast to coast have been articulating and have been asking this government to do.
The third area is on the question of refugees. We have seen from our own documents that private sponsorship in the last number of years has doubled. It has gone from
6,000	a couple of years ago to 10,000 this year to 13,000 next year. At the same time, we have seen government levels stay the same. They have basically been the status quo.
Statements by Ministers
What we are seeing, of course, is a shift away from a strong government commitment to one of a greater community commitment. While the community commitment ought to be there, we are also saying that the government commitment should increase proportionately, because otherwise there would simply be a one-sided commitment and what we need is a two-prong approach.
Another matter dealing with refugees was the curious aspect that neither in the minister's response nor in her documents does she talk about the refugee backlog, which is an absolute mess and nightmare from the word go. There are over 100,000 people in the backlog, some
85,000	claimants all told. Up until a couple of weeks ago only 57 claims had been finally processed. Those people cannot afford to wait two, three or four years for that backlog to be cleared. Canada cannot afford to go through this expensive and time consuming exercise. What we need is a minister to recognize that there is a grey area between her black and white view of immigration, that there is a compromise solution that offers a win-win solution.
The fourth item is that this blueprint ignores the international realities and world opinion. For instance, the Prime Minister travelled to Singapore just a few days ago and he was criticized, justifiably so, for promoting a very selective immigration policy in that part of the world that "skimmed the cream", that allowed rich business immigrants to immigrate without balancing with family class, without balancing with refugees from that part of the world. The minister did not address this feature. She failed to address the other feature of business immigration, that is say, to ensure that the business proposals by which they are approved are in fact being realized in this country.
On the international stage the minister also failed to make any mention about the historical developments in eastern Europe, particularly the question of East German migration and particularly since she has had discussions with the Canadian German community in this country. We allowed special movements in 1956 from Hungary of 37,000; in 1968,12,000 Czechoslovakians; and in 1982, 10,000 Polish citizens. There is not one mention about Canada being in touch with the movements in eastern Europe vis-a-vis immigration.
Finally, I also would like to simply and quickly address a comment made by the Prime Minister whereby he suggested that there are ''racist tendencies" in some Canadians about refugees and immigration. This is the same Prime Minister who announced a national crisis and called a national emergency session of Parliament

October 18, 1989
Statements by Ministers
over a couple of hundred refugee claimants who landed in eastern Canada. That lecture is misguided and, if there is any tolerance, understanding, or education, it ought to start with the Prime Minister and the government.


Mr. Dan Heap (Trinity-Spadina):: Madam Speaker, I am pleased to have this opportunity and I thank the House for agreeing to make it possible for the statement and the replies, because the minister's report shows a consistently anti-democratic bias throughout.
She restricted both the total increase in immigration and the annual consultation, while the government cuts back on adjustment programs for immigrants. She is restricting family reunification as a proportion, while expanding the brain drain. She restricts refugees from police states and death squads in Central America so as to increase economic migrants from eastern Europe.
In Canada, the minister is sweeping nearly 100,000 refugee claimants of the old backlog under the rug by denying them right of counsel and using specially distorted guidelines for so-called humanitarian review. Furthermore, she refuses to say what she will do with the 7,500 in the new refugee backlog for 1989.
The increase of only 10,000 or 15,000 total immigration flies against the unanimous recommendations of the Tory led committee on labour, employment and immigration in 1985. Holding back the demographic study that was promised for 1988 and excluding many immigrant support groups from the consultation enables her to run her program through with sham consultation.
While her colleagues reduce opportunities for immigrants, especially women, to learn English or French as a second language, by cancelling the citizenship instruction and language training program she cuts back job training opportunities for immigrants as well as Canadian born workers.
While increasing the target for family reunification, which is the cornerstone of her immigration policy, by only 7 per cent, she boosts the business immigrants and families of selected workers by 21 per cent and the retirees by 50 per cent. This goes with increasing delays
in family class applications as immigration staff is transferred to business immigration.
The anti-democratic bias shows most in the minister's overseas refugee plan. She is increasing the level for eastern Europe and reducing the level for Latin America. She hides almost 4,000 questionable refugees from eastern Europe by not including them in her totals. They are the designated class who need not show a well-founded fear of persecution. Yet, eastern Europe is becoming more free, as she herself acknowledges, while the death squad killings increase in Guatemala, El Salvador and Chile. She claims that private sponsorships for Central America have declined, although she knows that the reason why sponsorships have declined is that her overseas consular officers have delayed interviews and applications.
Finally, the Minister predicts only 7,000 to be landed annually of those who claim refugee status while in Canada since January 1, 1989. This is shocking. After more than nine months the immigration and refugee board has already granted refugee status to 3,049, while 7,555 have not yet received decisions in their cases. Most of them have not even had their cases opened. So does the Minister plan to deport over 4,500 of them and any more that come before December 31, without giving them any hearing at all on their claims?


QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER
[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)
Albert Glen Cooper: Madam Speaker, Question No. 142 will be answered today.


Mr. Kaplan: Has the United States Drug Enforcement Administration turned over any funds derived from drug money forfeitures to the Canadian ambassador in Washington and, if so (a) what amount (b) to what use is it the intention of the government to put the money?
October 18, 1989


Right Hon. Joe Clark (Secretary of State for External Affairs):: On Thursday September 21,1989, at a presentation ceremony held in Washington, Canadian Ambassador Burney accepted a cheque for $US 1,000,000.00 from US Attorney General Thornburgh. These monies represent the Canadian share of $US 5,000,000.00 forfeited from money laundered in the Polar Cap Case and was provided to Canada pursuant to a bilateral Memorandum of Understanding signed on September 7, 1989.
The cheque was forwarded to the Department of External Affairs and deposited to the Miscellaneous Revenue Account of the Consolidated Revenue Fund on Monday October 2, 1989.


Albert Glen Cooper: Madam Speaker, I ask that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.
[Translation\


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: The question enumerated by the parliamentary secretary has been answered. Shall the remaining questions stand?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Albert Glen Cooper: Madam Speaker, I ask that all notices of motions for the production of papers be allowed to stand.


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Shall all notices of motions for the production of papers be allowed to stand?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from Tuesday, October 17, consideration of the motion of Mr. Wilson (Etobicoke
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Centre) that Bill C-28, an act to amend the Income Tax Act, the Federal-Provincial Fiscal Arrangements and Federal Post-Secondary Education and Health Contributions Act, the Old Age Security Act, the Public Utilities Income Tax Transfer Act, the War Veterans Allowance Act and a related act, be read the second time and referred to a legislative committee.
Albert Glen Cooper: Madam Speaker, yesterday as we debated this bill, we had an agreement to split our time into 10 minutes and 5 minutes for questions. I am wondering if we could have the consent of the two opposition parties to maintain the same agreement for today.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: No problem, Madam Speaker. For today, we agree to maintain the arrangement of 10 minutes for speeches and 5 minutes for questions.


Ms. Mitchell:: Madam Speaker, no, we do not have agreement on this side. Our members would like to have the full time.


Mrs. Louise Feltham (Wild Rose):: Madam Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to take part in this debate and to speak in support of this important and timely bill.
In my remarks this afternoon I want to direct the attention of the House to an examination of the package of measures in Bill C-28 as a whole. Indeed, I would like to look at the bill in the context of our budgetary and economic policy as a whole. In that context, I want to affirm that the policy set out in this bill is a reasonable one, a fair one and, not least, a necessary one.
When I say the measures in this bill are reasonable, I mean they are appropriate to the economic circumstances we are in. We are in a serious situation, particularly with respect to the growing public debt, and the measures that address the problem. To demonstrate what I mean, let us examine just two of them: first, the surtaxes. I believe it is reasonable to expect all taxpayers to bear some of the burden of deficit reduction, since the deficit is a problem that affects everyone. That is why we have proposed to increase the federal surtax by 2 percentage points, from 3 per cent to 5 per cent, effective July 1, 1989.

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The new high income surtax of 3 per cent will be levied on people with incomes over $70,000. In addition to the general surtax this will ensure that the burden of deficit reduction falls most heavily on those who are best able to carry it.
Second, the large corporations tax. I believe it is reasonable to expect all large corporations in Canada to pay a fair share of federal tax and thus help contribute to the deficit reduction effort. This new tax will only apply on capital in excess of $10 million and thus smaller businesses are not subject to this tax. The budget papers show that about 3,600 large corporations, accounting for approximately three-quarters of the total corporate capital employed in Canada, will be subject to this tax.
I am satisfied that when this bill is examined in committee, the members of the committee will find that the policy it implements is a reasonable one like the two specific provisions I have just noted.
My second concern and a constant concern of the government is with fairness. We want to ensure that the impact of our policies will place the greater burden on those who are better able to cany it, and we want to ensure that everyone who is able is helping solve our common problems. A number of the measures in this bill contribute to the fairness of the package. The two measures I have just mentioned, for example, ensure that those with higher incomes do contribute a fair share.
Other measures demonstrate the government's commitment to targeting assistance to those who need it most. To increase the fairness of the system we are targeting more assistance to lower-income Canadians by doubling the refundable sales tax credits for adults and children and by raising the income threshold so more people will qualify for the full credit. For those who receive the full credit, these measures will more than compensate for the federal sales tax increases that were announced in the April budget.
A second example of a measure designed to increase the fairness of the income tax system is our proposal to ensure that Canadians with incomes over $50,000 a year repay the benefits received under the family allowance and the old age security programs. The proposal respects the principle of universality in social programs, which
this government fully accepts, by ensuring that all eligible persons continue to receive these payments.
The programs remain untouched because the amount of repayment does not depend on the status of the individual but on his or her income and is administered through the personal income tax system. Of course these benefits are already subject to personal income tax and, therefore, are already being partially repaid at progressive rates by all taxpayers. Lower and middle income Canadians who receive these benefits will not be affected by this measure, and those whose incomes drop below the threshold will continue to enjoy full benefits. The $50,000 threshold is indexed on the same basis as other indexed brackets and thresholds in the tax system. As well, the level of the threshold will be reviewed periodically and adjusted as appropriate.
Other measures also improve the fairness of the system. I want to draw attention to the new deductions in respect of part-time attendant care for the working disabled and to the new drought relief tax deferral for cattle farmers who have had to reduce the size of then-breeding herds because of the drought. These provisions are designed to assist those with special needs and will continue to enhance the over-all fairness of the tax system.
To have a fair tax system we must have a fair tax base. Therefore a number of measures are included in this bill to make the tax base more equitable. An example is our proposal to tax accrued investment income on an annual basis. This will help ensure that those who invest in contracts and pay income annually and those who choose to invest in compound instruments will be taxed on a comparable basis.
Measures relating to the taxation of leasing profits will ensure that the leasing industry bears its fair share of tax and will help curtail the use of leasing as an after tax financing mechanism. At the same time we were careful to ensure that these proposals will not interfere with the legitimate use of leasing.
Finally, I want to draw attention to a third characteristic of the measures in this bill. I believe they are reasonable and they make the system more fair. They are also necessary. They accept the reality of constraints imposed by a growing public debt and demonstrate that this government is acting effectively to face the many challenges that we face as a result. The debt is large, and is growing as we speak. By this time tomorrow the debt
October 18, 1989

will be larger by more than $80 million. Two weeks from now it will have grown by another $1 billion.
The main reason for this dramatic rate of growth is that the interest payments on the debt are increasing rapidly. Only 20 years ago, just 12 cents of every dollar taxpayers sent to Ottawa went to interest payments. By 1984, that figure had already grown to 32 cents, and this year it is over 35 cents.
The debt is a major obstacle to building the kind of future we want for ourselves and for our children. But this does not have to happen. This does not have to be the legacy by which future generations of Canadians remember us. We can and we must stop borrowing from our children and their futures. We must all realize that it is too easy to borrow from future generations. They cannot speak in this debate. They are not here to vote on this legislation. But they are the ones who would face the consequences if we did not act. So we, in this House-all of its members-must speak for them. We must act on their behalf by taking the necessary actions now to reduce the deficit and control the growth of the debt. We must start paying our own way.
This is exactly what our government has been trying to do from the first day that we took office. From day one we recognized how serious the debt problem really was and we have been acting responsibly to bring it under control.
In this budget, which this bill will help implement, the Minister of Finance proved he is not complacent. He introduced a careful balance of expenditure and revenue measures to deal with the debt. These debt control measures will cut more than $5 billion from the projected deficit this year and $9 billion next year. The budget measures will cut the annual deficit in half, to $15 billion by the year 1993-94. These are reasonable measures. They are fair measures and they are necessary measures which recognize that deficit reduction has a greater purpose. It provides more flexibility for the government to ensure that the programs Canadians value can be maintained; it means that Canadians have greater confidence in their economy and their future; it holds out on the promise of sustained economic growth, improved competitiveness and the creation of productive
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jobs; and it is an essential pre-condition for an increasing prosperous and compassionate Canada.
In summary, Madam Speaker, I believe the measures in Bill C-28 are an integral part of the reasonable, fair and necessary economic policy set out by this government at the beginning of its term in office which we have followed consistently since that time.


Mr. Butland:: Madam Speaker, I think rubbish and nonsense are euphemisms for pure unadulterated garbage. The member did not mention the word clawback. I believe it was invented by the Conservative government and it is a very appropriate term. She should have noted that $50,000 now will certainly not be $50,000 in five years, ten years and 20 years. Does the hon. member agree with the finance committee chairman's statement that this is a pernicious, sneaky attack on universality? It is the end of universality as we know it. Does she not accept the fact that it will affect several thousand seniors now but as many as one million in 20 years from now? Does she not agree that this is effectively the end of universality as we know it?


Louise Feltham: Madam Speaker, maybe the gentleman does know what rubbish is all about, but when I speak I am sincere in saying that what this government is doing is necessary to protect our seniors now and in the future. Universality is not being threatened.
As I stated in my speech, old age security payments are in place. They will stay in place when seniors receive their cheque every month. They can spend that. There is no limit as far as whether they have to return so much on a certain month. We will be dealing with this in the income tax legislation, as we have done with all other issues, to ensure that seniors in the future do receive what is necessary for a good living.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: Madam Speaker, the speech just given by the hon. member for Wild Rose was absolutely incredible. In the course of her statement she indicated that this government had concentrated its efforts on deficit reduction.
Would she not agree with me that this government is obviously a colossal flop when it comes to deficit reduction? The Minister of Finance in his first budget in 1984 indicated that the deficit this financial year would be $16 billion dollars and it is $30 billion. Also he indicated that he was going to reduce the deficit and, in fact, the national debt has doubled in four years of economic mismanagement by this government. She has the gall to

October 18, 1989
Government Orders
stand on her feet and suggest that this government's policy has been deficit reduction from day one.
Would the hon. member not agree with me that if that has been the policy that it has been a total and complete flop?


Louise Feltham: Madam Speaker, no, I will not agree with the hon. member that what the government has done is a total flop. I would assume that if you understand anything about finances, and being one of the members of the Liberal Party, you must realize the legacy you left to us. The interest that we pay each year on the debt, with the additional amount every year and compiling that amount, makes the debt that we have today an inheritance from your government.


Mr. Mayer:: Just a comment, Madam Speaker. The hon. member for Kingston and the Islands gets up and talks about what has gone on. Some of us were in this place when the hon. member's party was the government. We had interest rates of 22 per cent, 23 per cent, 25 per cent. We had an inflation rate at 11 per cent and 12 per cent.
If the member wants to talk about seniors, one of the most pernicious things that any senior citizen has to deal with is inflation. If we are talking about managing the economy, surely to goodness in terms of dealing with the seniors, which is one of the things he talked about, one of the things that we can do for seniors is to provide a stable economic environment so that when they get into their retirement years, some of that stability is there in the form of stable interest rates and reasonable inflation rates.


Ross Harvey: Madam Speaker, I must admit I am fascinated by the hon. minister's argument that it is okay to poke a person in the right eye now, because someone used to poke him in the left eye.
I must thank the hon. member for her vigorous and stimulating defence of the government's policy in this regard.
I must confess, however, that when listening I was reminded of the words of Humpty Dumpty in Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland who said at one point-I believe I can recall this-"When I use a word, it means
precisely what I intend it to mean, neither more nor less". I was reminded of this in the member's use of the term "universality".
I would like to ask the member if her understanding of universality is the same as mine, which is to say that a universal program is a program that is available, without any hindrance, to all Canadians. Or in her use of the term, does it mean that it is in some way means-tested, as will be the case with the old age security program and the family allowance program, given the passage of this bill?


Louise Feltham: Madam Speaker, I think I have already answered that question. I stated earlier that all eligible seniors will receive the old age pension. Old age security is not something that will be determined to any one person by the amount of money he or she has at this time. Seniors will receive a cheque every month. The old age security cheque will not be discontinued because someone has an excess amount of money. People will receive those cheques.
The income tax department will look at the amount of money that a person has. If he or she can be taxed on an amount over $50,000, then, on a percentage basis, some of that money will be returned to the government.
I must also answer to the questioner, that when talking to the seniors in my riding, they are in agreement that the future generation and young people now need some of that money and they are very glad to share it with them.


George Saunders Rideout: Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise and speak on this particular bill and to talk about the ramifications of this legislation. As one looks through and sees the size of this bill, one realizes right away that it is a far-reaching bill which deals with all sorts of things: income tax, federal-provincial fiscal arrangements, post-secondary education, old age security, and so on.
I think it reaches furthest into the pocketbooks of Canadians. It reaches furthest into the pocketbooks of the elderly and the young, the unemployed, the sick, and the students of this country. I feel badly about it too. I really do. I think it is a shock and a shame that this government would foist this type of legislation upon Canadians.
October 18, 1989

The clawback in particular is a breach of the Prime Minister's so-called sacred trust, a thing that would never happen. But the clawback is happening and is being implemented in this legislation. It is a shame because it is a direct attack on the elderly of Canada. They are the people who paid their way and supported this country and this government, and now they are repaid with a clawback.
The principle of universality has been destroyed by this legislation. It is shocking to say the least. If I can quote the Canadian Council on Social Development which said, back in April of this year, that by taking back the entire family allowance from 368,000 families and all of the old age security from 54,000 seniors and reducing these benefits for many more, the government is eroding the fundamental principle of universality which recognizes our collective responsibility for caring for children and for the elderly.
That is a shocking indictment of this government and what it has done. The clawback of family allowance will take up $1.68 billion from family budgets over the next five years, roughly $500 million a year by the year 1991. Those are families, in most cases, which cannot afford this loss and this reduction. Of course, the government will tell us that it will give it back, that it will have all of these fancy programs and ways to restore some of the money, but I say to you that it should not be taken in the first place. It should not have to be put back.
Some things are sacred. Some things ought not to be touched. Obviously we have to maintain that principle of universality. The party that I have the pleasure of working with and the riding that I have the pleasure of representing firmly believes that we should maintain the principle of universality.
I am also concerned about the effects of this legislation on higher education. Again, the Canadian Association of University Teachers said:
Higher education is, in fact, an investment as much as an expenditure. The Finance Minister talked in his budget about the effect on future generations. The effect of failing to compete with the Americans, the Japanese and many European countries in educational investment will be to ensure a future for our youth as hamburger flippers rather than as meaningful participants in the technological era that is upon us.
What is the effect of this legislation and the effect of stopping the movement of funds to higher education to the universities in our community? I happen to have one and my hon. friend from Beausejour has another. I can tell you from talking to the presidents of those universities that they have had to cut back on programs and cut
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back on some of the education that their students are receiving. It is in large measure because this government is not fulfilling its obligation to higher education.
I also want to talk about the UI cuts in Bill C-21, and the effects of those cuts which are covered here in this legislation. Moncton was lucky, quite frankly, and had the legislative committee in that riding. We heard from a number of people who had concerns, but the impression that one is left with is that the committee wasted its time, that nothing really had any impact on what the government intended to do.
There is no guarantee that the UI program which has set up a training budget will see training done in New Brunswick. There is no guarantee that there will be any jobs once people are retrained. The government is taking money out of the pockets of New Brunswickers, and the unemployed who have contributed their funds to the unemployment insurance fund will end up in Ontario in Quebec and out west where the high-tech industries are looking for retraining in doing jobs. The effect of this legislation is to take money out of Atlantic Canada, out of New Brunswick, and put it where it is really not needed for retraining people, where there is an abundance of jobs and work.


Mr. Robichaud:: It is a resettlement program.


George Saunders Rideout: It will force the people of Atlantic Canada and New Brunswick to move and to live in such places as Toronto, heaven forbid. This government hammers away at the people of Atlantic Canada. I think it is absolutely essential that there be an amendment to this legislation which would see the money that is taken from the workers of New Brunswick stays in New Brunswick for retraining and that there is new job creation and new opportunities for which these people can be retrained.
It was interesting that cabinet ministers from the New Brunswick government were not allowed to speak or to give their views at the hearings because somebody suggested that they may be grandstanding. The Hon. Russ King, Minister of Advanced Education in New Brunswick, spoke of the problem of illiteracy in New Brunswick and that because of the changes in the UI, people would have to give it up if they wanted to get training to improve themselves. They are in a Catch-22 situation because if they are illiterate, want to improve themselves and try to do something in a particular area it is going to cost them their UI. That will cost them the

October 18, 1989
Government Orders
opportunity to be retrained, which is the focus of this legislation.
Needless to say, the changes in qualification times have very serious adverse effects on an area like New Brunswick. I know from discussions with my colleague from Beausejour that the seasonal workers in his riding, as well as in my own, are being very adversely affected by the UI changes.
What we have to look at in all of this is the ripple effect that this type of legislation has, with all the changes that have been put upon the people in the regions. There is less money for seniors. There is downgrading of education and health facilities in Atlantic Canada; changes to UI in effect hitting the people who can least afford it; losses of VIA Rail jobs and losses of VIA Rail passenger service in Atlantic Canada.
In my own riding the closure of the CNR shops is putting 1,200 people out of work. Now we have the allusion from a recent transport committee meeting that perhaps the Atlantic region is going to be closed and another 2,500 jobs will be lost to the Moncton riding. All of these things spill over the whole economy and have an adverse affect on the citizens of that economy.
This is bad legislation. It is hardship legislation. It is legislation that is going to be felt by Atlantic Canadians for a long time.
I think it is particularly interesting to look at the social benefits that this type of legislation is adversely affecting, particularly with the clawback. We look at the Prime Minister's campaign promise, and appropriately it was in Summerside, P.E.I. where they are really thrilled about the promises from the Prime Minister. Ele said: "As long as I am Prime Minister of Canada social benefits, especially those for the elderly, will be improved not diminished by our government."
What a commitment, and here is the proof of the commitment. You can see that the commitment was nothing but hollow and really negative as far as a
commitment to seniors in Atlantic Canada and in my riding is concerned.
In conclusion, the clawback is adverse, and the whole approach of this government as far as privatization is concerned, closing the bases, closing VIA Rail passenger service, all points to one thing. This government suffers from a rare disease called "deficititis". It is fighting the deficit on the backs of those who can least afford it, our seniors, the people who depend on a national rail service, the people in communities with military bases, and the people particularly in the regions who depend on a national, equitable UI system. This bill should be withdrawn.


Mr. Crosby:: Madam Speaker, as this debate on Bill C-28 continues and we hear from members of the opposition, I always feel the compulsion to rise in the House of Commons to put the facts on record in case anybody is actually listening to the ramblings of the hon. members opposite, particularly with respect to the change in the old age assistance taxation. They speak of the elderly, those who are in dire straits and need help, but what they never mention is the exact method of taxation, the fact that only those who receive old age assistance and whose incomes exceed $77,000 a year will be asked to pay back that part of the old age assistance which is not already taxed. In the case of an individual making over $77,000, I think it probably amounts to $1,500 or less which he or she is being asked to contribute.
Apparently, the hon. members want those people to keep that money, possibly at the expense of other Canadians who are really in dire need and need maintenance programs, special help and assistance, which this government is providing. They say in defence of their position, that we are breaching the golden rule of universality. I have said here, and I will say it again: you cannot eat universality, you cannot wear it, you cannot put it in the bank, you cannot improve your lifestyle with the concept of universality. Many think it is a sacred cow rather than a sacred trust.
The government has taken those steps to insure that Canada remains solvent, to insure that Canada, as a nation, is able to provide benefits to those in need. Yes, at the expense of those not in need. Yes, at the expense of people with incomes of $77,000 and more.
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Does the hon. member disagree with the policy that takes money from people with incomes of $77,000 and gives it to those with no income or little income, who are really in need? Is he against that policy?


An Hon. Member:: Hear, hear!


George Saunders Rideout: Madam Speaker, in a nutshell I disagree with any program and any piece of legislation that has the effect of taking money out of Atlantic Canada and putting it someplace where it is not needed. That is what my hon. friend is suggesting that we should do.
Sure he suggests that we should cut VIA so there are no passenger rail services in Atlantic Canada. He suggests that we should take all of the training money like UI and send it to Toronto-to Ontario-and to Montreal where it is not needed. That is what I am opposed to, and I will continue to fight that type of legislation. I am surprised that my hon. friend could support such terrible legislation for Atlantic Canadians.


Mr. Nunziata:: Madam Speaker, the member opposite says that rich Canadians should not receive government benefits, that universality should not be directed toward rich Canadians. Well, his Prime Minister is a rich Canadian. In fact, he earns over $100,000 a year perhaps $140,000 a year. He is at the public trough. He has four children.
I would like to ask the hon. member, through my colleague, whether he believes that the Prime Minister of Canada is paying back, for example, the family allowance that he is receiving for his four children? He is a wealthy Canadian.
The bottom line is that senior citizens have a legal right to the old age security, and this government does not have the legal right or the moral right to take back what these people are entitled to, especially when the Prime Minister across the way is whistling and blowing at the same time. If he really believes that rich Canadians should not be receiving government benefits, why doesn't he give back to the people of Canada the family allowance that he receives every month?


Robert (Bob) Speller: Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to rise in this House today representing the views and concerns of the people of Haldimand-Norfolk and to discuss Bill C-28.
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I had the pleasure last week of talking to some senior citizens about this bill. I know the bill deals with a lot of different issues, but I want to centre on that one issue. The bill makes 59 different amendments to the Income Tax Act, and I cannot deal with them all. So I want to relate to you some of the experiences I had talking with senior citizens about what they felt about the whole clawback.
This government calls this bill tax reform. But I say it is nothing but a sham. It is a disguised way of increasing taxes and it is a way of increasing taxes on senior citizens, on those who least can afford it.
We hear the gibberish across the way, by the Conservatives, who keep talking about budget deficits and cutting back on the budget deficit and bringing down taxes. That is what they said prior to the election. They said our taxes would go down. Unfortunately, what they did not say was that the Conservative government, since 1984, has increased taxes some 31 times. I do not think that most Canadians, especially the senior citizens I talked to this week, feel badly about paying their fair share. Unfortunately, what we are seeing is a government that consistently attacks the same people, those who are least able to attack back.
I want to first look at the budget and at Bill C-28. I want to talk about what the finance minister has been saying about budgets. The finance minister indicated that this cut-back will affect only seniors with an annual income of $50,000 or more. Today, it may be $50,000 but what about tomorrow, what about next year?
We have already seen examples of the government making commitments and then breaking its promises. It could be $40,000. It could be $30,000. There is no commitment yet by this government to say specifically that it will keep the clawback at $50,000.
The government says that this program will still have universality. What the government is not admitting is that along with the pension cheque or the family allowance cheque, it is also sending out tax invoices. It is also taxing these people back. Granted, these people will still receive benefits and it is universality in that sense, but the government is taking it back underhandedly in other ways. I think that is wrong. Senior citizens, quite frankly,

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recognize that fact and are not prepared to put up with it. It is not universality.
Seniors can hardly believe that this is taking place because of what the Prime Minister has said in the past. He said: "As long as I am Prime Minister, social programs, especially those for the elderly, will be improved, not diminished". I had a hard time explaining what he meant by that on behalf of the Prime Minister when I spoke with seniors in my riding. They could not understand how a Prime Minister who made that promise could then bring in legislation like Bill C-28 which directly takes away their income.
What these cuts mean is that some people at 75 years of age will pay a higher tax on their income than a 35 year old person with the same income. That is not right. Seniors want to know why that is the case. Using the finance minister's own formula, a 45 year old couple who now earns $28,000 a year will have to pay tax on their old age pensions when they retire. The people recognize that.
A 55 year old Canadian who is today earning $25,000 will have his old age pension completely taxed back at the age of 80. In 20 years, over two million Canadian seniors will have to pay tax on their old age pensions.
The President of the National Senior Citizens and Pensioners Association, an organization of seniors groups which represents half a million Canadian seniors, stated recently that seniors have been betrayed and misled by this government. That same point of view was echoed by many seniors in my riding. The president said that he views this proposal as a serious breach of faith by our government and an insidious effort to undercut the social security programs that on numerous times have been stated a sacred trust.
The coalition of Quebec seniors said that the pension clawback is discriminatory on the basis of age, unfair and contrary to the Charter of Rights and that it creates a steeper tax rate for seniors than for others at similar levels. Seniors who, with great difficulty have succeeded over the years in saving for their retirement, are being penalized.
That same feeling was echoed by many seniors in my riding. This government seems to be saying that Canadians should not count on the sacred social contract, that the sacred contract is no longer there. Do not count on
having a family allowance, do not count on having a pension when one reaches retirement.
Many seniors in my riding kept asking, "Didn't we pay into this? Didn't we throughout our lives pay into this? Why do we now not have the ability to get it back?" They cannot understand. They keep hoping that there must be some legal technicality that can help them out of this situation. They said that they fairly, and with the understanding they would get something back, paid into this, but now they are not receiving anything back. They want to know from this government why. Quite frankly, I agree with them. I do not know why. I ask the government, why is it now that it is taking away the pensions of our seniors?
I feel it is important that everyone pay his fair share of taxes. However, it should not be just the large corporations, richer Canadians, who are able to sneak around the tax system. Seniors asked me this past week why it is that large corporations over the years, especially in the last five years, have been able to evade taxes and why it is that they are being singled out as the ones who have to pay.
This proposal means that a senior with an income of $70,000 per year will be taxed differently than someone younger. That is not fair. Seniors want an answer from this government as to why that is. To date in this debate, I do not think we have heard anything from this government.
In conclusion, I want to point out the views of the seniors in my riding to whom I spoke in Simcoe this past week, seniors who say that over the years, they have fought for Canada in different wars, they have paid their taxes fair and square. They decided that they would go into this program and in fact they paid into this program, and they want their money out of the program now. They call upon this government to take a few moments and explain to them why it is that they are now the ones who are being pressured to bring down this government's debt which it has doubled since 1984.


Howard Edward Crosby: Madam Speaker, again I feel compelled to respond by way of a comment on Bill C-28. As you know, Act of Canada, but opposition members seem to focus in on the clause which enacts the new Section 180.2 with respect to old age assistance. Again, for reasons I have
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already explained, I think facts should be put on the record.
Let me start this time, for the benefit of hon. members, with this fact. There are three million recipients of old age assistance in Canada. Of those three million recipients, 2,633,000 or 87.8 per cent will pay no tax at all under this new provision. Another almost 200,000 more will pay no tax. When we come to tax, 32,000 recipients will have their old age assistance, the amount of money given to them by the Government of Canada from the national treasury taxed back under this provision. Those
32.000	people have incomes in excess of $100,000. The government is asking people with incomes in excess of $100,000, 32,000 of them, to pay back their old age assistance payments which came from the treasury of the Government of Canada and from the taxpayers of Canada.
That is not even all that bad because it is already taxed back in the normal course a great proportion of the amount they received as part of the normal taxation system. I say to the hon. member, I do not see what the problem is. Does the hon. member believe that those
32.000	people earning over $100,000 a year should keep that money at the expense of other Canadians who need help from the Government of Canada? Is that what he thinks?


Robert (Bob) Speller: Madam Speaker, that is a ridiculous argument. I challenge the member to go back to his own riding, speak to the senior citizens, and ask them what they feel. Ask them if they feel that it is fair that this government takes away a program that was a sacred trust, that this Prime Minister had told them was a sacred trust. I challenge him to go back to the senior citizens in his riding and ask them. Have you been there? Have you asked them? Have you seen them? Have you talked to them? Have you asked them how they feel?


Howard Edward Crosby: You show me a $100,000 income earner and I will talk to him.


Robert (Bob) Speller: Madam Speaker, that is ridiculous. I spoke with the seniors in my riding. They want to hear why this government broke its promise. This government promised them that these programs would be sacred but instead took them away from them. They want to know
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why this government continues to make promises that are broken.


Gilbert Parent: Madam Speaker, I did listen to the entire speech made by my hon. colleague. Unless I missed it, I might put this question about this despicable move that the government is making to take money back from the old age pensioners. Is it the hon. member's understanding that this $60,000, $50,000 or $70,000 is going to remain static or is this amount going to be increased every year as the inflationary rate diminishes the real value of the dollar? What I am asking is if indeed this amount which is today set at $50,000 will be worth $42,000 or $30,000 in the years to come? I wonder if the hon. member could address that question.


Robert (Bob) Speller: Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his question. He is absolutely right. I thank him for his insight. In fact, this government has made no commitment whatsoever to keep it the same. In fact, over the next few years, that figure, because of inflation, will drop and so you are absolutely right.
These people who will be earning $35,000 during the next few years will have it taxed back. Seniors recognize this. Seniors come to me and I am sure they come to the hon. member and ask why the government is not promising something. They do not believe its promises anyway but they say there must be something to this. If the government is not making a correction here, then we have something to worry about in the years to come.


David Walker: Madam Speaker, it is not with a great deal of pleasure that I feel compelled to stand up and speak in this debate. The actions of the government deserve to be rejected by all Canadians as the changes in Bill C-28, in fact, damage one of the most important constituents we have in this country.
In beginning my own contribution to this debate, I was thinking about how the government finds itself in the position where all of a sudden it has to turn on senior citizens in order to increase its revenue base. The government in 1984 was full of promise, full of national debate, full of lots of vigour towards changing the Canadian way. How did it change the Canadian way?
First of all, the Conservatives turned to all their friends at high income levels and said, "We are going to give you a tax cut. We are going to reduce the amount of

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money you have to pay in taxes. We are going to allow you capital gains tax free."
Then they went to the corporate world and said, "Don't worry, we are going to reduce your taxes." All of a sudden, a recently created deficit of about $100 billion suddenly blossomed until right now we face the awful spectre of a $350 billion accumulated deficit within the next two to three years.
They then realized that they had a choice. They could go back to their friends and companions and say, "We have made a mistake. We have to start taxing capital gains. We have to start taxing corporations like we do individual families. We have to go back to high income earners. We have to take money back from you." No, they are traumatized by going back to tax these people. Or else they could go back into their revenue base and somehow or another pull back on expenditures. Every minister sits around the table and says, "Not me, not me" except, of course, for the Minister of Transport. He is very easy that way. He will let you take away VIA Rail. All the other ministers are protecting their own bailiwicks.
So we have a government which is both bankrupt in money and in ideas. Its solution is to increase taxation on seniors. People on the other side of the House refuse to look at it in that simple way. They are increasing the rate of taxation among seniors in this country.
People again say, "Well, listen, why not tax the people who are making all this money?" First of all, you have to remember that the support one Liberal government after another built up for universal programs in this country was based on that very premise, that they were universal. It means you had access to these programs no matter what your income level. It means that the average middle-class family, making somewhere between $40,000 and $100,000 a year, with two people working, feels secure, whether we are talking about medicare or about looking forward to their pensions. They felt that they were going to be looked after. One of the ways of keeping a generous coalition going in a country such as Canada is by making sure that the middle class feels they have a stake in the system.
This government, in its own cruel and miserable way, is taking away the middle class. It is going to make the
middle class feel insecure. It is going to make the middle class feel as if it is not going to have a stake in the system.
When you do not have a stake in the system, what happens? You begin to pull away your own support. When you do not get a service from the government, why do you pay taxes? One of the great issues in local politics in this country is the issue of policing, and one of the most difficult things to do is to make sure the middle class feels well policed so that the police can then turn around and use resources in poor areas.
It is the same thing with pensions. Why should a person paying a lot of taxes who is not getting a benefit from the pension system support somebody with less income? The answer is that they will not do it. This government understands it the same way that Margaret Thatcher understood it in England. You pull away the middle class, you privatize it, you make it feel like it can look after itself and you dismiss the poor with the back of your hand. We are going through the same process right now.
This bill has to be fought and opposed because it poses a threat, not only to working poor in this country, but to the middle class. If we want to continue as a country with national programs, we need people who pay taxes. We all know as politicians that people are upset with the high tax rate. We have to give those people an opportunity to see and to understand that the system is working for them.
We in the Manitoba caucus, the hon. members for Winnipeg North, St. Boniface, Winnipeg South Centre and Winnipeg-St. James, had a one-day seminar on pension reform last June. We were surprised by the number of groups which stepped forward to outline the problems of the pension system in Canada. It is not only a question of the clawback but also several other problems that have to be reformed.
In my own constituency, and I do not have to tell members who have been in the House for a long time that the former member for Winnipeg North Centre built a reputation for fighting for the poor of our constituency. Through one speech after another, he made the pensioners in Canada realize that the Government of Canada had to make a commitment to them and had to live up to that commitment. Since then, people on Selkirk Avenue, Main Street, Portage Avenue and Pritchard Avenue in Winnipeg understand that the role of
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the federal government is to protect their pensions and to enhance their lifestyle.
They are now joined in Winnipeg North Centre by a new group of elderly who are not aged 65 but are aged 55. They are middle class families who come in from the suburbs and who need protection and income support. The neighbourhoods in Winnipeg North Centre will be transformed by older people such as these making a commitment to one of the oldest and poorest constituencies in this country. It is one that needs to be regenerated. These people have to work together and they have to feel they have a stake in the system. When you take money away unnecessarily, people lose their reason for supporting the system.
People often make light of the fact that the degeneration of income or the lack of an income base is only affected with the first 3 per cent. One of the demographic changes we have in this country is the number of people who live well past 65. For example, in Winnipeg North Centre, the people who come into the senior citizens' residences are often aged 81. They begin their life as seniors at age 81. They live to their mid-eighties. Let us say they live to the age of 85. Stop and think about it; you have your old age pension for 20 years and for each one of those years the government does not protect 3 per cent of your income. What is the erosion in your buying power for 20 years at 3 per cent per year accumulative? You have to realize that you will take a huge reduction in your living standard.
The minister from Manitoba, the minister responsible for western diversification, stood up earlier to remind the House of high interest rates back in the early eighties and pointed his finger across the floor saying he cannot believe that those on this side of the House were even worried about inflation nowadays, given what we did to the country. I would like to remind that member that the reality of inflation is that it can break out upon us at any time. It is not limited to that government or this government. The people who understand this better than anyone else are the seniors. The ravages of inflation haunt them because their income level is unprotected and that lack of protection is furthered by the government's action. On that particular item, I join my caucus in strongly opposing the government.
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On a second issue, the government has again failed in this legislation to address the question of fair taxation in the corporate world. While I do not join my friends in the NDP in ranting and raving against the corporate world, I do think there is a frustration in the middle management in Canada, people working in all-Canadian firms, who cannot see fair taxation in the corporate world. International corporations, because of the financing, marketing and the legal structures, are able to move capital and tax dollars out of Canada. Until this government is willing to bring into the House legislation which addresses this issue of lost income, lost taxation, we will continue to find ourselves in the comer, having insufficient money to help those Canadians who need help the most.
There are two major faults with this piece of legislation; its inability to protect seniors at all income levels and to understand their needs for income protection far into the future, and the refusal of the government to deal with corporations and the extraction of proper corporate taxation rates that will enhance the revenue base of the federal government.


Ross Harvey: Madam Speaker, this bill marks one of the most significant changes in social policy in Canada in the last several decades. In sum, it eliminates the universal nature of two important social programs.
In the few minutes that I have today, I would like to focus on several aspects. I would like to focus on the government's recent promises concerning social programs, what the clawback is and how it works, what the government claims about the clawback, how the clawback will attack not just the rich, but ordinary Canadians everywhere in a very short time, and some alternatives the government could have considered.
Let us begin by looking at the government's promises about social programs. Most Canadians remember the Prime Minister's sombre assurance that social programs were a "sacred trust". Others remember this government assuring Canadians that it would improve social programs in general and improve the lot of seniors in particular. Let me remind people of two of these solemn assurances.
One is reported by the Canadian Press on March 7, 1984, when the Prime Minister said:
Our position is simple and straightforward. We are in favour of
universality in social programs and it shall not be touched.

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Again, on October 15, 1988, speaking to seniors in Summerside, Prince Edward Island, the Prime Minister said:
Let me say a special word to the senior citizens. In the future Canada will be doing more, not less, for all of you.
He said this. I am not making this up.
As long as I am Prime Minister of Canada, social benefits, especially those for the elderly, will be improved, not diminished by our government which is committed to social justice and fairness for Canadians.
Especially for the elderly, note.
So what about this bill? We are not talking small potatoes here, much as the government would like you to believe that we are. We are talking about a dramatic shift in the direction of this country. We are talking about ending the universality of social programs in Canada.
And we are talking especially about literally stealing the pension savings of older Canadians. I quote, because he stated it so much better than I could, from a letter by Mr. David Wilson of Winnipeg to that city's Winnipeg Free Press. He writes in part:
The old age security program was initiated in the early 1950s as a contributory program which paid for itself, with each year's payments funded by matching contributions. A special tax was created for this purpose, and each time the pension was raised the tax was raised as well. Up to 1972 this line was included on the income tax form: "Old age security-4 per cent of taxable income-maximum $240." It is also very likely that we continued to pay this tax after 1971, but it was not a separate item on the income tax forms.
The federal government has now ruled that the old age security pension can be taxed away from pensioners who have paid for it.
Not only is this a betrayal of what was previously deemed a sacred trust by this government, it is a theft from the very seniors who paid into the program for so many years.
We will get to the details of how the bill will work in a moment, but given that there is such a shift, such a substantial change in policy, would you not expect an honest government, a government that is straightforward with its people, to have a national discussion about this? Then, after, the pros and cons have been discussed, announce to the people of Canada what steps it plans to take? But no, this government's long suit is neither honesty nor openness. The announcement of this shift was made among an avalanche of bad news announcements in the budget, and there had been no substantial public consultation beforehand. Indeed, the Tory chairman of the finance committee admits this, even if the PM won't.
In a wonderfully candid moment, the chairman wrote to a resident of Edmonton. In his letter to Mr. William Daly, a 61-year old resident of Edmonton he said:
We have decided to eliminate universality and we do that in a sense by the clawback in both family allowance and the old age pension.
How admirably honest. Even if the government is not, obviously members of it are. He continues:
As you know, it has been a Conservative philosophy for some time that distributions from the state ought to go essentially to those in need. While the clawback may be unfair and sneaky, it is there.
An admirable honesty, wholly uncharacteristic of his benchmates.
As we had graphically demonstrated for us earlier this afternoon, the term "universality" is sometimes misunderstood. Perhaps it might be helpful to describe what is generally meant when we say a program is universal. Simply put, a universal program is one that delivers benefits to all Canadians, regardless of income. Why do this? Why not discriminate on the basis of income? The reasons change as one moves from program to program, but for the family allowance those reasons are principally two.
First, universality is the recognition by the Canadian people through their government of the contribution that parents at all income levels make to raising Canada's future citizens. Second, it also recognizes in some small way that extra expenses are incurred by parents for raising children that childless couples and single people do not have.
As for the universality of the old age security program, that recognizes the contribution that all elderly Canadians, whatever their financial circumstances, have made to our society.
Now, it is true that although these two programs currently deliver the same monthly cheque to all their recipients, family allowance and OAS do not now provide the same benefit to all beneficiaries. This is because the benefits from both those programs are counted as taxable income. As a result many families and pensioners pay federal and provincial income tax on those benefits and, consequently, benefits after taxes of these programs are highest for lower income beneficiaries and lowest for

higher income beneficiaries. Every recipient now gets some meaningful benefit.
In fact tax filers in the top income bracket still end up with a substantial 55 per cent of the benefits, a situation due mainly to the grotesque distortions introduced into the income tax system by successive Liberal and Conservative governments.
However, under the new scheme above a certain income level higher income families and pensioners will have to pay back 100 per cent-the entire shot-of the benefits they received over the course of the previous year. The government has taken great pains to suggest that this is no big deal, that it will not affect many people at all.
We have heard that in the questions and comments following the remarks of previous speakers. And, according to the Budget Papers, on page 9, the clawback of family allowance and old age security payments will have a minimal effect on individual Canadians and families.
The finance minister claims, for example, that only 4.3 per cent of seniors will be paying back any part or all of their pensions, with 54,000 individuals paying back all of their OAS and 74,000 paying back a part of it. On family allowances he claims that only 14 per cent of families will be affected, with 368,000 paying back all of their family allowance and 167,000 paying back a part of it. Thanks to normal inflation, these numbers in both cases will go up rapidly year by year so that more and more retirees will end up repaying their pensions and more and more families will repay all their family allowance.
The way the system works is that the income level at which the clawback starts will move upwards according to the same deindexing formula that exists in the tax system; in other words inflation minus 3 per cent and that is the key, Mr. Speaker. This means that if you assume an inflation rate of 4.5 per cent the income limit will move up by only 1.5 per cent in that year, 4.5 per cent minus 3 per cent. That is not indexing, and that means that inflation will erode the clawback floor.
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A worker earning $40,000 a year and watching his or her income rise with inflation would be earning enough to put his or her income over the clawback level for family allowances by 1997. For retirees, the clawback is more complex and phases in more slowly, but a simple rule of thumb is that a worker earning $28,000, that is roughly the average industrial wage, will be hit by the clawback by the time he or she retires.
This assumes that income keeps pace with inflation and that retirement income is 70 per cent of pre-retirement income. Once again the government accomplished this by not fully indexing the trigger figure of $50,000. Over time, through inflation, more and more of us will be caught.
Here are some other examples. A 30 year old making $30,000 will have part of her OAS pension clawed back when she retires at 65. The same is true for 35 year olds making $35,000, 40 year olds making $40,000, and 45 year olds making $45,000 a year. All told the clawback will catch about 128,000 Canadian pensioners in 1990. In 20 years that will rise to over one million Canadian pensioners.
In regard to family allowance a similar pattern applies. Assume that you are presently 23 years old and that you are making just over $25,000 a year. If you have children in five years and you never make more than that income, adjusted for inflation you will be losing part of the family allowance payment by the time your child is 18.
In 1990 roughly 14 per cent of families will have their family allowance subjected to the clawback. In 10 years that will rise to nearly 30 per cent. The proportion of families affected by the clawback will more than double within 10 years.
These examples are based on very conservative estimates of income growth and, no doubt, understate the case, I should point out.
The point is that the clawback does not maintain the principle of universality as Mulroney and Wilson contend. It marks the steady erosion of our social programs down to a much lower common denominator. Henceforth all social programs will be for the poor only. They will be targeted to those in need or deemed to be in need and thereby made selective, not universal. The clawback will move our pension system closer to that of the U.S. There, workers are covered by contributory pensions like

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our CPP or by means tested programs like our GSI, but not by a universal pension program like our OAS. No pension exists in the U.S. as a right of citizenship for those over 65.
This point is central: it has been Michael Wilson's mission as finance minister to shatter the universality barrier. Once that principle is gone, then it is a very simple matter to refine the clawback even further and make the program more and more selective by taxing back higher and higher levels of benefits.
The National Council on Welfare issued an excellent report in September 1989 entitled The 1989 Budget and Social Policy. It highlights some of the very damaging effects that this policy will have.
I have mentioned a few. I would like to refer to its report in a little more detail to outline a few more. First, the clawback will erode the principle of horizontal equity. One of the reasons for paying child benefits to all families including the better-off is to recognize their additional financial burden in raising children as compared with childless couples and single persons at the same level of income.
This is known as the principle of horizontal equity. After the clawback the only benefit available to all higher income parents will be the $66 per child non-refundable child tax credit. Clearly removing family allowances from better-off families will put them at a greater disadvantage vis-a-vis childless couples and singles who have the same income but no child rearing expenses.
Second, the clawback will discriminate against one-earner families. A one-earner family with an income of $56,000 and two children will have to return 100 per cent of its family allowance benefits to the federal government once the clawback is fully phased in, in 1991. However a two-earner couple with two children in which one spouse earns $45,000 and the other spouse $35,000, for a joint income of $80,000, will not have to pay the clawback because the higher income parents' net income is under the $50,000. Instead, the family will be subject only to the normal rate of taxation on its family allowances returning about 45 per cent of its benefits to the federal and provincial governments. The clawback is both unjust and illogical. The one-earner couple at $56,000 will pay back all of its family allowance. The
two-eamercouple earning $80,000, $24,000 more, gets to keep over half of its family allowance.
Third, the clawback will add to the complexity of the child benefits system. Over the past four years the Minister of Finance has further complicated an already complex child benefit system. In brief, the non-refundable child tax credit which replaced the children's tax exemption in 1988 is $66 for each of the first two children and $132 for the third and subsequent children. Families with incomes under $16,000 now receive their refundable child tax credit in two instalments while other families continue to get it only once a year. Children under age seven qualify for a $200 supplement to the refundable child tax credit in 1989 so there are now two rates. It is $565 for children over seven and $765 for those under seven. Parents with receipted child care expenses can claim a maximum $4,000 child deduction for each child under seven, but only up to $2,000 for children aged seven through fourteen.
Last, family allowances and both the refundable and non-refundable child tax credits are now indexed only by the amount of inflation over 3 per cent a year. Confused? The Lord knows I am, and I assume many of the parents of this country are.
Fourth, before the clawback there were two types of families receiving family allowances. Families too poor to owe income tax kept all of their family allowances while those which pay tax kept part of their family allowances and returned the rest to federal and provincial governments in the form of income taxes paid on their benefits.
After the clawback there will be four types of families receiving the family allowance. There will be families which keep all their family allowances because they are too poor to owe income tax. There will be those which keep part of their family allowance because they pay regular income taxes on their benefits. There will be those who keep part of their family allowance because they pay both regular income taxes and the clawback on their benefits. There will be those which will have to pay back all of their family allowances through the clawback.
This is part of what we have had heralded for us as a simpler and more easily understood tax system. This attack on universality is at very least ill-conceived, but it is more than that, and it is worse than that. There are a number of very important questions which need to be raised about this issue. For example, why should an individual be entitled to receive $100,000 in capital gains tax-free but lose the $4,000 he or she gets in OAS simply

because it was paid as a universal social benefit? Family allowances and old age security are already taxed in Canada. Why should a special tax be levied on children and on the elderly?
What will "the unique identity of Canada" mean in a few years when our social programs exist only to serve those in need? Will not our social programs be just like those in the U.S., leaner and meaner as all means tested programs are? How long will the population support the maintenance of social programs from which they are effectively excluded as beneficiaries? Will "need" be redefined downwards as it has been in Britain and in the U.S. and as it has been already with our UI and our welfare programs provincially?
If the essence of universality is destroyed through the back door, what is to protect medicare from attack? Will Canada's sick have to prove they are also "in need" to have access to our health care system? When did Canadians vote for having means tested family allowance and old age security programs? When was that put to them in any honesty at all?
Again, remember what the Prime Minister has said, defending the attempted deindexation of pensions in 1985. In Hansard, at page 5774 for that year, he said:
There is not a single elderly person in this country today who has been impacted unfavourably by this budget.
We will pass over that. Referring to the member asking the question, he said:
I have given him full responses to assure him that the commitment of this government to the elderly and the integrity of social programs is unrivalled and unsurpassed by any other party in the House and certainly is no less than anyone else's.
Or, how about the hon. member who chairs the finance committee, who said: "They", which is to say seniors, "live at a slower pace and they don't spend money in the same sense that you and I do. Older people don't wear out their clothes. They have plenty of money but they don't like to spend it".
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Mr. Blenkam apparently has forgotten that 42.7 per cent of single pensioners live below the poverty line in Canada, but we will let that pass as well.
I think actually in that statement from Mr. Blenkam, which I quoted earlier, he got it right. This government is, in his words, sneaky. It simply cannot be trusted to do what it says it is going to do.
I know the Prime Minister tries valiantly to paint the picture that he really cares about seniors and families in Canada, and his government has no alternative but to eliminate universality in social programs. That is the cry, the justification: "The deficit made us do it". What utter bunk. The alternatives are staring us in the face.
Just imagine raising additional money by attacking social programs, asking someone with a $100,000 income to forgo $270 per child in current family allowances, instead of introducing a fourth marginal tax rate of 32 per cent for high income earners, which would raise some $2,000 each or $300 million a year.
Imagine setting up a system that will lead Canadians to fight against Canadians instead of reducing the interest rate by 2 per cent, which would raise an additional $3.5 billion a year.
In conclusion, I entered this debate principally to voice the feelings of disgust and rage that I know characterize seniors in my riding and that I feel safe in assuming characterize seniors across this country. They know that this clawback provision, this bill in its entirety, is unjust. They are telling that to the government. The only question before the House is whether or not the government will have the guts to listen.


David Walker: Madam Speaker, with a great deal of trepidation I will ask the member a question. Going through the legislation I noticed the changes in the rules dealing with the surtax. This was brought to my attention by several constituents who were concerned that the government had very quietly changed its opinion as to what to do with the surtax. The temporary 3 per cent surtax on personal income taxes was imposed in 1986. In the 1987 budget the Minister of Finance promised that when the new sales tax was introduced the personal and corporate income taxes would be removed. That is a quotation from the Minister of Finance in the House of Commons on June 18, 1987.

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Now the minister has made the personal income surtaxes a permanent feature of the income tax system. Before the GST technical paper was released the Minister of Finance had promised to remove the surtax as part of the GST package, but that promise has been broken and the surtaxes are now a permanent tax on all Canadians.
The increase in the surtax from 3 per cent to 5 per cent will take another $1.1 billion out of Canadians' incomes, or an average of more than $100 per Canadian family. The surtaxes, in my opinion, defeat the minister's own stated objectives of tax reform. One of the government's objectives of stage one of tax reform was to lower personal income tax rates. The top marginal tax rate was lowered from 34 per cent to 29 per cent. However the imposition of the surtaxes on all Canadians has pushed the marginal tax rates back up to close to what they were before tax reform started.
The minister sold tax reform to Canadians by telling them that they would get lower personal income tax rates but would pay more sales tax. Canadians have the sales tax increases all right but not any of the savings as promised. I would just like to ask my friend what he thinks about the government reneging on its original promise to drop the surtax as it introduced the GST.


Ross Harvey: Madam Speaker, I would like to say that it took me completely by surprise, but I realize that in this House we are honourable and must tell the truth so I cannot say that.
If I were to take every broken promise uttered by this government and record it in Hansard, I would have enough Hansard to wallpaper my home back in Edmonton. So, is it a surprise? No. Is it characteristic of this government? Yes. Do I expect it to be the last broken promise? No. Do I expect that in breaking these promises the government is going to change its spots and in fact start benefiting ordinary Canadians? No. Do I expect that it will continue its assumed mandate of altering the taxation system to make it ever more unfair, ever more oppressive of ordinary middle and low income Canadians in the interests of high income Canadians? Yes. And, by the way, I would be really cautious about defending high income Canadians if I were the hon. member, because they have more than enough defenders across the way.
They suffer an embarrassment of riches in this regard too. I think I will let it go there.


Margaret Anne Mitchell: Madam Speaker, I want to make a couple of comments and ask for a couple of remarks from the veiy eloquent member who just spoke, who I am honoured to say is a colleague of mine.
Two or three years ago in the last Parliament we debated the cut-backs and erosion of social programs, particularly the family allowance and the old age pension, when the government at that time was deindexing. I was struck at the time by the fact that the senior citizens across the country organized and were able to change policy. However children have no vote and they really have no voice so it is much more difficult to organize.
The deindexation of the old age pension was stopped. The deindexation of the family allowance went forward. I am glad to hear the hon. member speak so eloquently on behalf of children in the country. I would remind him that when the family allowance was first brought in by the members of this party, largely, and by social democrats and others across the country, the intent was that it would grow and would gradually become a way of subsidizing the real cost of child rearing in this country. It was based on the philosophy that children belong to all of us.
I do not happen to have children, but I feel I have just as much responsibility, if not more, to pay taxes for the cost of rearing Canada's children. It is very, very unfair, therefore, to hit the parents who have the high costs of raising children with the high cost of housing, clothing, education, and so on, regardless of their income. It is very unfair to be taking this back only from them and not taking it out of general tax revenues.
Another point that has come into this debate in the past is the fact that the family allowance usually goes to mothers. It is often the only cheque that the woman, even of well-to-do families, receives in her own name. We heard some very eloquent statements from women on that aspect.
A further point that I think has come into the argument from time to time, and he perhaps touched on it, is that this is really doing away with universality. I would go further and say that it is doing away with a floor of social security in this country altogether. As social policy analysts have said, "if you do not have the middle class involved in some of the benefits from social
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programs, you lose political support and pretty soon the programs are coming down with tougher means tests and there is a great stigma on the kind of programs that go to people; we would be back to a dog eat dog society".
Perhaps my hon. colleague would care to comment.


Ross Harvey: Me too, Madam Speaker.


Eugène Bellemare: Madam Speaker, I welcome this opportunity to speak on behalf of the senior citizens in my riding and on behalf of families and their children.
I will now address to Bill C-28, an act to amend the Income Tax Act.

Bill C-28 makes 59 different amendments to the Income Tax Act, implementing many of the 1989 budget provisions.

Madam Speaker, to me, these changes in the Income Tax Act are an attack on universality, on senior citizens and on our families.
As of financial year 1990-91, the government will effectively put an end to the universality of social benefits in Canada. People who paid a special tax before 1971 to help pay for old age security benefits received the assurance of Parliament, when the tax reform was passed in 1971, that they would continue to be entitled to old age security benefits.
Last year, during the election campaign, the Prime Minister said repeatedly that he would not tamper with old age security pensions. He also said: "As long as I am Prime Minister of Canada, social benefits, especially those for the elderly, will be improved, not diminished by our government". That is the promise the Prime Minister made, the promise the whole country heard during the televised debate. At one point he even brought along his mother, repeating his promise that he would protect old age security pensions and would never tamper with them.
Incredibly, since the 1988 election the Tories have yet to keep a single promise they made to Canadians. They never mentioned this during the campaign. Never! They
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were playing a very different tune, which is why I say we cannot trust them.
Bill C-28 is an attack on the rights of senior citizens. It is an attack on the pensions they deserve. This Bill is an attack on family allowances and on our families.
This Bill is an attack on the principle of universality of the social programs we designed and implemented many years ago.
Madam Speaker, this bill is a complete denial of the promises the Prime Minister made during the last election campaign, as I said earlier. I would like to recall, for the benefit of hon. members, the promise the Prime Minister made in Sydney, Nova Scotia, during the last election campaign. He said: "As long as I am Prime Minister, social benefits, especially those for the elderly, will be improved, not diminished".
Bill C-28 is a betrayal of what the Prime Minister once called a sacred trust.
This is what my Liberal party leader had to say during the election campaign: "The men and women of Canada who worked all their lives to build this country counted on the old age security pension as one of their rights as Canadian citizens. They paid taxes all their lives. They planned their future on the basis of this pension. It is part of the social contract in Canada."

Bill C-28 makes 59 different amendments. Part 1.2 of clause 48 of this bill implements the clawback of family allowances and old age security pensions. The amount of the repayment is equal to 15 per cent of the taxpayer's net income over $50,000. The clawback of the family allowance will take $1,686 billion out of family budgets in the next five years, or $500 million a year by 1991.
Within 10 years close to one million Canadian families who currently receive family allowances or old age pensions will begin to lose their benefits due to the partial indexing of the $50,000 threshold.
The $50,000 threshold at which individuals begin paying their family allowance and old age security benefits is only partially indexed. This deindexation of the $50,000 threshold means that within 10 years close to one million Canadians will start losing their family allowances and the old age pensions. The clawback proposal would put a special tax on families with children

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and on seniors, a tax that does not apply to anyone else. In this way the clawback is anti-family and anti-senior.
The National Council on Welfare in a press release dated September 13, 1989 stated:
The federal government should abandon its proposed "clawback" of family allowances and Old Age Security pensions.
The move away from universal benefits is the most significant change in social policy in a generation, yet it was announced by the Minister of Finance in the budget speech with no prior consultation.
In the case of seniors, the federal government had publicly rejected the idea of a clawback or surtax on old age pensions as late as January 1985 on the grounds that it would "seriously disrupt" the retirement income system-the clawback changes the rules of the game without their consent. The elderly have already paid for their old age pensions through a lifetime of paying income taxes.
In the case of parents, the clawback discriminates against one earner families because it is based on individual net income. A one earner family with two children and a net income of $56,000 would lose all its family allowance benefits. A two earner couple where one spouse earns $45,000 and the other $35,000 would escape the clawback despite their combined income of $80,000.
Second, I would like to read from a letter dated June 23,1989, which was sent to the Prime Minister from from Les Batterson, president of the Senior Citizens Federation. It stated:
Our position is that the tax-back is age biased, grossly inequitable and has serious implications with regard to universality.
We view this proposal as a serious breach of faith by our government and an insidious effort to undercut the social security programs that you have on numerous times stated are a sacred trust.
We also are aware that we had previous deficits as serious as the present one and the government of the day did not tax back pensions to which Canadians had every reason to believe they had a genuine right.
The Coalition of Quebec Seniors in a letter to the Minister of Finance dated May 24, 1989 stated:
As the clawback begins to affect increasing numbers of individuals, there can be no doubt that the net effect will be a gradual reduction of the principle of universality.
We consider further that a special tax which is only directed at seniors is discrimination on the basis of age, unfair, and contrary to the Charter of Rights.
Your proposal creates a steeper tax rate for seniors than for others at similar income levels. Seniors who with great difficulty have succeeded over the years in saving for their retirement are being penalized.
Madam Speaker, thank you for giving me this opportunity to speak on behalf of the senior citizens, the families and the young people in my riding.


Francis G. LeBlanc: Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his very eloquent speech on the harm this bill will do to seniors in our country. He also reminded the government of principles which it seems to have forgotten: universality, equity and keeping prior commitments.

I would like to respond to a comment which was made repeatedly by my colleague opposite, the member for Halifax West. The argument that we hear repeatedly advanced on the other side of the House about the clawback measure, in particular, and the tax back on the family allowance, is that it is designed to tax the rich in order to give more money to the poor. I would like to ask, where is the money going to the poor? Everybody is being taxed more. The goods and services tax will be regressive. It will tax the poor citizens of this country, especially those in Atlantic Canada, proportionately more than it will tax the rich.
A whole litany of consumption taxes are being raised which we know will affect those with modest means much more than those with higher incomes. This line that we hear from the government is simply sophistry and designed to confuse what is really a tax grab from those people who are unable to avoid the tax.
The people who do not get taxed in this society are those who have the money to pay for tax lawyers, accountants, or who are members of large corporations that can avoid the tax. Let us face it, the government is unwilling to put in measures to obtain tax revenue from those who have it because it is much easier to tax those who, for various reasons, cannot avoid the tax.

The idea that this tax on old age security is a way of somehow making the system more fair is nonsense. Perhaps my colleague would like to comment on that in the time that remains.


Eugène Bellemare: Madam Speaker, I appreciate the comments of my colleague from Cape Breton Highlands-Canso. I think that we are talking about basic principles. And if the principle of universal social programs was established some time ago, we must stick to it, because a few years ago, senior citizens were much younger. They were then careful to put money aside, to invest well and all of a sudden, when they are retired and unable to react financially or politically or in any other way towards the government, they are hit in the pocket-book.
I think that if we want to raise taxes, if we must raise taxes, it is all right to raise taxes, then this must be done according to people's income and not because they get money from some source or another or in one way or another.
People must be taxed on their total income and not a particular aspect of it, like the amounts given under our social contract, family allowances or old age pensions. That is contrary to the principle of universality, Madam Speaker.


Mac Harb: Madam Speaker, I rise to discuss the bill proposed by the government. When I was glancing through the government report, one thing came to mind. It has been the argument of the government that one of the main reasons why it has to cut programs and projects that cater to people who are in need is because of the deficit.
Over the weekend, I was glancing at some documentation published by Statistics Canada, and also some documents published by different well-respected agencies.
In my view, to reduce the deficit, you just do not launch an assault on those who are keeping the economy rolling. Unfortunately, over the past five years the government has been panicking, and as a result it has been reactionary. It has launched an assault on middle income Canadians who are, to a large extent, the engine of the economy in this country.
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Over the past 20 years we have seen a drastic decline in the manufacturing sector and a drastic increase in the service sector. I might add that this is the source of the problem in Canada and that is why the government is in a panic situation. If we were to increase the level of productivity, we would not be in this situation.
In the 1970s the manufacturing sector in Canada employed approximately 31 per cent of the workforce. In 1989-1990, it employs approximately 25 per cent of the workforce. This will decline to approximately 20 per cent of the workforce by the year 2000.
In the 1970s the service sector employed about 36 per cent of the labour force; by the year 2000, it will employ approximately 53 per cent. So there is a massive shift of the labour force from the industrial sector to the financial sector or the service sector.
This has caused a panic. Why? Because in the service sector more emphasis has to be put on education, and a more educated workforce is required to carry on with the tasks. According to a Globe and Mail report published on September 5, 1989, we cannot take pride in the fact that we are doing enough in the area of education in order to tackle the deficit.
The report states that more than 22 per cent of Canadians over the age of 15 are not currently enrolled in any kind of educational system or they are considered to be functionally illiterate. Furthermore, approximately 30 per cent of Canadian students who enter secondary education leave without getting a diploma. In comparison, Germany has about 14 per cent. Only 72 per cent of Canadians at age 17 are still enrolled in some form of formal education, compared to 94 per cent in Japan. If we want to compare ourselves to our friends in the south, the worker in the United States has at least one year more of education than the Canadian worker.
The shocking thing is that per capita Japan has four times as many engineers as Canada, but we have 20 times as many lawyers as Japan. Probably that is the problem, we have too many lawyers not have enough engineers.
It was quite disappointing to see a decline in the area of investment for education. Last year there was approximately an 1.8 per cent increase in the area of education, and when we compare that to the years between 1985 and 1989, we only had an increase of about 2.3 per cent,

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which was well below the consumer price index of 4.2 per cent. Frankly, that is where the problem is.
We do not have an agenda for the future. We seem to be panicking. We seem to be pushing all the buttons at the same time when we do have the answer. We are all talking about the answer. The Prime Minister has been speaking for the past goodness knows how many years about the need for a better educational system, the need for standards, the need for more research and development, and the need for industry and private sector involvement. We are all saying a lot, but the government is not doing anything about it. That is what needs to be done. By investing more in the area of educational research and development, I can assure you that the train will start moving.
What we are doing is putting on all the brakes at the same time. We are increasing taxes. We do not have any other source of revenue except taxes as it is right now, and as a result we are going into the pockets of those who cannot help themselves. Unfortunately, in this particular case, it is our seniors, it is the middle-income earners.
I will challenge the minister in three years to tell me that one of the main reasons why they introduced the goods and services tax is to reduce the deficit. He should say that and he should tell Canadians that that is the main reason why it was introduced.
Who are the people who will be affected the most by this? It is the middle and low-income Canadians. It is quite unfortunate that the government has to claw back from those people who have built this country, who put in the infrastructure of this country. We have worked extremely hard in the Liberal party in the past 50, 60 and 70 years to build a middle-income group and to help those who need it. We introduced the social programs with the support of some of our colleagues in this House. We have them in place. Over the past four years, we have seen an assault that this country has never seen in its history.
This is a very, very sad thing to do. I have been to approximately 30 different town hall meetings in my riding with senior citizen groups. These people have attacked the government for its initiative to tax them and to take away their money. After all, it is the senior citizens' money.
Nobody could have put it better than a senior citizen in an article published in Today's Seniors of September 19, 1989. He said: "Having diligently saved for my retirement, it is most discouraging to find that instead of the enjoyment of the life I have saved for I will be contributing to bail out this spendthrift government." That is true.
Another senior said: "For the first time in my life I am frightened of the future." We are frightened of the future. Unless this government sets a proper agenda for the people of Canada, unless the government communicates the proper vision for Canada, unless the government stops looking at other means and ways than taxation then we are frightened of the future. I want to give the chance to some of my colleagues to address this particular bill, but I am frightened by what I see. I hope my colleagues from across the floor will also speak out on this issue.
Our senior citizens are hopeless. They need the support of all of us.


Mr. Brian Tobin (Humber-St. Barbe-Baie Verte):: Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise in my place and participate in the debate on Bill C-28.1 want to add my voice to those of my colleagues in this House who have, in as profound a way as they could, drawn the attention of the House to the enormous betrayal that is represented by the piece of legislation put before Parliament, the quite profound disillusionment that Canadians feel at seeing the 59 amendments contained within this bill.
Bill C-28 is not a bill that deals merely in dollars and cents, although ultimately that is the impact, one of dollars and cents. It is not a bill that is primarily financial in nature, although Canadians will count and be able to count in quite dramatic ways the dollars and cents lifted out of their pockets, the decrease in their spending power, but the bill is ultimately not about money. This bill is ultimately about what kind of Canada we are going to live in during the 1990s and beyond. That is really what the bill is about.
We see increasingly in this country quite strong signs of renewed intolerance, renewed lack of understanding, lack of sensitivity. We are seeing a different kind of Canada emerge through the latter part of the 1980s, and it is interesting, through the five or six years that this Conservative administration has been the Government of Canada. In the House of Commons we frequently see members stand up with tens of thousands of names on petitions protesting the fact that a distinguished, honourable and decent human being who wants to be an RCMP officer cannot because religious requirements are such that he must wear a turban. That says something rather disheartening about what this country is coming to. We
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see a chairman of a standing committee of this House describe the contributions of Canadians from a particular region to the work of that committee as not worth hearing. That says something rather disquieting about this House and this country.
There was a time not so long ago when those kinds of petitions-referring to turbans-or those kinds of comments from a distinguished parliamentarian just would not have been heard. But we are living in a different kind of country. Tolerance is disappearing.
Wrapped up in the 59 amendments to Bill C-28, wrapped up in the whole notion of clawback, wrapped up in the whole effort to pick the pockets of those least able to defend themselves, children and our senior citizens, is an example set by the government of that intolerance, that lack of caring, that insensitivity, that evolution of a new kind of Canada.
What kind of Canada is it? It is a Canada exemplified by those examples I cited, a Canada where citizens are taught to say I am okay, Jack, and that is all that matters. I can cut it. I have a roof over my head. I have bread and butter on the table and I am okay and it really doesn't matter a damn how my neighbour is. The same kind of mentality says you can define or defend culture on the basis of whether or not an RCMP officer, duly trained, properly equipped, is less an officer because he wears a turban for religious purposes. Intolerance!
That is what Bill C-28 is, a mean-spirited bill. It is intolerable. It says that the concept of universality does not matter any more. It. says that the Prime Minister's commitment to a sharing, caring, tolerant Canada doesn't matter any more. It says that the collection of values that have bound us together through all of these decades even within our diversity do not matter any more. It says that we are a different kind of country.
Canadians who are concerned about the clawback, Canadians who oppose clawing back those pension benefits from senior citizens acquired over a lifetime, do not oppose it just because we feel that a contract is a contract. That happens to be one good argument that somebody who paid all his life in the expectation of receiving "x" number of dollars ought to receive it because a contract was made and ought not to be broken.
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That is not the only reason you defend somebody who has a high income in his or her senior years and say that pension ought not to be taken away.
We do not defend the family allowance moneys being clawed back thereby taking from children, because, we say, even though somebody has a reasonably good family income he or she ought to get paid every cent. We all know the family allowances are already taxed back now up to 30 per cent under the income tax system. That is not the reason we are defending, as the government would have us believe, the well-to-do in this society.
The reason we oppose the clawback, the reason we want social programs to remain universal, is that we know in this party and we have historically known in this country-indeed the Conservative Party across the way used to know or at least pretended to know-that a social program targeted only to the poorest of those among us is going to be a damn poor program. That is the reason we stand and oppose this bill. Because all senior citizens in Canada who have followed this debate know, including the poorest of Canada's seniors, that if you claw back the benefits of Canada's upper-income senior citizens and you claw back out of homes the family allowances of Canada's upper or middle-income people then you have clawed away a large part of the notion of sharing and caring in this country and you are ghettoizing through our social programs those people who are the poorest among us. You are saying that you are designing a program that will only apply to the poor. That is exactly what you are saying. And do you know what happens when you do that? At one point in time those poorest people, the only ones who are going to get social benefits, become like the RCMP officer with the turban. An intolerant, indifferent, uncaring, so-called majority says: "It is not in my best interest any more. I do not want to pay for it. And there sure as hell should not be a social program at all in this country".
That is precisely what is wrong with the Tory mentality. It is a mentality that invites Canadians to say that if you can find within your own financial means a way of looking after yourself, a way of providing for yourself and your family so that you do not need any additional assistance whatsoever, you do not want to participate in the social program. The logical extension is, Madam

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Speaker, at the end of the day why should you pay in for social programs?


Mrs. Dobbie:: You wouldn't know logic if it jumped up and hit you on the face.


Brian Vincent Tobin: My friend opposite states that I would not know logic if it jumped up and hit me on the face. I say to my friend opposite, that if this member opposite had the courage, had the integrity of a basic human being, this member opposite would not stand and applaud like a trained seal for a Prime Minister who has lied outright, repeatedly, to the people of Canada. That is the bottom line.


Dorothy I. Dobbie: Withdraw and apologize.


Brian Vincent Tobin: Madam Speaker, I understand that in parliamentary tradition I cannot use that word. So, for the sake of not having my speech interrupted by a trained, spineless seal, which is parliamentary, I want to withdraw the word "lied".


James (Jim) Stewart Edwards: And apologize.


Brian Vincent Tobin: Apologize? You want me to apologize to the senior citizens of Canada for a Prime Minister who committed to them that their social programs would not be touched and then robbed their pockets? I cannot apologize for the Prime Minister. He has to apologize for himself. You want me to apologize for a Prime Minister who brought his mother, a senior citizen, on a stage and said, "My mother is a senior citizen. I would no more abandon her than senior citizens of the country". I cannot apologize for that act of betrayal. That is up to the Prime Minister.
I am concerned that Canadians understand that what is at stake here today is not taking substantial dollars out of the pockets of some Canadians. What is at stake here today is whether or not we in this country are going to continue to have social programs universally available, and as a consequence, always available to those who need it the most. That is what is at stake.
For those who believe that in this Canada we ought not to emulate and try to replicate that nation to the south where it is dog eat dog, where it is a fact of life that you get the health care you can pay for; no more, no less; where it is perfectly acceptable to see your neighbour in the gutter as long as you have done all right and saved your pennies. For those who believe that a country like Canada, as large as it is, and as sparsely populated as it is, can only survive when citizenship has attached to it some common meaning no matter where you live and what
your circumstance, then we have to maintain our social programs.
This government, had it any idea that a nation's heartbeat, a nation's soul, a nation's conscience cannot be defined like pieces on a Monopoly board, it would withdraw this bill because for the few pennies the government is putting back in the Minister of Finance's coffers, it is ripping the heart and soul out of Canada. The government is asking us to become a nation of intolerant, indifferent, selfish, mean-spirited citizens. That is not in the fibre of this country. It will not be accepted by the people of Canada. Had this government the courage of its words and commitments, it would withdraw this bill.
The people of Canada will not forget this bloody betrayal of our basic values and beliefs by this government.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: Questions or comments. The hon. member for York South-Weston.


John V. Nunziata: Madam Speaker, I would like to put a question or two to my friend and colleague. I believe, as he does, that Canadians are fair-minded people, that they understand the need for the Government of Canada, indeed all governments, to tax in order to ensure certain programs and benefits and in order to improve the quality of life for all Canadians.
In so doing, I believe, and I am sure the member agrees, that any system of taxation has to be perceived to be fair to all Canadians, whether you are a rich stockbroker on Bay Street or a single mother or father on welfare in Metropolitan Toronto.
I would like to ask the member whether he really believes-and he has been in the House now for a considerable period of time-that this government over the last five years has been fair with its economic policies? The member has enunciated our concerns with respect to the so-called clawback provisions, the attempt to de-index senior citizen pensions. Can he indicate to me how this government could possibly conceive it or believe it to be fair to clawback seniorcitizen pensions on the one hand and to allow rich investors on Bay Street to claim capital gains? Where is the justice? Where is the fairness? Where is the equity in that type of economic policy?


The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Champagne):: I am sorry to interrupt the hon. member. I am sure he will find a way to answer that question at the next sitting of the House.
October 18, 1989

Government Orders
It being 6 p.m. this House stands adjourned until The House adjourned at 6 p.m. tomorrow at eleven o'clock a.m., pursuant to Standing Order 24(1).

Thursday, October 19,1989