1990-10-25

[Stage Direction]
Mr. Speaker I have the honour to table a special report presented to Parliament by the Commissioner of Official Languages, in accordance with section 67 of the Official Languages Act.


Mr. Albert Cooper (Parliamentary Secretary to Leader of the Government in the House of Commons):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36(8), I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the government's response to several petitions.
[Editor's Note: See today's Votes and Proceedings.]



IMMIGRATION


Hon. Barbara McDougall (Minister of Employment and Immigration):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 32(2), I have the honour to table, in both official languages, copies of the annual report to Parliament, Immigration Plan for 1991-1995.



IMMIGRATION PLAN FOR 1991-1995

Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to table today the government's annual report to Parliament which provides an immigration plan for Canada for 1991 to 1995.
I should point out that this is the first time that the government has introduced a five-year plan. Traditionally, we have had in our Parliament a one-year plan on immigration. This five-year planning horizon is only one of the innovations that we have introduced to ensure that immigration to Canada continues to play an important role in our government's social and economic policies.

By adopting a five-year time horizon, there is sufficient lead time for our many partners in the process to develop their own plans to accommodate the people who wish to come to Canada.
I stress this need for planning and management of the process, because many people try to reduce this important policy initiative to a simple game of numbers.
Mr. Speaker, there are real people behind those numbers-people with real stories, real hopes and dreams-people who have chosen Canada as their new home.

It is our responsibility as a government to ensure that policies and program are in place to ensure that these people can integrate quickly and comfortably into Canadian society.
As part of my report, I am very pleased to provide a new federal integration strategy which will ensure greater collaboration with the provinces, with immigrantserving organizations, and with the private sector, as well as new programs and funding for language training for newcomers to Canada.
Much of the strategy was developed as a result of the extensive consultation process that I initiated across the country this past year, a process that included the

October 25, 1990
Routine Proceedings
broadest range of organizations and individuals ever put together from different walks of life and with varying perspectives on immigration.
There are clearly many points of view across Canada on how many immigrants we should accept, the type of immigrants we should encourage and the programs and services that we should provide. Of course, there are finite limits to our ability and to our resources.
As a government, we must make the difficult choices that are necessary to balance the range of opinions, the range of interests and the motives of all Canadians, and still live within our budgetary and other constraints.
To ensure that our choices are good for Canada, we spent close to two years examining the range of options available to us, against the backdrop of our domestic needs, our international obligations, our moral obligations to our own values and our ability to accommodate people coming to Canada.
Mr. Speaker, I believe that we have made these choices well. We propose a moderate increase in total immigration over the next five years rising from 200,000 people this year to 220,000 next year and to a maximum of 250,000 in 1992 and beyond.

In allowing that moderate growth, we propose to restore the traditional proportional balance among the three streams of immigration-the family, refugee, and independent categories. To accomplish this balance, we have been required to re-examine the nature of family immigration and to re-define "the family" using the criterion of real dependency.
In practical terms, this means that Canadians will be allowed to sponsor spouses and fiance (e)s; all dependent children, regardless of their age or marital status; all parents, regardless of age or their sponsor's length of residence in Canada; and all adopted children, regardless of age, who are legitimately dependent on their parents.
To allow for these new provisions, we have been forced to exclude adult, non-dependent children. But they may still be eligible to immigrate to Canada under the assisted relatives class.

We will also discontinue the "retirees" program in 1990, since most retirees who were bom in Canada and who wish to return in the retirement will be able to do so under other categories.
We have also chosen to continue Canada's fine record of humanitarianism by providing for generous numbers of government and privately-sponsored refugees, in addition to the people who will have their claims accepted within Canada.
Finally, we will be making a number of adjustments in the independent category to ensure that skilled workers are selected in accordance with both national and provincial economic needs and objectives.
While our choices as a government are difficult, they are no more difficult than the individual choices of those people who choose to come to Canada, who have come here to build new lives. As Canadians we must do everything possible to ensure that we understand both the challenges and the opportunities that immigration provides for us. We must each play a part to ensure that we provide a genuine welcome to those who have chosen Canada as their new home.
In tabling this report, I look around and see the faces of many people who either directly or through a family member know the reality of the immigration experience. It was that reality that directed our choices and our planning. It is that genuine understanding of the people affected that will govern our actions during the course of this plan.


Mr. Alfonso Gagliano (Saint-Leonard):: Mr. Speaker, first of all, I would like to thank the minister for having given us a chance to analyse the document she just tabled in this House, her five-year plan.
Mr. Speaker, it was a good try by the minister, considering she had to convince both her cabinet colleagues and the Tory caucus, who so often recommended freezing the number of immigration admissions to our country.
The minister is to be commended for moving slowly but surely towards the 1 per cent rate we Liberals have been demanding for several years.
However, Mr. Speaker, we can hardly rely on the figures given in this shiny new five-year plan, because so far, the minister's projections have never been realized.


October 25, 1990

The levels announced for 1990 are way off the mark, not only in terms of figures but also in terms of the various classes.
In 1988, the same minister tabled another shiny new plan which, according to her, would deal with the backlog of refugee claims that still exists today. Two years later, not more than 20 per cent of these cases have been settled, and now we have another plan, not for two years but five.
What these plans prove is that immigration in Canada is completely out of control. What we need is a return to principles. There was a time when immigration was subject to the vagaries of a changing economy. That is a thing of the past. Today, progressive minds see immigration as one of the major motors of our economy.
In a country with such a low population density, immigration, if dealt with intelligently, compassionately, and with sufficient planning, is an effective lever for developing our economic and human resources.
The fact is, we don't have too many immigrants in this country, Mr. Speaker. We don't have enough!
It is easy to fall into the trap of applying mainly economic criteria when analysing this question and to overlook the sociological and demographic reality we can expect in the decades to come.
The facts are clear, and the statistical projections are impressive. Basically, we have an ageing population in this country which does not reproduce in sufficient numbers to ensure replacement. For the past fifteen years, the birthrate has been below the levels required to maintain the present population.
At this rate, our population will increase during the next few years, reaching a peak of 28 million Canadians 25 years from now, and then dropping to 15 million 25 years after that.
Mr. Speaker, clearly we must take steps now to deal with the consequences of this demographic curve, because if our population ever dropped to that level, this country will face serious socio-economic consequences. Just consider the impact of the following: a dramatic reduction in our productive labour force with the resulting drop in tax revenue, plus the need to meet the demands of an ageing population. To survive and prosper, we must compensate for our falling birthrate and
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maintain the labour force levels we need to maintain our level of economic activity.

We must decide now. Do we want Canada, over the next 50 years, to be an important country in the world, or are we satisfied to keep the status quo, becoming in the long run a marginal member of the global entity?
Today, everybody talks about our financial deficit. We do not have only a financial deficit. We have another deficit as important, maybe even more important. We have a human deficit which is increasing and becoming more threatening every day.
In the document tabled today, the minister puts great emphasis on her federal integration strategy, on Canadian values, and on national pride. This is only wishful thinking and good intentions.
The minister failed to outline a detailed action plan, specific objectives, and, last but not least, a budget.

In the document tabled today, the Minister puts great emphasis on her federal integration strategy, on Canadian values and national pride.
But it is only wishful thinking on her part since she failed to outine an action plan, specific objectives, and, last but not least, a budget.
Meanwhile, Mr. Speaker, the Canadian association of school counselors tells us that, due to a lack of resources,
125,000	to 150,000 immigrant children do not receive any education in French or in English. School authorities simply do not have the resources needed to deal with this sudden influx.
Mr. Speaker, this document does not say anything about a plan to make the Canadian population aware of the social changes related to immigration. We must act quickly to develop a strategy to inform and educate the Canadian public on the still unknown-and therefore threatening-issue of immigration.
Statistics show that roughly one Canadian out of three is reluctant, not to say unwilling, to welcome immigrants to Canada.
Information and education are the best guarantees we have against all forms of racism. This is one of the serious problems with this five-year plan.

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Routine Proceedings

Just a year ago, in the great burst of compassion, we expanded our definition of the family for immigration purposes. The minister announced the government's plan on the new family reunification to include all children who had never been married.
Today, in a drastic stroke, she again closes the door on families. Reduce access to families, that is another tragic aspect to the minister's five-year plan.

In closing, Mr. Speaker, today the Minister, with her plan and her big numbers, will give hope to a lot of people here and throughout the world. But we know very well that she can never stick to her plans. This is why we urge her to look beyond her rhetorical speeches and to give her department the resources it needs to implement the five-year plan.


Mr. Dan Heap (Trinity-Spadina):: Mr. Speaker, I do commend the minister for several aspects of her report. One is the innovation of the five-year plan which is very necessary, not only for potential immigrants planning to come to Canada, but for immigration staff and Canadian citizens planning or preparing to receive them.
Also, I commend her for undertaking to move toward the level of 250,000 immigrants per year which has a good deal of public support, especially from the Canadian Ethnocultural Council, but also from many others.
I commend the minister, also, for one of her decisions regarding the funding of language training and I will come to that later.
However, there are several matters which I cannot commend and I do not agree with her that she has maintained the proportion of family reunification to independent immigration to refugee immigration. In fact, family immigration has not been sustained by her government for several years at the proportion that it used to have and that most people have intended that it should have. There is nothing here to indicate an increase in proportion to the increase in total immigration.
In fact, there is a memo that was leaked to The Toronto Star last month which suggests that immigration posts abroad will process some family members more slowly, last in line. As it is now, it takes two years for many posts to get a family member over here. The new plan makes some wishes but has no provisions for speeding this up.
There is also no attempt to increase the number of government-sponsored refugees selected overseas from the large pool that desperately need resettlement. In fact, the restriction for the last half year on the loan program, in violation of a written agreement with private sponsoring groups, has seriously hindered the bringing in of privately sponsored refugees as well. There is no clear assurance that the loan program will be restored even though several months ago Parliament voted a very generous sum of money for that purpose.
The minister also does not take into account the fact that the Department of External Affairs announced at the beginning of July that it would be reducing the number of visa officers overseas and at home. In other words, the expansion that the minister undertakes is not being matched by staff and is actually going to be hindered by staff if the Department of External Affairs carries out its program of restructuring and cuts.
Within Canada, the Canada Employment and Immigration Commission has not announced any increases in staff or money to handle the extra workload that the minister has undertaken. We know from past experience, certainly in Toronto, about the line-ups that start in the small hours of the morning and continue all day long. We know that the minister does not have enough staff to handle the work even as it is now.
The good news about language training is that the minister has undertaken verbally $200 million over the next four years to teach English or French as a second language to adults. This is what her staff gave us last night.
The bad news is that there is no willingness at all to assist the schools of Canada in teaching English and French as a second language to children and the SLT program of last year has, of course, been cancelled. In Ontario alone, there will be tens of thousands of children in school who are not being served by second-language programs and that will seriously hold back their
October 25, 1990

Routine Proceedings
education and the education of others in the same school classes.
Finally, I wish to point out that the relative priority being given in this program is the continuing increase in the proportion of independent immigrants. This is questionable in two ways, one of which I have already mentioned. It is done at the expense of family immigration and at the expense of government-sponsored refugees which is frozen at the level of 13,000. It has been at for several years and, according to her report, will be frozen for the next five years. It also raises a question of what the government's motive is in going abroad for independent immigrants.
We have heard it suggested, especially from the other side, that the government has to find skilled people at the lowest cost. In other words, there are poor countries who manage to train a few skilled people or a few highly educated people. We would like to go and scoop those up and bring them to Canada, rather than the government, at any level in the country, spending the money needed to train Canadians, whether they have been bom here or not. It would be foolish, as has been done over past generations, to rely on simply bringing our skilled trades and our highly educated professions from overseas.
For one thing, if they move to Canada they may still be footloose and move on to the United States; that is a pattern we have observed. For another, it hurts the training programs for Canadians and stultifies the opportunities for Canada's young people to grow up and learn the trades that are needed in our country.
Therefore, I regret that the same minister who is responsible for training programs seems to want to undercut those programs with her program for independent immigration.
All and all, although there are certain details of this program that seem to be well managed, the main thrust of it is still not what the Canadian people want or need.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Shefford, on a point of order.


Hon. Jean Lapierre (Shefford):: Mr. Speaker, since this question goes to the very heart of the linguistic duality of this country and the minister has made a major announcement today, I would appreciate an opportunity to address the House and comment very briefly on the minister's speech, since what she said is important to Quebec's linguistic and demographic balance. In fact, the survival of French-speaking Quebec may be threatened by her immigration levels if immigration is not controlled under the provisions we hoped-


Mr. Speaker:: I hesitate to interrupt the hon. member, but I take it the hon. member is rising and asking the Chair if it would be appropriate that he have the same privileges as the two official opposition parties in responding to the minister. That is the point. The hon. member may be moving on to saying what he would say, if he was replying to the minister, but I have his point.
I have a problem, the hon. member knows that, with the rules. I would ask him to address that particular point and then I will hear other members.


Jean-C. Lapierre: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Without addressing the substance of the debate, in accordance with the Standing Orders, I believe we represent an important group in this House which has a point of view it wishes to communicate to the House. I think that, in response to the minister's speech regarding a number of questions of particular interest to us, and in the name of democracy and especially in the name of freedom of expression in this House, I believe it would be appropriate for us to have a chance to comment on speeches as important as the one the minister just made, which has a major impact on the constituents we have the privilege to represent.
Mr. Speaker, I am not asking for special favours. I only ask that occasionally, we be given an opportunity to respond to important announcements made by the government. I am sure the government would not object if we were allowed to comment on speeches made in this House to give Parliament first notice of their policies.

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Consequently, if the purpose of ministers' statements is to give advance notice to parliamentarians, out of respect for this Elouse and what this institution represents, I am sure, Mr. Speaker, that the government and members of other parties in this House would be interested to hear the views of the various groups sitting in this Chamber. This goes to the very core of this institution and our democratic traditions.
For instance, as far as immigration is concerned, I am sure that the Quebec perspective is of particular interest to the hon. member for Ottawa-Vanier and the Minister of External Affairs, who has an abiding interest in Quebec issues. So I would like to be able to oblige by expressing my point of view.


Right Hon. Joe Clark (Secretary of State for External Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, I am just as deeply interested in questions related to the interests of Quebec as I am in democratic issues. Democracy calls for respect for rules, Mr. Speaker, and the rules of the House are clear.


Mr. Jean-Robert Gauthier (Ottawa-Vanier):: Mr. Speaker, I feel I must respond because the member for Shefford did refer to me personally. First I would remind him that the Standing Orders are quite clear when it comes to ministerial statements, that is who can respond and how.
Mr. Speaker, I fully agree that this morning's ministerial statement is important and that the parties in opposition to the government have the right to reply. I did say the parties in opposition to the government have the right to reply. The Standing Orders are quite clear on that point. For the benefit of hon. members, allow me to read Standing Order 33(1):
33.(1) On Statements by Ministers, as listed in Standing Order 30(3), a Minister of the Crown may make a short factual announcement or statement of government policy. A Member from each of the parties in opposition to the government -
I underscore the words "parties in opposition"-
-may comment briefly thereon. The time for such proceedings shall be limited as the Speaker deems fit.
The minister spoke for seven minutes and I think that the opposition parties, certainly the Official Opposition and the third party, the New Democratic Party, did keep to the allotted time.
This morning, Mr. Speaker, the member for Shefford wants to debate the matter. He is entitled to do that. The debate has been opened by the minister's statement and it will go on, I imagine, during Question Period and probably during comments and statements by members under Standing Order 31. He will have every opportunity to comment on the decision. I know him well enough to realize he will do that without hesitation.
He said something like "we are an important faction in this House". He did not say "we are a political party of the House', he said "we are an important faction in this House'. That is what he said. Mr. Speaker, the Standing Orders do not say anything about factions having the right to respond to ministerial statements. The Standing Orders are clear, only duly recognized parties can do so. If the hon. members want, I could talk for several minutes or even several hours, read all the precedents since 1963 when the Standing Orders were changed, and even from the Parliament of Canada Act which gives a definition of party leader and determines who can be considered as such.
Mr. Speaker, in effect, what the hon. member for Shefford said is that, as an independent member of this House-it is his official status-, he would like to reply to the Minister. I am sorry but the Standing Orders do not allow him to do this. I agree with him that it is a very important issue. We are all concerned with-me as much as anybody else-the issue of linguistic duality. I certainly do not need a lecture from anybody on this. However, I, among others, would like to see the House function in a somewhat orderly fashion, which could be accomplished if the hon. members followed the rules as they are written.
If the rule in question is poorly written, I think it can be modified if a majority of members agree. But, in its current version, it clearly specifies that only the opposition parties have the right to reply. As far as I know, the group to which the hon. member for Shefford belongs is not recognized as a party in this House. Mr. Speaker, if we must start debating today what constitutes a party in
October 25, 1990

this House, I am ready to do it right now. And I would like to have my say on this fundamental issue: how do we know what constitutes a political party and what are the definitions contained in the Canada Elections Act and the Standing Orders of the House of Commons.
And since the hon. member for Shefford maintains that he is not a political party, Mr. Speaker, I am sorry to tell him that we cannot accommodate his request to reply to the Minister, but not because we are opposed to what he is going to say or to his freedom of speech. Even though freedom of speech is sacred in this House, we must follow the rules. Under the item of business called "routine proceedings", the Minister made a statement she had a right to make and to which we replied. In previous rulings, former Speakers, namely Mr. Mac-Naughton, Mr. Lamoureux and Mr. Jerome, have always maintained that independent members do not have the right to reply to Ministers' statements.


Mr. Nelson A. Riis (Kamloops):: Mr. Speaker, first I want to say that we acknowledge and appreciate the fact that the minister made the statement on major changes to Canada's immigration policy in the House today, which permitted then an opportunity for recognized opposition parties to respond.
I share the concern my hon. friend from Shefford obviously has in wanting to respond. I know as a member from the western part of Canada where these changes will have a major impact on our communities, I too would like to respond. The rules limit me from doing so. I also acknowledge that there are other members who are independent members whom I am sure would similarly have views that they too would like to reflect on in terms of this major announcement.
As the hon. member for Ottawa-Vanier pointed out, Standing Order 33(1) makes it clear what we can do within the rules. The only alternative my hon. colleague would have would be to seek unanimous consent-we do that from time to time-to overlook the Standing Orders or to alter them in order to let a certain event to occur.
That is the only procedure I see available. Mr. Speaker, your hands are tied, and in a sense our individual hands are tied, but that would be the only way that the
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hon. member for Shefford would have a chance of responding as would others, if they received unanimous consent of the House.


Mr. Speaker:: I do not see other members rising. If they wish, I of course will hear them. I do not think I need to hear further on this point.


Mr. Peter Milliken (Kingston and the Islands):: Mr. Speaker, I simply had some precedents that I thought might be of assistance to you in dealing with this issue from 1963, 1966 and 1979.1 can summarize them briefly if it would be of any assistance to Your Honour.
If not, I am prepared to rely on the arguments advanced by my colleague from Ottawa-Vanier and the hon. member for Kamloops which I submit are correct and in accordance with these precedents.


Mr. Speaker:: I want to thank the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands. I am very familiar with the precedents.


Albert Glen Cooper: Mr. Speaker, I hesitate to interrupt because we do not want to be seen in any way as preventing the opposition from participating in an important issue.
I, too, have gone through the precedents fairly carefully, and it seems to me that the precedents are quite clear that even though a group within the House is not a recognized party according to the parliamentary act that we deal with, often in the past the Speaker has allowed those members to intervene and make statements.
I think that would be the case here today, except for one rather unique exception; that is, as was mentioned by the hon. member for Ottawa-Vanier, we are dealing with a group that has not been registered as a party electorally. I think that does have a significant impact on how it can be treated within the Chamber. Essentially, that is a very serious difficulty. The Speakers' precedents in the past have been very clear, that independents were not allowed the privilege of responding to ministerial statements because they did not represent a party. Even though we now have a group that think of themselves as a party, they are in fact not registered as one within the House or with the Electoral Act of Canada.

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Jean-C. Lapierre: I am pleased that my colleagues have now established a certain number of criteria they would like to see applied when a party is recognized as such.
Mr. Speaker, we would also like to benefit from your great wisdom and would appreciate if you could tell us whether the Canada Elections Act takes precedence over the precedents of this House and whether the Canada Elections Act or the legislation dealing with political parties provide for de facto recognition within this institution.
Mr. Speaker, if technically, one must register with the Chief Electoral Officer a reference was made by the hon. member for Ottawa-Vanier and the parliamentary secretary I would like some clarification in this respect. I read comments by some of our colleagues in the Hill Times, and not that I want to advertise the fact, but it is clear that some of our colleagues tend to emphasize the importance of registration with the Chief Electoral Officer.
Mr. Speaker, I raised the matter because it keeps popping up every time. We sent you a joint statement that we had formed a political group in this House. We believe this House controls its own destiny and its own rules. I did not imagine the Canada Elections Act and registration with the Chief Electoral Officer in any way affected the recognition of parliamentary groups by this House or their recognition for income tax purposes.
Mr. Speaker, I know you are an eminent lawyer, and I was counting on your insight. Actually, I would be tempted to approach this as a question of privilege, because the question of registration is brought up time and time again. I would like to know how the matter of registration impacts legally on our status here in the House. I wish you would rule on that once and for all. It would also help the hon. member for Ottawa-Vanier and other members who regularly refer to this issue.
Mr. Speaker, I therefore wish to seek the unanimous consent of the House for commenting briefly on the immigration question, since I don't think we have settled the issue of party status, but I raise this question with a
big question mark, and I would appreciate the benefit of your wisdom.


Mr. Speaker:: I want to thank the hon. member for Shefford for his comments, and the other members-

-the hon. member for Ottawa Vanier, the hon. member for Kingston and The Islands, the hon. member for Kamloops, the right hon. Secretary of State for External Affairs and the parliamentary secretary.

This is very interesting, because the hon. member for Shefford is seeking an interpretation from the Chair respecting certain laws of Canada. A legal interpretation might be very interesting. I am tempted but, unfortunately for the hon. member for Shefford, it is not the Chair's role to interpret the Statutes of Canada. Consequently, I must reject the hon. member's request. I have taken a few moments of the time of the House to discuss a matter which, as I said before, is most interesting but it is an area that is closed to the Chair.

I would like to draw to the attention of hon. members rule 33. It is very clear.

33. (1) On Statements by Ministers, as listed in Stanting Order 30(3), a Minister of the Crown may make a short factual announcement or statement of government policy. A Member from each of the parties in opposition to the government may comment briefly thereon. The time for such proceedings shall be limited as the Speaker deems fit.

We are bound by the rules here and, as hon. members have said, that is the rule. I think the hon. member for Kamloops said the Speaker's hands were tied. That is certainly the case and, without consent or without a change in this rule, I must say to the hon. member for Shefford that I am not in a position to allow the hon. member to respond.
I want to point out to hon. members, as has been mentioned in argument, and also to the public that this does not mean that the hon. member for Shefford or others who sit in this Chamber outside the recognized parties at the moment do not have a chance to be heard. That would be an interpretation which is not accurate.
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All members have the right to speak during the period called Statements by Members each day, a full 60-second statement. Further, members have the right to ask questions in Question Period. After that question is asked, under the rules members can go further. They can ask to be allowed to speak on the adjournment debate and, when their turn comes up, that is a seven-minute speech to which the government responds for three minutes. There are other ways-and I have not precluded some other ways as well-in which these matters can be raised.
Unfortunately for the hon. member for Shefford, I am bound by the rule. I see the hon. member is indicating some understanding of that. His route, I think, is discussions with his colleagues and, if there is to be a change, then of course I would abide by it.
It has been brought to my attention that there was a request by the hon. member for Shefford to respond. Is there unanimous consent to allow the hon. member for Shefford to respond?


An hon. member:: No.


Mr. Speaker:: I have to advise the hon. member there is not unanimous consent.



INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT RESEARCH CENTRE

[Stage Direction]
20TH ANNIVERSARY
Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, just 20 years ago, in a remarkable act of foresight and goodwill, this House gave unanimous approval to legislation creating the International Development Research Centre. In the two decades since, the IDRC has attracted the interest and the commendation of the world as it has offered forms of innovative and effective assistance to the scientific communities of the developing countries.
This week, the centre's International Board of Governors, composed of distinguished scientists and development experts from 11 different countries, is meeting in Ottawa for one of its regular meetings. As they do so, these men and women have every reason to view with pride IDRC's accomplishments. It is a pride that I know is shared by all hon. members of this House.

IDRC's statutory mandate is to support development-related research. Since its creation, the Centre has chosen to do so by encouraging and funding scientific research undertaken and managed by developing country scientists. In this way the research is relevant to needs, and the competence and experience of local scientists is deepened and enhanced. IDRC-funded research has led to increased supplies of food and water, improved education and health services, more reliable data for decision-makers, and better access to information.

The success of the centre has attracted the commendation of committees of this House, even of the Auditor General of Canada, and of numerous international observers. Its developmental data bases are recognized as among the most diverse and valuable of any in the world. They include, for example, all of the original archives of the Brundtland commission.
The accomplishments of IDRC, Sir, are a credit to Canada. To the board and to the staff of this unique international organization, I extend, I am sure on behalf of all members of the House, thanks and best wishes for continued success as the IDRC enters its third decade.


Some hon. members:: Hear, hear.


Mrs. Christine Stewart (Northumberland):: Mr. Speaker, it is my great pleasure to rise today in support of the words of the right hon. Secretary of State for External Affairs in commending the International Development Research Centre for 20 years of very successful development work.
I find it unfortunate that Canadians are not as familiar as I think they should be with the very successful work of the International Development Research Centre, for if we go around the world into the most remote areas of Third World countries we will find people talking about the accomplishments of the International Development Research Centre.
Some 15 to 20 years ago the populations of Canada and developed nations around the world were concerned about famine and hunger in India; but few Canadians realize what an important contribution the International Development Research Centre has made to the fact that no longer do we hear about famine in India despite severe droughts that it has undergone. This is because of the significant and important research that the Interna-

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tional Development Research Centre has put into the sphere of agriculture, its focus of attention and concentration.
Besides concentrating on agricultural security worldwide, employees of the centre have put a lot of effort into health and nutrition and social sciences. They have done much to relieve the poverty at the grassroots level in Third World countries around the world. Next week they will have a small technological fair at their centre to which they will invite the public to see some of the technology that they have brought into place: technology which, for example, has produced pumps that are easily maintained in the Third World, bringing healthy, safe water to population, and a simple device such as the hulling machine which has saved women in Third World countries hours daily in preparing their daily food.
Today we also have visiting us in our country a Dr. Mahbub ul Haq from the United Nations Development Program who has helped the United Nations put out a report on world development. He indicates in his report that it is not so important that everybody in the world have $20,000 U.S. as their income per annum, but how we distribute wealth in the world; that if we support countries who are interested in equitable distribution of wealth and employ the resources that organizations such as the International Development Research Centre make possible, we can do much to improve the status of living of peoples around the world.
Along with the right hon. Secretary of State for External Affairs, I wish to congratulate the International Development Research Centre on its accomplishments. Through its technological fair and through its collaboration with other Canadian entities such as our non-government organizations in our universities, I hope Canadians will become more aware of the enormous contribution of the International Development Research Centre to effective international development and that others in Canada will be encouraged to follow its example.


Some hon. members:: Hear, hear.


Mr. Stan J. Hovdebo (Saskatoon -Humboldt):: Mr. Speaker, the New Democratic Party supports international development assistance and recognizes the International Development Research Centre as a proper tool for helping to implement Canada's commitment to humanitarian aid to the developing world.
On the 20th anniversary of the International Development Research Centre, we extend congratulations to the board of governors and the staff of the IDRC on a job well done. We also congratulate former Prime Minister Lester Pearson and the Parliament of the day for their foresight in establishing the centre.
IDRC is also to be congratulated on its success to adhering to the development principles laid down 20 years ago at its inception. These principles targeted assistance for the poorest people and stressed aid to developing countries to help them create their own long-term solutions to pressing developmental problems.
The IDRC's practice of assisting with research at the local level, especially the supporting of promising young scientists for developing countries, is a logical and sensible approach to meeting the needs of Third World countries to overcome the cycle of poverty. Getting aid to the right people is always a concern. IDRC seems to have successfully met that challenge.
New Democrats call on the Secretary of State for External Affairs to increase the funding to IDRC to the 5 per cent of the ODA target originally set for IDRC and to increase ODA funding quickly to the UN target of .7 per cent of Canada's GNR We believe the Department of External Affairs, CIDA, and IDRC could extend the value of Canada's ODA by working much more closely together in sharing experience and expertise.
I hope that the International Development Research Centre will use its 20th anniversary to analyse its impact and assist all Canadians to understand the tremendous value of Canadian Official Development Assistance.
In closing, I want to congratulate Mr. Ivan Head, IDRC's president, on his appointment to the Order of Canada last evening. This honour reflects well on the good work done by Mr. Head, the board, and the staff of IDRC.



INTER-PARLIAMENTARY DELEGATIONS TENTH ACTIVITY REPORT OF THE CANADIAN BRANCH OF THE INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF FRENCH-SPEAKING PARLIAMENTARIANS

Hon. Andree Champagne (Saint-Hyacinthe-Bagot):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 34(1), I have the honour to present to the House, in both official languages, the Tenth Activity Report of the Canadian Branch of the International Association of FrenchSpeaking Parliamentarians.
This Report is a summary of the meeting held by the American Region from August 16 to 19, in Portland, Maine, and presided by Mr. John Martin, the Speaker of the House of Representatives.
I want to point out, Mr. Speaker, that the seven sectors of the American Region, including Louisiana, were represented. The proceedings were therefore very interesting and I invite my colleagues to peruse the Report I have the honour of presenting today.



BILL C-63 REPORT OF LEGISLATIVE COMMITTEE

Mr. Gilbert Parent (Welland-St. Catharines-Tho-rold):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the report of the legislative committee on Bill C-63, an act to establish the Canadian Race Relations Foundation, with amendment. It is particularly apropos today, with the statement of the Minister of Employment and Immigration.
Mr. Speaker, I wonder if you would permit me just to say how very much I appreciated the fact that the member for South Shore chaired the last three sessions of the committee. He obtained the complete co-operation of all members on the committee. I do compliment him and thank him for putting this legislation through.
[Editor's Note: See today's Votes and Proceedings.]
Routine Proceedings PROCEEDS OF CRIME ACT



MEASURE TO ENACT

Hon. Gilles Loiselle (President of the Treasury Board and Minister of State (Finance)) moved: for leave to introduce Bill C-89, an act to facilitate combating the laundering of proceeds of crime.


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


Gilles Loiselle: for leave to introduce Bill C-90, an act to amend the Bank Act (extension).


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


Mr. John Manley (Ottawa South) moved: for leave to introduce Bill C-341, an act to amend the Parliament of Canada Act and the Canada Elections Act (change of political affiliation).
He said: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of this bill which amends both the Parliament of Canada Act and the Canada Elections Act, would be to recognize the importance that political party affiliation plays in the election of members to this House. It would result, in the event of change of party affiliation during the course of a Parliament in a member's seat being declared vacant, and a by-election being held within 90 days of the change of party affiliation.
I think it would enable voters to have a direct say in members' decisions to change party affiliation.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the first time and ordered to be printed.
[Stage Direction]
October 25, 1990
Routine Proceedings

Jean-Robert Gauthier: Mr. Speaker, it is my duty to table today at least half a dozen petitions on behalf of Canadians who are strongly opposed to a tax on books.

These people claim that it has been a tradition in Canada not to tax magazines, books and newspapers, that the uninhibited dissemination of the printed word as a cornerstone of democracy, culture, education, and a literate and productive society will be negatively affected by the application of the proposed goods and services tax.
The undersigned humbly pray and call upon Parliament to reaffirm the historic principles embodied in the tax free status of the printed word by retaining the zero rate in the GST legislation and regulations.

In closing, Mr. Speaker, I want to point out the slogan the editors came out with in Quebec and that I find quite striking. It says: "To tax books is imposing ignorance."


Mr. David Kilgour (Edmonton Southeast):: Mr. Speaker, I have two petitions, both approved as to form by the clerk of petitions.
It is an honour to present a petition signed by almost
3,000	residents of British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Ontario concerning the proposed goods and services tax.
In a sentence, the petition says that the tax would be inflationary and regressive. It would reduce the standard of living of Canadians generally. Agreeing fully with the thrust of the petition, I am honoured to present it.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
David Kilgour: Mr. Speaker, the second petition is on behalf of approximately 132 residents of Edmonton, Toronto, London and Oakville about the imprisonment of Mr. Yih-Sheh Leo, a Canadian citizen in Taiwan. Among other things, they call for
the Government of Canada to do everything possible to obtain his early release.


GOODS AND SERVICES TAX
Gilbert Parent: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present a petition with regard to the goods and services tax.
This petition is part of 17,000 names which were collected by Mrs. Idris O'Neill of St. Catharines, Ontario and submitted to this House beforehand.
I was struck by the words which are used in presenting this petition. They are: "the right thus to present a grievance common to your petitioners," meaning the people who sign this, "in the certain assurance that your honourable House will therefore provide a remedy."
This is one of the series of petitions which has been put in this House of Commons by many members of Parliament. It would seem that the only remedy that this government is going to give us is more of the same. It is just not listening to the people of Canada who have been saying for many months that they do not want this tax.


VETERANS AFFAIRS
Mr. Maurice Foster (Algoma):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present three sets of petitions signed by a number of constituents in Massey, Ontario, in Little Current and Sheguiandah on Manitoulin Island and Thessalon, Ontario.
The petitioners call on the government to maintain its support and services to veterans. They point out that veterans of Canada have already made a great contribution to this country, both in wartime and in peace. They call on the government to maintain those services and not deprive them of much-needed services and assistance in times of hardship.


GOODS AND SERVICES TAX
Maurice Brydon Foster: Mr. Speaker, I have three other petitions signed by several hundred constituents in Espanola, Makaroff and in Wawa. I also have petitions from Kagawong, Gore Bay and Meldrum Bay on Manitoulin Island calling on the government to withdraw the goods and services tax.
The petitioners would have to do this at the Senate level because the bill has been passed in the House. They point out the unfairness of the tax to low-income
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families and to people who want to read. For instance, the Prime Minister's spouse yesterday talked about the importance of reading-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Order.


CANADIAN WHEAT BOARD
Mr. Rod Laporte (Moose Jaw-Lake Centre):: Mr. Speaker, I rise today to present a petition on behalf of a number of farmers from Saskatchewan.
With thousands of bushels in the field and this government failing to move grain in the world markets, thousands and thousands of farmers are going into bankruptcy. These farmers are concerned about the future of orderly marketing in this country.
The petitioners are concerned that the government is continuing to oversee the dismantling of the Canadian Wheat Board. They call upon this government to return oats to the jurisdiction of the Canadian Wheat Board to give oats and barley the same protection that wheat now enjoys. That would ensure that changes could only be made by Parliament itself, in order to give farmers in Saskatchewan and across this country protection.


GOODS AND SERVICES TAX
Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, I will continue to rise until there is not a gasp of hope left, I suppose, in terms of presenting petitions against the goods and services tax.
Today I rise to present petitions from Kamloops, Port Hope and Oshawa as well as Toronto, from individuals who are opposed to the goods and services tax. They point out a long list of reasons, all accurate and precise, why this is a fundamentally bad tax. It is coming at the worst time ever as we are into a recession. They are asking that the government reconsider their determined effort to proceed with the tax.
Mr. Speaker, I have another petition from all parts of Canada against the government's decision to tax literature and reading material. They cannot understand how the government feels that taxing a children's story book is going to be good for that child or good for the country.
They ask the government to consider not taxing reading material.


QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER
Albert Glen Cooper: Mr. Speaker, I ask that all questions be allowed to stand.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Shall all questions be allowed to stand?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS

[Stage Direction]


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from Wednesday, October 24, consideration of the motion of Mr. de Cotret that Bill C-78, an act to establish a federal environmental assessment process, be read the second time and referred to a legislative committee; and the amendment of Mr. Taylor, (p. 14644).
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I wish to inform the House that, because of the ministerial statements, Government Orders will be extended 31 minutes. The hon. member for Gander-Grand Falls.


Mr. George S. Baker (Gander-Grand Falls):: Mr. Speaker, the House of Commons is debating today a bill concerning the environment. That is an admirable thing to be doing. It certainly is good to read what the Government of Canada claims it is trying to do with this new environment bill.
In the bill, there is a preamble which reads:
-the Government of Canada seeks to achieve an appropriate balance between economic development and the preservation and enhancement of environmental quality; -
Today, in the Statutes of Canada, we have a Clean Air Act, an Environmental Protection Act for the land, and a clean water act, through the Fisheries Act. So one would think, on the face of it, that we would not need any more acts of Parliament.

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Mr. Speaker, if you go over those laws which are presently in effect in Canada, you will come to the conclusion that if the Government of Canada were doing its job, you would not need another bill to be introduced into the Parliament of Canada, passed by the Senate and made law, to deal with the protection of the environment. But the reality in dealing with the principle of this bill is that we have more problems today than we ever had with the environment and the reasons are quite simple.
If one looks at the Environmental Protection Act which was brought in to protect our enviomment and which outlawed polychlorinated biphenyls, commonly known as PCBs, and other substances that harm the environment, one would say, "Well, that is wonderful, that will protect our environment, that will protect our forest land, our trees, our walkways, all of the areas of nature that we have across this countiy".
But, Mr. Speaker, what does the federal Department of the Environment suggest to the power companies or to anybody else who wishes to construct a power line or keep it clear or construct a road or a right-of-way? It says, why not use a chemical called 2,4-D? That will kill all of the trees, the plants and the flowers and everything else, all along that power line. It is pretty cheap as well. So a toxic chemical is placed in the Canadian environment, from one part of Canada to the other, to kill all of that vegetation. Everywhere that pole line and that roadway goes, anything goes to get rid of plants, trees, and things that might interfere with that particular development.
The Government of Canada has on its books an act called the Environmental Protection Act suggesting to anybody who wishes to do so that, yes, we approve of the use of a chemical called 2-4-D to get rid of every single thing in the path of that power line, road, or right-of-way from one area of Canada to the other. Can you imagine the number of Canadians who go out every year to pick berries by the side of the road or on a pole line? Does any Canadian think about why it is those wild raspberries or wild strawberries grow so well in those areas, or why a blueberry grows so well under a power line, not knowing that perhaps two months or one day previous, a toxic chemical which kills vegetation was sprayed in that area?
Under provincial licences, there is supposed to be a sign put up. But how many signs can be put up? The Department of Agriculture and the Department of the Environment approves of that toxic chemical sprayed in our environment, taken away by the rain and the streams in all parts of Canada. You might say that is not bad because it is just on the power lines and the roadways. What about our wilderness areas and forest lands?
We have an Environmental Protection Act which allows the use of a tree killer called 2-4-D to be used in any part of Canada. It is used today and was used from one part of Canada to the other this year.
filming to the forests,there is the Clean Air Act. The Department of the Environment, together with the Department of Agriculture, suggests to the paper companies that they should go up in an aeroplane and spray another toxic chemical all over the forests, in western Canada to kill the beetle and in eastern and central Canada to kill the spruce budworm, the hemlock looper, or the balsam woolly aphid. The Government of Canada says: "You can do that. We suggest you do that. Here is a list of the chemicals we will give you approved by Environment Canada for use to kill the particular insects that you want to get rid of."
Province after province this summer bought one of the most toxic chemicals ever studied by man, apart from DDT which was used in the fifties. They bought fenitro-thion and matacil and they sprayed it over enormous areas of forest land from aeroplanes.
If we get the picture, we might go into our wilderness area and leave the pole line or roadway, where the plant killer 2-4-D is used, and walk into the forest, where on all of the trees in little oil droplets is a toxic chemical called fenitrothion which is designed to kill specific insects such as the beetle, the balsam woolly aphid, the hemlock looper, and the spruce budworm.
The Department of the Environment has a study done by the National Research Council on the use of fenitrothion. The study shows that chemical, used in Canada under the auspices of the federal Department of the Environment, has killed not only the forest insects they are trying to get rid of, but it has killed bees, harmless insects, and it has killed the birds, the very predators of the insects they are trying to get rid of.

If the birds that normally eat the insects that they are trying to get rid of are being killed, the next year they are going to have to spray again, aren't they? The same numbers of birds are not being reborn. Of course, the federal Department of the Environment says: "Well, it doesn't really kill the birds. It kind of-well, they don't grow right after." There will be birds that have only one wing.
Because of the approval of the federal Department of the Environment, some provinces today are caught in an endless cycle of using toxic chemicals on all of our wilderness areas and forests to kill an insect that they cannot kill, but they are killing everything else.
Those two chemicals that I just mentioned fenitro-thion and matacil, and 2-4-D, which is used in our right of ways to kill the plants and the trees, are relatively cheap. Also approved for use by the Department of the Environment is another substance which again could be sprayed called bacillus theringensus. The short name is BT. It was invented in Canada by a famous scientist in the Quebec region of the Canadian Forestry Service, a gentleman by the name of Dr. Schmirnoff. He invented it and that is being used today in many countries of the world where they want to rid of insects but they do not want to kill the natural predators.
I am telling you, Mr. Speaker, when you really get into this subject, you discover that some of the most interesting things were used to try to get rid of these pests in our wilderness areas. Why, one was invented at a university in eastern Canada, a particular substance that affected the normal cycle of reproduction of these particular insects. In other words, it was like a perfume that gave off the odour of a female budworm, in this case, and of course the males would then try to reproduce at the wrong time of the year. It did not work, but a lot of money was spent on it. I guess you could say that a lot of budworms were frustrated to death.
Many things were tried and the Canadian Forestry Service came up with this one solution called BT. But there is one drawback to it; it is expensive. It is not cheap like the fast fixes of the chemicals.
So, there is the Environmental Protection Act to protect the land and a chemical called 2-4-D sprayed from one area of Canada to the other to get rid of growth
Government Orders
of plants. There is the Clean Air Act to protect us from things in the air and to protect our environment. Yet, we approve the toxic chemicals fenitrothion and matacil used from one part of Canada to the other in all of our wilderness area over our forests. There is not much left, is there? That covers the forests. There is a chemical sprayed from the air, from one end of this country to the other. There are the tree ways, the walkways, and the power lines. There is another chemical used to kill the trees there.
Then, we turn to the clean water act, or what we call the Fisheries Act. Keep in mind what is before the House today, the statement in the preamble of Bill C-78:
- preventing the degradation of environmental quality and at the same time ensuring that economic development is compatible with the high value Canadians place on environmental quality.
We all know what a disaster we have in the waterways of Canada. Under the Fisheries Act, we use a section of the act when a pulp and paper mill puts a substance into the water. We can stop that substance from going into the water, because under the law we cannot disturb fish, and that is the hook that we have for the protection of the environment; namely, the fishing resource.
In the federal government, the Department of External Affairs has taken over the management of that environmental aspect of our development. As I have outlined to the House before, more foreign nations are given licences to plunder our resources on the bottom of the ocean within our 200-mile zone than are Canadians. Let me repeat that. Mr. Speaker, when you go out between 12 and 200 nautical miles, which is perhaps 230 or 240 road miles, that area of our coastline in eastern Canada has more licences granted to enormous factory vessels of 500 feet long and there are more vessels granted to foreign nations than there are licences granted to Canadians.
This year, we saw the Canadian licences cut back in the closure of fish plants in Nova Scotia and in Newfoundland. Today, more licences are granted to foreign nations than to Canadians in what we call the off-shore fishing resource of Canada. So far this year, 82 factory freezer trawler licences have been issued, mainly to Cuba, the Soviet Union and two other countries that were originally called East Germany and the German Democratic Republic. Some of these licences were never picked up.

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Government Orders
As I speak today, there are 14 Soviet vessels about 50 miles north northeast of Fogo Island in Newfoundland. There are two Japanese vessels about 100 miles east of the Labrador coast. They are fishing today. They have these enormous nets, as I pointed out before, on rollers that go along the ocean floor, kill everything and grab everything in their path. You cannot have spawning of fish when you have these gigantic, ultra-modern nets, almost like something out of Star Wars, all over our ocean floor totally destroying everything, all because the Department of External Affairs is the real manager of that resource in this country today.
On the principle of this particular bill, the report card for the Government of Canada under the Clean Air Act, under the Environmental Protection Act and under the clean water act, commonly referred to as the Fisheries Act, shows one big zero. It need not be that way. The Government of Canada is totally to blame for the total destruction of some of our fundamental resources in this country.


Mr. Jim Fulton (Skeena):: Mr. Speaker, just a quick question to my friend, George. In relation to Bill C-78,1 am just wondering whether or not he would agree that the bill, as drafted, is inadequate and that it really should apply to government policy, and the acts which should be listed, of which there are over 100, such as the Fisheries Act, should be included in the bill and that the regulations which the government side want to bring in is sort of a Trojan horse. The government side loves to do that and to say everything that is not in the bill can be done by Order in Council.
Would the hon. member agree that that kind of Trojan horse provision is not good for this kind of legislation? Canadians should know what the bill really means. We have regulations missing, acts missing, policy is not referred to and little things, of course, like the minister has never bothered to even speak on the bill. It has been before the House for four months. Perhaps the hon. member could deal with those matters which have been left out of the bill and perhaps he might ponder out loud why the minister will not come to the House, while we still have 20-minute sections when he could, in fact, be questioned. Perhaps we might wonder why he is not here.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I do not think the hon. member should bring that to the attention of the House. He may be watching it on television and he may be down, but I do not think that that should be brought to the attention of the House.


George Baker: Mr. Speaker, I think he is watching it on television and he is even making notes to try to straighten out a few things, I am sure.
My main point is that, regardless of what is in the bill, the Government of Canada does not follow through on what it claims its intentions are. I know that we have had court decisions that have brought on this bill.
The court, as I understand it, was trying to make the federal government responsible for certain actions for which it did not want to be responsible. The bill could be interpreted in such a way as facilitating the absence of the federal government making a definitive decision that the court thought it should make.
I think that that is why the Government of Canada is really not promoting this bill as the answer to the environmental problems that we have. The government may say that that is the case but it certainly will not repeat it too many times because we have too many people in Canada who are, as the preamble states, "compatible with the high value Canadians place on environmental quality".
Canadians do place a high value on environmental quality. Canadians use our environment. Canadians want our environment to be clean when, right now, it is filthy. They want to be able to visit our waterways and visit our forests and today, these are in a mess. They do not want to have chemicals rain down upon them, as they presently do in this country. It is a most disgusting and outrageous thought to walk into our forest lands and realize, if some people only knew the truth, that on a tree is a droplet of oil and in that oil is a chemical that kills things. When you get to a roadway, you do not realize that on each side the reason nothing grows there is because a chemical sprayed there.
What is the answer to it? Well, there is an answer. It is called labour work. There is an answer to preventing trees from disturbing a pole line. Get someone in there to chop them down. TTiere is an answer. Do not use those massive spray programs in our forest land. I really believe that the answer lies, and I know a lot of people would not agree with me, in promotion of the natural predator to the level we had. In other words, restore the bird populations to the levels they were. There is a danger in that as you cannot just have bird sanctuaries all over the place because you will have an over abundance
October 25, 1990

of birds. I recall when one government had a problem with the balsam woolly aphid. It decided to bring in the predator, the shrew. A shrew is a very tiny little animal with a sort of long tail. It is like a tiny mechanical mouse that you sometimes see in a store. The government brought in shrews.
I recall the day that this was announced in the provincial legislature. The premier of the province said: "Well, we got rid of the balsam woolly aphid. The shrews have eaten them up. But now we have a problem with too many shrews". He went on to say that the predator of the shrew is the snake, but if the government brought in snakes, it would never win the next election. That is a problem. The woodlots of eastern Europe where they have bird sanctuaries is a partial solution to this problem of using chemical sprays in our environment.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I regret that the hon. member's time has expired. It has been a very wonderful speech.
Questions and comments are now terminated. Debate? It should be the Liberal Party, but I will recognize the NDP if that is what the hon. member would like.
The hon. member for Skeena has the floor. He will be the last speaker who will have a 20-minute speech under Standing Order 74.
The hon. member for Ottawa-Vanier.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: I do not want to take exception to your ruling, Mr. Speaker. I have some notes. I do not want to follow my colleague from Gander-Twillingate. I cannot hope to speak like he does and I do not have the knowledge that he has, but I did wish and hope that I could start my speech before the allotted eight hours are up, which I am told will be around one o'clock. If we could get some understanding of that.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The hon. member will have 20 minutes plus 10 minutes questions and comments. There are 48 minutes remaining as of the commencement of the hon. member for Gander-Grand Falls, so the hon. member can judge for himself that there will not be that much time left. If he does get
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into it, naturally the Chair will allow the 20 minutes or he can get unanimous consent if he likes. I am just bringing this to the attention of the hon. member for Ottawa-Vanier.
The hon. member for Skeena has the floor on debate.


James Ross Fulton: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have a somewhat broader ranging opportunity to speak to Bill C-78, and I appreciate my friend giving me the opportunity.
There are a lot of people in this country who want to know more about Bill C-78. It is only through debates such as this that they will get an opportunity. It appears that the government side does not intend to put up the minister because, as the Speaker just pointed out, this is the last 20-minute speech that will have a 10-minute question and answer period with it. The government has ducked the opportunity to bring the minister forward. In the last full day of debate, the government has not put up any speakers. I guess its intention is to not really let its agenda be broadly known in the country.
In our series of hearings in the special committee, which was struck on June 27 but did not have a chair until September 24, we had a few witnesses. We had Mr. Robinson, the head of FEARO, the Federal Environmental Assessment and Review Office, and we have had some people from the Department of Justice. Other than that, we have not had a chance to really do what we were intended to do, which was to act as a pre-study but also as a special committee. My understanding was that we would have the opportunity to redraft Bill C-78, taking into account the major concerns that have been expressed from every province and from both territories, and from public interest groups, who want serious, tough-minded workable legislation when it comes to environmental assessment.
It seems that the government agenda is to not allow for the special committee to do its work. It wants to now complete second reading and force this legislation off to a legislative committee where only minor amendments and adjustments can be made. It certainly is the

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intention of myself and my party to do everything we can to hold the minister's feet to the fire so that some of the substantive changes that this legislation requires are made. The more than 100 acts of Parliament that should be included, things like the Fisheries Act, the Railway Act, acts affecting Crown corporations and so on, should all be included and they have not been.
It is our understanding from evidence before the special committee that the Department of Justice and FEARO have nearly completed their work in listing all of the acts that have some environmental implication, the Navigable Waters Act and others, so that they could in fact be included in the legislation. That work is nearing completion and that should be done.
There should be nowhere near as many weasel phrases used in the legislation. That means that the sections that have so much leeway in terms of Order in Council powers should be specified in terms of very carefully delimiting regulations so that the public, corporations, industry, provincial, municipal, territorial and federal governments all know just exactly how the legislation should work, how it is triggered and so on. That is lacking.
Policy is not included. It clearly should be. As I noted in the ministerial recommendations from the FEARO documents that are for some strange reason stamped secret, I guess we can find in there some of the reasons why the policy has not been included. Many of the provinces met privately and some of the memos were leaked. We learned through that process that many of the provinces wanted to make sure that the kind of litigation that we have seen in relation to the Rafferty-Alameda, in relation to the Oldman River Dam, in terms of the litigation now under way, and in relation to Alcan's Kemano 2 project could not occur in the future.
I quote from page 22 of 40 pages of this so-called secret FEARO document where it states:
93. Advantages/Disadvantages: The principal advantage of legislation is that it represents a long-term commitment by the Government to good and open environmental planning while also obliging all departments to implement the Process, removing the basis for much criticism. It would ensure that the Government applies its best efforts to preventing environmental damage from its own activities or from those it controls. Some consider that this "advantage" is really a disadvantage in that it could constrain departments' discretion. Assigning authority to the Minister and, in the case of Department of Environment proposals to an agency
reporting to the Minister, for deciding on the level and form of assessment would enhance the credibility of the process.
Now comes the key part:
It is also clear that the public would favour the opportunity to seek legal remedies in the courts if the law is not implemented. Unlike the present Order, however, the legislation would, in effect, establish clear limits for court intervention. Assessments of policy proposals would not be vulnerable to such intervention.
This is the 18th draft. It took 18 ping-pong balls in terms of drafts from those who were drafting it in the Department of Justice and FEARO, on up through the system to the Privy Council Office and the cabinet, and back down again. It seems that every time it came up cabinet requested further limitations in terms of the legislation and more gopher holes.
Effectively it has reached the point now where almost any project imaginable can somehow or other be diverted by the minister's discretion out of the process, meaning that there is no known imaginable project that would with absolute certainty undergo a mandatory environmental assessment and review.
A good in point is what we see on the front page of The Gazette: headlines such as "James Bay might start without hearings, Bacon seems to be winner in battle for early start on work." It goes on to point out that the largest industrial project ever conceived of or proposed in North America is the James Bay II project, known as the Great Whale or La Grande Baleine, and the NBR. Those two projects combined are the largest industrial proposal ever in the history of North America.
Even though the courts have ruled that the 1984 cabinet guidelines order is mandatory and there are an abundance of federal jurisdictions impacted by the James Bay II project proposal, we have yet to hear a single strong statement from the government that before this project gets under way, before roads and airports are built, before forests are cut down, before construction of the dams begin and so on, the hearings must take place publicly and that that process must be completed.
Surely we have learned from the loss of environment and the loss of federal and provincial government credibility on the Rafferty-Alameda. The disputes seemed to end up with: what is safety related work, what is safety related construction, and what is completion construction? Now we find the premier of Saskatchewan dumping on the Minister of the Environment and the
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Minister of the Environment chucking dirt back at the Government of Saskatchewan.
The fact is that the environmental assessment panel has resigned. The courts said there had to be an environmental assessment, but we have the two levels of government allowing a project to proceed in direct affront to the court and in direct violation of the law. Precisely the same is going on in relation to the Oldman River dam in Alberta.
As many members of this House will know, in March 1990 the Federal Court of Appeal ruled that Justice Jerome erred in his decision. The court quashed the federal licence to construct and ordered the federal environmental assessment of the project; but that construction continued. The federal government still has not appointed an environmental assessment review panel or an EARP, even though ordered to do so in March by the Federal Court of Appeal.
The federal Minister of the Environment has asked federal justice for a legal opinion on whether he can appoint an EARP while the decision is under appeal. As we know now, that has been sent off to the Supreme Court of Canada. Nothing is in the way of the Minister of the Environment doing what the court had ordered him to do; but he is still not doing it.
We have the two most controversial projects at the moment. On the Rafferty-Alameda, the EARP panel has resigned and no EARP has been reappointed so that it can complete its work before the project is over. In terms of the Oldman, now that the valves have been closed and the reservoir is starting to fill, one of the highest courts in the country, the Federal Court of Appeal, ordered that there be an EARP. The minister still has done nothing to comply with the law. What is the public to think?


Mr. Benjamin:: He is in contempt of court.


James Ross Fulton: Of course he is in contempt of court. I suspect he is also in contempt of Parliament. However, that does not seem to matter when it comes to the 1984 cabinet guidelines order even though they have been ruled mandatory. I have all kinds of memoranda from within government, between different agencies, pointing out that it is mandatory and is no longer discretionary.
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The government knows it is mandatory, but it is not fulfilling the mandate imposed upon it by the courts.
What is the government doing in relation to Bill C-78? Does it pass the simplest tests, even with the tests placed upon the 1984 guidelines order by the Federal Court and the Federal Court of Appeal? The answer is no. It fails on every test that someone seriously concerned about the environment or sustainable development could possibly put the legislation to.
Referring to the comments of the member for Gander-Grand Falls who spoke a moment ago, for many years it was believed by many members in this House and by many members of the public that the solution to pollution was dilution; you just dump the crap in the river or dump it in a lake. Eighty per cent of the toxic and hazardous wastes produced on a daily basis in Canada is still illegally or improperly disposed of.
Where do you think it is going, Mr. Speaker? It is going into the storm sewers. It is going on farmers' fields. We know in some cases, with some of it, that it goes into peoples' gas tanks. They drive around the city and pump the PCBs out on the street so that the chemical companies do not have to pay to dispose of it properly.
This country and the rest of the world are in desperate need of serious environmental assessment legislation that can assess existing projects.
Forty per cent of the marine pollution in Canada today come from pulp mills. For years we were promised new pulp mill guidelines and regulations by this government; ever since 1984 practically. "Oh, we are going to clean this up. We are going to do something. We are coming forward with it. We will eliminate dioxins. We will eliminate furans. We will do something about all of these other things"; but diddley squat is done and the public is getting madder and madder every day.
I described this bill a moment ago as having been carefully addled with gopher holes. The 18 times it went to cabinet, every time cabinet said: "It ain't loose enough. What if we want to put a nuclear plant in my riding? What if I want to build a dam? What if I want to give a cabinet Order in Council exclusion to my pals from Alcan?" Hey, Montreal headquarters picks up the

October 25, 1990
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phone: "Hi, Bri. Listen, I need an Order in Council to exempt my billion dollar project".


An hon. member:: Sold.


James Ross Fulton: What do they get? On October 12 Bri goes to cabinet: "Exclude the project", the project is to lower the Fraser River by three feet.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: If the hon. member is referring to the right hon. Prime Minister, I wish he would say the right hon. Prime Minister instead of using his first name.


James Ross Fulton: That is precisely whom I meant, Mr. Speaker. You are quite correct. That is what I meant to say and I was just coming to it.
This project will lower the Fraser River by three feet at Hell's Gate. Don't you, Mr. Speaker, think a project that does that or a project that will lower the level of the Nechako River to only 12 per cent of its original flow should have an assessment?
This is a government that knew it would be sensitive to go out and slaughter the 3,500 bisons in Canada's largest national park, Wood Buffalo National Park. It has been known for 60 years that there was brucellosis and tuberculosis in that herd. Now all of a sudden: "Oh, yes, they can have a panel to look into that".
What about a billion dollar project that will take three vertical feet out of the Fraser River? That project, in and of itself by direct action, will increase the pollution levels in the Fraser River. If there is less water and the communities, the pulp companies and everybody else are still dumping the same amount into less water, what will happen? You know what happens, Mr. Speaker, if you only put one ounce of water with two ounces of Scotch, compared to two ounces of water with two ounces of Scotch, right? This is what is going to happen from this project.
I find it contemptible of the people of Canada to give an Order in Council exemption to a project. The Prime Minister is on record saying there would be a full public inquiry and an environment assessment. What good is his word? Zero. Four ministers of fisheries in a row: James McGrath, full public inquiry and an environmental assessment of Kemano II; the present Speaker, as minister of fisheries-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I do not want the hon. member to question the Chair. On what he was just saying about the amount of Scotch in comparison to water, you get just as much alcohol in the blood whether
you have two or one. It does not really make any difference. I do not think the hon. member should question the Chair anyway.


James Ross Fulton: You raise a very good point, Mr. Speaker. Four ministers of fisheries in a row said that K-II should undergo a full public inquiry and an environmental assessment: James McGrath, the present Speaker, Romeo LeBlanc, and Pierre de Bane. Now we have a minister of fisheries who goes and participates in getting an Order in Council exemption of the project.
What is the Government of Quebec thinking today in relation to the 1984 cabinet guidelines order?
The Rafferty-Oldman project, despite a ruling of the Federal Court, despite the resignation of the EARP panel, despite the views of people from right across this country, is proceeding. It has been politically exempted from having an environmental assessment. The Oldman River dam in Alberta, what has happened to it? Despite a binding ruling, a unanimous ruling of the Federal Court of Appeal, that project is proceeding. It has been politically exempted from what is required and known to be mandatory by the Department of Justice. The Kemano project in British Columbia, exempted by Order in Council, has never seen the light of day.
Who could possibly stand in this House and suggest that Quebec Hydro and the Government of Quebec would even want to consider a full public inquiry and an environmental assessment of the largest industrial project in the history of North America? They will go the same route. Who is kidding whom? They will start building roads. They will start building airports. They will start cutting down the forests, but Canadians are not going to put up with it very much longer.
I predict that this kind of contempt of the law, contempt of the courts, contempt of Parliament, and contempt of public concern will lead to a kind of approach and a kind of response that will require the same kind of serious abuse of civil rights that we saw at Oka this summer.
What about the Trojan horse provisions? Why is not only the legislation drafted in such a way as to be litigation proof? Why is it made litigation proof? The public at least now under the Order in Council can once in a while go to the courts, not apparently get binding injunctions but at least have a bit of a public say in what goes on. This legislation has a flak jacket all around it, making it practically impermeable to the rights of Cana-

dians to go to the appropriate courts of appropriate jurisdictions to get some kind of redress.
Why so many Order in Council provisions? Why aren't the regulations listed? What is the government hiding? What is the secret agenda? Why are the acts of Parliament not included? When the minister himself put out his propaganda packet on June 18, he said that acts such as the Fisheries Act might some day be included. Clearly all of that should be included now.
The other serious issue of concern of Canadians is that for a long time there was an adage in this country that you could go ahead with your own little project. You could go ahead with Point Aconi because it was only going to let off 1.5 million tonnes of carbon dioxide a year, and the "sox and nox" releases from it were not that significant and were not going to violate the agreements that had been made with Ottawa.
We have the Point Aconi project going to proceed. What about the three thermal plants that are proposed for southern Alberta? What about the Shand in Saskatchewan? What about all of these other projects? "At what point," the public keeps asking, "does the destruction of the environment by what has been described as insignificant increment stop?" Everybody wants to-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I regret to tell the hon. member that his time has expired. I know we all want to listen to him, but his time has expired.
We will go now to questions and comments and I will recognize the hon. member for Surrey North on a question or a comment.


Mr. Jim Karpoff (Surrey North):: Mr. Speaker, I was fascinated by the speech being given by the previous speaker, particularly his discussion around Kemano and some of the other projects that seem to be destined to go ahead.
I would like him to expand on it particularly as he would see it influencing such things as the Big Bend in Surrey, which is the last fresh water marsh in the lower Fraser River estuary. Where will it be if the Fraser River is dropped three feet? Will it no longer be an estuary or a marsh but be a high and dry piece of land that some
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developer is going to want to come along and develop? I would like the member's comments on that.


James Ross Fulton: Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for an excellent and pertinent question. If we look at issues like Kemano II or Kemano completion that have been exempted from public hearings, issues like the Big Bend are precisely the kind of issue that should have a mandatory environmental assessment.
What we know is that by excluding a big project like Alcan from public hearings, people like the residents of Surrey, New Westminster, Vancouver, Hope and Williams Lake, right on up to Prince George and into my constituency have been excluded from the opportunity to know what the impact of a substantial lowering of the Fraser River means to their community.
It means the people who want to pump out water for the purpose of hay production cannot do that any more. Those new industries that might have wanted to extract water or place certain kinds of materials back into the water will not be allowed to proceed.
The Big Bend is a veiy important marshland and part of the Fraser River estuary. It is important to all the anadromous species as they come down-it does not matter whether it is sockeye, Chinook or any of the other species-that they make use of the Fraser River estuary. They need those marshlands.
No initial environmental evaluation has been done. There have been no public hearings in relation to Big Bend. There have been no hearings in relation to the over-all impact on the Fraser River estuary. This is a cover-up of cataclysmic proportions.
The government has refused to allow knowledgeable, well-meaning, well-intentioned British Columbians to come out and talk about the largest and most important river in British Columbia, and what the impact of something like K-II will mean in relation to their community, their environment, their fishery and the future of their fishery and of the great blue heron populations which make use of Big Bend.
There are other bird populations that make use of it for nesting areas. The utilization by fish and by fry, the

October 25, 1990
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importance of these kinds of areas have been dramatically undermined by the approach of this government.
I want to say that the overwhelming desire of Canadians is for a quality piece of environmental assessment legislation. We know the shortcomings of the 1984 cabinet guidelines order, but how can we possibly approve at second reading a piece of legislation that, according to Ray Robinson, the present head of the Federal Environmental Assessment and Review Organization, says that this legislation as it stands does not go as far, is not as wide-reaching as the 1984 cabinet guidelines order?
What kind of a pig in a poke-


An hon. member:: It is a step backwards.


James Ross Fulton: It is a step backwards. That is what every major environmental organization in the country has been saying to Parliament. This is a step backwards.
Why would we possibly consider a step backwards when we look at the kinds of issues that need to be assessed? There are existing projects that need to be assessed that are excluded from this.
The mandatory review list is not included. Are nuclear plants going to be included? Are nuclear waste sites going to be included? Are major hydroelectric dams going to be included? We are asked to buy a pig in a poke.
In the post-Meech Lake Canada parliamentarians can no longer go for these smoky backroom decisions. Who is going to make the mandatory list? It has been discussed in departments. Provinces are discussing it. We have a lot of lobbying going on in Ottawa, people who want to be on the exclusion list. I spoke about this before.
Mr. Speaker, can you imagine the back-up of phone calls into that process about who wants to get on to the exclusion list? People from the oil patch, people from the hydro patch, people from the nuclear patch, people from all of these different patches who want to be on the exclusion list?
Legislation of this nature must be very straightforward. The public must know whether it is on the Big Bend or on a major project like K-II, or James Bay, or Rafferty-Alameda or on the Oldman, or brucellosis in the buffalo or issues in Canada's far north or on carbon
dioxide in the atmosphere or on any of these issues. Small though they may seem to be to government, or large though they may be on the global horizon, we have to know how they are triggered.
What happens in the first stage? What are the federal jurisdictions? What is mandatory? What is exempted? Why has the government gone to such great lengths to dig all these gopher holes through the legislation, leaving the discretion entirely to the minister at times or to cabinet at other times? Why was the government not totally forthright and set up an arm's length Canadian environmental assessment and review operation so it would make the decisions?
It would have the legislation. It would decide, and both industry and the public would have an avenue of appeal to the minister so that there was a political opportunity for appeal on a decision to mandatory exclude or mandatory include. What many of these environmental errors are leading to are dangerous situations in communities. I have spoken to my colleagues from the Koote-nays on issues like major new pulp mills. Communities are being divided and the process is forcing the division as much as anything else, because people do not know what the rules are. That is the problem with this legislation.


Mr. Lee Clark (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of the Environment):: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member goes on at considerable length with respect to what he perceives to be the deficiencies in the bill. He talks a lot about the role of the federal government, which of course is something which have been evolving since 1984. I think if he were being honest with the House, he would concede that there are substantial improvements in this bill over what was provided in the 1984 guidelines.
I am interested in an indication from the hon. member on behalf of his party as to the role he perceives for the provinces in the area of environmental protection, understanding of course, as he does, that there is a joint responsibility. I think it would be very helpful if he could explain to provincial jurisdictions wherever they may be, whether it be in Ontario or elsewhere, as to whether or not he perceives that they have a role and he could specify what that role would be.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The hon. member for Skeena has two minutes.


James Ross Fulton: Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for the question, although I am not quite sure what he is referring to when it talks about all honesty. I would certainly like to hear a lengthy speech from the member about what he views as ideal or better legislation.
Let me deal with the question that he poses. It is an important one and one that is not dealt with as directly in this legislation as I think it should be.
The provinces and territories do have very clear constitutional jurisdictions. However Canadians, as the member knows as parliamentary secretary, and as public opinion polls have demonstrated extensively over the last half dozen years, are looking increasingly to the federal government and at times look to the federal Crown to use POGG power, peace, order and good government in relation to some major projects, to intervene and to protect the environment on behalf of all Canadians.
What we do know is that there are more than 100 acts that have been passed by this Parliament since 1867 that are clearly in federal jurisdictions. Wherever those federal jurisdictions are, this legislation should be crisply clear and show that there is a federal role in relation to environmental assessment.


Walter Leland Rutherford (Lee) Clark: What about the provincial role?


James Ross Fulton: The provincial role in terms of joint assessments and joint reviews is built within this, but it is not clearly enough delineated. The provinces, as the member knows from the meetings they have had earlier this year, have been attempting to reabsorb many of the environmental jurisdictions entirely unto themselves, other than inteijurisdictional, that is, interprovincial or international matters where they think there can be joint review panels, but I think the issue of where there are federal jurisdictions-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Questions and comments are now terminated.
I would just like to bring to the attention of hon. members we are now operating under the provisions of Standing Order 74. Orders of the Day began at 12.11 p.m. We had 48 minutes of debate and it expired at 12.59 p.m. We are now into 10-minute speeches with no questions or comments. The hon. member for Ottawa- Vanier has the floor for 10 minutes. If he wishes to ask
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for more time after he gets near the 10-minute mark, I will be glad to ask the House for unanimous consent.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: Mr. Speaker, I was hoping that the member for Skeena would stop talking at 12.48 p.m. so that I would start my remarks and get my 20 minutes but he did not, so I will take my 10 minutes starting now.
Bill C-78 provides for legislation that could have played a crucial part in the important effort to protect our environment. The principle behind the bill is a good one. It is to make sure that we assess the potential environmental impact of projects in order to reduce or eliminate adverse effects. There are parts of the bill that in our view are commendable including some of the statements in the preamble. Unfortunately, this bill has such serious flaws that those of us on this side of the House cannot help but view it and the effort with great disappointment.
Bill C-78 is supposed to create binding legislation ensuring that proper environmental assessments are conducted for projects within federal jurisdiction. But this bill is so full of holes that there are no guarantees that those projects under federal jurisdiction will undergo such an assessment.
A national coalition of 28 environmental groups virtually condemned the bill earlier this fall after a meeting in Hull, Quebec, saying it needs to be completely rewritten. We agree. According to the Winnipeg Free Press on October 2, these groups are critical of the proposed legislation because it gives the federal government total discretion to decide whether an environmental assessment process should be implemented. This is because the bill makes so many allowances for exclusions that it is easy to wonder if any projects will be included in the mandatory lists.
One Manitoba representative at the meeting in Hull on environmental issues, lawyer Brian Pannell, said in the news release issued after that meeting that if Bill C-78 passes in its current form, "Canada will return to the dark ages of environmental law".
Such legislation, returning us to the medieval ages of environmental awareness, is the last thing Canadians want, it is the last thing we need at a time when all around us we see evidence of the damage we have already caused to our environment.

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Mr. Speaker, there are two rivers within the confines of my riding, the Rideau river which crosses the riding and the Ottawa river which flows along the northern limit.
Mr. Speaker, we are regularly witness to the serious and sometimes disastrous consequences of spilling all sorts of products-including extremely toxic substances-into the two rivers, and to the environmental damage that may ensue. When the beaches of those rivers are closed in early summer because of high coliform counts, polluting bacteria and chemical products we have every right to ask whether governments- municipal, regional, provincial and federal alike-are doing something to prevent these practices which we all condemn, namely the discharge of toxic materials into our rivers.
A few years ago, Mr. Speaker, here in the House in Ottawa I put a question to find out why the federal government did allow departments-Public works, among others-to award painting or cleaning contracts to companies that ended up dumping their waste products into the Ottawa or Rideau river. Mr. Speaker, I was told it came under provincial jurisdiction. That is precisely where the problem lies! The various government levels are not on the same wavelength and they have a hard time understanding one another.

A few years ago, as I said, pollution of the Ottawa and Rideau rivers was very worrisome but things have not changed very much. They still close the beaches. They still tell us not to go swimming because the water is polluted. They still tell us that there are chemicals, heavy metals, pollutants being emptied into the rivers. It is time that we here at the federal level took this matter very seriously.
Some of those materials being dumped are serious and highly toxic and include the PCBs, polychlorinated biphenyls, which as you know, Mr. Speaker, can cause cancer. What provision does Bill C-78 make for an environmental assessment of the existing practices of federal departments, agencies, Crown corporations and their employees? I did not find it in the bill. I would hope that they will look at that attentively.
I agree with the former Minister of the Environment who made a statement here in Ottawa on June 9, 1987, saying that unless we take better care of our rivers, and I quote former Minister Tom McMillan, "unless our
attitudes and practices change, what we pass on to the next generation will not be shining rivers but open sewers".
I am sure all members would agree that the Ottawa River and all other Canadian rivers, for that matter, must be cleaned up and protected from further pollution.
Every region and community in Canada has its own environmental concerns and we should carefully study this bill to be aware of its lost potential.
I would like to point out briefly some of the serious flaws in this bill.

First, nowhere in the bill can you see the telling expression "sustainable development".

Instead, we have some vague statements in the preamble, including one about ensuring, and I quote the preamble:
- ensuring that economic development is compatible with the high value Canadians place on environmental quality.
If the government is really committed to the concept of sustainable development, which it says it is, why will it not put the actual term into the preamble? Just put "sustainable development" somewhere in the preamble. If the government wants to place the environment first among its concerns, and in partnership with the economy and all Canadians, why not put the concept of sustainable development and what it requires into the preamble? Why not be crystal clear about our intent?
Clause 4(a) of that bill should be strengthened in my view and changed from requiring that the environmental effects of projects be given, as the bill states, careful consideration, to something more forceful and also more useful, which would be fully reviewed and scrutinized.
One of my greatest concerns with this legislation, as I mentioned, is the lack of guarantees and its ample provisions for exclusions. Two Federal Court decisions handed down earlier this year regarding the Oldman River project in Alberta and the Rafferty-Alameda Dam project in Saskatchewan ordered Ottawa to make mandatory the current EARP guidelines, the environmental assessment review process guidelines. Until now, these guidelines were discretionary. Bill C-78 with all its exclusions would, in effect, undo these court decisions which were encouraging and steps in the right direction for greater environmental protection by making environ-
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mental assessments mandatory for all projects under federal jurisdiction.
One of the provisions of Bill C-78, clause 6(l)(a), states that an environmental assessment of a project is not required where, and I quote:
- in the opinion of the responsible authority the project is described in an exclusion list;
This grants additional powers to a minister, making the opinion of the minister weightier than that which is written in the act.
In clauses 21 and 24 we find the discretionary powers of responsible authorities and ministers outlined. These discretionary powers include the ability to terminate an assessment. That is unacceptable to us.
In clause 34 we find that the authority responsible for the project, such as a minister, is the one required to act on the report of any review and makes the decision to allow the project to proceed or to stop it. Such a requirement leaves the minister vulnerable to intense lobbying from those who wish to see a project go ahead, regardless of the environmental costs and consequences.
A bill that grants such discretion and allows for endless exclusions is clearly one without teeth. What we need now and what we needed years ago, is legislation with teeth, something that will make things happen. The Tories promised this legislation in 1984. It was going to be, in their own words, tough. Perhaps they overlooked their promise to deal seriously with this legislation.
Mr. Speaker, the report card on this bill, as we have said, is negative, it is zero, zilch, and no good.


Mrs. Beryl Gaffney (Nepean):: Mr. Speaker, I too am very pleased to be standing before the House this afternoon speaking to Bill C-78 which is an act to establish a federal environmental assessment process.
The purpose of this bill is to create binding legislation to ensure that environmental assessments are carried out on certain projects within federal jurisdiction. It would replace the federal policy on environmental asses-
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sment and review known as the guidelines order in effect since June, 1984.
Canadians need some sense of confidence that the environment is going to be protected. They are looking for a more considered, sensitive process. This bill is one that gives us something to discuss and to move ahead with because it is badly needed.
Unfortunately, the weakness of the legislation before us makes for a skeptical public and questions the motives of us as legislators and the seriousness of the government's intent in enacting this resolution.
The credibility of the bill would be considerably enhanced if the concept of sustainable development would find its way into the preamble and the purposes. It would be considerably more enhanced if this reference to a balance between the economy and the environment were referred to. This is significant because the over-riding purpose of this legislation should be to foster sustainable development.
It has been said that the 1980s will be remembered as the decade that the earth spoke back. It seems that we cannot pick up a newspaper these days without reading stories about problems in our environment. Think about it: acid rain, smog, dirty water, closed beaches, and global warming. Today human kind is seriously reassessing the relationship with the natural world. We have become aware that in our enthusiasm for economic development we have neglected a crucial component of what allows our economy to support us, the environment. We have been living off the capital we have inherited, not the interest and it has to stop.
Most people want to do the right thing when it comes to our environment. Many of us still have a basic lack of understanding of what we can do to relate to the environment. We hesitate to call ourselves environmentalists, but we do not want to be labelled insensitive. What we do know, all of us, is that the problem is urgent and the time for change is now. And changing we are. With increasing awareness of environmental issues, comes a burning desire to save this planet earth which is the source of our existence. Along with fears and new awareness comes inspiration and dedication. I would like to challenge all of us to let us makes 1991 the year that we answer back.

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There are many global concerns that Canadians are faced with. PCBs, mentioned earlier by one of my colleagues, are made up of dioxins and furons, two of the most lethal toxins known to man. Several years ago the federal government took the step to eliminate PCBs. The problem is that PCBs, once created, do not go away. They cannot be destroyed. Therefore, they must be stored, at least until some means of safe destruction is available. The federal government should be encouraged to finance research into safe disposal techniques. Until these are in place, national standards should be established for the safe movement and containment of PCBs.
Global warming. What is global warming? It would result in large-scale melting of glaciers causing the level and size of oceans to increase. Flooded coastlines and islands would be the catastrophic result.
Our water. Canadians are the greatest users and abusers of water in this world. Our supplies of clean usable water are limited. We must learn to use them wisely. It is vital for life and our survival depends upon it.
Ozone depletion. Ozone is a form of oxygen that is suspended above the earth's surface. The ozone layer, approximately 15 to 35 kilometres, forms a protective shield from the sun's harmful rays. It is being destroyed.
Toxic chemicals, pesticides, and herbicides. We overuse them and these chemicals leak through the soil, get into our water supplies, and when ingested they accumulate in body fat.
Wildlife and endangered species. We are killing them off at an extremely rapid rate. There is habitat loss and destruction, overuse and poaching, and toxic contamination. What are we doing to our wildlife and endangered species?
Deteriorating infrastructure, acid rain, and our forests. Our forests are being cut down at an alarming rate and we depend upon our forests for the oxygen necessary to clean the air we breathe. It is also a contributing factor to global warming.
If I could get more site specific and deal with issues closer to home with regard to the environment, I would like to talk about the Rideau River. We have two rivers here in the national capital region, the Rideau River and the Ottawa River. For too long we have been standing around deploring the deterioration of the environment
without doing anything about it. Many of us have difficulty dealing with the enormous scope of these problems, and I would like to focus on the ecological crisis facing us.
Let us be specific about the Rideau River. Everyone is aware of the Rideau and the fight to maintain it as a beautiful and vital river here in our nation's capital. We might not know all that is happening to the river or whether or not anyone is doing anything about it, but yet this historic waterway has become a major recreational resource. Once on it, you can make your way from the Ottawa River to the St. Lawrence River. It may be small but it is environmentally significant. The river is in trouble and we are the cause of its trouble.
Fortunately, more attention is being given to the Rideau River and I would like to mention four particular areas with which people are concerned. The rural beaches program by the Rideau Valley Conservation Authority. They are doing a study which will identify our major rural pollution sources in the Rideau River and its beaches. It is terribly important.
Another study done by the Conservation Authority is a study of the Rideau Lakes. The aim is to protect the lake environment. Its members talk to the cottagers. They are doing something about it. The Rideau Valley Conservation Authority is an arm of the provincial government and of regional government. Those are two programs being initiated by them.
The Rideau Canal Management Plan is the federal government plan of the Canadian Parks Service of Environment Canada. The plan will provide for future management, use and development of the canal. It is the policy of the Canadian Parks Service to provide opportunities for public consultation during the preparation of plans.
The Regional Municipality of Ottawa-Carleton is also continuing its sampling and testing program of the Rideau River.
The Friends of the Rideau are the people who live along the Rideau and the cottagers who live along the Rideau. They are officially known as the Rideau Waterway Co-ordinating Association, unofficially as the Friends of the Rideau. It is a non-profit organization concerned about the environmental impact upon that river.
October 25, 1990

Why do I mention the work under way on this particular river? I did so because, if the government is serious about the environment and what is happening today, then it must be more involved than it is. The federal government is doing less than any other agency to help protect certain areas of our environment. That is exactly why I zeroed in on that particular one.
Bill C-78 excludes, for instance, tax breaks aimed at particular individual projects as a reason to refer these projects to environmental review. What a waste of time, energy and money. This could be a gaping loophole if the federal government was to abuse this exclusion. Instead of devising financial packages to subsidize a project, Ottawa could put together tax incentives, reductions and deferrals, or duty remission schemes, that would be equally as attractive to a company or a consortium with a purpose of avoiding environmental review. Why go to the expense of an environmental review if you do not have to? This is especially relevant to energy, mining and resource projects.
The government should seek out all environmentally friendly businesses and recognize them through any number of positive ways. For example, the government should ask businesses if they meet or exceed all applicable government regulations, if they have developed an environmental code of ethics for their companies, and if they have worked toward pollution prevention rather than clean up.
The government should call on small businesses which practise environmental friendliness. It should promote these firms, hold them up as models to the community, and put their names in a book so that the public will know which company is selling environmentally friendly products or is friendly to our environment.
Mr. Speaker, I see my time is up. I thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak to this very important bill.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The hon. member's time has expired. It being 1.31 p.m., I do now leave the Chair until two o'clock this day.
At 1.31 p.m. the House took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The House resumed at 2 p.m.

Mr. Bill Attewell (Markham-Whitchurch-Stouff-ville):: Mr. Speaker, on Sunday, October 28, 1990, the official dedication ceremonies will take place for the Charles Goldlust Human Rights Centre at the National Headquarters for B'Nai Brith Canada in Downsview.
Charles Goldlust, who passed away in 1985, was interned as a child in the death camps in Germany but was miraculously able to survive. He became deeply involved in all facets of Jewish life in Canada.
The Charles Goldlust Human Rights Centre houses the Institute for International Affairs and the League for Human Rights. The League is among Canada's most respected human rights advocates with a mandate to combat anti-Semitism, bigotry, hatred, racism and any other human rights abuses.
The memory of Charles Goldlust and his good deeds will continue to light the path of brotherly love, harmony and tolerance for all humanity.


Hon. Ralph Ferguson (Lambton-Middlesex):: Mr. Speaker, yesterday the United States International Trade Commission found that imports of Canadian fresh, chilled and frozen pork, which account for a mere 3 per cent of the U.S. market, somehow threaten the U.S. pork industry.
This new ruling comes after an earlier remand by a panel under the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement which had disputed the commission's earlier finding.
It has become clear to Canadian farmers that this government has failed to achieve any of their free trade goals. In fact, the Free Trade Panel has been overruled.

October 25, 1990
The U.S. Secretary of Agriculture stated very clearly during the free trade negotiations that the U.S. Trade Remedy Laws are intact and in the event of a dispute, U.S. law shall prevail.
I call on the government to admit that the Prime Minister's objective under free trade as stated in Hansard on page 4146, March 16, 1987, "is to help Canadian farmers by increasing the predictability and security of access of exports from the farm sector" has, in fact, become another broken promise.
This government promised Canadian farmers that the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement offered guaranteed access, not the guaranteed harassment they have received.

1990 COACHING AWARDS


Mr. Willie Littlechild (Wetaskiwin):: Mr. Speaker, last evening, some outstanding Canadians were honoured at the 1990 coaching awards dinner. The dean of coaches, Mr. Jack Donoghue in his remarks referred to Canadian youth as our greatest natural resource, and that we need great coaches for their continued positive development.
I ask this House to join with me and the Minister of Fitness and Amateur Sport in congratulating the coaching award recipients, in particular, four Albertans: Michael Jiranek of Bashaw, who received the Longine-Wittnauer Coaching Excellence Award; Deryk Snelling and Peter Connellan from the University of Calgary for their 3M coaching Canada awards; Mr. Paul Hortie of Edmonton, who sadly passed on before his recognition. However, Mrs. Sylvia Hortie received his award for outstanding contribution to coaching in the sport of boxing.
Thank you as well to TSN for providing turning point scholarships. From this leadership, Sir, Canada will continue with pride to be among the best in the world.


SOCODEVI
Mr. Marcel R. Tremblay (Quebec Est):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to take this opportunity to draw the attention of the House to an organization for international co-operation in my riding, the SOCODEVI.
This organization comprises 12 major co-operative institutions in Quebec that wish to promote the use of this formula as a development tool in Third World countries.
SOCODEVI works together with co-operative or pre-co-operative partners in developing countries, by offering technical and financial support to help these partners establish and promote the development of viable organizations, all in a spirit of partnership and mutual co-operation.
The member institutions of SOCODEVI are involved in a variety of sectors, including finance, agro-food, forestry, housing and tourism.
Mr. Speaker, I hope that SOCODEVI will serve as a model for other institutions and that their work will continue to produce the same excellent results we have seen so far.


IMMIGRATION
Mr. Phillip Edmonston (Chambly):: Mr. Speaker, following the demise of Meech Lake, the Tory government failed the first real test of bilateral negotiations with Quebec, namely on the immigration issue.
An administrative agreement on immigration which, according to the Premier and the Prime Ministers, was imminent in June, is now back in limbo after being discussed for more than three years.
Everything with respect to standards had been settled, and funding was almost finalized. A signing session was scheduled by the federal government and then mysteriously cancelled a few months ago.
In view of this new deadlock, Mr. Speaker, today the federal government should have the courage and intellectual honesty to sign this agreement and continue giving Quebec the means to exercise its legitimate and unchallenged responsibility in the field of immigration.


LEBANON
Mr. Mark Assad (Gatineau -La Lievre):: Mr. Speaker, On October 13, 1990, the Syrian army, supported by Lebanese pro-Syrian leftist militants, launched a simultaneous attack by air and land against a Christian enclave of East Beirut with the pretext of putting an end to the opposition of General Michel Aoun and the agreement
October 25, 1990

obtained. After the soldiers defending the presidential palace surrendered their arms to the invaders, the latter slaughtered them like sheep and mutilated their bodies. Then the Syrian army initiated a massacre of those in the vicinity.

Mr. Speaker, on many occasions in this House I have condemned the foreign armies on Lebanese soil, in a Lebanon that was one of the signatories to the United Nations Charter in 1945. We have asked the international community,in every way possible, to oblige both foreign armies to leave Lebanese territory.
Mr. Speaker, what does it take to persuade all Canadians to put pressure on the Canadian government to persuade the UN Security Council to end the massacre of a people?


SMALL BUSINESS WEEK
Mrs. Edna Anderson (Simcoe Centre):: Mr. Speaker, Small Business Week 1990 is an opportunity for all of us to focus on the importance of small business to the economies of our communities and to the economy of Canada.
This government's policies have been designed to stimulate entrepreneurial spirit, but we must do more to enable Canadian firms to effectively compete domestically against foreign companies which can now easily access the Canadian market and to also be able to go head-to-head in the international marketplace.
Ensuring that our youth have the training and the skills required to meet the demand for a skilled workforce will go a long way in meeting the needs of the manufacturing industry. A young, skilled, innovative workforce will allow greater emphasis on productivity, which is the key to both increased export success and to improving the supply potential of the economy.


GOODS AND SERVICES TAX
Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, the recent movie, Sex, Lies and Videotapes was obviously a personal hit with the Minister of Finance for he has now produced and directed his own version.
Three hundred thousand dollars of taxpayers' money has been used to finance this propaganda video. We will have to await the "R" rating but we can certainly predict some of the lies. The minister's video will say the GST is a visible tax. But it is not. It will say the GST will be revenue neutral. It will not be. The video will say it does not apply to food; in part, it does. The minister's video production will say it will benefit Canadians. It will not. It will say the GST will help small business. Untrue. The video will say the GST will reduce our debt. It will not.
The Minister of Finance's version of Sex, Lies and Videotapes will fail to be a box office success. But the minister may wish to submit this spoof of reality to America's Funniest Home Videos.


EXTRADITION ACT
Mr. Doug Fee (Red Deer):: Mr. Speaker, tens of thousands of Canadians have demanded changes to the Extradition Act. Frankly, I am embarrassed that we have such a prolonged procedure, one that allows foreign fugitives to languish in Canadian custody at Canadian expense rather than face justice in their own country.
The hon. member for Peterborough presented a bill to this House on Tuesday that would reduce the extradition proceedings by up to one and a half years. The Official Opposition and the government had agreed to expedite the bill and move it to committee for action.
We had the opportunity to vote with all-party agreement. For purely partisan reasons, the New Democrats refused to agree and have delayed that vote. We had the means to improve the Extradition Act but the New Democratic Party delayed these improvements. The Canadian public has demanded them and we are going to see this act improved in spite of the NDP.

October 25, 1990


GOODS AND SERVICES TAX
Mr. John R. Rodriguez (Nickel Belt):: Mr. Speaker, in light of the deal by Liberal senators to get the GST passed, let us look at the facts.
Do the Liberals really oppose the GST?


Some hon. members:: No.


John R. Rodriguez: Did the "hypogrit" senators defeat the GST bill at first reading when they had the majority?


Some hon. members:: No.


John R. Rodriguez: Did the "hypogrit" senators defeat the GST bill at second reading when they had the majority?


Some hon. members:: No.


John R. Rodriguez: Did the "hypogrit" senators use their majority to defeat the GST in April?


Some hon. members:: No.


John R. Rodriguez: Did the "hypogrit" senators use their majority to defeat the bill in May?


Some hon. members:: No.


John R. Rodriguez: Did they use their majority in the Senate to defeat it in June?


Some hon. members:: No.


John R. Rodriguez: The facts are clear: The Liberals have lost it for the GST since Allan MacEachen and Jean Chretien first devised it in the early eighties.


Some hon. members:: Shame.


SMALL BUSINESS WEEK
Mr. Gilles Bernier (Beauce):: Mr. Speaker, in a more serious vein, at the launching of Small Business Week, 12 young business people from across Canada received the FBDB award for young entrepreneurs. Small Business Week is an annual occurrence that emphasizes the contribution of small businesses to our economy.
This year's theme is: Quality and Productivity: The Competitive Edge. This week, hundreds of activities are being organized across the country to give entrepreneurs
a chance to exchange information. The award winners are from each province and are all 29 years old or younger. They were selected for their success in business and their innovative approach. The winner in Quebec was David Lauzon, 26 years old. David owns and operates a wood parquet factory in Papineauville, which employs 30 people.
In Beauce, in my own riding, our young people have a very developed sense of entrepreneurship. The federal government is proud of this record and wishes to congratulate all young entrepreneurs in this country.


LEBANON
Mr. Eugene Bellemare (Carleton -Gloucester):: Mr. Speaker, yesterday I was witness to a very troubling event.
Members of the Lebanese community held a demonstration in front of the Lebanese Embassy here in Ottawa. What started as a peaceful march turned into a very violent rally. Fortunately, I was able to diffuse the situation through concerned dialogue.
I do not wish to put the blame on anyone, however, I would like to stress that violence either here in Canada or elsewhere in the world cannot and will never be a solution. Human rights must be respected and can only be achieved through peaceful negotiations and mutual respect.
It is only in this spirit of non-violence that we can hope that Lebanon will recover its sovereignty, independence and peace.


ED SHURTLEFF
Mr. Greg Thompson (Carleton -Charlotte):: Mr. Speaker, I rise today to salute an inventor, Ed Shurtleff of St. George, New Brunswick.
Ten years ago, Ed realized that money and resources were being wasted every time he threw away dirty oil, so he set out to invent a refiner, convinced that ecological concerns would make such a machine viable.

Four years later, he produced the first model of what would become the SX302 refiner. The device is now available for use by municipalities, truck fleet operators and conventional waste oil handlers.
Canada and the world need more inventors like Mr. Shurtleff. It is by controlling and eventually eliminating waste that will enable us to give future generations an environment in which they can live and prosper.


SMALL BUSINESS
Ms. Catherine Callbeck (Malpeque):: Mr. Speaker, I want to take this opportunity today to recognize the contribution of small business to the economy of Canada.
I want to recognize the spirit and determination of Canadian entrepreneurs as they attempt to run their businesses during these trying economic times.
In Prince Edward Island, 90 per cent of the businesses are small and, therefore, the greatest source of new jobs in my province. The rural nature of Prince Edward Island demands that small businesses play a vital role in both the economic and social structure of the Island.
With personal and business bankruptcies at an all time high in this country, a devastating 37 per cent, the area of small business deserves the attention of this government.
It deserves to be promoted and assisted with encouraging government policies and programs, not continually discouraged with regressive practices like the government's high interest rates which produce the high dollar and, of course, the goods and services tax.


THE ENVIRONMENT
James Ross Fulton: Mr. Speaker, a November 10,1989, internal government memorandum from Dieter Gruenwoldt to Bob Taylor gave the House a very important insight into what has been going on in relation to EARP legislation. I quote:
The recent April 1989 Rafferty-Alameda Federal Court Decision relating to the Environmental Assessment and Review Process, EARP, has determined the EARP Guidelines Order in Council, 1984, to be a law of general application. The implementation of EARP is therefore no longer "discretionary"; it is now mandatory-
We have seen in the Rafferty-Alameda case that the government did not do its job. It is now in contempt of the courts and the law of Canada.
On the Oldman River dam case, the government has not lived up to the Federal Court of Appeal unanimous ruling and is now in contempt of the ruling of the court.
On the Kemano II project in British Columbia, it has given Alcan a special Order in Council exempting it from mandatory provisions of the law of Canada.
We heard last night that the Government of Quebec plans to proceed with James Bay II without applying mandatory-


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member's time has expired.


CORRECTIONAL SERVICE CANADA
Mr. Bill Vankoughnet (Hastings -Frontenac-Lennox and Addington):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to pay tribute today to the dedicated employees in our penitentiaries, the Correctional Service staff.
Correctional employees are responsible for the custody and control of offenders who in many cases have become Canada's most hardened and dangerous citizens.
It is clearly evident that the environment of corrections is both stressful and perilous. It is very difficult for front line CSC employees to endure long enough to become eligible for normal retirement. It is urgent that the question of an early retirement and retraining package be addressed for these employees. It is imperative that such a plan be implemented.
Correctional Service employees play an integral role in safeguarding Canadian citizens. I am hopeful that members of this House will see fit to support their request for such a package and repay their vital contribution to society.

Oral Questions



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Hon. Herb Gray (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Secretary of State for External Affairs.
Late this morning the Canadian Press reported that the minister told the parliamentary committee that "Canada is ready to use force to get Iraq out of Kuwait, even without United Nations approval".
Why is the government contemplating using force against Iraq in this way without a United Nations resolution? Is this not a break with Canadian tradition and contrary to the spirit of the resolution adopted by this House and the letters the minister has sent to the external affairs critics of both opposition parties?


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, the Leader of the Opposition and his party would do the House and, I think, the public of Canada a service if, instead of simply relying upon newspaper condensations of a committee hearing, they would consult with the members of their own caucus who were present at that committee hearing.
I made the point, which I think was generally agreed to by members of all parties in that very useful, calm, non-partisan joint session of the committees on national defence and external affairs this morning, that Canada has two principal goals. One of those principal goals is to have the resolutions of the United Nations accepted and to have Iraq out of Kuwait. Another of those principal goals is to use the United Nations and to operate under the auspices of the United Nations. We hope that we can accomplish both together.
We certainly do not want to leave Saddam Hussein in any doubt at all about the determination of Canada to support the resolutions that we have supported in the United Nations. We know that Saddam Hussein understands only the language of strength. There has been an unprecedented demonstration of strength. We do not want to give him any reason to believe that there will suddenly be some weakening of that strength.
On Canada's part there will not be, and so what we are seeking to achieve here, in support of resolutions of the Security Council, is a demonstration to Saddam Hussein that the only alternative open to him is to move back from Kuwait. That is the best opportunity to give peace a chance. That is the policy of Canada.


Herbert Eser (Herb) Gray: Mr. Speaker, if there is to be the kind of use of force the minister spoke of in the committee this morning, I ask him: Who will make this decision? Will it be the United Nations? Will it be the United States itself? Will it be Canada? Canadians deserve and need to know the answer to that question today.
Right Hon. Joe Clark (Secretary of State for External
Affairs): Mr. Speaker, that question or one very similar to it was put and answered in the standing committee this morning. I am sorry the Leader of the Opposition did not have the opportunity to consult with the members of his party who were active, constructive, non-partisan participants in that committee session this morning.
I have written to my colleagues in the House, the hon. member from Winnipeg and the member from Burnaby. I have indicated to them that if there is some change in the circumstances of decisions the Government of Canada has to take we will seek to consult Parliament and, if consultation is not possible, to advise Parliament.
I made it clear in the committee today that decisions as to changes in policy that Canada might have to contemplate will naturally be taken by the cabinet of Canada. We cannot always wait. Events do not always wait for us to come to Parliament to consult as to whether or not we should respond to a situation that, to quote the member from Newfoundland, his defence critic, "can hot up very quickly". His defence critic understands that. I hope that the hon. Leader of the Opposition might talk to his defence critic.


Herbert Eser (Herb) Gray: Mr. Speaker, I want to assure the Secretary of State for External Affairs that I am asking the questions I am asking today precisely because I have consulted with my colleague, the lead External Affairs critic for the Official Opposition, as will be very clear when he gets the floor after I complete my questions.
October 25, 1990



I therefore wish to ask the Secretary of State for External Affairs whether today, he can give all Canadians the assurance that any decision involving the offensive use of our forces against Iraq will not be made without consultation and debate in this House and without a resolution by the United Nations.


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, first of all, I am glad the question was asked, because everything will be clearer after the questions by the hon. member from Winnipeg, since the questions put by the Leader of the Opposition indicate that the Liberal position is not clear.
However, I must point out to the hon. member-and I believe he is well aware of this-that there is a possibility that one of the permanent members of the Security Council might exercize its veto within the Council. It is therefore possible that a veto would make it impossible to act under the auspices of the United Nations. That is why we are now and in fact have been from the outset, negotiating carefully and diligently to find a way that would make it easier for Canada to arrange for a system that would make use of the auspices of the United Nations.
I hope the leader of the opposition is not about to say that Canada's commitment to being against the invasion of Kuwait by Iraq is something we are prepared to set aside if China, for instance, were to exercise its veto in the Security Council. That would be irresponsible, and that is not our position.


Hon. Lloyd Axworthy (Winnipeg South Centre):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Secretary of State for External Affairs a related question, which he also knows is very much a concern to Canadians, dealing with the question of hostages.
We have now had statements by two U.S. cabinet ministers, Mr. Cheney and Mr. Baker, that Canada had been contacted about sending a high level delegation to Iraq to seek the release of hostages. We now have a statement from the state department spokesman, Richard Boucher, saying that President Bush and the Prime Minister in fact have talked about this matter yesterday.
Oral Questions
I want to ask the minister what is going on. We have denials from the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for External Affairs. We have assertions by the Americans that discussions are taking place.
Have we been contacted? Has there in fact been discussions with the Americans about whether to send a delegation? In fact, and perhaps most important, are we going to do something other than having our own officials in Baghdad make contact? Will we take special measures to seek the release of Canadian hostages presently being held in Iraq?


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, I had thought the member was going to pursue the line of questioning commenced by his leader, but I certainly can understand why he did not.
There are two questions at issue here. One has to do with a report out of the United States suggesting that the foreign minister of Germany and I had been invited by Saddam Hussein to visit Baghdad. That is false. I have not been invited. I have no expectation that there will be an invitation for me to go to Baghdad.
There was a question as to whether there had been conversations between the President and the Prime Minister. The hon. member will know that there have recently been visits, among others, by the former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Mr. Heath, to Baghdad and that there have recently been discussions with regard to the treatment of French citizens who are in Iraq.
The Prime Minister and the President were involved in a conversation the other day having to do principally with the acid rain question. It is entirely natural that they would have discussed this phenomenon that had involved France and that had involved the United Kingdom.
With respect to things that Canada might do, the hon. member asked a very helpful question the other day. I gave him an answer which I repeated in committee today, which I think and hope is helpful, that if there are serious practical proposals put forward by him or anyone else as to means by which Canada can help come home some of the remaining Canadians who are in Iraq or who are in Kuwait, and if that can be done in a way that is consistent with the Canadian support for the UN Securi-

October 25, 1990
Oral Questions
ty Council resolutions, then naturally I will look very carefully at that.
The House would want to know that today fully 97 per cent of the Canadians who were in Iraq or Kuwait at the time of the invasion of Kuwait are home. Of the 3 per cent who remain, some wish to remain. There are some who are against their will. We want to have them come home.
If the hon. member has a practical suggestion that is consistent with the Canadian support of the Security Council resolution, naturally I will look at it.


Lloyd Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question. I think it would be very helpful if the Secretary of State for External Affairs would elaborate on the discussions held between the President of the United States and the Prime Minister about the Iraqi situation, particularly if in fact they discussed, as the Leader of the Opposition was mentioning, the potential use of force against Iraq.
Have there been consultations? Have there been those kinds of discussions to determine whether, how, and at what time we might take those actions?
In that case I would go back to the question of hostages and ask the Secretary of State specifically if he would undertake to send a special emissary to Iraq, a noted Canadian who might make that representation, or in particular to send a group of parliamentarians who are not associated with the government but could represent the interests of all Canadians in trying to seek the security and safety of those 59 Canadians still left in those war-torn countries.


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, I think, but I want to confirm, if the hon. member shares my view that any action we take should be consistent with Canadian support of the Security Council resolutions. Does he agree with that?


Lloyd Axworthy: Uh-huh.


Charles Joseph Clark: Yes, and that we should not take any action that would send a false signal to Saddam Hussein who might think that Canadian will was slackening. Does he agree with that?


Lloyd Axworthy: Uh-huh.


Charles Joseph Clark: Yes, he does. Those are the conditions that I have set forward in my answer earlier. If there are proposals by the hon. member or others that will accomplish those goals and respect those conditions, then I am prepared to look at them very seriously.
The member and I had an opportunity in the committee this morning to talk about how my colleagues and I can best keep members of Parliament informed about developments that occur with respect to the situation in the gulf. A question was put to me regarding a particular aspect of a conversation between the Prime Minister and the President. I replied to that.
I intend to be similarly forthcoming on other particular questions that are put to me. As I said earlier today in the standing committee, and I think to the agreement of all members of the House, if some of those matters are matters which are best discussed in some confidentiality, I would request the opportunity to discuss those in confidentiality, but I want to keep the House of Commons fully informed.


Mr. John Brewin (Victoria):: Mr. Speaker, let me remind the House of the statement the Secretary of State for External Affairs made to the committee this morning.
He said that he approved the use of force with or without the approval of the Security Council of the United Nations. That statement, I submit, is a green light to the United States and others to proceed without the approval of the Security Council, which is a position the Canadian government until now has been working to prevent.
Will the Secretary of State for External Affairs explain to the House what steps he is going to take to repair the grievous damage this statement has made to Canada's credibility as a member of the Security Council?


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, it is inevitable that in an exchange like this, either my credibility or that of the hon. member will suffer. We will see whose does.
Because he was present throughout the debate, the hon. member knows that I repeated a maintes reprises the position of Canada, that our strong, strong preference is to work through the United Nations and that, indeed, we
October 25, 1990

have been bending all of our efforts to that end with some substantial success.
I think that the willingness of the United States to support the United Nations to the degree it has is due, among other things, to the consistent, effective, persuasive encouragement by Canada for them to take that position. That remains our strong preference. But he knows the United Nations system. He knows that there is the capacity among the permanent members to exercise a veto. It has happened several times in the past and has stopped that institution from being effective.
He also knows, if he has been following-and I am sure he has-the recent debates regarding events in Jerusalem, that it is possible for a series of conditions to be imposed upon resolutions that are taken by the Security Council that can either destroy consensus or make those resolutions less helpful than they would otherwise be.
I repeat, our strong preference is to have Canadian action and, indeed, world action, within the context of the United Nations. But we want Saddam Hussein to be in no doubt at all. We have supported sanctions. We want Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait. We prefer to have him out of Kuwait as a result of United Nations action, if that is possible. If that proves not possible, then obviously Canada is going to keep its word to the United Nations.


John F. Brewin: Mr. Speaker, it is not just Saddam Hussein who is listening, but it is those in the United States who are now on the point of deciding a very critical issue, an issue which will put at risk the lives not only of Americans and Iraqis, but now, after the statements made by the Secretary of State for External Affairs before the committee, the lives of Canadians will be involved in this.
Mr. Speaker, it is absolutely critical that the Secretary of State for External Affairs make it clear to the United States that all parties in this House, and the Government of Canada, will not accept U.S. military action outside the approval of the United Nations.
Will the Secretary of State for External Affairs not support the United Nations in this, instead of just the U.S.?


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, we consistently have been supporting the United Nations and, indeed, have been successful in encouraging the United States to support
Oral Questions
the United Nations to a degree that is unparalleled in recent memory.
Perhaps I can best deal with this by putting a question to the hon. member. Is it the position of the New Democratic Party that if a permanent member of the Security Council vetoes action by the United Nations, then we should simply pack up our resolutions and let Saddam Hussein stay in Kuwait? Is that the NDP position?


John F. Brewin: Mr. Speaker, the NDP position is that until all has failed, the United Nations must get the complete, unqualified support of this government, this Parliament, and this country. That is what the Secretary of State for External Affairs is required to do.


Some hon. members:: Hear, hear.


John F. Brewin: As a final supplementary, Mr. Speaker, let me ask for the government's intentions vis-a-vis the Canadian forces. The Secretary of State for External Affairs this morning made a general statement favouring the use of force with or without the support of the Security Council.
Is it the government's position that Canadian forces will be involved in such action? Will the government undertake to come to this House before any escalation of Canadian participation in military action in the Gulf takes place?


Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, I would think that Canadians who are interested in knowing what went on in the committee would want to avail themselves of the opportunity to read the committee report, and not rely on the questions that have been put by my hon. friend, or some partial media report.
He has asked for a commitment. I have given a commitment in a letter to his colleague from Burnaby, and to the member for Winnipeg. That commitment is clear. It was delivered. It was offered by this government in the spirit of trying to keep the House as informed as possible.
Does the United Nations have our unqualified support? Of course, it does. We want the United Nations to work. We want those auspices to be the auspices under which Canada acts. We recognize that there is a veto in the United Nations. But we recognize that there would not have been, for example, United Nations action in

Oral Questions
Korea but for the accident of the absence of China. The question I put to him was not a debating trick. The question I put to him was, if there is a veto exercised by the United Nations that makes it impossible for a United Nations command, does he want Canada to say "Stay where you are Saddam Hussein"? We do not.


IMMIGRATION
Alfonso Gagliano: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Employment and Immigration. In the report the minister tabled today, it is evident that family class immigration will rise to a high of
100,000	in 1992 and drop sharply by 1995 to 85,000.
Why did the minister not follow her own policy just announced a year ago to increase family class immigration? What has she against family unification?


Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, as the hon. member can see from the table, this government is not at all against family reunification in Canada. Indeed, the numbers after 1992 remain considerably higher than they are today.
The hon. member has expressed his support in the past, as have other members in the House, for a balance between the humanitarian, independent and family categories, and I think that the definition of a family, which is based on core family members and dependency, would meet with the approval of members of this House and other Canadians, particularly since the number of family members will continue to increase.


Alfonso Gagliano: Mr. Speaker, we used to have a 50 per cent family class. Now we have it down to 30 per cent. That is the difference in her policy.

Mr. Speaker, in the immigrant integration federal strategy unveiled today the minister did not suggest anything to help schools cope with the wave of immigrant children. Why does the minister refuse to lighten the burden of schools that simply cannot provide
adequate educational training for immigrant children? Why?


Barbara Jean McDougall: First, Mr. Speaker, it is clear that in 1984 there were no dependents, none at all, just families. But the hon. member and his party are against dependents. Such was the situation that year. But in our case this is the first time we have drafted a five-year integration plan for the future. We are adding extra funds-$200 million-for integration and language courses for adults, of course, but for small children as well. We are now in a position where we can teach languages to 43 instead of only 28 per cent of the immigrant population. Still there is no denying that the provinces do have legal responsibilities in children's classrooms.


INTEREST RATES
Mr. Douglas Young (Acadie-Bathurst):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Finance. The many personal and business bankruptcies are continuing proof that not only do government monetary policies drive Canada into a recession, but it is also becoming obvious that if we do have a recession in this country, Quebec is hardest hit among all the provinces. I want to ask the Minister of Finance whether he now intends to take every measure required to make sure that the Governor of the Bank of Canada, Mr. Crow, lowers the overly high Canadian interest rates?


Hon. Michael Wilson (Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, I am not sure that I would agree with the premise of the hon. member's question. The basic question I have responded to on many occasions is that we are watching what is happening in the economy and what is happening with inflationary pressures. We have indicated very clearly in the past our sensitivity to what has happened with the 1.5 percentage point drop in interest rates over the course of the summer. I think the hon. member has a clear sense of what the policy is of the Government of Canada.
October 25, 1990

It is important for us to watch what happens over the course of the next few months. If we see a continuation of what went on during the summer, certainly that would be reflected in interest rates.


M. Douglas Young: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. The interest rate is frozen today but the recession is moving ahead with a great deal of speed. The GST is part of that.
Mr. Speaker, I want to ask the Minister of Finance whether or not he intends to support the Prime Minister's off-the-cuff comments on the west coast about the removal of GST from books and educational materials or does he realize that no amount of snake oil and patchwork on the GST are going to make this palatable to Canadians. Is he going to let the Prime Minister play games that maybe it can be fixed after the GST is put it in place? Is he going to do what Canadians are asking him to do and withdraw the GST?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member talks about playing games. Canadians understand clearly the game that the Liberal Party of Canada is playing. They have seen their leader on the one hand saying, "We will kill this tax," and on the other hand, "We are going to have a commission"; on the one hand, "We are going to look at this thing again after we are elected," on the other hand, "We are going to kill the tax". People understand very clearly the games of the Liberal Party of Canada. The Liberal Party of Canada is playing a very cynical, partisan game.
On the one hand they have said we should get on with elements of tax reform, as Senator MacEachen, Senator Buckwold and Senator Kirby said back in 1987, but on the other hand, "Let's let Canadians think we are against this tax. Let's give Canadians a sense that we are against the goods and services tax", because deep down they know that this tax is important. It is a very cynical, partisan game that they are playing now and Canadians are showing that they are not fooled by it.


Mr. Lyle Dean MacWilliam (Okanagan -Shuswap):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance. Once again the Minister of Finance and his tax-happy gnomes are acting without any sense of restraint. They are not content to tax literacy and harm the Canadian
Oral Questions
publishing industry, they have now decided to tax foreign books and magazine publishers by either forcing them to collect the GST from Canadian clients or by threatening to halt shipments at the border.
Has the minister considered the impact on Canadian publishing if other countries decide to retaliate against this global tax grab? Will the minister explain how this extension of the GST will not act as a barrier to cultural access for Canadians? Finally, will he not reconsider his punitive actions and withdraw this regressive taxation on all books, publishing and literature.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I believe I responded on Monday and Tuesday to the last question. I think the hon. member understands quite clearly the position that we have taken with regard to foreign publishers of magazines that compete with Canadian publications. We want to put the Canadian publications in a position where they are not disadvantaged in relation to the publications that come in and compete with them.
If the hon. member is saying we should not give the Canadian publishers a level playing field, then I would like to hear that from him.


Mr. Ross Harvey (Edmonton East):: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary for the minister. It's about cheatin' and hurtin'. Canadian bands playing Canadian bars and lounges will have to charge the owners of those bars and lounges the GST. As things now stand, American bands playing those same bars and lounges will not. As a result Canadian bar and lounge operators will be encouraged by the GST to hire American bands.
Will the minister agree that his GST will be cheatin' Canadian bands and leaving them hurtin'?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, there ain't no such minister.


SENIOR CITIZENS
Mr. Lawrence MacAulay (Cardigan):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Deputy Prime Minister in the absence of the Prime Minister. During his recent trip to Vancouver the Prime Minister made the following statement about Canadian seniors and I quote:

Oral Questions
They should be in bed at 71 years of age having milk and cookies!
October 25, 1990
How can the Prime Minister make a statement that is so insulting and out of touch with Canadian seniors?


Some hon. members:: Hear, hear.


An hon. member:: No, he said that about Liberal senators.


Hon. Monique Vezina (Minister of State (Employment and Immigration) and Minister of State (Seniors)):: Mr. Speaker, I did not hear the statement, but it seems to me that it would be quite appropriate and applicable to Senator Hebert, if we keep in mind his behaviour in recent days.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Monique Vézina: I will continue by stating that we as a government give priority to elderly people. We have programs which attest to the fact that the elderly make up an active and dynamic component of Canadian society. We will continue to defend our affirmative action programs for seniors, and I have the full support of both the Cabinet and the government in these measures.


Lawrence MacAulay: Mr. Speaker, criticism against seniors is criticism against seniors.
My supplementary question is directed to the Deputy Prime Minister again. From the Prime Minister's comments, are Canadians to conclude that people such as former Governor General Roland Michener, author W. O. Mitchell and human rights activist Rabbi Gunter Plaut, all of whom are over 71, should stop contributing and go to bed?
Is the government not aware that the seniors of this nation continue to make the country what it is today?


Monique Vézina: See, Mr. Speaker, the behaviour of Senator Hebert does provoke a passionate response! I am convinced that the kind of behaviour we saw on TV last week is an insult to older people who are full-fledged and responsible citizens anxious to do their share in the Canadian community-


AGRICULTURE
Mr. Bob Speller (Haldimand-Norfolk):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Agriculture.
The minister should be aware that, while American negotiators at the GATT are pressuring Canada to give up on supply-management, American politicians in Washington have passed a bill through both houses of Congress which will set up their veiy own system of supply-management in dairy.
Has the minister informed the Americans that their position on supply-management is totally hypocritical? Has he asked them if they will now, given this recent development, support our position at the GATT?


Some hon. members:: Hear, hear.


Hon. Don Mazankowski (Deputy Prime Minister, President of the Privy Council and Minister of Agriculture):: Mr. Speaker, as the hon. member knows, the Canadian position has been well documented and well thought out. It is a balanced and realistic position. We do not take our marching orders from the United States of America.


Some hon. members:: Hear, hear.


Some hon. members:: Oh, oh.


Robert (Bob) Speller: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary question is directed to the same minister. He seems to be staying surprisingly silent while editorial boards across the country attack supply-management based on faulty information, I might add, that his ministry gave out a few weeks ago on subsidies to dairy farmers.
Will the minister stand in the House today and tell Canadian consumers the truth, that the actual amount of dairy subsidy given to farmers is only one-tenth of the $2.2 billion he claims to be giving dairy farmers, and that the only reason we pay more for milk here in Canada is because the Americans subsidize their dairy producers in billions of dollars?


Some hon. members:: Hear, hear.
October 25, 1990


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, the proof of the pudding is in the Canadian government's position.
If the hon. member's position is such that he is not in favour of the Canadian position, which fully supports and strengthens the supply-management system in this country, he is about the only Canadian associated with agriculture who does not share that view.


Some hon. members:: Hear, hear.


THE ENVIRONMENT
Philip Edmonston: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Environment. When the hon. member for Lac-Saint-Jean was Minister of Environment our party supported his view that an environmental impact study be carried out before proceeding with the James Bay project.
We have learned today the the Government of Quebec will begin the construction of infrastructures for this project without first holding public hearings. So my question is: will the Minister of the Environment, in his fight for public hearings, support the former Minister of Environment on the same issue?


Hon. Robert de Cotret (Minister of the Environment):: Mr. Speaker, I am happy to tell my hon. colleague that I discussed this issue this morning with my counterpart in Quebec, Mr. Paradis, and that his facts are not quite correct.
The Quebec Cabinet did not decide yesterday to allow the project to go forward but to ask Quebec Hydro to submit the 400 environmental studies done to the Ministry of the Environment for review. The Quebec government assured me this morning that no construction permit would be issued before this review is completed. We agreed, as we have done on several occasions, to have a proper environmental review done before construction starts.


James Ross Fulton: Mr. Speaker, the James Bay II hydro project is the largest industrial project ever conceived in the history of North America. As the
Oral Questions
Minister of the Environment knows, environmental assessment of federal jurisdictions by the Government of Canada is mandatory, meaning that construction without assessment is illegal.
Will the minister assure the House that before any infrastructure construction or any construction of any of the ancillary parts of the diversions or dams will not be allowed to proceed by the federal government until the environment assessment process and hearings are complete and have been reported to Parliament and the people of Canada?


Robert René de Cotret: Mr. Speaker, I will repeat again in English what I just said in French.
There is no construction permit to allow the project to go along. There is an agreement between the Government of Quebec and the Government of Canada to ensure that there is an appropriate environmental assessment process completed before construction starts. That is the state of this particular file.


LONG POINT MILITARY BASE
Mrs. Carole Jacques (Mercier):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Defence.
Yesterday I met the hundreds of employees of the Long Point military base who were demonstrating against the eventual closing of the base following the recommendations contained in the Productivity Group's report.
Mr. Speaker, this closing would be an economic disaster for the Montreal region, since the military base is the largest industry in East Montreal with its 1,500 employees and the thousands of indirect jobs generated through its contracts with Montreal businesses.
Can the Minister guarantee us and confirm in writing that the Long Point military base will not be closed?


Hon. Bill McKnight (Minister of National Defence):: Mr. Speaker, as I have informed my colleague earlier, there has been a preliminary study of depots throughout Canada. I cannot provide the assurance that she requests because of budgetary restrictions, because of the need for operational efficiency, and because of the changing

Oral Questions
geopolitical situation around the world. I cannot guarantee bases in any place in Canada or abroad.
What I can tell the hon. member is that any action that would be taken would need additional study. I can assure the hon. member that that study or any study has not been undertaken to provide that information and at this time there is no intent of closing Long Point.


IMMIGRATION
Mr. Gilles Duceppe (Laurier-Sainte-Marie):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Employment and Immigration. The Quebec Minister of Cultural Communities and Immigration recently said that the federal government had cut by 17 per cent the financing of programs to teach French to Quebec immigrants and that immigration had increased by 12 per cent in that province.
The Couture-Cullen agreement also had to be renewed to be brought up to date. The purpose of this new agreement was, according to the Minister, to confirm the exclusive right of Quebec to select dependent immigrants and to ensure Quebec is in charge of the linguistic, cultural and economic integration of immigrants.
My question, Mr. Speaker, is this: Is the plan announced this morning by the Minister compatible with this new agreement?


Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, I dealt last week with the immigration agreement between Canada and Quebec.
Today we announced we would increase the funds for language training and counselling across the country, and Quebec is no exception. There is money for French classes in Quebec since the number of immigrants to that province is going up.


Gilles Duceppe: Mr. Speaker, I wish the minister would explain why the agreement has not yet been signed, why she is acting
unilaterally and exactly how much money she intends to inject into the plan so that French-language programs will be available to immigrants in Quebec?


Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, I answered these questions last week and again this morning. If the hon. member would care to read the plan I laid on the Table this morning, perhaps he would realize what the situation is with respect to language courses for Quebec.
I remain very sensitive to the situation in Quebec, and I am very much aware of Quebec's concern about the proportion of immigrants coming to Quebec.


CORRECTIONAL SERVICE CANADA
William John Vankoughnet: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the President of the Treasury Board.
In May of this year, the former President of the Treasuiy Board met with delegates from Correctional Service Canada in Kingston, Ontario. At that time, the minister stated that he would undertake to deal with early retirement and retraining provisions for Correctional Service staff separately from the Public Service reform bill if that bill had not been tabled by early fall of 1990.
Can the minister tell the House what steps will be taken to facilitate this early retirement and retraining package for front-line Correctional Service employees?


Gilles Loiselle: Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for his question. Of course, in my new portfolio one of the very important challenges I have to meet is Public Service pension reform. The government is well aware of the importance attached to this issue by the Correctional Service employees and their representatives. I hope to be in a position to proceed fairly soon with this reform and I am sure the appropriate legislation will cover the people to whom he is referring.
October 25, 1990


OFFICIAL LANGUAGES
Hon. Warren Allmand (Notre-Dame-de-Grace):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Acting Prime Minister.
This morning the Commissioner of Official Languages tabled a special report condemning the government for its failure to adopt the regulations necessary to implement the Official Languages Act passed by Parliament in 1988 with the support of all political parties. Two and one-half years have passed with increased attacks on bilingualism and this law has not yet been implemented.
Why has the government not tabled these regulations? If the government truly believes in the principles of bilingualism and this law, why does it not show some leadership and have this law implemented as soon as possible?


Gilles Loiselle: Mr. Speaker, I would like to reaffirm the commitment to the government to issuing these regulations as soon as possible.
I will tell the hon. member, in all frankness, that the law makes the President of the Treasury Board particularly responsible for that area and I take this very seriously. I would not want to introduce regulations which were very advanced without going through them myself and consulting with the Federation des francophones hors Quebec and Alliance Quebec. I have been doing that and I have also spoken with the commissioner. I know he has his own views on this, and I respect them.


William Warren Allmand: Mr. Speaker, that is a lot of nonsense. It has been two and one-half years since the bill was passed and the consultations took place more than a year ago.

Mr. Speaker, during the debate on Bill C-72, the Prime Minister said that this bill was so important that Parliament should sit around the clock to adopt it.
Is this just another example of the Prime Minister's political rhetoric? If the legislation was so important at the time, is it now less important? Why doesn't the Prime Minister meet with cabinet around the clock to
Business of the House
ensure passage of the regulations and the implementation of this legislation? Why?


Gilles Loiselle: Mr. Speaker, I may recall that the Commissioner of Official Languages made some very important nuances that my hon. friend tends to forget. He explained that there were a number of things that had to be improved, but the legislation is in place, it already provides services and there are now 1,600 points of service in Canada. Furthermore, in the public sector, we have finalized 40 memoranda of agreement with the departments in recent months, identifying their responsibilities with respect to official languages.
I realize that we must get on with the regulations, and I am trying to as fast as I can, but I want to do it in such a way that it will help Canada exercise its full responsibility for official languages.


POINT OF ORDER
Charles Joseph Clark: Mr. Speaker, during an answer I gave earlier today with regard to the situation in Korea, I mentioned China, inadvertently, when I meant to mention the Soviet Union. I want to thank the several colleagues in the House who drew my error to my attention.


BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Jean-Robert Gauthier: Mr
Speaker, I just want to put the question usually put on Thursdays to the government House leader. Could he inform the House what the agenda for the House will be for tomorrow, Friday, and next week, Monday and Tuesday.


Mr. Nunziata:: And be nice about it, Harvie.


Hon. Harvie Andre (Minister of State and Leader of the Government in the House of Commons):: There is the hon. member for York South-Weston talking about

October 25, 1990
Government Orders
niceness again, a ratpacker telling me to be nice. I am always nice.
Mr. Speaker, this afternoon we will carry on with Bill C-78, the environmental assessment review process legislation, which I hope we will be able to complete. Tomorrow, it would be my intention to call, for completion I hope, second reading on Bill C-73, Crown corporations dissolution, and second reading of Bill C-81, dealing with the UN Convention on contracts, a technical, non-contentious piece of legislation, as well as, hopefully, second reading of Bill C-82, having to do with the charging of fees in Quebec ports, simply to provide a legal basis for what is now occurring.
On Monday, I will call for the final day on second reading of Bill C-84, Petro-Canada. For Tuesday and beyond, I will have the usual discussions with House leaders of the opposition parties to see what can be arranged.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate receiving this information and it is very helpful. I wonder if I could ask my friend, the government House leader, if he has any idea when Bill C-46 might be brought forward. I remind him that in the throne speech of this particular Parliament, it was stated: "You will be asked to legislate new conflict of interest standards for parliamentarians". Could the government House leader give us some indication when we might have a chance to begin that in earnest?


Harvie Andre: As the House leader of the New Democratic Party knows, we have been struggling at great length in our House leaders' meetings every Tuesday to try to reach some accommodation for dealing with the legislative program of the government in an expeditious manner, and that continues to be our objective.
If the House leader of the New Democratic Party is saying he is anxious to see some scheduling so that we can all plan and we can put things and there will be no parliamentary tricks to delay and disrupt our agenda, then I would welcome those discussions and I look forward, with great enthusiasm, to the next meeting of our committee.


Some hon. members:: Oh, oh.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: These types of discussions should be done behind the curtain.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. de Cotret that Bill C-78, an Act to establish a federal environmental assessment process, be read the second time and referred to a legislative committee, and of the amendment of Mr. Taylor (p. 14644).
Robert René de Cotret: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in this House to speak to Bill C-78, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, at second reading.
This government thinks that this bill is an important step forward in the campaign waged by this country to preserve and promote our environment. Bill C-78 is central to the overall objective of the government's "green plan": To make Canada, by the year 2000, the industrial world's most environmentally friendly country.
In fact, the Dutch government, a world leader in this area, wrote to the Federal Environmental Assessment Review Office that this new legislation will make Canada the most environmentally friendly country and help the Netherlands develop their own reform program.
We will meet this objective while ensuring that the law is clear, efficient and predictable. Our goals have not been achieved within the present regulations, defined by the courts, which have never been intended as anything other than flexible guidelines.
Given the great significance of this legislation, Mr. Speaker, I would like to briefly outline the four key principles used by the government in drafting the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act.
First, the government wanted an environmental assessment process that would be clear, consistent and predictable. There should be no uncertainty for any of the participants or any of the stakeholders in the environmental assessment process.



October 25, 1990

Second, we wanted a process that would be efficient and fair. Each project should receive the amount of time and the kind of assessment it requires.
Third, the government wanted legislation that would allow us to "anticipate and prevent" problems, rather than continue to struggle with the less effective and more expensive approach of react and cure.
Fourth, we wanted legislation that would encourage public participation and provide opportunities for the public to play a role in decision-making.
The Canadian Environmental Assessment Act is a good law designed to meet all four principles. It is the result of two years of broad consultations with a wide spectrum of Canadians, including governments, the private sector, native peoples, environmental and other special interest groups, the legal profession and environmental assessment professionals.
The Canadian Environmental Assessment Act delivers virtually all of the recommendations from those consultations. A major feature of the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act is that it will end the uncertainty and the confusion created by recent court decisions based on the 1984 guidelines Order in Council.
By giving the federal Environmental Assessment process the power and the precision of law, both the efficiency and the effectiveness of the process will be greatly improved.
While the current guidelines Order in Council has proven to be an effective environmental planning tool, the past six years of experience have identified a number of problems. For example, the current process does not allocate time and resources according to environmental risk. As well, the current process provides many opportunities for duplication in assessments between different federal agencies and between different jurisdictions.
In Bill C-78, Mr. Speaker, we believe we have achieved a number of substantial advances that will solve most of the major shortfalls of the old system. It will, for example, ensure that our environmental assessment resources are focused where they are most needed by directing projects into process streams according to their degree of environmental risks. Projects likely to cause significant impact on the environment will immediately be subjected to mandatory study. Projects that are similar to ones that have previously been assessed will be candidates for class assessment, and projects that clearly
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do not pose environmental risks will be identified on a government-wide exclusion list and be exempted from the assessment. In addition, Mr. Speaker, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act will introduce mediation as a means of improving the efficiency of the public review process of major projects. Mediation will be the preferred choice for public review whenever all stakeholders are willing to participate and work toward a consensus on the potential environmental effects of a project and the measures necessary to mitigate those effects.
Mediation will involve representatives of all groups which have a direct interest in or are directly affected by a proposed project. In this manner, Canadians who are most involved with and most concerned about a proposal will be able to communicate effectively with each other, with the project proponents and with the responsible federal authorities.
To minimize the duplication of assessment processes, joint review panels will be established where another party or jurisdiction also has the responsibility to assess a project. The other party could be a provincial government, the government of a foreign state, a body set up under a comprehensive land claim agreement, a federal regulatory authority.
Further, another federal public review process can be named as a substitute for a panel review under the new act. One example of a substitute panel may be the National Energy Board.
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to remind hon. members that the government is also establishing a parallel environmental review process for all proposals that require a cabinet decision, whether that relates to policies, programs, major projects, or to new legislation. The federal government is committed to an environmental assessment process for all its decisions, one that will preserve cabinet efficiency and confidentiality, but at the same time ensure that all decisions are open to public scrutiny.

An environmental impact statement will accompany the announcement of any cabinet decision. Thus, Canadians will be invited to examine thoroughly these public statements and Ministers could be called before the Standing Committee of the House of Commons on the

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Environment to discuss the environmental effects of their policies, programs, projects or legislation.
Mr. Speaker, I would now like to go on to talk about some of the improvements which will make the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act much more efficient than the existing Order in Council.
First of all, the proposed Bill will ensure that an environmental assessment is carried out before the project goes ahead. This, Mr. Speaker, will ensure that environmental problems are identified and alleviating measures are in place before the actual work starts. That way, we will be able to maintain both a healthy economy and a healthy environment. As importantly, Mr. Speaker, we will avoid the actual process which, so often, turns out to be inefficient from both an administrative and environmental point of view.
Second, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act will give the Minister of the Environment greater powers and increased control on the environemental assessment process. Nobody but the Minister of the Environment- not even the responsible authority of the project-will have the power to decide whether mediation or a panel review is necessary.
The bill will also give the Environment Minister the power to set up public review panels to assess the projects which could have serious transborder environmental effects on federal, provincial, Indian or foreign lands.
For instance, a project in one province likely to have environmental effects on another province or a federal or Indian territory, or even outside the country, would belong to this category.
Third, in order to ensure an effective environmental assessment process, this government will agree to provide major new funding for the purpose of fully implementing the process throughout. The addition of this new funding could even triple the current level allocated for environmental assessments.
In order to make it possible for the process to be effective, the Act will set up the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency which will have an arm's laugh approach with all departments, including Environment Canada. Its mandate will be to assess and report on the implementation of the environmental assessment process throughout its organization, Every year, the minister
will have to table in the House a report which Canadians will be able to examine.
Fifth, the new legislation will require the setting up of follow-up programs in order to ensure the effectiveness of the new assessment process. The Act will ensure that the setting-up of follow-up and monitoring plans will be part of the environmental assessment of all major projects.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I regret to interrupt the hon. minister, but his allotted time has expired. Is there unanimous consent to allow him to continue?


Mrs. Campbell (South West Nova):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of information. Did the minister not use his 40 minutes in the first half of this debate?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: No, he did not.


Coline M. Campbell: I would like to know why he insults us by a 10-minute speech and asks for unanimous consent.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Perhaps the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands can straighten it out for the hon. member.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: Mr. Speaker, there were indications that the minister could not make it this morning to be here for the 20-minute speech which he might have legitimately given.


Coline M. Campbell: Forty minutes.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: No. This morning he would have had 20 minutes in the usual course, with 10 minutes for questions and comments. That time expired, and now we are into the 10-minute segment.
We recognized that the minister could not be here. There were discussions among the parties. We would be happy to extend his 10 minutes by an additional 10 so that he has a full 20-minute speech without questions or comments.


James Ross Fulton: Mr. Speaker, I rise on the same point. We are certainly glad. We understand the difficulties the minister had in being here earlier. We are certainly prepared to let him have the full 20 minutes but, like other members, we certainly hope there is unanimous consent to allow for a 10-minute question and answer period, which I am sure the minister would seek.
October 25, 1990


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I will allow the extension of time, but I will not allow the questions and comments period.


Some hon. members:: Oh, oh.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Is there unanimous consent?


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, all that the minister is asking is that we revert to the way we were dealing with the matter earlier. I would ask that we seek unanimous consent to have the minister complete his remarks with a 20-minute speech-as a matter of fact a few moments extra if he wishes-and then the usual 10-minute question and comment period.
I seek unanimous consent to allow the minister to proceed that way.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Members have heard the suggestion. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Mr. Fontaine:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I am sorry.


James Ross Fulton: I rise on a point of order. Could you perhaps put it again, Mr. Speaker? It is a government member who is blocking unanimous consent for his own minister to speak.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Gabriel Fontaine: I said "no", Mr. Speaker.


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


Lyle Dean MacWilliam: Mr. Speaker, in preparing to speak today on this particular piece of legislation it was very tempting indeed to wander in here with a volley of criticism toward this minister and this government in respect of this particular bill.
It is so easy to criticize this government for the duplicitous nature of this legislation. In looking up that definition, duplicitous means double meaning, deceitfulness, appearing to be that which is not.
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Far be it from me to suggest that the minister himself is duplicitous, or that this government is duplicitous. Certainly, in the eyes of Canadians, this legislation is indeed duplicitous.
Rather than a tirade of concern about this legislation, I would rather go into some specific details and show precisely where it falls down. Since the Hon. Tom McMillan was environment minister-and that was some time ago-this government has been promising strong environmental legislation and a strong review process that would be entrenched in law. Instead what we have is a weak and hollow shell of a bill. It has more holes in it as my colleague said than a piece of Swiss cheese. It is weaker in fact than the current guidelines within which the minister must work. It is a step backward in terms of an environmental review process, not a step forward.
It appears that government members are intent on ramming through this bill before the accompanying regulations can be drafted. One has to ask why. I think the reason is very clear, that they want this bill in place before the important decisions have to be made in terms of the specifics of the regulation. They want to leave it vague. They want to duck the issue in terms of a hard-nosed piece of legislation that could be brought down with respect to the environmental review process.
For example, cabinet decisions are exempted from this legislation. This would mean, for example, that a cabinet decision to cut public transit would be exempt.
Members from British Columbia are very familiar with the effect of having too much control by cabinet over these kinds of sensitive issues. Sometime ago, for example, the agricultural land reserve in British Columbia was put in place. There was a professional body of about 80 individuals called the Environmental Land Use Secretariat. This body was put into place to police those kinds of decisions; but the government of the day at that time, the Social Credit government of the day, decided to disband those individuals and decided that cabinet in fact would be the final answer as to whether a piece of land remained in the reserve or without.
We have seen the impact of playing politics with sensitive decisions in that manner. Certainly members from British Columbia have seen the weakness in having

October 25, 1990
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direct political access through cabinet to those decisionmaking processes.
By giving cabinet decisions exemption from this legislation we see a direct political linkage here that is far from comfortable, the process far too political, far too fraught with error.
The bill leaves important questions unanswered, questions like: which projects are going to be covered? Which will be exempted? What legislation will actually fall under the act? How will Crown corporations be affected? Will foreign aid and development be properly assessed?
These concerns have been left to regulations that are yet to be defined. The regulations themselves, the teeth of the legislation, have been left undefined.


An hon. member:: It sounds like a pig in a poke.


Lyle Dean MacWilliam: The federal environment assessment and review office will report to the environment minister under this act. That is direct political control. This agency which is responsible for implementing the legislation should have been left to be independent, answering only to Parliament.
A number of reports including the New Democrats' report on the environment, Towards a Sustainable Future, and various environmental groups have called for the creation of an independent environmental auditor to review such government operations independently. This was in the original draft of the bill, but it has been axed. It has been watered down and completely axed in the final version.
It is clear that this legislation has been drastically watered down. It is now, in the government's words, "only an advisory process".
I want to go back a ways and suggest that six provinces have been successful in their appeal to the federal government to cut the guts out of this legislation, legislation that could have had teeth but has been watered down and made essentially useless. The Governments of Nova Scotia, Alberta, British Columbia, Ontario-the previous Government of Ontario-Manitoba and Quebec met sometime ago to mobilize, pressure and develop a strategy to water down the environmental assessment review process.
I want to read into the record a news release of the Winnipeg Free Press in May 1990. It states that the western provinces are demanding that Ottawa rewrite its
environmental review guidelines so major projects cannot be halted for court ordered environmental studies. It goes on to say that Premier Gary Filmon said recent Federal Court of Canada rulings have created a nightmare for developers. Well, too bad. If the environmental review process finds that a development goes against the guidelines for sustainable development and goes against common sense in terms of preservation in the environment, too bad for the provinces. We should have that kind of legislation so there is some kind of regulated federal control over the kinds of procedures we have seen in the past and that we continue to see impact upon our environment.
Many projects, as I have mentioned, are now either in the process of being built or considered for construction. They may well escape these environmental review procedures. Let us consider the Rafferty-Alameda-we have talked about that a number of times-and the Oldman River project and the largest megaproject in the history of this continent, the James Bay project. These projects may well not be considered under these legislative guidelines.
In British Columbia-and the members from B.C. have talked on this time and time again-the Alcan Kemano project will divert all of the 12 per cent of the flow of the Nechako River into the Fraser River and divert it into another water course. If that project goes through without an environmental assessment, it will be a disgrace to the environmental integrity of the House.
The diversion of those waters will leave only 12 per cent of the original flow, dropping the level of the Fraser River by over three feet at Hell's Gate in British Columbia. It could have disastrous environmental consequences.
I know my time is limited. I have many other points that I would like to argue, but let me sum up by saying that Bill C-78, the environmental legislation now before the House will not-and I repeat will not-be a step forward but a major step backward. It is a duplicitous piece of legislation that will not do the job and I submit is not intended to do the job which the public believes it should be warranted to do.
Canadians want strong federal legislation and strong measures. They want a government with a commitment to environmental integrity and a commitment to the concept of a sustainable environment. This legislation
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takes us the other way. It weakens what we already have in place. The government has not served the public well.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 38, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for The Battle-fords-Meadow Lake-Agriculture; the hon. member for Vancouver East-Human Rights; and the hon. member for Cape Breton Highlands-Canso-Fisheries.


Christine Susan Stewart: Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to stand this afternoon to speak to Bill C-78, the government's proposed environmental assessment act.
I have to say at the outset that regrettably I am not an expert in the area of environment, but I do have a strong concern about the proposed legislation. I have in front of me some statements made by people who are experts in this country who along with me have expressed serious concerns about Bill C-78.
To quote from some of their statements, they are saying such things as: "Mr. Mulroney's government's latest environmental legislation is fundamentally flawed. Canada will return to the dark ages of environmental law if Bill C-78 passes in its present form. Bill C-78 proposes to replace current federal environmental assessment laws. The federal law presently requires that environmental impact studies be conducted for proposals likely to injure the environment significantly. Environmentalists assert that the presently proposed bill will give the government complete discretion over whether to hold environmental impact studies". Rod MacDonald of the Saskatchewan Action Foundation for the Environment is quoted as saying: "This bill completely fails to meet the objectives of environmental assessment."
The environmental assessment caucus of the Canadian Environmental Network met in Hull on September 28, 29 and 30 solely for the purpose of discussing the bill before us today. Thirty-five representatives from groups across the country were in attendance. Delegates unani-
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mously called Bill C-78 a step backwards, directly contradicting the federal Minister of the Environment.
When we complete debate at second reading of this bill, a vote will be held. We will be voting in principle whether to support or not support this bill. If the main principle of this bill is purported to provide good environmental assessment to all projects in this country that are federal, and projects out of this country that are funded by the federal government or funded by other agencies with federal government input or projects that cross a federal boundary, that would be one thing. It is my belief that there is a principle hidden within this bill which is more significant and that is, that this government has full discretion when to call an environmental assessment review and when not to. That is of serious concern to me because I believe it is a step backward from where we are right now with FEARO.
I have particular concerns with regard to this bill. One of them starts with the preamble to the bill itself, which does not even express the words "sustainable development" nor support the principle of sustainable development. Instead, it talks about ensuring that economic development is compatible with the high value Canadians place on environmental quality.
There are all kinds of Canadians and some support environment in one way and some in other ways. I think what we are all trying to say is that whatever Canadian projects we are involved in, they must encourage and support sustainable development. It is a serious flaw of this bill that it does not speak in its preamble about the importance of sustainable development.
To change that we could propose an amendment. There are other amendments that could be proposed to this legislation that would improve it. I have to say again that I am more particularly concerned about what seems to be an underlying fact of this bill, that no matter how we amend it, whether or not an assessment is done is entirely up to the discretion of a minister, not even the Minister of the Environment.
The purpose of this act is to ensure that the environmental effects of projects receive careful consideration. I believe that the purpose of the act should be more ensuring than stating that projects receive careful con-

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sideration. It should state that projects are to be fully reviewed and ensure that projects are scrutinized for sustainable development.
In clause 6 of the bill it states that:
(a) in the opinion of the responsible authority the project is described in an exclusion list.
It sounds straightforward but it could lead to improper discretionary decision by a minister of the Crown. The key is that the opinion of the minister is sovereign and not a statute, and that again speaks to my particular concern about the wholeness of this bill.
In clause 11(3) we say that the scope of the environmental panel study will be determined by the responsible authority, the minister under which the responsibility of the project falls. This clause would be strengthened considerably if this responsibility were conferred on the Minister of the Environment. We have any number of ministers making decisions about whether or not a project will go to a panel and just how that environmental panel will determine its authority. I believe that the scope of the bill must be changed to provide for mandatory environmental assessment of projects.
Section 34 outlines clearly that if a responsible minister can justify the impact of a project, no matter how adverse, the project will be allowed to proceed. The discretionary power conferred by this bill in the responsible authority is a major flaw that could reduce the effectiveness of other parts of the legislation. In general, it leaves far too much room for industrial and business lobbies to influence the responsible authority to make a decision that would be contrary and detrimental to Canada's environmental protection objectives.
The Minister of the Environment was stating in his earlier remarks that one of the intents of the new proposal, Bill C-78, is to have in place clear, consistent and predictable outcomes. I would say that we have just the opposite, that what we would be approving if we went ahead with this bill is an assessment process which would be entirely unpredictable, inconsistent, totally dependent upon the discretion of whatever minister was in charge of a project.
I believe that in many ways this bill is going by us, it looks like a sheep but in fact it is a wolf in sheep's clothing. If a project were to get to the review panel stage, there are many things which I agree with in that process. However, even at the end of the review panel's deliberations on any particular project, that panel does
not have judicial, nor quasi-judicial function but can simply advise. I do not have a great problem with that aspect of it, however the fact that we cannot get the public panel review process without undergoing a very discretionary process is of particular concern to me.
If a project does go to the review panel process, one of the areas that again is of particular concern to me is that projects that are carried on and funded in whole or in part by the Canadian government overseas can be exempt from environmental assessment under this legislation. I believe that in Canada we must view all aspects of the environment in terms of the picture that was taken by NASA of our planet earth some years ago. Mr. Speaker, if you look at that image in your mind you can see that the environment knows no such thing as political boundaries.
What happens in other countries of the world affects us. What happens to the environment in Third World countries can affect our environment here in Canada. I think it is absolutely necessary that we apply the same standards overseas as we do in Canada. We cannot penalize countries in the Third World with assessments that do not equally apply here in Canada. I believe that Canada must break out and set the example. An environmental assessment review process is equally important to all of our projects abroad as they are in Canada.
It is very important that we have public participation in all of the environmental assessments that we undergo and in our regulations. I think that we must make sure that when we are able to do environmental assessments overseas that we make allowances for public input to that process.
As I said, I am very concerned that there are going to be special regulations set aside for international projects, projects funded in full or in part by the Canadian government. We will be allowing environmental degradation to continue in the Third World which not only affects populations living in the Third World but affects us as well. We all must be very concerned about this.
Poverty is understood to be a leading cause of environmental degradation. I think that we must attack environmental degradation internationally from the grassroots level, dealing with individuals and the situations in which they find themselves. We must apply appropriate environmental technologies to ensure that people in the Third World are given the opportunity to live a better
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life, but a better life that preserves our environment, not only for themselves but for us as well.
People in the Third World who are in need and who are beneficiaries of our projects want to have a voice in the projects that are put forward for their benefit. I think that we have a responsibility to help them to participate in the decision-making process.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Debate. The hon. member for Ottawa South, and then I will recognize the hon. member for Wetaskiwin. I will then go to the hon. member for Surrey North, and then the hon. member for Winnipeg North.


John Paul Manley: Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for Wetaskiwin for rearranging the time so that I could proceed now.
I think that this is a very important piece of legislation that we are dealing with today, important not only because of what is contained in the bill itself and the fact that it sets out in legislative form the guidelines for environmental assessment at the federal level, but also because it needs to be a representation of what the Parliament of Canada believes in terms of environmental value.
We have certainly been evolving very rapidly in our understanding as a society of the importance of preserving the environment, not just for our own enjoyment at the present time, but for future generations.
What this bill needs to do and what it perhaps fails to do is to ensure for all of us that the standards that we expect to be applied to the preservation and protection of the environment are done in a fair, clear, effective and meaningful way.
We know that this bill is an evolution from the previous guidelines that existed. One would hope that by taking the guidelines and putting them into statutory form, that an advance forward would have been made. In fact by actually taking what previously had been a guideline and saying it is now the law of Canada, it is in the statute books, that we actually would have been able to say, "Look at this. Canada has moved forward. Canada has established a rule of law with respect to the protection of the environment which will be a model for
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countries around the world". But I fear that the government has failed in the bill that it has put forward.
I point out the preamble where the object of the legislation is set out. The preamble states that the object is "to achieve an appropriate balance between economic development and the preservation and enhancement of environmental quality". That, Mr. Speaker, indicates the fundamental flaw in thinking that underlies this piece of legislation.
To see the environment and its preservation and protection as somehow in a continuum or as a trade-off with economic development is exactly the wrong approach to this issue. In fact, economic development for the future depends upon environmental protection now. It is not a trade-off. Our future economic well-being is not going to be improved by degrading the environment today. Our future economic well-being depends upon us acting today to preserve and protect the environment that surrounds us. It is as crucial tomorrow as it is today, as it was when we did not know about in years gone by.
At first blush, this seems to be a fairly wide-reaching environmental assessment structure because the environmental projects to be assessed, as set out in clause 5 of the bill, are very wide ranging and include almost everything where a federal authority is involved. But the first thing that strikes me is if the intent in drafting this clause 5 was to prevent the federal government from intervening where, in the interests of the peace, order, and good government of Canada, it should be intervening in projects that have an effect both interprovincially and within a province. The heritage that we have-

The heritage of Canadians is too important to be left only to the provinces.

If we have the power under the peace, order, and good government provisions of the Constitution Act of Canada, as we do, according to the Supreme Court of Canada, for example, to impose mandatory wage and price controls in order to prevent inflation, then surely the federal government will acknowledge that it has the power under the same provisions to intervene in development projects which are going to be environmentally harmful. Yet I do not see even a wish on the part of the

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federal government to acknowledge that that jurisdiction may be theirs in the context of clause 5.
We then get into the process itself, the power of the ministers to exclude projects from environmental assessment and review. Clause 6(l)(a) states:
in the opinion of the responsible authority the project is described
in an exclusion list;
If that is the case, then it is exempt from environmental assessment and review.
The responsible authority is very broadly defined and can include, in the case of a department or ministry of state, the member of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada presiding over that department or ministry. In other words, any minister deciding that a project is on an exclusion list can prevent environmental assessment and review from occurring. As a minimum, that should only be the power of the Minister of the Environment.
The Minister of the Environment should have responsibility to account to the House of Commons for the welfare of our environment, as a whole. The Minister of Public Works should not be able, under clause 6, to decide that a project is exempt from assessment and review. Only the Minister of the Environment should be able to do that, if any minister is able to do it. If a minister is able to do that, and if it is the Minister of the Environment, then that decision should be reviewable. There should be an appeal. It should be possible for the people of Canada to take the Minister of the Environment to court and say: "You should not be exempting this. The implications for our environment are too great." That provision, as far as I can see, is simply not in this bill.
It strikes me in so many ways that this bill, although well meaning and although its time has come, is an inadequate response in the context of many events occurring in Canada, such as the Rafferty-Alameda situation and the Oldman Dam. We are seeing the guidelines being enforced by the courts first and the federal government being dragged along somewhat reluctantly. Now is the time to have a clear, legislated statement of what it is that we think should be the standard for the world, not only for Canada, in protecting the environment.
As I sit down, Mr. Speaker, I would like to acknowledge the great assistance of my co-op student, Tom Yurkiw, who worked so hard in preparing notes for this.


Wilton (Willie) Littlechild: Mr. Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to participate today in the debate, at second reading stage, on Bill C-78, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act.
The time for speeches at this second reading stage is limited and because my native heritage is very important to me. I would like to focus my remarks on those aspects of the bill that hold special meaning for the aboriginal people of Canada. However, let me also be quick to add that this issue of environment is very important to the whole of my constituency.
Hon. members opposite have been very quick to find fault with the fact that Bill C-78 is a planning and consensus-building process based on the principle of self-assessment. It seems that they would prefer that every environmental assessment lead to a court enforceable edict by some all knowing and all powerful authority who would ensure that the best interests of the environment are defended against the inherent evils of development. Personally, I find this suggestion to be both naive and dangerous. It is also quite contraiy to the very principles of sustainable development.
Long before the arrival of Europeans on this continent, native communities were both self-governing and self-sustaining. First Nations lived in harmony with nature and were as one with the land, with their ancestors, with their children and their children's children. There was no room in native society for practices that could deplete the natural resources and damage the environments on which future generations would depend. In fact, politicians, academics, and so-called environmentalists who proclaim the virtues of sustainable development, but who fail utterly in their attempts to define such development in practical terms, would do well to reflect upon the lessons learned and the way of life practised by untold generations of native peoples in North America. They have always been, and are still, concerned with management between development and conservation.
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If I were to listen too long to hon. members opposite,
I might have to conclude that the successful application of sustainable development in native society could only have been achieved through strong central decision making. But nothing could be further from the truth. The sustainability of native society has always been based firmly on consensus building, on a strong sense of community, on deep respect for the experience of elders, and on individual accountability for decisions and actions, in short, the very principles that I see underpinning the proposed Canadian Environmental Assessment Act.
Self-assessment and the accountability implicit in that concept tend to strike a very responsive cord with native people and with their ideas of sustainable development. I believe that in the environmental assessment process, the self-assessment approach will always be far more effective than one based on central control. By making individual departments and ministers of government responsible for the environmental assessment process, there is the potential to make some real progress towards changing attitudes about the environment and focusing decision-makers on the goal of sustainable development, progress that could never be made in a centralized system.
For example, under the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act decision makers will have to deal directly with the affected public, become sensitive to the public's environmental needs and concerns, and be publicly accountable for the environmental effects of their decisions. They will not be able to hide behind a central environmental authority.
Planners throughout government will have to learn to integrate environmental, social and economic factors, in short, to go beyond the platitudes and learn what sustainable development is really all about.
All departments and agencies of government will have to develop a sense of environmental awareness and stewardship. They will not be able to leave it all to one small sector of the bureaucracy and, in due course, every minister will have to learn to be an environment minister.
An environmental assessment process that puts all of the responsibility and authority for environmental protection in the hands of review panels or environment ministers is not going to move us along the path towards the goal of sustainable development. If anything, it is more likely to lead us rapidly in the opposite direction. What will put us on the path towards sustainable
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development is a process that puts environmental assessment responsibility and environmental protection accountability where it really belongs, in the hands of the individual government decision makers who make project decisions on a daily basis and that is exactly what Bill C-78 will do.
There are, of course, a number of other features in Bill C-78 that hold particular interest for native peoples in the country. While the legislation is not intended to define native rights, nor is it appropriate that such rights should be defined in environmental legislation, the bill in fact goes a long way toward recognizing a new partnership in environmental matters between the federal government and the First Nations of Canada.
A good example of this partnership can be found in the sections of the bill dealing with joint panel reviews. For the purposes of environmental assessment, the bill recognizes native land claim administrations and native self-governments as jurisdictions on a par with provinces and foreign governments. In this respect, first nations will have the option of being equal partners with the federal government in assessing the effects of any projects that may affect their joint or separate interests.
As well, provisions are made in Bill C-78 to adapt the environmental assessment process to projects on Indian reserves by means of a special regulations. Such special regulations will be developed co-operatively with First Nations. They will recognize the decision-making responsibilities of native peoples for projects on their reserves. They will also recognize the effective and comprehensive environmental assessment processes that many First Nations and native communities have already developed and put in place to deal with the effects of said projects.
Bill C-78 also contains important new provisions for follow-up and monitoring programs for all major projects. From a native perspective, listening very carefully to what nature has to tell us is a basic prerequisite to a healthy and sustainable society. For too many years, however, modern North American society has been blind to the warning signs that the environment has been trying to give it. Modern society has failed to heed these warning signs because modern society has been unwilling to listen to the environment and face up to the reality of what we have been doing to it. Basically, modern society has failed to stay in touch with the environment on which its livelihood and indeed its very sustainability depends. I have seen this occur on own lands during my own lifetime.

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Bill C-78 will take a major step forward in ensuring that we listen carefully to the environment from now on and that we learn from the feedback that it is able to provide us. Monitoring programs will allow us to evaluate the accuracy of our environmental impact predictions and to judge the effectiveness of our impact mitigation measures. In this way we will learn quickly from our successes as well as our mistakes, and we will be able to improve and update the environmental assessment process as we gain experience with it.
Probably the most intriguing and innovative sections in Bill C-78 with respect to native interests are those relating to transborder environmental effects. These provisions will allow the federal government to provide much earlier and more effective protection to native land interests during a variety of claim and self-government negotiations.
For instance, once the boundaries of a native land interest have been identified and agreed to by the parties to a land claim or self-government negotiation, the Minister of the Environment will have the authority to establish a public review panel to look into any developments that could cause serious environmental damage to those lands, whether those developments will be located on or off the defined lands. In addition, the minister will have the power to issue an order, and back it up with a court injunction, prohibiting the development from proceeding until the minister and the native people are satisfied that any serious environmental effects can be mitigated. If that concern cannot be satisfied, then the project can be held up indefinitely or at least until the native people take over control of the land under their claim or self-government agreement.
Bill C-78 represents an important step forward in the federal government's environmental assessment process. It is also an important step forward in the government's willingness to learn from the First Nations of Canada about the principles of sustainable development and to work with the First Nations of Canada to protect their common environmental heritage.
As a native Canadian and as a member of the government, and, as I said, because of the importance of the environment to Wetaskiwin, I am prepared to offer my
strong support for Bill C-78 for the very reason that it is an effective planning and consensus-building process based firmly on a principle of self-assessment.


Mr. Rey Pagtakhan (Winnipeg North):: Mr. Speaker, today we have an opportunity to reflect on a great Canadian dream, to have an environmental assessment act so that we can secure for ourselves and for our children in the future a secure life and a secure standard of living.
Debate on this bill brings us to the concepts of economic development and environmental conservation. The two must be linked and that bridge is what we call sustainable development.
Currently there are laws and regulations to protect the environment, to avoid the threats to air, land and water, and the threats to plants, animals and our citizens.
What are some of the consequences to human health, for example, of global climatic change, a real environmental concern today? We can expect due to increased climatic heat an increased number of deaths among our elderly citizens, among the chronically ill and debilitated persons, and among our young infants. We can expect increased death and incapacitation from lung diseases such as asthma, chronic bronchitis, emphysema and bronchiectasis. They are chronic diseases which could make it difficult for patients to breathe.
There are also consequences of global climatic change that emanate from the thinning of the ozone layer, not only from the heat itself. Due to this thinning in the ozone layer, we can expect an increased incidence of skin cancer among the Caucasian population of the world, an increased incidence of cataracts, a reduction in the immune response of the body, and thus the individuals are subject to infections and to increased gravity of infection.
The global climatic change also poses adverse effects on food supplies and agriculture in general. These consequences definitely ask for solutions. One approach is to ensure that binding, effective environmental assessment processes are in place. Thus, there is an opportunity for all of us, government, citizens, businesses, everyone, to face a challenge, to do a job in partnership.
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Growing concern with the quality of life, that is good health and a good standard of living, is evident in Canada and in other countries as well. It is believed, for example, by 88 per cent of Canadians that pollution has adversely affected public health. Forty-nine per cent believe their own personal health has been affected. Seventy-three per cent believe pollution is a major cause of cancer and 81 per cent of Canadians believe that pollution problems threaten the veiy survival of humanity.
Indeed, we Canadians are rightly preoccupied with our environment. It has become a rallying point for us to take steps to protect it by recycling or paying more for products and to pass legislation which would ensure the environment would be for our productive use today as it would be for our children of tomorrow.
We now understand what our reasonable environmental expectations are and we understand even more the depth of our commitment to future generations.
What are some of the basic requirements for environmental processes? Mr. Robert Gibson of the Department of Environment and Resource Studies, University of Waterloo, in September of this year produced an excellent document which I feel could serve as a useful framework for evaluating the bill before before us, Bill C-78.
The most important concerns I have on this bill relate to two basic issues: what environmental assessment requirements should we expect to accomplish? Second, how do we ensure that the expectations will be met? Two expectations are apparent today. There ought to be full consideration of environmental factors and public and private decisions must extend to cumulative and global responsibilities. No longer sufficient is careful attention only to immediate and local concerns.
The second expectation concerns the resulting decisions which should positively and significantly contribute to achieving sustainability. Admittedly, there is no precise definition of the term, but the concept is clear enough, that is that our use of resources today for
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economic development must ensure we have continuing reserves of these resources as well as for the future. The test of sustainability of development must encompass not only the biophysical but also the social, economic and cultural environment. Inherent in this test of sustainability are the beliefs that equity, acceptability and durability are met as fundamental criteria.
An environment assessment process design must therefore fulfil three basic principles: It must be effective, it must be practical and it must be efficient.
The third principle, efficiency, demands fairness to all parties be delivered.
The second principle requires the process and its demands to be understandable and easily doable.
That it ought to be effective means we ought to be able to encourage, guide, and, when necessary, to force the proper things to be done.
Does Bill C-78 stand the scrutiny of the foregoing basic requirements and principles underlying environmental assessment process? Let me quote: "Canada will return to the dark ages of environmental law if Bill C-78 passes in its present form", said Mr. Brian Pannell of the Manitoba Environmentalist Inc.
As a Manitoban, I definitely agree with this serious indictment made by Mr. Pannell. But why?
The purpose of this bill is to create binding legislation to ensure that environmental assessments are carried out on certain projects within federal jurisdiction. The purpose is excellent, but several flaws are evident.
Allow me in the remaining minutes to focus on a few specific clauses and to consider some amendments. I would suggest, Mr. Speaker, that clause 4(b) should be amended to include sustainable development as a purpose of the bill "to bind responsible authorities to the concept of sustainable development"
The purpose of this act in clause 4(a) should read: "That projects are fully reviewed and scrutinized to ensure sustainable development, as defined in subsection 2(1)".

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In fact, in the preamble we say we believe in the concept of sustainable development.
In conclusion, I would like to say that sustainable development is a concept that requires a strong mind and a strong heart for what are required are reorientation in our current economic strategies, as well as a will to make financial transfer payments between and within communities, provinces and countries.
The concept challenges us to self-evident truths that this human planet can survive without us, but we cannot survive without its life support system.
In its present form, I cannot support Bill C-78.


James Capsey (Jim) Karpoff: Mr. Speaker, there are very few times in Canadian history that the public came together unanimously to either support or reject things.
We have a situation in Canada right now where the public is together because they oppose the GST. We have a situation where the Canadian public is quickly coming together, wishing that this non-elected Senate be abolished because of the plugging of the Senate by the Tories and because of the double-cross by the Liberal senators when they did not take their opportunity to kill the GST.
We also have in Canada a coming together, a consensus of Canadians that they want an environmental review process that will have some teeth and ability to protect the environment. There is a strong consensus growing in the Canadian public that they will not tolerate this type of inept legislation. They say that the environmental process must have at least these six principles. They may want to have others.
First, the environmental review process must be non-discretionaiy. No cabinet should have the discretion as to whether it is going to take place. Mandatory, that is the first principle.
Second, the environmental review process must be independent, particularly of political interference from government. They will not accept anything less than that.
Third, the process must be open, open to the public and open and above board so that people know that a proper and thorough assessment is being done.
Fourth, they want it to have the technical competence to really examine all of the issues involved, not just some of the peripheral ones but all of the implications both in terms of that immediate project and the long-term effects. Some of them are quite far away. We have heard of examples and I will be referring later to the effect of the Kemano II project, hundreds of miles away on a riding like mine in Surrey.
Fifth, they want the panel to have independent research so that they are not relying on what Alcan tells them or what some other developer tells them or certainly not what some cabinet minister and his department tells them.
Sixth, they want there to be the possibility for real and serious interveners participation where they will have funding and resources and time to properly put their position before a review panel.
I mentioned in this House yesterday the Big Bend in Surrey. It is one of the last freshwater marshes on the lower Fraser River estuary. Right now it is under tremendous threat because of the lack of an environmental review process. The CNR, a tool of government, expropriated the whole area adjacent to the marsh for an intermodal yard. It put it in. The municipality, the local people, no one had a say.
Now we have upstream Kemano II being started where the government has waived an environmental review. It is going to drop the Fraser River three feet. What is the effect on Surrey Big Bend going to be? We have marine life there. It is a fish habitat. It could be very critical and is undoubtedly very critical to salmon spawning. We have beaver there. If you drop the water level three feet, what effect is that going to have on the beaver? There are blue heron. No one has done an environmental impact. We have a developer coming along and saying: "What I want to do is just fill the whole thing in, preload it for an industrial site, dump dirt in there, and backfill".
There has got to be a mandatory environmental review process. I can tell you, Mr. Speaker, that the residents of Surrey and my riding will not tolerate a bill like this. They will not accept it where there is discretion at every
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step of the way. They want a bill that will be mandatory, open to the public, in which there will be an opportunity for them to participate in that review and to ensure that the environment is protected.
This bill allows discretion, particularly by the government and by the ministers. It does not even call or allow for environmental review of government policy. Government policy is exempt. The NDP report Towards a Sustainable Future talked about an environmental auditor who could independently review government operations and policies. That is what is necessary.
When the land commission in B.C. was first established under the then premier, the member from Esquimau, its hallmark was that it was an independent land commission, at arm's length from the government, which had authority to act in the interest of the community. Everyone knows what the Socreds did. We also know that in B.C. the Socreds and the Tories are the same people. We have another example here of where people are determined not to have an arm's length body to protect the environment and the interests of the Canadian public.
In closing, I wonder what is the sudden reason for the change in process that the government has brought in. A process was set up where it was going to review this legislation before it was brought back to the House so that some of the major changes that everyone agrees must be made could be made and it could be redrafted before it came back. Now it has been dispensed with. People want effective environmental legislation, but they do not want it done so quickly that it is ineffective.


Lloyd Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, I am glad I was in the House to listen to the speech from the last hon. member who was very anxious in laying blame on all the other villains and perpetrators of environmental damage, particularly in other parties.
It brought to mind some history. It is too bad he is not prepared to stay to listen to it. About 20 years ago I was the chairman of the environmental council in Manitoba, the first time it was established. The issue at that time was a major hydro project that was being initiated by the then Schreyer government which carried the label: New Democratic Party.
Mr. Green, its the minister of natural resources, would meet with us on a periodic basis, bang the desk, take his shoe off, throw it at people, scream, yell, jump, and say:
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"By God, the progress of Manitoba was not going to be stopped by a bunch of environmentalists who were going to get in the way of this major project."
I spent almost three years as chairman of that council before I was elected to the Manitoba legislature. I can probably say one of the reasons I got elected was my stand against the New Democratic Party government initiative in flooding something like 300,000 to 400,000 acres of northern Manitoba waterways, displacing thousands of native people and aboriginals in Manitoba and, to this day, not acknowledging that any compensation should be paid.
I can recall Mr. Green, who I know is carried as one of the great heroes, a paragon of New Democratic representatives at the time, was the one who said that by God environmental assessment was something that would happen over his dead body.
I say this simply to remind my hon. friends to the left that it is time that self-righteousness gave way to some self-consciousness and recognition that this entire community and all parties are culpable and that nobody can escape some serious responsibility for having made the wrong decisions in the past.
Unfortunately 20 years later we are making the same mistakes. It seems that we have not learned an awful lot in those 20 years. We are now using the language of environmental accountability and responsibility, but there is still a basic reservation or a lack of willingness to understand just how crucial it is that we change the ethic of our time. It is understandable-and you, Mr. Speaker, in particular would understand it, coming from the province of Alberta-coming as we do from western provinces where for a long period of time the initiation of major capital projects was our lifeblood. Hydro projects, pulp and paper projects and the development of our natural resources, in the opening of the west those were considered to be good things, not bad things. Over time we are learning that what was a good thing also carries with it very bad consequences.
I want to make the case that I think my colleagues up to now have done a superb job in pointing out the serious gaps in this legislation. I also want to say that this will never work. Environmental assessment will never work until we find a way of balancing those fundamental

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questions of fundamental development and environmental accountability.
I do not think that anyone takes pleasure out of the federal government be a policeman in terms of the actions of the provincial governments. We can see down the road a whole series of potential conflicts, but one way to ensure that there is a more reasonable accommodation is to get the right federal legislation in place. That has not happened. Loopholes and escape hatches are provided and the clauses by which discretion can be exercised do not give a clear message to provincial governments that at the federal level continued abuse or degradation will not be tolerated. However, there is always a way of slipping through, of getting around, and of short-circuiting the system.
I would prefer somewhere down the road for some future government to work out a new arrangement where we share responsibility between federal and provincial governments on these projects. I think that our own creative juices should be employed for finding out how we can share jurisdiction for environmental assessment.
I think it is particularly crucial in the case of fresh water. One of the great mythologies of Canada at this time is that we are a country that abounds in fresh water. That is not true. We have lots of water. Much of it is in places that are not accessible and, where it is being used, it is running out.
We saw a case in this House only a short week ago when we argued over the Rafferty-Alameda dam. What was at stake was a large part of the Palliser Triangle in western Canada which is dry and needs water. Having been born in Saskatchewan and knowing the people well, I sympathize with the feeling that that part of the world cannot survive many more of the droughts that we have had over the last few years.
The quick fix solution that Mr. Devine offered-build a dam and it will all be solved-is not the way to approach the problem. I know that the Senate is not exactly a word that comes lightly to the lips of members of Parliament on the opposite side these days, but I recommend a Senate study that was done a few years ago by Herb Sparrow, the senator from Saskatchewan, on water conservation on the prairies. It pointed out that we did not need a big, grandiose megaproject to solve the
water problems. The real answer is a series of small steps to conserve the soil, to bring about a different raising of the water level in the prairie region, something that should have been undertaken jointly by federal-provincial governments.
No one had the political will to do that, so it ends up in a confrontation. We have angry words between federal-provincial governments. We have fights in the House of Commons. We have demands of the federal government to step in and stop the project.
I was pointed at and I have no apologies for that, because it had gone too far. However, we had wasted two, three, five or ten years initiating what Amoiy Lovins once called the soft half toward project development: small irrigation projects, water reservoirs, ways of controlling the salinity of the soil. A whole series of such measures would require some investment, some involvement and some joint planning. They would not require legalistic confrontation.
In my view an environmental assessment should be in effect the last resort. When stupidity prevails environmental assessment is brought in to put a stop to it. We could avoid a lot of that if we began to have a pro-active environmental program and began to say: "Let's not do the big capital projects any more." Maybe we have to say that like the dinosaur the age of the huge megaproject must come to an end, and that whether it is in energy, water, or resource development there is a better alternate way which does not do the kind of damage to the environment we have seen in this country but preserves and conserves water, develops resources and creates wealth. The two must go hand in hand.
It is important that we are debating Bill C-78 in isolation. We should see it in the context of a larger package of the green paper and other areas or, more important, in a willingness on the part of government leaders at the three levels of government to come together and start doing some joint development and planning in order to deal with environmental problems. We are caught in the compartmentalization of this countiy: here is a provincial right, here is a federal right, and where they clash we will have a fight and take it to court. It is about time we realized that water and air pollution does not recognize provincial or federal boundaries. It is shared by all jurisdictions.
October 25, 1990

I have a case in point in own city of Winnipeg where I am trying to promote the development of a tri-level task force to deal with the degradation of water in the three rivers running through that city. I think that is a more constructive way to approach the problem as opposed to ending up in front of the tribunals.
I am saying what we should do in the future, which is the reason this bill is important. Unless we have the proper tools at the federal level, the message will not get through. We should be able to see where this kind of madness has prevailed and say that we are trying to solve the problem by building a big capital project and bringing about all kinds of unintended consequences. Until we can say we have the right to make such assessments, we will not begin to get the proper discipline and proper ethics in place in other parts of Canada.
This is as much an ethic and discipline upon ourselves as it is upon others. I am sorry in a sense that the legislation does not reflect that reality, because this in some ways could be the most important way for the federal government to say it is changing its rules. As long as the loopholes are there and the open clauses and the ways of slipping it through, people will continue in their cynicism, believing that the government is not really serious about its responsibilities to the environment.


Mr. Mac Harb (Ottawa Centre):: Mr. Speaker, I was not originally planning to speak to this legislation, but since it touches upon the environment I feel compelled to address a couple of very specific issues such as the binding of the legislation and the power of the federal government to enforce it.
A few months ago I asked the Minister of the Environment about issues that affect Canadians, that is the issue of infrastructure and the issue of controlling the dumping of raw sewage into rivers, oceans, lakes. At the time the minister specifically stated that it was within the jurisdiction of the provincial governments to do so, that the issue was a provincial responsibility and that the federal government had nothing to do with it.
In light of this particular bill, I wonder whether the minister or the government will maintain the same position they had all along or whether there will be some
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change in terms of that position and they will be playing a more active role in the area of enforcement.
There is another example where sustainable development plays a very important role. If we are talking about dumping raw sewage into the oceans, of course the negative impact will be tremendous in terms of the fishery and the quality of life for people who rely to a large extent on fishing.
At the same time, the groups that have opposed the legislation are skeptical about the ability of the federal government to listen to their concerns. For instance, if the government is to set up some sort of an advisory body or public participation process, would a decision of the advisory body or panel, per se be a binding one or not?
All in all, Mr. Speaker, I think it is a good move on the part of the government to start addressing the issue of the environment. But I think it is extremely important to look at all aspects of the bill before proceeding with it.
I do not think it is too late for the government to go back to the different groups that they have been consulting with, the opposition parties and the public at large, to find out the areas where there are concerns, and try to address those concerns.
In general terms, as my colleagues who have spoken a little earlier stated, the issue in Saskatchewan is quite an alarming one, where we have seen the different jurisdictions fighting over an environmental issue.
I think the time has come for the different levels of government to sit down and really define the responsibility a little more clearly. I would suggest they should forge a partnership between all levels of government when it comes to the environment. I think that it is extremely important to agree on enforcement. Who will oversee the enforcement and who is going to pay for the implementation of it? How are the different relations between the two levels of government going to take place?
There is another important factor and that is the municipal level of government, because the municipal governments are not part of what we are doing. They have been left out.

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I might add that some municipalities in our country, whether they want to or not, are contributing to pollution and the degradation of our environment. Unless we bring that third level of government into the picture, we are going to find ourselves in a bit of an awkward situation when it comes to major problems, whether they are federal initiatives, provincial initiatives, or for that matter, whether they are third sector initiatives.
Mr. Speaker, I think it is time for the minister to take a deep breath, go back a little bit and start with that objective in mind, that is, the involvement of all of the partners in the issue of the environment. We must make sure that everyone is buying in because unless all levels of government buy in to what the federal government is doing, I do not think we will see this bill succeeding.
I do know the minister has the environment issue at heart. I know he is very serious about the issue and I think it is quite timely for him to start this consultation process and bring those different partners together.


Mr. Lyle Kristiansen (Kootenay West-Revelstoke):: Mr. Speaker, in addressing Bill C-78, an act to establish a federal environmental assessment process, I want to say right off the bat that, in our view, this is not a good bill.
It is long overdue. It has been long awaited. It is full of missing links and the process that led to the bill before us was short circuited.
Finally, it is a recipe for conflict because of what is missing in the bill, and I will come to that in a moment. The bill before us is not a recipe for resource management or conflict management, or a recipe for conflict resolution, but, rather, it is a bill that creates conflict by indecision and by what is missing from it. It is management for conflict, not to resolve conflict.
What is wrong with Bill C-78? First of all, the bill will be less effective than the EARP guidelines currently in place. It will undo progress made through court decisions like the Muldoon decision on the Rafferty-Alameda dam. Measures in the bill are left to the discretion of the environment minister, making it difficult for the courts to order compliance. Cabinet decisions and government policy, in general, will be exempted from the law, and
although intervener funding has been promised, it is not in the legislation, so it could be easily withdrawn.
In addition, the level of funding is not clear. Crown corporations, CIDA, and export development corporations are exempted. Basic questions like, which projects will be reviewed, which will be exempt, and what rules will apply, are not answered by this bill. This will be in the regulations which can be easily changed by the cabinet, at the minister's and the cabinet's discretion.
When it comes to process, the bill was introduced and first reading was given on June 18, 1990. It was then referred to a special pre-study committee. The pre-study committee was disbanded before any work was done, and now we have the bill before us for second reading.
Just that short list of inadequacies and missing links is enough to make one think that this is the animal that was created by the proverbial committee, the doublehumped or, in this case, the triple-humped camel. Except it was not done by a committee, it was done within the bowels of the ministry, with a pre-study committee that never got a chance to really adequately deal with the subject matter placed before it.
I would like to put this bill in the context of a dispute, a resource conflict which has taken place and is still taking place within my own constituency. The proposal for the modernization and expansion of the Celgar pulp mill in Castlegar, British Columbia first came to public light at the end of 1989. The Celgar Pulp Company is proposing to expand its bleached kraft pulp mill on the Columbia River, at Castlegar, B.C. The company operates as a joint venture between CITIC Inc. and Power Consolidated Pulp Inc. of the People's Republic of China.
Celgar filed an environmental impact assessment report, as a prospectus, with a major project steering committee in December of 1989. It was not until the end of June of this year, a full six months later, when we finally got the federal government and the provincial government to get their acts together to put a combined impact review process into place.
In that time feelings naturally arose, as they do in any community and especially in a community with as many activists, both pro and con, on these kinds of issues as mine does, and the absence of a review process, one that was in place or could be easily put into place between the two levels of government-and nobody suggests that that
October 25, 1990

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is an easy thing to do-led to an escalation of that conflict.
That is what I mean when I speak of the absence in the bill of any kind of a clear outline of a process that has to be followed. It is a recipe for that continuing kind of confrontation and escalation of community conflict. If our purpose, as politicians, is to create conflict rather than to resolve it, then we could not do better than to adopt the very vague recommendations and solutions presented in this bill.
At the beginning of the summer, I put out a "Householder" in my constituency, as we all do. I laid out my own position regarding this particular proposal as it relates to my constituency, and the modernization and expansion of Celgar Pulp very clearly. Frankly, my own judgment is that it is a sound proposal and, in fact, cleans up the environment and I made that clear. But it has been difficult to try to be any kind of a voice of reason and to keep people on the same course, in terms of building long-term, stable communities with some sensible and renewable economic growth and, at the same time, with a greater harmony between ourselves and our environment, when nobody knows what the ground rules are.
I would just like to read from the short statement I made in that "Householder":
On the home front, while we now have an announced timetable and process for considering Celgar Pulp's proposal for a new and cleaner Castlegar mill, the question remains: Did it really have to take so long?
Surely it was not too much to ask, as I had done since my first meeting with Celgar officials in Vancouver last January, that federal and provincial ministers and officials get their act together early to launch a joint review mechanism that could deal openly and expeditiously with this long-awaited application.
It was obvious for months that the law and the courts would require a joint or parallel review process -and that delaying its start could only jeopardize the prospects for a development which has been awaited for some 20 years.
There are costs to any development. But in my opinion, the costs of not proceeding with this one are higher, for both the physical and human environment -and with no local benefit -than conditional approval.
Let's hope, in spite of the dithering and the delay, that we still have a choice to make.
I ask the minister and the government to take a second look at this piece of legislation, and while we still have a chance as a Parliament, to draft legislation which will work, which will lay out a process that can be accepted by industry, by labour, by environmental activist, by all of us who care for sane development, so that we will know what the ground rules are and investment decisions can be made.
Certainly industry is not going to be particularly overjoyed with a new set of rules and regulations, but it is better than not knowing what the rules and regulations are going to be. This will give us all a chance to adopt proposals within our own areas which are sensible, which are sane and that we and our children can live with.
One of the other problems we have is the absence of anything clear on intervener funding. I would like to read something very brief from a paper that was just circulated to many of the publications in my area. It concerns the current process in and around Castlegar:
The approach of the -hearings causes further frustration. Celgar can trot expert witness after witness before the review panel, all of them paid for with money made from the public forests. Yet the public has not been provided with funds to hire consultants; the only experts testifying for the public will be the few who were willing to come for their expenses and a small fee raised out of the pockets of local residents. Lawyers know very well that an "expert" can usually be found who will corroborate just about any side of an issue, because the facts can always be selectively made to line up with one's personal outlook and motives. It is only by hearing a large and balanced number of experts serving various sides of the issues that the truly irrefutable facts can be established.
Mr. Speaker, it is important to have full intervener funding. We have to make decisions and make them expeditiously. It has to be a process that is seen as fair by all if we are to manage conflict rather than to create it.


Mr. Jack Whittaker (Okanagan-Similkameen-Merritt):: Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure today to rise and speak for a brief time on Bill C-78, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act.
I think it might be somewhat helpful at this stage for some who have not been following this to first of all go through a little bit about the environmental assessment process. The process that we are looking at now is to replace the former process called the Environmental

October 25, 1990
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Assessment and Review Process, commonly called EARP.
The environmental assessments are intended to determine whether a project or activity will harm human health, fish, or wildlife, or their habitats, and if so, how these affects can be mitigated. If environmental damage cannot be mitigated, the review should force a halt to the project or activity under review.
What do we have in this particular reform package, Bill C-78? We have a promise that all cabinet decisions will be reviewed for environmental impacts although these reviews do not have to be made public. We have $100 million per year in additional person-years for the EARPs and we have interveners or participant funding to support public participation in EARPs.
What is wrong with Bill C-78? The bill will be less effective than the present EARP guidelines that we now have in place. It appears that it will undo the process made through court decisions like the Muldoon decision on the Rafferty-Alameda dam.
The measures in this bill are left up to the discretion of the environment minister, making it difficult for the courts to order compliance.
Cabinet decisions and government policy in general will be exempted from the law. Although intervener funding has been promised, as I have said, it is not in the legislation, so could be easily withdrawn. In addition, the level of funding is not yet clear.
Crown corporations, CIDA, and Export Development Corporation are all exempted under this new act. Basic questions, such as which project will be reviewed, which will be exempt, and what rules will apply, are not answered by this bill. This apparently will be in the regulations which, as we all know, can be changed by cabinet.
The process that we have run into here throughout this bill is a process which has introduced this bill, first reading, on June 18, 1990 and it was referred to a special pre-study committee. The pre-study committee unfortunately was disbanded before any work was done and, of course, we have the continuation of the debate now ongoing.
I found the comments and editorial in The Ottawa Citizen last June interesting. The headline read: "Environmental Review-Trust us, we're Green Tories". Some of the comments within that are fairly relevant when we look at exactly where this bill is going and what is involved. I would like to read a little of this editorial from June 19, 1990, from The Ottawa Citizen. It talks about the flaws in the system and the good intentions perhaps of the government but say that it is unconvincing because those assessments will not become public. It then goes on to say:
The first part of Monday's package is even more seriously flawed. The promised legislation is supposed to set up environmental reviews of government-funded projects before the bulldozers move in. It would give review panels power to call evidence and question witnesses. It would help finance environmental opponents of projects.
But the core of the new law is hollow. What types of projects must be reviewed? What other federal laws automatically trigger environmental assessment? What projects are exempt? What rules apply to aid projects?
It also talks about the regulations. It states:
Regulations mean flexibility, says the government. Exactly. The public has seen which way the Conservatives flex when environmental protection is at issue. This government hasn't earned that degree of trust.
The trust it speaks of is the trust that Canadians are looking for in governments. They are finished and tired, as we have seen throughout Canada with governments- Liberals and Conservatives-in the past who have given hollow promises and then not followed through with their promises. The promises in this case I think have been promises that we have seen constantly leading up into elections without any substance.
We have a chance for once of keeping some of those promises, the promises that we actually are about our environment, we actually care about what is happening.
The debate a couple of weeks ago on a Private Member's Motion was interesting. The motion of the hon. member for Okanagan-Shuswap refers to funding for various waste management programs and suggests that perhaps the federal government should put its money where its mouth is and assist in some of these areas of funding. A Liberal member got up and talked about municipal infrastructure, totally losing the point of the motion before the House. The point was that our environment is what is important, not the roads, not the sidewalks, but the structure to keep our water and water systems clean and healthy and our air clean.
October 25, 1990

We have that opportunity, but we must grab it now. Tomorrow is too late.
It is interesting that the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy in a recent news release has given its advice to the Prime Minister on how to strengthen the new environmental assessment reform package by opening up government policy assessment to closer public scrutiny. The news release states:
-Dr. Johnston said that, "for the environmental assessment of government policy to be effective, there is a need for public confidence in the process - " He added that there is also a need for " - reassurance that such assessment meets appropriate general standards, particularly since departments initiating policy proposals will be doing the assessments themselves."
The news release goes on to state:
Because the assessment of government policies-from a sustainable development point of view -is a new, and as yet untried, approach the Government should conduct a full evaluation of the process, with public consultation, after a period of five years. Then consideration would be given to including policy assessment within the EARP legislation.
This is a start. I am hoping it is not a backward step. Now is the time to show all Canadians the trust they lost in government, and bring in something that is meaningful to all Canadians.


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


Some hon. members:: Question.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The question is on the amendment. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the amendment?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: No.


Some hon. members:: On division.
Amendment negatived.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The next question is on the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Albert Glen Cooper: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. There have been discussions among the three parties on this issue and there is an agreement to defer the vote on second reading to Tuesday.
Private Members' Business


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


Some hon. members:: Yea.


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


Some hon. members:: Nay.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: In my opinion, the yeas have it.
Accordingly, the vote stands deferred to Tuesday, October 30, 1990 at 3 o'clock.
It being 5 o'clock, the House will now proceed to the consideration of Private Members' Business as listed on today's Order Paper.



PRIVATE MEMBERS' BUSINESS


Mr. David D. Stupich (Nanaimo-Cowichan) moved:: That, in the opinion of this House, the government should take
action against the unfavourable GATT ruling in relation to British
Columbia salmon and herring.
He said: Mr. Speaker, the issue is not a new one, but neither is the resolution. It has been sitting on the Order Paper since April 4, 1989. Nevertheless, the problem still exists and, indeed, is worse than when this resolution was put on the Order Paper.
Before 1989, there was a system of regulations on the Pacific Coast which required that sockeye and pink salmon, the principal specie of salmon, and herring be landed and processed in Canada prior to export. There were reasons for this.
From the point of view of the employees in the processing industry, it provided employment in British Columbia, in Canada. Whereas, if those fish were not landed in Canada, but went directly to the United States, then processing our fish would provide employment in another country. So there were good reasons for it.
There was another reason that in the long run is even more important and that is that it gave us the opportunity to manage the resource. Without knowing how many fish are being caught and the times at which they were

October 25, 1990
Private Members' Business
being caught, and without being able to count or determine how many of each run of salmon are going up the river at any one time, we cannot properly manage the resource.
I am indebted to the former minister of fisheries for telling me on one occasion, in an aside across the floor, that there were 2,400 different runs of salmon. It is not a case of managing one species, one run, or whatever. It is a matter of trying to manage 2,400 different families over a period of time. To do that, we are maximizing the potential of the resource. By letting the fish go out of the province before they are landed and counted, before we know what is happening, and before we know what species there are, we were losing the opportunity to properly manage the resource. So, there were good reasons for having those landing regulations.
However, the Americans objected. They took it to GATT and GATT agreed with them, initially. Whether it would have in the long run, we do not know. The Canadian government neglected or decided not to appeal. It had the opportunity to appeal, as provided for in GATT, but Canada decided it would not appeal and that it would accept the ruling of GATT.
We had another opportunity, and this was an opportunity that was pressed by both the processing industry and by all of the people working in the processing industry: the fishing industry, the fishermen themselves, their organizations, people working in the plants, and the fishermen who were not organized in unions. All of them pressed the government to appeal the GATT ruling, or, if not, there was an alternative and that was to accept the penalty.
At that time the penalty was calculated to be an annual penalty of $5 million. But we are dealing with an industry that on the west coast of British Columbia is worth in excess of $1 billion. There was plenty of opportunity and good reason for all those people, everybody involved in the industry, to press for us accepting the penalty and preserving the industry, preserving the right to maintain employment in Canada and preserving the right to husband that resource and to manage the resource properly. However, we gave that up.
I can only suspect-and it is not just my idea, but certainly I agree with the conclusion-that we gave it up because the federal government wanted to show how good the free trade deal was for Canada. It knew there would be an opportunity to test this before a free trade panel. Indeed, there was. Under the free trade deal, the Americans again protested what we were doing before we had time to make changes. We did make changes in the regulations that they did not like, and it was all protested to the free trade adjudication process and a free trade panel was set up.
The free trade panel initially said that requiring landing of 100 per cent of these species of salmon and herring was restraintive trade. They made that decision and they said that if it was not 100 per cent, for example, if it was only 18 per cent, that might not be considered to be restraintive trade and might be acceptable. They did not say it would be.
People have said the free trade panel recommended 18 per cent. That was not the case, Mr. Speaker, not as I read it. What they said was: "If you come back and try us with 18, we just might accept it." Well, we did not do that. We appealed this time. We could have appealed to GATT and likely won, but we did not. We did appeal the free trade ruling, and, of course, we lost. Not only did we lose, we lost some ground that we might have made had we negotiated the first free trade panel agreement, because the second time we went to the free trade appeal, the appeal came against us. It said that 20 per cent of the volume two of these species of salmon and 20 per cent of the herring could leave without being landed in British Columbia. Eighty per cent had to be landed here. It could then be shipped out of the province without any processing. It is not all that practical to ship it out with processing, although it is done to some extent. The free trade panel said 20 per cent for the first year. It is to go up to 25 per cent over a period of four years.
The American trade negotiator made it very clear that the Americans wanted access to the total resource. The 25 per cent was an interim measure, as they were not going to accept 25 per cent in the long run. They were going to let us get away with 20, 21, 22 and 23 per cent until it became 25 per cent, knowing by that time, unless there was a change of government, Canadians would be so locked into the free trade deal there would be no way

out of it and we would have to accept whatever the Americans wanted to do to us, which this government is prone to do.
I notice the hon. member from the other side speaking from his chair. I hope he gets up and convinces me that I am wrong and convinces the processing industry in B.C. that they are wrong when they say that this is going to lead to an export of unprocessed fish. I think the member drawing attention to me knows that for decades B.C. has had a reputation for quality fish. Our sockeye salmon, in particular, has an international reputation. A very high price is commanded for it in international markets because it is a quality product. There are reasons for that. The regulations are very stringent. These regulations are not just on paper, but they are observed because they are policed, and the industry is aware of that. It makes it more expensive to produce according to the Canadian Regulations for Quality. Everyone agrees with that. That is one reason the market is prepared to pay the higher price for a Canadian product.
If our processors are going to be denied access to the product at prices they can afford to pay, they are not going to be able to sustain the quantity of production that will enable them to financially maintain the quality of production. The argument is that if they are going to whip the ground out from under us and say we do not get the supply of fish, then we want them to relax the quality regulations so that we are down to the level of the Americans.
It is the whole idea of a level playing field in the free trade deal. Instead of bringing them up to our level in social services with people, we are supposed to go down to theirs, and this government is leading us down that road. When it comes to processing fish, instead of maintaining our reputation internationally for high quality fish, we are prepared to sacrifice our quality and compete with the Americans on their ground.
If anyone on the other side can convince me, the Fisheries Council of British Columbia, the unions involved in the fishing industry in B.C., the independent fishermen in B.C., and the shore workers, and everyone agrees on this, if one member on the other side denies it, then that member has a long way to go in persuading all of those people that they are wrong and that he is right. I
Private Members' Business
hope he is right. I fear that he will not be. Only time will tell, I suppose, although time is telling already.
The question has come up whether I do or do not believe in GATT. I said there was a GATT ruling and it went against us. We had the opportunity to appeal .That was provided for. It was this Tory government on the other side that sold us out. It did not do the appeal because it did not want to go that route. The government had no faith in GATT.
Second, there was an opportunity, even if GATT ruled against us, to pay the penalty. It would have cost us $5 million to protect a billion dollar industry and it could have been done under GATT. I believe in GATT. It is this government across the way that does not have the faith in GATT that some of the rest of us on this side of the House do. The opportunities were there. We gave it up because this government wanted to go the free trade route and sold us out.
There was no Canadian appeal and no penalty, and the free trade deal ruled against us. I think we have lost every argument before the free trade panel since it started. The first one lost was before a fisheries free trade panel, the one dealing with the west coast. I do not know of any that we have won. The hon. member is shaking his head.
The Fisheries Council of British Columbia, as I said, is concerned about quality. In a report put out by Mike Hunter of the Fisheries Council of B.C., it states that our fish inspection regime was designed in an era when we had protectionist regulations. He is talking about the landing regulations. We simply cannot afford to have the government dictate to us what quality specifications must be.
The former Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, the former Minister for International Trade, and the current Minister for International Trade all reassured the workers on the west coast that jobs would not be lost. This is a direct quotation from the minister of fisheries: "will not allow jobs historically established to be threatened by any such initiative". So, they talk big, talk great, talk most reassuringly, but then give up the fight totally.
Again, the Fisheries Council of Canada has indicated that the long-term future of the processing industry in B.C. is now threatened. Given the fact that between 60 per cent and 70 per cent of the costs to the processing sector are tied to the purchasing of product, there is very little room left for cost cutting. The only opportunity at all is to cut labour costs. You cannot do that through

October 25, 1990
Private Members' Business
improved technology because the government has been doing that steadily. It is a most modern industry compared to any other country that does this kind of work. The industry has already tried that.
There was a strike last year, a work stoppage, or whatever, a management-worker dispute on the issue. Industry was trying to cut costs by tearing it off the hides of the workers, trying to get the workers to agree to lower standards and to poorer conditions in order to get an agreement that would make them better able to compete so that they would not lose the processing industry to the United States. We lost that.
There is no question that direct exports of unprocessed fish leads to job losses. The current Minister for International Trade has admitted that. Although he will not apply it to the west coast, he certainly has admitted it with respect to the east coast. A quotation from the Minister for International Trade is as follows: "I believe the amount last year was some 80 million pounds". He is talking about exports to the United States from the east coast of unprocessed fish. He went on to say: "If sold in Nova Scotia it would be a considerable help to fish plant workers in Nova Scotia".
According to the government member for South Shore, the province of Nova Scotia loses 1,000 jobs annually as a result of the province having regulations permitting the export of unprocessed fish. Of course, that is what the west coast fisheiy has been trying to get into as well.
When supply is threatened, jobs are threatened. I made that point and the fisheries council made it. The Pacific Advisory Group in the Vision 2000 document stated: "The impact of the removal of export restrictions on salmon and herring is as yet uncertain. It could result in a significant increase in the export of unprocessed fish to the U.S. with loss of jobs in the Canadian processing sector".
As important as the loss of jobs is, my greater concern is for the loss of our ability to manage the resource, to husband this resource. Canadians have paid the price to protect this resource, manage and conserve it. We have paid for it ever since we have been in the business. For
100 years we have been paying the costs of managing this resource.
Giving the Americans direct resort to this resource is certainly a direct benefit to the U.S. processing industry. We paid for it. We have husbanded it. We have done without on occasion. We have hired people to work in the industry. We have hired people to police it. We have done all these things at great cost to Canadians and now what we are doing, as a result of this government's inaction when GATT threatened us, and its actions under the free trade deal, is say to the Americans that we have looked after it all these decades, now they can have it, that we are ready to abandon the field because we want to be nice neighbours. When do we quit giving in to the Americans? When do we quit giving to them? When do we start demanding some access to our own fish?


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: When we get a new Liberal government.


David Stupich: When we get a new government. Yes, I agree with the speaker. If the New Democrats form the next government, certainly it will start to look after Canadian interests and live up to GATT.


Some hon. members:: Hear, hear.
It is important to protect this resource. It is not something we have created. It is something we have tried to maintain. It is very important to B.C.; it is very important to Canada. As I said, it is a billion-dollar industry. We cannot abandon the right, the opportunity, and the responsibility to husband this resource. Turning it over to the Americans and letting them handle it, harvest it without doing any management, without looking after it, without husbanding the resource, is abandoning that industry, abandoning that resource.
Mr. Speaker, you have heard plenty in this House about what has happened to the east coast fish stocks. I am talking now about the northern cod. That is a disaster created by humans through neglect, not through anything deliberate, through neglect.
We could be going down that same road on the Pacific coast if we allow the Americans to simply exploit the resource without accepting any responsibility for husbanding it, for managing it.
October 25, 1990


Mr. Jack Shields (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister for International Trade):: Mr. Speaker, the motion before the House deals with the salmon and herring fisheries in British Columbia. I am sure that all hon. members recognize the importance of these fisheries to British Columbians and to Canadians as a whole. Certainly, this government does.
But this motion will do nothing to enhance the economic well-being of the people of British Columbia. Rather, if it were passed, it would do a great disservice to them. That is why this government cannot accept such a motion and why it should not be passed by this House.
The motion calls upon the government to take action against the GATT ruling in relation to British Columbia salmon and herring. This is a classic example of the kind of backward thinking that typifies the opposition to this government's policies.
Action against the GATT ruling would turn the clock backward. It would tell Canadians that we can rest content behind the protectionist barriers of old policies. It would tell Canadians to cast off the benefits that they have gained through the open multilateral trading system. It would invite Canadians to turn their backs on developments in the rest of the world.
This government cannot ask Canadians to do this. We will not make the mistake of looking inward and backward with respect to our competitive interests as the hon. member would have us do and, of course, the NDP would have us do. We will continue to look outward and forward, to seize the opportunities to enhance our economic well-being. Failure to grasp the emerging opportunities for Canada in the global economy would doom our country to second class status. This is not the approach of this government.
It is a fact of life of the 1990s that we must build strong, competitive industries which can thrive at home and abroad. The salmon and herring industries of British Columbia enjoy a world-wide reputation. They have built this reputation through the sale of top quality products. The industry has benefited from access to foreign markets. But it must also be prepared to face the challenge of foreign competition if it is to continue to prosper. The purpose of this motion before us today is to isolate these industries from the international economy. The effect would be the ultimate decline in our competitive position.
Private Members' Business
Mr. Speaker, the government has acted in response to the GATT ruling on salmon and herring. Our consistent objective in addressing this issue was to maintain the integrity of our conservation and management regimes for these fisheries. Our purpose has been to ensure the enhancement of these natural resources for the continued benefit of Canadians, now and in the future. It was for that reason we introduced a landing requirement for all species of salmon in April 1989 when we removed the regulations found wanting by the GATT and the GATT ruling.
Because Canada and the United States could still not come to an agreed resolution on the free trade agreement consistency of the landing requirement, our two countries decided in mid-1989 to place the issue, which still involved the precise nature of our GATT obligations, before a panel within the context of the free trade agreement which provided a bi-national and expedited panel process to resolve the issue.
As hon. members will be aware, that panel found that our proposal to implement a landing requirement for 100 per cent of the Pacific salmon and herring catch was not consistent with the free trade agreement, which incorporates GATT rules. However, the panel recommended that if Canada were to exempt 10 per cent to 20 per cent of the various species of the catch in each fishery from the requirement that it had to be landed, this would bring the measure into free trade consistency and would address Canada's conservation and management concerns.
In its examination of the issues, the panel was quite sensitive to Canadian needs with regard to the resource conservation and management.
In response to this panel ruling we arrived at an agreement with the U.S. that 100 per cent of the catch would be subject to conservation and management control. The settlement with the United States thus provides that Canada has the right to require that all salmon and herring be brought to a registered landing station either at sea or on shore. In that context, up to 20 per cent of the allowable catch was made available for export by sea in 1990. In 1991-1993, up to 25 per cent of the catch will be accessible through at-sea landing stations, only after verification of the conservation and management information. The agreement will be reviewed in the fourth year, with the assistance of technical and industry advisers, in light of experience and prevailing conditions.

October 25, 1990
Private Members' Business
The agreement also contains provisions with respect to roe herring. While Canada continues to control the export of roe herring to all destinations, exports are permitted to the United States if processed to the same extent as herring is processed in Canada, or if actual consumption is certified to take place there. This helps to ensure that Canadians will continue to be able to benefit from the comparative advantage they enjoy through the expertise they have developed in herring roe extraction.
It should also be noted that under the agreement for roe herring and salmon caught in Canada's Pacific waters to transported directly from the fishing grounds to the United States, the following conditions, among others, have to be met: first, only licensed Canadian tender vessels, equipped as sea-based landing stations, are eligible to transport roe herring and salmon directly from the fishing grounds to the United States.
Second, in order to qualify as a sea-based landing station, a tender vessel is required to maintain on board adequate facilities for Department of Fisheries and Oceans inspectors to supervise counting, sorting, and weighing and to permit on-board biological sampling. All fish brought on board the buying station must be made available for these purposes.
Third, a sufficient number of Canadian inspectors have to be on board each buying station at all times that the station is in operation.
Through this agreement the government has maintained an effective resource management and conservation system for Pacific salmon and herring. The same high standards in inspection and sampling activities are used now in both onshore and offshore locales. Hon. members should note that our fisheries managers are fully satisfied with the quality of our conservation and management information. Further, rather than the mass export of Canadian unprocessed fish that some had predicted-we heard the cries; we heard them over and over again in this House-less than 1 per cent of the catch has been exported to the United States through at-sea landing stations.
I will repeat that for my hon. friends across the way: rather than the mass export of Canadian unprocessed fish that some had predicted, less than 1 per cent of the catch has been exported to the United States through at-sea landing stations.
The free trade agreement panel process, which was not of a binding nature, enabled both sides to come to a judgment as to how the principles of the findings could be maintained, while allowing for a practical implementation which would satisfy the legitimate concerns of each side. As such, it provided Canada and the United States with a basis for coming to a resolution of this bilateral dispute.
Some of our critics on the salmon and herring issue sometimes sound as if they just cannot stand any kind of trade liberalization and do not want any trade agreements with anybody, but we cannot be content to stick our heads in the sand and wish our challenges away. The government has developed a resolution to this dispute which will continue to benefit the Canadian economy. All those concerned in these fisheries must be ready to sharpen their pencils. They must be prepared to make the kinds of adjustments that our competitors are making world-wide. If they are not, they will not stay on top; if they are, we will stay on top in this area. This government has confidence in the ability of the British Columbia salmon and herring fisheries to meet this challenge.
The motion before us is a vote of non-confidence. It is a vote of non-confidence in the ability of our fisheries to compete. That is why this motion is fundamentally flawed and why it cannot be supported by members on our side of the House.
Mr. Francis G. LeBlanc (Cape Breton Highlands -
Canso): Mr. Speaker, I would like to commend my NDP colleague for introducing this motion and for bringing this subject back to the floor of the House. As he has outlined in his remarks, it is really an issue not only of trade but an issue of resource conservation and the ability of Canada to control one of its most vital resources, namely fish, be it on the Pacific coast or be it on the Atlantic coast.
I listened with interest to the explanation of my friend from the NDP of his motion. I also listened with interest to the comments from the other side. It is very interesting to hear the government engage in this form of self-justification after the fact.
As was outlined earlier, the lobster and herring GATT ruling on the west coast emerged as a result of a complaint by the United States through the GATT process. Canada, in response to that initial GATT ruling, instituted landing requirements. This government
October 25, 1990

instituted landing requirements in order to meet the GATT ruling and still maintain some conservation of its resource stock.
However, that was not good enough for the United States, so it brought the issue again before the Canada-U.S. free trade panel. Of course we are all familiar with the result of that panel. Essentially Canada was forced to abandon its landing requirements and to allow the United States virtually free access to our west coast salmon and herring without having to land them in Canadian ports. Certainly the 20 per cent requirement, although it is not 100 per cent, is a significant portion of our fish production.
Now government members, after having lost this dispute with the United States, are quite happy to engage in justifying the decision after the fact and using the arguments that they really have pride in our fishing industry and in our ability to compete on the west coast. It is really an unwillingness to accept what happened, that they lost through that free trade panel.
This year the shoe was on the other foot. This time it was the Atlantic lobster. This time it was the United States through an amendment to the Magnussen Act, which regulates, among other things, the size of U.S. lobster U.S. fishermen are allowed to catch, increased the minimum size of Atlantic lobsters that could be allowed in the United States. At the same time it blocked Canadian exports of lobsters that were below that minimum size.
The trade minister and the Prime Minister protested loudly in the House of Commons that this was a trade restriction and not a conservation measure as the American fishing industry tried to proclaim. They instituted a free trade panel. We had the free trade panel with three U.S. panellists versus two Canadian panellists. Of course the decision favoured the Americans, even though we were arguing that the American restrictions under the Mitchell bill were GATT inconsistent and were a violation of GATT rules. We brought the issue to the free trade panel where we were outnumbered by the Americans and where we lost the dispute.
What did Canada do? Rather than admit that once again we had been snookered, once again the government had failed to defend the Atlantic as well as the Pacific fisheries industry, they tried to put the best
Private Members' Business
possible face on this defeat. They tried to gloss over the fact that really the Canadian government had capitulated once again and, in this case, had allowed the American lawmakers to argue that they were protecting their resource and that their rules were not trade distorting restrictions. However, on the west coast they were quite prepared to concede that our landing requirements, which were instituted for conservation reasons, were trade distorting reasons.
What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. This government cannot have it both ways. We are either acting to conserve our resource, to protect our fishing industries, or we are not. We cannot allow the U.S. legislators through the free trade agreement to bully us, whether it be by arguing conservation when it suits them or arguing trade restrictions when it suits them. We have to start defending our fishing industry, which this government has consistently refused to do, whether it be through the free trade agreement or by appealing GATT rulings as my colleague has mentioned.
I think it is an eminently sensible motion. It is a timely one at this time, given that the Uruguay Round is reaching its final stages.
One of the issues that has not been prominent in this discussion of the world trading system, since we are discussing the world trading system, is what I believe will be an emerging concern in international trade, that is the whole conflict between free trade and environmental protection, between free trade and the management of non-renewable resources such as our fish. This is an area in which the rules and the international code of ethics are still very vague.
If the recent behaviour of this government is any indication, it is prepared to allow the preponderant force of our neighbours to the south to determine in what instances they will defend their resource conservation measures and in what instances they will simply tell us: "No, you cannot defend yours. That is against free trade and we will block you on that".
The initial reaction of the government to both of these disputes is not a very good indicator of how the government is going to defend our interests in resource conservation, which is going to be one of the key issues in environmental protection in the future.

October 25, 1990
Private Members' Business
The motion we have before us today is a way for us to remind the government of that point, particularly in this instance when we are discussing Bill C-78, the government's environmental assessment legislation, which has been before us this week and which the government is anxious to have passed. It has many gaping holes in it, particularly as it has to do with international jurisdictions. This is an opportunity for us to remind the government that there is one very important trade and environmental issue that is just not being addressed.
I would like to thank the member once again for bringing forward this very sensible motion.


Mr. Scott Thorkelson (Edmonton -Strathcona):: Mr. Speaker, today we are presented with the following motion:
That, in the opinion of this House, the government should take
action against the unfavourable GATT ruling in relation to British
Columbia salmon and herring.
I would first like to suggest that this motion is even less relevant and even less appropriate today than it was on April 4, 1989 when it was first tabled. That is over a year and a half ago.
The government has already taken action to resolve our dispute with the United States on salmon and herring in a way which has fully protected our conservation and management interests for both salmon and herring.
Perhaps the hon. member was not able to see the recent CBC story on the tremendous run that has been occurring in British Columbia recently. They have had to hire extra workers there. As the hon. member for Athabasca has pointed out, less than 1 per cent of the salmon has been going to the U.S. to be processed.
I wish to recall the origins of the dispute with the U.S. government on salmon and herring. This issue arose from a petition filed with the United States trade representative in April 1986 by processors in the U.S. They complained that Canadian processors were buying significant quantities of unprocessed Alaskan salmon and herring, while U.S. processors were denied any access to such fish caught by Canadians in waters off our west coast.
It is absolutely essential to keep this fundamental fact in mind throughout any discussion of this issue, that is,
that Canadians were free to buy unprocessed American fish for processing in Canadian plants while Americans, under old regulations, against which the GATT subsequently ruled, were unable to buy any unprocessed Canadian salmon and herring caught off our Pacific coast.
In the past as much as 15 per cent of the salmon and 8 per cent of the herring processed in British Columbia was imported from Alaska.
In any case, the U.S. took this complaint against our former export prohibitions on unprocessed Pacific salmon and herring to the GATT. In November, 1987 a GATF panel presented its report, which found that our regulations were inconsistent with our obligations under GATT. Other GATT members supported the panel conclusions as valid and did not support the argument that Canada put forward in defence of our regulations. Faced with this reality, Canada agreed to the adoption of the panel report by the GATT in March, 1988.
This is the only ruling of the GATT against Canadian practices involving fish products. In her statement in the House of Commons on March 21, 1988 the Hon. Pat Carney, in her capacity as Minister for International Trade, announced our intention to remove the GATT inconsistent export prohibitions and bring forward new regulations to put in place a landing requirement for all Pacific salmon and herring.
Miss Carney explained that maintaining the status quo was not a viable option, since it would expose Canadian workers to the threat of U.S. retaliation, and that is no small threat.
In debating this motion, I think it would be useful to question what it would really mean to "take action against" a GATT ruling. In order to do this, we have to reflect on what the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade is, how it works and what Canada's place is in the GATT.
The GATT was established in 1948. It is the only multilateral agreement that lays down agreed rules for international trade. Over 85 per cent of world trade is covered by the GATT. It also functions as the principal international body concerned with negotiating the reduction of trade barriers and other measures which distort competition and concerns itself with international trade regulations.
October 25, 1990

GATT is thus both a framework of rules and a forum in which countries can discuss and resolve their trade problems and negotiate in large world trade opportunities.
The tenfold growth in the volume of world trade over the last four decades has provided continuing evidence of the GATT success in this double role. There are now 99 members of GATT and No. 100 is on the horizon. The GATT is the cornerstone of Canadian trade policy. Canada was one of the 23 founding members of the GATT agreement, and our membership in it has served Canadians well over the many years. Canada relies on international trade for its economic well-being. We are a trading country. Trade represents some 30 per cent of our GNP and roughly three million Canadians depend on trade for their livelihood. In addition, exports generate about $5,000 a year for every man, woman and child in Canada.
This motion implies that any time that a GATT ruling finds any of our policies inconsistent with the general agreement, Canada should simply ignore the ruling, or as the motion rather mysteriously puts it, to take action against the ruling. But what would we be taking action against? The GATT? The GATT is not only an international agreement, but a forum composed of its members, who are our most important trading partners. So the motion really says that any time that Canadian policies are found to be GATT-inconsistent, we should make a unilateral decision to take action against our trading partners.
The problem with this is that, although Canada is a significant trader of some products on a global basis, we are, in over-all terms, a middle-sized economy and trader. This leads inescapably to the fact that we must depend on strong and predictable international trade rules to provide a secure basis for our export sales. Our free trade agreement with the United States is built upon the GATT. A strong GATT is the best security for Canadian trade and the related jobs. We cannot expect to use the GATT rules to provide a solid base for Canadian economic growth if we ourselves are not prepared to live by these rules.
No country can expect to win every challenge to its practices under the GATT and Canada is no exception. The number of dispute settlement cases in the GATT is tending to increase and this should be no surprise to
Private Members' Business
anyone. In various countries around the world, new and sometimes complex rules and regulations are put into place which have trade-restrictive effects which are questionable in terms of GATT consistency, and thus come under challenge. In other cases, old or traditional policies, such as Canada's former ban on exporting unprocessed Pacific salmon and herring, are challenged. The GATT dispute settlement system has worked as much in Canada's favour as it has against Canada. We cannot pick and choose, simply as it suits our convenience.
In essence, GATT is intended to provide a secure and predictable international trading environment in which industrial and commercial entities-public and private-have the confidence to invest, to create jobs and to trade. We have done very well by GATT and we will continue to do well. The resort by governments to protectionism, on the other hand, has been shown to reduce business confidence, raise prices, slow investment and to damage economic growth and development prospects over-all.
To ignore GATT rulings would constitute a threat to Canadian jobs, as this would leave Canadian trade exposed to retaliation from Canada's trading partners. If we ignore the rules, we create a situation in which others can also ignore them. A less disciplined trading climate would undermine the progress which we had made since 1948 through the GATT.
I have said that this motion is even less appropriate today than it was when it was first written over a year and a half ago. We have already responded to the GATT panel report in a manner which respects the GATT system but also ensures that the conservation and management of our valuable salmon and herring stocks is preserved. This involved implementation of a landing requirement, which was referred to a panel within the framework of the free trade agreement.
There were adjustments which were made. This year there have been a net increase in the number of workers employed in the fishery on the Pacific coast. That has been very good. People are very much aware that what the opposition is proposing is non-workable and does not make any sense.
I would like to conclude my remarks by suggesting that this motion is inappropriate and it should not be adopted in the House of Commons.

October 25, 1990
Private Members' Business


Mr. Ross Belsher (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Transport):: Mr. Speaker, I am very glad to rise this afternoon in this House and speak to the motion that we have before us that says:
That, in the opinion of this House, the government should take
action against the unfavourable GATT ruling in relation to British
Columbia salmon and herring.
Mr. Speaker, I wish to speak against this motion that we have before us-


John R. (Jack) Whittaker: Support us on this one. Support the fisheries in B.C.


Ross Belsher: Well, I'm all for the fisheries in B.C. That's just it. I am perfectly satisfied that the action we are taking is more in the way of protecting the fisheries and runs less risk than to take advice from the other side of the House and go against the GATT ruling that we have before us.
Just because the GATT ruling is unfavourable in relation to British Columbia salmon and herring, I am confident that the facts relating to the British Columbia salmon and herring fisheries makes it very clear that this government has brought this issue to a satisfactory resolution.
As the last speaker said, I guess a year ago this motion would have been very much in order because there had not been a satisfactory resolution to the GATT ruling, but a ruling has been made. The predictions which we have heard from time to time about the demise of the industry simply do not add up to scrutiny, Mr. Speaker.
Time and time again in this House we have heard the doom and gloom that has been portrayed from the members opposite. Time and time again, Mr. Speaker, they have been false. It is a sad commentary on how this House works when the members opposite do things that really set out to scare people and to lead them into thinking that black is not black and white is not white, things like that.
Members of this House will be aware of the importance of these fisheries for the Canadian economy. British Columbia salmon and roe herring are valued at close to $1 billion in annual wholesale value. Over 4,400 salmon fishing vessels and 1,500 herring fishing vessels involving 15,000 fishermen participate in these fisheries along the 6,000 miles of B.C. coastline. On average,
80,000	tonnes of salmon and 30,000 tonnes of roe herring are landed each year. The processing sector employs approximately 6,000 persons. Approximately 200 vessels are currently licensed as fish packers.
In coming to a resolution of the dispute brought by the United States before the GATT, to which this motion refers, the government has consistently sought to ensure that the conservation and management regime applied to these vital natural resources is maintained. This would enable the economic benefits which they bring to the communities along the coastline of British Columbia to be sustained and enhanced.
When the United States objected to the landing requirement introduced in April 1989 for all salmon and herring, it was agreed to take this matter to a panel established under the free trade agreement as a means of finding a satisfactory resolution of this matter.
The decision of that panel confirmed Canada's right to verify catch reporting and to conduct biological sampling to provide for the conservation and management of the salmon and roe herring fishery resource. However, it was the panel's view that a percentage of the resource could be exported directly from the fishing grounds without impairing the integrity of the fishery management regime. On the basis of this decision, agreement was reached on February 22 of this year with the United States.
The member opposite has alluded to that and it was 20 per cent for year one and it could roll by a further 1 per cent each year until it reached 25 per cent, if my memory serves me correctly.


David Stupich: Then you decide what's going to happen anyway.


Ross Belsher: The member opposite wants to cross bridges before we get to them. I think we should deal with the issue as we now have it before us.
This agreement permitted specified percentages of the total allowable catch of British Columbia salmon and roe herring to be made available to the U.S. buyers for direct sea exports in each of three British Columbia export zones, the south, the central, and the north.
In implementing this negotiated resolution, the Department of Fisheries and Oceans established an export management unit. This unit verifies catch reporting and
October 25, 1990

conducts biological sampling to provide for the conservation and management of the fishery resource.
At the time the agreement was reached with the United States, there were those from the opposition who claimed that any agreement would spell the doom of this important industry for Canada. Indeed, the motion before us is a clear reflection of that pessimistic approach and a lack of confidence in the ability of the fisheries of British Columbia to compete. The statistical data for this year however shows the opposite to be the case.
In the 1990 roe herring season, there was a total of 987.6 tonnes of unprocessed roe herring shipped by land to the United States. No export-at-sea licences were issued. Of the total amount shipped to the United States, 606.7 tonnes was processed in that country and the remainder was shipped back to Canada for processing. By comparison, there was a total of 1,500 tonnes of unprocessed roe herring imported into Canada from the United States.
In the 1990 salmon season, which is ongoing, 22 applications have been received for export-at-sea licences. Eleven licences have been issued and four vessels are actively engaged in direct export-at-sea to the United States. To date, a total of 497 tonnes of salmon have been exported to the United States directly by sea, all from the south export zone. Exports of salmon by land to the United States to mid-September were approximately 2,800 tonnes.
In contrast, during this period, approximately 6,000 tonnes of United States salmon were imported from Alaska to Prince Rupert and 900 tonnes were imported into the lower British Columbia mainland from the Puget Sound area. The over-all import level to Canada from the United States exceeds by more than double the export level to the United States.
In considering these exports of fish to the United States, I believe it is important for hon. members to take note that the programs operated by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans for a biological sampling and catch verification at shore based landing stations have been extended to cover at-sea exports. This ensures effective conservation and management of the salmon and herring fisheries. As well, communications and management information systems have been developed in order to
Private Members' Business
provide the capability to control exports near ceiling levels and to provide timely information for enforcement purposes. The experience gained this year is invaluable to the planning process for both the upcoming herring and subsequent salmon seasons.
We are talking about GATT and it was a GATT ruling that this was all about. We lost the fight at the GATT that the Americans brought against us and so we resorted to the dispute settlement mechanism that was negotiated in our free trade agreement. That dispute settlement has found that it is legal and consistent for Canada to expect to count and to land on shore the majority of our fish. That will be an ongoing process and that is what we have here before us now.
This government has worked hard to bring this matter to a resolution with the United States which meets the interest of all Canadians, particularly those engaged in the fisheries in British Columbia. The facts I have presented show that these fisheries are functioning well and there is no basis to assume that the people of British Columbia will not continue to benefit from these resources.
This is a renewable resource. This is a resource that has to be managed. It has to be managed carefully and judiciously. With the co-operation of all the people in the industry, we can expect to have an ongoing fishery for the years ahead.
This year was no exception in that the run on the Fraser River, the Adams River run, was one of the highest runs experienced in the last 50-odd years. It was a beauty to behold. We expect these cycles to continue because nature, in its wisdom, has devised ways that the fish head out to sea to grow, come back home to the spawning grounds to replenish the cycle, and then die off.
I am glad to be able to stand before the House today and state uncategorically that I am satisfied that we have managed this GATT ruling in an acceptable manner, and that the fishery is well on its way to a continued and enjoyable resource.
I know the riding of the member opposite is much closer to the fisheries than mine. Mine is up in the Fraser Valley. Nonetheless, there are a lot of fish that go by our doorstep up the Fraser River to the spawning grounds.

Adjournment Debate
They then come down so that his fishermen can then fish for them upon their return.


Mr. Ken Monteith (Elgin-Norfolk):: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak to the motion put forward by the hon. member.
British Columbia salmon and roe herring are valued at close to $1 billion in annual wholesale value. Over 4,400 salmon fishing vessels and 1,500 herring fishing vessels involving some 15,000 fishermen participate in fisheries along the 6,000 miles of B.C. coastline. On average,
80,000	tonnes of salmon and 30,000 tonnes of roe herring are landed each year. The processing sector employs approximately 6,000 persons. Approximately 200 vessels are currently licensed as fish packers.
As you are aware, Mr. Speaker, following the GATT ruling and prior to the Canada-U.S. Trade Commission decision regarding herring and salmon, all catches of these species were required to be landed in Canada. Biological sampling, catch verification, surveillance, and enforcement activities were developed to manage fisheries in an environment where all fish were landed in Canada.
The Canada-U.S. Trade Commission decision regarding at-sea export of salmon and herring authorized exports of up to 20 per cent of the available catch in 1990, and 25 per cent in the years 1991 to 1994. The packer fleet is capable of assembling up to 150 vessels which could theoretically meet criteria to qualify for direct export licences. The implementation of the at-sea export provisions in the herring and salmon fisheries introduced a number of new components to the management regime for these fisheries and established the requirement for the implementation of a more complex management and conservation regime.
The New FTA Export Management Program was designed to address the following requirements: administration of export licence applications; inspection of vessels to confirm compliance with licensing specifications; issuance of at-sea export ory licences; publication of expected volumes of salmon and roe herring to be available from each export zone; over-all planning and execution of export catch sampling, catch verification, export monitoring, industry liaison and enforcement activities; development of export sampling plans, detailed in-season monitoring and reporting of catch statistics and export levels in line with the authorized export
ceilings; and integration with onshore sampling and catch verification programs.
The position of the DFO FTA Export Manager was established and the incumbent was made responsible for the over-all planning and execution of export catch sampling-


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



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION

[Stage Direction]
A motion to adjourn the House under Standing Order 38 deemed to have been moved.

Mr. Len Taylor (The Battlefords-Meadow Lake):: Mr. Speaker, on October 11, I asked a question of the Minister of Agriculture. I asked if he would reinstate the interest-free cash advance. It was the fourth time that week that I had risen in the House to ask for the reinstatement.
I was encouraged that the minister said he was giving the matter urgent consideration. I was even more encouraged when, two days later, he announced the reinstatement of this important program. The minister, however, made his announcement, not in the Chamber, but at a Saturday morning meeting of writers in Saskatoon.
Instead of providing Parliament with the information that I had asked for, just two days previous, he chose to go outside the Chamber for the announcement and left Parliamentarians, such as myself, to respond to the media and to report to our constituents without the benefit of the information that he had made available that morning.
Mr. Speaker, you will recall that last year I and my colleagues in the New Democratic Party in the House argued strenuously against government legislation which originally removed the interest-free portion of the cash advance. We argued that there were times when this
October 25, 1990

program was very necessary and this year the government was forced to recognize that we were correct.
The government's mistake on this matter has not been adequately corrected, however. The minister's announcement makes reference to the reinstatement of the interest-free cash advance for this year only. If this year's conditions on the Prairies are duplicated next year or the year after, we will have to argue again and again, year by year, for the interest-free program which has served the agricultural community well since the 1950s.
Last year's legislation should be immediately rescinded and the interest-free cash advance program permanently reinstated. This past week, I visited a number of elevator agents, bank managers, credit union managers, and farmers and I have found that the most contentious question remaining this year is that the program requires cheques to be issued jointly to the farmer and the financial institution. I would like the government to consider issuing the cheque to the farmer and leave to his discretion which bills get paid and when, under the cash advance. The big banks and the government are working too closely together on the issuance of these funds.
Our agricultural sector is much too important to be left to the whim of the politicians. There must be some stability brought to agricultural financing. As long as prices remain low and interest rates and fuel prices can rise unchecked, Canadian food producers must have some protection, some security.
I ask the Minister of Agriculture to recognize that even though the interest-free cash advance is only a small program in the whole system, it is important enough to be a permanent part of our support mechanism. I ask that he take the next step and reinstate the program, permanently.


Mr. Murray Cardiff (Parliamentary Secretary to Deputy Prime Minister, President of the Privy Council and Minister of Agriculture):: Mr. Speaker, as it has been indicated, on October 13, the Minister of Agriculture did announce measures to assist cash-strapped farmers. Those are in the interest-free cash advances which are now available on undelivered grain.
We know that farmers can now receive, if they qualify for interest-free advances, up to $50,000 through this one-year program. I want to make sure that everyone
Adjournment Debate
understands that it is a one-year program. That decision was arrived at in consultation with working groups as to the need and the way to best provide that program. This program will be administered through the Prairie Grain Advance Payments Act and the Advance Payments for Crops Act. All crops covered by these two programs are eligible for the interest-free advances.
It is estimated it will cost the treasury about $95 million in interest relief in 1990 alone. This is a shortterm measure to answer an immediate need. We know that $95 million is a lot of money, especially now when we are strapped for funds in this country.
It does not address the long-term needs. That is why it has to be a one-year program, because as everyone in this House knows, and anyone who has any connection to agriculture knows, we are working on a longer-term program such as the safety nets that we started over a year ago with the committee. The committees are made up of producers and organizations from across the country and are to come up with a long-term program so that we will not need interest-free advances such as we do right now. The government has responded to the needs at the present time.
We hope that we can have some of these programs in place, such as GRIP and NISA, for the 1991-92 crop year. If governments agree, federal and provincial, this new safety net could provide benefits to Canadian grains and oilseeds farmers next year. This would give them the stability necessary to plan their financial future much better.
These are the two programs we are working on, the net income stabilization account, or NISA, and the Gross Revenue Insurance Plan, or GRIP. NISA would enable farmers to set money aside in good years in an individual trust account, their own personal account.
GRIP is a combination of yield protection and price support. The two programs will benefit agriculture greatly. We have seen the needs over the last few years and have continued to stand by our farmers. I want to make that very, very clear. The Special Canadian Grains Program, the Canadian Crop Drought Assistance Program, and this spring a commitment of about $450 million to Canadian grain farmers are an example of the

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Adjournment Debate
commitment we have put forward. On October 13, there was another extension of that support.


HUMAN RIGHTS
Ms. Margaret Mitchell (Vancouver East):: Mr. Speaker, some months ago, I asked the minister to continue funding the Court Challenges Program. Since then I am happy to report that this program has been extended for five years, although a 10-year extension was requested.
The Court Challenges Program provides financial and legal support for litigation to test selected cases and establish precedents for protection of rights under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. This is an essential program for helping disadvantaged groups, including women, natives, visible minority and disabled persons, to achieve a greater degree of equality.
Several cases involving equality rights for women have set important precedents and more are pending. It was essential to extend the funding program since there have been few cases concerned with discrimination against visible minority persons processed.
Barriers to equality continue to exist and racial discrimination remains a most critical and regrettable problem in our country. Many people of colour, including recent immigrants and people who have been here for several generations, do not feel they are accepted as equal citizens in Canadian society. Over the last year racial intolerance and racist incidents have escalated dramatically. Results of February polls showed 54 per cent of Canadians felt there was an increase in racial intolerance.
A study by B'nai Brith found a dramatic 88 per cent increase in incidents of harassment. There were also many media reports of racial discrimination. Blacks and other visible minorities continue to be victims of discrimination and violence in schools and universities. Many job applicants were rejected and humiliated, and promotions were rare.
The percentage of native people in prisons far exceeds their proportion in the general population. Blacks complained about being easy targets for bullets of police officers. Racist pins and bumper stickers were circulated freely. Jewish graves were singled out for desecration.
In addressing a seminar on the rights of the child, John Turvey, a street worker in my riding, said: "Seventy per cent of the kids I see on the streets in the downtown eastside of Vancouver are aboriginal. They make up 5 per cent of the general population. We are a racist culture."
The federal government cannot maintain its innocence regarding racial discrimination. For 10 years an apology and redress for the historic racism of the Chinese head tax and the Chinese Exclusion Act has been outstanding.
Mr. Idris Ben-Tahir and Ms. Mary Pitawanakuat experienced racial harassment in the Public Service. The government's long delay in allowing Sikhs in the RCMP to wear turbans exacerbated overt racism. The government refused to reverse the recent CRTC decision which refused the only black format radio station in Canada, despite its obligations under the Canadian Multicultural-ism Act.
The inaction of both Quebec and federal governments to prevent and deal with overt racism during the Oka stand-off is a national disgrace. Images of burning natives in effigy, the Ku Klux Klan, racist slogans and rock-throwing are scars on our souls. The Prime Minister's promise of an investigation has been forgotten.
Systemic discrimination continues in the Public Service where only 2.9 per cent of federal employees were visible minorities, compared to 6.3 per cent in the general workforce, this despite a commitment to employment equity. Recently, the Secretary of State refused promised funding for a National Employment Equity Network conference, creating considerable hardship for participants who represented target groups.
I call on the government to make a concerted effort to eliminate racism and discrimination by strengthening and enforcing employment equity and the Canadian Multiculturalism Act by increasing funds so that the Human Rights Commission can do its job; and by increasing, rather than withdrawing funds from advocacy groups that are working for equality. Canada is a multi-racial, multicultural country where all citizens must be equal in reality, not just in rhetoric.
October 25, 1990


Murray Cardiff: Mr. Speaker, as the member knows, the contribution agreement between the Department of the Secretary of State and the Canadian Council on Social Development for the administration of the Court Challenges Program was scheduled to expire on March 31 of this year.
Through this program, financial assistance is provided for the preparation and defence of test cases involving equality and language rights under the Canadian Constitution. Cases funded under the program have dealt with such issues as discrimination based on mental and physical disabilities, mandatory retirement, equality for native people, discrimination based on marital status and citizenship, and equality for disabled persons. The program, which was introduced in 1985, had a five-year budget of some $11.5 million.
Notwithstanding the difficult fiscal circumstances, the government agreed to renew the program because it is sensitive to the concerns of minority groups and disadvantaged persons and to their views on the importance of the Court Challenges Program.
The minister announced on May 10, 1990, that the Court Challenges Program would be extended for another five years. It will have a five-year budget of $13.75 million. However, the program will now be administered by the Human Rights Research and Education Centre of the University of Ottawa. An agreement was signed with the centre on July 22. The Canadian Council on Social Development felt that it was no longer appropriate for it to administer the program and that another organization should assume responsibility for the Court Challenges Program.
Mr. Speaker, I can therefore assure the hon. member that the government fully supports the Court Challenges Program and what it is trying to achieve.


FISHERIES
Mr. Francis G. LeBlanc (Cape Breton Highlands- Canso):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to return to a question I asked on December 12 of last year. The question concerned the closure of the Canso fish plant. I want to
Adjournment Debate
review some of the chronology that has taken place since that question was asked on December 12.
On December 11, National Sea Products closed its fish plant operations in Canso, putting 750 people out of work and closing down the town's only industry. This action began a struggle by the people of Canso, a struggle which has been dramatic and which has made Canso a national symbol.
I have pursued that struggle on behalf of the people of Canso here in the House of Commons, asking repeated questions in the House and following this issue since that question on December 12.
Later on that same week of December 12, I was privileged to have the hon. Speaker accept my request for an emergency debate, and on December 18, we debated in this House the crisis in the Atlantic fishery, raising this matter to a national concern. Canso had become a symbol. The people of Canso did not take the closure of their fish plant lying down. They held rallies. The trawler workers travelled to Ottawa to convince the government to reverse its decision. The town council of Canso came to Ottawa. When the provincial government provided a very unacceptable deal in February, they turned it down and continued the fight.
Over the summer, after repeated and lengthy negotiations, the provincial and federal government, through the Minister of Fisheries, worked out a deal with a new consortium called Seafreez Foods Ltd., which has allowed Canso to achieve a new lease on life. This Seafreez deal has enabled up to 500 of the 750 people who were working at Canso to resume their work in the fish plant. Through a complex arrangement with foreign fish operators, it allows the trawlermen in Canso to go back to work.
Today, there are 12 people hired at the Canso plant. They have a new manager, and four trawler boats are ready to go out to sea. The refrigeration unit is being replaced and the plant should be in full operation in mid November. This turn of events is a result of the determination and tenacity of the people of one small community in Canso not to take the loss of their livelihood lying down. It is a symbol of their determination to maintain

October 25, 1990
Adjournment Debate
their livelihood and to demonstrate to both the federal and provincial governments that they are determined to continue the work that has nourished their community for centuries. The people of Canso are committed to making the deal work and to being able to continue their long association with the sea and keeping the town alive.
The deal that has been worked out is an imaginative and workable deal. It represents a major commitment on the part of both the provincial and the federal government and the companies involved. I wish to compliment the federal Minister of Fisheries and Oceans for helping to put this deal together. I would like to say as well that I expect the government to hold to the commitment that has been made to the people of Canso and to Cansonians that this deal will ensure a stable future for their community. Cansonians will accept nothing less.
I want to mention that the crisis in the Atlantic fishery is by no means over. There is still a great deal of anguish and hardship throughout Atlantic Canada in many fishing communities as a result of the declining fish stocks and the mismanagement which has occurred in recent years through the fishing industry. The crisis will not be over and we will have to continue to work toward a new arrangement which will allow communities like Canso to grow and prosper.
One of those communities is Lockeport. Unfortunately, the town of Lockeport, which has been in a similar situation to Canso, has not been able to come up with a deal that satisfies the requirements of the provincial government to be able to open its fish plant. That is one community among many that needs to have continuous support, and continued work will have to be made in order to ensure that its industry is preserved.
As the fisheries critic for my party, I am committed to working toward ensuring that fisheries policy ensures the survival of these communities, wherever they may be, and ensures the future of a stable fishing industry.


Murray Cardiff: Mr. Speaker, I want to say that the Government of Canada is committed to assisting the community of Canso which has seen its fish plant close as a result of resource reductions in important Atlantic groundfish stocks.
In May, the Government of Canada announced the Atlantic Fisheries Adjustment Program of $584 million in assistance for the fishing industry.
These funds will implement a long-term strategy for the fishing industry and include a short-term adjustment package, with a commitment to spend up to $130 million to assist employees in Nova Scotia and Newfoundland who were laid off because of declines in northern cod stocks; an additional $28 million to improve surveillance; $150 million for rebuilding the stocks; $130 million for adjusting to current realities; and $146 million for economic diversification both within the fishery and outside.
These special initiatives are in addition to ongoing federal programs to assist in a workforce adjustment and to attract other enterprises and alternative employment opportunities to Atlantic Canada.
The National Sea processing facility at Canso was closed as a result of northern cod quota reductions. Canso is therefore eligible for assistance under the short-term adjustment package. Of the $130 million available under this initiative, $26.7 million have been projected as required for Canso. These funds will be available over the four year period to 1994 on adjustment measures such as training programs, community development initiatives, and other measures.
The Atlantic Fisheries Adjustment Program includes $146 million to foster diversification within the fishery and to promote alternative employment in areas affected by quota reductions and stock depletion. Canso is also eligible for assistance under this initiative.
In addition, on August 10, 1990, the Government of Canada announced support for the Seafreez proposal which the member spoke about. This initiative will protect and maintain 500 jobs at the Canso plant. It is great to hear that it is starting in operation again. Certainly it sounds as though by mid-November, by what the member was saying, it is going to be operational and quite a number of people will be working. It is rewarding to see something like this happening and that plant being utilized.
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We believe that these initiatives will secure the future of the community of Canso and permit it to continue its 400-year involvement with the Atlantic fishing industry.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The motion to
Adjournment Debate
adjourn the House is now deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly, this House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 10 a.m, pursuant to Standing Order 24(1).


[Stage Direction]
The House adjourned at 6.17 p.m.
[Stage Direction]
Friday, October 26,1990