1992-05-11

[Stage Direction]
The House proceeded to the consideration of Bill C-328, an act respecting National Public Service Week, as reported (with amendments) by Legislative Committee H.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: The Chair has received no motion of amendment concerning the report on this bill.


Mrs. Marlene Catterall (Ottawa West):: moved that the bill, as amended, be concurred in.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: When shall this bill be read the third time? Now?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Marlene Catterall: that the bill be read the third time and passed.


Mr. Bill Kempling (Parliamentary Secretary to President of the Treasury Board and Minister of State (Finance)):: Mr. Speaker, there have been conversations among the parties and we are prepared to have this bill pass all stages at this time.


Marlene Catterall: Mr. Speaker, in view of the apparent agreement of all parties of the House, I do not think there is any need to debate this bill.
I would like to thank all members of the House and of the legislative committee for their co-operation in getting it to this stage.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: It is the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion.?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the third time and passed.
Mr. Milliken:: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order. Because the disposition of the hon. member's bill concludes private members' hour for today, I wonder if the House might consent to suspend the sitting until 12 o'clock?


SITTING SUSPENDED
The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: Is there unanimous consent to suspend the sitting until twelve o'clock?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: The sitting is therefore suspended until twelve noon.
The sitting of the House was suspended at 11.12 a.m.


SITTING RESUMED
[Stage Direction]
The House resumed at 12 p.m.
[Stage Direction]
May 11, 1992
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Mr. David Barrett (Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca) moved:: That this House urge the government to abrogate the
Canada-U.S. Free Hade Agreement.
He said: Mr. Speaker, in the short time I have in front of me it will be impossible to give a detailed catalogue of the devastation of the free trade agreement and the impact it has had negatively on all Canadians.
Before I go into those specifics, I think it is worth while to remember that we did have an open debate in this country during the 1988 election campaign regarding the free trade agreement.
At that time, and prior to the campaign itself in the national debate, there were many people who were involved who were not running for office, but from the business community, from the trade union movement and interested sectors of academics and others who expressed opinions. There were a number of people who spent a significant amount of their time extolling the virtues of this agreement.
I remember clearly being in a debate with Dr. John Crispo and at that time doing a radio interview with Dr. Crispo. I remember him as one of the spokespersons advocating the free trade agreement, repeating the government's promises-although he was not speaking for the government-about the thousands of jobs that were going to be created, about the great expansion that would take place in the Canadian economy and virtual guarantees almost that the government was going to take care of retraining for those people who admittedly would be displaced, albeit small numbers the government said.
It is in that atmosphere and that context that I want to focus on the reasons why I think the agreement should be abrogated. Anything less would be a cop-out in my opinion. Renegotiation would be a cop-out. As a matter of fact, if I may digress just for a moment, the free trade agreement is being forced open into a form of renegotiation in any event through what is happening with NAFTA.
Those people who supported the free trade agreement were wrong. It was a serious mistake in my opinion because there were not tens of thousands of jobs created because of the free trade agreement. There was not the massive infusion of new capital into this country so that we could play on a level playing field. Of course during the course of my remarks I will quote statistics from Statistics Canada, paid for by taxpayers, to substantiate these claims.
It has been a disaster. It has ripped the guts and the heart out of the manufacturing base of this country. It has destroyed the economy of the provinces of Ontario and Quebec more than any other regions in this country, and has continued to be ignored by the United States. In any instance it feels Canada may have been out-competing the Americans, it immediately uses tactics to attack Canadian interests in spite of the agreement that it claims would give us a level playing field.
What has the damage been in three years of the free trade agreement? Since the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement came into effect, the destruction of manufacturing jobs has been dramatic and devastating. To find a period of greater collapse of manufacturing employment, one has to go back to the Great Depression in this country. Manufacturing employment fell by 29.7 per cent in the Great Depression. The current recession has seen manufacturing employment fall by 23.1 per cent and there is no sign of it stopping.
I repeat, during the height of the Depression, Canada's manufacturing employment fell by 29.7 per cent. Since we signed the treaty on January 1, 1988, we have lost 23.1 per cent of our manufacturing employment, part of it due to the recession, most of it due to the free trade agreement. I will come to those numbers in a moment.
A number of subsectors have already surpassed the Depression figures. Those levels have gone higher than the Depression and they are in the area of food, beverages, leather, textiles, clothing, printing, publishing and chemicals.
We have lost more jobs in the food, beverages, leather, textiles, clothing, printing, publishing and chemicals manufacturing sector than we did during the Depression. Furthermore, between June 1989 and October 1991, there was a net loss of 461,000 manufacturing jobs, which means 23.1 per cent.

My good friends claim that most of these were lost to the Depression. Using the government's own Department of Statistics, 150,000 of these jobs disappeared before the formal onset of the recession. The recession and its definition of an onset is laid out clearly by the number of months of a downturn in the economy. One hundred and fifty thousand jobs lost before the recession was declared to be happening.
There was a drop of 270,000 jobs in 1981-82 in that recession when the Liberals were in power. I point that out because this government is fond of attacking the Liberals for their mismanagement of the economy. In actual fact, as hard as the Liberals tried, they could not screw it up as much as the Tories did. Only 22 per cent of those jobs lost during the Liberal recession were due to permanent plant closures. But in the first three years of the free trade agreement, 65 per cent of the jobs lost in this country were due to permanent plant closures.
Permanent plant closures, 65 per cent of those jobs lost because of that. This government signed an agreement that led to this catastrophe in the economy and it has the nerve to spend a million dollars to hire a Harvard professor to tell it what is wrong with productivity. On page 69 of the report from that Harvard professor, he points out that one of the problems is the free trade agreement.
Isn't that ironic, Mr. Speaker? And now it is spending $15 million to go around telling Canadians to be more productive. All you need is a job to be productive, and that is pretty hard for most Canadians, especially those who are unemployed.
In comparison with the United States, if we want to put this in the same frame of the recession then let us put it in the framework of the impact on the United States during this same period of time. While Canada experienced a 23.1 per cent decline in manufacturing jobs, the United States realized only a 6.3 per cent loss in its manufacturing jobs; almost four to one; three and a half to one. If the recession is to blame then there should be a comparative percentage of at least relative closeness to the damage that has been done by the recession itself. In this instance, we can see clearly that the United States has not suffered nearly as much as Canada.
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Three and a half to one ratio on a percentage basis of job loss compared to the United States. Is our recession three and a half times worse? If you want to use that frame, the government will deny it. The fact is the devastation of the free trade agreement has caused that dramatic change in the percentage of jobs lost.
From 1985 to 1988 Canada averaged a $4.7 billion surplus with the United States in its current account balance. That is goods, services, interest and dividends. From 1985 to 1988 the Tories reputation of maintaining a surplus balance of payments with the United States was outstanding. What happened when they signed the free trade agreement? Let us look at these figures.
That surplus turned to a $2.4 billion deficit in 1989, a $0.4 billion deficit in 1990, and reached a $3.1 billion deficit in 1991, according to the government's own figures. The government's own statistics and the government's own figures show the dramatic turnaround not only in the job loss but also in the balance of trade account between Canada and the United States.
The other canard is offshore investment. Again I use the government's own statistics and point out what has happened since this government signed the free trade agreement. In 1990-91, 97 per cent of foreign direct investment in Canada was takeovers of Canadian-based companies. Only 3 per cent was new investment. This exceeds the five-year average proportion of takeovers, which is 90 per cent.
Every single figure I have given, every single statistic I have quoted has been from the government's own booklets, Department of Statistics, or any other document it has produced. No matter how you slice it the free trade agreement has been a disaster to the people of Canada, it has been a disaster to the small Canadian manufacturing sector, and it has been a disaster for our future.
How do we get out of this mess? The first thing we must do is have the courage to say this is Canada, we must stand up on our own feet in the world and say we have been burned by this government's disastrous agreement, but our only option is to give six months notice to abrogate the treaty and then pick up the pieces from there.

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There are those who say now we will really be in trouble. It is very interesting. First of all they gave us this illness and then they say, oh no, radical surgery will only kill us. Radical surgery gives us a chance to cut out this disaster. If we continue with the illness, we will all be dead waiting for heaven to arrive.
There is a middle ground too that I must address because I am a politician and I am speaking about politics. It was a political decision by this government to go ahead with the free trade agreement. As I mentioned earlier, there was a great debate in this country led by the former prime minister of this country and the former leader of this party, Ed Broadbent, and of course John Tbrner.
John TUmer as a Liberal leader and the Leader of the Official Opposition took a dramatic position that was in direct opposition to the position his party had had for years. John Tbrner as a great Canadian and also a very good friend of mine had the courage to stand up and say to all Canadians he as the leader of the Liberal Party would if elected not sign the free trade agreement. He made profound statements along with my own leader, Ed Broadbent, about the dangers of signing this agreement and pledged his party not to sign the deal.
The political atmosphere has changed. I have listed statistically the devastation of this agreement. Our party has taken the position of abrogating, the government wants to defend itself on its own mortal blows that it has given itself, but I want to talk about the disappointment of the Official Opposition.
Once John Tbrner left, the Official Opposition took the position away from John Turner and went back on the fence and said it wanted to renegotiate. Renegotiate is a cop-out. Renegotiate and cop-out are synonymous. There is no way to escape it. It is far more dangerous for the Canadian people to hear and believe that somehow there is some way of renegotiating this treaty to protect what we already have and regain what we have lost.
That is fatuous nonsense. It borders on being sanctimonious political cant. There is no possible way you can renegotiate this deal. What the Liberal Party does not understand and does not seem to appreciate is that it is not one Single arena they would have to negotiate in, but three arenas; with the White House, with the Senate,
and with Congress and each one of them would take its pound of flesh.
If anybody has any belief that the United States was committed to staying on a level playing field, let us take a look at the damage it has done sector by sector in attacking the Canadian economy.
In almost every single arena, the United States has assaulted those Canadian industries which showed they were able to compete. The United States has retaliated in softwood lumber, in beef, in pork, in whole ranges of areas and has gone further than specific battles, but it has also taken on sectors in our economy that we thought were protected, like automobiles and automobile parts.
Let us look at the automobile parts decision and the decision by this government to fight back against the Honda ruling. The Honda ruling was made not to punish Honda but to send a clear signal out to any other off-shore investor who was looking to Canada as a potential investment area, saying: "Hey, we have Canada under control because of the free trade agreement. If you invest in Canada, we will harass you".
The Honda decision was made by the United States to harass off-shore investors by giving them a signal that if they invest in Canada any attempt to enter into the. U.S. market will be subject to U.S. interpretation of content rule.
Last week I raised the question in this House about the unfair competition by Americans offering tax benefits. I raised the example of just one small company, the Central Power and Light Company in Corpus Christi, Texas which was offering companies 10 years of tax relief if they would come down. Other financial benefits were offered to come to Corpus Christi.
All of the ads and all of the promises offered by that light company are a violation of the free trade agreement, every single one of them. What has the minister's response been in this House to these violations? He said: "The member has a point here and we brought it up with GATT".
GATT is not concerned with this. If this government had any courage at all, it would use the FTA panels that it says are so successful in defending Canadian interests. This is a violation of the FTA. This is a violation of the free trade agreement that this government signed and it
May 11, 1992

does not have the courage to face the Americans with these violations that are taking place every single day.
The list of events and the wrongs under this agreement goes on and on and on. The next federal election in this country will be fought over this issue along with the North American Free Trade Agreement. Tens of thousands of people in this country have already lost hope. Any polling interpretation or any reading of the mood of the Canadian people is one of giving up.
During the 1988 election I said that this would be an election about the loss of the innocence of Canada. My oldest son asked why I made that remark and I said: "This will be the first time in the history of this nation that we will be, if the Tories are elected, electing a government that has given up on Canada".
From shore to shore, we have had a government that has not understood clearly what this nation is all about. There are only 27 million people in this country. We have a cornucopia of resources. None of those resources were put in the ground by the multinational corporations. None were put in the ground by the oil companies.
The oil well, the natural gas well, the timber, the fisheries, the minerals in the ground of this great nation belong to the people of this nation to be leased or used by those manufacturers. Those God-given resources were to be husbanded by prudent, thoughtful, cautious governments. They were not to be given away.
The first give-away pattern took place when the great railroads were built across this country. But no one ever envisioned that we would some day reach the point where the government gave up on Canada and all the resources of Canada.
What is to be done? There are many options. The first thing that has to be done is to abrogate the treaty, take an inventory of where we are in this country and then from there, begin to develop our own resources. We are not a poverty-stricken nation but we will soon be driven to that category under this government's policies.
We should reassess our economic foundation, develop an industrial strategy that is moulded on a more competitive view of the world than just surrending to the United
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States and international corporations' domination of a three-country market through NAFTA, and take a look at where we are financially and internationally in the world. There are options for us.
I presented to the Minister of Finance an option in terms of jobs right now through a municipal infrastructure using municipal bonds sponsored by this federal government and allowing RRSP funds to be invested there, at no cost to the government. It is an imaginative, thoughtful but different approach. It should examine the proposal instead of brushing it aside.
Let us look at the option of alternate financing as the provinces of Alberta and Ontario can do through treasury branches. Let us have the option of a fiscal instrument owned by the people of this country as Margaret Thatcher did, using the post office in great Britain as a fiscal instrument for mobilizing indigenous funds for industrial development in Britain.
It is ironic that I should speak of Margaret Thatcher. I find it interesting, but she never once destroyed the instrument that was started by the Labour Party, using the post office as a fiscal instrument for mobilizing funds for indigenous development in that country.
On and on and on. We have abandoned our control of oil. We must continue to supply, because of this agreement, the U.S. and the U.S. market at the same level. We have not had the guts to determine that oil should be refined and processed in this country, while we subsidize gasoline in the U.S. economy to compete with Canadian workers.
Timing to natural gas, tens of billions of cubic feet of natural gas have been sold out under this administration simply for a fast buck at low prices. These are stupid, stupid decisions made by a government that has lost its courage, its nerve, and its vision of what this country should be.
I am deeply disappointed, as I conclude my remarks, not so much in this government that has proven it is a failure, but much more in the Official Opposition which has abandoned the position of the right hon. member for Vancouver Quadra of abrogating the free trade agreement. Let no one be fooled: if you defeat the Tories and

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vote for the Liberals, you are going to get exactly the same thing, only renegotiated with sugar coating.


Mr. Greg Thompson (Carleton-Charlotte):: Mr. Speaker, all I can say is that the hon. member is suffering from the ostrich syndrome. It is the same syndrome that he and his entire party have suffered from for a number of years. I do not care what he says, that is his choice, but I think he has got to put some research and fact into what he is saying. I do not think he can stand up in this House and constantly debate on emotion and only emotion.
The statistics will prove something different from what the member has said in this House today. One thing I want to point out-and the hon. member never does this in the House-is that we have control over our resources: when we want to sell them, if we want to sell them, and how much we want to sell them for. It is time he has told Canadian people that. We have absolute control over that, but he wants to disregard that in total because that is not the kind of message that sells well with his constituents.
The only thing I want to say is that is a debate we went through in 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991 and 1992. He is probably right. We will debate it in the next general election as well. However, the facts will be on our side because we will have proven by that time that it is working and it is working very much in our favour as a nation.
The hon. member talks about displaced jobs. When Mel Hurtig debated William F. Buckley Junior on the free trade debate it was interesting. They talked about the job losses in Canada. Let us assume there have been 400,000 displaced jobs in the manufacturing sector in Canada. Let us assume that figure is correct. Why does he not point to the United States of America and tell the people of Canada that there has been a corresponding job loss in the U.S. to the tune of 3.5 million to 4 million jobs in the manufacturing sector? He does not want people to know that. The fact is that we are caught up in a world recession as is the United States. If he wants to blame all of our economic ills on that trade agreement, it is not going to wash with the Canadian people.


David Barrett: Mr. Speaker, I am always amused at the government spokespersons in this debate. They ask why
we do not point this or that out and for our statistics. If the member had cleared the wax out of his ears, he would have listened to what I did quote on the job loss in the United States from the government's own statistics.
I will repeat these for his edification, and I will repeat them slowly because this government needs to hear things very slowly. While Canada experienced a 23.1 per cent decline in manufacturing jobs, the United States realized only a 6.3 per cent loss of jobs for the same period; 21.7 versus 6.3. Any grade one student understands that 21 per cent is higher than 6 per cent. If we brought in a blackboard and I was allowed to demonstrate on the blackboard that three times six is eighteen-


An hon. member:: He still wouldn't get it.


David Barrett: -we still have lost over three times as many jobs percentage-wise in the same period as the United States has lost.
The member can talk about Mel Hurtig and talk about other people whom he perhaps does not like, but is he calling the department of statistics liars? Do we need to call the bureaucrats of the department of statistics to the bar of this House and ask them why they are lying or making the government figures look like lies?


Mr. Nystrom:: Bring the Tories to the bar.


David Barrett: Maybe we should bring the Tories to the bar.
Let us deal clearly with control of the prices of our own natural gas and oil. What I clearly said was that we could not control the supply amounts. If we diminished or increased we have to give a diminished or increased amount to the Americans in both oil and natural gas.
My friend made a comment about the sale of natural gas in controlling prices. When we took office in British Columbia natural gas was selling at 32 cents per thousand cubic feet. We forced the contracts open through force majeure. Canadian people and British Columbia taxpayers were getting hosed on those contracts permitted by Liberal governments. By the time we left office gas was selling at $1.24 per thousand cubic feet, and it was still 10 cents less than what it was selling in Texas. The people of British Columbia made an additional $700 million profit from those sales. That is the kind of thing I am talking about, having the courage-
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Mr. McDermid:: How did you lose the election?


David Barrett: How did we lose the election? That is a good question. It is because the Liberals and the Conservatives joined Social Credit against the NDP. That is exactly what is happening again. The same old power interests that dominate this party have now taken over the Liberal Party. That is the answer.
We are all alone on this position of abrogation, but we are alone in principle too. We like our company and we know Canadians support it.


Mr. John Manley (Ottawa South):: Mr. Speaker, I am somewhat confused by some of the remarks of my friend from Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca. Perhaps he can clarify a few things for me.
Evidently an egregious error was made by The Financial Post a few months ago when it reported the leader of his party as having said that she would renegotiate the free trade agreement. I guess it was a mistake.
I would like the member who spoke to explain whether his party has obtained a transcript of the interview so that we can understand exactly what it was that his leader must have said to The Financial Post that caused it to misunderstand so badly that party's position.
The member makes it sound very clear and simple. I wonder whether when the NDP got help as his elected government, its leader would be inclined to phone the President of the United States and tell him that Canada was about to abrogate, or whether in fact she might propose a list of things that need to be improved in relation to Canada-U.S. trade relations and hold out the prospect of abrogation as perhaps a consequence if some improvements were not made.
In other words, is he really saying that no consultation with the U.S. government would occur, but that we would simply declare a trade war to begin the day after her swearing in?


David Barrett: Mr. Speaker, if the member is confused about the New Democratic Party's position, all he has to do is watch the vote on this motion today. That is all he has to do.
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I am confused about the Liberals' position so I will watch how they vote today. This is the showdown. It is very simple; are they for abrogation or are they against it? My dear friend can say anything he wants but he is caught with his own petard. Is he for it or against it? We will see how the vote comes out today. This is the motion and we will see how they stand. How will we do this?


An hon. member:: What are you going to do, phone George Bush?


David Barrett: The member asks: "What are you going to do, phone George Bush?" What did your leader say when he went to Washington? What did he say to George Bush? We are still waiting to hear about that conversation.
There is a current interview by an esteemed American journalist by the name of Joel Connelly, talking about the Leader of the Opposition's visit to Washington in an interview he did former Ambassador Ney. Mr. Ney claims in the interview that the Leader of the Opposition spent half an hour extolling the virtues of the United States and did not raise anything more timorous than: "Perhaps we could revisit this negotiation". That is Mr. Ney's statement to an American journalist. If the hon. member wants a copy, I will send it to him.
The simple fact is that the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party said to the international corporate world: "We are going to stand back and let you do whatever you want to do with your agenda". We say no to that and we will notify the Americans. As the Prime Minister of this country said during that famous debate, all it takes is six months' notice. Is the hon. member calling the Prime Minister of this country a liar? In this instance, I am not calling the Prime Minister a liar. I agree with the statement he made on television that night during the debate when he said: "All it takes is six months' notice". That is all. Either you cut it off or you die one death by a thousand cuts.
Meanwhile, what about the ordinary people of this country? Has the hon. member seen the food lines in this country? Has he seen children go to school hungry? Has he seen the economic consequences to families in this country? These pious nitwits who sit over there have no feeling whatsoever for the ordinary Canadians who are suffering because of job losses. It is a shame and a scandal.

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Hon. Michael Wilson (Minister of Industry, Science and Technology and Minister for International Trade):: Mr. Speaker, I guess the answer to the hon. member's question about what the NDP leader was talking about will never be known because we sure did not get an answer from the hon. member.
I am vety pleased to have an opportunity to speak on this motion. I will read it again so that people can hear it:
That this House urges the government to abrogate the
Canada -U.S. Free Trade Agreement.
It is a seductive motion. It is preying on the concerns that Canadians have about the economy. I listened to the hon. member very carefully. There is an old expression: Figures lie and liars figure. The speech twisted figures, it distorted facts, it even misquotes people. Michael Porter was misquoted. Michael Porter is very supportive of the free trade agreement, contrary to what my hon. friend has said.
The motion is the wrong way to go. It shows the fundamental difference between the New Democratic Party and the Liberal Party on the one hand and the Progressive Conservative government on the other hand. Canada will not strengthen its economy by protectionism. Members of the NDP are offering Canadians a Charlie Brown security blanket. They are saying, forget about the free trade agreement.
The NDP policy is "The future is the past". Let us go back to the old comfortable days, the 1960s and 1970s when things were just great.
That is not the way it is today. The NDP might want to go back but the world will not. The change that is around us in every country of the world today will not stop simply because an out of date politician or an out of date political party puts forward an out of date motion. The importance of this debate is that we have an opportunity to explain why this motion is out of date and is wrong.
What would happen if tomorrow morning the Government of Canada notified the Government of the United States that it was going to abrogate the free trade agreement? Let us be ruthless, let us do it tomorrow. What would be the impact if we did it tomorrow? What would we achieve and what kind of situation would we face at that time?
Yes, there is some superficial attraction to this. Take the Honda case. Abrogation would solve it. In one sense there would no longer be duty free entry for Honda cars into the United States. There would be no problem in interpreting the U.S.-Canada rules of origin, but it would not do much for Honda and it would not do that much for the 1,400 workers that Honda employs in Ontario. Honda would immediately become liable for the duties being disputed. Every car shipped from Canada into the United States would pay the U.S. duty and every part coming from the United States to Canada would have to pay close to a 10 per cent duty.
It would not take long for Honda to put two and two together and move their Alliston plant down to Ohio. But our dispute with U.S. customs would be over and we would have some peace of mind in our relationship with the United States, but no more jobs. The jobs would be gone. It would be the same for every other company which has invested in Canada to tap into the United States market.
Things would also become a lot clearer in the softwood lumber file. It is incredible that this motion would be put by a B.C. member of Parliament. The government of British Columbia and the industry in British Columbia were very aggressive in wanting us to terminate the memorandum of understanding on softwood lumber.
Where would we be without the FTA if we were still in the softwood lumber dispute? We would not have an opportunity to challenge any decision through the dispute settlement process. The U.S. Department of Commerce, the U.S. International Trade Commission could stop worrying about their decisions being reviewed by the free trade panel. They could go back to the old way, the way it was done in 1986 without the binational review. We would not have to refer them to a panel made up of Canadians and Americans who would judge this in an objective way. Things might not work out as well for the Canadian lumber workers in his province, but at least the NDP members would have the satisfaction of knowing that they would no longer have to blame it all on the free trade agreement.
Let us not forget about the pork decision last year. The pork decision resulted in pork producers being paid back about $20 million in duties because of the actions of the free trade panel. Is my hon. friend suggesting that we
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should just scrap these panels? If he is, what he is saying is that the pork producers would continue to pay, year in and year out, those $20 million of duties.
If the free trade agreement were scrapped tomorrow, what would be the first thing the pork producers would do in the United States? They would initiate another countervailing duty action and the Government of the United States, the International Trade Commission, would not have to worry about another panel. They could just go ahead and do what they did last year and our pork producers would be caught. They would have to start paying duties again and put in jeopardy about $500 million worth of trade between the United States and Canada. But the NDP would be satisfied. They would have peace of mind because we would not have a free trade agreement.
['Translation\
Unfortunately, cancelling the FTA will not help the brewing industry much because it is not covered by the FTA. Our beer dispute with the United States began in GATT. Cancelling the FTA would probably not encourage the United States to be more accommodating on beer or anything else. So far, I find nothing good in the idea of cancelling the FTA. Let us look at the other side of the coin. Would it create new problems? Let me mention some of them. My mail would certainly swell when tens of thousands of Canadian business people and professionals who have to go to the United States would learn that the provisions of chapter 15 allowing them to stay there temporarily no longer apply.
More than 60 categories of professionals who now travel effortlessly back and forth across the border would once again have to stand in line and fill in long forms before travelling to the United States for business purposes.
Canadian engineers, consultants, astronomers, graphic designers, architects, pharmacists, physiotherapists, chemists, geologists, urban planners, these professionals would all be frustrated in their efforts to serve their customers in the United States market. They would lose business to their detriment and to that of the Canadian
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economy. What purpose would be served by undoing what, by all accounts, has been a resounding success?
There would be the question of unravelling the tariff cuts which have been implemented to date, many of which were accelerated at the request of business on both sides of the border. Thousands of Canadian businesses have restructured to serve the broader North American market and they would have to revise their business plans. Where would they be when the tariff reverted to the old levels, as they must under the GATT?
They would find themselves competing in the U.S. market on the same basis as the rest of the world. A quick check of the trade statistics indicates that while Canadian exports to the United States grew over the last three years, largely as a result of the free trade agreement and despite the recession, U.S. imports from the rest of the world had declined.
Canadian companies have improved their import share because U.S. tariffs on Canadian products have been down while those of other countries have remained at the same level. It is not a good sign for companies that are heavily dependent on the United States market. That increase in exports of $5 billion translates into about 75,000 or 80,000 jobs, jobs that we would not have if exports had stayed at the same level.
Abrogation of the free trade agreement would likely bring about a reversal in the inflow of foreign direct investment. The first three years under the FTA saw a remarkable level of consumer investor confidence as both Canadian and foreign companies took steps to make Canada the base for their North American operations. That also means jobs to us.
Proctor and Gamble, for example, restructured its North American operations so that the U.S. plants now specialize in longer production runs while the Canadian company, a more specialized type of company, has access to the product mandates for speciality products for the whole of the North American market.
That is the kind of rational long-term planning that would have to be reversed if we decided to abrogate the free trade agreement.
Similarly would Gandalf, GTE Sylvania, Heron Cable, Hughes Aircraft, Kodak, and Polymer International, to name but a few, reconsider their decision to rationalize

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production and serve the North American market from Canada?
Would Dow Chemical, Cargill Limited, E.D. Smith, Dupont, Rubbermaid, Cameo, Nikon Optical, Ganong Brothers and the dozens of other companies that have expanded facilities in Canada to serve the North American market change their minds?
Check these companies, Mr. Speaker. Their decisions have strengthened and enlarged their presence in Canada and made the jobs of their employees more secure.
Would the hundreds of Canadian companies that are showing every day that they can compete in the U.S. market now that the barriers are down continue to put their resources on the line if the U.S. tariff reductions were reversed?
They are successfully competing as the $110 billion in exports to the United States attest every day. How well would they do if the United States again treated us like the rest of the world and raised those tariffs?
Could our exporters rely on other markets? Does anyone opposite seriously think that our trading partners would not worry about the stability of a country that walks away from a trade agreement of the scope and importance of the free trade agreement? What kind of message does that send out to the rest of the world? Putting aside the fact that other countries would give their eye teeth for the kind of access that we enjoy to the United States market, what does abrogation say about our reliability as a trade and investment partner?

The New Democratic Party has its lists of companies that closed down. It continually repeats how many Canadians are looking for work or lost their job in the last few years. I know these figures. They are precisely the figures which keep me, as Minister for International Trade and Minister of Industry, trying relentlessly to meet the challenge that they present.
But instead of wringing my hands and blaming the FTA, I look for solutions-real solutions instead of imaginary ones. In working with Canadians to find solutions, I am encouraged by the many success stories reported to me. They may not make headlines, but they are nonetheless real.

Let me just give one example of this. Sit-Rite Products makes high-end furniture. It decided to consolidate its activities in Mississauga and close its facilities in Atlanta. It is a decision the company does not regret. It has been good for its employees, good for its suppliers, and good for its customers. That company did it because Mississauga offered a good site from which to serve the whole North American market. It made sense because the borders were open.
If the answer to Canada's economic difficulties lies in closing our borders and handing out subsidies, I would not hesitate to recommend that route to my colleagues. But the bitter experience of the past few years is proof positive that is the road to disaster. The companies that are closing and the jobs that we are losing are companies and jobs that could not adjust to meet the tough reality of a global economy. I take no satisfaction in making that point, but it is a point that we must never forget.
It is not difficult to find examples around the world of economies that chose autarchy and the disaster that followed. Every trade minister I meet who visits Canada from Latin America is eager to tell us the tale of woe that flowed from years of closed borders. Next week at the OECD I will be meeting trade ministers from Sweden to New Zealand, from Austria to Australia, and they will emphasize the need to keep markets open and to negotiate new and better trade rules.
Australia and New Zealand have a free trade area. Sweden and Austria, not large countries, are both applying to join the European Community. Yes, they will face tougher competition. Yes, some of their companies will suffer. So why do they do it? It is because their companies will become tougher competitors and they will have access to greater market opportunities, precisely what Canadian companies have under the free trade agreement.
No, this government is not going to follow the counsel of despair that permeates the resolution before us today. We will stay the course, the course that I outlined in 1984 as Minister of Finance which is gradually turning this country around. We are trying to create an economy with a future, a future attuned to the real world in which we find ourselves today.
May 11, 1992

Last week I was in Munster, Germany to consider how we can bring the shattered economies of central and eastern Europe into the global trading system. What is the objective of most of these countries? It is to join the European Economic Community, reduce their tariffs, and open up their economies to greater competition. They want to join the real world. They want to reject the past. It is sad that the NDP policy is to embrace the past. The discussion was a vivid reminder of the error of excessive government intervention. It also served to impress upon me once again the tremendous and important opportunities we have in Canada if we organize ourselves to take on the world.
To get there, we need a policy mix that rewards private initiative and that encourages our entrepreneurs to look to the future with confidence both inside as well as outside Canada.
Canada has a proud tradition as a trading nation. Our current prosperity, our wealth as a nation and our ability to promote the best quality of life in the world is in large measure the product of our success as world traders.
The key to the transition we are facing does not lie in government programs and regulations. It lies in the imagination, initiative and industriousness of Canadians in Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Lunenburg, Bathurst, Nanaimo, Drumheller, Rosetown and Rimouski. Across this vast land Canadians are determined to prove that yes, they can compete.
We have been working hard with companies, trying to ensure that they have the opportunity to compete and the access they need to the rest of the world. This is why we negotiated the free trade agreement, why we have negotiated the NAFTA, and why we are aggressively working to see a successful conclusion of the Uruguay round.
Our trade offices around the world are all dedicated to one objective. If there is an opportunity out there for a Canadian company, we want to make sure that Canadian company knows about it and gets the sale.
Finally, we must defend the access that we have gained and ensure that no Canadian company loses a sale because of lack of government effort. That is why we work hard to keep good relations with our trading partners. That is why we spare no effort to advance the
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interests of Canadian entrepreneurs. Our best weapon in defending those interests is a good trade agreement.
The FTA is by far the best way to deal with hard-nosed American protectionism. Make no mistake, the Americans can be difficult. Honda, softwood lumber, magnesium or pork; you it name it, they have tried it. We fought each one very hard. Without the FTA life would be even tougher, but what if we did not have an FTA? What if we did not allow for this opening up of our economy?
We would be protected for a while. We would not be exposed to as much change, but would the change stop outside Canada? No, it would not. The change would continue because no one is going to stop the world and allow Canada to get on again. When we finally did open up as most other countries are doing now, the adjustment would be that much greater.
We cannot hide from the world today, but don't just take my word for it. Listen to B.C. Premier Mike Harcourt. Last week, he said:
Our government means business-We have to prepare for the
global economy. We cannot prepare for it by building walls around
ourselves.


David Barrett: Oh, oh.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Unfortunately that is what the NDP wants to do. I could not have said that better myself. Mr. Harcourt understands trade. He understands the significance of this to the hon. member's own province. Mr. Harcourt is aggressively seeking out markets, seeking out ways of improving business. That is the approach we feel we must take as a government. We must ensure the best possible opportunities for Canada, not abrogate this free trade agreement.


David Barrett: Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the minister for quoting Mr. Harcourt. Mr. Harcourt is talking about opening new markets, different deals than the one we are stuck with, and more common sense in making agreements.
I want to talk about the alternatives, but before I do that I want to comment on a couple of things the minister said. He left the impression that somehow, if the free trade agreement were abrogated, the auto pact would be gone. Let us understand what we had before we signed the free trade agreement. The terms and conditions of the auto pact were as follows. Duty-free access to the United States is predicated on the fact that vehicles must come from Canada and vehicles must contain at least 50 per cent North American content.

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Duty-free access to Canada is predicated on the fact that manufacturers must locate in Canada, manufacturers must maintain at least a 75 per cent ratio of production value of vehicles made in Canada to net Canadian sales, and the manufacturers' amount of Canadian value added for all classes of vehicles in Canada must be at least as great as the amount achieved in 1964.
This is a sectoral agreement that has been in practice to the benefit of both countries lo these many years. There is absolutely nothing in the free trade agreement that says if we would abrogate the free trade agreement the auto pact would be abrogated as well.
That is a fabrication. I hope the minister did not attempt to leave that impression with this House or with the Canadian people. This sectoral agreement was there before the free trade agreement and will last after the abrogation of the free trade agreement.
My good friend the minister said they had these great sales into the United States. Everything is relative. I repeat, in 1985 to 1988 the Canadian average annual $4.7 billion surplus in trade with the United States was in goods, services and dividends. No matter how much it increased in Canada, it increased dramatically more in the United States' favour. The minister avoids making that comparison.
I repeat that surplus turned into a $2.4 billion deficit in 1989, a $0.4 billion deficit in 1990, and reached a $3.1 billion deficit in 1991, three years after the free trade agreement. No matter how much both sides increased, we decreased from our surplus.
The minister also mentioned the Honda case. He said what my friend the spokesperson for the New Democratic Party is saying, that it would frighten off investors. It is important to deal with that. In the Honda case the U.S. is charging that the majority of the value of cars made in Alliston, Ontario by Honda actually comes from Japan due to the value of the auto parts imported into Canada from Japan. The U.S. is sending a message to foreign auto makers, and who got the message? Well, Korean trade attache Myeng Keun Ha said: "Future Korean investment in Canada will end if the U.S. harassment does not. It will be safer to invest directly in the United States".
This is not the New Democratic Party saying this. This is an offshore trade official saying they will not invest in Canada if the harassment continues, contrary to the pious wishes of the minister.
In conclusion, I would like to quote from Mr. Gordon Ritchie in an essay in The Wall Street Journal. For the edification of the minister, Mr. Gordon Ritchie was one of the principal architects of this deal. He said in consequence to the American reaction to Canada's protest of the U.S. countervailing duties on Canadian softwood lumber: "Senior officials in the Bush administration have hinted the U.S. may refuse to be bound by the decision of the binational panels or may even refuse to allow the case to go before them. This would be tantamount to tearing up the free trade agreement".
If the Americans do not get their own way, Mr. Ritchie is saying, there is some suspicion they will go about it by bullying and threatening, in effect tearing up the deal anyway.
On the last comment on the EC, nonsense. The minister knows very well that the European Community is made up of relatively the same size population and countries with varying degrees of economic development: the poor regions of the south coming into the richer regions of the north, all under a social contract protecting workers conditions, the environment and other areas. There is nothing like that, when the minister talks about Latin America, coming from Mexico. Even today's newspapers point out there is no protection.
I say to the minister that point by point he has lost his argument.


Mr, Wilson (Etobicoke Centre):: Mr. Speaker, let me respond to some of these outrageous statements that my hon. friend has made. Let us talk about the trade statistics. In the trade statistics, as I indicated clearly, we have increased our exports into the United States' market. The rest of the world's exports into the United States have dropped. In other words, we have benefited by the free trade agreement in relation to other countries trading into the United States' market.

My hon. friend refers to the trade surplus. The part of our trade surplus that is covered by the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement, goods and services-not interest, dividends and tourism-is up about $1.5 billion since the free trade agreement came in.
The next point he refers to is statements by Gordon Ritchie. In this case, I agree with my hon. friend and I agree with Gordon Ritchie. If the U.S. did not allow any decision on softwood lumber to go to the binational dispute settlement panels, that would indeed be a very serious thing. I just do not believe that will happen and we will see what happens in time.
My hon. friend referred to the European Community, countries relatively the same size going into the European Community: Luxembourg of 1.5 million people is right next door to Germany, a country of now 75 million people; Belgium and France, Belgium with about 10 million people against France with 50 million to 55 million people. My hon. friend lost that point as well.
The final point that I will speak to is the Honda issue. My hon. friend says the auto pact is not part of the free trade agreement. I appreciate him saying that because that is contrary to what his colleagues have been saying for the last three years. Honda is not a part of the auto pact, so it would be governed by the ordinary rules of trade. If there is no free trade agreement, it would be covered by the ordinary rules of trade. It would not have the benefit of access to the United States market under the auto pact because it is not a member of the auto pact.
The thing that just astounds me every time I hear the NDP stand up and talk about the tremendous benefits of the auto pact is going back to the late sixties, we find that for three, four, five years the hon. member's party was blindly critical of the auto pact, saying that it was going to ruin our automotive industry and yes, there were some difficult times there.


An hon. member:: Yes, we were wrong.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: My hon friend says, yes, we were wrong. We are going to find out that the NDP is wrong about this debate on the free trade agreement, as it was wrong about the auto pact back in the late sixties.
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Hon. Lloyd Axworthy (Winnipeg South Centre):: Mr. Speaker, on a recent trip to Japan I had my first opportunity to see the unique Japanese institution called sumo wrestling where great behemoths of 300 or 400 pounds get together in a very small ring, clasp arms around one another and shake their jowls and move until one sort of falls over.
I thought that was a unique Japanese institution until I came to the House of Commons today and witnessed the debate between the hon. member from Esquimalt and the minister of trade. Here is our own re-enactment of sumo wrestling, two behemoths, overweight, overstuffed, sort of standing together stationary in entrenched positions being unable to understand that the world, the time and thinking must move on.
I am here to present what I think is a more effective and realistic position on the kind of trade initiative and the kind of trade program that Canada must consider.
Let us first take into account a certain false premise that the minister of trade injects into every single debate. He equates the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement with open free trade as if it is the only kind that is at all possible. We know he is wrong. There is the GATT for example based upon multilateral principles, where there are common rules and some common institutions and in which the tariffs have come down more substantially under the GATT than they did under the free trade agreement. There was greater movement after the Tokyo round of GATT negotiations to bring tariffs down between Canada and the United States than there has been under the free trade agreement. But the question is, what price was paid?
Under multilateral negotiations where there is a large number of countries in negotiation you do not have to go on a one-to-one bargaining relationship with a country 10 times your size. There is a way of pooling risk, pooling negotiating leverage and pooling bargaining power so that there can be shared benefits and shared costs.
There is also the auto pact, which is another form of opening up trade, but the key there is in the form of a managed trade agreement where the parties to the agreement, in this case both the United States and Canada, build in safeguards to ensure that employment would stay in their respective countries. If it did not stay in those respective countries they could change that

May 11, 1992
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agreement, they could bring the tariffs back. It was designed to ensure that employment in certain key sectors would remain.
There is also the European Economic Community which is quite a different model of free trade than what we have under the FTA. It was organized on very different principles, whether it would be some supema-tional organizations. It began on a sector by sector basis where there is a pooling of risk and a pooling of capital. Over time it was also a clear agreement that under the European Economic Community the parties to the agreement would also make joint decisions. There would be common law and common codes, none of which appears under the Canada free trade agreement. The fact of the matter is that the FTA has far less to do about bringing down tariffs and opening up trade than it does about putting handcuffs on the Canadian government and its ability to provide a management role in the economy.
The real story of the Canada free trade agreement was told to me across a dinner table by the chief negotiator, Mr. Reisman, where he admitted that the whole purpose of this is to make sure that governments in Canada would not be able to operate a mixed economy, but would be able to support the free market flows. In other words, it was far more an ideological document fitting in with the broad philosophy of the present government and its business corporate allies than it was a document trying to honestly analyse what is in the best interest of Canada.
The hard reality is in order to get the bargain this government gave up substantial powers in order to manage its economy and I would suggest to enable us to meet trade challenges in a much more competitive global environment.
The FTA is a continental trade agreement designed primarily to eliminate, reduce or to handcuff the activity of government institutions in Canada as a way of ensuring that the kind of economy we designed over the years would be eliminated and there would be a laissez-faire open market system in which government could not hold large corporations accountable. That is the real essence of the free trade agreement and that is why we are paying a price today.
Canadians in the past were never concerned about reducing some tariffs. We did it from 1948, the beginning
of the GATT, right through. At the same time there were governments in power that understood that there is dislocation when tariffs are reduced. Certain industries are affected and there were special programs brought in. I remember things like the Canadian Industrial Renewal Board to deal with things like the shoewear and the textile areas to help them retool, modernize and to deal with worker dislocation. There was a real dedicated effort to come to grips with the adjustments that were required, not by some phoney program of getting the federal government out of training by turning it over to the unemployment insurance contributions of the employer and the employees, the federal government abdicating its total role and cutting back its own commitments to training, which is one of the great fallacies that this government likes to perpetrate.
The reason I mentioned the different models of trade relations is because it has a very important bearing on what you do with the FTA. You have to analyse what the problem is in order to come up with the right answer. Before we do that, it is also important to deal with some of the phoney statistics used by the minister of trade, the Prime Minister and others as they try to convince Canadians of the unconvincable, that the free trade agreement is working. I suppose you do not have to go much further than the inherent wisdom of the Canadian people. In the last survey I saw, about 65 or 70 per cent were opposed to the FTA. Why? Because they know brothers, cousins and sisters and mothers who have lost jobs, who have seen their factories moved as a direct consequence of it.
The minister keeps saying: "Well, out trade is improving". Is it? Let us have a more accurate analysis drawn from the Bank of Canada Department of Finance's own figures. The three year merchandise trade surplus of Canada from 1986 to 1988 was $31.5 billion. From 1989 to 1991, it was down to $26.5 billion.
Canada's three year current account balance with the United States, not just the merchandise balance but the entire balance, all the invisibles, the dividends, the transfer payments between corporations was over a three year period from 1986 to 1988 plus $10.6 billion. Since 1988 and the free trade agreement, it is minus $10.8 billion. Is that a record of success? Is that a great demonstration of the effectiveness of the free trade agreement's ability to generate wealth?

:

May 11, 1992

In 1991 we had a minus $300 million current account balance with the United States compared to 1984 when they took over the government of a plus $6.7 billion surplus on current accounts. How can the Minister for International Trade, with any degree of honesty, any degree of accountability to the Canadian people get up and keep saying: "The thing is working" when in fact it has gone from a $6.7 billion surplus to a minus $300 million deficit. Is that the accomplishment the minister really likes to talk about? Is that the great success story he likes to parade across the country? If it is, he has turned the world upside down. He has been using inverted logic and funny-money economics. He really belongs with the Reform Party and its curious form of economic mathematics. He certainly does not belong in the role of minister of trade who has some responsibility.
Let us deal with one of the other canards that keeps being thrown in. The minister for trade throws in examples. I listened to his speech and he said: "Well, this factory, General Electric, I think is going to give us a world product mandate". It was not the first time, by the way. There were times before 1984 when world product mandates were done in negotiation with the Government of Canada and others.
What is happening is that IBM, Canada's largest computer firm by the way, just last Friday announced that all its marketing, all its research, all of its head office activity, its accounting is moving back to its head office in the United States with the loss of several thousand jobs along with it. That story has been repeated every single day across this country. There is not a constituency in this country that has not had to hold a graveyard ceremony for its lost industries: not layoffs, not jobs that will come back, but jobs that have moved south of the border.
I can say this. When we were discussing and debating the free trade agreement, the warning we offered at that time was that the specific kind of agreement negotiated by this minister and others would lead to a form of harmonization, where the pressure would be on to bring our tax laws, our environmental standards, our labour standards down to the lower level, unlike the European Economic Community which requires countries to go the highest level not the lowest level. As a result, I can point to firms in my own constituency which, faced with a cost
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problem, were basically forced to say: "Well, if I move to Tennessee there is no minimum wage. If I move to Texas there is no environmental code or labour standards". Therefore, if they get a marginal degree of interest on their costs from a balance sheet point of view it may make sense. From the point of view of the economy of the country, it is a disaster. It means a total, complete wipe-out of those jobs. There is nothing built into the FTA to deal with that fundamental problem.
I can recall that during the period of 1986, 1987 and 1988, debating with this minister in the House and asking:. "What would be built into the free trade agreement to take into account the appreciation of the dollar?" At the time, the U.S. Treasurer, who was Mr. Baker at the time, kept saying that one of the American agendas was to get its trading partners to bring up the level of their dollar in order to help bring down the U.S. trade deficit.
The then Minister of Finance said: "Oh, don't worry about it. It won't happen. It will never occur".
Since that time the Canadian dollar has appreciated by 16 per cent and as a result we have lost close to $24 billion of exports. That is the problem. There was nothing built into that agreement to take into account that whatever benefit that we might accrue as a result of a 2 per cent or 3 per cent reduction in tariffs we would lose by a 16 per cent appreciation in the dollar.
Do not tell me that was not part of the understanding that went along with the FTA. It was not written in the agreement. The minister may scoff but can he deny that the dollar has appreciated by 16 per cent since 1984, and that as a result we have been haemorrhaging a large number of our manufacturing jobs along the way?
There is clear evidence and that is the difference.
In 1988 we were debating what was hypothetical. They said it was going to be good, there were going to be jobs and economic growth, and salvation would be at hand. Elmer Gantry, otherwise known as the Prime Minister, went on the preaching pulpit across the country, supported by the corporate sector and a $10 million ad campaign, saying: "If you sign the agreement your hair will grow, the warts will go off your hands, there will be milk and honey pouring in downtown and on Bay Street, everyone will be happy". Who could say no or yes.

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We said that we saw problems and difficulties, and we set conditions, but there was no hard evidence.
The evidence is in. Four hundred thousand jobs have been lost and a million and a half people are unemployed.
Mr. Speaker, can you believe the statement of the minister in this debate in which he said: "We really are on the right track". Can you believe it? He is a minister of the Crown who, I hope, read the statistics that came out last Friday about the net loss of jobs. In my own province of Manitoba there has been a net loss of 17,000 jobs over the last two years.
Yet he is saying: "Hey, folks, we are on the right track". The right track to hell is where this government is taking us. It is taking us right down the road to decline as a country. Part of the reason is because it surrendered without a fight, without negotiations, the ability of the Government of Canada to be able to effectively manage its own economy.
Let me give a quick list of the things that we gave: U.S. national treatment rights to Canada's exports under article 105; tariff-free entry for U.S. processed dairy, poultry, and egg products, which is leading to the decline of the marketing boards; we relinquished Canada's right to use minimum export price requirements which meant that in the fish processing dispute with the United States we could not use that method as a way of protecting our fish processing industry; we relinquished Canada's right to levy export taxes; and harmonization with the U.S. of Canadian standards and related procedures for agricultural food and beverages which, as one of my colleagues pointed out in the House last week, means that substandard meat is being imported into Canada at this very time.
I have a whole page of things that were given away in exchange for that tariff reduction, which we had been successful in negotiating over the years under the GATT anyway.
Let me deal for a moment with the real question. There is no question that the free trade agreement is not working in the economic, social, or political interests of this country.
To cap that off, allow me to mention an interesting study released by OECD on Friday which pointed out that U.S. exports to Third World countries have increased more than any other country in the OECD.
Canada has declined, we have actually been losing our exports. The figure was at one time close to 13 per cent of our exports and is now down to 7 per cent.
It points out that our ability to mount an effective diversified export trade program in a world which is becoming far more pluralized has been lost. Our ability to target certain industries and to deal with certain programs that will allow us to open up marketing around the world as it becomes more pluralized and more diversified is being lost.
By every indicator-Japan, the Pacific, Latin America, and European communities-our exports are declining, partly because of the obsessive preoccupation of this government with the U.S. market. That is all it sees. That is where it puts all the resources. It is also partly because we have lost the ability of a Government of Canada to put in place the kind of policies and programs that would allow us a more diversified, pluralistic, and export-led trade program.
Another question is: "What do we do about it?" My friend from the NDP was less than complimentary about the fact that we have said that our position is to renegotiate.
First, let us understand a little history. I think the hon. minister recognizes that I was here when the history was made so I know something about it. Prior to the free trade agreement, in fact in 1987, our own party put out a very specific policy paper. I have it here in front of me if it needs to be tabled.
We said that any negotiations with the United States on free trade must meet certain conditions, and we set about 12 conditions. However, only two of them were met. It was on that basis that we rejected the FTA, particularly because it gave away the store, it gave away the farm, the factory and the transportation industry. It gave away our social safety net and probably eventually it will give away our water.
We are saying: "We still believe the free trade agreement is not working in the economic interests of this country, and we still believe, as we did then, that it was a bad deal". The question is what to do about it now. It has been in effect for four years. Some of the changes are already in place, some of the tariffs are already coming down.
May 11, 1992

If you abrogate it, then do we wipe those changes out and go through a readjustment? As Winston Churchill once said: "Once you have written it, you have to rewrite it". The fact of the matter is that there are certain problems.
Second, my friend from the NDP, who is an objective judge of good policy, knows that there is a certain requirement under international law on to deal with treaties. Unfortunately, It has now been signed into law, but during the election campaign his leader spent the last two weeks attacking us rather than the government, which he should not have done.
As a result, we did not get the number of seats in the House that would have meant that the agreement would not have gone through. Nevertheless it signed the agreement. Therefore, under international rules, it must be treated with a procedure and process that recognizes certain basic responsibilities and obligations under international law. One would be to at least give the Americans the right to say that they do not want to renegotiate.
Is that an unreasonable stand? My colleague asked the member for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca if he had an answer about what his own leader said. He did not but I do, because I have the actual article here. She said: "If elected, we would sit down with the Americans and say, how can we make this thing work? If not, we would give them six months' notice".
Does that not sound like renegotiation? It sounds like it to me. "We would sit down with them to see how we could make things work". Is that any different from what the leader of the Liberal Party said in New York and Washington when I was with him?
He said: "We have certain conditions that would have to be met on energy, on investment, on subsidy codes, on agriculture and if you do not want to talk, we will use our right to abrogate". That was the position that was taken. It is clear and it is unequivocal. By the way it also has the support of 69 per cent of Canadians. The Angus Reid poll said that 69 per cent of Canadians are reasonable and understand the importance of conducting international relations with some degree of responsibility, 18 per cent would scrap the agreement, 12 per cent would keep it, and 69 per cent would adopt the Liberal position.
Therefore, I would like to offer this amendment. I move:
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That the motion be amended by changing the period at the end to
a comma and adding the following words:
unless the Agreement has been successfully renegotiated in a manner satisfactory to Canadian interests.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: I take under advisability the amendment moved by the hon. member. We move on to questions and comments.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I take it from the way that the motion is phrased that if it cannot be negotiated the Liberal Party would abrogate it and accept all the penalties that my hon. friend referred to. It is an interesting way of approaching this very serious matter.
As I said earlier, this last speech pointed up the differences between both the Liberals and the NDP and the Conservative government. I want to address a couple of the points that my hon. friend raised.
He talked about a loss of sovereignty. In any trade agreement there is a loss of sovereignty. There is a loss of sovereignty in the GATT negotiations, the seven or eight that there have been since the war. There is a loss of sovereignty if we accept the Uruguay round because it covers services, it covers intellectual property, and it puts a much tighter framework around disciplines so all countries will be giving up some element of sovereignty.
My hon. friend went on to say that he likes the European Community model because that includes common law, common decision-making and common policies. It that what he is looking for between the United States and Canada? Surely not. That is why we have a free trade agreement rather than a common market like the European Community.
He again used these figures on the trade performance since 1988. He has taken a three-year average. If he examines that three-year average he will see that our trade surplus was coming down during that period. However since 1988 it has reversed itself and has moved higher.
He is making the same mistake as the member for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca made in comparing the current account surplus. It includes interest dividends and tourism which were not covered in any way by the free trade agreement. That sort of a statistic is a phoney statistic and my hon. friend knows it.

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He referred to harmonization. One of the key concerns about harmonization in the 1988 election was that we were going to scrap medicare. What do we see more recently in the United States? The United States is moving our way. It is looking at the Canadian health care system and thinking that is what it should harmonize with and that it should adopt. It is not happening the other way around, contrary to what his leader and he were saying during the course of the 1988 election.
He talks about water and losing the social safety net. That is nonsense.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: Yes, it is. You're speaking nonsense.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Can my hon. friends show me where water is being exported to the United States? Can my friends show me where the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement is undermining our social safety net? We have improved the social safety net since the free trade agreement.
My final point concerns the Canadian dollar. My hon. friend says that is was part of the understanding that we would push our Canadian dollar up.
I have commented so many times about this question that I get sick of hearing myself talk about it. Let me ask my hon. friend one question. If there was an understanding why, has the Canadian government abrogated that understanding by allowing the Canadian dollar to fall from 89.5 cents to the current level of 83.75 cents? Why have we been able to get away with that if there was this understanding between the United States and Canada? There simply was no understanding. My hon. friend knows that and to perpetuate it is to greatly mislead the Canadian people.


Lloyd Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased once again to offer some rebuttal to the minuet of false pretensions of the Minister for International Trade. He is more skilled at dancing on his toes than he is at telling the truth.
He says: "Well, things are still getting better". Let us just use the last complete year. At $103 billion, domestic exports to the United States were down $2.1 billion the last year. Let us look at what constitute our exports. I will tell the House where we are losing our trade with the United States. Motor vehicle engines and parts, truck tractors, chassis, and various forms of equipment are down 19.1 per cent. What is up? Crude petroleum. We are again shipping off our raw resources with no
value added, no job content, in exchange for the more heavily mechanized heavy equipment development in the industry. It is no wonder we are losing manufacturing jobs.
If this is a minister who is satisfied with Canada becoming a hewer of wood and a drawer of water, if that is the Tory economic policy, then it is no wonder that the Canadian people are just waiting for the moment when they can turf them out on their ears. The fact of the matter is that Canadians want to be highly competitive, they want to have a highly sophisticated economy. They do not want to be using up our valuable natural resources in exchange for lost service manufacturing jobs.
This minister who knows no equal when it comes to making this world safe for euphemisms was able to say: "We have added to the social safety net". Let us look at how the government has done that. It has totally abdicated and withdrawn from any responsibility in the unemployment insurance fund. It has turned over the entire funding to the employers and the employees, which means that it now excludes young people who are not eligible for unemployment insurance, women who are coming back into the work force, and people who have exhausted their benefits. There are two and three-year waiting lists for those training programs. This is a government that says: "Look at what a wonderful job we are doing".
It has carved more holes in the social safety net than the Spaniards have fishing nets off the east coast on the Grand Banks, where we are losing all that cod.
The fact is that the free trade agreement, based on a hard-nosed analysis, is not working in the economic interests of this country. The government has done nothing to provide any response to it, no adjustment program and no attempt to renegotiate.
Even worse, it is repeating the same mistake. One would think that after you had hit your country between the eyes with a two-by-four you might ease off a little. However, the government is now down there negotiating the same kind of deal with the same kind of people. It is going to make the same botch of it because it does not understand the importance of ensuring that in this competitive world there is a government in place that knows how to stand up for Canadians, to preserve our independence, and work to ensure that there is an effective government working for Canadians rather than working against them.
May 11, 1992


Mr. Steven W. Langdon (Essex-Windsor):: Mr. Speaker, you suggested earlier that you were going to make a ruling with respect to the amendment which had been moved. Are we now speaking on debate to the amendment or are we speaking on debate on the main motion?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: The amending motion presented by the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre is still under advisement. However, to avoid depriving anyone of a chance to speak, I will allow debate on the motion, pending the Chair's ruling. I prefer not to intervene at this stage. Resuming debate on the amending motion of the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre.


Steven W. Langdon: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
The amendment which the Liberal Party has moved today points out the differences which exist in trying to deal with the devastation which has hit this country as a consequence of the free trade deal.
There is an approach that says: "Let's recognize this devastation. Let's recognize the causes of it and let's talk about doing something different, about taking a different approach. Let's replace the free trade deal with a new economic strategy that does not make us dependent on the United States, that does not tie ourselves in with all sorts of giveaways which we have given to the United States in the free trade deal". That is the approach of the New Democratic Party.
Then there is the approach of the Liberal Party. It says: "We are not quite sure but we think that we can renegotiate this", without ever indicating what would be renegotiated.
The United States has indicated what it would like to renegotiate. It would like to renegotiate so that some of the protections for Canadian culture are done away with. Perhaps that is what the Liberal Party wants to renegotiate, perhaps it wants to give that to the United States.
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The United States has said that it wants to renegotiate the auto pact. Various members of congress in the United States have said that they want to see a change in that free trade agreement so that the safeguards Canadians have in the auto pact, which ensure that there is Canadian content, are done away with. Perhaps the Liberals want to sit down with the Americans to renegotiate and do away with that.
The United States has also said that Canada got away with far too much in the free trade agreement in terms of intellectual property rights. It has said that there should be much more constraint, it should be much more difficult for Canada to take a different approach than the United States. Perhaps that is what the Liberals want to renegotiate.
Those are the things that the United States has made clear it wants to see changed. All we can assume is that is what the Liberals want to see changed as well, because the Liberals are not prepared to tell us what their bottom line is. They are prepared to say to the people of Canada: "Yes, yes, do not worry. We are going to renegotiate. You can rest assured".
Canadians are cautious people. Canadians like to think that it might be possible, despite the fact that the person who negotiated this deal with the Americans was the key economic advisor to the Liberal leader. I am talking about Simon Reisman.
Simon Reisman was the key economic adviser to the member for Vancouver Quadra when he was leader of the Liberal Party. That member subsequently took such a strong position against that trade deal because it was not negotiated properly, as his Liberal party now says.
The Liberal Party was advised by Simon Reisman for years. The Liberals made Simon Reisman the Deputy Minister of Finance, the most powerful position in the bureaucracy of this country. He went down and negotiated a treaty and came back and said: "Boy, have we taken those Americans to the cleaners. They are virtually a Third World country in terms of negotiating skill when it comes to dealing with us from Canada".
Now we hear the Liberals say that despite this magnificent Liberal adviser who led the negotiating team, despite this magnificent Liberal appointee who had been Deputy Minister of Finance, despite the great skill that Simon Reisman was supposed to have demonstrated to generations of Liberals, despite all that it will somehow be possible to renegotiate. They are saying that through

May 11, 1992
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renegotiations it will be possible to make everything right.
It is certainly true that there are still some people in this country who believe in fairy tales. There are still some people who believe that over the rainbow everything is going to be beautiful. There are still people who think that in the end everything turns out right no matter what. They are morality believers. They really think that the world is a wonderful and good place and all of us simply have to sit down together and we will work out something just superb.
This is exactly the same Liberal Party that gets up day after day in this House of Commons and says that the Americans are not even respecting the present spirit of the free trade deal. They say: "They are not respecting the spirit of the deal but we are going to sit them down and good old Canada, the boy scout of the world, will prove to the United States the error of its ways. We are going to prove to the United States that all you have to do is smile and chuckle and, my goodness, life will be wonderful once more".
It is quite possible, listening to the Leader of the Opposition, that he actually believes that if he sits down with the President of the United States and he throws away his notes, as he likes to throw away his speech notes, it will be possible for the very force of his personality to persuade the United States that all these terrible attacks, against the spirit of the free trade deal which the Liberals attack, will somehow disappear.
Mr. Speaker, it is also possible that you will turn into Santa Claus and give everyone in this country a new car in their driveway. It is quite possible the Minister of Finance will actually turn into someone who cares about unemployed people in this country. That too is possible. Saul on the road to Damascus did after all have a magnificent conversion. However, it is a precedent that we have not seen repeated many times in the continuing history of our world.
I say to the House and the people of Canada that anyone who believes the Liberals when they say that: "Yes, there is good will on the part of the United States.
All we have to do is renegotiate it. We just have to say those words and because we are Liberals, after all, George Bush will sit down like a lamb and sign away everything which the Americans fought so hard to get and got in that past free trade deal".
This is not just pie in the sky on the part of the Liberal Party. It is fundamentally dishonest on the part of the Liberal Party to stand in this House of Commons and attack the United States for breaking the spirit of the free trade deal, attack the United States for being aggressive and tough in international trade, and then say: "We will be able to sit down with them and we will be able to sort it all out".
Of course, it is the kind of pie in the sky that Canadians would like to believe in. All Canadians across this country would like to believe in gingerbread houses in the middle of the haunted forest. We have all read the stories. However, the world is not like that.
Unfortunately, the Liberal Party has lost touch with the reality of the world. The Liberal Party has been out of power at the federal level so much and has proved itself so inept in power at the provincial level that it no longer has the capacity to see the world as it is. It sees the world instead as it would like it to be. It sees a world of fantasy figures, a world of good witches of the west who will come sweeping brilliantly down on to the stage and make everything right. It is dishonest. It is not just dishonest, it also begs the fundamental question when we start talking about the trade deal.
Canadians believe that we should not be in that trade deal as it is presently constituted. The vast, vast majority of Canadians believe that, and they are right. They have seen what the trade deal has done to this country. They also know realistically that if we are going to get out of the trade deal there have to be alternatives. There has to be a new strategy, a new direction and a new approach that we take. The Liberals by saying: "Well, all we have to do is we just have to sit down and talk" are avoiding facing that tough question of what the alternatives are. They are avoiding answering in a responsible way the question that surely any party that wants to govern must answer, and that is: What will you do instead of pursuing the free trade deal?
May 11, 1992

I do not think the answer is easy. I do not think there are easy answers to that question. That is why when we move our position today on this opposition day we do it with seriousness and we do it with a depth of conviction. We also do it with a considerable sense of just how serious a step this will be for Canada to take to move out of the free trade arrangement. There are no easy answers, but there are answers.
I think the answers are that we have to reverse direction, not just on the free trade deal but in three key areas: the free trade deal, the GST and the way in which we have kept our interest rates so much higher than those in the United States.
There seem to me to be seven steps in such a strategy. The first is that we have to recognize that a relatively small economy like Canada must have safeguards in its trade relations with a much larger economy like the United States. The auto pact, for instance, has been a great success in Canadian trade politics because it dealt with one broad sector and because it gave safeguards to Canadian producers. We have to look at other areas where it is possible to have deals like the auto pact.
Second, we have got to get rid of the GST. We have to replace it, not with a new manufacturers' sales tax or some kind of national sales tax on consumers, as the Liberals talk about sometimes. Instead it is time to put a fair tax system into place where we eliminate some of the unfair, unjust loopholes that exist, where we put into effect some of the taxes which work well in the United States, like a minimum corporate tax, where we restore some measure of progressive fairness in the income tax system itself.
Third, we have to focus on interest rates. We have got to see to it that they are no more than 1.5 percentage points higher than in the United States. That can be achieved by our Bank of Canada, but we have to recognize that this means a lower value for the Canadian dollar, probably in the 75 cent to 77 cent range.
Fourth, to make this strategy work, it is critical that the federal government keep tight control on the national deficit. In the view of the federal New Democrat caucus, which discussed this issue very carefully in planning our response to the past budget, Canada has reached a point with 35 cents of every tax dollar going for interest on the national debt where we must not increase the national deficit. To do so while carrying through major policy
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changes like a withdrawal from the free trade agreement would be a recipe for disaster.
Fifth, we have to take federal initiatives to get people back to work and to improve our work force. To do so, given concern about the deficit, means we must reallocate money in the national budget. That reallocation can come from less defence spending, from fewer government departments and cabinet ministers and from a new approach that streamlines the host of different agencies that now hand out money to corporations for regional development. A single regional development bank that loans money instead of giving it away would make much more sense.
Sixth, we need an economic recovery fund in this country, organized like similar investment pools in Europe with the co-operation of business, labour and government. This national fund would attract money from the private sector as in Europe from RRSPs, pension funds, and mutual funds. This pool of capital would then be available to build up and modernize key parts of Canada's industrial sector.
Seventh, finally, for the community and small business level of our economy, we need a community economic development strategy in this country. We have spent a good deal of time talking with community economic development groups across this country who have shown us what exciting initiatives can take place at the local level to get people back at work if the money is available for those groups on a consistent, continuing basis.
Over all it is possible to replace the trade deal with a new economic strategy of the kind I am talking about. But we cannot do that until we face reality and facing reality means recognizing that this is not a world of fairy tales. This is not a world, as the Liberal Party would like us to believe, where everything is coming up roses and Canada is just going to get its way by smiling sweetly. We have to face the need to very clearly and specifically say to Canadians that we are going to get out of this trade deal. We are going to replace it with a new economic strategy. We are not going to get lost in the never, never land of long, tedious negotiations with the United States which will give us nothing in terms of benefits, create tremendous uncertainties in this country and be fundamentally dishonest so far as the people of Canada are concerned.

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The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: Before giving the floor to the hon. member for Ottawa South, I am ready to rule on the motion moved by the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre. That motion is in order.


John Paul Manley: Mr. Speaker, in listening to the speech of the NDP member for Essex-Windsor as well as that of the member for Esquimau-Juan de Fuca earlier, I have a sense of deja vu of the 1988 election campaign.
It seems that the NDP, which is so bankrupt of ideas of its own, when it gets a little desperate, turns not to attacking the Conservatives but to attacking the Liberals. We saw it in the 1988 election campaign when in the last 10 days of the campaign, the Leader of the New Democratic Party spent most of his time attacking John Eimer who had made the free trade agreement the issue of the campaign.
It started its campaign with its leader not even mentioning the issue. Then, he climbed on the bandwagon, and as soon as he was on it, he tried to push John Thrner off the bandwagon. What a bizarre scene that was.
We now see that we are trying to deal with the difficult problems that this, having been put into this relationship, has created for Canadians. What does the NDP do? As the last speaker demonstrated, he spent fully 13 minutes of his 20-minute speech attacking the Liberals, trying to make fun of the idea of renegotiation.
I have a few problems with that. I tried to get an answer from his colleague earlier, unsuccessfully. I look at the weekend edition of The Financial Post from October 26 to October 28 and see on the front page the Leader of the NDP saying or at least being quoted as saying: "If elected, we would sit down with the Americans and say: How can we make this thing work?". It sounds a lot like sitting down and renegotiating to me.
What do we have here? We have the NDP standing up and saying: "No, we are just going to abrogate. We do not mind the fact that this is a huge and complex trading relationship that we have going here. We do not mind the fact that we have countless enterprises in Canada that are reliant upon a trading relationship with the
United States. We will not even try to work out our problems. Day one, we are going to abrogate".
Then, what are we going to do next? One of the things we are going to do, point one of his seven point program, is to look at other areas for deals like the auto pact. I am sure we will make a lot of progress with the United States sitting down and proposing other managed trade arrangements with the Americans, after he has abrogated the free trade agreement on day one without even having begun to discuss the difficulties that we have with it.
The fairy tale that he really should be confronting is the fairy tale notion that the NDP solutions for the Canadian economy in complex times like these can be dealt with by ranting and raving against the Americans.
We do not go up to the biggest kid in the schoolyard and provoke a fight with him. We have to find a way to outsmart him. What we need to do is sit down at the table and work out a relationship with the United States that is going to correct the wrongs of the last few years and find a solution for us to begin to prosper once again.


Steven W. Langdon: Mr. Speaker, there are two points that I would make in response to my friend from Ottawa South.
Of course, he was not here during the debate and the fight that took place prior to 1988, so he will not realize that for years in this House of Commons it was the New Democratic Party which fought against free trade, which fought at every stage against the movement on the part of the Conservatives, and supported by the Liberals in the early stages, to establish a free trade deal with the United States.
He will not realize that it was not until 1987 that the Liberal Party changed its position and said: "We finally decided, in part because the NDP's position in the polls was so much higher than the Liberals, that we will change and adopt the NDP view on the free trade deal". It happens that I was very pleased when that particular conversion took place. Over the years we have become used to us taking positions based on thinking, based on analysis and based on looking at the world as it really exists.

Sometimes it takes the Liberals, six months, a year, sometimes two years and sometimes it has taken them 20 years as in the case of medicare. Often it has taken a long time for them. Often they have said: "Yes, I guess the NDP was right".
The last point which I would make with respect to this particular comment is simply to say that the auto pact, I should say to my friend, is not with the United States as far as Canada has set it up. The auto pact is something of which any country in the world could be part.


Mr. Speaker:: I have been listening with very great care to the hon. member's remarks, but unhappily I have to announce that it being two o'clock p.m., the House will now proceed to Statements by Members, pursuant to Standing Order 31.


STATEMENTS PURSUANT TO S. O. 31
Mr. Fred J. Mifflin (Bonavista-Trinity- Conception):: Mr. Speaker, the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization, NAFO, is meeting in Dartmouth this morning to develop a system for conserving the rapidly diminishing groundfish stocks off the Grand Banks.
While unemployed Canadian fishermen are forced to lay aside their nets, they can look outside the 200-mile limit and see 88 European vessels fishing non-stop. I know, Mr. Speaker, I did a patrol out there at the beginning of this month.
The minister of fisheries said last week that only in desperation will Canada act beyond 200 miles. Ask the 80 families on the Bonavista Peninsula that have had no income or compensation since the FPI plant in Port Union closed in February if the situation is desperate. They are losing their possessions and are beginning to go hungry. Their hopes are dwindling like the fish stocks on which their future depends.
I am joined by the Official Opposition in urging this government to take bold action now in response to a truly desperate situation and give NAFO a deadline for
Canada taking control over the nose and tail of the banks if foreign overfishing does not cease.


WESTRAY MINE DISASTER
Mr. Peter L. McCreath (South Shore):: Mr. Speaker, once again a Nova Scotian community has been devastated by a coal mine explosion. Coal mine disasters are part of our history in Nova Scotia, a part we had thought left behind with the closure of the Springhill mine some 30 years ago. Now history has repeated itself and far too many families are touched by it.
No one feels this tragedy more than the local MLA, Premier Don Cameron, who quite properly has indicated there will be a full and independent inquiry into the whole matter and so there should be. To that commission should be left the task of asking questions and seeking answers.
The rest of us, politicians, media and certification seeking unions should stand back from this process. Rather we should join with all Nova Scotians in using our energy, our resources and our empathy to assist those who have been directly touched by this tragic event.
Let all members here join together in sharing our thoughts with the families of the miners and let us pray that those who still remain below will be found alive and well.



Mr. Rod Murphy (Churchill):: Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the federal New Democratic Party, I would like to extend our true sympathy to the family and friends of those who died in the Westray mine explosion this past Saturday.
Our compassion for the grieving families is as great as our hope for those men who are still missing. We hope they may be safely rescued.
As the past labour critic of our caucus, I know of the terrible danger that Canadians workers encounter day after day. Nowhere is this sad fact more apparent than in the coal mines of Nova Scotia.
Not quite two weeks ago, on April 28, workers honoured those who have been killed or injured in the workplace and had resolved to improve occupational

May 11, 1992
health and safety everywhere. Each year over 1,000 Canadian workers are killed on the job. We must add 11 more in 1992.
Now we must give our sympathy to those grieving families and we must give our understanding to those families who await the rescue teams. However, calls for an independent and impartial public inquiry must be listened to in order to safeguard against another disaster such as this.
Mr. Speaker, at three o'clock I will formally ask the House to consent to a minute of silence out of respect for the miners of Westray and for their families.
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THE PRIME MINISTER
Mr. David Walker (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, we all know the old expression "a picture is worth a thousand words", but the real question is, when is the picture worth $56,000? The answer, when the Prime Minister deals with the rights of the child.
Apparently in his never-ending search to be seen at the right place at the right time, the Prime Minister got taxpayers to chip in $56,000 for his photo opportunity. When asked in the House of Commons about such waste, the Prime Minister was so indignant that he was speechless, or at least almost so.
Let us see where this $56,000 could have been spent. How about in Winnipeg's inner city where Challenge '92 cannot find enough money to help needy students? A picture is worth a thousand words but $56,000 is worth 20 summer jobs.
Perhaps if these students came to Ottawa for a picture with the Prime Minister, they too could be successful and famous. In the meantime, tough luck, says the Prime Minister.


AIRPORTS
Hon. Alan Redway (Don Valley East):: Mr. Speaker, the greater Detroit area has 15 airports serving about 4.3 million people. By comparison the greater Toronto area, serving a similar population, has only five airports; Pearson, the Island, Mount Hope, Oshawa, and Button-ville.
Buttonville is one of the busiest airports in Canada, handling over 76,000 passengers a year, accounting for almost 300 jobs and generating $60 million annual income.
Without help from the federal government, help it has never before received in almost 50 years of operation, Buttonville may soon be forced to close.
In his February budget speech, the Minister of Finance stressed the important contribution that adequate infrastructure like airports make to our competitive position as a nation. He was right. Surely we are not going to damage Toronto and Canada's competitive position by allowing Buttonville to close.


BREAST CANCER RESEARCH
Mrs. Shirley Maheu (Saint-Laurent-Cartierville):: In
1960, one woman out of twenty was likely to have breast cancer. The ratio is now one out of nine, but no one knows why.
Last week, more than 5,000 Canadian women died of the effects of this type of cancer. Funding for breast cancer research is negligible. In 1991, only $4 million was spent on research, to fight a disease that kills and mutilates thousands of Canadian women.
This is an intolerable situation that demands drastic action now.

Canadian women are fed up with this government's inaction. Once again we must spend more money on research. We must beat breast cancer. To do less would be irresponsible and cowardly.


MENTAL HEALTH WEEK
Mr. Rene Soetens (Ontario):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to remind the members of the House and the public that last week was Mental Health Week.
The Canadian Mental Health Association used this occasion to raise public awareness about the rights, needs and abilities of persons with mental disorders and about mental health promotion issues affecting all Canadians.
May 11, 1992

This year's theme was housing. People who lack safe, affordable, long-term housing are exposed to severe stresses and deprivations. These can cause serious health problems, both physical and mental. Low income and discrimination creates special housing problems for many people who are recovering from mental illness and trying to reclaim a place in the community.
Local branches of CMHA across Canada held special events to highlight the issue of housing and mental health.
Please give them your full support throughout the balance of the year.


CHILD CARE
Ms. Dawn Black (New Westminster-Burnaby):: Mr. Speaker, we know that in 1991, 1.3 million Canadian children under the age of six needed child care because both or their only parent was in the paid labour force. There are only 320,000 licensed child care spaces in all of Canada.
The Tories have taken more than $1 billion per year out of the Canada Assistance Plan which funds child care, social assistance, and programs for families at risk. That is 10 times as much as the $100 million per year they announced they would put in for children at risk.
When will the government realize that pre-school children without child care are at risk?
Tax credits do not create child care spaces. Poor children need child care so their parents can look for jobs, so they can eat regularly, so they can learn and play. In a country in which one out of six children is poor, Canada's health minister said that poverty is not a child's reality.
Well, Mr. Speaker, clearly the minister has no grasp of reality.


ECONOMIC RECOVERY
Mr. Guy Saint-Julien (Abitibi):: Mr. Speaker, according to President Andre Berard of the National Bank, the recession is over. Mr. Berard said it was time to be optimistic and look at the months and years ahead as a time for taking advantage of new opportunities.
Economic recovery is expected to be particularly strong in Canada because this country has a definite edge over other large industrialized economies.
According to Mr. Berard, we have won the first round in the fight against inflation, which is now below 2 per cent. By digging in his heels, Mr. Crow has given new credibility to Canada's financial policy.


HUMAN RIGHTS
Ms. Margaret Mitchell (Vancouver East):: Mr. Speaker, this government prefers to exclude those who do not conform rather than amending the Human Rights Act to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation.
It has condoned the discriminatory practices of the Armed Forces and ignored reports of the independent Security Review Committee which ruled that the military's policy against employing or promoting homosexuals violates the charter.
The latest victim is Lieutenant Michele Douglas, a declared lesbian, who graduated at the top of her class in basic training. As a result of a recent ruling of the Supreme Court of Canada this officer has been denied a top security clearance and lost her job.
We support the recommendation of John Bassett, head of the Security Review Committee, that this government must amend the CSIS act to protect human rights. People of all sexual orientations must be protected under the Canadian Human Rights Act.


TOURISM
Gregory Francis Thompson: Mr. Speaker, tourism was a $26 billion industry in Canada in 1991, employing more than 600,000 people in 60,000 businesses and represents the fourth largest generator of foreign capital into the country.
However, while the world continues to discover the rich diversity this country has to offer, it seems Canadians are increasingly choosing to take their money and travel abroad.

May 11, 1992
Last year Canadians spent $15 billion on tourism outside the country and the federal government has been working to stem this outflow of money by encouraging Canadians to take their next vacation here at home.
As part of this initiative the minister of tourism has launched an extensive advertisement campaign entitled "Canada-A World All Our Own" to remind Canadians that a vacation here is spectacular and good value by any comparison. May 11 to 17 is National Tourism Awareness Week. Let us take a look at where we spend our tourism dollars and see if we can spend a little more here at home.


TRANSCANADA PIPELINES
Mr. Joe Comuzzi (Thunder Bay-Nipigon):: Mr. Speaker, over this past weekend TransCanada Pipelines unveiled a truly remarkable recycling project located in my riding of Thunder Bay-Nipigon.
TransCanada Pipelines uses turbo compressors to move natural gas. These compressors generated a great deal of heat which was released into the atmosphere. Now the company has developed and built a turbo generator which takes this heat, combines it with additional energy, allowing it to produce 36 megawatts of electric power. In layman's terms, it is enough power for over 20,000 homes.
In essence what it has done is take waste heat, recycle it, and produce electric power. All Canadians should be extremely proud of this Canadian company for its research and development.
Mr. Gerald Maier, president of TransCanada Pipelines and David Russell, vice-president and all of the people involved in this huge project at TransCanada Pipelines should be congratulated on this wonderful and outstanding achievement.


REFORM PARTY
Mr. Scott Thorkelson (Edmonton-Strathcona):: Mr. Speaker, like many Canadians I was deeply concerned when I saw the Toronto riots on TV. We must eliminate racism from our police forces, government agencies and among Canadians themselves.
The mean-spirited Reform Party would abolish the Department of Multiculturalism, end funding for race relations programs, cross-cultural programs, integration and literacy programs. These programs help new Canadians integrate into society. Just when Canadians are looking for solutions to end racism, the Reform Party wants to institutionalize it by ignoring the problems.
The Reform Party naively and ignorantly believes racism does not exist in Canada. It does and we must have the proper machinery in place to deal with it. The Reform Party would make Canada a turbulent, mean, intolerant society.
Canada deserves better than the intolerance of the Reform Party.


WESTRAY MINE DISASTER
Mr. David Dingwall (Cape Breton-East Richmond):: Mr. Speaker, sadly once again disaster has befallen the coal miners and their families of Nova Scotia.
At the best of times coal mining is a punishing occupation, unpleasant to work at, and potentially dangerous to the miner's health. The explosion on the weekend at the Westray Coal Mine in Plymouth, Nova Scotia, fulfils the worst of the miners' fears and the fears of an entire community.
It is an unhappy duty for me once again to offer condolences to the relatives of young people who met a sudden and tragic death; a hard end to a hard life. To those involved in the rescue operation, some of whom have come from my own riding in Cape Breton, we offer our sincere thanks.
Mr. Speaker, even at this late hour our prayers still continue and our hope shall never die.


KURT BROWNING
Mr. Doug Fee (Red Deer):: Mr. Speaker, Canadians know and appreciate the athletic skill of three times men's figure skating champion, Kurt Browning. Kurt's athletic achievements and abilities do not need to be embellished, they speak for themselves.
Kurt spoke in Red Deer last week to the Alberta Sports Council. He talked on volunteerism. Participants were not aware that Mr. Browning two days before had provided an outstanding example. There is another Kurt, an eight-year-old boy in Toronto who has exhibited great
May 11, 1992

Oral Questions
personal courage and strength in battling heart and lung problems.
Young Kurt was a great admirer of Mr. Browning. The Children's Wish Foundation had asked Kurt if he would make time to visit his eight-year-old fan. He did more: He spent the entire day with him; he took the youngster skating, he did a back flip for him, he skated his entire Canadiana routine and then hosted the family at a Blue Jay's ball game.
Kurt Browning will never seek recognition for this selfless gesture. But this indicates why those of us who know him respect him for more than his athletic ability. Kurt Browning has skated for Canada. He is a proud Canadian and a Canadian whom we can all be proud of.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Mr. Paul Martin (LaSalle-Emard):: Before starting, Mr. Speaker, I am sure that all of us on both sides of the House wish to associate ourselves with the words that were spoken by the member for Cape Breton-East Richmond.

Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Finance.
When we talk about economic problems, the minister is inclined to hide behind international projections. I suggest he listen to the local projections from the streets of Montreal: 20 per cent of our young people are officially registered as unemployed, thousands more than a year ago; 36 per cent are drop-outs; and 21 per cent of our families are living below the poverty line.
Yesterday, one of my constituents told me it was the saddest Mother's Day in her life because she was no longer sure her children still had a future.
My question is this: What kind of hope can this government offer a whole generation of young people it ignored during the years that are so decisive for their education?


Hon. Don Mazankowski (Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, the Canadian economy is weak, and we have acknowledged that, because the world economy is weak. It is not because of our policies. It is a world-wide economic slowdown. That is reflected in the downward revision of the OECD and of the IMF. As the hon. member knows, having been in business himself, Canada's economic activity is based to a large extent upon our ability to export internationally.
I can indicate to the hon. member that with the pick-up in the United States, and the United States is our major trading partner, there is a clear indication of some pick-up on the trade side. Our exports to the United States are improving. That is reflected in some job improvement.
In the case of the statistics that were just reported, some 34,000 new jobs were created in the manufacturing sector; some 24,000 new jobs created in the merchandise trade sector. I should also indicate to the hon. member that we see today a major movement toward greater job training and skills upgrading. I remind the hon. member that 70,000 UI claimants are now engaged in training and skills upgrading. I think that is a very positive indication because that is part and parcel of the restructuring and adjustment process that is going on and the need to upgrade our skills and to retrain our people.


Paul Edgar Philippe Martin: Mr. Speaker, what is truly frightening is that the minister may actually believe what he is saying.
The facts are that the future for our youth is getting bleaker and bleaker with every passing day. Many of our young people cannot get the training which is required for the jobs of tomorrow, and many of those who do have the training cannot find jobs in their field of study. As a result of this government's inaction, we may well be facing an entire lost generation. The question is: How can our young people be expected to compete in the future against European and Japanese youth who are not only being given complete skills and educational training in a wide range of apprenticeship areas, but whose governments have developed the industrial base which is required to develop them?

May 11, 1992
Oral Questions


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, I am glad that the hon. member does agree with me because the Labour Market Development Strategy is a clearly designed policy to do just that.
As I indicated, 70,000 UI claimants are now receiving training and that compares to something like 20,000 per month in the first six months of 1991. So really the programs that we have put in place, the replenishment and indeed the expansion of the training fund that I announced in the budget, are a clear indication that we are spending money on skills upgrading and job retraining and that provides encouragement to our young people. It also helps those who are adjusting into a different kind of economy that is emerging. The hon. member knows that and I have heard him speak about it.
The economy of Canada is indeed changing. We have to recognize our educational programs. We have got to recognize our training and our skills upgrading. That is part and parcel of the prosperity agenda that is being so eloquently managed by my colleague, the Minister for International Trade.


Paul Edgar Philippe Martin: Mr. Speaker, this is incredible. The prosperity agenda is simply a lot of useless analysis that is confirming something that everybody in this country has known for a long, long time.
For the love of heaven, get on with the job. The industries of tomorrow are created by the research and development budgets of today, which this government has decimated over its mandate. The exports of tomorrow will be created by the small businesses of today. They require technology diffusion. They require patient capital. Nowhere has this government given any indication that it understands the need.
The question is: When will this government understand the comparative advantage is not something that is simply inherited by a people? It is a stage that is created by farsighted governments.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, I do not disagree with the observations of the hon. member. That is why the budget that I brought down on February 25 addressed every one of those items: research and development,
manufacturing and processing, improving the investment climate, improving research and development, all of which is co-ordinated and synchronized with the initiatives of the Minister for International Trade.
In addition, the member referred to the small business initiative. I remind the hon. member that Canada has the best tax regime in the world for the small business sector.


EMPLOYMENT
Lloyd Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Finance says we are on the right track. It is a track that is totally bypassing the province of Manitoba.
In one year alone we have lost 17,000 jobs, 23 per cent of the job losses in Canada since the election took place in Manitoba, even though we have only 4 per cent of the population. Winnipeg has the highest level of child poverty in the country.
I am describing nothing less than the social and economic calamity in which this government totally ignores its responsibility and abdicates any role for investing in the province of Manitoba.
I want to ask the Minister of Finance: In light of these dramatic and tragic figures, will the Government of Canada undertake a special employment and economic development program for the province of Manitoba so our people can go back to work, which is what they want to do?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, the points that the hon. member has made have been addressed in the budget and they are being addressed by the Minister of Industry, Science and Technology and International Trade in the prosperity agenda.
The hon. member knows that the provincial government brought down what I think was a very prudent budget that was complementary to the initiatives that we undertook in terms of improving the competitive position of the manufacturing and processing sector, improving the climate for small business and improving the climate for investment.
I remind the hon. member that through our initiatives and the support for the agricultural industry, farm income is reported to be up by 74 per cent across the
May 11, 1992

prairie region in 1992. That too is a good indicator. That will create economic spin-off. That will create jobs.
In addition to the initiatives of skills upgrading and job retraining, we do have our priorities right.


Lloyd Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, I will tell you what the results of two Tory governments are for Manitoba.
We have had a 1.6 per cent loss in the GDP, which is the worst in the country. At the same time, this government has cut by 15 per cent the training funds going into the province of Manitoba. We have a two-year waiting list for people who need to be trained in the province.
I want to ask the Minister of Finance again. Under the clear evidence provided by these figures, will the Government of Canada immediately initiate and sign economic development agreements for the city of Winnipeg and the province of Manitoba so that we can get the province working again, put some stimulus in the economy and bring back some hope for the people of Manitoba?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, the figures that the hon. member cites are totally wrong.


Lloyd Axworthy: They are not wrong. Come to Manitoba.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: There is $3.4 billion being allocated to job retraining and skills upgrading. That is about a 50 per cent increase over 1990-91 and about a $300 million or $400 million increase this year over last year.
The hon. member cannot really make that claim and make it with any degree of justification. I have indicated we are part and parcel of an economic slowdown that is occurring throughout the world. There is adjustment taking place. There is restructuring taking place. What is important for Canada is to ensure that we provide the appropriate framework, the appropriate climate for investment, for job creation and for activity. That leadership has come from the federal government through the budget and it has been complemented by-


Mr. Speaker:: We must move on.
Oral Questions


Hon. Audrey McLaughlin (Yukon):: Mr. Speaker, may I say on behalf of myself and members of this side of the House that we share the grief of those in Nova Scotia who have lost their loved ones and certainly share their hope for those who are yet to be found.

Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Deputy Prime Minister. The Conference Board of Canada says that the social cost of dropping out of school is very high: $4 billion during the working lives of young people who dropped out in 1989. The government also has to spend over $30 billion annually to support those who have no jobs.
Since the government has to pay in any case to compensate for its economic policies, why does it not take the money and invest it in job creation?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, that is precisely what we are doing. Through the Labour Market Development Strategy, some 70,000 UI claimants are now currently engaged in training and skills upgrading.That is an important policy shift that this government has undertaken.
I agree with the hon. member in her observation. But I have to remind her that we are doing just that. We are providing more resources for skills upgrading and retraining to mesh the job needs with a newly emerging economy. The hon. Leader of the New Democratic Party should be encouraged by that.


Audrey Marlene McLaughlin: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary for the Deputy Prime Minister. It is also true that this government cut back $100 million in the Canada jobs funding in the last budget and that there is no training available for many people who want training. The people that I know and I am sure the people the minister knows do not want to be on unemployment insurance or on social assistance. They want a job and they want training in order to do that.
I must say if we look at the statistics, not only is it difficult for those who have dropped out of secondary school to get a job, but it is equally difficult for those who have post-secondary education. The Deputy Prime Minister says that he is doing some training, but it is true that

Oral Questions
the policies of his government have helped to create unemployment. I ask the Deputy Prime Minister what will the government do immediately to at least stop the loss of further jobs.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, I again remind the hon. member that some $3.4 billion is being provided for job retraining and skills upgrading. That is a $300 million increase from 1991 and about a 50 per cent increase from 1990.
We certainly are providing and earmarking a lot of funds. What are we going to do in the future? I indicated to the hon. member there is some pick-up in the manufacturing sector. There is some pick-up in the trade sector. What we did in the budget is tiy to identify those weak sectors of the economy, particularly the manufacturing sector, which needs to have a competitive and business environment and which has to have a competitive tax environment, and we have addressed that.
The hon. member suggests that there is an easy answer. I refer her to the recommendation of her employment and manpower critic, the member for Timmins-Chapleau, who said that the government should looking into printing the money it needs to spend its way out of the recession. I can tell her that is not a policy direction we will ever adopt.


Audrey Marlene McLaughlin: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary question is for the Minister for International Trade. I have a concrete suggestion and question for the Minister for International Trade.
In St. Catharines, Ontario, as the minister knows, a profitable GM foundry will close, throwing about 2,000 people out of work. In addition to the training needs of this country, we also need some changes in the kinds of agreements we have made with other countries.
Is the Minister for International Trade prepared to ask for increased Canadian and North American content rules for the Canadian auto industry so that we can at least maintain some of the skilled jobs we do have?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, my hon. friend should recognize that before she gets down to tight requirements on where the jobs should go she should reflect on the fact that 17 per cent of automotive production is in Canada, that is North American automotive production. She knows that we have somewhere around 10 per cent of the population.
With regard to her specific question on content, she is aware this matter is under review in the North American free trade negotiations. There is a range of requests ranging from the current 50 per cent to as high as 75 or 80 per cent.
We are consulting with the industry on a very intensive basis to decide what the appropriate level should be in view of the broad rules of origin, consultations and negotiations that are under way. I will take her comments under advisement as part of those consultations.


Ms. Albina Guarnieri (Mississauga East):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance.
It was this government, in partnership with the Bank of Canada, that embarked on a contractionary monetary policy that was guaranteed to kill jobs and further strangle Canadian workers in the middle of a recession. Rather than protect these workers, this government cut UI benefits and froze welfare payments to the provinces.
I ask the minister to justify his government's deliberate efforts to create unemployment and abandon its jobless victims. When will this government stop blaming unskilled workers for the unemployment it created?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, we did not cut unemployment insurance benefits. We redirected those benefits toward a process where people would be able to prepare for new jobs and new economic activities that are occurring as a result of a changing economy. Nor did we cut welfare payments. The payments going to the provinces under the CAP are going up at a minimum of 5 per cent per year, and in the have not provinces they are going up on the basis of demand.
May 11, 1992

The hon. member may want to correct the original allegation because I think it tends to be somewhat misleading and does not augur well for an enlightened debate.


Albina Guarnieri: Mr. Speaker, it is a shame that this government does not write its press lines from the welfare lines it created.
In the twisted view of this government, we are living in a time of recovery under its prosperity agenda. Yet today 172,000 fewer Canadians have jobs than they did one year ago at the height of the recession. There are 240,000 more people living on welfare in Ontario alone.
Why is the minister so unmoved by the face of misery on his unemployment figures that he offers only cosmetic remedies to mask the Tory gangrene that has left the Canadian economy with so few jobs? Why have the jobless been erased from the conscience of this government?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, I have not been unmoved by the trend toward the higher than acceptable unemployment figures. I want the hon. member and all other Canadians to know that. She can provide simplistic solutions but unfortunately that is not the answer.
What we have to do is get the fundamentals right. We had to ratchet down inflation and bring down the elements that drive up inflation, the inflationary expectations and the inflationary pressures. We had to put in place an appropriate fiscal and monetary policy that was co-ordinated. We have done that and we have had a considerable amount of monetary easing; over seven percentage points since the high of 1990.
These are the fundamentals. We have tried to encourage the housing sector. We have tried to improve the climate for the manufacturing and processing sector, the small business sector, and the investment side of things. These are the kinds of things that are necessary in order to restructure the economy and build a broad based, modem economy that Canadians expect of government.


Hon. Herb Gray (Windsor West):: Mr. Speaker, I too have a question for the Deputy Prime Minister.
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He has been talking a lot about training. In Windsor, Ontario unemployment has risen from 10.3 per cent in February to 12.8 per cent in April. In light of these disturbing numbers I ask the minister in the absence of his colleague the minister of employment: Why has the government cut the funds for summer student employment in Windsor this year by 20 per cent? Why has the government cut the funds under section 26 of the Unemployment Insurance Act for project based training in Windsor this year by 34 per cent?
If the minister is serious about jobs and training, will he undertake on behalf of the government to restore these funds, to cancel these cuts today?


Hon. Pierre H. Cadieux (Minister of State (Fitness and Amateur Sport) and Minister of State (Youth) and Deputy Leader of the Government in the House of Commons):: Mr. Speaker, as my colleague, the Minister of Finance, indicated a few minutes ago, the training funds have gone up in Canada by some $300 million compared to last year.
With respect to the specific question on the student Challenges program this summer, the funds are allocated by regions as my hon. colleague and friend knows. The funds for the Ontario province have been increased with the adjustments, bearing in mind where there was the biggest increase in unemployment during the year with respect to the students.
I am sure that my hon. colleague will realize that the funds have been increased by some $3 million over all this year. He probably participated in the recent Business Drive for Jobs that was launched last Friday in order to encourage the private sector to participate in hiring students for this summer.


Herbert Eser (Herb) Gray: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the Deputy Prime Minister.
His colleague's answer does not get away from the fact that funds for summer student employment in Windsor have been cut by 20 per cent this year and funds for project based training under section 26 of the Unemployment Insurance Act have been cut by 34 per cent.
Looking at another element of section 26 of the Unemployment Insurance Act, the funds for people taking courses for which they pay fees have been almost entirely used up already, with eight months to go this year alone.

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In light of the demand for training because of the high unemployment connected with this government's policies, will the minister undertake today to provide all the funds needed to respond to the demand for this kind of training? Can he give this undertaking today, right now?


Pierre H. Cadieux: Mr. Speaker, as I indicated earlier, the funds for the Challenges program have been increased over all by some $3 million this year, as they were increased by $3 million last year.
With respect to training per se under the other programs of employment and immigration, there is an increase of some $300 million compared to last year. It is $3.4 billion over all or nearly double the increase since the early nineties.
I believe that all their funds are there. With the co-operation of the private sector in the Business Drive for Jobs, which I am sure my hon. colleague will encourage and help, we will have all the jobs necessary for the students in his area and all across Canada.


CHILD POVERTY
Mr. Chris Axworthy (Saskatoon -Clark's Crossing):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Deputy Prime Minister.
Last week the Minister of National Health and Welfare made a number of statements which indicate that the government is abandoning its commitment to eliminate child poverty by the year 2000. The minister said: "This goal is an unrealistic dream". For the over one million children living in poverty in Canada, poverty is a real nightmare every day of their lives.
In November 1989 the Deputy Prime Minister voted along with every other member of this House to eliminate child poverty by the year 2000. Have he and the government reneged on this promise? If so, why?


Mrs. Barbara Sparrow (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of National Health and Welfare):: Mr. Speaker,
poverty is one of the greatest concerns of this government and indeed of everybody in the House.
No, the Minister of National Health and Welfare has not backed off. What he said at the committee meeting was that he was facing reality and that he would not commit himself that all poverty would be wiped out.
We would indeed continue forth with the child benefit plan that was announced by the Minister of Finance in February. That is $2.1 billion into the family unit. He also came forth a couple of weeks ago with Brighter Futures, another action plan. That is $500 million over four years.
We will continue with the strategy on drugs and family violence. We will never turn our backs on poverty, not one minute.


Chris Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, it is time the government got its message straight. Either it is going to keep its commitment to eliminate child poverty by the year 2000 or it is not. It is not an unrealistic dream. It is a promise that must be kept for all Canadian children.
I have a specific question for the parliamentary secretary. In the summer of 1988 the Prime Minister said that child care was a fundamental right. What has changed in the meantime? Why does the government no longer consider child care to be a fundamental right in Canada?


Barbara Jane (Bobbie) Sparrow: Mr. Speaker, we are realistically looking at the revenues, the expenses and the tax system this government has in place.
We had a choice and it was a very difficult choice. Children are extremely important, but what we have done is taken the limited funds we have-and I mentioned them earlier in my remarks-to target them at youngsters in need, at children in need. We are trying to take care of low birth weight babies, youngsters that live in poverty, youngsters who are not able to learn because they have not enough food and youngsters who are not immunized in this country today.
No, we are not turning our backs. We are directing what moneys we have to the most useful and best place possible.
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Oral Questions
INDUSTRIAL RESEARCH ASSISTANCE PROGRAM gives IRAP its particular strength. We intend to proceed
and work on the basis of that strength.


Mr. David Berger (Saint-Henri-Westmount):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister for Science and it is about the Industrial Research Assistance Program.
The minister says that the government completely supports IRAP. Yet the National Research Council told the industry committee of this House that the real value of IRAP's contributions to the private sector had declined by 28 per cent since 1984.
The minister's so-called new funds do not change that. IRAP and its customers are no better off this year than last.
Why does the minister refuse to provide the funding recommended by the committee which would allow the minister to say that the government completely supports IRAP in deed and not just in words?


Hon. William C. Winegard (Minister for Science):: Mr. Speaker, there has never been any doubt that the government supports IRAP and will continue to do so.
What we have done is put roughly $28 million into IRAP to make sure it stays where it is while we have another go at looking at the whole issue of technology diffusion in Canada.


David Berger: Mr. Speaker, for two years in a row, two unanimous committee reports of the industry, science and technology committee of this House have asked the government to restore IRAP's funding.
The National Research Council and small and medium sized businesses all across Canada need this money now and want the funding restored.
How can the minister justify his continued neglect of this program which he lavishly praises for creating jobs at minimal costs?


William C. Winegard: Mr. Speaker, the funding available for IRAP is certainly a significant part of the program, but most of the people I talked to while of course wanting to see more money in the program also make the very significant point that it is the network of people that IRAP has and the connection with the NRC laboratory system across the country that


GOVERNMENT CONTRACTS
Mr. Don Boudria (Glengarry-Prescott-Russell):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Deputy Prime Minister.
Today Canadians learned that while the government restraint applies to most people, it does not apply to the Prime Minister when it takes care of his own riding.
I want to ask the Deputy Prime Minister this. Why does the government preach restraint to all of us? Why is it that there is no money for the unemployed of Montreal, for the unemployed of my riding and for other unemployed Canadians yet there seems to be good and plenty when it comes to giving out contracts in the Prime Minister's own riding?


Hon. Paul Dick (Minister of Supply and Services):: Mr. Speaker, I read with some alarm the rather selective reporting of the $5 million that had gone to the Prime Minister's riding in procurement in the last four years.
I could not help but notice in the hon. member's remarks that in no way did he get that sort of help in his constituency of Glengarry-Prescott-Russell. He is absolutely correct. His riding in the last three years has had $27 million worth of procurement.
I also should say that Beausejour received $21 million and the Yukon had $26 million. It is very regretful that the press would only pick out one high-profile riding rather than doing a balanced look across the country.


Don Boudria: Mr. Speaker, I am sure all of us will be waiting anxiously at three o'clock for the minister to table all of that for all MPs. This answer comes to us from the minister and a government that spends $56,000 taking a picture of kids and has no money for child poverty in this country.

I would like to direct the following supplementary to the Minister of Supply and Services or to the Deputy Prime Minister. Now that Canadians know how much money has been handed out in the form of contracts, how can the government expect all Canadians to tighten their belts, when the government seems to be able to find enough money to reward people in the Prime Minister's riding?

May 11, 1992
Oral Questions


Paul Wyatt Dick: Mr. Speaker, obviously the hon. member read a supplementary which he prepared before he heard the answer to the first question.
This is hypocrisy and phoniness when more than five times is being spent in his riding in a shorter period of time than in the Prime Minister's riding. This is just hypocrisy.


CHILDREN
Dawn Black: Mr. Speaker, last December, Canada ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. In that convention articles 18(2) and (3) commit Canada to provide care for the children of working parents. Child care advocates have clearly indicated that the Brighter Futures program that the government announced last week does not meet the needs of Canada's children.
I want to ask the Deputy Prime Minister this. Why did this government ratify this convention at the UN if it did not believe that child care is an urgent need for Canada's children, including those children who are considered at risk?


Barbara Jane (Bobbie) Sparrow: Mr. Speaker, children form a very important part of the nucleus of our society. Indeed, we all are responsible for the youngsters. We are most interested in their upbringing, their health, their welfare, their education, their training and their future.
What we have done is we have taken the limited funds and we have targeted those children who are most at risk. I mentioned earlier, besides signing and ratifying the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, we have gone through with the various steps to support youngsters. Our plan of action on Brighter Futures will indeed help those youngsters who are really most in need.


Dawn Black: Mr. Speaker, in reality it is the policies of this government that continue to put the children of this country at risk. It has capped the Canada Assistance Plan. It has cut out any idea of a national child care program in this country.
It has put children at the bottom of the heap after going to the altar of deficit reduction.
The Prime Minister committed in good times and in bad times that Canada's children had a first call on Canada's resources.
I want to know when this government will take the issues of children seriously. When will this government honour the commitments that this Prime Minister has made over and over again to the children of Canada?


Barbara Jane (Bobbie) Sparrow: Mr. Speaker, as I said before, we do take the children very seriously. There are fewer living below the poverty line today than there were some years ago, but that is not good enough.
I just want to say to my colleague that we spend more than $15 billion annually through transfer payments and special programs, through the child care expense deduction and the child care tax credit, as well as what the Minister of Finance announced with regard to the child benefit program-and I look forward to a debate on that-and the action plan Brighter Futures.
We will indeed target our limited funds to the children most in need. They are the ones who need it.


TAX COURT OF CANADA
Guy St-Julien: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of National Revenue. On January 15, 1992, Louis Germain, Clemence Cote and their six children wrote to the Registrar of the Thx Review Board to lodge an appeal concerning income tax payable on family allowance payments. They asked for the appeal to be heard in Val-d'Or, but the Department of Justice decided it would be held 110 kilometres away from their home.
Does the minister realize that this refusal to hear the case in Val-d'Or means that Germain and Cote, who now have seven children between the ages of nine years and four months-the children will be present in court tomorrow-will have to make a 220-kilometre round trip on a road that is unsafe? Will the Tax Review Court of
May 11, 1992

Oral Questions
Canada grant the family's request and take corrective action as soon as possible?


Hon. Gerry Weiner (Minister of Multiculturalism and Citizenship):: Mr. Speaker, the minister is out of town today on government business, but I will certainly ask him to consider this matter as soon as he comes back and get in touch with the hon. member this week.


SAMSON CREE NATION
Mr. David Kilgour (Edmonton Southeast):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the acting Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development.
The Samson Cree Nation in Alberta is now owed approximately $400 million in oil and gas royalties which the minister's department has collected in trust for it.
In January of this year the minister said in Edmonton that the money would finally be handed over to them and I salute him for that. Will he give us a specific date as to when the money will be given? Will it be next week, next month or next year?


Hon. Monique Landry (Minister for External Relations and Minister of State (Indian Affairs and Northern Development)):: Mr. Speaker, I heard the hon. member's request about the application for funding submitted by the Cree community. I will pass the question on to my colleague as soon as I can get in touch with him. As the hon. member mentioned earlier, I am sure that negotiations are under way and that we will be able to respond to these concerns in the near future.


David Kilgour: Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the minister for her reply. I realize she is not acquainted with this particular case.

Chief Victor Buffalo is a highly respected First Nations leader in western Canada. He has been attempting to get this money now for, I believe, 12 years.
I repeat, will someone on the government side say when the money will be given? It is needed for schools, hospitals and all kinds of things by that band.


Monique Landry: Mr. Speaker, I can inform the hon. member that since the Prime Minister announced the new agenda for the native community, we have made tremendous progress in all matters concerning native people. This government has made commitments and delivered the goods. I am sure that in this particular case, as in others, we will be in a position to respond to the concerns of the community in question.


FISHERIES
Mr. Francis G. LeBlanc (Cape Breton Highlands-Canso):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Fisheries.
Today, the fisheries commission of NAFO, the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization, is holding an extraordinary meeting at Canada's request to discuss the surveillance reporting and enforcement of NAFO managed stocks in the nose and tail of the Grand Banks.
Would the minister spell out for this House what his government's minimum success requirements are for this meeting?


Hon. John C. Crosbie (Minister of Fisheries and Oceans and Minister for the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency):: Mr. Speaker, this is a special session of the NAFO Committee on Surveillance and Enforcement that was requested by the Government of Canada. It is in further pursuit of our objective which is to have established, outside the 200-mile limit on the nose and tail of the Grand Banks, an effective surveillance and enforcement system which is not now present in that area. In the last two years there have been other

May 11, 1992
Oral Questions
meetings of this particular committee which was set up at the urging of Canada.
Among the proposals we are making to this NAFO committee are proposals to place international observers on all of the vessels that fish outside the 200-mile limit on the nose and tail of the Grand Banks; proposals in connection with the objection procedure; and proposals with respect to improvements of the hail system, so that catches would be reported when leaving one zone to go to another fishery zone. There are some six proposals in all, including proposals for effective aerial surveillance.
Now, if all of these objectives could be secured this week we would be more than delighted. But if some of them are achieved, Mr. Speaker, that will be very good progress as well.


Francis G. LeBlanc: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary is also for the same minister.
The minister knows that NAFO has been totally ineffective in preventing blatant overfishing by its members. The European Community continues to set its own quotas unilaterally several times higher than those set by NAFO.
In the event that strong enforcement and surveillance measures are not adopted at this meeting, is the minister prepared to serve notice on the other members of NAFO of Canada's intention to pull out of this toothless organization and to extend the functional jurisdiction over these vital cod stocks? Does the minister not think that the situation in the northwest Atlantic calls for the desperate measures that he talked about in Cancun?


John Carnell Crosbie: Mr. Speaker, the amount of rhetoric used in connection with this issue is not going to assist. There is no point in calling NAFO a useless organization. NAFO has its uses.


Mr. Tobin:: Toothless. He didn't say useless.


John Carnell Crosbie: It does establish a management regime outside the 200-mile limit on our Atlantic coast. It does set quotas that all of the countries involved, with the exception of the European Community, have been observing. Even the European Community has observed many of the quotas.
It does enable scientific advice to be rendered as to the state of the stocks outside the 200-mile limit. There is no regional international fisheries organization in the world that has the power of enforcement. The reason is that sovereign nations have not chosen to give up any of their sovereign rights in connection with enforcement, giving enforcement power to these organizations.
No one country can change that. It can only be done by international negotiation and agreement and international consensus. That will not come if we simply shake our fists and howl and bawl and use exaggerated rhetoric.


CENTRAL POWER AND LIGHT COMPANY
David Barrett: Mr. Speaker, last week in this House I raised a matter with the Minister for International Trade concerning subsidies being granted by the Central Power and Light Company in Corpus Christi, Texas.
The minister agreed in his response to me that the subsidies offered by this company are a violation of the free trade agreement and said that the matter had been raised with GATT.
I would like to ask the minister, or someone on the government side, if the government is prepared to table with this House the letters or briefs that have been filed with GATT regarding the tax incentive violations against the free trade agreement. Is the government prepared to table its complaints to GATT in this House?


William C. Winegard: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member knows there are many members of Parliament sitting in this House who have the same kind of difficulties in their own ridings. Canada has always wanted to push this at the GATT and will continue to do so. That is where it must be resolved, at the GATT.


David Barrett: Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the minister for telling me the obvious. Now I would like him to answer the question.
May 11, 1992

The question is: The minister has said that the government has complained to GATT about these violations of the free trade agreement. I am asking the minister specifically whether the government is prepared to table with this House the correspondence or briefs it has sent to GATT regarding these particular violations.
The government has already complained. All we want to know is how it has complained, where is the correspondence, where are the briefs and do they exist?


William C. Winegard: Mr. Speaker, as members of this House will know, a lot of discussion goes on in the GATT without formal documents in front of the delegations. I will certainly bring the matter to the minister's attention to see if there is any way under our terms of discussion in the GATT that we might fulfil that request.


FISHERIES
Brian Vincent Tobin: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. The minister of fisheries has announced the cancellation in Newfoundland and Labrador of the dockside monitoring program, a program that allows the Government of Canada to monitor the catches being landed in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador.
The cancellation results in the loss of 45 jobs in western and southwestern Newfoundland. More important, it results in the loss of the ability of the Government of Canada to monitor landings in Canada at a time when we are asking internationally for the world to respect our ability to manage Canadian cod quotas.
Why did the minister cancel that program at a time when the minister has been travelling around the world telling the world community: "Trust us, we can manage these cod stocks. We shall manage landings in our own country and we shall act responsibly". Why cancel this important program at this time?


John Carnell Crosbie: Mr. Speaker, once again the question is
Oral Questions
loaded with inaccuracies in its prologue or its foreplay or whatever you want to call it. It is completely inaccurate.
The dockside monitoring program has not been cancelled. We have just had a task force report with respect to dockside monitoring. We are going to continue to make it possible for there to be a dockside monitoring program in every area where the fishing sector in that area wants it to continue. Where there is 60 per cent support for dockside monitoring, it will continue.
Dockside monitoring is aimed first and foremost at verifying and tracking the landings of each fisherman who is under an individual quota or other catch sharing arrangement. The system is in effect to assist those people for their own particular purposes of keeping track of who has caught what. Its primary purpose is not conservation but we are continuing to make it possible so long as those involved will meet the cost of the operation.


Mr. Speaker:: A very short supplementary. I know the hon. member will keep it short.


Brian Vincent Tobin: Yes, Mr. Speaker.
Will the minister confirm, despite that impotent answer, that in fact the program is going to come to a close at the end of May, some two weeks hence. The program is finished by May 31, according to the minister's own press release.
If the program is going to be continued on a voluntary basis, to be paid for by fishermen, how many fishermen have come forward to volunteer to pay for this dockside monitoring program or is he buffaloing the world community?


Mr. Speaker:: The minister may wish to respond.


John Carnell Crosbie: Mr. Speaker, the hon. gentleman seems to think that the volume of his question indicates its intelligence. Usually it is in direct variance.


Mr. Speaker:: If the hon. minister wishes to address the question, please do so.


John Carnell Crosbie: I will repeat again, Mr. Speaker. The dockside monitoring program is not ending but govern-

May 11, 1992
Routine Proceedings
ment funding, as of the end of May, will be ended in connection with the dockside monitoring program.
The program will be there. Where fishermen indicate in the various areas that they want the program and they are prepared to pay for the program, we will assist them in doing that. We will continue with it because it is a program of assistance for the industry and individuals involved. Therefore, the program continues.


PRESENCE IN GALLERY
Mr. Speaker:: I wish to draw to the attention of members of the presence in the gallery of His Excellency, Dr. Yassim Saeed Noman, President of the Council of Deputies of the Republic of Yemen.


Some hon. members:: Hear, hear.


POINT OF ORDER
Mr. Nelson A. Riis (Kamloops):: Mr. Speaker, a point of order. My hon. friend, the Minister of Supply and Services referred to the money that goes to the Yukon, knowing full well that it is a territorial government and has quite a different relationship with the federal government than a typical constituency.
Since the minister referred to the procurement in a certain constituency, would it not be helpful from his point of view if he tabled the list of procurements from each of Canada's constituencies and then we can establish a more viable evaluation.


Don Boudria: Mr. Speaker, on the same point, I want to ask the minister if at the same time as he is answering that question, he would table the documents from which he sought the answers to both this question and the one that was raised by the member for Kamloops as he is required to do under our rules.


Paul Wyatt Dick: Mr. Speaker, I do not know whether the hon. member is suggesting I file every one of the contracts in every one of the constituencies. It would be an awful pile of paper. We would have to chop down an awful lot of trees to get it covered.
I can give the list of how much has been procured on behalf of the Government of Canada in each constituency. It has always been available over the years and anybody can get the information anytime he or she asks for it. I will put it together and have it tabled.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Hon. Kim Campbell (Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada):: Pursuant to Standing Order 32(2) I am pleased to table, in both official languages, a research report of the federal, provincial, and territorial family law committee entitled The Financial Implications of Child Support Guidelines.


DIVORCE ACT
[Stage Direction]
Hon. Kim Campbell (Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada), seconded by Mr. Corbeil, moved for leave to table Bill C-79, An act to amend the Divorce Act and the Family Order and Agreements Enforcement Assistance Act.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBIois):: Pursuant to Standing Order 68(2), the motion is deemed to be adopted.
Ms. Campbell (Vancouver Centre), seconded by Mr. Corbeil, moves that the bill be now read the first time and printed. Pursuant to Standing Order 69(1), the motion is deemed adopted.
Bill read first time and printed.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: Mr. Speaker, a point of order. I realize in its anxiety to get its legislation introduced, the members of the government move motions without indicating who is moving and seconding, but in the case of the motion just put by Your Honour for first reading of this bill, the Minister of Labour had left the House and was not here to second the motion.
May 11, 1992

Your Honour moved the motion in his absence. I would hope, Mr. Speaker, you would make sure that if someone is going to move or second this motion they are here.
[Translation\


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: The Chair has taken note of the hon. member's comment and, in compliance with the rules of the House, I see that the Minister of Communications is here. So the motion for first reading is seconded by Mr. Beatty.
Oh, I see Mr. Corbeil there. So the situation is now in order again.


JUSTICE AND THE SOLICITOR GENERAL
A. Kim Campbell: Mr. Speaker, I believe you will find there is unanimous consent for the following motion: That pursuant to section 19 of an act to amend to the Criminal Code and the Canada Evidence Act, (sexual offences), Chapter 19, 3rd Supplement, Revised Statutes of Canada, 1985 the Standing Committee on Justice and the Solicitor General be the committee to review the act.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: Does the minister have the unanimous consent of the House to move the motion?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: The House has heard the terms of the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

David Charles Dingwall: Mr. Speaker, I have two petitions today signed by residents of of such places as London and Ottawa as well as other parts of Ontario.
Routine Proceedings
The petitioners are opposed to the government's action in terminating the Court Challenges Program. This program has been very valuable to Canadians that wish to oppose or to make interventions on behalf of needy citizens with regard to a variety of laws which they believe to be not in their interests.
They call upon the Government of Canada to rescind its decision of some time ago and to replace the Court Challenges Program with the appropriate moneys from the Consolidated Revenue Fund.


Mr. Girve Fretz (Erie):: Mr. Speaker, I have a petition from a number of constituents of my riding of Erie.
The petitioners are asking that the government bring forward legislation providing for a referendum of the people and binding upon Parliament to accept or reject constitutional amendments proposed by the government, the acceptance or rejection of the proposed amendments to be determined by a majority vote of the total votes cast in the whole of Canada together with a majority vote in a majority of provinces with the territories being given the status of one province.


Mr. Jean-Robert Gauthier (Ottawa-Vanier):: Mr. Speaker, I have the duty today to table four petitions. These petitioners ask Parliament to restore the Court Challenges Program. As we know, this program helped Canadians and especially minority groups assert their constitutional language and equality rights in court.
The petitioners make the point that this program cost each Canadian only 10 cents a year and they urge Parliament to put the necessary pressure on the government to reinstate this program which is very much in demand.


Margaret Anne Mitchell: Mr. Speaker, I have a petition which I am pleased to present from a number of people in British Columbia.
The petition states that whereas the effects of the new immigration policy for foreign domestic workers which was announced on January 30 discriminates against

May 11, 1992
Routine Proceedings
women on temporary work permits and does nothing to reduce the exploitation of domestic workers.
The new changes require six months' full time training in a field or occupation related to live-in care and grade 12 education and consequently discriminates against women from developing countries and is gender based.
Whereas the minister has shut down the foreign domestic program for 12 weeks thereby unduly increasing the lengthy wait women must endure overseas, therefore the petition calls upon Parliament to urge the minister of immigration to put the implementation of the new changes on hold, including the 12-week suspension of the old FDM program, urges the minister to provide all domestic workers advocacy groups with details of the new changes and urges the minister to meet with representatives of all domestic workers advocacy groups as soon as possible to discuss an acceptable alternative to the new policy changes for the foreign domestic program.


Mr. Ken Hughes (Macleod):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to table today on behalf of constituents from the riding of Macleod as well as from other ridings in Alberta a fistful of petitions signed in support of restraint in government spending. I am honoured to be able to do that today.


Shirley Maheu: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36, I have the pleasure to present a petition coming from Montreal, Verdun, Pierrefonds, Dollard des Ormeaux, St. Hubert to name but a few places.
The petitioners point out that the Canadian Race Relations Foundation, a federal government initiative passed by this House of Commons almost two years ago, was supposed to demonstrate the government's commitment toward eradicating racism.
Since this Canadian Race Relations Foundation is an essential component of any drive to eliminate racial discrimination in Canada, the petitioners call upon Parliament to urge the government to consider the advisability of establishing the Canadian Race Relations Foundation this fiscal year.


Ms. Lynn Hunter (Saanich-Gulf Islands):: Mr. Speaker, it is my honour to table a petition pursuant to Standing Order 36 on behalf of 36 of my constituents concerned with the Canadian constitutional crisis.
Their particular concern is the consultative mechanism of the Government of Canada. They ask that a referendum be placed upon Parliament to accept or reject constitutional amendments, the acceptance or rejection of which would be determined by a majority vote of the total votes cast in the whole of Canada, together with a majority vote in the majority of provinces with the territories being given the status of one province.
I am pleased to be able to table this petition. It is a demonstration that the people of my constituency are really concerned about what is going on in our country.


Mr. Stan J. Hovdebo (Saskatoon-Humboldt):: Mr. Speaker, it is my honour and duty to present a petition on behalf of a number of citizens mostly from the region of the city of Quebec who express their concerns about the trade in human workers between Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
These petitioners call upon the government to urge the United Nations to take action to have this illegal trade recognized and terminated.


QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER
[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk)
Mr. Jim Edwards (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of State and Leader of the Government in the House of Commons):: Mr. Speaker, Question No. 255 will be answered today.


Ms. Hunter: Between 1980 and 1990, what is the annual amount and type of ammunition provided to private gun clubs and individuals (a) nationally (b) at the Heals Rifle Range in Saanich, British Columbia, by the Department of National Defence and what is the total cost of this ammunition?
May 11, 1992


Hon. Marcel Masse (Minister of National Defence):: The Department of National Defence has not provided ammunition to private gun clubs or individuals in the past 12 years.
However, in accordance with an Order in Council dated 26 November 1948, and Canadian Forces Administrative Order 50-11, the Department of National Defence provides assistance to military rifle associations, the Dominion of Canada Rifle Association, and provincial rifle associations. Regardless, these are not regarded as private gun clubs.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: The question as enumerated by the parliamentary secretary has been answered.


James (Jim) Stewart Edwards: Mr. Speaker, I ask that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: Shall the remaining questions stand?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Barrett (p. 10480), and the amendment thereto of Mr. Axworthy (Winnipeg South Centre) (p. 10495).
The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: At the suspension of the debate there were five minutes remaining in the question or comments period after the speech of the hon. member for Essex-Windsor.


Steven W. Langdon: Just very briefly, Mr. Speaker, what was being suggested was that because the auto pact was an arrangement with the United States, therefore the sectoral arrangements that I talked about as part of what we have to look at in our alternatives to the free trade deal necessarily had to be sectoral arrangements just with the United States. That position is incorrect in two ways.
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First, the auto pact is for Canada not an arrangement just with the United States; it is in fact open to any country in the world to enter into the auto pact arrangements with us.
Second, there is no reason whatsoever why sectoral arrangements that we set up in the future need be just with the United States or need be with the United States at all. In fact, there are a great many possible sectoral arrangements which could be set up, for instance between ourselves, the United States and Japan; for instance between ourselves and the European Community. Those kinds of sectoral arrangements, so long as they have safeguards for Canadian jobs, are what can make for much better trade relations than the kind of open-ended trade deal that we have with the United States at the moment.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the hon. member. I sense a reluctance on his part to deal with this issue because after all, it was the question that I heard raised by my colleague from Ottawa South.
It is the statement by the leader of his party that if elected, she felt it appropriate that the New Democratic Party government sit down with the United States and talk in order to work out the difficulties with the free trade agreement. In other words, she wants to do exactly what the amendment we are debating advocates. That is that the agreement be renegotiated to reflect the concerns of Canadians.
I wonder if the member could tell me whether the motion moved today by the hon. member for Esquimau-Juan de Fuca in fact represents the policy of his party or whether in fact it is the policy of the hon. member for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca. If it is not, who speaks for the party? Is it the member for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca or the member for Yukon? Or is this another case where the New Democratic Party says one thing when it is in opposition but does quite the opposite when it takes office as we have witnessed repeatedly and with such consternation in Ontario for the last two and a half years?


Steven W. Langdon: Mr. Speaker, this motion represents the policy adopted in a convention of 2,000 delegates of the New Democratic Party. It also represents the position of the member for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca and it repre-

May 11, 1992
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sents the position again and again expressed and emphasized by the leader of my party.
If the member for Kingston and the Islands would prefer to take the word of Diane Francis, that sympathetic and accurate journalist where the New Democratic Party is concerned, over the motion which has been put on the floor of this House of Commons, which the New Democratic Party will vote on, it is his privilege to do so.
But what I am looking forward to with much more interest is what the Liberal Party will do when it comes to the question of how it will vote on whether or not to abrogate this free trade deal which is so badly damaging Canada and so desperately destroying jobs across Ontario and in the very home town of the member from Kingston and the Islands. In the very home town of that member, there are plants which have been shut down thanks to that free trade deal and he should realize that.


Mr. Andre Plourde (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister for International TVade):: Mr. Speaker, since twelve o'clock today, you as well as I have heard hon. members of the NDP and the Liberal Party state all the reasons why they think Canada should no longer be part of the free trade agreement. But they seem to have conveniently forgotten all of the benefits that have accrued to Canadian businesses as a result of this agreement.
Might I refresh their memory with a few examples? The Clearly Canadian Beverage Corporation is an exceptional Canadian company, based in Vancouver. Clearly Canadian sells natural and flavoured sparkling mineral water. At the beginning of fiscal 1991, the company marketed its products in 30 American states and, by year end, was available in all American states and every Canadian province. Clearly Canadian reported record sales of $71 million in 1991, up 250 per cent from a year earlier.
The company's president, Douglas Mason, attributes part of that success to the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement. Let me quote Mr. Mason:
In order to sustain growth in a free trade environment, it is important to be aggressive and active in the market place. There exists a wealth of opportunities and I believe that Free Trade has changed the attitude of business; it has been of great assistance to our company's progress.
3M Canada, based in London, Ontario, is another example of a company that has taken advantage of the opportunities created by the FTA. Just over a year ago, 3M decided to invest $30 million in a new manufacturing plant in Brockville. The company chose Brockville after a year-long search for sites in Canada, the United States and Mexico. It chose Canada because of the tariff reductions offered under the FTA.
Several months later, 3M announced two more investments: the first was to modernize and upgrade its Havelock, Ontario plant, a $5.6-million investment; the second was an addition to the company's plant in Morden, Manitoba, an $ 11.5-million investment.
Do you know why 3M chose to make this significant investment in Canada, Mr. Speaker?
3M's Executive Vice-President, Alfred Cordell, said, and I quote: "Our recent decisions to invest in our Canadian operations reflect our confidence and commitment to our future here in Canada."
Mr. Cordell added: "Long before the free trade agreement was implemented, we were working on rationalization of production, and when the FTA was implemented, we were more than ready to capitalize on it."
Another company, Webcom Limited, prints books, directories and catalogues in Toronto. With the advantages of free trade, the company has refocused its products in the United States and export sales now account for about 20 per cent of total sales. Employment at Webcom also increased by 22 jobs in 1991.
Mr. Warren Wilkins, president of Webcom, says:
The U.S. offers exciting opportunities, and to be competitive, we
must operate as easily in the U.S. as we do in Canada. What the
Free Tirade Agreement does is create a different environment and a
greatly enlarged market. Free Trade has given Webcom access to the
U.S. market, which is a tenfold increase, if not more.
And the list goes on.
Ganong Brothers Limited of St. Stephen, New Brunswick has been making chocolate and confectioneries in Canada for 118 years. In 1990, its export sales grew 180 per cent. In 1991, it was a Canadian Export Award Winner. Company president David A. Ganong said:

Ten years ago, it was clear we were not going to survive or grow if we were only dealing with Canada and Canadian competitors. We had to change our focus. With the introduction of the Free Tirade Agreement, we decided we could make it work here.
Another 1991 Canadian Export Award Winner, Pallis-er Furniture Ltd. of Winnipeg, Manitoba, has made strong gains in the United States.
With 1,700 employees and a value of $161 million, the company challenged the U.S. competition in the moderately priced wood furniture market and it succeeded.
Palliser's president Art DeFehr says:
We told ourselves that when Free Trade became a fact of life, we were going to reposition ourselves so that we could be competitive in a geographical area or product area. Aggressive Canadian companies can compete with the best in the world by focusing their product, their work ethic and their commitment to quality and service.
The Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement has been instrumental in the success of these companies. All have benefited from the elimination of tariffs, special measures to enhance access to American markets, and a more liberalized regulatory framework for investment.
These companies are not front-page news, but they are concrete examples that the FTA is working for Canada.
None of these successes occur on their own. In large measure, they reflect the effectiveness of Canada's market development program in the United States.
Analysis of the results of the total trade promotion program in the United States last year confirmed a high return on the resources devoted to it. Each dollar spent in funding 356 separate promotional projects in 1990-91 generated $89 in on-site and 12-month forecast sales-totalling, in all, over $1.5 billion.
All regions actively benefited. Of 4,519 companies directly involved, 25 per cent were from western Canada, 38 per cent from Ontario, 27 per cent from Quebec and 10 per cent from Atlantic Canada.
A key part of the over-all strategy is introducing non-exporters to the potential of the U.S. market, through the seven-year-old New Exporter to Border
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States (NEBS) initiative. More than 825 firms participated, and experience shows that half of NEBS participants will eventually become exporters.
The missions program, which takes NEBS graduates and existing exporters to non-border locations and introduces them to trade contacts, also had positive results, with 340 participating firms and $52.5 million worth of business reported.
Promotional efforts to foster investment identified over 4,500 serious prospects. In addition, U.S. posts made about 500 more one-on-one contacts with senior executives of major U.S. companies.
Efforts to encourage tourism generated $339 million in revenues for Canada. The promotions also resulted in media coverage valued at approximately $33 million, with tourism development over-all generating some $300 for the industry for every dollar invested.
Let me add a few words here about Canada's participation in Comdex-the biggest trade show in the United States devoted entirely to computer products. By any account, the results of Canada's participation in the Fall '91 Atlanta Comdex show are impressive. At 57 strong, the Canadian contingent racked up $65 million in sales.
The U.S. market is equally important to companies in most sectors. In agrifood, for example, the U.S. market represented 60 per cent of Canadian exports, or $7.2 billion in 1990. Canada has been particularly successful in its use of food shows to attract food brokers, distributors and retailers. The Minneapolis show, with a budget of $14,000, resulted in projected sales of $10 million for its 33 participants.
U.S. buyers at the Toronto International Interior Design Show were expected to generate sales of about $45 million over the 18 months following the exhibition. The U.S. market absorbed about $1.2 billion worth of Canadian office furniture last year.
In my view, it would make no sense at all to abrogate a free trade agreement giving Canada and Canadian companies improved and secure access to the largest single market in the world.

May 11, 1992
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In support of that statement, let me read what some others have been saying about this historic agreement between Canada and the United States.
Peter Morici, writing last year on "A New Special Relationship-Free Trade and U.S.-Canada Economic Relations in the 1990s", said:
The benefits of the FTA reach much further than removing existing barriers and avoiding new barriers to trade and investment. It established processes and a context for better management of the relationship.
Gordon Ritchie in "Free Trade: Year Three" said:
The direct economic impact of the Canada-U.S. free trade agreement, or FTA, has been small but positive, very much as expected, with measurable increases in business investment, trade and output and decreases in prices.
Econoscope, published by the Royal Bank of Canada, noted in 1991:
One effect of the free trade agreement is to encourage Canadian industry to become more outward-looking- The full impact of this enlarged vision will be felt in the longer term through greater productivity and employment, lower prices and higher real incomes.
Writing in the Globe and Mail on March 9 this year, Alan Gotlieb said:
The dispute mechanisms in the agreement place Canada in a better position in the market than any other U.S. partner. This is a privilege not to be despised. It goes a long way toward ensuring that disputes arising in the national legal system of either country -will have an impartial review by a binational tribunal-
And he continued:
If Canada were to back away from what we have now, by terminating the agreement, we would be removing the most significant protection against unfair trade action that any partner of the United States has obtained. It would be an act of folly-
Does anyone believe that without the free trade agreement, the United States would be less protectionist?
These comments alone suggest why it would be unwise to abrogate this agreement. Clearly, members opposite would do a great disservice to Canada and all Canadians. Their position turns a blind eye to the basic realities concerning our trading relationship with the United States and the benefits we enjoy as a result of the free trade agreement we have negotiated with our largest and most important trading partner.
In closing, Mr. Speaker, I cannot help thinking Canadians would be better served if members opposite were to acknowledge these truths and join with us in ensuring that Canada and Canadians benefit fully from the expanded and secure access to the U.S. market obtained under this agreement.


Mr. Dennis Mills (Broadview-Greenwood):: Mr. Speaker, I listened attentively to most of the member's speech, the last three-quarters of it. I apologize for not hearing the first part. He talked about the various trade shows and exhibitions that Canadian corporations have attended in the last year and a half to two years and the orders a lot of these companies received at these trade shows.
I would not dispute any of his figures. I have always been a big supporter of the trade show program, the trade show service of the Government of Canada and the way we try to help our industries in this country. The Canadian Government Exhibition Commission is an instrument of this government that I believe in immensely, as does this government.
However, I think the member is not looking behind those sales figures. I want to give him a very specific example of an organization in Mississauga, an area just outside Toronto. It is an organization that manufactures batteries. It is a Canadian division of a U.S. company. For years and years, every year it has been in Canada, this company had a research and development facility. It had manufacturing capability. It would not only make batteries for Canada, but through its sales and marketing force it would manufacture in Canada and export to parts of Europe.
Since the free trade agreement the U.S. operation has basically given a directive to the Canadian operation that it no longer needs the Canadian manufacturing capability. It can manufacture all the product required for Canada by just adding one or two hours a week on top of the U.S. manufacturing capability. Because of free trade this Canadian branch plant lost its research and development capability. It also lost its manufacturing capability. Now we basically have a distribution centre.
So often this is what is happening with this free trade agreement. That company in Canada is still doing sales.

May 11, 1992

It is going to these trade shows and writing up orders, as the member mentioned during his speech. The manufacturing, the research and the development side of business is no longer a part of many Canadian companies. Statistics will show that research and development is down as well as manufacturing.
My question to the member is very specific. When he gives these numbers on sales that have increased in various sectors, has he not maybe misled a little because he has not gone behind and taken a look at the manufacturing and the research and development jobs that have been lost because of the free trade agreement?


André Plourde: Mr. Speaker, I want to start by thanking the hon. member for the Liberal Party for his question. As I told him some time ago, in another debate we had on free trade here in the House of Commons, whenever we talk about external trade or exports, opposition members, both the Liberals and the NDP, have a theory that one must destroy whatever the government does to develop the economy. However, life also has its practical side.
I do not know what the hon. member who asked the question did before going into politics. Personally, I learned both theory and practice. I helped found three major manufacturing companies in Quebec and one in Ontario, in Cornwall. And speaking of research and development, I owned shares in these companies, and I did not wait for governments-either Quebec, Ontario or the federal government-to help my companies do research and development. Those companies are here today, and they are in even better shape since we signed the free trade agreement with the United States.
The figures I mentioned in my speech were not provided by Statistics Canada nor by the Conservative Party. They were given by companies and by the presidents of those companies.
As a member from Quebec, I could quote some figures for Quebec companies, since I did not mention them in my speech. I referred to companies in Vancouver, the home of the NDP member who presented the motion against free trade. I mentioned companies in Nova Scotia and Ontario. I will give figures that can be checked. Cameo Inc. of Montreal exports 50 per cent of
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its production and has invested $30 million in its Montreal plant to produce a new line of dishwashers for the North American market. It did not wait for the government to help.
In just a few years, Le Groupe Laperriere et Verreault Inc. of Trois-Rivieres has become one of the major manufacturers of pulp and paper equipment in the country. Production, worth $12 million in 1987, rose to $200 million in 1991.
Regency Footwear Limited in Loretteville, near Quebec City, as you know Mr. Speaker, today exports 30 per cent of its production to the United States, compared with 1 or 2 per cent in 1988. President Henri Bergeron-you can check this-said that free trade has been beneficial.
Another company, Formica Canada in Saint-Jean-sur-le-Richelieu, spent $2 million updating its plant. Since the FTA was signed, the company exports 50 per cent of its decorative laminates and finds it easier to import its raw materials.


Dennis Joseph Mills: Mr. Speaker, I would like to make a couple of points to the member.
I was not proposing government handouts when I asked this question. I have had some experience in manufacturing. I was involved with a fairly large auto parts manufacturer for a couple of years before I returned to Ottawa in 1988. I am not talking about government handouts.
I am talking about the fact that in the past we used to encourage foreign investment to come to this country, encourage foreign investors to set up their businesses, we would encourage them and many times we would almost regulate them by saying: "We welcome you here. We want you to come here but we would like you to be aware of the fact that we as a government believe that manufacturing jobs and research and development jobs are important".
My final point to the member is that chapter 14 of this free trade agreement wipes out all of that regulation. As a result, more and more U.S. plants are retreating from their manufacturing responsibilities that they had for many years in this country.

May 11, 1992
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For many years, these American firms made money with manufacturing in this country. Now chapter 14 of the free trade agreement has hurt manufacturing in every region of this country.


John Paul Manley: Mr. Speaker, I welcome this opportunity this afternoon to discuss free trade once again. We are like veterans who always like to talk about past wars and battles, and veterans of the 1988 election will, I think, always be ready to get involved in a debate on free trade with the United States.
I believe that many of the principles we voiced during the election as members of the Liberal Party were justified and still apply today. We saw the problems arising from the free trade agreement as political, not just economic problems. Generally speaking, it was a debate on sovereignty, not merely a matter of trade statistics.

I think that what was important about the free trade debate in 1988 was that we were trying to draw out for Canadians the essential question of whether we were to pursue a policy of independence on the North American continent or we were going to make a crucial decision to allow our policies to become more and more integrated with those of the United States as we moved more fully into a continental policy-making structure.
Therefore throughout the debate in 1988 many of us in the Liberal Party were raising issues that, if we were to categorize them, technically were not trade issues as much as they were issues of political sovereignty, of independence. Much of that position comes from the concepts that led to Canada being an independent nation on the northern half of the North American continent.
Throughout our history we took a different course from the United States. Our historical roots are greatly different. Our economy developed differently because of policies pursued by our national governments. In part this ensured that despite our proximity to the United States, despite the very strong demographic as well as economic links that existed between our two countries,
we always had a foot in some other camp. Throughout much of the early part of our history our ties to Britain and the British Empire, and then the British Commonwealth, gave us that counterweight to continental pressures and enabled us to build an independent policy in many areas, both economic development and foreign policy.
As that important bond to Britain and the Commonwealth has diminished in importance over the years we have felt more and more the tug of continentalism. By the time we got to the 1988 election the continental magnet was so strong as to be almost irresistible.
What we needed from our government then, as we do now, is a counterweight strategy. We need to find a way to once again put at least one of our feet in some other camp other than continentalism. That is not necessarily the best thing for the United States of America.
The United States has clearly indicated what its policy is going to be. It is seeking to build a western hemispheric trade unit in which it will be the dominant force and which will give the U.S. its own counterweight against the emerging trading blocs in Europe and Asia.
The question for Canadians is whether we ought to be fully integrated into that western hemispheric trading bloc or we should pursue an alternative trade strategy that builds more and more on our role as a Pacific nation and our historic links to the emerging democracies of eastern Europe, building on the basis of shared language and culture that we have because of our Ukrainian, Polish, Hungarian, and Czech communities.
We were a safe haven for nationals of many of those countries in their dark years. Now is the time for us to resume the renewal of those relationships.
In essence, that is what was wrong with entering into the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement. However, a lot of things have made it go wrong.
Shortly after the agreement was signed and during the election the Advisory Council on Adjustment was doing its work. It published a large volume entitled Adjusting to Win. It highlights the fact that this important free trade agreement was entered into without an adjustment strategy for displaced workers.
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Shortly after the free trade agreement came into effect the Government of Canada directed, through consultation and discussion, the Bank of Canada to pursue a policy of what is called price stability or zero inflation. The consequences of that policy were that the Canadian dollar increased in value relative to the American currency by about 20 per cent over a very short time. When the trade deal was signed, in October 1987, the Canadian dollar was trading at about 76 cents U.S., and nobody even thought about what the impact of that agreement would be if the dollar reached, as it did last November, 89.5 cents, a major increase in the exchange rate.
Nobody thought about the impact of implementing a free trade agreement concurrently with the implementation of a major new visible sales tax.
We can go to any border community in our country on a weekend and see what free trade has come to mean to thousands and thousands of Canadians who in protesting the GST have brought commercial success to countless U.S. border communities.
In an article published in the G-7 report by Catherine Swift of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business the problems in implementing the free trade agreement and the fiasco that the government has made of this policy are highlighted. She says: "The early period of adjustment for Canadian firms to the trade agreement was effectively scuttled by other policies pursued by the Canadian government. Notable among these other policies were a significant appreciation of the Canadian dollar vis-a-vis its U.S. counterpart, a record high spread between Canadian and U.S. interest rates, further expansion of the total tax burden on Canadians generally and small firms in particular and other policies inconsistent with the FTA such as an absence of action to reduce interprovincial trade barriers leading to the perverse result of higher trade barriers in some instances between Canadian provinces than between Canada and the United States".
This whole strategy, if we can call it that, reminds me of the hockey team owner who goes out and uses his money to recruit a team and thinks he can win without practising and without a strategy to defeat the opposition. We signed the big deal, we got the big player, in the
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government's mind, but we did not have a strategy for winning the big game. In fact, we are now debating, fully three years after the free trade agreement came into effect, the reduction of interprovincial trade barriers. In other words, we went into the major game without even having an intersquad game among ourselves. What kind of strategy is that?
Although I speak as a veteran of the wars on the free trade agreement I am concerned that if we focus too much on this particular agreement we will miss some of the important issues with which we must deal. If we distract ourselves from dealing with the crucial issues of economic policy then we are not going to be able to deal with those things that will affect the well-being of our children in the future. In the past, our economic prosperity has been heavily reliant on the fact that we have been able to exploit our rich natural resources and that we enjoyed a major manufacturing boom following World War II.
Since that time, things have changed quite drastically in the world. There has been the rebuilding of western Europe following World War II and the emergence of Japan as a major industrial force. There has also been the emergence of the new Asian nations. Taiwan, Korea, and Singapore are producing vast quantities of the goods that we consume here in North America. Soon there will be the re-emergence of the eastern European economies which have well educated and skilled workers with very low wage expectations. If they can bring investment and a new infrastructure to bear on their economies they will be able to produce significant amounts of manufactured goods for export.
What does Canada have to do to deal with that? If we spend all of our time focusing on our relationship with the United States, however important that may be, we could well miss the most important challenges that are ahead of us.
In order to meet those challenges there are two things that we should do. First, we should recognize what our strengths are. I for one am sick and tired of hearing the Government of Canada going around telling Canadians that they are not competitive with the rest of the world.
It is time our government stood up and said how good we are, not how bad we are. We continue to have one of

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the highest rates of labour productivity in the world. We continue to be highly educated, compassionate people.
We have a strong system of social supports. Our social programs are a strength for us rather than a drain on us. These are things that we have going for us. We have to stop looking upon them as some kind of impediment to our success. What we need to do is recognize our strengths and then recognize the challenges that face us.
The challenges are out there in the new and developing world. We will only face them if we educate our young people, if we provide them with hope, if we provide them with the skills that they will need and if we share with them an understanding that our future economic success and well-being depends on their ability to compete with the rest of the world.
What about the motion today? The NDP has proposed a motion that would oblige the Government of Canada to abrogate the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement. As I said in comments earlier today, the speeches I have heard so far are very reminiscent for me of the election campaign, because when the NDP runs out of things to say, it attacks the Liberals.
In the 1988 election campaign, its leader, Ed Broad-bent, forgot to mention the free trade agreement in his opening remarks at the start of the election campaign. Once it became the major issue as a result of the interventions of the leader of the Liberal Party, he tried to get on board. Once he had done that, he tried to push the leader of the Liberal Party off and spent the last 10 days of the campaign in vicious, personal attacks against the leader of the Liberal Party.
Many of us believe that seats were lost due to split votes because of the NDP strategy of attacking Liberals in the 1988 election campaign. Its members come into the House today, having dropped 20 per cent in the polls in the last 14 months. Their leader is on the ropes, they have no policy to offer so they begin ranting and raving about what the Liberal policy is on free trade.
What is their policy? Their policy is simply to walk up to George Bush and punch him in the nose. That is what will do it. Yes, sir, we will tell those Americans that the free trade agreement is history. That is what we will tell them. Then, all those jobs will come back. Those factories, they will all reopen. The investment will pour
into Canada once we have told those Americans where we stand with them.
That is the most naive lot of nonsense that I could imagine. Not only that, I have trouble to believe anything that comes out of that party. I am from Ontario, the home of Bob Rae. Do you remember the agenda for people the NDP brought forward in the midst of the Ontario election campaign? There is not very much of it left. My friend from Broadview-Greenwood points out the hypocrisy of the statements.
There have been two speakers who have been up so far today during this debate. I have been asking them if they have the transcript of the interview that Audrey McLaughlin gave to The Financial Post in which she was quoted as saying: "If elected, we would sit down with the Americans and say, how can we make this thing work?"
That sure sounds like renegotiation, not abrogation necessarily. What are the NDP going to do? If Bob Rae is any example, the NDP will become a lot more pragmatic in government than it is in opposition. This seems to annoy the member for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca.
We were in the House on December 10.1 was here at the time and I heard it. His leader, who narrowly defeated him for the leadership of his party, gave a speech. He got up in questions and comments, obviously haunted by Bob Rae in Ontario and preoccupied with taxation.
He wanted to know if the NDP would bring in a minimum corporate tax if elected to power in Ottawa. Here is what he said: "Can she tell us a time frame?" This is the former leader of the NDP and premier of British Columbia asking the present federal leader of the NDP a question. Does she answer it?
"My colleague asks about timetables. Clearly it is the policy of this party to bring in a fair tax system. We have alternatives. Tax reform is a priority."
Is there a timetable? No. She will not even answer questions. I do not think they know what their trade policy is. I think their party is a hoax on trade issues.
The member for Essex-Windsor did not seem to have too many ideas about what renegotiation might mean. Maybe that is their problem.


An hon. member:: Where are they?
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John Paul Manley: There are none of them in the House. It is their motion but none of them are here. That is not surprising. They do not like to hear the truth.
He does not know what renegotiation means. He seems to have difficulty with the concept. Let me give him some suggestions.
What about subsidies? Articles 1906 and 1907 of the free trade agreement provide for the creation of a working group to discuss subsidies and the definition of subsidies. That has not been completed. That is an item of renegotiation.
What about rules of origin at the core of the Honda Civic dispute between Canada and the U.S. at the present time? Drafters of the agreement agree that the text is ambiguous. That needs to be renegotiated.
What about extension of drawback provisions? These are provided for in the agreement. There is a possible extension. We should be renegotiating those.
What about technical standards and the ability of the United States to impose technical standards as a non-tariff barrier to Canadian goods?
What about agriculture? What about the fact that the Western Grain Transportation Act subsidy is prohibited in exports of wheat to the United States? That should be renegotiated.
What about the export of products containing sugar from Canada to the United States? It is using that to protect its sugar industry. That should be renegotiated.
What about financial institutions? Our financial institutions want reciprocal treatment with the United States, not national treatment. That should be renegotiated.
What about shipping? We have given away transportation on the land. We allow the United States to protect itself with the Jones Act. What about renegotiating that?
Has none of this occurred to the NDP? I do not think so.
We could list dozens of things that could go on the table in the continuing discussions about a complex, multi-multi-billion dollar relationship that exists in trade between Canada and the United States. Surely the only reasonable, prudent course for Canada to take four
years or five years after that agreement has been implemented is to sit down with the Americans, not hostile like the NDP is, not as sycophants like the Conservative are, nose to nose and do business with them to work out the hard parts of our relationship with them.


Hon. Doug Lewis (Solicitor General of Canada):: Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest. My friend makes excellent speeches. I thought he delivered his remarks very well. I have one question for him and then he can comment on the facts and figures I will give.
The first one is naturally to disabuse any suggestion that Catherine Swift of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business is an independent observer of the scene. If my hon. friend wants to proclaim that independence and champion it, he will naturally be prepared to deny categorically the comments in the media that she is going to be a candidate for the Liberal Party in the next election. I know my hon. friend will want to do that. If he could tell us the riding then we would be even more informed. I do not want to impugn her independence at all.
I listened with great interest to my hon. friend describe so-called disasters the free trade agreement caused in Canada. One of those disasters is that Canada's trade surplus with the United States went from approximately $13 billion to $18 billion in 1990. That disaster is an increase of almost 40 per cent in the trade surplus. That is how the Liberals see disasters.
Our exports of high technology merchandise to the U.S. have increased by $4 billion, while our imports in this frontier sector have fallen by $600 million. That is my hon. friend's definition of a disaster.
Another disaster is that since 1988 Canada's net direct investment went from a deficit of $2.4 billion to a surplus of $5.1 billion in 1990, the first surplus in 15 years. That is a disaster in terms of my hon. friend's definition.
The last disaster I want to bring to the attention of my hon. friend is that the value of all exports to the U.S. has increased by approximately $8 billion since 1988.
Next election time we are going to have another year to add to that. I suggest to my hon. friend that he kind of back off that line of attack because Canadians do not

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consider those kinds of increases in time of recession to be a disaster. We consider that to be a success.
When our trade with our biggest trading partner goes up, that is a success.


An hon. member:: Raw materials?


Douglas Grinslade Lewis: No, no. It is in manufacturing goods that it is up. Even if it is up, why does my hon. friend from Broadview-Greenwood ask? As my hon. friend knows, Broadview-Greenwood has not produced raw materials for almost a century. They cut down all the wood at Pape and Danforth, and my hon. friend knows that.
I want my hon. friend from Ottawa to raise his sights beyond the rhetoric of the information provided to him by his research department, inadequate as it is, and to look at the actual facts to see what sort of an increase we have in trade.
That is what my hon. friend is going to be faced with in the next election. The lies about free trade doing away with pensions which the Liberal Party spread in the last election are all going to be out the window. Outfits like Statistics Canada are going to produce those kinds of figures. I suggest to my hon. friend: "Get off that tack fast because you are not going to sell it". Canadians know that disaster is not an increase in trade to our biggest trading partner. It is all there. It is well documented. My friend who normally does all his research has unfortunately missed that point.


John Paul Manley: Mr. Speaker, I must say I am a little baffled by the intervention. I have looked through my notes and I do not believe I used any statistics. I did not refer to disasters. What I referred to in particular was that the implementation of the free trade agreement was done without any consideration for a strategic context in which to implement it successfully.
Looking at it strictly from the point of view of an economic instrument, a macro-economic policy, where I was most critical of the agreement was in the context of its political implications and its effect on Canadian sovereignty. With respect to the economic implications, we can fight back and forth with statistics. Whether the statistics are coming from one side or the other, I suggest to the minister that they are probably not going to get that far with Canadians in the next election.
The issue is going to be: What are we offering the people who are out of work in terms of hope that they are going find a job? If the NDP can convince them that abrogating the free trade agreement will bring some jobs back, maybe they will support that. If the government can convince them that they lost their jobs through no fault of the government, that it was just one of those unfortunate things that came along in the context of international economics and the government was not responsible for it, then maybe they will vote for it. I think we are going to have to present people with a lot more hope and a lot less statistical analysis.
With respect to the trade agreement itself and the macro-economic implications of it, my criticisms-and I did not hear the minister respond to any of these-were as follows. First of all it was brought in without any adjustment strategy despite the fact that when it was being promoted the Prime Minister-and I believe these are the exact words-said that massive adjustment programs would be made available. There were no adjustment programs made available for workers displaced as a result of the free trade agreement.
Second is the impact of the rising dollar on the price in U.S. dollars of our export goods. The minister did not respond to that. I have not alleged any kind of conspiracy on that issue. What is clear is that no attempt was made to manage the exchange rate so that Canadian firms could benefit from the free trade agreement as a result of managed exchange. On the contrary, they were penalized.
Furthermore I said that the GST had an impact on the implementation of the free trade agreement.
There was no comment on any of those. Those were the economic criticisms that I made of the agreement.
As for Catherine Swift, I have no knowledge she is intending to run as a Liberal candidate. I would have to say I would be most delighted if she were to run in the minister's own riding.


Lynn Hunter: Mr. Speaker, I want to clarify a reference the member for Ottawa South made to an article in The Financial Post of October 26, 1991. This article was the result of a wide-ranging interview with the Leader of the New Democratic Party on a wide range of topics.
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She wrote in response to the article of October 26 wherein Ms. Francis from The Financial Post concluded that New Democrats had "softened their position on the free trade agreement". My leader wrote:
This conclusion is not accurate. Our party continues to oppose the deal and maintains the position that it ought to be abrogated. A New Democratic Party government would use the six month provisions contained in the agreement to notify the United States of our intention to cancel the deal. We have in the past offered a number of alternatives to the economic and trade policies pursued by this government. We are continuing to develop these alternatives and are confident that a new economic direction for Canada would do much to help the millions of Canadians hurt by the economic policies of the last decade, including the free trade agreement with the United States.
This letter is dated December 3,1991 and published by The Financial Post. I just wanted to put that on record to clarify any concerns.
The New Democratic Party policy on the abrogation of the free trade agreement has been consistent and clear and any alternatives to that view are just mischievous.


John Paul Manley: Mr. Speaker, I have asked both the member for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca as well as the member for Essex-Windsor whether the NDP or its leader requested a transcript of the interview so that we could see exactly what she said.
I must say if she says what she has since said in her letter-and I assume that is the position their party will take into the next election-then I do not think it will be of much assistance to them. Again the question simply arises: What jobs will return to Canada as a result of an abrogation?
It is profoundly conservative in the truest sense of that word to attempt to bring back the past. That is the one power governments do not have.


Mr. Lee Richardson (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Transport):: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to share my time with the hon. member for Calgary Southwest. She is on a roll today after scoring well in Question Period. However I invite her to join me.
On the question of implementation of benefits to the free trade agreement, I am surprised we are still getting questions and concerns because of the success of the free trade agreement. This agreement, particularly for those of us in Alberta where we have seen immediate benefits from the free trade agreement, has really cushioned
Canada from what would have been an even more severe recession than we have gone through.
Here are some of the facts. Since the FTA came into effect on January 1, 1989, Canadian merchandise exports to the United States have increased approximately 5 per cent. Despite the recession, exports in 1991 matched the average of the first two years of the free trade agreement. The over-all trade relationship totals more than $250 billion.
Net foreign direct investment inflows to Canada between 1986 and 1991 totalled $27 billion or an average of $4.5 billion a year. In comparison, cumulative foreign direct investment flows to Canada between 1980 and 1985, the five years preceding, amounted to a negative $5.4 billion. We can see the obvious benefits of the free trade agreement.
Since the inception of the free trade agreement in 1989 and up until 1991, net foreign direct investment flows to Canada amounted to $5.9 billion, second only to the previous high of $6.6 billion attained in 1990.
In the three years preceding the free trade agreement, 1986 to 1988, cumulative net foreign direct investment flows to Canada totalled $10.4 billion or $3.5 billion per year. The sharp increase in foreign direct investment flow since 1988 strongly reflects upon the foreign investor's confidence in the Canadian economy and the government's structural reforms, the free trade agreement, tax reform, privatization, and deregulation.
Unemployment in the country is too high. This cannot be blamed on the free trade agreement. The fact is that while many of the jobs have been lost in the manufacturing sector, job increases in the service sector are keeping pace.
There have been four regular annual tariff reductions. At the request of industry, two accelerated tariff eliminations have also been implemented since 1989 covering approximately $8 billion in two-way trade with the United States. A third acceleration was initiated in November 1991.
Thirteen more professions made it known that they want to benefit from the temporary entry provisions of the free trade agreement and were approved for facilitation of business travel in 1991.

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The dispute settlement provisions of the free trade agreement are working effectively, especially as regards binding binational review of anti-dumping and countervailing actions. A prominent example is the pork case. The binational panel in that case overturned the U.S. determinations and eliminated the countervailing duty on Canadian pork.
No other U.S. trading partner has the same level of protection from U.S. trade actions. No other trading partner has the same right to bilateral review of changes to U.S. trade law.
There is no doubt that the current recession is making it difficult for both governments to manage the bilateral trade agenda. Protectionist pressures are increasing and United States industries are seeking more trade actions against imports.
We have made it clear to the United States administration that we expect them to stand up to these pressures and to meet their obligations under the free trade agreement.
It has been more than three years since the free trade agreement came into force on January 1, 1989. The free trade agreement is the largest trade agreement ever concluded between two countries. Its main goal is to gain improved and secure access to the United States market. The free trade agreement is meeting this goal.
I would like to highlight today the progress that has been made in the implementation of the free trade agreement and the resulting benefits to Canada. I will also speak about developments in the bilateral relationship of which everyone should be aware.
A provision for consultation and revision of free trade agreement rules of origin is included in chapter three. Several amendments of a largely technical nature have been agreed to by a bilateral working group. Changes to the domestic laws of Canada and the United States are being drawn up to reflect these revisions.
The U.S. customs service has ruled that only interest paid on mortgages taken out on real property which is used in the production of goods qualifies for tariff-free treatment under the free trade agreement.
Canada holds the view that certain other interest costs are also eligible under the language of the free trade agreement.
Formal consultations were held in Washington in October 1991. On January 6, 1992, Canada requested a binational panel be established to review the United States decision. The final decision of the panel is scheduled to be released on June 8, 1992.
The valuation of intermediate materials is a key issue in the U.S. customs service audit of the free trade agreement tariff status of vehicles produced in Canada. The audits are a normal part of a customs administrative process carried out by both customs services on a wide range of items. If the conclusions of any U.S. audit are based on interpretations of the free trade agreement with which Canada disagrees, the matter will be vigorously pursued with the United States.
Chapter four of the free trade agreement provides for phased elimination of tariff and tariff-related measures, as well as other restrictive measures applied at the border within the 10-year implementation period of the free trade agreement. Four annual free trade agreement tariff reduction exercises have taken place since January 1989.
The free trade agreement also provides for accelerated tariff elimination at the request of industry. Two rounds have taken place since 1989 eliminating tariffs on some $8 billion in two-way trade in goods. Building on the success of the first two rounds, a third round was initiated in November 1991. Two hundred and eighty requests have been received and are being reviewed. A consolidated list should be published in The Canada Gazette by mid-June.
In order to obtain preferential duty treatment of goods under the free trade agreement, Canadian exporters are required to complete exporter's certificates of origin. Revenue Canada reports that the certification process is working smoothly and that more exporters are incorporating this requirement into their administrative routine.
There is also a free trade agreement provision for refunds on duty paid on free trade agreement tariff-free imports to Canada. In the first half of 1990, Revenue Canada processed over 75,200 requests for free trade agreement duty refunds, of which 85 per cent were decided in favour of the importer.
The free trade agreement obliges Canadian and U.S. accreditation bodies to recognize each other's qualified testing and certification organizations. The Canadian Standards Association has applied for accreditation to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration of the U.S. Department of Labour. The Standards Council of Canada is in the final stages of processing applications
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for accreditations from Underwriters' Laboratories Incorporated and the American Plywood Association.
The FTA also encourages the development of compatible standards-related measures and procedures for product approval. The Canadian industry associations and standards bodies are developing relationships within their U.S. counterparts.
Examples of co-operation include the agreement between the Electrical and Electronic Equipment Manufacturers of Canada and the U.S. National Electrical Manufacturers Association as well as that between the Canadian Standards Association and the U.S. Underwriters' Laboratories Incorporated.
Agriculture has been a contentious bilateral issue. The free trade agreement calls for a streamlined meat inspection system. Agreement was reached in February, 1990 on a proposal for a new, open-border inspection regime which would allow meat inspected under either country's meat inspection program to move freely between the two countries. The United States failed to implement the agreement and in response on September 9, 1991, Agriculture Canada introduced a replacement system which re-inspects U.S. meat entering Canada at a limited number of designated facilities.
On October 18, one month and nine days later, the U.S. Department of Agriculture published a notice in the federal registrar announcing its withdrawal from the proposals. Efforts are continuing to reach bilateral agreement on an alternative approach to this issue.
The use by the United States of its Export Enhancement Program has resulted in difficulties for Canadian wheat exporters. Under the FTA each country is required to take into account the third country export interests of the other. Nevertheless, the United States has heavily subsidized wheat exports into traditional Canadian markets. Canada has expressed concern that the EEP depresses prices and harms Canadian producers.
Import permit requirements for wheat and wheat products were removed by the Canadian Wheat Board in May 1991 after U.S. subsidy levels were determined to be equal to or less than the level of government support for that grain in Canada.
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Under the FTA article 702, the snapback provisions of the FTA allow either Canada or the United States to impose additional temporary duty on imported fresh fruits and vegetables when imported prices are depressed and domestic crop average is not higher than historical levels.
Are you giving me an indication, Mr. Speaker, that we are not going to get all this technical matter on the agenda? In that case, I will conclude. I wanted to have some of this technical material on the record because we have been getting a number of questions.
Let me just say that the free trade agreement is working and benefiting Canada and Canadians. We therefore reject the opposition's call to rash and foolish action.


Mr.   Brian@: Mr. Speaker, I just wanted to commend the hon. member from Calgary for his comments with regard to the success of the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement.
The opposition over the past several hours has, on many occasions, suggested that every single riding has been impacted negatively across this country by the free trade agreement. I am here to report to you, Mr. Speaker, and to the people of Canada that the riding of Elk Island is not one of those ridings.
In fact, Dow Chemical in Fort Saskatchewan in the riding of Elk Island has just initiated an $800 million expansion to its petrochemical operation.
The president of Dow Chemical, Denis Wilcock, has indicated to people in the riding and to workers who will be benefiting from that expansion that this new $800 million expansion would not have been possible had it not been for the free trade agreement.
As well in my riding there are two new chemical plants producing an environmentally friendly chemical used in the pulp and paper industry. These industries as well are exporting. They are in the Bruderheim area. Canadian Oxy has one plant and Alchem has another.
I just wanted to ask the member why, during the last election, were the doom and gloomers in the opposition saying that all of the plants in my area would be closing down and that my parents, who are senior citizens, were

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going to lose their pension and that my four children were going to lose their health care benefits?
In fact, my parents' income has increased since 1988. There are new plants opening up in my riding of Elk Island and my children still have their health care.
What were the motives for the doom and gloomers spreading this disinformation about free trade?


Lee Richardson: Mr. Speaker, one can only speculate as to the motives of the opposition parties when they see the benefits to Canada of the free trade agreement. It is the same kind of scare tactics that the socialists use with regard to medicare today, that everyone is going to lose their medicare. Far from the case. It is simply not going to happen. Nor, as has been suggested by some opposition party members, is it that the free trade agreement would be harmful to Canada.
In fact, the proof is in the pudding. It has been clear to many across the country that we have had a world-wide recession but in fact Canada has been cushioned from that veiy recession through the benefits of the free trade agreement.
The objective of the free trade agreement was to give free access to the American market. Canadians should consider these facts on free trade and the benefits of free trade. We should mention that we are looking at a market here of 26 million people and are now expanding that market to one of 250 million people. This is the benefit to Canadian industry.
Our exports to the United States rose 4.6 per cent in 1990. We sell more to the Americans than we buy from them, $17.4 billion more in 1990 compared to $14 billion more in 1988. So there is an increase just over the two years of the free trade agreement of $3 billion in increased sales to the United States. Since the free trade agreement our exports of aerospace products, engineered industrial machinery, transportation equipment, and chemical products have grown by $4 billion.
Because of the free trade agreement dispute settlement mechanism, which I mentioned in my remarks, our pork producers won a clear victory against their U.S. counterparts. We did not have this alternative before. We did not have this opportunity previously to go after
these anti-dumping and countervail decisions in the United States. We now have an independent tribunal which deals with these and here is a clear victory against United States counterparts and we will be getting back the $20 million paid to U.S. customs.


Barbara Jane (Bobbie) Sparrow: Mr. Speaker, I want to extend my appreciation to my colleague from Calgary Southeast for sharing his time.
One thing that westerners-I was going to say Albertans, but indeed westerners-realize is that free trade is very, very important for our country to maintain its standard of living and indeed to progress.
Some of our major industries, of course, are agriculture and the petroleum industry and petrochemicals. The free trade agreement which came into implementation on January 1, 1989 has certainly assisted us. It has not all been free and easy and there is certainly no agreement that does not come without a few problems, but we are certainly far better off.
The interesting thing is that Canada, out of all the countries in the western industrialized world, is more trade-dependent than any other country. Actually, about three million jobs depend on trade here, as well as almost 30 per cent of our national revenues. So we in Canada have to trade to maintain our standard of living and indeed obtain the revenues.
But there are critics. I am sorry the hon. member for Ottawa South could not stay in the House because he did pose a question with regard to people forecasting doom and gloom and always suggesting that we Canadians cannot compete. And I just wanted to say to him that-


Dennis Joseph Mills: He said we could.


Barbara Jane (Bobbie) Sparrow: We can. That is absolutely right. But he said there are people out there who are saying that we cannot. We certainly can compete. Obviously, over the last five, six, eight years, this country has been rationalizing its manufacturing business, and indeed its resource industry, whether it is from British Columbia with regard to forestry or Alberta with regard to oil and gas or wheat.
My colleague from Saskatchewan knows very well what high subsidies can do for the exportation of grain, and he knows the major problems we have when we are
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at the GATT table. Although that is another story, GATT has to resolve those unfair trading practices.
Canadians do not have to be fearful. We really do have the ability to compete. We just have to get out there and sell better, merchandise our products better and build our goods and our services more efficiently. We certainly can do that.
Some people do like to stick their heads in the sand. We have lived very well in this country over the past decades. We are quite dependent on our natural resources in the west, on manufacturing in central Canada, and on natural resources and the fishing industry on the east coast.
The whole world is changing and the globe is changing. It is becoming smaller and smaller. For Canada to negotiate a trade pact with the United States, our closest neighbour, to ensure that we have access to its market is a step in the right direction.
Let us get this straight, there is no such thing as free trade. What we are really discussing is freer trade. Prior to January 1, 1989, 80 per cent of all the goods that we exported to the United States were relatively duty free. We were working on a very small portion and we are pleased to phase out the duties over a period of 10 years. That process should terminate about 1998.
The most important part is the dispute settlement mechanism. When we do have a trade dispute with the United States, and there is just cause and reason, we will be able to take it to a tribunal made up of equal numbers of American and Canadian people with an arbitrator, a negotiator chosen by both sides.
The cause for our dispute would be reviewed and a decision would be made within, I believe is 315 days, less than a year. Prior to this free trade agreement any dispute had to go to GATT. There are 108 countries in GATT and it took six, seven or eight years for the dispute to be resolved. By the time you got through the dispute mechanism arguing your case whether you were right or wrong, the industry was having a pretty tough time.
I would like to ask the critics of the free trade agreement if they have another mechanism that would resolve some of these disputes. We now have an agreement that takes the 240 million or 245 million people in the United States and combines them with our 27 million
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and to make a very strong market of 270 million or 280 million.
We have to watch the rest of the world. Multilateral trade is very important. The United States is a major trading partner, but our second biggest trading partner is Japan. Indeed, the Pacific Rim is a very important trading partner for all of us in North America and we look forward to expanding our trade there. Our third largest partner would be the European market.
This year, 1992, is the year that 12 European countries come together in a common market. I believe the number is up to 14. Spain and Portugal have entered the EC so there are 14 countries. There is also talk of the Community expanding further.
While North America is pulling together to improve and set down some relatively strict but flexible criteria for trade we must also realize that Europe '92 represents 350 million or 380 million people. It is a tough market, because it is so large, but we can do it.
I really want to emphasize that this is no absolute magic formula. It has to be worked on by both sides. There is no doubt about it.
We were used to living with protectionism. As we work down these barriers with the United States in the different industries that are involved, agriculture being the last one that we will be working on toward the end of the nineties, it means that goods and services will be able to flow across the border both ways.
The world is now too small for protectionism. Protectionism protects an industry at home, it may give it a tax advantage or a subsidy advantage, and does not really push it to become more competitive.
We can see that Canada stands in an excellent position to improve its trade. As mentioned by my colleague for Calgary Southeast with regard to this dispute mechanism, we did take the pork dispute to it and Canada won. That meant that between $20 million and $24 million was put back into the producers' pockets. The government was also successful in the raspberry dispute a year and a half or two years ago. We do have a problem today with the Honda engine. I can assure the House that if this is not resolved at the border with our people on both sides it must go to the dispute mechanism.

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It has also helped with the question of softwood lumber. If we did not have this special court to challenge both sides today, we would certainly have a problem.
I look forward to moving through the three to five-year schedules that were set down in the FTA so that we can see more of the goods.
In conclusion, one area I wish to mention concerns unifying the standards between Canada and the United States. This is one area we have to move in. Indeed, we have to move all across Canada in order to get our trade barriers down.
I was very active during the debate in 1989. I certainly support free trade. I support the dispute mechanism that we have used, and it can be improved on. I look forward to the future for Canada. With our resources and our value added, we certainly can improve our trade surplus and our exports.


Mr. Robert D. Nault (Kenora-Rainy River):: Mr. Speaker, I was listening very intently to the member's speech and I would like to ask her a couple of specific questions.
Now that we are entering into a new regime of a global economy and a new regime that people classify as a free trade regime, I would be interested in knowing how she feels about the lack of labour adjustment programs in our country to deal with the close to 500,000 Canadians who are out of work. I would like to know whether she feels that is a fair price to pay for a particular change in direction and philosophy from one government to the other.
Whether she wants to use the recession as the reason or not, the fact remains that something in the range of 65 per cent of those jobs lost are due to permanent plant closures. Obviously we must do something with these people to get them back to work. I would be interested to know how she proposes to deal with that because it has become more obvious as we watch the government twist and turn in the wind that this was not part of its strategy when it first entered into the free trade agreement.
Second, I would like to know about the importance, as far as this member is concerned, of an environmental accord with the other countries in this free trade atmosphere that we are entering into. Is it acceptable for a
country like Mexico to pollute the environment and not have any environmental standards whatsoever? That lack of regulations can entice businesses to move to Mexico because it is obviously cheaper to do business when it does not have those regulations.
I would be interested to know what the member really feels about those two very important issues. One is the environmental accords which we do not have and the other is the labour adjustment program for the close to half a million Canadians, 65 per cent of whom do not have a hope in hell of getting their job back once this particular recession everybody is using as an excuse is over. I would like to know whether she can give an answer to those questions.


Barbara Jane (Bobbie) Sparrow: I thank my colleague for raising a couple of issues with regard to labour adjustment programs. There have been labour adjustments on both sides of the border. If any of us in this House think that only Canadians have experienced job losses over the the past two or three years, it is not true. It certainly has happened in the U.S, England, Germany and Japan.
IBM said that it was laying off some 30,000 workers all around the world, and General Motors is laying off
74,000.
With regard to labour adjustment programs, we could look at the UI program. We have taken some of that funding and put it to job training. That adds up to hundreds of millions of dollars. As well, the Minister of Employment and Immigration announced in the last couple of days a creation program for single parent women to help them get off welfare and be retrained.
As for plant closures, we lived under protectionism for so long in this country that the plants did not upgrade. They did not put in the new technology. We were so far behind we were not competing. I guess, I do not have the statistics in front of me but the hon. member and I can talk about this, that some of those plants probably should have been closed before. For the hon. member to absolutely blame that on the free trade agreement is not fair.
The environment is a major issue. There is a trade agreement coming with Mexico one way or another. We did not initiate it. We are sitting at the table to protect the FTA, the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement. Mexico does have some very good environmental stan-
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dards but it does not implement them, nor does it have an environmental act.
The way to assist our colleagues is by being there. When we work with Mexico and trade with it we would have far more strength in an advisory capacity. We could even force it to meet North American standards on the environment.
One thing that is interesting is that by the year 2010 Mexico's population will be larger than the United States. It is getting huge. It will be a trading partner. I would like to sit down and make sure that there are some rules and guidelines to not only protect labour adjustment programs but also our environment.


Francis G. LeBlanc: Mr. Speaker, I rise today to add my voice, and that of my constituents, to the important debate that is currently before the House concerning the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement and the motion by the NDP.
First, I would like to express my deepest sympathy to the families of the coal miners in Plymouth, Nova Scotia whose lives were beset with tragedy early Saturday morning. My thoughts and prayers are also with the 26 souls who were working in the mine when the explosion occurred.
Nova Scotia has a long history of coal mining, and its history of disasters of this nature is just as long. My native Cape Breton has endured this kind of agony before and so our hearts go out to the families and the communities of those affected. We can but hope that some good will come out of this terrible event and that the memory of those fallen miners will ultimately serve a greater purpose.
With this in mind, I would like to turn my attention once more to the debate before this House concerning the NDP's stated intent of abrogating the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement. I am sure that some people will criticize the motion of the member for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca. They will see this motion as yet another example of his party's wont to embrace simplistic and expedient political postures as a means of scoring cheap political points.
I will not comment on this except to say that I do not believe the motion before the House to be irrelevant even though I fundamentally disagree with its premise at this time. This debate has enormous bearing on the
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shape of Canada's trading relationships, not only with the United States but with the world.
Not unexpectedly we have heard differing accounts of what the impact of free trade with the United States has been on Canada. On one side of the debate we are told that virtually every job lost and every social ill has been a direct result of the free trade agreement. On the other side it is argued that free trade has been good for Canada and that its benefits have merely been offset by the impact of the recession.
Once again, Canadians find themselves being asked to choose between diametrically opposed positions. They are expected to sift through a plethora of facts and opinions and reports and surveys which have arisen since the free trade agreement came into effect. They are being asked to decide who is most accurately reflecting the reality of the economic impact of free trade and what it means for the future.
This was the choice which befell Canadians in the 1988 federal election, a choice which became increasingly difficult as campaign rhetoric reached a fevered pitch. The issues at hand were of immense importance, as they are today, and as such should be measured against what are in Canada's best interests. As in 1988, this must be our guiding principle today.
As such, the first thing we must collectively realize is that Canada is a trading nation. This is something which my friends to the left seem to have forgotten. So much of what we hold dear, our standard of living, our social programs, our very way of life depends directly on our trading relationships with other nations.
Trade is the lifeblood of Canada's economy. Over 40 per cent of our Gross National Product is as a result of our trade. One in every three jobs in Canada relies on trade. Over the last few years this reliance has come to have an even greater significance as the global economy undergoes rampant change. Money in its movements no longer recognizes international borders. Instead it recognizes productivity and efficiency and above all else competitiveness.
The member for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca and his party would have us believe that the abrogation of the free trade agreement with the United States would be some sort of panacea for our economic problems. Members of the NDP would have us return to the days of protectionism and high tariff walls regardless of global economic reality.

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As economic strategies go, this would be disastrous, at least without overwhelming evidence to the contrary. But the NDP are far less concerned with Canada's economic strategy, it would seem, than they are with their own political advancement. They see the Conservatives, on the other hand, defending the free trade agreement and trying to downplay the economic ruin which has been brought about by the recession and by their own economic mismanagement.
On the other hand, the NDP think the Liberal Party's position, calling for a renegotiation, can be exploited. The Liberals would keep free trade with the Americans, they say. No different from the Tories, they say.
The member for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca went as far as to suggest this morning that renegotiation would be a cop-out. His colleague the member for Essex-Windsor called renegotiation a fairy tale. Only the NDP will do the right thing and abrogate the free trade agreement, they say. A vote for the NDP is a guarantee to Canadians that there will be no need for difficult decisions, they would have Canadians believe. Everything will be fine. I mean, has it not worked that way in Ontario?
No, Mr. Speaker, it has not worked that way in Ontario. It has been just the opposite for Bob Rae and his cohorts. Their adversarial posturing in opposition has given way to the crashing economic realities which face not only Canadians, but nations around the world.
Bob Rae can no longer afford to take positions that merely sound good, positions that exploit fear and economic hardship. Bob Rae's government has learned the hard way and Ontarians are paying the price of their education.
Would that Mr. Rae's NDP cohorts here in Ottawa might have learned the same lesson: that political expedience carries a heavy price. That is why it scared me when I heard the member for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca say this morning that his party is alone in principle in calling for the abrogation of this deal.
This having been said, I nonetheless believe that the debate before the House is an important one. I know that Canadians have suffered tremendously as a result of the recession and that many of the flaws of the FTA have caused great problems for our economy. There is no denying that the free trade agreement, as negotiated by
this government prior to the last election, is fraught with flaws. These are made all the more untenable when one considers that the government was warned repeatedly about the perils of signing a deal without adequate safeguards and definitions.
When the Prime Minister blames our trade woes on low level harassment from the United States administration, he should instead blame himself and his government for not going the extra mile during the negotiations, and for ignoring the implications of signing a deal that was ill-defined in some parts and incomplete in others. Such was their desperation in wanting to get a deal.
Much of what has befallen Canada since the implementation of this deal can be directly attributed to this government's failure in this regard and to its failure to obtain the guarantees and safeguards that would have protected Canadian interests from punitive American trade actions.
Where are the safeguards which might have prevented the dumping of American products in Canadian markets? Where are the safeguards on rules of origin and content? Where is the much talked about definition of subsidies? If the Minister for International Trade is to be believed, it is to be found in the Dunkel text of the current GATT negotiations.
Of course, if GATT negotiations grind to a halt then what does the Minister for International Trade propose? Perhaps he could tell us that.
Free trade with the United States has taught Canada an important lesson, namely that the Americans are only too ready to exploit the omissions and the flaws contained in this deal if it is in their own interests.
There were no tears shed south of the border for our workers in the Canadian beer and lumber industry, in the furniture industry, in the mining industry, in agriculture or in manufacturing. This government has learned too late that however cosy the relationship between the Prime Minister and the President, the Americans are in no mood to pussyfoot around when it comes to trade.
They are not going to let the perception of a special relationship get in the way of their bottom line. If there is a buck to be made at the expense of Canadian jobs, then so be it. If there is a vote to be had by American

politicians at the expense of Canadian interests, so much the better.
It is no coincidence that Canada's top two trade negotiators during the negotiations, Gordon Ritchie and Simon Reisman, are now on record as stating that U.S. trade remedies have greatly weakened Canada's position in terms of its agreement with the United States.
Gordon Ritchie said only last January: "One of the basic assumptions I made was that the Americans, having signed the deal, would not behave in an aggressive and unwarranted way toward its largest trading partner".
Simon Reisman, who was Canada's chief negotiator said: "The Americans are behaving like real thugs these days in protecting their interests".
The reality is that these gentlemen would not be making statements like these if the government had heeded our warnings. It should have realized that with a new global economy emerging, which is both lean and mean, we cannot take anything for granted, especially when it is Canada's economic and social well-being that are at stake.
In the last federal election, the Liberal Party opposed this free trade deal with the United States. It is important to note, however, that we opposed it on the basis of how it had been negotiated and on the basis of its flaws which have since become glaringly obvious.
We in the Liberal Party are nonetheless in favour of increased trade as a means of protecting and enhancing the standard of living which Canadians enjoy. We made this clear in 1988 and our belief in this position dates back nearly a century.
This is a marked difference from those in the NDP who feel that our standard of living in Canada is somehow a birthright. Ideology, it would seem, does not permit the NDP to take a hard look at the facts, except of course when they are forced to do so, as is now the case in Ontario.
This is a lesson which the governing Conservatives should also take to heart. The main preoccupation of this government in dealing with its economic woes seems to be finding someone to blame. Its inability to control the deficit, even after years of continuous growth, is blamed on previous governments or on the provinces.
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Punitive American trade action is blamed on low level harassment and not on its own failure to negotiate appropriate safeguards. Likewise, it is far too easy to blame every job lost on the free trade agreement, although it is clear that the impact of free trade with the United States is one of the reasons why over 1.5 million Canadians find themselves unemployed.
There have been devastating job losses in Canada's manufacturing sector which the government cannot simply dismiss. How much of this job loss can be attributed directly to free trade or to high interest rates, or to a high dollar? Who can say?
At the same time the Minister for International Trade talks about twisted figures and distorted trade. Surely he is not immune to the misery his government has created through its economic policies. Surely he is not looking to blame others for his own government's economic mismanagement.
I wonder if the minister would have the nerve to stand in his place today and to claim that we enjoy secure access to American markets. Was that not what obtaining a free trade agreement with the United States was all about? We certainly used to hear the words secure access a great deal from this government. How times change.
The same can be said of the government's failure with regard to preparing Canadians for the implementation of the free trade agreement. Any initiative which this government has taken since January 1, 1989, has been after the fact and in many cases far too late.
Where was the much discussed increase in research and development, so essential to providing much-needed technological advancement within Canadian industry? Where was the move toward adjustment and training programs so essential to preventing the job losses which we have endured since the onset of the recession?
In short, where was the government's game plan to make this agreement work for Canadians? The answer is nowhere. This deal was conceived as a means of returning the Conservatives to power in 1988. The ultimate irony is that the NDP now sees the abrogation of this agreement as its ticket to power. Like the Conservatives,

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what happens after is immaterial, achieving power is paramount, whatever the price.
We in the Liberal Party will not advocate the abrogation of the free trade agreement, nor will we stand by as the current deal unravels of its own accord. Our position on this matter is clear. We need a clear definition of subsidies. We need a clear definition of dumping. We need to make chapter 18 disputes binding. We need to reduce the timeframe for settling disputes. We need better content provisions. We need to renegotiate those aspects of the free trade agreement which have left us open to U.S. trade remedies and to outright harassment. These things should have been provided for when the deal was signed. The fact they were not, along with a complete lack of a game plan on the part of the government, has meant additional economic hardship for Canadians.
This does not mean we can throw out the entire package and expect everything to be fine afterward. The NDP might believe this but it may learn, come the next election, Canadians are not as willing as they once might have been to believe in fairy tales.


Douglas Grinslade Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I have already put on the record several general facts about free trade and I will not reiterate them because there was a full House when I brought them in and so many members have left in abjectness. They know they are shot in the next election and have left the House.
I did want to put on the record that Atlantic Canada's total exports to the U.S. under this flawed agreement that my hon. friend referred to went from $4.7 billion in 1988 to $4.9 billion in 1990. I do not know how they register increases in trade in Atlantic Canada but we figure it in central Canada as a plus. My hon. friend may do it differently.
Specifically, Polymar International of Truro, Nova Scotia, which already exports 50 per cent of its industrial packaging products, recently hired 40 employees because of expanded sales to the United States. Kemrow Inc. of Fredericton, New Brunswick brought up the U.S. owners of the technology, closed the American plant, expanded its products line, and moved rapidly to market its products in the U.S. and overseas.
A medical diagnostic kits manufacturer, Diagnostic Chemicals of Charlottetown, P.E.I. is benefiting from the elimination of duty under the FTA. "We expect the U.S. could account for 75 per cent of our market in the near future," said President Regis Duffy.
Just to cover all four of the Atlantic provinces, in St. John's, Newfoundland, Newtech Industries now has 38 employees, up from 14 in 1989. "Over the long term I expect free trade to save us money as a result of tariff elimination on imported components and the final exported product," predicts President Don Nickerson.
My hon. friend will know that trade to the United States has increased by $8 billion since 1988. If that is a flaw, my hon. friend would do well to help us have more flaws.


Francis G. LeBlanc: Mr. Speaker, unemployment has been up in Atlantic Canada since 1988, which is before the free trade agreement. It is seriously up in the minister's own province of Ontario where the manufacturing base has literally crumbled as a result of hundreds of plants moving south of the border and closing their doors. That is very much directly related to this agreement.
As far as Atlantic Canada is concerned, the minister has cited some plant expansions or job increases that may or may not have a direct relationship to this free trade agreement. They may simply be industries which are suitable for location in Atlantic Canada, but there are other industries in Atlantic Canada that were very much worried and adversely affected by this agreement.
The minister might want to discuss the matter with Stanfield's of Truro which has not prospered as a result of the free trade agreement or Crossley-Carastan Carpets, another industry that has been devastated by this agreement. We could provide an equally long list of firms which have not been assisted by this agreement in Atlantic Canada as well as in Ontario, his home province, where the agreement has literally been devastating for the economy.
We are going through a recession that we do not seem to be coming out of. The disturbing statistics of last week discouraged workers. The Canadian labour force is actually shrinking while the number of jobs in the United States has actually been increasing. It is a disturbing statistic, one which we ought to examine in the context of
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the debate we are having today on the consequences of this government's free trade agreement.


Joseph R. (Joe) Comuzzi: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask a question of my colleague from Cape Breton Highlands-Canso. First I will compliment him on the eloquent way in which he made very salient points with respect to the differences in the Liberal Party on the trade agreement as it was passed a year or two ago in this House. We now find deficiencies that our colleagues on the the other side do not want to acknowledge. However, that is for another day.
I would like to ask my colleague about his impression of the responsibility of opposition members on this side of the House when we start speaking on issues of great importance like the trade agreement.
With respect to the motion on the floor today, the motion to abolish the trade agreement, it certainly does not follow our agenda. The reality is that when something is put in place we do not deal with it that way internationally.
One area I am concerned about is the realities of governing. That is what I think my colleague was mentioning. They cannot go out, as we witnessed in Ontario, and promise free education to all university students and then not be able to deliver. They cannot go out and build up the expectations of people that they are going to offer a comprehensive automobile plan and then not deliver.
They cannot go out and raise the expectations of people in the province of Ontario or indeed the country by saying they are going to offer increased health services and then not deliver when in government. They cannot go out and offer fulfilling social programs like day care and then not be able to deliver.
I wonder whether this is a similar example of an opposition party that is not responsible, saying it is going to completely do away with the trade agreement quickly if and when it should take office. They are just not the realities of governing, and I would like my friend to comment on that issue.


Francis G. LeBlanc: Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Thunder Bay-Nipigon has put his finger on the essence of the debate. It is the credibility of the NDP that is at issue here or its lack of credibility. Quite clearly it is fighting a battle. Had it fought that battle with us when it was time to fight, we may not have been in the situation we are now in. Times have changed. For the NDP to be fighting those old battles and irresponsibly promising Canadians what it cannot deliver is repeating on a national scale the disaster which has occurred in Ontario since the election of the Bob Rae government.
Of course the member is right to question the credibility of the NDP in this whole debate in the context of simply tearing up or going back after the fact on battles which were fought before the fact. The NDP has to be much more specific about what it would propose as a trade strategy than what it has advanced today.


Mr. Len Gustafson (Parliamentary Secretary to Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, I want to comment particularly with regard to the speech that was delivered. When we look at the global economy we are facing, the only problem with the free trade agreement is that it should have happened 10 years ago. North America should have been moved to the position of competition as it relates to free trade in the global economy.
Anyone who today goes as far as the NDP did and says that we should abolish the free trade agreement and move toward a protectionist mode in a global economy has no idea of what is happening in the world.
It is interesting to note that the Liberals seem to be on both sides of the issue. It is a little hard to detect at times just exactly where they are.
Certainly the trade of Ontario with the United States is greater than that of Japan. In a country like Canada a trade agreement is absolutely necessary. If we are to compete with the European common market, if we are to compete with some of the other countries that are forming trading blocs, we must and should have moved to a free trade agreement 10 years ago.


Mr. Dave Worthy (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Public Works):: Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to speak to this topic today.

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It is easy for many people to consider themselves free traders when times are good, when the economy is growing and when exports are rising. It is not so easy when times are tough. It seems to many wellnigh impossible when our best and most important trading partner seems to be responding to political partisan protectionist pressures.
As a result many are saying that we as a government and as a country were naive when we entered into the free trade agreement. Some may say we were misguided. Some may say we were uncaring. Others will suggest it is time to let it go. None of the above are true. None of the above suggestions that we would let go are responsible and could work.
Instead, when times are tough it is time more than ever before for us to be constant in our trading arrangement. We of all the trading nations in the world depend on trade. Per capita, Canadians depend on trade three times as much as the United States. We depend on trade twice as much per capita as the people of Japan. We consider Japan and the United States to be examples of some of the greatest trading nations in the world. Canadians depend upon this foreign trade more than either of those nations.
For those I have heard from British Columbia who suggested that the free trade agreement was not good, it fills me with horror and I am mystified by it. In the discussions just a week ago with industry leaders from the cattlemen's association, from the mining association and from the forest industry, the one single message they had for our Prime Minister was: "Stay firm on our free trade agreement. We depend on that free trade more than any other province in Canada".
Are we being indifferent to the plight of Canadian auto workers, lumberjacks, miners and brewers in holding the course? Not in the least. We have and will continue to deploy every resource and opportunity to defend our interest and help those in need. We will do so with all the vigour and all the tools at our disposal, but we will do it within the rules.
There are those in the United States and in Canada who may be prepared to risk a return to the jungle. I am not one of them. Nor is this government. There are those who offer counsel of despair. There are those who say that Canadians cannot compete with the rest of the world. There are those who want to abrogate the
agreement. There are those who want to retaliate emotionally, to hit back. That is easy to say but difficult to do effectively. Experience has shown that few retaliatory actions ever hit the target. More often than not it means shooting yourself in the foot.
While we will not fall prey to any short-sighted and self-defeating approach, we do not need to adopt a siege mentality either. The rules of the free trade agreement bite both ways. Where we think the Americans are wrong, we will use the rules to defend our interests and we should use those rules then. We will not be shy. Using the rules may not always give us quick relief but it leads to lasting relief. It is a relief based on the sound foundation of rules rather than the momentary but deceiving rush of retaliation.
The economic circumstances which disposed us to take the road to free trade at the beginning of our mandate have, if anything, become more compelling. In 1985 we were only seeing early signs of the phenomenon since dubbed globalization. Today the signs are unmistakable. We, like the Americans, the Japanese and other great trading nations are increasingly part of that global economy. This world poses direct challenges to Canada which can be summed up in a simple phrase. By the end of the decade we must transform ourselves from a trading nation into a nation of traders.
The free trade agreement, the GATT negotiations, trilateral negotiations with Mexico and the United States, our prosperity initiative, the February budget and learning initiatives-all of these programs are based on the premise that we must transform Canada from a trading nation into a nation of traders.
No one doubts that we are currently a trading nation. Over the past decade we have exported about a quarter of our production every year, most of it to the United States but a lot of it to markets all over the world. We can compete and we do compete. However it is sad to say that we are not yet a nation of traders. Our trading culture still remains too shallow. We still export too limited a range of products to too few markets. Not enough companies have an export vocation. Not enough Canadians accept that international business is the key to future growth. Not enough Canadians accept that we have to be competitive on a world scale, that every Canadian must have a stake in the global economy. We will not achieve that by hiding from the world. We will
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not achieve that with one-way free trade. We will not achieve it if we do not adapt.
Trade is where the domestic economy meets the international economy. A successful export performance is a pretty good indication that the domestic economy is working, that it is competitive. It is an indication that our economy is adjusting and becoming more productive.
Our past record speaks well, but we have to still do better. We have to improve our productivity. We have to keep prices stable. We have to accept competition at home as well as abroad. We have to invest in the future and provide an attractive investment climate for both Canadian and foreign investors alike.
That is why the Canadian government negotiated the free trade agreement with the United States. That is why we are negotiating a trading agreement between Mexico, the United States and Canada. That is why we want to reduce the debt. That is why we want to keep inflation low. That is why we want to reduce the heavy hand of government in the economy. The result will be a growing, stronger, outward looking economy that provides not only a future for us but, more important, for our children.
In 1988, just prior to the free trade agreement, there was a net direct investment outflow from Canada of $2.5 billion. In 1990 Canada enjoyed a record net direct investment inflow of $4.3 billion. The difference since the free trade agreement is over $6.5 billion in our favour. We also maintained a healthy trade surplus with the United States and it has grown since the free trade agreement. Our exports have continued to grow. Some of that export growth has been manufactured goods, such as electrical machinery, rolling stock and high-tech products such as aerospace equipment and scientific and professional instruments.
Obviously we are a nation of resources. Many of our exports are in the resource area. Unfortunately, plant closures and job losses get more press than new investments and increased exports. The success stories of free trade are real. There will be more of them as our economy recovers from the recession and they will provide the base for strong, adaptable industrial sectors.
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Where trouble does flare up, the free trade agreement helps to localize and then eliminate disturbances. For example, the free trade agreement process made resolution of the pork dispute possible. Canadian efforts have proven the value of clear rules and objective decisionmaking to ensure the correct and proper application of trade laws. The system works and it can be made to work better.
We believe, in fact I have absolute faith, that the system will work and the results will be good for Canada in the softwood lumber case and in the Honda case as well.
The government has made it clear to the U.S. administration that close and careful political management must be brought to the implementation of the free trade agreement. We continue to believe that the free trade agreement is fundamental to our objective of competing, competing successfully in the global economy.
To that end we will vigorously pursue our rights under the agreement and on the issues at hand, including if necessary full recourse to the dispute settlement panel. We will make every effort to work with the administration to find solutions to the problems. We believe we will succeed. We believe the free trade agreement remains the best security for our trade relations with the United States. We believe it has proved its worth and will continue to do so.
We cannot, must not, let the people of Canada forget that Canada is a nation dependent on trade, especially trade with our American partners. We need that trade to make it work better. It will work better for all of us in Canada and it will show us the way. The rest of the world judges Canada as the nation most likely to pull out of this recession in good shape. Part of the reason for that is our free trade agreement.


David Barrett: Mr. Speaker, I continue to be amazed at the position held by some of my worthy colleagues on that side of the House who have almost a pious belief that the United States is adhering to this agreement with the vigour of decency, fairness and on a level playing field. The belief is that the United States is viewing its share of this free trade agreement as one of no protectionism and honour bound to say that there is a level playing field.

May 11, 1992
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I am puzzled. How much evidence does this government need to understand that the United States has been clobbering us inside and outside the agreement.
I have deep respect for the American people but the United States government is in a protectionist mode, except for the President's office, where they talk out of one side of their mouth and then do something else. Certainly the Senate and the Congress are both in a protectionist mode. This is an election year and the evidence becomes more obvious in election years than at any other time.
I want to specifically go back to some of the things that the United States is doing unfairly, unconscionably in this agreement and our government is supinely lying back and not doing anything about it, saying: "Oh, it will be straightened out. Do not worry about it". Meanwhile, we are losing jobs.
Thirty-nine U.S. states were allowed to grandfather in clauses that allowed them to give preferential buying out of state budgets for U.S. goods first. This government did not even bargain for a level playing field of government expenditures in all the 50 states. As a consequence of that, if one provincial government passed a law today or began to practise by Order in Council a preferential buying policy for that single province, they would be violating the free trade agreement.
Do hon. members know what that means? If the province of Quebec decided that it wanted to institute a policy of giving a 10 per cent preference to suppliers in the province of Quebec of paper products or anything the government bought, that would be a violation of the free trade agreement. That is a fact. Canadian taxpayers' money under this free trade agreement cannot even be used as a leverage to buy Canadian. What kind of a deal was that? Thirty-nine states are allowed to do it and yet we are not allowed to do it. The province of Prince Edward Island, trying to keep small businesses alive, cannot do it.
I will give another example, because this member is saying that it is the only route to go. This is one example.
I will do it quietly because I do not want to disrupt the government benches. Conscience speaks louder than my words, Mr. Speaker, and their conscience is being hurt. As far and as deep as we have to look, but it is there, they do have a conscience. I believe it because I have faith in humankind but my faith will be shattered.
Let me give another example of the violations.


An hon. member:: Time.


David Barrett: It is not time at all, not time enough. Here is an example. The Central Power and Light Company of El Paso, Texas, is saying and I quote: "Come down to Texas. We will give you three-year abatements of property taxes as an incentive".
They can go as high as a 10-year abatement.
That is a violation of the treaty. It happens in every single jurisdiction-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: I hope the hon. member will end these comments or ask a question of the previous speaker.


Lee Richardson: Time.


David Barrett: Hosed. And you are doing nothing about it. You will not even turn the water off.


An hon. member:: Hear, hear.


Dave Worthy: Mr. Speaker, I always know that I am in for something when the previous speaker stands up and says that he is amazed. He is a member who is well known in British Columbia. I know that he speaks very strongly on this issue, but when he is speaking to British Columbians it is hollow rhetoric because he offers no alternative to the free trade agreement.
If he could rip up what people in Canada and around the world have recognized as the best trading agreement a person could possibly have with the United States he would rip it up. He would rip it up, throw it away and turn our industries, not only in British Columbia but across the country, into a no rules game. He does not like any of the rules that do not go exactly the way he wants them.
There have been a number of cases in which the trading environment is obviously getting better under the free trade agreement. Our trade with the United States has increased. Our trading balance has improved. The free trade agreement is working, especially in the province that he and I come from. If anybody in Canada understands the value of the free trade agreement it is those of us in British Columbia. I know that the hon. member would recognize it also if he could speak freely in the House.
May 11, 1992


Robert Daniel Nault: Mr. Speaker, I welcome the opportunity to ask my colleague a question concerning the free trade agreement.
There seems to be a sense among members of the Conservative Party that when you enter a free trade agreement or any agreement it simply becomes a commercial document. Therefore it is business as usual and there are no problems. The job loss created by the plant closures is just part of doing business.
More specifically, I would like to ask the member about the Mexican free trade agreement that we are working on now which is more than likely to be approved. In most countries around the world they deal with the social factor. I want to ask the member if he feels that it is a responsible move of this government to not deal with the differences in the standard of living in the countries we are talking about.
In Mexico it is obvious that the labour standards, the health and safety standards and the employment standards are lower than Canada's. It is also very obvious that they are lower than the United States. It is also true that those same standards in the United States are lower than those in Canada. Obviously if you are going to have an agreement and you are going to do business those particular standards create costs for businesses in those areas.
I would like to ask the member whether it is a fact that during this whole process, during this whole treaty, this free trade agreement that we are entering into in this North American bloc, that somewhere down the line we are going to meet. We will either have to set lower standards to compete with Mexico and the United States or Mexico will have to rise up to our standards, one or the other. Otherwise, we must enter into some sort of social treaty to protect our standard of living. I would like to know from the member whether he feels that is not a necessity, in essence that this is just a commercial document and those items are not of interest or a necessity to protect the Canadian workers?


Dave Worthy: Mr. Speaker, I take the question very seriously because I think he spoke seriously on the issue.
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I know that it is a concern to many people across Canada. It should be a concern, because it is an obvious difference in environment. There is a dramatic difference between Mexico and Canada.
Trading nations around the world, whether they are in Europe or North America, are more and more going to have to try to face exactly those issues that the member was referring to. I do not think that there is anybody who has all the answers to it. They are certainly not simple answers.
I will give an example of how things work themselves out in a free trading environment, when you believe in it and when you practise it. When the free trade agreement was being negotiated the greatest criticism was that we would experience the same situation in some of the southeastern U.S. states where wages and standards are lower.
That was going to be the competition that wiped us out. It is interesting that the greatest pressure in the softwood lumber issue is coming from the industry in the southeastern U.S., where the wages are about half of what they are in British Columbia. It is they who are saying that they have difficulty competing with us.
The member will realize that this is not a total parallel, but it is an indication that-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: Order please. The time for questions and comments has now expired. Resuming debate.


Chris Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to join in this debate, even if only for a short time, to support the resolution that has urged the government to abrogate the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement.
To suggest, as the Liberals have done, that we can renegotiate parts of that agreement is absurd in the extreme, even if we only listen to what President George Bush told the leader of the Liberal Party, which was that there would be no renegotiation of this treaty.
We have two choices. One is to essentially stick with the treaty as we have it, which is what the government opposite wants, and expand it to include Mexico and put even further pressure on jobs and social programs in Canada. The second is to get rid of it altogether and start from scratch. Clearly this free trade agreement has

May 11, 1992
Supply
taken away from Canada the opportunity to set its own rules in terms of the economy and social programs.
The first thing that Canada needs to do to put its economy back on track is to take back control of Canada, take back control of the economy, and take back the opportunity to make decisions which are in the best interests of Canadians. No longer can this country continue on this downward spiral of competitive poverty, of driving Canadian living standards and social programs down to meet the lowest common denominator of whomever we happen to be negotiating with at the time.
First, it was to push our competitive situation and social programs down to the level of the United States-to play on a level playing field. Now in the context of dealing with Mexico we must push those wages and those social programs down even further to the lowest common denominator.
An alternative and appropriate response to this process of giving transnational and multinational corporations the right to make decisions over what is appropriate for Canadians is for the Canadian government to take back control of Canada. The Canadian government should be able to make decisions which are in the best interests of Canadians rather than allow economic, social, and environmental issues to be resolved by large corporations that have little or no interest in Canadians or in Canada.
The first step in allowing Canada to take back control of its economy, to take back control of its society is to scrap the free trade agreement. Once we do that we have the opportunity to set new rules, new guidelines and new policy alternatives to create a Canada controlled once again by Canadian governments, which surely are elected for that purpose.
There are a number of things we can do as an alternative to the free trade agreement approach to take back control of Canada. Instead of granting large corporations the freedom to operate as they please in Canada, and indeed in the U.S. and Mexico, we need to ensure that corporate behaviour is responsible and accountable to local communities.
We need to ensure that we screen foreign investments and that we implement local equity requirements to
ensure that we do have some domestic control over investments in Canada. Canadians should control more of the economic activity in Canada.
Instead of allowing manufacturing corporations to simply shut down plants and relocate their operations to another country to take advantage of cheap labour conditions, we need to ensure that Canada implements domestic content rules.
That would make sure that if a corporation is trading in Canada, is wishing to sell its products in Canada, then it should have some commitment to jobs and investment in Canada. That corporation should give something back to Canada rather than just sell goods from the cheapest possible supplier.
The auto pact is a good example of this managed trade where corporations have taken a responsibility selling products in Canada and ensuring that they produce products in Canada too.
In the area of agriculture, rather than opening up agriculture markets to agribusiness, large corporations which are serving the purpose of wiping out farmers in Canada we need to ensure that we move toward a more sustainable food production system for the country. This would support family farms and maintain effective food safety standards.
Orderly marketing systems and supply management which are under threat now from pressure by the United States and the GATT should be strengthened. They should be established in areas where they do not exist to ensure that farmers have a fair return for the cost of production and to ensure that consumers have stable food supply.
In terms of energy, instead of a continental energy policy that just gives the United States direct access to non-renewable oil and gas reserves in Canada we need to ensure that we emphasize energy conservation and sustainable development.
We have a right. We should have a right. We should get that right back by abrogating the free trade agreement to ensure that our energy needs come first, that our energy is used for the best advantage of the Canadian manufacturing industry and Canadian people.
We should be able to regulate the exports of our oil and gas to the United States rather than just handing those resources over to the Americans as they see fit.
May 11, 1992

Instead of giving multinational corporations free access to service markets in Canada, we need to make sure that those service markets are addressed in a way which benefits, and is in the best interests of, Canadians.
Included in this are imported sectors such as media, culture, and finance. We surely as a sovereign nation should be able to exclude foreign investors from sectors like media and culture in order that we may sustain it for ourselves and with our own interests at heart.
There are many economic alternatives we can pursue in order to get the control of the Canadian economy back in Canadian hands. But the first thing we have to do is to abrogate the free trade agreement.
In response to non-economic and social matters where Canadians are extremely worried by the implications of the free trade agreement, the indications that the free trade agreement would have serious repercussions on the environment in Canada, on social services in Canada, on the health care system, all those concerns are coming true.
Instead, while facilitating the rapid exploitation of our non-renewable resources or treating environmental protection measures as an unfair trade subsidy, we need to make sure that we develop an environmentally friendly and sustainable economic system in Canada to ensure that we can maintain those resources for our children and our children's children.
Countries violating environmental protection standards should be subject to retaliatory trade sanctions so that we are then on a level playing field with regard to the environment, something which affects the whole planet.
In regard to social assistance, instead of permitting our social services and our social programs like health care and education to be seen as subsidies or for the potential for them to be seen as subsidies, we need to ensure that our citizens have the guaranteed right to adequate health care, public education and social assistance. We need, not to drive our social programs down to the lowest common denominator as we have seen in the free trade agreement and as we are seeing in the negotiations with Mexico, but to drive them up so all those covered by
Supply
any agreements between countries and certainly making sure that Canadians-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: Order, please. It being 5.45 o'clock p.m., it is my duty to interrupt the proceedings and put forthwith every question necessary to dispose of the business of supply pursuant to Standing Order 81(14).
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.


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


Some hon. members:: Yea.


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


Some hon. members:: Nay.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: In my opinion the nays have it.
And more than five members having risen:


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: Call in the members.


PAIRED -MEMBERS
[Stage Direction]
nil/aucun
[Stage Direction]
Mr. Speaker I declare the amendment lost. The next question is on the main motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?
Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: No.


Mr. Speaker:: All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.


Some hon. members:: Yea.


Mr. Speaker:: All those opposed will please say nay.


Some hon. members:: Nay.


Mr. Speaker:: In my opinion the nays have it.
And more than five members having risen:


PAIRED - MEMBERS
[Stage Direction]
nil/aucun
Mr. Speaker:: I declare the motion lost.


ALLOTTED DAY-S. O. 31-MANPOWER TRAINING
[Stage Direction]
The House resumed, from May 8, 1992, consideration of the motion of Mr. Peterson:
That this House has no confidence in the Government because of its abject failure to provide job training and retraining initiatives to enable Canadians to cope with the economic dislocations and deprivations resulting from federal government policies; and, in particular,
That this House condemn the Minister of Employment and Immigration for his continual failures to provide the House and the people with accurate and unambiguous factual information on this matter.
Mr. Speaker:: Pursuant to Standing Order 45(6), the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred division on the motion in relation to the business of supply.
The question is on the motion of Mr. Peterson.


PAIRED-MEMBERS
[Stage Direction]
nil/aucun
Mr. Speaker:: I declare the motion lost.


MEASURE TO ENACT
[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from Thursday, May 7, consideration of Bill C-36, an act respecting corrections and the conditional release and detention of offenders and to establish the office of Correctional Investigator, as reported (with amendments) from the Standing Committee on Justice and Solicitor General; and on Motions Nos. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 20 and 22.
Mr. Speaker:: Pursuant to Standing Orders 76(8) and 45(6), the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred divisions on the motions at report stage of Bill C-36.
The hon. member on a point of order.


Mr. Angus:: Mr. Speaker, I think you will find that the House would be willing to apply the vote just taken under the opposition motion to the four groups of amendments for Bill C-36 and then a reverse at report stage.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it agreed?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Mr. Speaker:: It is so ordered.


PAIRED -MEMBERS
[Stage Direction]
nil/aucun
++YEAS
Members
Allmand
Angus
Axworthy (Saskatoon-Clark's Crossing)
Barrett
Bellemare
Bevilacqua
Blackburn (Brant)
Boudria
Clancy
Dingwall
Ferguson
Flis
Foster
Gaffney
Gauthier
Harb
Hovdebo
Jordan
Keyes
Kilgour (Edmonton Southeast)
Langdon (Essex-Windsor)
LeBlanc (Cape Breton Highlands-Canso) MacAulay Manley Mifflin Mills Murphy Nystrom Parker Phinney Prud'homme Robinson
Skelly (Comox-Albemi)
Taylor Vanclief Waddell Whittaker
Anderson
Atkinson
Beatty
Bernier
Blackburn (Jonquiere)
Bourgault
Brightwell
Cadieux
Cardiff
Chadwick
Chartrand
Clifford
Collins
Cooper
Cote
Darling
de Cotret
Dick
Anawak
Assad
Axworthy (Winnipeg South Centre)
Belair
Berger
Black
Blondin
Catterall
Comuzzi
Dionne
Fisher
Fontana
Fhlton
Gagliano
Gray (Windsor West)
Harvard
Hunter
Karpoff
Kilger (Stormont-Dundas)
Langan (Mission-Coquitlam)
Laporte
Lee
Maheu
McLaughlin
Milliken
Mitchell
Nault
Ouellet
Peterson
Proud
Riis
Rompkey
Stewart
Tobin
Venne
Wappel
Wood-74
++NAYS
Members
Andre
Attewell
Belsher
Bird
Blenkam
Boyer
Browes
Campbell (Vancouver Centre) Casey
Champagne (Champlain)
Clark (Brandon-Souris)
Cole
Cook
Corbeil
Couture
DeBlois
Desjardins
Dobbie
[Stage Direction]
May 11, 1992
Supply
Domm
Edwards
Fee
Ferland
Fretz
Gibeau
Greene
Gustafson
Hoc kin
Hughes
Jelinek
Joncas
Kemp ling
Landry
Larrivee
Lewis
Lopez
Masse
McCreath
McDougall (St. Paul's)
Moore
Nicholson
O'Kurley
Plourde
Redway
Reimer
Richardson
Saint-Julien
Scott (Victoria-Haliburton)
Shields
Soetens
Stevenson
Tetreault
Thompson
Tremblay (Quebec-Est)
*Rimer (Halton-Peel)
Vankoughnet
Vincent
White
Wilson (Swift Current-Maple Creek-i Wilson (Etobicoke Centre)
Worthy-118
Dorin
Epp
Feltham
Fontaine
Friesen
Gray (Bonaventu re-iles-de-la-Madeleine)
Guilbault
Hawkes
Homer
Jacques
Johnson
Jourdenais
Koury
Langlois
Layton
Loiselle
Marin
Mazankowski
McDermid
McLean
Mulroney
Oberle
Paproski
Porter
Reid
Ricard
Roy-Arcelin
Schneider
Scott (Hamilton-Wentworth)
Sobeski
Sparrow
Tardif
Thacker
Thorkelson
Tremblay (Lotbiniere)
Van De Walle
Vien
Weiner
Wilbee
liboia)
Winegard

[Stage Direction]
nil/aucun
Motion No. 6 negatived.

[Stage Direction]
nil/aucun
Motion No. 20 negatived

[Stage Direction]
nil/aucun
Motion No. 22 negatived.
Douglas Grinslade Lewis: that the bill, as amended, be concurred in.
The House divided on the motion which was agreed to on the following division:
(Division No. 142)
++YEAS
Members
Andre
Attewell
Belsher
Bird
Blenkam
Boyer
Browes
Campbell (Vancouver Centre) Casey
Champagne (Champlain)
Clark (Brandon-Souris)
Cole
Cook
Corbeil
Couture
DeBlois
Anderson
Atkinson
Beatty
Bernier
Blackburn (Jonquiere)
Bourgault
Brightwell
Cadieux
Cardiff
Chadwick
Chartrand
Clifford
Collins
Cooper
Cote
Darling

May 11, 1992
Supply
de Cotret	Desjardins	Axworthy (Saskatoon-Clark's Crossing)	Axworthy (Winnipeg South Centre)Dick	Dobbie	Barrett	BelairDomm	Dorin	Bellemare	BergerEdwards	Epp	Bevilacqua	BlackFee	Felt ham	Blackburn (Brant)	BlondinFerland	Fontaine	Boudria	CatterallFretz	Friesen	Clancy	ComuzziGibeau	Gray (Bonaventure-iles-de-la-Madeleine)	Dingwall	DionneGreene	Guilbault	Ferguson	FisherGustafson	Hawkes	Flis	FontanaHockin	Homer	Foster	FiiltonHughes	Jacques	Gaffney	GaglianoJelinek	Johnson	Gauthier	Gray (Windsor West)Joncas	Jourdenais	Harb	HarvardKempling	Koury	Hovdebo	HunterLandry	Langlois	Jordan	KarpoffLarrivee	Layton	Keyes	Kilger (Stormont-Dundas)Lewis	Loiselle	Kilgour (Edmonton Southeast)	Langan (Mission-Coquitlam)Lopez	Marin	Langdon (Essex-Windsor)	LaporteMasse	Mazankowski	LeBlanc (Cape Breton Highlands-Canso)	LeeMcCreath	McDermid	MacAulay	MaheuMcDougall (St. Paul's)	McLean	Manley	McLaughlinMoore	Mulroney	Mifflin	MillikenNicholson	Oberle	Mills	MitchellO'Kurley	Paproski	Murphy	NaultPlourde	Porter	Nystrom	OuelletRedway	Reid	Parker	PetersonReimer	Ricard	Phinney	ProudRichardson	Roy-Arcelin	Prud'homme	RiisSaint-Julien	Schneider	Robinson	RompkeyScott (Victoria-Haliburton)	Scott (Hamilton-Wentworth)	Skelly (Comox-Albemi)	StewartShields	Sobeski	Taylor	TobinSoetens	Sparrow	Vanclief	VenneStevenson	Tardif	Waddell	WappelTetreault	Thacker	Whittaker	Wood-74Thompson Tremblay (Quebec-Est)	Thorkelson Tremblay (Lotbiniere)	PAIRED-	MEMBERSTurner (Halton-Peel) Vankoughnet Vincent White Wilson (Swift Current-Maple Creek -Wilson (Etobicoke Centre) Worthy-118 Allmand Angus	Van De Walle Vien Weiner Wilbee -Assiniboia) Winegard
NAYS Members Anawak Assad	nil/aucun Motion agreed to. Mr. Speaker: It being 6.30 o'clock p.m., this House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 10 o'clock a.m., pursuant to Standing Order 24(1). The House adjourned at 6.33 p.m.	
Tuesday, May 12,1992