1993-06-02

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42 Elizabeth II

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Published under authority of the Speaker of the House of Commons by the Queen's Printer for Canada
Available from Canadian Communication Group - Publishing, Supply and Services Canada, Ottawa, Canada K1A 0S9.
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Wednesday, June 2, 1993
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Prayers

Mr. Guy Saint-Julien (Abitibi):: Madam Speaker, in June 1989, our Prime Minister, the Right Hon. Brian Mulroney, signed the official declaration for National Access Awareness Week, inviting all Canadians to make this week a special event and improve the quality of life in their communities.
Since then, communities across Canada have improved access to public places, services and facilities for persons with disabilities. However, much remains to be done to eliminate all barriers encountered by the disabled, who are entitled to take an active part in the daily life of their community and to have access to the same basic services as the rest of the population.
The impact of National Access Awareness Week should last throughout the year.


TIOXIDE CANADA
Mrs. Shirley Maheu (Saint-Laurent-Cartierville):: Madam Speaker, Tioxide Canada, a company that pollutes the waterways of Quebec with no apology whatsoever, has just been fined $4 million, which is peanuts. The company heaved a sigh of relief, because it was expecting a fine of $36 million as well as prison terms for some of its board members. What a difference a fine makes.
Why does the government not impose sentences that would deter effect polluters? Although Environment
Quebec now has two cases pending against Tioxide Canada, the Crown merely rapped the company's knuckles. The Conservative government had a moral obligation to go to the wall on this. This is certainly no way to clean up our environment. The federal government must wake up and impose sentences that will make all polluters think twice. Tomorrow, it will be too late.


THE ABB PLANT
Mr. Marcel R. Tremblay (Quebec-Est):: Madam Speaker, I was delighted to hear that ABB, a high tech company in my riding, has taken another step to make its Quebec plant one of its most important condenser manufacturing units in the world.
Since it opened in 1991, the Quebec plant has been growing steadily and will double its capacity for the production of condensers by the first quarter of 1994, to supply the North American market.
ABB employs about 2,700 people in more than 35 plants in Canada and has annual sales of about $1 billion. It is involved in many activity sectors including the production, transmission and distribution of electric power, industrial automation, steam generating systems, robotics, measuring instruments, environmental technologies, telecommunications and high-speed trains. The people of Quebec are proud to be part of the technology boom generated by ABB's experts.


SMALL BUSINESS LOANS
Mr. Robert D. Nault (Kenora-Rainy River):: Madam Speaker, the Royal Bank announced discounts of 10 per cent on service charges for small businesses. The major financial institutions continue to miss the point. Figures from October 1991 to October 1992 show that the value of small business loans by the big six banks increased by a

June 2, 1993
modest 3.8 per cent, compared with a 12 per cent increase for loans to large corporations.
In the same period 450,000 new jobs were created by small business. By contrast, large organizations cut
96,500	people from their payrolls.
Most will know that last year the financial institutions increased their service charges, in some cases by 400 per cent. Now they want us to believe they are doing us a favour by reducing service charges to small businesses by 10 per cent. They control the majority of lending to business. Given that position, they are not just responsible to their shareholders, they are responsible to the country.
The big six have two choices: Change their ways or get ready for the onslaught of new banks in this country.


QUEEN ELIZABETH II
Mr. Doug Fee (Red Deer):: Madam Speaker, today is the 40th anniversary of an historic event. On June 2, 1953 our sovereign, Queen Elizabeth II, was crowned Queen of Canada and took an oath to govern the peoples of Canada and her other realms according to their respective laws and customs. In response to this oath parliamentarians, new citizens and those entering into the Queen's service take a reciprocal oath of allegiance to Her Majesty.
Four days prior to her coronation the Queen issued a proclamation under the Canadian Royal Style and Titles Act officially adopting the title of Queen of Canada, thereby fulfilling the dreams of the Fathers of Confederation who often referred to Queen Victoria as the Queen of Canada.
I would like to quote two famous Canadians, one a Conservative and one a Liberal, who lived a century apart. Sir George-Etienne Cartier said that the monarchy was the essential element of the Constitution and Vincent Massey said: "The monarchy is essential to us. Without it as a bastion of Canadian nationality, Canadian purpose and Canadian independence we could not remain a sovereign state".
God save the Queen.


VISITORS' VISAS
Mr. Dan Heap (THnity-Spadina):: Madam Speaker, today's edition of The Ottawa Citizen highlights the frustrations faced by Canadians with relatives still residing in their former countries such as Lebanon, Guyana, and India, to name a few.
Many of those relatives would like to visit Canada before the death of loved ones and not just for burial ceremonies. The government seems to assume that everyone applying to enter Canada from a country with civil unrest or poverty will stay illegally even when the applicant has a spouse, two children and a family business back home.
Canada is now home to over four million foreign-bom people, representing 16 per cent of the population. I call on the Minister of Employment and Immigration to review the duty of overseas officers in deciding to issue or not issue visitors' visas. Let us have fair and equal treatment.


TRANS-CANADA HIGHWAY
Mr. Bill Casey (Cumberland -Colchester):: Madam Speaker, the new Government of Nova Scotia has announced that it will review the route for the new Trans-Canada Highway. I believe that the government is obligated to do this review as it campaigned on that promise and would be criticized if it did not follow through.
Having said that, I am very concerned about the people who are so very much affected by any change in this route. People's lives, homes, and businesses will all be destabilized during this review. As well, a lengthy delay would result in more tragic accidents on the present Trans-Canada Highway.
I urge that the new government consider all points of view from all the communities involved. I also urge the people who are affected to make their points of view known to the provincial department of transport.
I trust that we can take the politics out of this decision and choose the best route for all Nova Scotians. I pledge to do all I can to work with the new government to help resolve the issue.
June 2, 1993


SMALL BUSINESS LOANS
Mrs. Diane Marleau (Sudbury):: Madam Speaker, according to a government press release on small business: "Loans to small businesses in Canada will become more accessible as a result of the significant changes to the Small Businesses Loans Act".
A constituent of mine applied to a local bank for a loan under the program. The interest on the loan would have been about 7 per cent. He has long been known in Sudbury as a hard worker and for his dedication and commitment to his customers. He offered his personal home as collateral. However the bank in question turned him down.
Despite the bank's failure to help him he established his business by mortgaging his house. However he is paying an interest rate of 13.25 per cent, more than double what it should be costing him. That is unfair. Despite all of that his business is doing well and is already creating a number of jobs.
I want to make the point that the banks deal in a very heavy-handed way with small businesses. How many others have the banks turned down across this country? How many others have not established their businesses? How many jobs have not been created?


Madam Deputy Speaker:: I regret that the member's time has expired.


Ms. Dawn Black (New Westminster-Burnaby):: Madam Speaker, access to abortion services remains uneven across the country.
Fourteen hundred abortions are performed on Canadian women in American border states because of lack of access in parts of Canada. Women in the Atlantic provinces, the north and those outside urban centres spend a great deal of money and time to travel for this simple medical procedure.
When they do reach a clinic they are often forced to walk through a barrage of picketers who harass them. While they were in power both the Liberals and Conservatives significantly cut funds for family planning education, thus increasing the need for abortion.
I ask the health minister to make RU-486 available in Canada, as it is in the U.S., and for the government to reverse its policies of economic and social inequality which rob many women of the choice to have children and of the right not to have children.


POVERTY
Hon. Alan Redway (Don Valley East):: Madam Speaker, a United Nations committee has criticized Canada for not dealing with domestic poverty.
The UN has also criticized Canada for not spending enough on foreign aid to fight poverty in the Third World. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees has criticized Canada for not accepting more poor refugees, especially severely disabled refugees.
Another UN agency, the International Monetary Fund, has criticized Canada for not reducing our deficit and our debt fast enough. We might find some of the necessary resources in our defence budget but the UN Security Council keeps asking Canada to provide more of our military and its equipment for UN peacekeeping forces.
If we are going to address all of these very laudable concerns in the short run, we certainly have our work cut out for us.


PATRONAGE
Mr. John Harvard (Winnipeg-St. James):: Madam Speaker, the endless parade of patronage and sleaze continues.
We have seen the baby-sitter get an appointment. We have seen the barman get an appointment. We have seen the barber get an appointment. Even the barber's wife got a little gift from the Mulroney-Charest-Campbell cabinet.
Now we hear that former Tory MP Jim McGrath has received a plum patronage posting. McGrath has been given a three-year appointment to the National Transportation Agency.
The Canadian people are sick and tired of this kind of sleaze and nepotism. They are sick to death of the old ways of the Conservative Party.

Oral Questions
The Prime Minister may like to think that he is protecting the defence and environment ministers from the inevitable backlash. However that will not happen. These Order in Council appointments were made by the Governor in Council, meaning the cabinet.
The defence and environment ministers are part of that cabinet. They said yes to patronage for Toiy flacks, hacks and bagmen. However on election day Canadians will be saying a loud no to them.


NATIONAL ACCESS AWARENESS WEEK
Mr. Vincent Della Noce (Laval-Est):: Madam Speaker, from May 31 to June 6, Canadians all across the country will celebrate National Access Awareness Week, which promotes a fundamental value of our society: equal opportunity for all citizens. Based on community participation and partnership among the disabled and various sectors of activity, this national week is meant to be a special opportunity to emphasize the active participation of the disabled in the life of our society.
In Canada, tangible progress has been made in the quality of life and social and economic integration of the disabled, but much still remains to be done. Today I call upon my colleagues to take an active part in National Access Awareness Week and thus to promote the full and complete integration of the disabled in Canadian society. Access is more than a wish; it is a right for 4.2 million disabled Canadians.


SHOWBOAT
Mr. Howard McCurdy (Windsor-St. Clair):: Madam Speaker, the musical Showboat is a period piece which depicts blacks in the minstrel show tradition.
A new, supposedly updated, production in North York has evoked heated controversy and division among black and Jewish communities in spite of claims that Afro-Ca-nadians' sensitivities are being addressed.
In Toronto to deliver a lecture named after Garth Drabinsky, the show's producer, William F. Buckley entered the dispute. He said that Jews have a right to be sensitive because of the Holocaust, and he is right. But according to him blacks who suffered over 200 years of
slavery, 25 million dead in the Atlantic crossing, 100 years of second class citizenship, lynchings and showboat stereotypes are described as preposterous to express their sensitivity.
What could be more destructive to an historic alliance between two communities, both of which have suffered, than this racist trivialization of the sufferings of one by comparison to the other?
If the voices of the Buckleys are the price for Showboat, Mr. Drabinsky, it is not worth it.


DIRECT AIR LINKS
Mrs. Beryl Gaffney (Nepean):: Madam Speaker, in the nation's capital we have the Ottawa Lynx baseball club, the Ottawa Senators hockey club, an advanced technology sector and many industries with a large market to the south. Yet we have a government and a transportation minister that are incapable of approving a direct air link from Ottawa to the American market, and in particular, Pittsburgh and Chicago.
Ottawa was the only city in Canada excluded from the original Canada-U.S. air treaty in 1974. As someone said recently, the Minister of Transport should crawl out from under this desk.
Yesterday we heard this same minister has awarded direct air service from his hometown to Pittsburgh. I say shame on him.
The lack of air links is costing the Ottawa region $500 million annually. People from Ottawa and its environs have no choice but to throw this government and this minister out of office in the next election.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD

["I am now prepared to rule on a question of privilege relating to the alleged premature disclosure to the media of the sixth report of the Standing Committee on Health and Welfare, Social Affairs, Seniors and the Status of Women, a report concerning the blood transfusion system in Canada.\nI will first attempt to summarize the events which have led to today's ruling. On Thesday, May 25, the hon. member for Delta, who also chairs the subcommittee on health issues, raised a question of privilege concerning the apparent leak of his subcommittee's draft report. The hon. member for Delta expressed his concern about the report's effect being damaged by a premature re-", 'June 2, 1993\nRoutine Proceedings\nlease. This matter was pursued further by the hon. member for Winnipeg North who demanded an apology from the hon. member for Don Valley North for having accused him of releasing the report. The hon. member for Don Valley North subsequently offered an apology and also asked that the Chair investigate this matter; she further intimated that the list of persons who could have released the report was very short and in doing so, made specific reference to the hon. member for Halifax. The next day, May 26, the hon. member for Halifax rose on a question of privilege to request that the hon. member for Don Valley North rectify the unfortunate impression left by her statement of May 25. The hon. member for Don Valley North responded that no specific inference was intended and she reiterated her request for an investigation of the alleged leak.\nIn this ruling, I will deal with what I believe to be the two components at issue here: firstly, the breach of privilege resulting from the premature disclosure of a committee report and secondly, the very serious nature of conclusions arrived at and expressed during these interventions.\nAs members are aware, committee work must not be impeded by lack of trust or integrity. Over the years, there have been quite a number of cases brought to the attention of the Chair where alleged leaks of confidential committee information had taken place. In order to summarize the practice which has evolved in such cases, allow me to refer to a case which took place in 1987.', 'In 1987, the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River disclosed the content of some proceedings of the Standing Committee on Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development which was sitting in camera. Later on, the matter was brought before the House through the report submitted by that committee. On the same day, a question of privilege was raised by the hon. member for Selkirk-Interlake. The Chair held that the question was sufficiently serious to ask the House to give its opinion on the matter. The House then referred the matter to the Standing Committee on Elections, Privileges and Procedure, which concluded that the conduct of the member was contrary to the usage and practice of the House. Some time thereafter, the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River apologized to the House.', 'In keeping with our practices, it is therefore essential that the committee itself first review the situation and look at all aspects of the concerns raised by the hon. members. If it sees fit, the committee may then report the matter to the House. In this way, if the Chair judges that a prima facie breach of privilege has occurred, then the hon. members of the House can decide whether the question should be referred to the Standing Committee on House Management for further consideration.', 'The premature release of committee reports hampers the continued work of committees and puts the trust that exists between committee members at risk. Our democratic system is based on the very principle of trust and such incidents can only undermine the parliamentary regime by which we are governed.', 'Finally, the second element at issue here is one that needs to be addressed with great prudence. The Chair need not remind all members that gratuitous inferences made at the expense of individuals in this Chamber or outside can have devastating repercussions, be they founded or not.\nPersonal accusations have no place in the House of Commons. Dignity must prevail at all times and it is my duty to uphold it in this place.\nI want to thank all members for their patience and I am confident that members will demonstrate their usual good judgment and respect for one another in dealing with this matter.']
Hon. Jean Chretien (Leader of the Opposition):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Acting Prime Minister. This morning in Washington, the Prime Minister met President Clinton and, after lunch, the Prime Minister said that he did not agree with the President of the

United States on sanctions to strengthen the parallel accords.
If the Canadian government does not agree with the President of the United States on the kind of sanctions proposed to solve the problems, could the minister tell us what other sanctions will be put forward or what other sanctions the government is proposing, so that when we have agreements, there will be penalties for those who break them?


Hon. Harvie Andre (Minister of State and Leader of the Government in the House of Commons):: Madam Speaker, I think the point the Prime Minister was making was a point that the Minister for International Trade has made on several occasions. The trade deal is the trade deal.
Now the question on a parallel accord respecting the environment and labour codes should have mechanisms for ensuring compliance and so on, but those mechanisms should not effectively undermine the accomplishments of the trade deal.
The Americans have put a position on the table, negotiations are going on and we will see where those negotiations end up. Canada's position is very clear. We do not want to undermine the benefits of the trade deal by adopting inappropriate conclusions on the parallel accord.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Madam Speaker, it is not a very convincing argument put forward by the minister.
We would like to know the position of the government at the negotiations at this time. If we need to have some rules governing the environment and the labour conditions, we would like to know exactly what kind of penalties this government is proposing to make sure that every one of the partners will respect the conditions agreed upon.


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, those are under active consideration and active discussion.
There is a whole myriad of ways in which we can achieve compliance and have dispute resolving mechanisms and so on. Our position is simply that whatever we do on the parallel accord side should not have the effect
Oral Questions
of undermining the benefits of the free trade agreement and that remains our position.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Madam Speaker, the hon. member talks about myriad solutions, but why can the government not pick one of them and tell us what it is? It does not have a myriad; it does not have one.
We would like to know because it is very important. The President of the United States said that the Americans will not proceed with the NAFTA deal if they do not have an agreement on the environment and labour conditions.
I would like to know from the minister the position of this government in the light of the sanctions proposed by the American government.


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, I am sure the hon. member would think we were not very responsible if we were negotiating in public in terms of Canada's position.
I would remind the hon. member that we have a whole range of international agreements, including agreements with the United States, bilateral agreements on acid rain, on Great Lakes clean-up and so on, all of which have in them performance criteria and all of which have what was viewed at the time as sufficient teeth to ensure compliance by both sides.
That is the kind of thing we are looking at rather than something that interferes with benefits of the trading arrangements.


Hon. Lloyd Axworthy (Winnipeg South Centre):: Madam Speaker, in the absence of the minister of external affairs and the minister of defence, I will put my question to the Acting Prime Minister.
Members of my caucus have asked me to express on their behalf and on behalf of their constituents the sense of outrage that we feel about the continuing slaughter that is going on in Bosnia and the indifference of the United Nations and the member states to the horrible conditions there.

June 2, 1993
Oral Questions
The Prime Minister after his meeting with the President of the United States this morning said that new action in Bosnia must be authorized by a new Security Council resolution.
There is a Security Council resolution being considered by the Security Council this afternoon. It reads: "UN troops will be authorized to take necessary measures, including the use of force, to stop attacks against civilians".
I ask the government: Does Canada support this resolution?


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, first of all I want to say that everybody on this side of the House and indeed all reasonable Canadians are outraged at what is going on in the former Yugoslavia and the atrocities being committed where innocent civilians and women and children are the victims.
The hon. member is correct. The discussions are under way at the Security Council. The Prime Minister discussed the subject extensively with President Clinton this morning. He made it very clear that he felt the United States should be actively engaged along with the European allies in seeking to find a solution.
We have always taken the position that UN action is required. We are concerned about unilateral action. We are concerned about adopting a resolution that is imple-mentable because the safety and security of our troops are first and foremost.
Since the Security Council has not yet reached a conclusion on these particular discussions, it would be a bit premature for us to be making a judgment on them.
We can be sure that Canada is inputting. The Prime Minister through the President and the Secretary of State for External Affairs spent 45 minutes talking to the foreign affairs minister for Russia. We are doing everything we can on the diplomatic front.


Lloyd Axworthy: Madam Speaker, I am sure that all these discussions are taking place, but what has not taken place is a clear articulation of the Canadian position on this important resolution. That is missing.
Members of Parliament and their constituents would like to know. When we have UN relief workers being shot at, when we have troops standing by while genocide takes place, while we have the whole situation deteriorate into a mess, we believe that Canada because of our background and our reputation has the responsibility to take a stand on these issues.
I ask the minister again: Are we going to support the resolution being debated this afternoon at the Security Council authorizing UN troops in Bosnia to take action to stop attacks against civilians and to stop the slaughter?


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, I am a little confused by the hon. member's argument because he says that Canada should take a position quite independent of any position anybody else takes.
Of course, he realizes that if every country did this, no resolution would be possible. We can only find resolution by working together in discussion. As he points out, the UN now has it actively under discussion. I would be very surprised if Canada did not agree with the final resolution.
The final resolution has not been adopted. We stated our position quite emphatically. We believe it must be united action. We believe that unilateral action of the kind that was earlier proposed by the Clinton administration would not work. We believe that it is unrealistic to propose military action to which our troops could not possibly respond because of the numbers and equipment and the terrain in Yugoslavia and so on. All of those are being factored in. The discussions are under way. Canada as usual is being sought out for advice. We are looking for a consensus. We are not standing in isolation adopting our own position for the rest of the world to accept or reject.



Howard Douglas McCurdy: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Minister for Science.
The other day the president of the National Research Council appeared before the parliamentary committee on industry, science and technology. He warned that if the present pattern of budget cutbacks continues at NRC

that NRC would experience once more the crisis it experienced in 1990-91 with cutbacks in personnel, cutbacks in research programs and a complete demoralization of the scientific staff there.
My question to the minister is as follows. What kind of research and development policy is it that would decimate one of our most prestigious research institutions and will he indicate to this House that the government will embark on a plan to ensure that the crisis the president of NRC predicts will not happen?


Hon. Tom Hockin (Minister for Science and Minister of State (Small Businesses and Tourism)):: Madam Speaker, my hon. friend is taking licence with what the head of the NRC said the other day. He did not use the word decimate. He did not use any of the verbs the hon. member has just used. This government has cut back grants and contributions and cross-government programs 10 per cent here, 15 per cent there, sometimes even more in some operating programs.
When it comes to science those levels of cutbacks have not happened. In fact the cutbacks have not occurred. We are going to have more than zero per cent growth in contributions. They are going to be 1.5 per cent in the coming year.
This shows there is a preference in this government for helping research and development, for helping science and technology, plus the IRAP announcement which is an important part of the National Research Council.
Eighty-three million new dollars will go to the NRC to administer the IRAP for the next five years. This is an immense increase. Instead of having 225 officers in the field bringing discoveries in the laboratory to industry and to commercial prospect we will now have 300.
These are things the government has done in a time of restraint. They underline far better than any rhetoric the commitment of the government to science and technology-


Howard Douglas McCurdy: Madam Speaker, every time I ask this minister a question about any particular issue on science, he just shops through the market to find anything he can find without answering the question.
The fact of the matter is the president of the National Research Council said that the situation in 1990-91
Oral Questions
would be repeated if there is not change and that was a crisis.
The next question I want to ask is a supplementary for the same minister. In view of the fact that the parliamentary committee also praised the National Centres of Excellence Program, proposed that it be continued and that its funding be increased, we now hear from a variety of sources that there are plans to cut the funding from $250 million to $125 million.
I would like the minister to explain how the government can justify cutting by half the funding for a program that represents the most significant and successful new initiative by this government.


Thomas Hockin: I thank my hon. friend for the compliment because when we brought in the National Centres of Excellence, his party and he in particular fought the program. They said it would be better to give the money to the granting councils and let them decide where this money should go-
Instead we said something very creative. We said that we want to identify the 15 most excellent research opportunities in Canada, link them up with industry, build these centres and make them strong. We put that program in place beginning in 1989 and it is now under review. The parliamentary committee has complimented it and feels the program is working well. It thinks some changes should be made.
We are doing a peer review as well. These are the people who are the real scientists in the field. People in industry are doing their review of this program. The Prime Minister is committed to this program which will remain permanent. Whether we can maintain the same level of funding or not is a difficult question. Government is having to cut back. We are inviting the provinces to participate more than they are. We are inviting industry to participate more than it is. We will soon see what the level of funding will be.


Howard Douglas McCurdy: Madam Speaker, the hon. minister comes rather late to his expertise in science. I hope he will not again repeat the unmitigated falsehood that this member opposed the National Centres of Excellence Program. I did not.

June 2, 1993
Oral Questions


Mr. Oberle:: Yes, you did.


Howard Douglas McCurdy: Give me the proof. My next question is for the same minister.
In view of the yet undenied cutbacks in the national Centres of Excellence funding and in view of the projected cutbacks in NRC and the crisis that precipitates, are we to understand it is now government policy as suggested in its prosperity initiative report to de-em-phasize research and development-and I am not so sure the minister knows what that is-in favour of the begging, borrowing and stealing of technology from elsewhere?
Most people, most scientists he may eventually meet, would see it as a prescription for the destruction of our capability to advance in technology or anywhere else involving science.


Thomas Hockin: Madam Speaker, my hon. friend knows, but he does not want the House to be reminded of it, that this government in its stewardship of the public purse has had to cut back a number of programs.
Certain programs have not been cut back at the same level as others. One is grants to provinces, to persons and to individuals. The other field is aboriginals. Another field of federal government spending that has not been cut back nearly as much is science and technology. Science and technology, if anything, has been indulged in the over-all priorities of this government and we are going to continue to do that.


EMPLOYMENT
Ms. Albina Guarnieri (Mississauga East):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Acting Prime Minister.
Today Carleton University has once again reminded Canadians of the truth, that their government has mastered the politics of illusion. The authors of How Ottawa Spends reveal that this government's tangled web of technical trickery has silently robbed Canadian children and their families of more than $4 billion since 1986.
Will the minister explain how he expects to hide the darkest years for Canadian children with even more rhetoric of Brighter Futures?


Hon. John McDermid (Minister of State (Finance and Privatization)):: Madam Speaker, I understand that publication was released. It is an interesting publication because it covers one-half of government operations.
It talks about spending. It does not talk about taxes and tax levels. It does not talk about income. It does not talk about the problems Canada has both provincially and federally with its deficits. It does not talk about the problems we have in the country.
I want to point out in no uncertain terms the changes that have happened in the social field over the last nine years. For example, old age security, GIS and SPA have gone from $11.4 billion to $20.2 billion. These are for senior citizens. There has been an average annual increase of 6.6 per cent over that period of time. Canada Pension Plan has gone from $4.2 billion to $14.6 billion, an increase annually of 14.8 per cent. Child benefits have gone from $3.9 billion to $5.1 billion, an average increase of 3 per cent each and every year over the last nine years.
I could go on and on. Maybe in answer to a supplementary question I could continue my list.


Albina Guarnieri: Madam Speaker, it must be Groundhog Day again because the government cannot see its shameless shadow.
The government already wears the dunce cap in the G-7 when it comes to unemployment, but today we learned that our savagely high jobless rate masks the fact that 16 per cent of Canadian workers are looking for full-time jobs but cannot find them, leaving a record number to rely on part-time work.
Will the Minister of Employment and Immigration tell the over two million Canadians who cannot find fulltime work why, when it comes to job creation, this government calls in sick?


John Horton McDermid: Madam Speaker, I understand why the hon. member only asks one question every two weeks. It takes her that long to write it, obviously.


Some hon. members:: Oh, oh.


John Horton McDermid: If she can be cute so can I.
Obviously those at the meeting of the OECD at the present time where a number of countries are represented, including Canada, are seized with the worldwide problems of unemployment and job creation. The problem is that at the same time they are wrestling with

debt and with very serious economic problems in all countries. It is something they are discussing.
It is unfortunate the employment end of things lags recovery. As recovery comes employment follows unfortunately later than recovery. Employment will improve over the next period of time, albeit not as fast as we all would like. It is not just a Canadian problem; it is a world-wide problem.


Mr. Mark Assad (Gatineau-La Lievre):: Madam Speaker, my question was for the Minister of Finance, but since he is not available, I will direct it to the Acting Prime Minister or the Deputy Prime Minister.
One of the Conservative government's worst mistakes was its obsession with monetary policy, which worsened the economic situation, witness the 13.4 per cent unemployment rate in Quebec. The outlying regions are the most affected by business shutdowns, which lead to job losses.
When will the minister correct, improve or change his regional development policy in order to stem the flood of job losses? He could certainly do something.


John Horton McDermid: Madam Speaker, I might remind the hon. member-and I believe he was part of it-on Bill C-91 that was brought forward in the House to help with the job situation especially in the province of Quebec he voted against it. I want the record to show that. Any time we have tried to help the employment situation that hon. member has voted against it, and I want the record to show that. It is very important the people of Quebec understand that.
Second, the construction industry is one industry where we feel that jobs can be created. Housing affordability today is as good as it has been in 25 years. We have also brought in programs to assure low down payments so young couples can buy their homes. We have lower interest rates which have to do with the fight the government has put on to assure that we get lower interest rates and lower inflation so savings are not eaten away and for the creation of jobs. We have assured that RRSPs are used for housing.
Oral Questions
We have done a number of things to improve the situation. If the hon. member took time to study the reports that are coming out, he would know that Canada is poised to have the best record in 1993 and 1994 in recovering from the recession.


Mark Joseph Assad: Madam Speaker, I pity the audience which just heard his answer, because it is far from the answer needed for the question I asked. While the minister gives all sorts of explanations that have nothing to do with the question, unemployment goes up and the hope of finding a job goes down. As students arrive on the labour market this summer, the problem will get even worse.
Madam Speaker, I repeat: When will the minister present a real economic recovery plan for the outlying regions which suffer more than all other parts of the country?


John Horton McDermid: Madam Speaker, the employment situation is one that we are concerned about.
I am sure the hon. member would be pleased at seeing the reports that came out today. The one from Bums Fry Limited said its leading indicator of Canadian economic activity rose 3.1 per cent, its highest level since March 1990, and that the help wanted index which tends to be an early indicator of new hiring increased by 9.2 per cent in May, the largest increase we have seen in four years.
All the signals are very positive and we feel very confident that as this year progresses we will see improved employment opportunities in Canada.


YOUNG OFFENDERS ACT
Mr. Ian Waddell (Port Moody-Coquitlam):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Justice. I see he is back from his campaigning and in his seat among his caucus.
As the minister is aware, we in the NDP believe that society should take tough measures against violent crime, but as a society we must balance this approach by

June 2, 1993
Oral Questions
putting in place a program to prevent crime in the first place.
The minister is aware there was a meeting last week of the provincial attorneys general in Quebec City. I understand they recommended not only a review of the Young Offenders Act but a process that would bring communities together for a discussion of the whole juvenile justice system.
Did the minister receive recommendations from the meeting of the attorneys general? If so, what was his response to them?


Hon. Pierre Blais (Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada and Minister of State (Agriculture)):: Madam Speaker, at this meeting last Friday I mentioned to my provincial counterparts that we were contemplating different amendments to improve the Young Offenders Act.
Obviously with the time we have before us it would be very difficult to table legislation. However they agree. I suggested that maybe we could table a proposal, a white paper or something similar. I am contemplating this possibility to ensure that Canadians will be capable of making their point and being part of the consultation process. I will make a final decision in a very short time.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: Madam Speaker, the minister will know that I rose in the House a month ago and put before him a resolution from the village of Belcarra in my riding of Port Moody-Coquitlam. They called for a public review of the youth justice system, not just a bill but a public review of the youth justice system.
At that time 400 municipalities in Canada had agreed to it. There are 12 more in British Columbia, bringing the total to about 136. There are another 400. Now there are 536 municipalities and the provincial people.
I call upon the minister on behalf of our party to show some leadership on the national level and hold a national, non-partisan inquiry into the youth justice system. Why not announce that now before the end of this Parliament?


Pierre Blais: Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague knows that at this very moment in committee I think we have eight justice bills being looked at by parliamentarians here and in the other place.
The proceeds from crime bill will be here in a couple of days. We have the stalking legislation on which some of the member's colleagues are working on a daily basis. We also have the child pornography legislation. We have taken a lot of major steps in the protection of society.
I understand what my colleague is saying about the Young Offenders Act. I think we amended the Young Offenders Act last year. I will make public in a few days what are the intentions of the government in this area. I share with my colleague that this is an ongoing concern in the population and we will address it.


THE ENVIRONMENT
Mrs. Marlene Catterall (Ottawa West):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Minister of State for the Environment.
Yesterday environmental groups gave the Minister of the Environment failing grades for breaking the environmental promises made at the earth summit just one year ago. It is a miserable record: no sign of the law to guarantee the safety of Canadian drinking water, no legislation to prohibit the wholesale export of Canadian water, no national plan to freeze greenhouse gas emissions, no action to protect old growth forests and constant cuts to green plan funds.
When will the minister get back to his desk and campaign for his first responsibility, the environment?


Hon. Mary Collins (Minister of Western Economic Diversification and Minister of State (Environment) and Minister Responsible for the Status of Women):: Madam Speaker, I am really glad my hon. colleague raised that question.
The report the Sierra Club provided was interesting. I actually felt that it really had not done its homework. I do not think it attended the meeting on Monday when our Canadian ambassador for environment and sustainable development, Mr. Campeau, brought out the report card on what we have done on the UNCED follow-up.
June 2, 1993

We have met our commitments. We are the first industrialized country to ratify the climate change convention and the biodiversity convention. We are already implementing both of those and we are developing national plans. We have been the lead in the development of the United Nations Conference on High Seas Fisheries, a very critical component.
One of the most important things which is often forgotten is that the Minister of the Environment, concerned about the dynamics of the UNCED followup, convened a meeting in April bringing together 12 of the environment ministers from around the world representing most of the industrialized countries. From that he has created a real political push to ensure that the meeting of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development to be held in June will indeed be a success.


Marlene Catterall: Madam Speaker, my supplementary question is for the same minister.
Lots of meetings, lots of press conferences, lots of words and not much action. When the environmental ambassador does what he is supposed to do, he paints a rosy picture of Canada's inaction.
The major piece of environmental legislation of this Parliament, the Environmental Assessment Act, was passed a full year ago and has still not been proclaimed. Now we know that other cabinet ministers are hacking away at the regulations that will put teeth into protecting the environment.
Will the minister please get back to his real job, fight off the ambush from his cabinet colleagues and make sure the Environmental Assessment Act gets proclaimed and not gutted?


Mary Collins: Madam Speaker, again I am sure my hon. colleague will remember that the bill came back from the Senate with a number of recommendations. It asked that they be implemented before the act was proclaimed.
One is the development of all the regulatory requirements. Doing things in the real way, the open and transparent way, we went through a major consultative process.
Oral Questions
We have just received the report from that stakeholders group and we will be using that. We will be working with colleagues toward the ultimate proclamation of the act and the implementation of the regulations.


Hon.   Chas. L. Caccia@Davenport: Madam Speaker, my question is for the same minister.
A year ago at the United Nations Conference on the Environment and Development the Minister of the Environment and the government declared climate change a top priority.
Yesterday environmental groups released a report card giving the government and the minister a D as in dismal on the follow-up to climate change.
Can the minister tell us when Canada will release its detailed national action plan to stop global climate change and explain the delay?


Mary Collins: Madam Speaker, again perhaps those who prepared the report overlooked some of the tremendous number of activities that we have taken in the past year with respect to the climate change convention.
Not only were we the first country to ratify it but we will also have this month the publication of our first national report on climate change which has come about as a result of multisectoral discussion.
In fact I attended the recent meeting of environment ministers. We are now working with the energy ministers for a plan this fall to ensure that we are working together to achieve our objectives federally and provincially.
Just think of some of the other things we have done: the tree planting program, the energy efficiency program-


Madam Deputy Speaker:: I think we are getting into a speech. The hon. minister may have the possibility to continue on a supplementary.


Hon.   Chas. L. Caccia@Davenport: Madam Speaker, I can see that the level of rhetoric is pretty high on the government side but it is not backed up by action.
At the same conference in Rio the government also signed a biodiversity convention. However the government and the minister have failed to say one word on

June 2, 1993
Oral Questions
probably the most important biodiversity issue in Canada.
Does the minister agree that Canada's ecological integrity and in particular that of the Pacific Rim National Park depend on the ecologically rich Clayoquot Sound forests or not?


Mary Collins: Madam Speaker again I am glad my colleague raised the question of the biodiversity convention.
Here Canada was in a leadership position. We were the first industrialized country to sign it and the first country to ratify it.
We are now working with a national biodiversity plan and with colleagues in the development of new national parks. Not long ago I signed the Haida Gwaii agreement. We recently announced the new park in the Yukon.
We are proceeding with every component of our biodiversity strategy, all those that are within-and I ask my hon. colleague to listen to this-within federal jurisdiction.


THE ECONOMY
Hon. Lome Nystrom (Yorkton-Melville):: My question is for the Acting Prime Minister.
A couple of days ago the Minister of Finance met with his provincial counterparts here in Ottawa to discuss the problems of the economy. The provincial ministers made it clear that they have done what they can to keep the deficit in check at the provincial level. They now want help from the federal government on the monetary side in terms of interest rates.
I want to ask a question in light of statements made by the Quebec finance minister, Mr. Levesque, and the Ontario treasurer, Mr. Laughren, and in light of the fact that the government has had a high interest rate policy for a number of years which has helped ruin the economy. Will the minister now use his authority with the Bank of Canada to lower interest rates further in this
country in order to help stimulate the economy and create jobs for all Canadians?


John Horton McDermid: Madam Speaker, I think that points out more poignantly than any other words could why the NDP will never ever form a national government in this country.
Those interest rates are not dictated by the government and the hon. member has been around here long enough to know that. If he is truly interested in finding out how things work, he should go to committee this afternoon and hear John Crow, the Governor of the Bank of Canada.


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Madam Speaker, the minister of finance in Quebec has asked the federal government to intervene. The treasurer of Ontario has asked for the same thing. Other provincial ministers have done the same thing.
Why does the government not use its authority and ask the Bank of Canada to lower interest rates in this country?
It was recently pointed out that the real interest rate in the United States federal reserve is some zero per cent; in Canada the real interest rate is about 4 per cent. Why does the government not intervene to reduce the gap between real interest rates in our country and the United States which would create jobs in Canada?


John Horton McDermid: Madam Speaker, again the hon. member is way off base. I was at those meetings of finance ministers and I did not hear the finance minister of Quebec or the treasurer of Ontario ask the government to intervene. I did not hear them ask that.
I did hear them say that we have debt and deficit problems. We do not have that under control yet. They all admitted that and that they have to continue to fight that. They also indicated they wanted to see growth and job creation in this country, as we all do and they believe we are on the right track to that.
However, neither of those individuals requested direct intervention in the Bank of Canada by the Government of Canada. Therefore, the hon. member is totally wrong in his question.
June 2, 1993

Oral Questions


GOVERNMENT APPOINTMENTS
Mr. Don Boudria (Glengarry-Prescott-Russell):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Acting Prime Minister.
On four separate occasions in recent days my colleagues and I have raised the issue of Mr. Ami Thors-teinson's appointment to the board of directors of the Bank of Canada 16 days after his companies defaulted on mortgages, making Canadians liable for up to $6 million worth of debt.
Why did the government neglect to tell us that Ami Thorsteinson was moonlighting as the president and chairman of another Crown corporation, Petro-Canada Limited? What is he going to do about it?


John Horton McDermid: Madam Speaker, Mr. Thorsteinson was on the former board of directors of Petro-Canada. When Petro-Canada was privatized Petro-Canada Inc. held the responsibility of managing the debt of Petro-Canada and to make sure that the debt was erased. He has done an excellent job and as a matter of fact paid a dividend cheque from defeasance fees to the Government of Canada for their accounts over the last year.
For the hon. member to stand up here and make that silly accusation is totally unparliamentary and unbecoming of him as a member of this House.


Don Boudria: Madam Speaker, that sounds like the comments the Prime Minister made last week, two days after another minister said that we were right in asking the questions and quite right in asking for the person's resignation.
Yesterday the Minister of Public Works said in response to a question: "After all, the opposition quite properly pointed out some difficulties. Upon consideration of them, it does appear that it is not appropriate for Mr. Thorsteinson to continue with this appointment".
I want to ask the minister if it was so inappropriate for this person to hold public office yesterday, why is it so appropriate today?


John Horton McDermid: Madam Speaker, Mr. Thorsteinson has been in this job for some time and has done a good job. The job at Petro-Canada Inc. is winding up and therefore I have no regrets whatsoever that Mr. Thorsteinson ran Petro-Canada Inc. He did an excellent job and his record speaks for itself.


NATIONAL DEFENCE
Hon. William Rompkey (Labrador):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Acting Prime Minister.
In May I raised a question with him about an expenditure of $43,000 for the Somali board of inquiry which will last 90 days. I was wrong. The cost of the inquiry is more like $225,000 including furniture, computer equipment and renovations.
When there is empty office space in this town and computers not in use, how can the government justify spending $225,000 on an inquiry that lasts 90 days?


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, the hon. member was correct when he said he was wrong.
He said that the commission spent $43,000 buying furniture. Wrong. The furniture was valued at $43,000 and they have rented it for the duration of the inquiry.
He said that computer equipment has been bought. He is partially right. The computer equipment is something DND has had in its acquisition program. It has been purchased, will be used by the inquiry and then will become part of DND's inventory to look after its needs.
Every step of the way, care is being taken by the commission and by DND to ensure the inquiry is done in the most cost-efficient manner possible. I think the hon. member should give credit to the integrity of the people involved. He should recognize they appreciate it is the taxpayers' money and they are acting responsibly.


Bill Rompkey: Madam Speaker, I appreciate that it is taxpayers' money and I appreciate that care should be taken to control the expenditure involved. Bearing that in mind let me ask the minister:

June 2, 1993
Oral Questions
Why was the $150,000 awarded without any tender at all? Why was that done?


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, I am not sure what contract he is talking about.


An hon. member:: The computers.


Harvie Andre: The hon. member should allow me to answer because in fact what happens in respect to computers, given the government's requirements and needs for many of these, a broad general request for proposal is made to the suppliers. Based on the economics and the best deal possible, an agreement is signed that the government will purchase from that supplier the computers as they are needed.
In fact a competition, a tender if you will, was held but it was for the broad general purchase of these. As I say, DND requires them and has purchased them. DND is allowing the inquiry to use them and they will then become part of DND's stock as something that is needed. They are not a special purchase and it was not contrary to Treasury Board guidelines.


CANADIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION
Mr. Simon de Jong (Regina-Qu'Appelle):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Communications.
I have a letter dated May 21, 1993 from the president of the CBC, Mr. Gerard Veilleux, to the minister. In the letter the president stated that the budget cuts to the CBC announced in the April budget would "jeopardize our ability to meet our mandate".
I also have a letter sent by Mr. Paul Racine, assistant deputy minister, communications, to Mr. Tony Manera, senior vice-president of the CBC. This letter shows that the Department of Communications is preparing to set up an in-house task force of bureaucrats to review and cut back the CBC's mandate and services.
My question to the minister is-


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. I think it would only be fair for the Speaker to hear what is being said without screams from both sides of the House.


Simon Leendert de Jong: Madam Speaker, thank you for reminding some hon. members about proper decorum in the House.
Will the minister refer the question of the CBC's mandate and finances to the Standing Committee on Communications and Culture where it can be studied in an open and participatory forum rather than by a closed door committee of bureaucrats?


Hon. Perrin Beatty (Minister of Communications):: Madam Speaker, I am a bit surprised at this question. The hon. member is a member of parliamentary committees. He knows that the parliamentary committees are masters of their own fate and can look into any matter whatsoever within their mandate.
Certainly any time that annual reports are produced, any time that estimates are produced, Parliament can at least have the scope to look at anything it wishes to look at.
If he asks me if it is more difficult for the CBC to meet its mandate under a period of restraint, or course it is. If he is asking if the mandate of the CBC is under review, of course it is. He is well aware of the fact that the CBC itself is undertaking a review of its mandate and taking a look at a whole repositioning exercise, that he should be well aware of, to ensure that the public broadcaster is able to discharge its responsibilities in serving Canadians.
The hon. member will also be well aware of the fact that the Canadian taxpayers are providing a subsidy of over $1 billion a year to the CBC to assist it in doing that.


COMMUNICATIONS
Mr. Gilles Duceppe (Laurier-Sainte-Marie):: Madam Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Communications. Bell Canada has indicated to the
June 2, 1993

CRTC that it intends to go ahead with a new 911 emergency calls service. This service will be a slightly improved version of the former emergency calls system. However, the new service will be far more expensive.
For instance, for the Montreal Urban Community, the cost per line per month would be 47 cents, including taxes, instead of the present rate of 9 cents. This 500 per cent increase would mean an additional expense of $5 million for the MUC alone.
In Quebec, the new rates would be at least 35 per cent higher than those in Ontario, while a dedicated emergency calls service would exist only in Ontario. My question is this: does cost-effective federalism mean a 500 per cent increase for taxpayers in the Montreal area, rates that are 35 per cent higher in Quebec than in Ontario, not to mention the services which will be unavailable to us?


Henry Perrin Beatty: Madam Speaker, as the hon. member is well aware, as he indicated himself, the proposals that were made by Bell Canada were made to the CRTC. It is the CRTC which has the responsibility of doing that.
For him to suggest that there is somehow an unfairness here and for him to try to feed on fears of interprovincial rivalry of one sort or another is very unfair. He should be well aware of the fact that at the present time there is a significant subsidy going the other way across the border between Ontario and Quebec. For him to suggest that somehow Quebecers would be better served by breaking up Confederation, he certainly misleads Quebecers in suggesting anything of the sort.


Mr. J. W. Bud Bird (Fredericton-York-Sunbury):: Madam Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of National Health and Welfare or his parliamentary secretary.
The provincial government in New Brunswick has recently introduced a new provision with respect to medicare services when citizens are outside of Canada for more than 90 days. After that time, medicare payments will not be applicable for services obtained outside the country. Citizens have been advised to take
Privilege
out private health insurance coverage for such contingencies.
As well, the New Brunswick government has reminded residents that medicare coverage could lapse for citizens who are outside the province or the country for more than 182 days.
My question is whether or not the principle of modification of medicare coverage touching on absence from the province as I have just expressed is consistent with extra billing and user fees as have been previously found inconsistent with the Canada Health Act? Are these provisions with respect to temporary absence legitimate under the health act?


Madam Deputy Speaker:: I think the question has been put. We are getting into a speech. The hon. parliamentary secretary.


Mrs. Barbara Sparrow (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of National Health and Welfare):: Madam Speaker, the Canada Health Care Act requires each province to insure its residents for necessary health services.
It also has five criteria that are set down. When you are dealing with the authority of residency within a province, each province has the jurisdiction within that area. Some provinces have six months but I do see that New Brunswick, Quebec and Ontario are looking at three-month periods and that is within their jurisdiction. Do not conflict that with user fees.


PRIVILEGE
Madam Deputy Speaker:: I am now prepared to rule on a question of privilege relating to the alleged premature disclosure to the media of the sixth report of the Standing Committee on Health and Welfare, Social Affairs, Seniors and the Status of Women, a report concerning the blood transfusion system in Canada.
I will first attempt to summarize the events which have led to today's ruling. On Thesday, May 25, the hon. member for Delta, who also chairs the subcommittee on health issues, raised a question of privilege concerning the apparent leak of his subcommittee's draft report. The hon. member for Delta expressed his concern about the report's effect being damaged by a premature re-

June 2, 1993
Routine Proceedings
lease. This matter was pursued further by the hon. member for Winnipeg North who demanded an apology from the hon. member for Don Valley North for having accused him of releasing the report. The hon. member for Don Valley North subsequently offered an apology and also asked that the Chair investigate this matter; she further intimated that the list of persons who could have released the report was very short and in doing so, made specific reference to the hon. member for Halifax. The next day, May 26, the hon. member for Halifax rose on a question of privilege to request that the hon. member for Don Valley North rectify the unfortunate impression left by her statement of May 25. The hon. member for Don Valley North responded that no specific inference was intended and she reiterated her request for an investigation of the alleged leak.
In this ruling, I will deal with what I believe to be the two components at issue here: firstly, the breach of privilege resulting from the premature disclosure of a committee report and secondly, the very serious nature of conclusions arrived at and expressed during these interventions.
As members are aware, committee work must not be impeded by lack of trust or integrity. Over the years, there have been quite a number of cases brought to the attention of the Chair where alleged leaks of confidential committee information had taken place. In order to summarize the practice which has evolved in such cases, allow me to refer to a case which took place in 1987.

In 1987, the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River disclosed the content of some proceedings of the Standing Committee on Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development which was sitting in camera. Later on, the matter was brought before the House through the report submitted by that committee. On the same day, a question of privilege was raised by the hon. member for Selkirk-Interlake. The Chair held that the question was sufficiently serious to ask the House to give its opinion on the matter. The House then referred the matter to the Standing Committee on Elections, Privileges and Procedure, which concluded that the conduct of the member was contrary to the usage and practice of the House. Some time thereafter, the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River apologized to the House.

In keeping with our practices, it is therefore essential that the committee itself first review the situation and look at all aspects of the concerns raised by the hon. members. If it sees fit, the committee may then report the matter to the House. In this way, if the Chair judges that a prima facie breach of privilege has occurred, then the hon. members of the House can decide whether the question should be referred to the Standing Committee on House Management for further consideration.

The premature release of committee reports hampers the continued work of committees and puts the trust that exists between committee members at risk. Our democratic system is based on the very principle of trust and such incidents can only undermine the parliamentary regime by which we are governed.

Finally, the second element at issue here is one that needs to be addressed with great prudence. The Chair need not remind all members that gratuitous inferences made at the expense of individuals in this Chamber or outside can have devastating repercussions, be they founded or not.
Personal accusations have no place in the House of Commons. Dignity must prevail at all times and it is my duty to uphold it in this place.
I want to thank all members for their patience and I am confident that members will demonstrate their usual good judgment and respect for one another in dealing with this matter.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Mr. Charles A. Langlois (Parliamentary Secretary to Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and to Minister of National Defence):: Madam Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36(8), I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the government's response to 11 petitions.
[Editor's Note: see today's Votes and Proceedings.]
June 2, 1993


Mr. Bill Attewell (Markham-Whitchurch-Stouff-ville):: Madam Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the report of the legislative committee on Bill C-122, an act to amend the customs tariff, textile tariff reduction.



COMMUNICATIONS AND CULTURE


John Williston (Bud) Bird: Madam Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the third report of the Standing Committee on Communications and Culture in relation to violence on television.
This report arises from two orders of reference from the House, one in November as a result of a petition presented to this House by Virginie Lariviere of Quebec containing more than 1.3 million signatures expressing concerns about violence on television in Canada, and another on February 12, 1992 arising from a motion by the hon. member for Regina-Wascana calling for a review of media portrayal of violence in Canada, especially with respect to women and children, and seeking better ways to protect innocent Canadians while not unduly restricting freedom of expression.
In response to these two orders of reference our committee has made a series of recommendations. They call for voluntary regulation and control of television portrayal of violence by the broadcasting industry and individual Canadians, measures to empower Canadians with a wider selection of education information about media literacy with new technology to control television sets and channels, and a new national classification system for television programming and video films. All of this will help Canadians with a better quality of choice for television programs on behalf of themselves and their children.
Routine Proceedings
I would particularly like to pay tribute to the hon. member for Outremont for his work in chairing the subcommittee that drafted this report.
[Editor's Note: See today's Votes and Proceedings.]



COPYRIGHT ACT


Hon. Bob Kaplan (York Centre) moved: for leave to introduce Bill C-442, an act to amend the Copyright Act.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Pursuant to Standing Order 68(2), the motion is deemed adopted.


Robert Phillip Kaplan: Madam Speaker, under the Canadian Copyright Act, which follows a British precedent several hundred years old, the copyright of documents which are issued by the government including statutes, for example, are the private property of the Crown. Anyone who copies them theoretically and legally is responsible to pay a royalty for them.
This is inconsistent with the practice in most other countries and the purpose of this proposed law is to abolish the Crown copyright and make public documents public property.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Mr. Kaplan 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 the first time and printed.



CANADA WATER EXPORT PROHIBITION ACT


Mr. Nelson A. Riis (Kamloops) moved: for leave to introduce Bill C-443, an act to prohibit the export of water by interbasin transfers.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Pursuant to Standing Order 68(2), the motion is deemed adopted.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Madam Speaker, this bill has the enthusiastic support of the member for Okanagan-Similkameen- Merritt and the member for Prince George-Bulkley Valley.

June 2, 1993
Routine Proceedings
We have introduced it in response to 43,000 petitioners and after extensive public consultation. People are expressing their concern that our water, especially in the case of the North Thompson River, ought not to be for sale.
This act is necessary due to the government's failure to recognize that our water resources are in jeopardy due to its haste to ram the North American free trade agreement through Parliament. International resource management and international legal affairs experts have concluded that, because the government has failed to negotiate specific exclusions for the bulk export and transfer of water in both the free trade agreement with the United States and the North American free trade agreement with Mexico and the United States, water is a trade commodity as identified in these two agreements and under the GATT becomes a legitimate export commodity out of Canada into both the United States and Mexico.
Literally thousands and thousands of British Columbians, supported by people across the country, have indicated that they want this legislation passed before Parliament recesses to safeguard our freshwater rivers and lakes.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Mr. Riis 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 the first time and printed.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Point of order, Madam Speaker. There have not been consultations and I wonder if you would find there is unanimous consent in the House that this matter be referred to the appropriate standing committee as soon as possible.
May I seek that unanimous consent?


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Does the hon. member have unanimous consent?


Some hon. members:: No.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Obviously there is no unanimous consent to send this bill to committee at this time.



COMMUNICATIONS AND CULTURE


John Williston (Bud) Bird: Madam Speaker, arising from the presentation a few moments ago of the report by the Standing Committee on Communications and Culture with respect to television violence I would like to present the following resolution:
Whereas this House received a petition on November 18, 1992 from Ms. Virginie Lariviere of St-Polycare, Quebec, containing 1.3 million signatures expressing serious concerns about violence on television in Canada and calling for government action to address the moderation of such violence; and
Whereas such petition was referred to the Standing Committee on Communications and Culture for study and report which has been tabled in this House today;
That this House, as one important measure to contribute to the over-all reduction of violence in Canadian society, calls on all Canadians to exercise their utmost influence in all reasonable ways to control and diminish the portrayal of violence on Canadian television screens; and
That this House call for initiatives to be taken jointly by the federal and provincial governments and the industry to develop a universal film, video, and television program classification system for Canada.


Mr. David Dingwall (Cape Breton-East Richmond):: Madam Speaker, there has been some consultation with the Official Opposition, particularly the hon. member for Mount Royal, and the Official Opposition wishes to give its consent to this motion.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Madam Speaker, there have been consultations. I must say on behalf of the New Democrat caucus that we enthusiastically support this resolution. As a matter of fact, we would like to see it go a lot further but this is a first step.


Mr. Alex Kindy (Calgary Northeast):: Madam Speaker, I do support this initiative. It is an excellent one and I think the independents are certainly in favour of it.


Mrs. Pierrette Venne (Saint-Hubert):: Madam Speaker, I want to say that we in the Bloc quebecois were also consulted and that we support this motion.
I may add that once again, we were only given the English version of the motion. I would appreciate it if from now on, we could have it in French as well.
June 2, 1993


Charles A. Langlois: Madam Speaker, about the document that was produced in English, I would like to explain to the hon. member that the document was prepared at the last minute and unfortunately, there was no time to have it translated. However, I promise to have it translated as soon as possible. Meanwhile, the government is delighted with this show of support and will make it unanimous.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: The Chair concludes that the hon. member for Fredericton-York-Sunbury has the unanimous consent of the House to present his motion.


John Williston (Bud) Bird: Madam Speaker, I believe the resolution was presented in both official languages.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: A French version was laid on the Table, and I am sure we can get this copy to the hon. member for Saint-Hubert right away.


Pierrette Venne: Madam Speaker, when I said we gave our consent, it was for a motion that was available to me only in English. I know that according to the Standing Orders, motions are always tabled in French and English, but only the English version was available when I spoke.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: We do have this motion in two versions. 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.

Nelson Andrew Riis: Madam Speaker, once again it is an honour to present a petition on behalf of a large number of petitioners. There are now more than
43,000	individuals who are concerned about maintaining sovereignty over our fresh water.
Routine Proceedings
The petitioners ask the Government of Canada to ensure that water is identified as an exempt category in the North American free trade agreement and in the FTA as well.


Mr. Jesse Flis (Parkdale-High Park):: Madam Speaker, it is an honour for me, pursuant to Standing Order 36, to table the following petition signed by close to 500 residents of the greater Toronto area.
They wish to draw to the attention of the House the fact that incidents of crime involving violence are becoming more and more frequent, each incident of violence harms the public and there would be fewer such incidents if certain legislative measures were taken.
Therefore the petitioners call upon Parliament to enact legislation pertaining to all crimes involving violence that would result in much tougher sentencing, little or no parole and a decrease in the age limit of the Young Offenders Act.
It is fitting that I have the honour to table this petition at the same time that the television classification motion was just passed.


Mr. Russell MacLellan (Cape Breton-The Sydneys):: Madam Speaker, parents and grandparents in my riding are seeking a ban on the serial killer board game. The game comes with a body bag, 25 babies and 4 serial killer figures. The object is to commit murder and the person with the highest body count becomes the winner.
This game is not in the best interests of children and in the wrong hands could become dangerous and suggestive to easily impressionable young people.
I am from an area that just had three murders at a McDonald's restaurant in the very recent past. I ask the House to consider this and to urge the Government of Canada to ban the sales of the serial killer board game.


Mr. A1 Horning (Okanagan Centre):: Madam Speaker, I am pleased to present four petitions with 118 names from Oscar Kleppe, John Semple, Angus Morrison and I.J. Dayton on behalf of a group of constituents of mine who humbly call upon Parliament to enact legislation which would allow a referendum of the people, binding upon Parliament, to accept or reject two official lan-

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guages, English and French, for the government and the people of Canada.


Mr. Svend J. Robinson (Burnaby-Kingsway):: Madam Speaker, I have three petitions to present. My first petition is signed by hundreds of residents of British Columbia.
It notes that two young Canadians, Christine Lamont and David Spencer, who were sentenced to 28 years each in a Brazilian prison, have suffered grave miscarriages of justice. There have been a number of riots in the compounds in which they are held which threaten their health and safety. The only relief available for then-punishment is to request expulsion.
Therefore, the petitioners call upon Parliament to urge the. Prime Minister to request the Government of Brazil to expel Christine Lamont and David Spencer and return them to Canada in accordance with Brazilian law.


Svend Johannes Robinson: Madam Speaker, the second petition notes that in October 1985 the subcommittee on equality rights of the justice committee submitted a unanimous report to Parliament recommending that the Canadian Human Rights Act be amended to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in all areas of federal jurisdiction.
The petitioners go on to note that despite repeated promises the government would act on this commitment and despite calls by the Canadian Human Rights Commission for the government to act on this commitment, no action has been taken.
Therefore the petitioners call upon Parliament to ensure the government acts to bring forward immediately an amendment to add sexual orientation to the Canadian Human Rights Act as a prohibited ground of discrimination.


Svend Johannes Robinson: Madam Speaker, I have a petition which is signed by hundreds of residents of the cities of Burnaby and Vancouver on the subject of the proposed North American free trade agreement.
This petition points out that NAFTA has resulted in even greater trade concessions being demanded of Canada. It refers to the problem of bringing on to the market generic drugs and points out that NAFTA cannot be remedied through renegotiation.
Therefore, the petitioners call on the House to reject the proposed North American free trade agreement and recommend to the government that it use the termination clause to end the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement.


Mr. Maurice Foster (Algoma):: Madam Speaker, I have the honour to present seven petitions today. They are signed by 225 people from throughout Manitoulin Island.
The petitioners express their concern that the government plans to automate the weather station at the Gore Bay-Manitoulin airport later this fall. They express concern that services to navigators and the general public will be sharply reduced by that automation.
I note the Minister of State for Transport is in the House today. We have been making representations to her. I am sure that these petitions will only reinforce those representations.


Maurice Brydon Foster: Madam Speaker, I have the honour as well this afternoon to present a petition signed by more than 100 constituents of the hon. member for Renfrew-Nipissing-Pembroke who has been ill and in hospital. He is making a great recovery and has been back in the House at least once. He has asked me to present this petition on his behalf.
This petition deals with the impact of the planned North American free trade agreement. The petitioners are concerned about a loss of jobs, the impact on the environment and the impact on government independence.
I present these petitions on behalf of the member for Renfrew-Nipissing-Pembroke.


Mr.   Brian@: Madam Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 361 have the honour and the privilege to present a number of petitions today on three separate issues.
June 2, 1993

The first is related to the Young Offenders Act. There are a number of petitions including the names of over
2,000	people in the communities of Sherwood Park, Fort Saskatchewan, Bruderheim, Tofield, Nisku, Beaumont, Ardrossan and in and around the Edmonton area.
The petitioners call upon Parliament to strengthen the Young Offenders Act or replace it with legislation that will be a stronger deterrent to youth crime. They are most concerned with repeat violent young offenders and recommend harsher penalties, including work camps. In cases of dealing with theft or property damage they suggest financial repayment to the victims.


Mr.   Brian@: Madam Speaker, my second petition deals with the acknowledgement and redress for injustices committed by the Government of Canada against Ukrainian pioneer settler communities during and following the First World War.
It includes the names of approximately three dozen petitioners from the Edmonton area. They call upon Parliament to give a succinct timetable for resolving this important redress issue.


Mr.   Brian@: Madam Speaker, there are two final petitions. One is on behalf of Mr. Alec Saruk of Lamont who calls upon Parliament to provide for a referendum on the Official Languages Act.
This would allow a referendum that is binding on Parliament to accept or reject two official languages, English and French, for the government and the people of Canada. The second petition is from a number of people in the Edmonton area and it is with regard to the same issue.


Mr. Stan J. Hovdebo (Saskatoon-Humboldt):: Madam Speaker, it is my honour and duty to present a petition on behalf of a number of constituents.
The Prime Minister indicated in October 1992 the intention of the government to settle the claim of
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redress to the mutual satisfaction of both the government and the Ukrainian community.
These petitioners call upon Parliament to urge the government to act on the unanimous motion of the House of Commons of September 27,1991 and settle the acknowledgement and redress issue to the satisfaction of the Ukrainian Canadian community and the government.


Mr. Ronald J. Duhamel (St. Boniface):: Madam Speaker, I have the honour to present a petition on behalf of several petitioners.
They ask the government to review its tax regulations and laws, particularly as it affects parents who have special needs children. These parents are often directed by their family physicians to place them in special facilities that incur additional costs.
These parents feel, and I support their request, that there are often significant additional costs which they cannot deduct from their income. They want the government to review the situation.

I think that is an entirely legitimate request. [English]


Ron J. Duhamel: Madam Speaker, the second petition I have the honour to present is from petitioners who point out that our greater challenges in Canada are really our social problems. These problems include inequity, poverty, unemployment, et cetera.
They point out that we need strong social science research to determine the causes and propose solutions. They feel that the current arrangement of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council is an appropriate one.
They ask that this proposed merger be set aside and that the government study this question, consider the implications and then decide at some future date.

That is another legitimate request I support.

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Mr. George S. Rideout (Moncton):: Madam Speaker, it is my pleasure to introduce a petition under Standing Order 36 relating to two people who are in a Brazilian prison.
The petitioners call upon Parliament to urge the Prime Minister to request the Government of Brazil to expel Christine Lamont and David Spencer and return them to Canada in accordance with Brazilian law.


George Saunders Rideout: Madam Speaker, I have a second petition which it is my obligation to present. It concerns a referendum with regard to language.


Mr. Vic Althouse (Mackenzie):: Madam Speaker, I have the honour to present a number of petitions, mostly from farmers along the eastern side of Saskatchewan.
In their opinion the Canadian Wheat Board has played a vital role in the orderly marketing of Canadian wheat, barley and oats since its inception. They note that the Minister of Agriculture's proposal to remove barley from the jurisdiction of the Wheat Board is another step toward dismantling the board.
They call upon the government to keep barley under the jurisdiction of the Canadian Wheat Board and to actively support the marketing of other crops by the Canadian Wheat Board.


Mr. Lyle Dean MacWilliam (Okanagan-Shuswap):: Madam Speaker, I have a petition with regard to the introduction of competition in the long distance telephone market as well as the passage of Bill C-62 and the regulation that would take place under the provisions of that bill.
These petitioners are opposed to the disruptive effects of the introduction of long distance competition and the deregulatory effects of this bill.
They ask the Minister of Communications to engage in substantive consultations with all segments of Canadian society regarding the market impact of this deregulatory environment.


Lyle Dean MacWilliam: Madam Speaker, the second petition I have the honour to present is from petitioners who are concerned about the impact of the North American free trade agreement and the restrictions being placed upon Canada's federal, provincial and territorial governments now and in the future.
They ask the government to reject the proposed North American free trade agreement and recommend to the government that it use its termination clause to end the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement.


Lyle Dean MacWilliam: Madam Speaker, the final set of petitions I have the honour to present concerns the changes to the Unemployment Insurance Act.
These petitioners, from throughout British Columbia, are concerned about the impact of these changes. They call upon the House to reject the amendments made to the Unemployment Insurance Act, particularly with respect to the appeal process for employees and the difficulty that has caused with respect to dismissal.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: Madam Speaker, I have the honour to present a petition signed by 1,425 people from the lower mainland of British Columbia.
They point out to this House and the government that Christine Lamont, whose family lives in the area where the signatures come from, and David Spencer will be rotting in a Brazilian jail for 28 years.
They request the Canadian government ask for the expulsion of these two people to Canada to get them out of that jail, which it could do. This petition is from 1,425 people from Langley, Surrey, and Aldergrove, B.C.


QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER
[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)
June 2, 1993
Charles A. Langlois: Madam Speaker, question No. 524 will be answered today.


Mr. Taylor: Does the government have employees in the riding of The Battlefords - Meadow Lake and, if so, (a) how many and what is their primary place of employment (b) are any positions designated as bilingual and, if so, (c) how many vacancies have occurred in both unilingual and bilingual positions and how many of those have been filled?


Hon. Gilles Loiselle (President of the TVeasury Board and Minister of State (Finance)):: The government has 157 Public Service employees in the riding of The Battlefords-Meadow Lake. Four of these employees are in bilingual positions and 153 are in unilingual English positions. These employees are mainly located in Battle-ford, North Battleford and Meadow Lake.
In Public Service recruitment in Saskatchewan in 1992, the 36 new recruits were appointed to unilingual positions.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: The question mentioned by the parliamentary secretary has been answered. Shall the remaining questions stand?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Charles A. Langlois: Madam Speaker, I would ask that all notice of motions for the production of papers be allowed to stand.


Ron J. Duhamel: Madam Speaker, on February 12, 1993 I gave notice of question No. 472, which reads as follows:

What is the total number of Aboriginal women employed in a legal capacity within (a) the Department of Justice (b) other federal
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departments (c) crown corporations and governmental agencies and (d) human rights commissions?
According to a Standing Order of this House the government is allowed 45 days to answer such a question. It has now gone beyond 100 days.

Now I am as reasonable and patient as the next person, but quite frankly, this is going a bit far.

I recall another such question that took 400 days. It was on the spending of GST revenues. I cannot wait that long. We are coming to the end of the session. I am becoming increasingly frustrated because these questions have been asked by constituents of mine and I cannot provide them with an answer. I want to do so and I want to do so in the immediate future.
Can I please have some assurance that these answers will be supplied to me within the next couple of days?


Charles A. Langlois: Madam Speaker, I have made a note of the hon. member's concerns, and I will see to it that his question is answered as soon as possible; I hope within a matter of days.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Shall all notices of Motions for the Production of papers stand?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Today being the last allotted day in the supply period ending June 23,1993, the House will, as usual, proceed to consideration of a motion to concur in a supply bill.
In accordance with recent practice is it agreed to have the bill distributed now?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.

June 2, 1993
Supply


Frank Oberle: That Vote 1, in the amount of $65,974,000 under Treasury
Board-Program expenditures, in the Main Estimates for the fiscal
year ending March 31, 1994, (less the amount voted in Interim
Supply), be concurred in.


Mr. Bill Kempling (Parliamentary Secretary to President of the Treasury Board and Minister of State (Finance)):: Madam Speaker, I am honoured today to speak to the matter of full supply for the main estimates for the fiscal year 1993-94.
This year the main estimates total $161.1 billion. Through these estimates the government is seeking Parliament's approval for $48.9 billion in new spending authority. The remaining $112.2 billion represents statutory payments that have received previous parliamentary approval.
These main estimates, as well as those tabled in the previous eight years, reflect the government's commitment to eliminating waste and inefficiency, as well as divesting activities and organizations that no longer serve a vital public need in order to reduce costs and strike a proper balance between Canadians' demands for federal services and their ability as taxpayers to pay for them.
In this regard much has been achieved over the past eight years. Program spending has been held to 16.7 per cent of Canada's gross domestic product for the past two years as compared to 20 per cent in 1984.
Since 1984 the growth in program expenditures, including Public Service salaries, has averaged only 3.7 per cent per year as compared to an average inflation rate of 4 per cent per year. This translates into a net real decline of 2.6 per cent.
These achievements illustrate the government's commitment to increased efficiency through the rigorous control of expenditures as well as the implementation of many innovative management practices. This government has maintained and will continue to maintain careful stewardship over taxpayers' dollars. We are leaders in this area, as is demonstrated by our long record of success.
The year over year increase of .4 per cent in the main estimates is the outcome of an annual review of the requirements for all 137 programs delivered by 111 departments, agencies and Crown corporations appearing in the estimates. This increase can be divided into two broad categories: adjustments to statutory items, which amount to a net increase of $423 million or 74 per cent of the year over year growth, and changes to voted items, which amount to $149 million or 26 per cent of the year over year growth.
Statutory spending this year is $112.2 billion, or 70 per cent of the total estimates. Spending in this category includes such things as major federal transfers to Canadians in respect of old age security, guaranteed income supplement and unemployment insurance benefits; transfers to the provinces under equalization programs for health, education and social assistance; general Public Service programs; and public debt charges
Voted spending, approved annually by Parliament, amounts to $48.9 billion in these estimates. This reflects an increase of .3 per cent over last year. The major factor underlying the growth in the voted portion of the main estimates is the continuing requirements of items funded initially through the 1992-93 supplementary estimates.
Items approved through the 1992-93 supplementary estimates and included in the 1993-94 main estimates reflect the incorporation of new policy and workload increases announced or identified after tabling of the
1992-93 estimates. In addition, these Main Estimates include the additional costs of collective agreements as extended by the Public Sector Compensation Act.
On a consolidated basis the budgetary main estimates will increase by only .4 per cent for this upcoming year. Four main areas account for 82 per cent of the total allocated budgetary spending: public debt charges account for nearly 25 per cent; social programs for 38 per cent; fiscal arrangements for close to 12 per cent; and defence spending for 7.3 per cent.
Social programs are the largest component of over-all spending for 1993-94 with the federal government directing over $61 billion or, 38 per cent of its planned spending, in this area. The government will continue its efforts to ensure the health and well-being of all Canadians. Elelp is directed to those in greatest need through programs of assistance to the economically and
June 2, 1993

socially disadvantaged including the jobless, unskilled persons with disabilities, seniors and immigrants as well as aboriginal people, veterans and children.
The Departments of Employment and Immigration, National Health and Welfare, Indian Affairs and Northern Development, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation and Veterans Affairs account for nearly 99 per cent of the spending in this sector. For 1993-94, program spending will amount to $120.9 billion with growth being kept at about a 1.7 per cent increase over last year.
This growth is due in large part to increased benefits being paid out under old age security, unemployment insurance, fiscal equalization and the Canada assistance programs. The remaining growth is the result of increased spending on aboriginal people and veterans, supplemental income support, payments to fishermen and plant workers in the northern cod fishery of Newfoundland and the investment in public infrastructure.
The spending programs for 1993 and 1994 are well within the limits set out in the spending control legislation that was approved by this House in 1992. The December economic and fiscal statement announced the government's intention to change the unemployment insurance program. As a result of the passage of Bill C-113, the government is expected to generate savings of $850 million in 1993-94 alone. However this bill was approved after the main estimates were tabled and therefore these savings are not reflected in the estimates of 1993-94.
The December statement also announced reduced funding for transportation subsidies, the Public Utilities Income lax Transfer Act and grants in lieu of taxes to municipalities. These measures are expected to generate significant savings, however they cannot be included in the estimates as the changes to the statutory authorities had not been approved at the time of the tabling of the main estimates.
The recent budget measures announced by my colleague, the Minister of Finance, will see significant changes to the way in which government does business. Streamlining will become necessary in many areas of
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government and tough decisions will be made regarding the discontinuation of discretionary programs. We, as Canadians, can no longer afford some of these. Estimates tabled in the next few years will no doubt prove to be testimony to the positive impact resulting from this budget. We will be able to live within our means at that time.
Expenditure management has already forced departments and agencies to face increasing demands for their services with fewer available resources. Reductions in available moneys within the operations and maintenance budgets have been an element of the restraint measures announced in every budget since 1985. This has resulted in reductions to the purchasing power of operating and maintenance budgets of an ongoing program in the order of 30 per cent since 1985.
Canadians have expressed the desire for governments to spend less, spend smarter and be more efficient. Perhaps this feeling has never been stronger than at the present time. Tackling this country's deficit through spending cuts has become a number one priority of governments within Canada. Transfer payments continue to account for most of the growth in the main estimates. For this upcoming year transfer of payments will increase nearly $1.4 billion. Increasing costs in unemployment insurance, Established Program Financing, the Canada Assistance Plan, payments to provinces as well as transfers to seniors accounts account for nearly all the growth in this area.
In the 1993-94 estimates $42.6 billion, or 26 per cent of total budgetary expenditures is for transfers to persons. Of this $42.6 billion, unemployment insurance and transfers to seniors account for over $20 billion. The Minister of Finance announced a 10 per cent cut to transfer payments for selected programs in his December statement. Savings as a result of this initiative are expected to reach $779 million in 1993-94 with $644 million being reflected in these main estimates.
Cutbacks in government expenditures have not only originated from reducing transfer payments to individuals and provinces. The more severe reductions have been made in government operating expenditures.

June 2, 1993
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Between 1992-93 and 1993-94 transfers to persons and provinces increased by 1.7 per cent whereas total capital operating expenditures by government departments will decrease by 0.8 per cent.
Notwithstanding the extent of recent government cutbacks, the Government of Canada remains committed to the green plan. Although a 10 per cent reduction in green plan funding was announced in accordance with the December economic statement, green plan funding increased by $64.7 million over the planned 1992-93 levels. Other changes to green plan funding levels in the estimates stem from the February 1992 budget which saw the reallocation of moneys for future years.
Expenditure control initiatives are not limited solely to placing fiscal restraints on current operations. We are also restructuring. As a result of the February 1992 budget close to 40 agencies have been wound up, merged or consolidated. It is estimated that $56.6 million will be saved in 1993-94 due to this rationalization.
The concept of cost recovery and user fees is becoming increasingly popular as a means of collecting government revenues to pay for services that benefit only a small portion of the population. At the same time such an initiative removes the obligation from taxpayers to involuntarily pay for services they do not use. With the pressure on this country to reduce its deficit primarily through lowering the government expenditures and not through tax increases, the government is placing the emphasis on supporting higher priority programs that benefit all Canadians.
By adopting user fees and cost recovery, the government is attempting to provide an improved service it might not otherwise be able to afford and ensures the best use is made of scarce resources. This will also foster a more service oriented market-based sensitivity in government as it becomes more attentive to its clients needs.
To assist departments with the implementation of user fees, several pieces of legislation have been introduced and approved by Parliament over the past few years. With this renewed interest, the amount of money received annually through user fees has doubled to well over $3 billion in the last eight years. It is expected that this trend for revenue generation will continue.
The initiatives I have outlined are only a sampling of the many initiatives the government is currently promoting. It is committed to reforms that will continue to assure a high quality of service to Canadians at a reasonable cost.
Finally the 1993-94 main estimates now before the House are representative of a government serious about restraint and reform in order to benefit all Canadians. Given our success to date I know we are on the right track. I am confident Canadians will welcome the changes we are initiating and considering for the future in the areas of cost reduction and enhanced program delivery.
These initiatives will be pursued in a manner that will allow us to organize and operate government programs to ensure continued prosperity for all Canadians.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: Mr. Speaker, I want to ask a broad question with one specific. I do not expect the hon. member to be able to answer the specific but I will bring it forward anyway.
I wonder how serious the government really is in cutting fat and costs in terms of looking at things. It seems to me it cuts things that are embarrassing. It cut the Law Reform Commission, the Court Challenges Program and anything that could politically embarrass it and it says that is cutting the fat. It does not cut anything that is not embarrassing that is fat.
The hon. member said the government tried to cut back. In what serious way did it try to cut back? How did it seriously look at these programs?
I know the provincial governments are dealing with this. I know the minister of finance in British Columbia personally and I know the provincial treasurer in Ontario. They have had to go through department after department cutting back and looking at what was really essential and trying to preserve what really helped people.
I was looking through this briefly. There are billions and billions of dollars of expenditures. I see something called the Northern Pipeline Agency on which we spent $469,000. I know personally that the Northern Pipeline Agency was set up under a previous Liberal government in the 1970s to supervise the building of the pipeline that
June 2, 1993

was supposed to come down from Alaska and the Mackenzie Delta to the lower 48 states.
We never built the pipeline but here we are in 1993, the Northern Pipeline Agency is still there and it is costing my constituents in Port Moody-Coquitlam and the other taxpayers in Canada $469,000. Is the government really serious about cutting back or not? When I see things like a Northern Pipeline Agency which is a hold-over from some bygone era I wonder if it is really serious.
I do not expect the hon. member for Burlington to be able to identify one expenditure and have all the facts. He might have that but I do not know. What is the process of seriously cutting back programs that are extraneous and not cutting back the programs that really affect people?


William James Kempling: Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for his question because when I was in the opposition I used to ask the same sort of question. I remember vividly when we closed down an agency that was established during World War I at the time of the Halifax explosion when a number of ammunition ships exploded. A number of people were killed and terrible damage was done.
I recall that our leader at the time was Mr. Stanfield. It was in the 1970s so from 1917 to 1973, I believe, this agency kept working. It had offices, personnel and letterhead. It submitted annual reports and finally it closed down. I think the member realizes that once we start something it is very difficult to close it down.
I remember when the Northern Pipeline Agency was established. I think I had some long talks with the Hon. Mitchell Sharp who headed the agency for a time. It served a purpose but like a lot of things it was hard to close down.
I guess every department of government has been clawed through by Treasury Board to see what changes could be made. We have closed down agencies and something in excess of 40 government departments as I recall, saving billions of dollars and we continue to do this. We have released about 12,000 public servants through attrition and the closing down of departments. We got rid of more than 20 Crown corporations and about 80,000 employees have ceased to be a liability of the government.
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On the other hand we have done many other things that we cannot cover in a short speech in the House of Commons. I ask the hon. member to reflect back on the pension legislation we passed a few months ago where we used to carry the government portion of pension liabilities as part of the national debt. All those pensions are now self-funding. The government puts its portion in, the employees put their portion in and those pension funds are now supervised by a board. That is an ongoing thing and over the years it will dramatically help us look after those pension accounts. It is something that should have been done years ago but it was not. Do not ask me why it was not done, it just was not done.
We have made tremendous progress in a few years against a spending estimate that is down now but has been very high, in the billions of dollars, over the past number of years. We are going to continue to do the very best we can.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: Mr. Speaker, I am just going to add one thing. It is a comment the member will appreciate perhaps in the spirit in which it is intended.
When I was a young member 14 years ago and came to the House, Tommy Douglas had just retired but he was around in the lobby and in the House. I asked him about the estimates once and he told me that all the estimates of all the departments would go through the whole House.
He said he used to come into the House and spend his time listening to and taking part in that debate. That is how he learned about Canada. He had learned about fisheries and Indian issues. He said it was a great learning experience.
It is tough for us now. When I look at this I see that I know bits and pieces through committees that I have sat on. I knew the pipeline from the energy committee and my experience in the north. However there are a lot of areas that I do not know.
This is not a question but just something I want to pass on to the House and to the hon. member. Perhaps the older method of doing things when we actually went through things department by department in the whole House was where we could get an overview rather than having 30 committees and being able to go to only one of them.

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I would ask the hon. member to look today at the Northern Pipeline Agency and tell me maybe at some other time whether it really is doing any work. Is Mitchell Sharp still there? Who knows? He was quite a great parliamentarian.
I will have to take the hon. member's word. He is trying to cut back with the exception, perhaps, of this agency.


William James Kempling: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member tweaked my memory. I remember Tommy Douglas vividly. He was a great parliamentarian.
The member refers to the procedures about the estimates coming before the House. Actually it was one of the tests of a minister's ability to get his spending estimates through the House. He would bring his estimates into the House and he had to stand in his place in Committee of the Whole and get his estimates passed. If he had an easy time going through with the House and gave reasonable answers then he was considered to be a pretty good minister.
However I think the volume of expenditures has moved so greatly that time just does not permit it. Maybe we should be looking at a procedure that allows that to happen again. I know it is difficult to get into the estimates.
A few years ago we had a gentleman from Treasury Board or the Auditor General-one or the other-who was going member by member through the estimates saying: "What can we do to explain this to you that will make it easier?" A manual was going to be issued.
Then the estimates became so big. There are the supplementaries. If a manual is put on top of that then there is so much paper that it is very difficult to digest it all in the course of the year.


Mr. Douglas Young (Acadie-Bathurst):: First of all, Mr. Speaker although I would like to say it is a pleasure to take part in this debate on the motion for concurrence in the Main Estimates for the current fiscal year, for me and for the Canadian public the pleasure is not unadulterated.

I must say that in listening to the parliamentary secretary it is a major problem, as raised by my friend who spoke previously in questions and comments, that
the estimates now seem to go through the process in a very odd kind of way.
If we look at what actually is done in committee with estimates, it is very little. I find it rather sad that in this House, and in other arenas related to the parliamentary process, people will discuss matters of $100,000 or $1 million.
I do not want to be equated to C.D. Howe and what is a million. We all know that every dollar is important. It seems there is a lot more focus and a lot more interest on the kinds of amounts of money that we can understand and grapple with. Those are the things we pursue. Yet hundreds of millions and even billions of dollars are spent with very little public scrutiny and very little public understanding.
It seems to me that if we are going to recognize our obligation as parliamentarians to restore confidence in the Canadian political system and try to overcome the cynicism that is out there, then we are going to have to be far more effective in dealing with these kinds of measures.
Today we are talking about $161 billion in spending. We talked about this since the budget process was initiated. People in committee, special interest groups around the country, individuals, organizations and those in sectors of our economy that are affected by increases and decreases and changes in the spending patterns of the government have had their say. However, I want to spend a little bit of time today trying to put the notion of spending and taxation and the financial activity of government into perspective.
There is a little quiz that I developed. I use it in various ways when I go to high schools and universities and speak to groups that are preoccupied with the debt and deficit. If we are speaking today of the government's expenditure plan involving some $161 billion, then we are at the same time talking about the fact that the government will only raise somewhere in the neighbourhood of $125 billion to $130 billion. This leaves a shortfall of $30 billion.
As I was saying to my colleague from Hamilton moments ago, it is a pathetic commentary on our system and our society that we can talk about $161 billion as though we knew what we were talking about. For example, in speaking with young people, and some not so young who are preoccupied with debt, they are concerned about the debt because they know it is a tremendous burden on their future. They know that the kinds of opportunities that will be made available to them will not
June 2, 1993

be the same kinds of opportunities available to me and my generation when we were growing up. They know that governments of every political stripe, provincially and federally, for many years have mortgaged the future of many of our young people.
At the same time, people not quite so young are concerned about whether or not the investments they made in their futures and their senior years will pay off. Will the Canada Pension Plan survive the changes in our society and the changes in Canada's financial situation? Will medicare, unemployment insurance and the social safety nets be kept in place? Will an economy in Canada be capable of making sure that happens? There is a great deal of unease out there.
Here we have politicians and bureaucrats and many of them have never made a payroll or been involved on Friday afternoon with the bottom line and whether it is red or black or something to which they ever had to pay attention. Yet they have a great deal to say about huge amounts of money.
When I go into these fora such as high schools, universities, community colleges, community groups and so forth I try to use examples that I hope will help them to understand what some of us are so glib about as we talk about these enormous expenditures. For example the national federal debt is somewhere in the neighbourhood of $480 billion. That is a lot of money. I am sure that every Canadian understands that $480 billion is a lot of money, but let us turn it on its head and try to use-I know some members in this House were always opposed to metric-a simple exercise to see if we can, as Canadians, get a notion of what we are talking about.
Thke $4.80. It may buy a big Mac, a coke and a side order of French fries. This is something that Canadians can cope with. Take $48. Father's Day is coming up so maybe we will take dad out to a reasonably good restaurant and buy him a beer or maybe a not too expensive bottle of wine. One can have dinner for two and it is a pleasant evening out. Thke $480. This may be a weekend at a good hotel celebrating a couple's anniversary. Take $4,800. Maybe we will get a trip to Florida for $4,800. A couple takes off and spends a few weeks in what they hope will be the sunshine in an exotic area in the United States or in the Caribbean.
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How about $48,000? For $48,000, one might think about buying a Cadillac, a Lincoln or some other luxury car, but we are starting to talk some money at $48,000. My colleague from Ottawa says that would buy a summer cottage.
With $480,000 we are talking about a luxury home in one of the very exclusive neighbourhoods in the major cities of Canada. I think Canadians whether they live in a bungalow or in a so-called mansion can grapple with $480,000.
Let us talk about $4.8 million. That is a lot of money and it is a big number. I think most Canadians would say that we are starting to get out of their league with $4.8 million.
But what about $48 million? How many thousand dollars are there in $48 million? How many $2 bills are there in $48 million? What could I buy with $48 million? We hear about these huge lotto opportunities that arise every now and then. In my view $48 million is really beyond the pale for most Canadians.
Then we talk about $480 million and we are a long way from the big Mac, coke and French fries. However, at $480 million we are still talking peanuts in the context of the fiscal situation of Canada.
We could talk about $4.8 billion. Now we are into the stratosphere. Politicians talk about that when they say that helicopters are only around $5 billion, which is $4.8 billion plus a few hundred million. It is a long way from my big Mac at $4.80.
Then we talk about $480 billion. How many hundred dollar bills are there in $480 billion? How many thousand dollar bills? How many SkyDomes are there in $480 billion? Let us do the exercise. Let us say SkyDome costs roughly $480 million. It just happens to be a figure that works out. How many SkyDomes could we have in Canada if we were able to use the national debt for purchasing? We would probably have 1,000 of them. Imagine that communities of 200 and 300 people in Canada would have a SkyDome if we took the debt and transferred it.

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What is incredible about this is that collectively, the economists, the politicians and the bureaucrats have moved into jargon, systems, programs and processes that have fostered the cynicism of Canadians who say: "I do not think they know what they are talking about. I cannot understand it, but as I watch them perform and as I see what is happening to my country, I do not really think that any of us really have a grasp of this".
Surely there has to be a way. The point I want to make in this presentation is we must restore integrity to the system. I cannot let this pass. I want to be very serious because we are dealing with a very important problem when we talk about the understanding of Canadian taxpayers in the estimates process and how much money we are spending.
Today in the "Report on Business" in The Globe and Mail I see: "Bureaucrat warns of tax revolt. Canadians may be driven offshore, finance official tells MPs".
This official, David Dodge, is now the deputy minister of finance. He was the assistant deputy minister of finance when I sat on the finance committee and we went through the goods and services tax expose. This is the chap who assured Canadians that the goods and services tax was the only way to go, that it was the right thing to do and was a model that would be followed by nations around the world.
The Australian government just used the GST to get itself re-elected. For those who did not follow the Australian election, they used Canada as an example of what happens to governments that bring in GST. Of course, the opposition in Australia was suggesting it might just do that.
I want to point out that if there is real cynicism and frustration on the part of Canadians, here is a senior bureaucrat, the top bureaucrat in the Department of Finance suggesting that there might be a tax revolt. He was the architect and the most staunch defender of the goods and services tax, which has been described by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business as the nightmare on Main Street.
The CFIB talks about the only way to deal with the GST. I quote: "The Canadian Federation of Independent Business will tiy to play a constructive role in the
ongoing reform of Canada's sales tax system and will go to the membership for a fresh mandate when a new government is formed and new options are presented to the Canadian public. A new sales tax initiative requires political leadership and a new spirit of co-operation between all the political and economic partners".
Certainly that is the answer to the GST morass, but to have the senior bureaucrat in the Department of Finance go further and say that it would be very difficult to raise personal income taxes, he says: "Whether we can go higher is up to you as politicians".
We have to come to grips with the fact that Canadians are really questioning the integrity of the system. They are asking us as politicians. They are going to be very aggressive in asking us over the next few months when we go out on the hustings as some of us try to get elected and many others across the country will try to get elected for the first time.
There is no doubt that Canadians understand that in a time of financial crisis resources have to be well managed. I do not think that anybody in the country is interested in having anyone point to the NDP governments of Ontario, Saskatchewan, British Columbia or the former Liberal government or the current Conservative government on the federal scene and say: "They did a terrible job". We all know that. Everybody is just trying to do the best job they can to try to get the country back on track.
What I want to suggest today falls directly into what was said by my colleague from the NDP in terms of the estimates process here and the response of the parliamentary secretary.
If we are going to have any chance of convincing Canadians that they have to continue paying taxes and have to continue dealing with the cutbacks in services and programs, they are going to have to buckle down.
Governments are going to have to be extremely serious and very up front with what they are going to do. We are going to have to establish measurable goals. Political parties and governments are going to have to tell Canadians where they expect to be based on their policies and programs within a certain period of time. Those goals will have to be measurable. The systems to report on those goals will have to be transparent.
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There has been work done in trying to develop an accountability process that Canadians and parliamentarians can understand. Looking at the estimates and the Public Accounts, volumes of material are available. All of it is there, if you can find it. However, I defy most Canadians to ever try to get to the bottom of it, even in following one very focused line of thought. It is very complex. It is very difficult.
Surely with the electronic and information technology available now we should be able to deal in the accountability process in a very transparent way. Tell Canadians what is going on. That process of accountability has to be relevant. It has to be reliable. It has to be understandable. It has to be consistent. If we set those goals and we set our objectives and if we do not meet them, we have to tell the Canadian people why.
For example if there is a spending program in Canada and there is a huge crisis in the west for grain farmers and it throws everything off the track, I think Canadians understand that, but they want to be told: "This is why we are not meeting our deficit objectives. This is why we cannot do what we said we would do. It is because we are taking care of the farmers". Or it could be the Atlantic fishermen or a major crisis in the automotive industry which changes the picture.
In order to do that, it is going to take a lot of co-operation in this place. When we talk about accountability, we are going to have to talk about how we reform this place. How MPs participate in the process and the kind of input we have in preparing the spending plans as opposed to dealing with historical facts when we come back on Public Accounts.
When the estimates are deemed to have been passed tonight anyway no matter how much we talk here today, does anybody really think we could move an amendment to change one penny in the spending plans of government?
We may have to create a hybrid system from the traditional British parliamentary system of democracy and the systems in the United States and other jurisdictions, but surely we have a responsibility to move in that direction. This would demonstrate to Canadians that we are serious about trying to get our house in order and
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that we are going to share the information. That is essential if Canadians are going to understand what we are trying to achieve.
Part of that process we have to deal with and that I want to raise in this discussion of the estimates today is that traditionally we have had Auditors General report on the spending of government and deal with the accountability process.
The processes in various departments are checked to see if the job is being done properly. Much of that is historic. It is long after the fact. It is after the accountants and the specialists in the Auditor General's office have gone into departments. Then a report is produced, usually in October or November of each year.
I know my following recommendation is going to mean amendments to clarify existing legislation. However it seems to be the kind of thing Canadians would agree with. In other jurisdictions, the Auditor General reports on a timely, periodic basis. In other words when the Auditor General finds out what is going on in a specific area and has concerns and observations to make, that information should be tabled. Then parliamentarians and Canadians would regularly find out exactly what is going on with the expenditure of taxpayers' money.
In Britain there are some 40 reports a year by the Auditor General and Comptroller General. The office over there is combined. It is not a question of saying to the government 40 times a year: "Well, we have got you". Generally speaking, the fact the information is brought forward regularly rather than for political partisan reasons does result in better administration of the public money. On a regular basis, far more quickly than what occurs in Canada now, British parliamentarians and the British people are made aware of problems discovered by the Auditor General.
We believe that Canadians understand the debt and the deficit in terms of the challenge it presents and that it is a serious problem. Overwhelming debt and huge continuing deficits will destroy any future this country might have. Members, whether they are Liberals, Conservatives, NDP, Reform or Bloc Quebecois will have to deal with that reality.

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As we proceed over the next few years, politicians should be committed to looking at every government program and policy on a zero base. We should justify everything we do.
We should be saying to people: Certainly we want to ensure that there is free universal access to medicare. Certainly we want to ensure the integrity of the Canada Pension Plan. Certainly we want to make sure that unemployment insurance and support for the unemployed is there. Sure we want manpower training. Yes, there will be transfers to the provinces, but are they being administered efficiently? Is everything being done to make sure they are viable and rational programs?
Sacred cows no longer are going to be tolerated in this country. Canadians will insist on transparency in the system, accountability on the part of governments and parliamentarians. They are not going to insist because they feel that we need to be held to task. They know that without transparency and accountability the problems we are in now will be exacerbated in the future.
We have talked about doubling the debt in the last seven or eight years. We can talk about all the reasons for it, but that is not relevant. What do we do about the debt and the deficit in the future?
I hope when we next address the estimates in this House, both Canadians and parliamentarians will have a much better understanding of what this process is all about.


Hon. Bernard Valcourt (Minister of Employment and Immigration):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to say, first of all, that in addition to being relevant, the comments by the hon. member for Acadie-Bathurst went well beyond what we usually hear in this House.

I want to congratulate the member for his insightful purview of the debt problem we have in this country and the positive suggestions he made.
The hon. member described in plain, ordinary terms the dangers of pursuing a course of deficit and debt increase. Ultimately it is always the Canadian taxpayer who at the end of the day has to pay the note. Unfortunately for too long governments at all levels have looked
to not just the grandchildren but unborn Canadians to pay the price of these programs we have today.
I am sure the government, the President of Treasury Board and the Minister of Finance would want to look at the proposal to have the Auditor General report more regularly as is done in Britain.
However, when we talk about goals, in the latest budget the Minister of Finance set as a goal the reduction of the deficit to .9 of 1 per cent by the end of this fiscal framework, which is the next five years. That is a goal, but is that a goal the hon. member shares?
Some people were looking at the latest budget in which it is being proposed that government spending be reduced by $30 billion. That is a serious amount of money over a period of five years and the impact it will have. What does the hon. member say about that goal? Is that not the kind of goal he is proposing?
The other remarks by the hon. member are very relevant to what this government has been pursuing. The hon. member was not partisan in his comments and I do not want to be partisan either. For a period of eight years now since being given its mandate in 1988, I cannot believe every measure proposed by the government to cut expenditures, to cut the deficit, has been opposed by everyone on that side of the House who is not a member of this party.
I took it that he was calling for Canadian men and women and young Canadians to be part of and to understand the process. On every measure proposed, the Leader of the Opposition and the leader of the NDP stand in the House to condemn every step. Maybe I am wrong, but how can the hon. member advocate what he rightly points out should be done? We do not seem to be able to live through it and to see it happen.


M. Douglas Young: Mr. Speaker, first of all, on the subject of deficit reduction, I think everyone agrees that we should try and reduce the deficit by every means at our disposal, and the government's objectives certainly have their merits.
However, having been the finance critic for some time now, I can say that, for various reasons, the government's objectives have not been met, and especially its longterm plan for deficit reduction. If I remember correctly,
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according to its forecast at the time, by now the deficit should be less than $20 billion. However, we all know that this year the deficit will probably go over $30 billion.
I understand the minister's concern about trying to find ways for government to reduce its operating costs. Many of the votes we were discussing today, for instance, involve statutory requirements representing up to 70 per cent of the vote.

I understand the problem of the minister. I understand the problem of the government.
When I talk about reform of this place I think the nature of opposition has to be looked at. The automatic knee-jerk reaction to everything proposed by the government is bad. Very little support for most initiatives of government is an inheritance of the British parliamentary system where all members on one side vote one way and most members on the other side vote another way. I think it is something that needs to be questioned.
I want to address the problem that was raised by the minister in terms of how we deal with some of the initiatives of the government designed to reduce expenditures. This is where I think we run into a problem with the off-loading.
Fundamental to any hope of re-establishing fiscal integrity is a tripartite national conference involving the federal government, the provincial ministers of finance and the municipalities. I do not think there is any future for the country in terms of dealing with the $700 billion we have in the public debt without sitting down in a very serious and structured way to deal with the problem of national public debt.
To exclude the city of Toronto and to include New Brunswick, to exclude the city of Montreal and to include Manitoba, to exclude the growing, burgeoning city of Vancouver and to include Prince Edward Island in my view in talking seriously about tax reform is nonsense.
Perhaps the minister will take this as a suggestion, as would any government that wants to be serious about debt reduction and eventually the elimination of the deficit. It is childish to speak about reducing the debt so
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long as we are running a deficit. I do not care how we apply funds or what jargon we use.
The member for Mississauga North was chairman of the finance committee at the time the mayor of Vancouver, the first time I heard the proposal put forward, talked about the implications of off-loading. Just changing responsibilities from one level of government to another will not change anything.
One recommendation I would make is to develop a program, a beginning, not call people in, put on the television lights and have them posture about who are the good guys, who are the bad guys, who is paying the price, how municipal infrastructure needs to be paid for, and all the rest of it. All the people who represent the interests of the taxpayers-whether federal, provincial or municipal the tax bill goes to the same taxpayer-should sit down together to find out how we can deal with what people perceive, other than lack of jobs, as being the single most important problem in the country, that is the fiscal morass we are into with the debt and the deficit.
One recommendation would be for a national conference on debt management involving the three levels of government.


Howard Douglas McCurdy: Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to have an opportunity to speak on the last supply day in debate on the government's estimates. Quite frankly this is the dying gasp of a tired government. For eight years or nearly nine the government has pursued a neo-conservative agenda which has been expressed in a variety of ways and has caused a great deal of harm to our country. It has created great doubts about the future of the nation, caused a great deal of unemployment and caused a great deal of misery. Increasingly there are indications of civil strife as expressed by the demonstration that took place on the Hill last Saturday.
There is a preoccupation, not an unreasonable preoccupation, with the deficit. However, one thing all of us here and across the nation ought to recognize is that the deficit is a specific result of an over-all thrust, an ideological thrust imposed upon this nation. It has been the borrowing of a neo-conservative perspective best represented by George Bush, Margaret Thatcher and the Prime Minister which says that government is best that does the least, most particularly that government is best that does the least for the vast majority of people in favour of allowing transnational corporations to go

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where they want, to invest where they want, to build factories where they want and to move jobs where they choose.
Not since the Depression have the corporations had such power and freedom as what is evolving now under the umbrella not only of the free trade agreement but also under the prospect of NAFTA which will make it worse. As one of my colleagues indicated earlier, the American domination of GATT makes it as much a contributor to the over-all international application of neo-conservatism that is causing so much harm and so much damage.
The deficit is just a part of the result of this over-all agenda. One of the things that is not clear is when this agenda began to be applied. In fact that agenda began to be applied in the 1970s when the Liberals rejected what many would have considered a sincere effort of tax reform advocated by Mr. MacEachen. It instead moved to change tax policy to provide a lesser burden on corporations. The result has been a much smaller proportion of tax revenues paid by corporations and a much larger proportion paid on the basis of personal income tax and other sources.
It also introduced changes in the tax system which benefited not just corporations but those who are wealthy and rich and who have a good deal more influence than ordinary Canadians. The result of this, quite frankly as was found by Statistics Canada, was a considerable budget shortfall. Deficits began to mount as expenditures began to mount in the face of the depression of the early 1980s.
It should be recognized that during the recession of the early 1980s there was another contributing factor. That was a high interest rate policy that began to contribute as significantly as a revenue shortfall.
The combination of this was the accumulation of a debt of approximately $200 billion as a result of Liberal policies favouring corporations and the rich at the expense of ordinary Canadians.
An inflation fighting increase in interest rates, a pattern which has continued to this day, is based on the notion that the appropriate way to fight inflation is to
generate unemployment by means of high interest rates. As we recall interest rates mounted to 22 per cent.
Then came the Conservative government that continued this pattern of favouritism toward the large corporations and the wealthy. Then we also had Mr. Crow, confronted with burgeoning unemployment and inflation as well, choosing once again that characteristic approach of trying to fight inflation on the backs of the unemployed.
There is one thing that has to be recognized and it was demonstrated by Statistics Canada in its study. From 1975 until now, the burgeoning debt and continuing deficits were a result specifically of favouritism toward those corporations and the wealthy. That went to the extent that 44 per cent of the present debt is attributable to the shortfall in revenue resulting from that favourable treatment for those best off in our society.
As well, it should be noted that 50 per cent of the accumulated debt is a result of interest rates on the debt. It was as a direct result of the high interest rate policy of the Liberals as well as that of the Conservatives. It was the high interest rate policy that raised the value of the dollar and cut back on exports. It was the high interest rate that generated, according to a WEFA study, some
400,000	unemployed all by itself.
We talk about the deficit which has become an excuse for this government not to undertake initiatives that would have created jobs and a new knowledge based economy that this country must achieve if it is to compete internationally. However, that is only part of the equation. The other part of the equation is the unemployment it generated. This is unemployment in addition to that generated by high interest rates alone. It has to be emphasized that unemployment was deliberately incurred by the Bank of Canada under Mr. Crow specifically to keep inflation under control at the expense of the most powerless in our society.
We then had the other part of the corporate agenda which is the free trade agreement. As a result of the free trade agreement, according to numerous studies, it generated something in the order of 350,000 unemployed by itself.
It must be clear that if we have unemployment and closed factories that-

June 2, 1993

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order in midstream here. It is somewhat distracting to have a member carrying on a conversation with one of the pages at his feet. Is it okay for me to proceed?
As a result of the free trade agreement, some 350,000 additional unemployed were generated as a direct result of a government that saw the free trade agreement as an appropriate initiative within the context of a neo-conservative agenda. However, the over-all result is obvious. If we have unemployment then we have people who are not paying taxes. If we have closed factories then we have businesses that are not paying taxes. Furthermore, if we have a situation of unemployment then government has to pay out a good deal in terms of social support systems of various sorts to those who have become unemployed and that is a burden.
In fact, for every unemployed individual, $17,000 in costs are incurred. If we look at the level of unemployment right now $27 billion is taken out of the coffers of the government.
What is clear is that we are confronted with a situation in which the government is attacking social programs and we have various Conservative candidates contesting with one another to see who can propose the sharpest cuts in medicare, in unemployment insurance and in our social programs which have benefited Canadians.
This neo-conservative agenda, which did not achieve so much success before the Depression, continues to repeat the mistakes of the Depression.
The last time corporations and international financiers had so much power was just before the Depression. That era was also the last period during which we did not have the kinds of social programs that we have now to support those who have suffered as a result of the excesses of international financiers and corporations who then, as now, have the freedom to go where they choose for the lowest wages, weakest social programs, poorest health and environmental standards are poorest and where the tax burden is the least for those corporations. It wants to complete the story.
The consequences are inevitable. We see it around the world. It is that this approach contains within it the seeds of its own destruction. If this continues-the transna-
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tional corporations being able to go where they want for the least cost, least burden and least responsibility-then who will buy their products? Who will protect them against the masses of unemployed, powerless, excluded and alienated?
The deficit on the one hand is a result of a policy of favouritism that ignores the responsibilities of nations. It is supported by trade arrangements that seem to say that governments have no responsibility and that corporations will not address their responsibilities. The deficit fundamentally is a problem of revenues and it is a problem of unemployment. It is a problem of an arrangement that makes it impossible for the government, that ought to serve people, to act in ways which will serve people.
If there is to be an answer to it then it is not to be found in a continuation of the policies of this government and it cannot be found in the policies proposed by the Liberals. The Liberals are part of the problem. It was the Liberals who began the deficit and the neo-conservative agenda continued by this government.
There must be a change and that change is to be found in a renewal of the social democratic approach which recognizes that if we are going to have prosperity then it has to be on the basis in this new global economic world of empowering people. It has to be based on investment in our nation. It has to be based on the kinds of measures that the New Democratic Party has specifically proposed in order to put people back to work.
Here is what we will find if all of our program is implemented. The deficit will cease to be a problem for exactly the reasons that we outlined earlier. People will go back to work. Revenues will be once again generated. The cost to government of unemployment will be eliminated. To speak of that, it has to involve an abrogation of the free trade agreement. It has to involve a setting aside of NAFTA. It must involve changes in monetary policy. It must involve a decrease in interest rates because each decrease in interest rates generates jobs and at the same time it also cuts back on the deficit.
Today, according to the government's own papers, the deficit contributes directly to the level of interest rates. The deficit is the cost of paying the interest rates on the debt.

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The Liberals would not abrogate the free trade agreement. God knows what they would do with NAFTA. We would abrogate and we would introduce initiatives to create jobs.
The result is that the deficit over the period of a New Democratic government will be all but eliminated. The deficit will be eliminated and then we can begin to work on the cutting back of the debt.
What does this program involve? First of all it involves an infrastructure program that will prepare our nation with the grounds and the means of transportation, the electronic highway, and the scientific and educational infrastructure that we need. It will create 130,000 jobs immediately and prepare the way for subsequent economic development.
We propose a national investment fund which would encourage small and medium sized businesses, new businesses, to get off the ground. We project that would create 200,000 new jobs.
We propose a national child care program. It is part of our initiative from day care to doctorates to provide training and education for Canadian workers. That would create 70,000 jobs.
We would establish a national council on education to make our educational programs throughout the nation more in accord with our economic goals and to ensure equity and real accomplishment by students in the work place. In order to fund training in industry we would have a grant levy system to pay for it.
We would increase research and development, double IRAP funding, increase funding for the granting councils and find better methods than are presently used now to encourage industry to do research and development in house.
We would undertake initiatives to ensure that our natural resources are processed here to produce jobs in Canada rather than elsewhere.
By doing this the problem of the deficit would be addressed in the only way it can be addressed. That is by putting people back to work. We would create a country in which the government once more has the capacity and will to ensure that we have a sense of community in which we understand as Canadians that government is the means by which we express our responsibility to another. We propose to give people not a hand out but a hand up. That is how the deficit would be addressed, not
on the backs of the unemployed but by creating employment.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: Mr. Speaker, I want to congratulate the hon. member on an excellent speech and the fact that he actually dealt with the deficit in a way in which the country could live with. It is a way of putting people back to work in order to tackle that deficit. He has dealt with both problems, unemployment and the deficit, in a passionate way as he usually does.
I want to make a couple of comments and I want to ask him a question. The member who spoke previously quoted an article in the paper today about a Mr. Dodge, who is now a deputy minister of finance. Mr. Dodge goes on in the letter to say that the taxpayers are on the edge of a revolt and they do not want to be taxed any more. He wrote that even though Mr. Dodge made a lot of the taxes they are going to revolt against.
He goes on to talk about the Bank of Canada. He says that despite the pessimistic predictions, the Canadian economy in 1988 grew very strongly. The bank kept the screws on. The bank kept its monetary policy and high interest rates and kept going. He said that even for 1989. Then he says: "The banks squeezed harder but the reaction in the form of slowing in the wages and prices really did not show up until 1991". He was talking about southern Ontario.
Then he says, and this is the understatement of the decade: "We did make some mistakes, all of us, and that caused the adjustments problem". The adjustments problem meaning 12 per cent unemployment, 20 per cent or 25 per cent unemployment among young people, poverty, hardship, a growing deficit, Canada being rolled toward the position of a Third World country and recession in the country. It is an adjustment problem.
This is the kind of thing we face in dealing with the banks.
The second point I want to make, and the hon. member for Windsor said this, is that the Liberals were part of the problem. I was here in the early eighties when the Liberals had a National Energy Program. In committee I learned they gave out $13 billion, in 1970s money, in the form of PIP grants, petroleum incentive grants, on the Canada lands and in Alberta. For $13 billion in grants to oil companies they only took one tanker out of the north. It seems to me the origin of our national debt was the Liberal regime of the period. That was where it started getting out of hand.
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Today the government's expenditures and revenues are about equal. The shortfall is in debt payments. The member talked about high interest rates. Normal Canadians say that they are going down, that they are about 5 or 6 per cent on their mortgage so that is great.
What does the hon. member mean when he says that interest rates are still too high and that one of the problems caused by this government right now with regard to the debt is in the monetary policy? Could he comment on that?


Howard Douglas McCurdy: Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for the question.
Yes, we are talking about real interest rates. That is the difference between the cost of borrowing and the increase in the CPI.
The fact is that right now and for this past decade for the first time our interest rates have been as high as they were during the Depression. That is very interesting. Only in the last Great Depression, and I mean the thirties, were real interest rates as high as they are now.
Not since the thirties has there been such unencumbered freedom for transnationals and financiers to advantage themselves. There are so many parallels between now and then that it ought to cause us all to wonder. Did we not learn from the Depression that we cannot have a world in which the selfish greed of corporations can be pursued without limits, controls or regulations because inevitably that will be at the expense of the vast majority of people. That cannot go on.
Right across this world, across this land and across Europe we are seeing the results of it as unemployment mounts. All other statistics indicate economic growth, whether it be GDP, inventories or any of those things that this government cites, but the fact of the matter is that unemployment continues to mount.
Germany, a nation that has had an unemployment rate of 4 per cent or less for many years, today has an unemployment rate of 12 per cent. That is the inevitable result of a system in which corporations are free of any obligations to any nation. A policy such as that which has generated the deficit, which favours corporations as the Liberals did to an extreme and as the Conservatives are doing now to an equal extreme, is a policy that means
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devastation for too many, as we see now, and that must change.


Mr. Joe Comuzzi (Thunder Bay-Nipigon):: Mr. Speaker, I want to compliment the hon. member from Windsor on the speech he just gave. During his work career I know that he was a teacher at the university I attended. I thought he would have taken some of the economic courses for which the University of Windsor is noted.
I was interested in his remarks with respect to how he anticipates he could bring the budget we are discussing here today under a zero deficit and start paying off the debt.
It appears to me that on the one hand what he is saying should be applied, but to the Government of Ontario. On the other hand, perhaps what we should be doing is consolidating his thinking in respect to the creation of jobs and the reduction of the deficit with respect to what this government across is doing for the whole of Canada and what he is proposing should be done by this government.
Given the realities of governments, which Premier Rae is beginning to realize today, how does the member propose putting those philosophical issues that he propounded here today in this House and apply them to the province of Ontario? The province of Ontario is the economic generator for Canada and if we could get Ontario going again then certainly we could get Canada going again.


Howard Douglas McCurdy: Mr. Speaker, as the hon. member indicates, I did once teach him but I failed. I took all of those economic courses at the University of Windsor and I guess he failed there too.
Ontario is a classic example of the subtlety with which the neo-conservative agenda has succeeded. I am not talking about the cuts in transfer payments to the provinces. I am not talking about the increased burden of social assistance payments that have been imposed upon the provinces. I am not talking about the inequity of this federal government in its treatment of Quebec versus

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Ontario with respect to the payment for the cost of immigration and refugees. I am talking about a situation in which high interest rates and a burgeoning debt, which have resulted partly from that and are partly due to the fact that the Liberals had a secret debt that they left behind when Premier Rae came to office.
Its freedom is considerably limited if there is not some kind of co-ordination of monetary policy and fiscal policy between the federal and provincial governments. The province does not control monetary policy. It does not control the high interest policy. All of the provinces are burdened with that.
One thing that is important to understand is that the degree of freedom of any province, and especially Ontario, is significantly affected by the free trade agreement. It is well known that Ontario lost nearly
300,000	industrial jobs from the free trade agreement alone, certainly a significant portion of them, and 397 plants went down south.


Bernard Valcourt: Mr. Speaker, it is an honour for me to participate in the debate on the main estimates for
1993-94. This budget shows this government's commitment to control spending and to implement measures that will lead to major gains in efficiency. Of course, we must continue to strive to deliver as efficiently as possible the services that Canadians want. We are now in a period requiring changes, and I submit to you that Canadians are ready to support the government in its efforts to make this transition successfully.
You will find in these main estimates many savings that should make it possible to achieve the measures announced in the budget of February 1992 and the December economic and fiscal statement. In making these savings, the government has made significant progress in disposing of activities, agencies and organizations that no longer meet an essential public need. This practice is compatible with our philosophy of maintaining a fair balance between the demands for federal services from Canadian citizens and our ability as a country to pay for these services through the tax revenue which we collect.
We have recorded numerous achievements in the area of expenditure management over the past eight years. Allow me to provide you with a few examples.
Program spending has been held at 16.7 per cent of Canada's gross domestic product for the past two years compared to 20 per cent in 1984. During the same period the growth in programs spending, including Public Service salaries, has averaged only 3.7 per cent per year as compared to an average inflation rate of 4 per cent per year. This translates into a net real decline of 2.6 per cent.
In the 1991 budget a commitment was made to introduce legislation that would limit programs spending for the next five years. The Spending Control Act has been approved by this House and the spending plans outlined in these main estimates are well within the limits set out in that piece of legislation. In fact the Minister of Finance has announced that the limits under the act will be further reduced to bring them in line with the reductions set out in our recent budget.
These examples clearly demonstrate the government's commitment to restraint and improved efficiency. Careful stewardship of taxpayers' dollars is being and will continue to be exercised through the rigorous control of expenditures as well as the implementation of innovative management practices.
Since taking office in 1984 our record in that regard has been one of success. In keeping with this tradition these estimates for 1993-94 will live up to the high expectations that Canadians have set for this government.
This year the main estimates total $161.4 billion and through these estimates the government is seeking Parliament's approval for $48.9 billion in new spending authority, of which some $13.9 billion of interim supply was granted earlier through Appropriation Act No. 1 of 1993-94. The remaining $112.2 billion represents statutory payments that have been granted previous parliamentary approval.
The growth in the main estimates of 0.4 per cent is the outcome of a number of decisions and factors affecting
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the budgets of all 137 programs by 111 departments, agencies and Crown corporations appearing in the estimates. This growth can be divided into two broad categories: adjustment to statutory items, which amount to a net increase of $423 million or 74 per cent of the year over year growth, and changes to voted items which amount to $140 million or 26 per cent of the year over year growth.
Canadians have indicated that they want governments to be more frugal in their spending, make smart investments that will provide a multiple pay-back, avoid expensive future costs and improve efficiency so Canadians receive more value for their tax dollar.
To this end the government continues to carefully scrutinize resource requests by federal government agencies. We must meet the challenges of restraint and serving Canadians in the best way possible to ensure that spending takes place only where Canadians need or want to receive services.
The Minister of Finance in his latest budget announced a series of initiatives that will bring about significant reductions in expenditures and contribute to lasting efficiencies in government programs and services. A total of $30 billion was announced in spending cuts and other measures. The cost of government will be reduced in 1993-94 as a result of the cuts in operating budgets by $12 billion annually by 1997-98. Program expenditures will be restrained in many areas, including defence spending and operating subsidies.
The reduction in grants and contributions for 1993-94 as announced in the December economic statement will be maintained with further and deeper reductions coming in future years. Expenditures on social housing will not be increasing in future years but will remain at the current level of approximately $2 billion a year. Funding directed toward shelters for victims of violence, housing on Indian reserves and persons with disabilities will continue as planned. Ongoing expenditure restraint has left government departments with approximately 30 per cent less purchasing power than was available to them in 1985.
Given that the cuts outlined by the Minister of Finance will continue through 1997 and 1998, tough decisions will be necessary regarding the future of programs that we Canadians may no longer be able to afford. In addition to the expenditure reductions an-
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nounced in the budgets, the restructuring of government is an imperative toward achieving increased government efficiency. Since 1984 we have been pro-active in this area. Twenty Crown corporations have been sold or dissolved and 40 more government organizations have been wound up, merged or consolidated. Considerable savings are possible through a continued emphasis on government restructuring and streamlining.
Cost recovery and user fees have been actively promoted by this government for the collection of revenue for services that benefit a small portion of the population. This system removes the obligation from taxpayers to involuntarily pay for a service which they do not use. With the implementation of user fees the government will maintain services that might otherwise be eliminated. Simply put, those who benefit the most from the service should contribute the most. The end result of cost recovery and user fees has been the fostering of a more service-oriented, market-based approach to conducting government business.

In the past eight years these user fees contributed greatly to helping the government maintain service delivery. Since 1985 the funds collected annually through this payment system have doubled and are now well over $3 billion.
With the current spending cuts, public service managers and organizations have to deal with stable, or in many cases increasing, demand at the same time as available resources continually decline. Managers have had to try to achieve this balance creatively, sensitively and constructively. To deliver programs in this new environment our managers have had to be more innovative and examine their workplace in order to be more efficient.
I think this has resulted in increased team-work and co-operation within the Public Service, as our employees understand their essential role in Canada's competitiveness on world markets. Dedicated and competent federal employees throughout the country and in missions abroad serve Canadians in such fields as health and safety, consumer protection, regional industrial assistance, aid to native people, scientific and technological assistance, foreign aid, representing and protecting our interests abroad, protecting people and property, protecting taxpayers through the fair and efficient administration of the Income Tax Act and customs and excise

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legislation and of course in the whole delivery of social programs.
As an employer, the government wishes to recognize this important contribution public servants have made by considering and implementing many new ideas to better meet Canadians' needs and in that way with that quality of service to bring the government closer to the people.
The government continues to give priority to the adoption of innovative management practices. Since it took power it has implemented a wide range of measures to improve operations management. Many recent initiatives flow from Public Service 2000, the major renewal exercise announced by the Prime Minister in 1989.
In the past year tremendous progress has been made under PS 2000. Legislation to reform the Public Service was passed by Parliament and the system of operating budgets now applies to all government departments and organizations.

As of January 1993,12 special operating agencies have been formally established with two more expected to receive approval shortly. These agencies, while operating within the structure of the Public Service, have been granted special flexibilities in order to manage themselves in a similar fashion to private sector businesses.
The rationale for establishing these agencies is to improve the quality of service to Canadians through the ability to respond quickly to changes in client needs. The Canadian public's expectations of its governments are changing. There is an increasing demand for simpler, quicker and more sophisticated access to government services and information. The government will continue to ensure that Canadians receive a high quality of service while at the same time operating within the resources available.
To do this we will continue to rely on the commitment displayed by Public Service employees in serving their clients. We are also committed to removing obstacles encountered by Canadians in dealing with the government. Our clients should find government services easier to use and more accessible. These goals will primarily be
achieved through the restructuring of government operations and continued training of our employees. With this in mind several government initiatives are currently under way.
Standards of services are being developed across government departments through client consultations: a single window concept of delivering government services. This initiative would see several government departments working together to provide a broad range of services at a single point of service delivery.
Canadian business service centres are currently being tested in Edmonton, Winnipeg and Halifax. These centres are designed to provide the business community with quick, accurate information on government services, programs and information at a single point of service. In total, 18 federal departments and agencies are participating in this initiative.
Hours of service are being examined with the aim of becoming more client-oriented and flexible to meet changing client needs. A single business registration number is being tested this year. This number would in some instances replace up to two dozen different numbers currently used across government departments. Departments are also reviewing the forms with the twin goals of eliminating unnecessary paperwork and adopting a more user friendly design. Electronic procurement is becoming widely used within government operations and investment in new technology and employee training will continue to ensure an efficient and effective Public Service for the future.
The message of this government is clear. We are serious about restraint and to this end we have acted on the wish of taxpayers for greater reductions in government spending.
The continuation of government reform is necessary. We must implement new approaches to organizing government operations in order to deliver the services most desired by Canadians. The measures that were announced in the recent budget and in the December economic statement clearly indicate our commitment to sound fiscal management and to reducing the demands on the Canadian taxpayer.
June 2, 1993


Joseph R. (Joe) Comuzzi: Mr. Speaker, I want to ask the minister some questions with respect to the department for which he is responsible.
His department as we know is twofold, immigration and employment. He and I have talked many times about our thoughts on immigration. We have asked many questions in this House about the immigration problems this country is facing and the horrendous costs that some of those decisions his government has made are adding to this terrible deficit that we are all trying to come to grips with.
I want to concentrate my questions to the minister today on the area that involves employment. As he was making his remarks just a few moments ago on the amounts of money he is requesting to administer his department, the thought just occurred to me that if we could get our economy in some kind of shape, we could create the jobs necessary because it is on his department of employment that the whole country rises and falls. Sometimes he has no control over the amount of expenditure because of the situation and the tragic condition of our economy.
I would think if his government could create these necessary jobs, which I give credit to him for trying to do even though it is simply not working, that the deficit of our country then would come under some kind of control. The very amounts that he is talking about in the expenditure for unemployment is the very amount that this country is in deficit on a national basis.
The creation of employment is really twofold. First we have to look after those people who are entering the work force on an annual basis, the students and those who are coming into the work force for the first time. Unfortunately during this economic period we also have to take care of those people who find that they no longer have a marketable skill and therefore find it necessary to be retrained.
It is in that first instance that I ask the minister why we have not used the technology available to us in Canada in order to enhance that position where we can handle those who are coming into the job market for the first time but more particularly those who need retraining. That involves the unskilled, the issue of upgrading and the issue of the retraining program itself.
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The minister and I both know how costly this is to his department this year. I am appalled that we have not used the technology that is available to us in order to enhance that program.
This past weekend I visited friends in one of the northern United States which has the same problems as we have. They have developed, using the technology available to them, a communication network. It has 67 university campuses, college campuses and high school campuses within the state, which is a little smaller than Ontario. It has connected those electronically. It will be providing to those citizens who need upgrading of skills the ability to receive that knowledge in their homes. It will be providing a training program for those who want to enhance their present skills because we know that it is always cheaper to keep a job than creating a new one.
The third item it is going to be progressing with is the ability to take those people whose jobs are now redundant and retrain them for the jobs of the future. Using the technology that we have available in the marketplace we can offer those services at a much lower cost than we are presently paying.
I ask the minister if his department has considered this or if he would like to meet with me afterward to pursue the use of this technology to upgrade and retrain our work force.


Bernard Valcourt: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member points to what is a very important and crucial part of the challenge that all Canadians are facing. This has to do with the necessity of having a framework in this country that allows youth and workers who are displaced by technological change to be able to retrain and acquire the skills and the knowledge they need to be active participants in this economy.
The hon. member will recall that this government, with the changes that we made to the Unemployment Insurance Act, has activated some of these passive funds that were used to give income support and to try to activate them to help unemployed Canadians.
I would point out to the hon. member the fact that in this fiscal year we will be spending $2.4 billion under the UI developmental use portion of that training program which is a 400 per cent increase from two years ago.

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Furthermore, out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund we will be spending $1.6 billion on some of those training programs. The challenge, which is one we collectively share as Canadians, is divided among all levels of government. We all know that education and training is a provincial matter in the sense that they are responsible for those institutions.
Through our spending power, yes, we tiy to help and be helpful and actually at the federal level we spend nationally 73 per cent of all moneys that governments spend for training. It is spent by this department.
The learning component of the prosperity initiative and this private sector group led by Mr. McCamus and Mrs. Marie-Josee Drouin consulted with over 6,000 Canadians in 186 communities, with every business group and union in Canada that were interested in participating and they came up with this plan. One of their recommendations was the electronic highway.
What the hon. member saw in that northern state of the United States of America is exactly what we will be able to do with that infrastructure project which my colleague, the Minister for International Trade and Science and Technology, announced following the December economic statement. That electronic highway will allow us and our partners in the private sector and the provinces to be able to disseminate a lot more skills and knowledge to those displaced workers and to those Canadians who want to acquire the skills and knowledge that will allow them to become active in the labour market.
I think it is a valid point that the hon. member has raised. It is one that we have acted upon and it is one that I will encourage many, many more Canadians to look into. Gone are the days where one level of government some place could fix it. This is a matter for all of us at all levels, and we as Canadians individually-parents, children, educators, leaders in communities-must work together in trying to give us the kind of work force that can succeed in this global economy. These are not buzz words, this is the reality. We must be prepared to do that, and that is what the prosperity action plan calls for, partnerships, which we are encouraging.
I will close on this note. When we look back to December's economic statement and the most recent budget where we announced cuts of $30 billion over five
years, one department, mine, employment and immigration was not cut in terms of its training budget. Quite to the contrary, in December we increased spending in order to meet that exact challenge that the hon. member has referred to.


Mr. Jean-Robert Gauthier (Ottawa-Vanier):: Mr. Speaker, I would have liked to put a question to the minister or comment on his speech, but in any case, I appreciate his supportive comments. He said, in referring to the speech by the hon. member for Acadie-Bathurst, that it was an excellent idea to have the Auditor General of Canada table specific reports in the House, from time to time, so that members would be more aware of the general state of government operations. I agree this is a very good idea. In fact, I introduced a bill in the House about a year and a half ago, which suggests just that.
Now that I have the minister's support, I will try and persuade more ministers to back my proposal. Maybe some day they will do it. I think it would let the Auditor General of Canada do what he is supposed to do, in other words, report from time to time to the House of Commons, as an officer of the House, giving his views on certain developments in the economics of government operations.
Mr. Speaker, we have before us Bill C-134, if I am not mistaken, which proposes to approve some $161 billion in spending by the government for the coming fiscal year.
On February 25 this year, the Conservative government tabled the Main Estimates, indicating the spending plan for 83 departments and agencies for the 1993-94 fiscal year. This spending plan, based on the economic and fiscal statement made by the Minister of Finance on December 2, will require, as I said earlier, about $161 billion plus, with the Supplementary Estimates tabled on May 25, another $414 million, so that the government's total expenditures for the current year add up to $162 billion, or at least that is what we are being asked to approve today.
Mr. Speaker, prior to concurrence in the House, the Estimates are examined in committee. Spending plans are usually examined by parliamentary committees, and at this important stage, all members, irrespective of their party affiliation, can hold the government accountable to
June 2, 1993

Canadians for the very substantial amounts of money that it wishes to spend.
However, there is, in this case, a big difference between theory and practice. In fact, because of its majority, the government controls the election of the committee chairmen, who are responsible for scheduling meetings to consider the Estimates.
I must say I am extremely concerned and disappointed when I see how some committee chairmen show so little interest in considering the Estimates for their departments. I have some statistics which I could table or send to anyone who is interested in the attendance of committee members or the interest of committees in reviewing expenditures. In fact, the Public Accounts Committee, which I have the pleasure to chair, is the only committee chaired by a member of the opposition. All other committees are usually chaired by a government member.
Now if we look at the statistics for these committees, they are really not impressive. We are talking about major departments like Indian Affairs, Agriculture Canada, Finance, Forestry and Fisheries, National Health and Welfare, Social Affairs, Senior Citizens, Status of Women, and I could go on with the Department of Transport and Official Languages. These parliamentary committees have shown very little interest in the main estimates for their departments or agencies in the years 1991-92 and 1992-93.
As for the 1993-94 main estimates we are being asked to approve today, the record is not particularly impressive. The Standing Committee on Finance, for instance, an important committee of the House which is responsible for examining the votes of the Department of Finance and the Department of National Revenue, representing a total of several billion dollars, did not bother to examine the votes at all. This is indeed a sad commentary.
The Energy, Mines and Resources Committee and the Transport Committee, both very important, did not meet once to examine the estimates. I think this is a major flaw in our parliamentary system that affects the government's accountability to the House of the Commons. I am sorry to say this, but it is irresponsible of members to
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criticize the government if they fail to provide for thorough scrutiny of the government's estimates, of its spending plans.
Today, only the Conservative members of this House are suicidal enough, if I may use the term, to vote in favour of a motion like the one we have before us today, a request for $161 billion, without prior review of the impact of government spending plans. This is like giving the government a blank cheque. I am not prepared to do that, Mr. Speaker, even if I am in the opposition. I am not prepared to give the executive, the Conservative government in power today, a blank cheque for $161 billion without thorough scrutiny and without ensuring that both transparency and accountability have been part of the process.
I believe I have every reason to say this. When considering the Public Accounts for the fiscal year that has just ended, I saw that the tax provisions for foreign corporations cost Canada hundreds of millions of dollars in foregone revenue. No taxes were paid, even when companies made sizable profits. They did not pay taxes because of loopholes in our tax legislation. What they are doing is not illegal, not against the letter of law, but it is certainly against the intent of the law, as I see it.
According to the Public Accounts, the cost of implementing the GST, which was prohibitive, totalled $1.7 billion, including $808 million in start-up costs and $900 million for transitional credits. The Prosperity Secretariat awarded 22 contracts for a total value of $3.3 million without public tenders. This is very disturbing, but no one queried this. Sixty-five million dollars in pension payments went to recipients who were not entitled to these payments. Extra amounts granted in 1989-90 for the Canada Student Loans Program may cost us $39 million. Canadians do not realize this, but Canadian students owe the Canadian government $1,088 billion. It bothers me that we are being asked to approve a major bill involving $161 billion and that the members of this House did not take the time, in my opinion, to examine this information carefully. Actually, the government is asking us to hold our noses and vote for the bill. I am not prepared to do that. In fact, the government wants to be absolved of its sins without benefit of confession. In the circumstances, I am certainly not prepared to support this bill.

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If we examine the reasons for the government's mismanagement, we realize that the Conservative government has not been consistent. After the Throne Speech, the budget is the first document that gives a general view of the government's policies. It reflects the government's financial position. Its impact on programs and program management and the consequences for the deficit and the debt are obvious.
The budget generally includes a collection of miscellaneous statistical information and economic forecasts, and during the past nine years we have been treated to some examples of Conservative rhetoric. This information is supposed to explain to Canadians, in simple terms that are easy to understand, how the government's regulatory decisions, including the monetary policy of the Bank of Canada-and Heaven knows its high interest policy has done a lot of harm-as I was saying, how all this helps to meet the objectives set by a good government that makes decisions with the requisite transparency, in the general public interest.
During the past few years, the Auditor General has elaborated on this subject in his reports, and especially in his 1991 Annual Report, in which he suggested how the government could communicate to the public, in a way that is both informative and effective, the results of its monetary and fiscal policies.
He recommended a "scorecard". In fact, the Auditor General suggested that the government prepare and publish, as part of an annual financial report, a "scorecard" that would show Canadians the results of its deficit reduction plan. These scorecards would compare actual results with budget forecasts. It is too bad the government never introduced this scorecard so that Canadians would have a better understanding of the objectives and the problems involved.
The hon. member for Acadie-Bathurst explained the situation very well, and I think some members would do well to read his speech. If the government had implemented this recommendation by the Auditor General of Canada, it could have avoided the catastrophic discrepancies in recent projections on the deficit. The government has lost a great deal of credibility because it is incapable of producing accurate forecasts.
For instance, in February 1991, the government predicted that the annual deficit for 1991-92 would be $30.5 billion. A year later, 11 months after the beginning of the 1991-92 fiscal year, the government announced that the annual deficit would be $31.4 billion. However, when the financial statements were published last fall, the real deficit was up to $34.6 billion, a difference of more than 13 per cent between what was projected and the actual figure, a difference of more than $14 billion in the projections of the Department of Finance. With all their experts and very sophisticated economic models, they were unable to predict the size of the deficit. They have all the necessary equipment, all the experts, but they cannot give us the proper figures.
In the private sector, someone that incompetent would be dismissed immediately. For eight years now we have been putting up with this government that cannot manage this national debt properly. I recognize the size and magnitude of the debt; I admit that compound interest is a problem. I know that a debt starts off easy, but as it grows, interest on the interest adds to the problem and costs dearly. That is the problem. However, the government has not explained the size of the problem to Canadians. Pressed to justify its predictions that were far off the mark, the Conservative government was never able to provide proper explanations that would have improved its future projections and helped it avoid making the same mistakes all over again.
To reduce the deficit, the Conservatives favoured budget cuts, without first setting priorities. The government did not understand that the deficit, employment, economic growth, inflation, taxation and good management are all inter-related and that co-ordinated, balanced policies are required to get the country out of the mess we are in.
Since the government has such a bad record in predicting the budgetary impact of its poor decisions, who can believe that this government is telling the truth when it tells us that the deficit in 1997-98 will be $8 billion, according to the latest budget? I think that projection is questionable. Besides, who would believe the Conservative leadership candidates who are now promising to wipe out the deficit in four or five years, depending on which one you listen to, without bringing
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June 2, 1993

in new taxes or raising taxes? They should explain what they mean. Many experts tell us that it makes no sense.
Obviously the government has lost control of the debt when the deficit estimates are so far off. Debt management is disastrous now. There has not even been an assessment of debt and debt management; it is important that such an assessment be undertaken. In the Standing Committee on Public Accounts recently we were told that the Department of Finance was starting to think that it would be good to review the debt program. It is high time that this be done.
Over the years the government has borrowed over $70 billion from the federal employees' pension fund without knowing the impact of such a decision on future budgets. By applying this policy blindly, the government does not know if this borrowing is cost-effective or if this policy costs hundreds of millions of dollars. No one has evaluated the impact of this borrowing. Mr. Speaker, $70 billion is a lot of money.
With questionable financial management, the Conservative government is mortgaging the future of several generations of Canadians. In the Ottawa region alone, in my region here, 62,311 people were collecting unemployment insurance or welfare in April 1993, up 4,400 or 7.6 per cent from last year. This is 11.6 per cent of the labour force in the National Capital Region. With the present government, there are 1,581,000 unemployed people and
2,723,000	on welfare; 12,333,000 Canadians are working but they can hardly have confidence in the future when the news is not good, the debt is too high and the government is run so badly.
With a tax rate bordering on 40 per cent, the citizens of Ottawa-Vanier, my riding, like all other Canadians, are fed up with being milked by the government. They want actual figures, reasons, simple, clear and specific information. They want to know how their money is managed. They want the government to account for how it collects and spends their dollars. That is clear. In fact, they want an honest government. The legacy which this government is preparing to leave is too far from these objectives to be what Canadians could consider to be good financial management.
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The Conservative record of fiscal mismanagement will go down in history as a great failure. Nine years after the Tories took over the budgetary reins, the national debt has soared to more than $450 billion. During their tenure the Tories have added at least $260 billion to the bill that we and our children must pay. Time and time again the Tories have missed their mark on debt management.
The question to be put: how can we afford this government? I think Canadians will demonstrate soon, this year, that this exorbitant government must be put out to pasture. The failure of the Tories to manage the debt has made many Canadians extremely cynical about their federal government.
More than one-quarter, 26 per cent of government spending, now goes to service the debt. That is up from
20.5	per cent in 1984. The size of our debt has led to a lot of talk in recent months about the debt crisis. It is important to put this in context.
While we must reduce the debt we are carrying as a nation to lessen the burden on taxpayers and the constraints on government, we need not fear that the sky will fall down tomorrow. There are other ways.
As long as we can demonstrate ably to investors that our country is worth investing in, Canada will not be shunned by its lenders. Confidence in our future goes a long way to encourage and reassure investors. However we must show these investors as well as Canadians that both provincial and federal governments are taking the necessary steps to control spending and that deficits must be reduced.
The Tories have neglected accountability which explains much of the current cynicism Canadians feel about their political system.
Today we are more vulnerable to the whims of international investors because the percentage of the federal debt owed to foreigners has grown from 11 per cent in 1984 to 23 per cent today. Again we must be assured-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: Order, please. The hon. member's time has expired.

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Mr. Nic Leblanc (Longueuil):: Mr. Speaker, I listened carefully to the speech made by the hon. member from Vanier. In my opinion this was a veiy interesting speech. The hon. member described rather accurately the behaviour of the Conservatives, that is the government, regarding the debt. Of course that debt started to grow under a Liberal government of which my colleague was a member. In fact it can be said that this debt started to grow about 20 years ago.
Nevertheless, the hon. member made a pretty accurate description of the problem but he forgot in my opinion, to elaborate a bit on the actions necessary to reduce that debt. We the members of the Bloc Quebe-cois believe that the main reason for this debt is bad management, primarily the result of overlapping jurisdictions of the provinces and the federal government. That aspect was overlooked by the hon. member for Ottawa-Vanier.
In fact, the experts of the Belanger-Campeau commission concluded, and these findings were supported by other experts from France and Great Britain, that this overlapping between Quebec and Ottawa alone amounts to some $2.5 to $3 billion a year in unnecessary administration costs. Moreover, we do not see all the consequences and losses of this mismanagement, which has a negative impact on government revenue, and I am only referring to overlapping between Quebec and Ottawa.
However if you look at all the other provinces this overlapping may represent $10 to $12 billion in operating costs, not to mention of course the losses due to this inefficient system. Again, the hon. member for Ottawa- Vanier did not mention this aspect.
I would appreciate his opinion on this. It is all right to describe what is going on but solutions must also be suggested. The solution that we, Bloc Quebecois members propose is a decentralization of powers. Quebec must absolutely manage its affairs according to its own priorities. This way, we will help this country, whose debt, as we just learned, is considered by the United Nations experts to be equal to that of developing countries.
I am asking the hon. member for Ottawa-Vanier to at least suggest some solutions, since he was a member of that Liberal government for a while.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: Mr. Speaker, solutions do exist. The problem of duplication between levels of government is a major one and we must resolve it. I think that the hon. member for Acadie-Bathurst has come up with a novel idea today that we should consider seriously. He has suggested that the three orders of government-federal, provincial and municipal-work together to reduce this national debt which could be as high as $575 billion altogether.
He has suggested that, since all of them have stewardship obligations-this may not be the best word to describe the idea I want to convey; anyway, governments have to account for the money collected from the taxpayers and the expenses made on their behalf-some kind of balance should be reached. To shift responsibilities as we have been doing for the past few years from the top, federal level to the provinces, which in turn shift the load onto the municipalities, is no solution because there are some very important players or participants involved. There are cities like Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver and other major cities that have a larger population and economy than some provinces but are not involved in setting the monetary or economic policies of this country.
We Liberals have proposed a trilateral conference, so to speak, to bring together the main stakeholders at the federal, provincial and municipal levels so that, together, we can find a solution. It is a matter of stewardship. It is a matter of collective will to solve our problem without passing on to the next level of government, down the line, so to speak, social and financial costs it cannot afford.


Mr. Fred J. Mifflin (Bonavista-Trinity-Conception):: Mr. Speaker, first I want to compliment my hon. and learned friend from Vanier who indeed has an established reputation in this House for accountability of government, both in government and in opposition. I believe that in municipal politics and as a school trustee he also established that reputation for accountability. I very much appreciate and respect the points he has made.
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I was going to ask him to elaborate on some other measures he might have. I know that time is short, but I just want to make one comment before that.
I learned here this evening and had it confirmed that the training budget in Canada right now through UIC and the Minister of Employment and Immigration is $3.8 billion. I look at how that money is spent versus the job development programs which have meant a great deal for my riding.
I see the member for Burlington who will remember the difficulty we went through when those job development programs were removed. That initiative had given the opportunity for those people who did not have work to get involved in programs. It was a major initiative for communities. It has now been taken away and has given way to $3.8 billion in training programs. I think one has to look at the effectiveness of that. It bears very close watching.
Perhaps in the time remaining my hon. colleague from Vanier could give us indications of some of the other areas of accountability for the over-all management of the public debt he may have in mind.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: Mr. Speaker, I am interested in the question because tomorrow morning in the Standing Committee on Public Accounts we are looking at chapter 9 of the Auditor General's report. It deals exactly with the effectiveness of these employment and immigration programs. If he wants to come and participate in this great experience with the department and its experts, I would be more than pleased to receive him.
The question is one of accountability. Maybe it is a buzz-word, but it is a very important word for Canadians today. Accountability as far as I am concerned is the obligation to explain how one has used one's responsibility. That is what accountability is: responsibilities and the way you use them. Accountability is only meaningful when used in tandem with authority and responsibility. [DOT]
I know it may be heavy stuff for some people. However if we do not understand that governments must be accountable to us for the way they spend and intend to spend our money, then there is absolutely no way that any government can operate or that any country can work.
I am saying that we have not had accountability as a direct reaction of this government to the people of Canada. I plead with governments in the future. I know our Liberal government when we do form the government will be fully accountable to Canadians on all aspects of public finances.


Mrs. Dorothy Dobbie (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs and Minister of State (Indian Affairs and Northern Development)):: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to engage in this debate. This is a topic that is a grave one to all Canadians. It should be of tremendous interest to all the members in this House.
I want to begin by dealing with a couple of issues. I would like to point out that the main estimates this year show that federal spending will rise only marginally by
1.5	per cent. This is lower than the growth rate, the cost of living and so on. This is the lowest growth rate in decades. It underlines our firm commitment to cutting waste and to improving efficiency in providing full value for every tax dollar spent.
At the same time the move to contain spending creates a real management challenge for us. It is difficult to make these kinds of changes, for example how can government deliver services effectively to Canadians with tight resources. It means we have to change the way we do things and take different approaches.
One of the ways in which we are responding to this challenge is through the Public Service managers. They must be as committed and resourceful as they can possibly be and need the tools to be flexible and innovative in the work place. I believe they are that resourceful and that committed and that they do have the tools, particularly since the spending estimates, they will have the guidelines and the leadership to show them the direction we want to take.
Let me first sketch very briefly the reasons that we need management ingenuity to ensure that Canadians continue to be as well served as they have in the past, but even more critically, to ensure that we are well served in the future as we go through these very difficult times.
The April budget extended and deepened the spending reductions that flowed from last December's economic statement. Together these measures will give us

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about $7.5 billion in savings over the next five years in government operations.
A key element of this spending restraint package is the freeze on employees' salaries for the next two years. Currently salaries account for about 55 per cent of the operating costs of the federal government.
The total employment in the Public Service is expected to drop by 16,500 by the year 1997-98 in order to accommodate the needs of the budget restraint. A good portion of this reduction will be handled through retirements and resignations. Nobody on this side of the House wants to create hardship for the many valuable public servants who have served us so well over the years.
Even though we are going to try to do what we can through attrition and through these measures, unfortunately there is no doubt that some people will find themselves looking for some other kind of work. That is one of the sad things, but it is true.
The government will have to provide services, no question about it, with fewer staff in a climate of very rapid change. That means that the way we do things has to change. Doing things the same old way is just no longer possible. We must find innovative new ways. We must be adaptable. We must be flexible.
Those are the things that will be essential to ensure that we can cope with the challenges of the very real budgetary restraints that all governments in Canada face.
That brings me to my second point. There are instruments available for managing change in this new, leaner Public Service that is currently under development. One of them is the initiative to reform the Public Service known as PS 2000. That has been an important step toward equipping managers to be more innovative, flexible and accountable. As the hon. member has just pointed out it is an issue that is necessary in a democratic society.
In this initiative managers have been given greater flexibility and more authority as well as responsibility and accountability for their decisions. They have more freedom to deploy staff. That makes it possible to make
practical decisions rather than bureaucratically-driven decisions. This means that decision making has moved down to the shop floor and that we are reducing layers of management when it comes to making some small but essential decisions in order to move the business of government along in a very efficient way. It also helps to remove some constraints that in the past have had the tendency to stifle creativity which then creates some job dissatisfaction. Obviously out of that flows ineffectiveness.
There are other benefits as well to PS 2000, but I want to focus now on operating budgets to illustrate the kind of change that is taking place in the Public Service. Change is needed for us to meet these challenges that are being created by the very necessary budget restraints that must happen in the next few years.
Operating budgets were implemented across the Public Service on April 1 of this year. There are some very fundamental and interesting changes. Under this operating budget approach managers will receive a set amount of money for the year to cover wages, operating expenditures and minor capital expenses. Operating expenditures would include utilities, materials, supplies, goods and services and the kinds of things they would generally have to purchase in the orderly conduct of their business. Some minor capital items might include furnishings, machinery or other equipment needed to operate an efficient administration.
This may not seem like much to you, Mr. Speaker, but this really is a significant change in the federal Public Service. To get a feeling for what kind of change this is and what it means, I think we should look back for a moment at the way things used to be done.
Since 1970 the Treasury Board has controlled the number of person years and the amounts of salary dollars that departments are entitled to. A person year for those who do not know is the equivalent of employing one person for one full year. It is one of the ways we measure productivity and employment activity here in Ottawa.
When the government started to reduce the work force in 1985 person-year controls really made it difficult to respond to the demands for cost-recovered services because a very structured and bureaucratic system had been set up. It was also an impediment to joint initiatives with the private sector, so clearly we needed to be more
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flexible in our approach to doing the business of government.
The value of operating budgets is that managers will now look at the total cost of providing a program or service and not just the person years involved. The amount of money received will no longer depend on the number of people in a department. Managers will now have to use the measurement in a more business-like, productive and effective manner. They will be able to decide what the best mix of human and other resources will be to get the job done.
Those are the kinds of thoughtful decisions that have to be brought to bear on the business of government if we are going to achieve the goals we have set for ourselves and the even tougher goals that may be set for us in the coming years.
This means we will have increased efficiency and most importantly, and I say this to my hon. friend who has just finished speaking, increased accountability because I think he is quite right. Accountability must go hand in hand with authority or there is no hope for the people.
Managers will also be asked to focus their thinking on cost effectiveness and not just slash and bum cost effectiveness because nobody benefits from that. There must be very carefully thought out methods of reducing the cost of the Public Service and ensuring that the operations of government are managed in a way that gives the best value for the tax dollar invested by each of the taxpayers. That should ultimately reduce the over-all cost of government.
Perhaps if the Public Service is totally and fully committed to this, as I know it is, it will help us find ways to reduce programs or perhaps even do away with programs without doing any harm to the citizens of this country who expect their tax dollars to be spent wisely and well.
Mr. Speaker, I think you will see that this is one way we can approach government to make the budget go a little bit further in a way that does not create any tremendous pain for any particular group. The framework for this is largely in place and we should see a new, creative and more effective management developing over the next few years.
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I just want to turn briefly to another point and that is the quality of our Public Service, managers and employees. I must say that in my experience here for the past five years and based on a reference point of my experience in the private sector for over 20 years, I have to commend many of our public servants who do a tremendous job. They are very dedicated and committed to the people of Canada and to being professionals and providing a professional service.
I know it is difficult for many people in the Public Service right now. So many things are changing and the opportunity to look forward to a lifetime steady job with some security is no longer as available to us as it once was. For people in the Public Service this is a very large change. I think it creates some strong sense of instability and perhaps in some cases even fear.
I believe we should commend all the members of the Public Service for the work they have done and the way they have conducted themselves through these difficult times when there is so much insecurity all around us. I know they have shared in the sacrifices that all Canadians are making and have had to make in order to bring the budget deficit into line. Perhaps we will have to make even more sacrifices in the future as we begin to tackle the deficit and make sure we do away with it completely.
The Public Service has shown imagination and ingenuity in this challenging period and I am very proud to mention some recent examples. For example, there is an award for innovative management that has been created by the Institute of Public Administration and Coopers and Lybrand. For the first time, perhaps because of these new attitudes that are being generated, the federal government Public Service was among the finalists. The departments of fisheries and oceans and supply and services were selected as two of the five finalists for their very creative and innovative ideas and their new approaches to doing things in a more efficient manner. I think that points to the commitment and dedication of these people to making sure the dollars we have are spent in the most effective way and their understanding that these are difficult times for everybody.
Last year in this House we passed legislation creating National Public Service Week, so we do appreciate the work that public servants do. During that week in mid-June Canadians will have an opportunity to recognize the accomplishments of Public Service employees. I want to commend all Public Service employees for the

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great dedication with which they have served their country and this government over the past number of years.
The main estimates before the House are tangible proof of the government's serious approach to financial management. Although we have managed to take a very large chunk out of the deficit, particularly with regard to the operating deficit which has been turned around in the past nine years, there is still a great deal to do.
Perhaps now more than ever before Canadians are willing to help us do this because attitudes have changed immeasurably over the last few years. I think people now understand they have a say and should be saying what they believe governments should be doing, rather than perhaps being the passive recipients of programs and expenditures created by politicians for interests that may not be entirely beneficial to the general public.
I think people also know that we now have to separate what we want from what we need because there is no more money left for the kinds of luxuries we allowed ourselves over the past two decades. I would say in pointing this out that we have all been responsible and not just any particular government or regime. The world has been on a spending spree for a couple of decades and now it is time to pay the piper. I believe Canadians are telling us in no uncertain terms they are ready. They understand that tough decisions must be made to get the deficit wiped clean from the slate and put the operating surplus to work creating funds that will create choices for people in the future.
So these main estimates are a veiy good step in the right direction and obviously are one of the first steps in the second phase of this government's plan to turn around the economy of Canada and make it viable and vibrant to ensure that Canadians have future choices available to them.
I think the next step will be a preparation in our own minds, as one of my colleagues across the way said in an earlier speech this afternoon, to critically examine every single thing we do and every single penny we spend. I think all our programs and expenditures must be put to some acid tests and they are quite simply: Does this program deliver the kind of benefit that it was expected it would deliver to Canadians? Is there a measurable benefit from this expenditure or not? Does the program provide full value for the money that is being expended?
Frequently there are programs in place and after a few years one wonders why they are still operating but it is politically difficult to perhaps make the decision to stop them.
Finally, is this something we really need or is it just something somebody wants in terms of expenditure? Programs that cannot meet that acid test or expenditures that do not meet that acid test will have to be ended if we are really going to get serious about dealing with this deficit.
In a year from now I hope that I will be standing here dealing with the main estimates and saying that because of the good work that was done in 1993 we are now able to proceed with the next step and take even larger chunks out of the deficit and bring more rationalization to government. One of the ways that we can do this of course is by changing the way we do things now. We have to be prepared to take an absolutely critical look not just at what we are spending but at how we are spending money. Perhaps we should take a look at the way government operates and be prepared to make some structural changes to bring some rational thinking to bear on the way government operates.
I believe that there is also a greater role for members of Parliament, as one of my colleagues opposite also said earlier this afternoon, to be involved in this critical examination of government expenditure. It seems to me that every member in this House should find one of his most important tasks to be the critical examination of government expenditures and helping the policy makers and the cabinet to discover the kinds of changes that need to be made in the coming budget processes.
Obviously that is what we are here for. We are here to ensure that Canadians get full value for their dollars. Part of our job is to act as a watch-dog over government expenditures and to ensure that the money being spent is for Canadian priorities and not just for the priorities of some politicians.
We must also be careful to examine not just where our dollars are spent but how we spend them. Are they being spent in the most cost efficient manner? When somebody puts together a set of specifications for public works or for some other product we are buying are those specifications based on what is cost effective and will do the job or are they based on some other criteria that does not respond to the public need right now? I think there
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are dollars to be shaved off in the way we spend money as well as where we spend it.
Finally we must be prepared to question the status quo in absolutely every area. I think we can learn a great deal by looking at something like the New Zealand model where in fact it was understood that unless some major structural changes took place to government that that government would go into bankruptcy. One of the things it did was to shave off 11 per cent of its operating costs in one year by setting up a contract between a minister and his deputy. That contract was based on the ability to deliver productivity throughout the year rather than to meet a budget target that might have been set artificially or had grown over the years because of artificial cost of living criteria.
I will close by saying that we have to be flexible and we have to be imaginative. Our managers and our management have to be the same way. I am pleased with what I see already and I am convinced that Canadians will expect more in the coming years and that they will continue to be well served.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to note that the member for Winnipeg South agrees that one of the important issues is accountability. Maybe I could add stewardship which I think I mentioned in my speech a few minutes ago. By stewardship I mean the action of elected officials to judiciously examine every expenditure made against the capability or the capacity of Canadians to pay. I think that has to be made more public and more prevalent in our system.
I would like to make one comment on Public Service 2000 on which my friend from Winnipeg South made some remarks. I agree that the objective to give managers more powers to manage is a reasonably good objective. The difficulty with that is that there is absolutely no accountability to Parliament by managers. In Public Service 2000 if there is one weakness in the whole system it is that managers will have more powers but they will not be accountable to the elected representatives of this House for the use of that power. I find that to be a weak link in the whole system.
I want to ask my Progressive Conservative friend a question about something that was suggested in this House which I alluded to in my remarks and that is the need for more concerted efforts of all levels of federal, provincial and municipal governments to co-operate and to meet regularly to discuss this over-all national debt that we have to face.
As she knows, her government has off-loaded a lot of responsibilities-if I may use that word-onto provincial authorities and they in turn have off-loaded onto municipal authorities. It could be social welfare programs or housing or whatever.
I want to ask her if she would agree with the idea of having a federal-provincial-municipal conference-the large cities with the provinces and the federal government-to come to grips with the magnitude of the deficit. I am told the deficit is close to $575 billion. That is the total of federal, provincial, and municipal debt right now. We are accumulating debt at a rapid pace across this country.
I think there is a clock in Vancouver that ticks at some $63,000 every minute. It comes to about $100 million a day. In 10 days there is $1 billion added to the debt. The compound interest on the debt-paid interest on interest-is one of the difficult problems we have to face.
I am asking her specifically if she would support such an initiative, for example calling a tripartite federal-provincial-municipal conference to discuss our debt problems and how to address them.


Dorothy I. Dobbie: Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my hon. colleague. I think that is an innovative thought to bring all three levels of government together. I know that certainly today, although the federal government collects the most in taxes over all because we have the most people to tax there is no question that the second largest level of government is the municipal level. Cities have become the dwelling places of many Canadians and they have huge administrative problems.
The member is right. When one level of government says that there will not be any more increases the next level of government passes that down and there is always somebody at the end that gets squeezed and it is generally the cities.

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I would agree that to bring people together to deal with this issue in a non-partisan way with the same goal is going to be helpful, but I think it is a short term solution. That should not mean that we should not do this. I think it is an excellent idea.
I do believe that we need to go one step further. This is not something new that has just happened to us. This has been around for a long time. Because we have three levels of government we tend to forget that there is only one taxpayer and there is a lot of competition between those levels of government and the taxpayer usually ends up carrying the can on this.
I think part of the reason for that is because this is a federation and we have to deal with it but nevertheless that does not mean to say that we cannot find some long term solutions.
I would go one step further from what my hon. colleague has suggested to say that I think we must set up a mechanism in this country to systematically deal with these budget issues, but more to deal with the dismantling of trade barriers and to deal with the negotiation of national standards in education and health and on labour mobility on a very wide front. I think it is the responsibility of the federal government to take the leadership in doing that.


Nic Leblanc: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Winnipeg South gave a lengthy explanation of what the government has done and that it has talked with public servants to obtain agreements to cut government spending and program spending in order to improve the financial situation.
In the latest budget tabled on April 26, 1993 on page 19, if we look at program spending, for example, we see that the government did not decrease program spending but increased it. From 1992-93 to 1993-94 the increase is about $3.1 billion. The next year, the increase is again $3.1 billion. In 1995-96 it is $1.5 billion. This means that over the next five years, although the hon. member tells us that arrangements have been made to improve management and to lower program spending, it goes up by about $12.5 billion. That is not peanuts; it is billions of dollars, a $12.5 billion increase in program spending. The
hon. member would have us believe that spending has been cut, but the opposite is true.
The government claims that it can lower the deficit, but it is doing so by raising revenues and not by cutting spending. It will raise its revenues by over $41 billion in the next five years. Where will it get the money? From the taxpayers' pockets again. Canada is already bankrupt. How do you think it will get $41 billion more in the next five years?
I do not know where the hon. member got her information, but I am getting mine right from her government's document, the one from the Minister of Finance dated April 26, 1993. Even worse, at the same time as it increases spending and revenues, the federal government continues to cut transfers to the provinces. It provides less service than before. As the member for Ottawa-Vanier said earlier, the provinces are forced to pass their deficit on to the municipalities. Despite all that, the government will continue to spend even more and thus increase its deficit. That seems rather unrealistic.
That is why I asked the hon. member for Ottawa- Vanier if he thought he had found the miracle solution, thinking that public servants would cut spending. No way! The government does not have the will to really run the country. In the budget we see that spending is still being allowed to rise instead of-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBIois):: In all fairness I must give the floor to the hon. member for Winnipeg South.


Dorothy I. Dobbie: Mr. Speaker, I think my colleague and friend has made some very good points.
It says in the budget, and the spending estimates reflect this, that we expect to increase expenditures by
1.5	per cent each year. I guess the argument we would have is should expenditures increase at all? Some people are saying that all expenditures should be frozen at 1993 levels and I think a very good case could be made for that.
My friend also asked a question as to where the revenues are going to come from to cover the increase of some $12.5 billion he has added up according to last year's budget. They will not come from the taxpayers. At least not in this budget. They will come from the growth in the economy we projected to be around 2.9 per cent.
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That is a fairly reasonable projection when some economists are suggesting our economy will grow by 3.5 per cent to 4 per cent over the next few years.
I absolutely agree with the hon. member that we must be very careful not to increase the cost of programs and not to add new programs at a time when people are crying out for us to reduce the over-all cost of government and to get rid of the deficit and begin working on the debt.


Hon.   Chas. L. Caccia@Davenport: Mr. Speaker, it is not an issue of innovation as the member for-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: I would appreciate it if the hon. member would indicate to the Chair whether he will be splitting his time.


Mr. Caccia:: Mr. Speaker, I understand there were indications we are splitting the time.
I submit that it is not a matter of innovation and flexibility as the hon. member for Winnipeg South has attempted to convince her audience to believe it is for debate here today.
If you review the performance of this government which this bill allows us to do today, in its request for funds the issue before us today is an issue of broken promises. It is an issue of broken faith. It is a matter of a government which preaches one way and acts in a completely different manner.
Let me give some examples to illustrate this. This government, when speaking abroad particularly, expresses great concern on certain issues. For instance on the issue of climate change, the Government of Canada in Bergen three years ago, in Geneva two years ago and in Rio last year, said that this question of climate change is a top priority.
As we speak here today, having made these grandiose statements abroad, there is no plan yet before us, no matter how the minister of state for the environment camouflaged today in Question Period her answers, on how Canada will stabilize let alone reduce carbon dioxide emissions.
Take biodiversity. Canada goes abroad and claims its full commitment to protect biodiversity. When the first issue comes up in Canada on the question of the protection of biodiversity, in the Clayoquot area on the
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west coast, there is not one word from the ministerial benches of this government. Total silence.
Therefore the future of Clayoquot is seen by decisions by the provinces whereby the government knows very well that the Clayoquot forest could be made part of the Pacific Rim National Park and therefore an extension of an already existing federal presence in terms of protection of biodiversity.
Thke the major flop in fisheries. We go abroad. We agree to hold conferences. But when it comes to cod and the protection of our fisheries offshore and beyond the 200-mile limit, all we can agree upon and all we can show a muscle on is to agree to have another conference.
Take forestry where we are more concerned about public relations in Europe than in improving our cutting practices. Thke sustainable agriculture where the review on the reform of pesticides policies has been completely ignored by this government despite a very fine set of recommendations produced by a commission two years ago.
Take the question of aid to developing countries. One year ago in Rio this government pledged to increase its aid to .7 per cent of its gross national product. What does it do eights months later at home? It reduces aid. Not only does it reduce aid but it reduces aid to the poorest of the poorest countries; to Tanzania, Rwanda, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Madagascar, Burundi. Not only that but it also turns CIDA, the Canadian International Development Agency, into a self-serving commercial agency. What hypocrisy if you compare the statements of this government with its actions.
Let us turn our attention to the domestic scene.
The government professes its desire to strengthen Canadian unity and what does it do? It produces the ill-fated Meech Lake agreement. Not having learned from that experience, it produces the Charlottetown agreement. Thank God the majority of Canadians saw through that smoke and mirrors and shot it down in flames. This government at home promises jobs. How does that jibe with 11 per cent unemployment? How does it jibe with increasing numbers of young people coming out of our educational institutions? They are facing years of unemployment because there is not one opportunity to find a job because the government is cutting its programs. It is cutting employment opportuni-

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ties. It is not creating jobs for the young people who are coming onstream in the labour market.
At home this government promised the sacred trust for our social security system. Yet it did not take it long to start cutting social spending in reducing and almost virtually suspending social housing. I will go into that a little bit later if time permits me in outlining the findings of the United Nations human rights committee that has just produced a study on Canada's performance in relation to human rights in relation to poverty, social spending, the phenomenon of food banks and the homeless. I will come back to that if time permits.
This government professes and proclaims that it will abide by its own environmental impact assessments. Yet it adopts policies which run counter to the recommendations made by the environmental impact assessment panels on the Oldman Dam, Rafferty-Alameda, Pearson International Airport and the latest, brightest idea, namely the link with Prince Edward Island which I will refrain to comment on because of lack of time and because I do not want to be sidetracked from the major items before us. I will say that it is one with the most asinine proposals that has ever come across the floor of this House of Commons.
On free trade, this government having proclaimed to respect the will of the majority, having come out of the 1988 election with a majority of seats in the House of Commons but with a minority of popular votes on the side of the Progressive Conservatives with the majority of the combined votes for the Liberal and the NDP Party expressing their opposition to the free trade agreement, proceeded and adopted it. Flowing from that, of course, now we have the NAFTA which is being rammed through in the fifth year of this Parliament when the mandate has run out and even before an agreement has been finalized by both the governments of the United States and Mexico.
This government has strangled provincial budgets. It has cancelled the Court Challenges Program, the Economic Council of Canada, the Science Council of Canada, the Institute for International Relations, the Ocean Institute and the Law Reform Commission. As I mentioned earlier, this government has suffocated the activity of the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. It
has fought unemployment on the backs of those who receive unemployment insurance by reducing benefits. It has shown a lack of attention to federal-provincial agreements. For instance, the agreement between Canada and Ontario has not been renewed since 1991. It has reduced rail transport despite all its commitments to improve transportation and energy ratios.
This government, despite its commitments in theory to improve environmental standards and performance, has an energy policy which, if one were to be charitable at the most, fits in the 19th century. It continues to provide subsidies for outdated megaprojects and engages in outdated energy policies. This government has deformed the Canadian tax system, changing it from a progressive system into a regressive one by imposing a number of sales taxes which affect more the lower incomes than the higher incomes. The tax system today in Canada is a disgrace. It is making the rich richer and the poor poorer.


An hon. member:: Not true.


Charles L. Caccia: The minister says: "Not true". I challenge him to rise in the House and give us evidence to the contrary. It is a sham what has become of Canada under the Tory legislation in the last eight and a half years. In the government's dying days it is incumbent upon us to put these matters on record when it is seeking money for its functioning until 1994. By that time this government will no longer be in power.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: Mr. Speaker, my friend from Davenport always makes good sense and always addresses the issue of environmental questions with a lot of vigour and conviction.
He mentioned a report of the United Nations dealing with poverty, homelessness and food banks. I would like to hear him comment on the relationship between the report of the United Nations on human rights and Canadian poverty, homelessness and food banks.


Charles L. Caccia: Mr. Speaker, I am extremely grateful to the member for Ottawa-Vanier for raising this question. Certainly it is important to put on record the views of an independent, neutral body that has studied the situation in Canada among other things. I am going to read from the document itself. Under the heading
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"Principal Subjects of Concern" and referring to financial resources and the like it stated:
-considering Canada's enviable situation with regard to such resources, the Committee expresses concern about the persistence of poverty in Canada. There seems to have been no measurable progress in alleviating poverty for the last decade, nor in alleviating the severity of poverty among a number of particularly vulnerable groups.
The next item stated:
- the Committee is concerned about the fact that, according to information available to it, more than half of the single mothers in Canada, as well as a large number of children, live in poverty.
It referred to the Progressive Conservative Party and stated:
The State party has not outlined any new or planned measures to remedy this situation. Of particular concern to the committee is the fact that the federal government appears to have reduced the ratio of its contributions to cost sharing agreements for social assistance.
We know that. The next item stated:
The Committee received information from non-governmental organizations about families being forced to relinquish their children to foster care because of inability to provide adequate housing or other necessities.
This is how we look abroad. It further stated:
The committee is concerned that there seems to exist no procedure to ensure that those who must depend entirely on welfare payments do not thereby derive an income which is at or above the poverty line.
The next item dealt with food banks, as the hon. member already hinted at:
A further subject of concern for the Committee is the evidence of hunger in Canada and the reliance on food banks operated by charitable organizations.
I wish members from the Conservative Party were still here to hear that. I quote again from the same document:
The Committee learned from non-governmental organizations of widespread discrimination in housing against people with children, people on social assistance, people with low incomes, and people who are indebted. Although prohibited by law in many of Canada's provinces, those forms of discrimination are apparently common. A more concerted effort to eliminate such practices would therefore seem to be in order.
The next item was:
The Committee notes the omission from the Government's written report and oral presentation of any mention of the problems of homelessness.
The Committee regretted that there were no figures available from the Government on the extent of homelessness, on the number of persons evicted annually throughout the country, on the lengths of waiting lists or the percentage of houses accessible to people with disabilities.
The next one was:
Given the evidence of homelessness and inadequate living conditions, the Committee is surprised that expenditures on social housing are as low as 1.3 per cent of government expenditures.
It continued:
The Committee is concerned that in some court decisions and in recent constitutional discussions, social and economic rights have been described as mere "policy objectives" of governments rather than as fundamental human rights.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. DeBlois):: The time for questions or comments has now expired.


Ron J. Duhamel: Mr. Speaker, I appreciated my colleague's comments. He drew to our attention the government's failure with respect to social programs by quoting a neutral third source, not opposition parties, talking about inadequacies in terms of health, food and homes. He also pointed out the inadequacies and the failings of the government with respect to living up to its commitments in the area of the environment, controlling the deficit, the debt, and the creation of jobs. It is really unfortunate he did not have more time, for which I am partially responsible because we are splitting the time.
I want to talk not only about the government's failings but about the performance of the government. For the past nine years the Conservatives have shamelessly promoted themselves as the masters of economic policy. The image however is at odds with reality. As recent counts show the economic record of the Conservative government has been one of unremitting disaster.
On April 14 the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops released a report condemning the high level of unemployment that continues to plague Canada. A few days later Canadians received news of an International

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Monetary Fund report stating that future economic growth could stall due to the Tories' inability to control the deficit. Each in its own right is a condemnation of the Conservative stewardship of the Canadian economy.
The Catholic bishops' report said: "Widespread unemployment is a gaping wound in Canadian society". Urging the government to assume responsibility over the problems of unemployment, the report states: "As long as job creation is not a firm priority in Canada our current social crisis will only worsen".
These are the kinds of messages that the Catholic bishops were sharing with this government, with political parties generally, and with Canadians. With 1.6 million Canadians unemployed and a further 2.3 million Canadians underemployed it is clear a solution to this problem is not a priority to the Tories. If it is they have failed miserably. Moreover the unemployment problem is largely the result of the Conservatives' misguided fiscal policy, a poor mix of programs that has stifled economic growth and seriously reduced job opportunities.
In its report on Canada's fiscal situation the International Monetary Fund told the government to get its house in order. The report suggests that the federal deficit and our growing debt pose serious problems to the strength of the Canadian dollar and as a result could undermine our already fitful recovery from the recession, fitful recovery because it is up and down; it is not consistent.
The IMF's cautionary tale is one the government has heard many times before. Judging by its performance up to and including its latest budget, it is one that it is unable to act upon, to hear or to understand. Over the past almost nine years the Conservative governments have forgotten that their priority is to reduce the deficit. They have run up annual deficits of over $30 billion. The problem is clear. This is a government that does not practise what it preaches or, if it does, it is unable to do what it wants. This is a government that is prepared to spend over a number of years $5.8 billion on cold war style helicopters and willingly approve, I might add, an aimless tour of Europe by a Prime Minister with some time on his hands who wants to make sure he does not get in the way of the leadership race or embarrass anyone, at a cost to Canadian taxpayers of $50,000 per day.
Because of the Conservatives' inability to control the deficit our debt according to the IMF will rise to $553 billion by 1996-97 or $55 billion higher than the government had forecast in its 1992 budget; not $55 million but $55 billion or $55,000,000,000 more than it had forecast in 1992. Yet accuracy in budgets has never been its strong suit. After nine years of Conservative fiscal insights that were misguided and unrelenting promises to reduce the burden, the debt has increased from almost $168 billion to nearly $460 billion.
When the Conservative leadership hopefuls, the Minister of the Environment, the Minister of National Defence and others say they will get rid of the deficit in four or five years, no one is being fooled; no one believes them. I will quote Jeffrey Simpson of The Globe and Mail. It is a particularly pertinent and insightful quotation with respect to the Minister of the Environment, the Minister of National Defence and others saying that they could get the deficit and the debt under control in four or five years. Mr. Simpson said: "The candidates served up bromides and illusions". He added: "A promise to slay the deficit monster in four or five years is an implicit admission of failure".
Only one thing is clear. Canadians can no longer afford the high cost of Conservative economics. Change is required. In short, Canadians need a government and a leader with the vision and the knowledge to get the Canadian economy back on its feet.
The objective of the Liberal government will be to reduce the deficit substantially as a percentage of the gross domestic product from 5.2 per cent to 3 per cent and to shrink the public debt as a percentage of the gross domestic productivity. Meeting this objective will require sound management, unwavering discipline in our expenditures, tough choices and, above all, new priorities.

The present situation is a clear indication that the government's budget and estimates are not doing a thing to meet the needs of Canadians today. At this very moment, 11.6 per cent of Canadian men and women who want to work are unemployed. They say nearly 3 million people, 2.2 million people, will get their food from food banks this year, and 2.7 million will be on welfare. Nearly five million people are living below the poverty line.
June 2, 1993

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Most are women and more than one million are children.
In 1984 when this government came to power the debt was a little less than $168 billion. The government said it was going to control the deficit and the debt. At the time the deficit was over $30 billion. Since then, there has been a deficit every year, with one exception I believe, but even then there were some doubts, because it went over $30 billion. The debt which was nearly $168 billion now stands at $468 billion. Obviously their policies are not working.
We must not forget that when the government talks about expenditure control it never says it transferred its expenditures to the provinces, which have done the same to the municipalities, universities, colleges and hospitals. So this is not a responsible approach.
It seems my time is running out. That is too bad because there is a lot more I wanted to say. Mr. Speaker,
I am sure you will agree it is high time we had an election, elected a new government and tried new policies that provide an innovative response to the real problems of Canadians. What are those real problems? Well, the first one is job creation, to give some hope to Canadians who feel utterly lost and think the country is out of control and the government is not working, or working very badly. I am now ready for questions.

I thank you and I am now willing to entertain questions.


Mr. Bill Blaikie (Winnipeg TVanscona):: Mr. Speaker, I would start with a few remarks about the nature of supply. Supply is an ancient and honourable term for the procedure by which the government is supplied with money in order to carry out its programs and do the things governments do.
This is the last day for the main estimates but I think it is also an opportunity to reflect on how insignificant the whole issue of supply has become in the House of Commons. At one time that was one of the main functions of the House of Commons and of course in theory it still is. It goes all the way back to the Magna Carta when the king could not raise taxes or spend money without the permission of Parliament.
Up until 1969, and it still exists in some legislatures in Canada, the government had to bring all its estimates before the entire House of Commons. If the opposition was in the mood it could make cabinet ministers answer questions down to the last detail of their expenditures. Members of Parliament were able to find out a great deal of detail and were also able to put a considerable degree of pressure on cabinet ministers. It was a time when members of Parliament were able to get certain things done for their constituents in return for speedy passage of estimates or whatever.
That practice ceased to exist in 1969 when the Liberal government of the day imposed a series of reforms unilaterally and not by consensus. One of those reforms was that the estimates would be considered by committee. When I first came here that was still a reasonably lively element of what went on around here although it certainly had its limitations. In the spring ministers would appear before committees to answer for their estimates and of course it would be a time when they would also have to answer for any other matters that came within their jurisdiction.
The press used to attend these meetings and it was an opportunity to see an exchange between the opposition members or for that matter government backbenchers and cabinet ministers about government policy and expenditures. Then of course the estimates were deemed to be passed by a certain date in any event.
To a great extent this has fallen out of favour and practice. Even when it was being practised more routinely than it is now the ministers always knew they had to put up with the meetings. They knew there was no chance the estimates were not going to be approved. They knew the committee could not really change the estimates. So it was just a matter of killing time until the questioner used up his or her time or the minister, as was often the case, used up the questioner's time. I am sure the member remembers when the minister would just take up time with the questioner, the 10 minutes would expire and that would be it. The scrutiny of the estimates would be over.
I was the health critic for a while in the early 1980s. The budget for health and welfare was in the billions and billions of dollars and I had 10 minutes to question the Minister of National Health and Welfare on that and

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maybe another 10 minutes if I was lucky and could schedule another meeting.
One of the problems we have is that this whole notion of supply, accountability and examination of the estimates is not as significant or meaningful as it was even a short while ago and even then it was not as significant and meaningful as it was early on.
That is not my main purpose this evening. My main purpose is to talk a little bit about the general economic and financial situation the government finds itself in and has put the country in. There is a great deal of debate everywhere about the question of deficits and debt.
I want to submit tonight that to speak about this problem without going to the heart of the matter-and I will try to explain what I mean by the heart of the matter-is to fundamentally mislead Canadians about what has been going on for the last 15 to 20 years.
A deficit can come about in a number of ways. It can be created by spending beyond a certain steady level of income. There can be a steady level of spending and if measures are taken that have the effect of reducing revenues, the result is a deficit. The government is very fond of giving Canadians the impression that the deficit is the result of overspending on such things as social programs for instance.
I want to submit to you tonight that the deficit is not caused by overspending on social programs because if we look at spending on social programs in relation to over-all spending, the GDP and a number of other things, it has not grown in the way the government wants Canadians to believe. A series of governments going back to the Liberal governments in the 1970s have successively and systematically forfeited the revenues that might otherwise have come to the Government of Canada through various tax measures.
When we talk about debt and deficits, it is important to have a sense of histoiy. It is important to know that as far back as 1972, the NDP through its leader at that time, David Lewis, was calling attention to the fact that the public treasury was then being built by the corporations. In 1972 the campaign slogan of the NDP was "Corporate Welfare Bums". It was trying to call attention to the fact that some of us spend a lot of time worrying about what
ordinary people who are forced onto social assistance might be getting for nothing and not worrying at all about what the corporations are getting in the form of government assistance.
So often it seems that the kind of system we have here is a kind of socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor. The rich are lined up at the public trough without apology because, of course, when they want money it is just to create a good business climate or it is an incentive.
It is not welfare but a corporate incentive. When ordinary people need money just to get food to eat that is welfare, pejoratively understood and pejoratively spoken about. When the corporations manage to be on the receiving end of public money, public assistance, then that is called an incentive. As far back as 1972 the NDP was calling attention to what we then called corporate welfare bums. Corporate welfare bum-ism has reached new heights since David Lewis first called attention to it in 1972.
In 1972 we still had not had a number of the Liberal budgets of the 1970s which, if the truth were told, were responsible in large part for the deficit. They were not entirely responsible because we cannot discount the high interest rate policies of the early 1980s and a number of other things. We cannot discount the fact that the current government has not seen fit to close a lot of those tax loopholes. If we are trying to develop an historical perspective we have to go back to those Liberal budgets in the 1970s, budgets that were wrongly predicated on a vision of never-ending growth, on a vision of our economy as an economy that would never sputter.
Joe Greene, a Liberal Minister of Energy at one point, predicted that there would be oil for 500 or 600 years. It is symptomatic of the age that despite warnings from groups like the Club of Rome and others that things were not as rosy as governments of the day thought it was our policies were based on this fallacy that there could be, and this fallacy is still prevalent today in many forms, an economy based on the need for infinite growth in a finite world. That is a problem that in some sense I do not think any party has come to terms with.



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This will be a problem as long as we have models of economic growth or economic activity which presuppose that there must be a certain kind of growth in order for good things to happen, in order for the poor not to be poor. The hope that people invest in growth is that if we get enough growth then the poor will somehow become not poor without the rich having to share, that growth will somehow solve the moral problem that is at the root of our economy.
We will always and will increasingly have an even more serious problem with the poor, not only in our own country but globally speaking, unless we face up to this flaw in our way of thinking, unless we face up to the fact that we are not going to be able to feed, clothe and shelter the entire world frugally unless somebody who has a lot gives something up. That is a difficult question for people to face.
Going back to the historical overview of the deficit-debt problem, it seems to me that we laid the foundations for our current deficit-debt problem in the 1970s when we had these unwarranted expectations. We then had the high interest rate policies of the early 1980s. Although that may have been in some way related to a larger global situation it was nevertheless a fact that the exceedingly high interest rates that we had here in Canada in the early 1980s were self-inflicted. It was a policy choice.
You may argue, Mr. Speaker, that it was absolutely necessary. You certainly did not argue that at the time, but you might argue it now. However these are policy choices that have been made by Canadian governments. Those high interest rates at that time, according to a Statistics Canada study released a year and a half or so ago, are 50 per cent responsible for the debt that we have.
Social programs were only 6 per cent responsible and 44 per cent was a result of revenue forgone as a result of tax expenditures, tax loopholes, shelters or whatever we want to call them.
In 1979 the Conservative government of the member for Yellowhead released a tax expenditure account. It was the first time that this had been done. If I remember the figures correctly, at that time it showed that for 1979, perhaps it was 1978, the total tax expenditure account,
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taxes not collected by the Government of Canada, was $32 billion. That year the deficit was $14 billion.
The money the government did not collect in 1979 was twice the deficit for that year plus $4 billion. Not all tax expenditures are bad things. Into the tax expenditure account went the child tax credit and various other things. It is not as if all tax expenditures are intrinsically evil or something like that.
The fact is that over the years that has piled up. A lot of those tax expenditures were needless tax expenditures. They were tax expenditures that were basically give-aways to the corporate culture in this country, the members of whom are very good at criticizing others when they are on the receiving end of public moneys but not so good at scrutinizing themselves when it comes to the way in which they receive assistance from the public treasury. They like to call them incentives rather than welfare.
This is the root of the problem. We have a revenue crisis in this country, not a debt crisis. The debt is a symptom of the larger problem of the revenue crisis created by some of the things that I have talked about here. I have not had time to go into the detail of it.
The revenue crisis is further complicated by unemployment. When we have policies that deliberately create unemployment we increase our revenue problem by removing people from the tax rolls and putting them on UI or welfare. There are a variety of ways in which people who are not working cost the country a lot of money. There is no willingness on the government side to recognize this.
High unemployment helps drive high public debt. Unemployment is not free. One estimate we are aware of shows that in 1992 each unemployed worker cost the federal government an average of $2,200 in forgone income tax, $730 in reduced federal sales taxes, $730 in forgone pension and UI contributions, $6,700 in unemployment insurance benefits claimed and $2,300 in the federal share of new welfare claims.
Each unemployed worker costs provincial or territorial governments $1,150 in forgone income tax, $850 in reduced provincial sales taxes and $2,800 in the provincial share of new welfare claims. That is an example of what I am talking about and why we say that the root cause of the problem is forgone revenue and policies which deliberately create unemployment or tolerate

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unemployment in the name of some other economic goal.
We are not going to solve our fiscal problems until we are committed to solving them, not through the current kind of policies that the government is following but through the creation of employment.
That is why we brought forward a jobs plan. That is why we have agreed with so many others across this country who have called for a municipal infrastructure program to get Canadians working, building and doing the kinds of things that we need for our future.
It is not a question of spending so much as it is a question of investment in Canada's future. That would be money spent wisely and it would be money spent in a way that would enable these Canadians who are actually a drain on the public treasury to become once again a boon to the public treasury.


Ms. Mary Clancy (Halifax):: Mr. Speaker, it is indeed a great pleasure for me to rise in this House today to put a question to my hon. friend and colleague, the member for Winnipeg Transcona. On the last supply day of this current session we are dealing with a figure somewhere in the realm of $161 billion. We are looking at a country in crisis. We are particularly looking at a crisis in the provinces and the municipalities of this country because of the way in which this debt has been off-loaded by this government on to provincial and municipal governments.
I know that my hon. friend from Winnipeg Transcona has great sympathy for provincial governments, and probably in particular for those governments in Ontario, which Heaven knows needs our sympathy, Saskatchewan and British Columbia. It has been advocated today by numerous members of the Liberal Party who have spoken in this debate that a tri-level conference of federal, provincial and municipal governments be convened to deal with a number of the problems that this off-loading of the debt has created.
I would consequently ask my hon. colleague from Winnipeg Transcona if he and his party would agree with this idea as it is one measure with which to clarify, deal with and receive the contribution from those various levels of government. Some people have merely agreed upon provincial input but, coming as I do from Atlantic
Canada, we are prepared to say, shocking as it may be to some, that the questions that arise from the problems of Toronto with over two million people are at least as important as those that arise in Prince Edward Island with approximately 125,000 people. I would ask for the hon. member's comments on this suggestion by the Liberal Party.


William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: Mr. Speaker, I certainly do not see any harm and I can see a lot of potential merit in the idea of having such a conference. However it would have to be a conference that was attended by the federal government with an open mind because part of the problem is that they are not short of representations made to them in the past and just recently by provincial governments and municipalities. It is a good idea but it may be that this government has passed the point where it will listen.
The municipalities have repeatedly called for spending on the municipal infrastructure in this country. I met with the Union of Manitoba Municipalities and it has all kinds of things that need to be done and that money could be spent on.
The government is fond of saying that people could not run a household like it runs the government. That may be true but the fact is that it often misrepresents how it is running the government.
When we add up our monthly finances we do not lump our 25-year mortgage into what we owe for the month of January because we make distinctions between money that is borrowed for long-term purposes and will come back to us in the form of assets and future benefits and money that is just spent for immediate purposes. One of the distinctions this government seems unable to make is the difference between those two kinds of moneys. It is a distinction that the municipalities in particular have been able to make.
I think all provincial governments are in a bind, not just the ones governed by New Democrats. The fact is that the provincial governments do find themselves in a situation that is quite different from the federal government because the provincial governments do not control fiscal and monetary policy. The provincial governments do not theoretically control the Bank of Canada. The provincial governments do not have the ability to initiate new tax measures as the federal government does. If they do initiate some new tax measures often the effects of these are vitiated by the fact that a neighbouring
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province tries to take advantage of the fact that they have initiated a certain tax measure.
Their hands are tied in many respects in a way that the federal government's hands are not. That is why it is so absolutely crucial that we get some leadership from the federal government. In the meantime provinces can be different one from another in how they deal with the off-loading and what they decide to do with that fact, what they choose to cut and how they choose to cut it. I think provincial governments will have to come to be judged not by the fact that they were forced to cut back but how they went about it and what they cut back.


Lyle Dean MacWilliam: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for my colleague, the member for Winnipeg Transcona.
With respect to the whole situation of level of taxation we often hear the concern, and it is a legitimate concern, that Canadians are overtaxed. When we look at the level of taxation in Canada as compared to the two dozen or so nations in the OECD we find that Canada is right about in the middle. Over all we do not pay excessive taxation. It is when you look at how much taxes individuals pay compared to the corporate sector where you find the discrepancy. Individual Canadian taxpayers pay a very heavy amount whereas corporate Canada pays very little in comparison when you look at the percentage breakdown.
Going back to the 1950s corporations and individual taxpayers shared about an equal amount in terms of the over-all tax revenues collected, about 50-50. Ever since then the level of income tax that individuals have to pay has gone from about 50 per cent almost up to 90 per cent whereas the level of taxes that the corporations pay has gone down steadily from that level of 50 per cent to approximately 10 per cent.
The discrepancy is very large and has been one that has been magnified or exacerbated by the policies of this government.
I wonder if the member for Winnipeg Strathcona would like to comment on this very real discrepancy we see in the level of taxation.
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William Alexander (Bill) Blaikie: Mr. Speaker, I think the member makes a good point that the relationship between corporate and personal income taxes in this country is way out of whack. At one point, as I think he mentioned, it was somewhat in the neighbourhood of 50-50, 50 per cent corporate, 50 per cent from personal income tax. Now personal income tax makes up far and away the largest share of that kind of tax and the corporations are down to around 10 per cent or 15 per cent and it gets lower all the time. Again this is a trend that had its beginnings with Liberal budgets in the 1970s. It is a trend that has not stopped.
It is a trend that this government has not been willing to put a stop to either in terms of corporate tax rip-offs or tax breaks and also in terms of the breaks that have been given to the very wealthy in this country as a result of a deliberate self-conscious policy on the part of the government.
The present Minister for International Trade, formerly the Minister of Finance, said in his first budget the problem with Canada is that we do not have enough rich people. He has succeeded in making some people rich but he has done that by making a heck of a lot of other people a lot poorer than they were and he has done that by changing the income tax system so that the people in the top percentage pay a whole lot less than they would have had we kept the system that was in place when they came to power.
As far as Canadians being overtaxed, obviously certain Canadians are being overtaxed in relation to other Canadians. The middle class in this country, those who play by the rules and pay the bills in this country, are the ones who are being taxed to death. They are the ones who cannot afford the accountants and the lawyers to figure out how not to pay taxes. They are the ones who basically this government and this country depend on in order to finance the workings of Canada. They are the ones who are overtaxed. But even they have to keep in mind, and I think we all have to keep in mind, that when we compare ourselves to some other countries, particularly to our neighbours to the south, that when we figure out our tax burden here we are also figuring into it the cost of our health care.
I know that many Canadians will go across the border and they will notice that the taxes on liquor are next to nothing and the taxes on this or that are next to nothing and they say: "Wow, terrific. Why can't we have a tax system like the Americans?" What they do not realize is

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that the average family of four in the United States pays somewhere in the neighbourhood of $300 or more per month for health care insurance. That is for health care coverage that does not compare to what we get through our taxes. Of course that does not even take into account the 35 million Americans who do not have any coverage at all.
You have got to do this kind of mega accounting or macro accounting when you talk about tax burdens. Canadians have coming to them a social wage in the form of medicare and other things that they pay for through their taxes that many of these other countries, particularly the United States which is said to have a lower tax burden, simply do not have.


Hon. Roy MacLaren (Etobicoke North):: Mr. Speaker, the budget tabled in March was the final budget of this government. As such it served as an appropriate epilogue to nine years of Conservative rule. It was similar in intent to the December 1992 financial statement, that is it was not directed primarily at Parliament or even the Canadian people generally but rather at foreign lenders.
The main purpose of the budget of March, as in the previous financial statement last December, was to reassure those increasingly jittery foreign lenders that the government has Canada's fiscal well-being firmly in hand. That of course would be no easy task.
Since this government took office in 1984 the national debt has almost tripled. The debt and deficits of the provinces have ballooned almost beyond recognition and the Minister of Finance has been consistently unsuccessful in meeting his own relatively modest deficit targets year after year.
Even less easy has been the government's task of convincing Canadians that it has finally achieved the kind of fiscal sanity for which it was elected or for which it claims to have been elected in 1984. Suddenly, if belatedly, the public at large has become seized with the magnitude of Canada's debt problem. It will be a major if not the major issue in the forthcoming federal election with party leaders as well as provincial premiers vying with each other to assure the Canadian people that they know best how to tame the debt and the deficit. Instead of competing in spending promises as was the case in past decades, instead of promising the Canadian people
more and more, the leaders of tomorrow will be competing in reduction promises.
The government's credibility problem is rooted in the fact that it is once again relying on exceptionally sanguine economic forecasts to mask a debt and deficit problem which it appears again powerless to resolve.
As outlined in the recent budget the government is basically assuming that Canadian output will rapidly build momentum during 1993 underpinned by solid export gains and further interest rate reductions.
During this period it is suggested that sustained economic growth of nearly 4.5 per cent will coincide with inflation at about 1.5 per cent. That would be a truly remarkable performance, not just in relation to our major economic partners, but in relation to Canada's more pedestrian record over the last decade.
Short-term interest rates will remain around 5 per cent, a mere 70 basis points above the U.S. levels. Long-term government bond yields will drop to 6 per cent and stay there. A combination of export led growth, low real interest rates and continuing low inflation will allegedly be sufficient to move the deficit below its $35 billion high water mark.
Never has the government's perennial tendency to use optimistic assumptions to generate longer term fiscal dividends been more evident than in its 1994-98 projections. A more cautious and realistic forecast would yield much less favourable fiscal results.
For example, the deficit could be stuck around $30 billion in a world of 3 per cent growth with modestly higher interest rates. Without revenue increases arising out of significant growth and low inflationary pressures, the proposed freeze on inflation adjusted spending will likely prove inadequate to address the government's serious fiscal imbalance. A multi-year freeze on actual program spending is needed to ensure that the official deficit forecast is realized.
The weakness of the government's approach to the debt and deficit problem over the last nine years is really twofold. First, in seeking to balance its escalating budgets, the government essentially opted for what it believed was the politically more expedient route of tax increases rather than spending reductions.

Since 1984, Canadian taxpayers have been subjected to no less than 38 separate tax increases, including the GST, amounting to almost $1,900 per household. Having once enjoyed, along with such countries as the United States and Japan,, one of the lowest per caput tax rates of OECD members, Canadians now have the dubious distinction of being among the most overtaxed people in the industrialized world.
The government's repeated boast that excepting interest payments on the debt, as if you could leave that aside, it has finally achieved an operating surplus is technically true. But it is one which has been bought at the expense of a crushing tax burden on Canadians. In an era when international competitiveness depends so much upon raising the levels of domestic savings and investment, the central thrust of the Conservative economic policy has been to tax increasingly the earnings of Canadians rather than promoting investment.
We have in these past years reached the point where tax-based solutions are no longer a realistic policy option both economically and politically for any future Canadian government. As the deputy minister of finance said only yesterday, if personal income taxes are raised much higher, the government risks driving Canadians "offshore or out of the formal economy".
Although it is true that the government has refrained from new tax increases over the past year, largely because it has left itself without any real choice in this matter, total tax revenues will stay close to 18 per cent of our gross domestic product for the foreseeable future. That is nearly two percentage points above the levels prevailing during the economic boom of the mid-1980s.
Moreover, provinces such as Ontario, British Columbia, Saskatchewan and Newfoundland have taken advantage of the lull to boost aggressively their own tax demands.
In following this path of least resistance the government did not counter inflation at its root, the stated objective of its economic policy. Rather, it fuelled it by its own excessive spending and by its all too frequent tax increases.
It was left to the Bank of Canada to attempt to combat inflation with the single tool, or I should say sledge-hammer available to it: high interest rates. This in turn
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helped to place Canada in a vicious circle of higher debt service charges as interest rates went up, higher deficits, higher taxes, higher inflationary pressures and deeper recession.
Perhaps the most worrisome effect of this vicious circle that the government created for itself is the rapid escalation in Canada's foreign indebtedness which now stands at over $200 billion.
As Canada's foreign borrowing has ballooned, Canada's deficit on current transactions with the rest of the world exports, imports, cross-border flows of investment has grown to 4.2 per cent of our gross domestic product. This is a level which is unsustainably high.
To illustrate this point let me underline that from 1985 to 1992 net payments of interest and dividends on our foreign debt increased by 74 per cent compared to a 43 per cent increase in our nominal gross domestic product. It is obvious that sort of increase in our foreign indebtedness cannot continue indefinitely.
There is of course nothing right or wrong a priori with foreign borrowing. What matters is why we borrow and what we do with the money we borrow. For instance, we may want to borrow because we see profitable investment opportunities that can procure for us a return in excess of the interest to be paid on the borrowed money. In such a case, incurring a current account deficit is then simply sound economics.
That is precisely what frequently happened in Canada in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Arguably it also underpinned investment booms and natural resources in the 1950s and 1970s and to a lesser extent, the public investment boom of the 1960s.
Despite relatively high levels of debt during those periods Canada's economy still performed well when it came to job creation and growth. Largely that was because the debt was amassed for productive investment in building highways, mines and pipelines. We and the foreigners recognized the extraordinary investment opportunities of the times in physical and human capital. Foreign borrowing was probably the best decision to make in those circumstances.
Foreign deficits can also reflect shortages of domestic savings that send the country borrowing abroad even if domestic investment is not so buoyant by past standards. Borrowing then serves to maintain consumption at high

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levels relative to our own income. As the saying goes, we are then in danger of living beyond our means.
It seems probable that the current account deficit explosion of 1985 to 1992 is in the latter category. Unlike investment booms of the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s the spurt of domestic investment of the last five years was much less intense. Two-thirds of it was in housing as opposed to productive plants, equipment and structures.
Most important, over-all domestic investment has experienced a long-term decline. The late 1980s investment peak is about the same magnitude as the early 1970s investment trough. National savings are even more depressed. At 15 per cent of gross national product in 1992 they stood at the lowest point since the Great Depression.
Part of the problem is with the recession induced collapse of corporate and government saving. Even the 1989 savings peak at 20 per cent of our gross national product was at a historically low level comparing unfavourably with the 24 per cent average rate of saving of the early 1970s. The savings decline like the investment decline is a long-term not a short-term phenomenon.
It should be noted that all of this also carries a significant financial market risk as well. Lower interest rates are part of the official solution to the deficit problem. If federal and provincial governments show no sign of decreasing their demand for offshore borrowing, unfortunately international investors already sensitized to exchange rate risks because of last year's extraordinary turbulence in currency markets, are likely to view the absence of meaningful fiscal improvements as adding to concerns over the credit quality of domestic securities. This raises the risk premium on such investments and limits the potential for durable interest rate relief.
The second weakness of the government's approach to Canada's debt problem is really the first writ large. If the government has found it politically difficult to reduce spending over the last nine years, it is largely because it has failed to develop a comprehensive plan for restructuring and redefining the way in which government operates in this country.
After all, this issue concerns more than some abstract figures termed "the national debt". It is about the size,
the role and the efficiency of government, a sector which, as many competitive experts all too easily overlook, now accounts for no less than 50 per cent of Canada's gross domestic product. It is about the allocation of resources in a way which promotes productive investment and physical and human capital rather than the kind of spiralling consumption we have witnessed in Canada over the last decade.
Instead of devising ways in which government might work better and smarter, to borrow from the Clinton lexicon, the Conservatives chose to leave the old structures and programs in place while attempting to cut and trim around the edges. The fact that the deficit remains stuck at $35 billion after nine years of such trimming underscores the real limits to this approach.
The first priority in tackling the debt crisis should have been to attempt to engineer a national solution to what is manifestly a national problem. Without real and binding co-ordination between Ottawa and the provinces, there was simply too much scope for unproductive shifting of spending among governments or for wasteful duplication of activities and conflicting policies.
The Conservative government offered up instead a unilateral reduction in provincial transfer payments, accompanied by pious admonitions that the provinces should follow Ottawa's lead in getting their fiscal houses in order. Faced by a sudden shortfall in revenues the provinces predictably reacted by ratcheting up their own deficits and occupying any tax room vacated by the federal government.
Another obvious target for reform was the bewildering and overlapping web of individual transfers and tax exemptions which has passed for a comprehensive social safety net for the last three decades. Even those aspects of our social security system that are more targeted have tended to evolve as ad hoc political and social expedients. It has been an accumulation over time of responses to special demands and not a co-ordinated approach to human resource development.
The present system of tax deductions and exemptions, for example, has often proven to be a less than successful means of targeting social assistance, if only because benefits tend to rise with the increase in income, often turning such provisions into tax shelters and loopholes.

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Nor was the existing collection of selected transfers designed with considerations of efficiency in mind. On the one hand most social welfare programs incorporate few incentives to work. On the other hand they deny income support to one group in society particularly deserving of help but largely overlooked by the present system: the working poor.
Increasingly, Canada is funnelling scarce resources into a social security system which is not just obsolescent, but to a degree unsustainable. The point here is that we need to restructure fundamentally the way in which social services are delivered, possibly along the lines of a negative income tax.
The government's economic fiscal and monetary policies of the past years have left Canada in a situation that is increasingly difficult. With interest rates higher than economic growth rates and the Canadian economy recovering, even while overseas economies remain in a slump, it seems unlikely that the normal growth rates and cycles in the economy will solve this problem.
The challenge will be there for the next Government of Canada.


Mr. John Manley (Ottawa South):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his address this evening. Tonight's ultimate votes go to the centre of parliamentary democracy. This is when we vote on supply for the government.
I have been doing a little study of the supply that was granted by Parliament over the votes of the opposition in a previous fiscal year. In fact I recently received some information by way of the Order Paper which I would like to give to my colleague. He may have some comment on it.
In April 1992 I asked what the cost was of the public opinion polls that had been commissioned by the government opposite for the year 1991-92 and what the purpose was of those polls. The government spent over $5 million on frivolous public opinion polling.
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I would just like my colleague to be aware of what some of the ridiculous expenditures were from a government that goes around the country spewing forth propaganda about fiscal responsibility and how it wants to take care of the taxpayers' money.
The government spent, for example, $140,000 evaluating a special income assistance program by way of public opinion poll through Agriculture Canada. It spent $200,000 checking out the attitudes and perceptions of farmers concerning federal agricultural policies and issues facing the industry by way of public opinion poll.
It conducted a poll to find out whether or not people in Atlantic Canada know about the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency. It had money for that in these tough, tough times.
Let us see what else we have in here. Immigration Canada spent $452,427 trying to find out what Canadians thought about various immigration issues.
I suggest to the government that it might want to consider having the odd election more frequently. It would soon find out what Canadians thought about it and its policies.
Out of Energy, Mines and Resources the government spent $15,000. What for? To test new R-2000 logos. That is just a little bit below the minimum wage for a year for some people living in Canada.
This is the kind of thing this government, which is seeking our support for its spending estimates, has found time to do. I have only gone through a few pages of a very long report.
I know there are other questions and comments so I would like to give my colleague from Etobicoke North the opportunity to comment on the fiscal prudence of public opinion polling on an enormous scale by the government opposite.


Roy MacLaren: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member draws our attention to a significant problem in the way in which this government has engaged in profligate spending during its eight or nine years in office. The example he has cited is only one of many that could be pointed to with regard to the excessive use by government of outside consultants, and in this case public opinion pollsters.

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The instances he has brought to us this evening raise two fundamental questions. One is the desirability of any government engaging in such widespread and basically irresponsible public polling and having followed that extravagant route, not sharing with the taxpayer the results of its polling which the taxpayer has paid for.
The basic problem is whether this sort of extravagance can be justified in any way. Quite clearly it is one of the instances that the Auditor General should examine. Such instances should be a matter for concern on the part of all taxpayers as we consider the ways we govern ourselves.
I can hardly believe there are any Canadians who would think their taxes should be spent in the way the hon. member from Ottawa has just described. I welcome his taking the occasion this evening to draw our attention to this sort of irresponsible extravagance that has marked the whole term of office of the present government.


Nic Leblanc: Mr. Speaker, I listened earlier to the hon. member for Etobicoke North who made a nice speech on what the government did wrong which lead to the current deficit and government inefficiency. I want to point out to my Liberal colleague that his own party was in charge of managing the affairs of the nation for many years, from 1972 to 1984, and that during this period the Liberal government spent more than it could afford to. Today we know very well the main cause of this situation. It is the centralizing Liberal government which generated those terrible deficits by creating a climate of confrontation between the provinces and the federal government.
The Conservative government made the same mistake. Last year, for the first time in the history of Canada, a department of education was set up, in spite of the fact that education is a provincial matter. Duplication of management activities between the provinces and the federal costs over $10 billion a year.
The Liberal member who wants us to believe that there are ways of improving the administration of this system while at the same time maintaining a climate of confrontation between the federal government and the
provinces would only perpetuate what the Conservatives do and what the Liberal government did before.
I wonder if the hon. member will ever learn that the only way to succeed, to steer Canada away from bankruptcy, assuming it is not already too late, is to decentralize. Only then will we be able to reduce expenditures and make all these operations more efficient. What do the hon. member and the Liberal Party propose to improve the economic situation of the country?


Roy MacLaren: Mr. Speaker, I do not know whether my friend who has just asked me the question wishes to engage in a pot calling the kettle black type of conversation. He was a Conservative for some years and presumably in that role endorsed the extravagant spending practices of the present government.
I think it is idle to spend a lot of time addressing the question of what one government or another did in some years past. What we are debating tonight is the government's supply measures. We are addressing the practices of this government over recent years.
If the member wishes to speak of centralization or decentralization I think that he is posing the problem in the wrong terms. Surely he or any Canadian taxpayer would want to see the elimination of duplication and interprovincial barriers to the free movement within our own country of goods, services, people and capital. I do not think it is beyond the wit of the government of the day or indeed of parliamentarians to eradicate the myriad of ways in which we engage in extravagant duplication between two and indeed three levels of government. If we seriously addressed the question of interprovincial trade barriers we would make real progress in the reduction of excessive government spending.


Mr. Pat Sobeski (Cambridge):: Mr. Speaker, it is unfortunate that the questions were long because the member for Etobicoke North talks about the past and I wanted to ask him a question. I will put it on the record and I am sure he will respond.
For every $3 in spending cuts in Bill Clinton's budget there is an increase of $1 in tax, while the budget of the last finance minister gave no tax increase and then cut
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spending. I was curious to see how the member for Etobicoke North would have responded to that.
I really admire the member for Ottawa South but I cannot go back to 1984 because neither he nor I were here to talk about past records. He brought forward some numbers and I am sure if I were to go back to the 1968 to 1984 period I would easily find similar examples of probably even greater extravagance.
Between 1979 and 1984 government spending by the Liberals increased by 13.8 per cent. We were also into high inflationary times and the inflation rate was 8.6 per cent, so during that period the Liberals managed to spend at a rate of over 5 per cent of the rate of inflation.
Meanwhile between 1984 and 1992 there were controls on spending by this government. During that period the inflation rate averaged 4.4 per cent and yet program spending increased by only 3.7 per cent or less than the rate of inflation. All the provincial budgets increased their spending by 7.2 per cent against an inflation rate average of 4.4 per cent, so their spending was 3 per cent above the rate of inflation. Everything has to be measured against a norm and the rate of inflation is a good way to do it.
Since coming to office this government has taken solid action to reduce government spending because the time has come for governments to start living within their means. Major house cleaning was required and this government had the courage to do it.
The government has turned a large operating deficit- and that is the difference between revenues and spending on programs of the early eighties-into a substantive operating surplus. What does that mean? In 1984 the government was bringing in $71 billion in revenue but it was spending $87 billion on program spending. Then it had to pay $22 billion on the interest so we were running a $16 billion deficit just on services. Imagine bringing in $71 and spending $87. A household cannot exist like that but the Liberal government had the capacity then to borrow and so it borrowed the $16, paid $22 interest and then we ended up with a $38 billion deficit.
Today government revenues are $120 billion. Leadership candidates of this party are saying if we cannot live with $120 billion we can reallocate and get our priorities right. They are saying that is enough for a government to exist on. But our program spending is only $115 billion, so now we are running a surplus. Members are quite correct that the total debt has increased and the carrying charge on the interest is some $40 billion today. That results in the $34 or $35 billion deficit that we have heard talked about today.
How do we try to compare those types of numbers? The period of 1969-70 is significant in Canadian history because it was the last time the federal government balanced its budget. As a percentage of gross domestic product 14.7 per cent was spent by the government on program spending. By 1984-85 it had risen to 19.5 per cent of GDP. Of course GDP is like family income because it is the income of the nation. Spending rose by almost 5 per cent but the government revenues did not so the result was an imbalance.
This government has taken spending from 5 per cent better than the rate of inflation to almost 1 per cent below the rate of inflation and now in 1991-92 program spending represents only 16.7 per cent of GDP. With that trend we are getting back to the stage as in the late fifties and sixties when governments got their spending down to 14 per cent of GDP. That is the direction this country has to move in and we are moving in that direction.
There have been spending controls. The member opposite for Ottawa South was a member with me on the finance committee when we were putting through a piece of legislation on spending controls. The hon. member and I in the finance committee travelled to Washington to review the Gramm-Rudman recommendations to control the American budget. There was the belief in Canada that the Americans were tremendously successful in containing their deficit. We went down and talked to the people in Congress and their support staff and clearly the Gramm-Rudman report was a failure.
It was a failure for two reasons. They tried to establish a target on spending and I think the projections were low on spending. They also projected targets for revenue and I think they were optimistic. The Americans wanted to

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reduce their deficit to zero with that difference and they had to keep moving the targets. It just did not work because again they over-estimated revenue and underestimated their expenses.
We came back from the U.S. with the recommendations because I have learned to listen. Occasionally members opposite do have good suggestions and the member for Ottawa South recognized it was a good suggestion. He gave some advice that the Tories on the committee accepted, just as I am sure the Minister of the Environment is listening carefully to backbenchers like myself as he projects to keep spending within the $120 billion envelope he has promised. We will see that transform over the next five years. I know I will be here for that.


An hon. member:: Over the next four years.


Patrick (Pat) Anthony Sobeski: Over the term of the government. I know the member for Ottawa South will be in Ottawa. Whether he will be sitting in the House remains to be seen.
We put a control on spending, a 3 per cent cap. We had good debate and we came up with a piece of legislation. When the current finance minister was looking at the budget to put controls on spending-and the member opposite might correct me if I am wrong-I believe our inflation rate was hovering around the 3 per cent to 4 per cent rate.
Inflation is now down to 1.5 per cent from 2 per cent. Therefore it was logical for the finance minister to say: "If inflation is down to 1.5 per cent, let's bring down the spending control caps to 1.5 per cent or 1.7 per cent". That simple action of cutting spending over five years by 1.3 per cent was accompanied by good fiscal management, prudence and a finance minister who said no when backbenchers or members opposite came forward and said to spend money. When the finance minister says no it represents a future savings of $7.5 billion which then carries forward each year into other budgets. I think that is significant.
For the benefit of most people out there, the Spending Control Act is not the sacrificial lamb. It is not the $15,000 study that the member for Ottawa South pointed out. There are sacrificial lambs people would like to see cut but the real savings are built upon policies like the Spending Control Act.
We have also reduced programs in the area of defence spending. There were reductions in the December economic statement and the April 1993 budget that alone total $5.9 billion over five years. This is in addition to the cuts made in successive budgets since 1989. The cumulative effect of the cuts from 1989 to 1997 will be about $14 billion. What it means for DND is that it has to start establishing priorities, putting its priorities in order. The government feels it is enough money to do the job. It just has to establish its priorities.
The funding for the green plan originally was $3 billion over five years. Again because programs have to be reduced and all departments have to share their portion of the burden, it has now been spread over six years instead of five.
We have had changes to the unemployment insurance where the average benefit was frozen in the 1992 economic statement and in the 1993 budget. That will save employees and employers contributing to the UI fund some $4.5 billion over the next five years. There have also been changes to permit eligibility. This is the voluntary quitters program that has been referred to. Again that will save over five years $2.7 billion from the premiums employees and employers have to pay into the unemployment insurance fund.
We have also seen cuts to grants and contributions. For example, grants to businesses and special interest groups were mentioned in the 1993 budget. Grants to most organizations and interest groups will be cut by 10 per cent in 1993 and 1994. They will be cut by a further 15 per cent in 1995 and by 20 per cent a year thereafter. Business and interest groups and individuals have also seen their grants cut up by $75 million in the past year and $125 million this year.
The hon. member for Mount Royal asks whether it gives one great pleasure to do this. No, it does not. There is no great pleasure in going to the taxpayers of Ottawa South and asking if they want $125 million in taxes to be used to pay for programs the member for Mount Royal wants. It is painful to do that. That is all taxes are; it is moving it from one taxpayer's pocket over to another taxpayer's pocket. The allocation that takes place is the difficult part.

I admire the member for Mount Royal for her consistency. When I say there were cuts to cultural subsidies she is well aware of them. Research Council grants have been cut. I give her credit; she is always pointing out to the government the importance of these sectors. I admire her for her consistency and I appreciate it. Certainly I witnessed it during the NAFTA debate when we saw many changes to the Copyright Act and the Patents Act. She made a tremendous contribution. The people in the cultural industry and probably even the bureaucrats in the federal department appreciate it.
I digress.
We have also seen programs eliminated. The petroleum incentive program of 1986-1987 resulted in savings of $1 billion a year. We have seen cost recovery measures. Governments provide services and it was deemed that if a service were provided to somebody or a licence issued then there should be a fee for recovery. We are seeing the fees for visitor visas and other immigration services increased. This will bring an extra $100 million into the Treasury each year. It is just paying for the cost of providing the service.
We are seeing better management of Canada student loans. Because of the high default rate the government is now collecting money from delinquent student loans, which is recovering over $40 million a year from the $1 billion that students owe.
We are seeing management improvements with, for example, the direct deposit of Public Service pay and pension cheques. Although very small it represents a savings of almost $1 million a year just by doing something simple like direct deposit.
We have seen profit making Crown corporations being asked to return more to their shareholder, the government. In 1990-1991, for example, we saw $150 million returned.
We have seen the inflation allowances for departmental capital and operating budgets being limited. This will result in savings of $1 billion between now and
1994-1995.
We have seen privatizations. We have seen the shares of Air Canada being sold to the public. That brought $707 million to the Treasury. We have seen the sale of 30 per cent of Petro-Canada, Teleglobe Canada, Canada Air, de Havilland, CNCP Telecommunications and CN Hotels. The list goes on.
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We have seen the budget for CMHC social housing frozen. We have seen CBC frozen. We have seen VIA Rail subsidies reduced. We have seen caps on transfers to the provinces. Yet in the last budget the finance minister did not reduce the transfers to provinces.
I have tried to demonstrate quickly in the limited time available what the government has done. I thank you, Mr. Speaker, for listening very patiently during my 20-minute presentation.


John Paul Manley: Mr. Speaker, I listened with a great deal of interest to my friend from Cambridge. He was quite right in saying that we worked together on the finance committee when we reviewed the spending control legislation.
He failed to mention that the unanimous report that the finance committee prepared on that was in large part rejected by the government. It was not followed. We, members from all parties, made recommendations that would have tightened the Spending Control Act but they were ignored.
I would like to take him back to the answer that I received from the government a while ago on my Order Paper question concerning the fiscal year 1991-92. I asked: "What was the total cost of all public opinion polls conducted or commissioned by any department? What was the purpose of each?"
The member made one reference to the fact that I was talking about amounts of $15,000. Indeed I did refer to one for $15,000 to test the R-2000 logo. I do not know about the member for Cambridge but my parents always taught me that if we look after the pennies the dollars will look after themselves.
I have a stack of paper that I received from the Government of Canada about public opinion polling and I am disgusted by it. I want to ask the member why we have to go through nine years of Tory government awash in rhetoric about cutting the deficit when this kind of thing is still going on in 1991-92.
Let me give a few further examples. The Minister of External Affairs spent $159,751 for two public opinion surveys. This is a 1991 update on Canadian public opinion on foreign policy and international relations.
Then there is the Minister of Finance. This one is nice and succinct. He is the one who goes around preaching to us about the deficit. He spent $226,800. Why? The survey was to assess public awareness on fiscal and

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economic issues and economic attitudes and opinions before and after the budget. That is from the Minister of Finance who was talking to us about tightening our belts.
What did the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans and the Minister for the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, the former Minister of Finance, spend? He spent $204,985 in that year. He wanted an environmental omnibus survey on fish and seafood consumption. This is a report including one customs survey, a survey of public opinion with regard to seals and sealing, cost and income surveys of fishermen and data surveys of commercial fishing licences on both coasts.
I have more. They just keep going and going. I am sure the member for Cambridge is anxious to get on his feet and distance himself from a government that would waste taxpayers' money, the hard-earned money of people in his constituency and mine, on frivolous pursuits like these.


Patrick (Pat) Anthony Sobeski: Mr. Speaker, I will make three points.
One of the things we learned during this Parliament was the desire of Canadians to be consulted. When we have a country that has 27 million people and is 4,000 miles long a government cannot be criticized for consulting.
As usual the hon. member brings out a long list. That last one works out to one-third of one cent per Canadian to study the attitudes with regard to the fisheries business and get information on it. If the hon. member is suggesting that Canadians do not want to spend less than one cent per Canadian to improve the fishing industry I do not know where he is coming from.
My final point is that he has a report before him. I was wondering whether there was an appendix attached which would explain the cost to the taxpayers of his request to dig up all this frivolous information.


Mr. Brian L. Gardiner (Prince George-Bulkley Valley):: Mr. Speaker, I rise to make a brief comment and ask a question of the member about a very important program that this government is now endangering.
I am referring to the Forest Resources Development Agreements with the provinces. The April 26 budget of the Minister of Finance said that this government is now shelving those agreements between the federal government and the provinces, which have done wonders in terms of reforestation, silvicultural work and research into forest concerns, and it is also doing so in the mining sector and in a number of other areas.
I have two brief comments with regard to the Forest Resources Development Agreements. My information on this does not come from any of the letters I have written. It comes from the government's estimates. The budget of the Minister of Finance talks about how it intends to do away with these agreements because they are generally in areas of provincial jurisdiction.
Yet I would like to refer the member to the estimates for Forestry Canada for 1992-93. It says the very opposite on page 54, that most of these agreements have now been funded in areas of exclusive federal jurisdiction, in research, wood lots and other areas. It is particularly disappointing to the people in constituencies across the country and those resource dependent communities, over 300 of them are dependent on the forest industry alone, that the message from this government is that it does not care about forestry.
Does the member think that this decision by the government, which is in the estimates, is a prelude to eliminating the Department of Forestry?


Patrick (Pat) Anthony Sobeski: Mr. Speaker, I cannot answer that question. The hon. member knows that in the Charlottetown accord a part referred to the six sisters. It talked about returning housing and forestry to provincial jurisdiction. However I cannot speak with any knowledge as to what would happen.
The member raises a very valid point. I do not dispute the numbers that he has put on the record at all because he did carefully read from the budget. I found it interesting that after the budget the finance minister was criticized because he did not cut deep enough.
After the budget there are always a number of receptions that take place. I went to one where I was greeted by a group of businessmen, eight or nine strong, who stood as a group and criticized the government. They asked: "Why did you not cut deeper?" When I broke away from that group and stood by myself someone from the mining industry came over to me. The
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mining ERDA grants were cut the same as forestry. I am not sure to what extent but they were both cut back.


Brian L. Gardiner: When they expire.


Patrick (Pat) Anthony Sobeski: When they expire, as the hon. member says. I was now one on one with this individual from the mining industry. He was part of the group that was condemning this government for not cutting deep enough but when it was one on one he asked: "Why are you picking on my industry?" That is the difficulty the finance minister has. We have to take a look at a wide range of programs and establish our priority. In this case, the mining sector and the forestry sector were cut back.
There are always cutbacks. One of my favourite groups was the Economic Council of Canada which suffered the same fate in a previous budget. These are worthwhile organizations. There are grants that are very effective for industries but when it comes time to cut back the cuts do hurt. That is the best that I can respond to the member's question.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: We switched speakers because the hon. member for Etobicoke North had an engagement that he had to attend. The hon. member for Cambridge allowed him his time. Therefore the hon. member for Cambridge was next and now we must get back to the routine again. Therefore I will go to the hon. member for Hochelaga-Maisonneuve and then I will go to the hon. member for Mount Royal on debate. The hon. member for Hochelaga-Maisonneuve.


Mr. Allan Koury (Hochelaga-Maisonneuve):: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate this opportunity to participate in this debate on the estimates.
Based on this year's budget, total expenditures should rise by only 1.5 per cent, a tiny increase, which goes to show how much attention is paid to the two major challenges facing the people of Canada and their government. More than ever, considering the size of our debt and the ever increasing debt service charges we have to
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pay, the people of Canada are expecting their government to keep spending under control.
It was with that in mind that the Spending Control Act received royal assent in 1992. This Act provides for expenditure ceilings which will ensure that between 1991-92 and 1995-96, program expenditures will not exceed the levels projected in the 1991 budget, except in specific circumstances. It also allows these ceilings to be adjusted downwards yearly. I can assure you, Mr. Speaker, that the expenditure plans contained in this these estimates are well under those required by law.
During that five-year period in an all-out effort to reduce the deficit by $30 billion, $7.5 billion in savings are planned just in government spending.
To achieve this while at the same time providing Canadians with the services they have the right to expect, the government will continue to streamline its operations to reduce its operating costs while improving its efficiency. That is why certain functions have been eliminated and certain service points closed. For instance, External Affairs will be closing down nine missions, including three embassies, while the number of immigration centres will be brought down from 64 to 51, 22 of which will be relocated with Canada Employment Centers.
With the operating budget system in place throughout the federal Public Service since April 1, 1993 managers are now invested with greater decision-making authority. With budgets covering wages, operating expenditures and minor capital expenditures, managers can chose the most efficient combination of resources to achieve their program objectives and meet the needs of their clients.
As indicated in the budget, there will be a $300 billion cut in operating budgets as well as reserves for contingencies and new initiatives in 1993-94 and further cuts in 1994-95 to reach $1.2 billion in 1997-98. Together with the wage strategy and the budget cuts instituted in the December 1992 statement this should allow for total savings of $1 billion in 1993-94, growing to $2.1 billion by 1997-98, which means that over the course of this five-year financial framework savings will amount to over $7.5 billion.

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Needless to say, because of these drastic cuts in operating budgets the Public Service needs more than ever to adapt, to innovate and to improve its efficiency.
It can be said today that the Public Service is at the forefront of new technologies in the field of information, for example as regards EDI, the electronic data interchange, as well as secondary technologies such as bar codes. EDI is already being used for collecting GST and source deductions, for electronic filing of GST and taxpayers returns, as well as to replace documents at point of entry. Moreover, as early as June 30, thanks to the Fast track initiative of Supply and Services Canada, suppliers will be electronically linked to federal departments and agencies which will help cut costs for the public sector and its suppliers, as well as improve the competitiveness of our business sector on world markets.
We are also innovating on other fronts, including the provision of services. For example, the Public Service has set up as a pilot project three service centres for Canadian businesses where business people can readily get accurate information on services and programs provided by the main federal departments and agencies. This is the case with the Edmonton service centre where, among other things, one can inquire about Supply and Services' tender process. In addition to representing 14 federal departments and organizations, as well as some provincial and municipal services, the Winnipeg centre also represents several business groups, industries and university groups. The fact that all these public organizations get together to provide in a single location the services required by their clients is the logical and desirable result of the implementation of the single window concept.
The single window concept, which was first mentioned in the 1992 budget, has become the InfoCentre initiative of the Government of Canada. An infocentre allows several departments to provide, in one location, information, publications, forms, interviews, etc., to clients who are not necessarily business people. For example, you can go to an infocentre to have a lost government cheque replaced. The Cornwall InfoCentre maintains the infosource index which provides all the available information on programs offered by federal departments
and agencies. Under the authority of Employment and Immigration, 129 infocentres already provide services on behalf of eight departments, including the Department of National Revenue, Veterans Affairs, Health and Welfare, and the Treasury Board Secretariat.
The special operating agencies, a concept which dates back to 1989, also illustrate the efforts of the government to manage its operations like the private sector. These 12 agencies, soon to be 16, are operational services which, while remaining within their respective departments, operate more according to the standards of the private sector. Many Canadians have already noticed an improvement in the service provided by the Passport Office, which was one of the first special operating agencies.
In view of such changes, public servants have had to show great adaptability. I would recall here that they, like all other Canadians, are participating in the deficit reduction effort, but that they are brilliantly meeting the many challenges they face. Thus, for the first time since the Institute of Public Administration of Canada and Coopers and Lybrand have awarded the Innovative Management Prize, the federal Public Service was among the finalists. The Department of Fisheries and Oceans, as well as Supply and Services, were chosen for their innovative ideas and were among the five finalists.
To make the contribution of public servants better known and to thank them, the government passed a bill which received royal assent on June 4, 1992 and instituted National Public Service Week, which will take place from June 13 to 19 this year. To highlight this event the government will give its annual awards of excellence and its annual prizes for employment equity. It will also be an opportunity for the departments to organize activities like awards ceremonies, conferences on better management practices, exhibits in shopping centres and visits to schools. More than ever, it is important to show that the Public Service can be proud of its employees.
I will close with these few words: the main estimates before the House are real evidence of how seriously the government takes its financial management. Eveiything is being done to reduce the cost of running the federal government and thus to reduce our deficit; also, everything is being done to give Canadians the services they
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demand in the most innovative, creative and economical way.


Nic Leblanc: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Hochelaga-Maisonneuve has spent a good part of his speech explaining that the government has undertaken with its officials a process which has led him to believe that the government is actually going to reduce its spending. He referred to government spending for previous years and for years to come.
I would like to point out to him that with respect to spending restraint, if he refers to page 21 of the 1993 budget tabled on April 26, it says the exact opposite: spending is expected to increase by about $3.6 billion next year, $3.1 billion the following year and so on for a total increase of $12.5 billion over the next five years. That is quite substantial, a $12 billion increase over five years. The hon. member would want us to believe that the government is cutting back when in fact its spending is increasing. All he has to do is read his finance minister's budget speech. It is very clear.
When he talks about deficit reduction, what he is really talking about is an increase in revenue because government revenue will indeed increase from $122 billion to $163 billion relative to spending. I would like the hon. member to check what his finance minister said in his statement to begin with. I for one believe the Minister of Finance, but apparently the hon. member does not because he is not even referring to the 1993 budget speech. I would like the hon. member for Hochelaga-Maisonneuve to tell me at the same time how he plans to achieve this deficit reduction. He knows full well as a member from the province of Quebec that one of the best ways of reducing the deficit is to start by avoiding duplication.
We know there have been detailed studies on the subject. The cost of duplication is between $2.5 and $3 billion a year, just because of administrative overlaps between the federal government and the province of Quebec. Managers in the Quebec Finance Ministry do the same as their counterparts in the Department of Finance in Ottawa. The same applies to managing economic development and manpower, with managers doing the same thing at the federal and provincial levels. It costs between $2.5 and $3 billion a year, just in administration costs. And let us not forget how ineffi-
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dent all that is. So, my first question is this: does the hon. member believe what he is saying or what the finance minister from his own party has put in writing in his budget?


Allan Koury: Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Longueuil says that we did not cut expenditures. If you look carefully, you will see that you are including previous deficits. I think you are mistaken when you say that. You will notice that cuts were made in practically all departments. You should try and see that. Do not look only at the documents.
I think you selected certain figures. I can tell you that Quebec receives about $4 billion more than it sends to the federal government. So do not tell me that you are getting short-changed.
As far as duplication is concerned, it is normal to have a federal finance minister because he oversees what is done in every provincial finance department across Canada. There are also other departments that are very important if we want to be more efficient. Look also at some of the provincial departments and you will see that there is no duplication there. I think those departments are important.


John Paul Manley: Mr. Speaker, I think the hon. member from Hochelaga would agree with me that the real waste in Quebec is all the money spent by the Bloc Quebecois to seek political indepen-dance for Quebecers, when those same Quebecers are really seeking jobs. That is what I call waste.
I would like to ask a question of the hon. member from Hochelaga about the Conservative record of fiscal management. He made a speech on public finances and, as I said earlier, I requested some pretty complete and complex information about this government's management and I received a lot of data.
I asked for specific information on the cost of opinion polls ordered by various departments. I will give the member some examples on which he may want to comment. The Minister of State responsible for Fitness and Amateur Sport requested a survey on the Thsk Force on Federal Sports Policy. Two contracts were awarded for a total of $75,000, although the actual amount paid was a bit less than that. Two other contracts were signed. The first one at $34,430 was for a telephone survey and the other one at $14,000 was for a survey of young athletes.

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The list goes on. Polls were made for Forestry. Another one made for Indian Affairs cost $150,974, and so on. Earlier, the hon. member for Cambridge said that these expenditures were not important, because they are not very substantial. For my constituents and maybe those in Hochelaga, those amounts are not so insignificant. They are in fact quite extraordinary since the Minister of Finance keeps saying that we have to cut the deficit.
I would like to hear what the hon. member has to say about that.


Allan Koury: Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to be able to answer my colleague's question. I believe in consultation across Canada. People told us that we did business without consulting them; well, now we do business after having consulted them. I think that is quite important. It costs less to consult that way than to go door to door and to have groups travel from one end of the country to the other.
It is quite important to ensure that people make their views known. The only way is to spend a few cents and not dollars as you say. It adds up to dollars, but if you take the total picture, instead of spending millions and hundreds of millions of dollars for crossing the country by plane to consult one and all, it is much better to consult as we are now doing; it costs less and the people are consulted. I sincerely believe that it is an appropriate and important way to do so.


Mrs. Sheila Finestone (Mount Royal):: Mr. Speaker, I rise to take a look on behalf of my constituents in Mount Royal from the towns of Cote St. Luc, Hampstead, Mount Royal and the areas of Snowdon and Cote des Neiges to kind of examine with their eyes the estimates that the government has tabled, the vote on the supply to government and what it implies for them.
I certainly would like to share with the people of this House and the population at large some concerns I have about the cultural sector because it is an important
industry. It has important revenue potential. I think that its vitality whether at the federal level, the provincial level or the municipal level has a growth potential that is vital to Canada regardless of language and regardless of where one lives in this country.
If we look at what the Tory finance minister has done and what the Tory thinking has been, we have seen them follow the same destructive path over the past eight and a half years. The trickle down economic philosophy that allows for market forces only without some sense of responsibility for government to enable the direction of the market forces has been pretty apparent. If one looks at the fact that we have focused on fighting this supposed deficit which was created by the poor management for the most part of this government one wonders about the manner in which this government has chosen to address the needs of a society that is in a serious state of recession, some of it brought on by this government's policies.
It should rebuild this country, help people have a sense of hope, help people face the future with a sense that someone cares and someone is listening out there.

The surveys to which my colleague referred, the hon. member for Hochelaga-Maisonneuve said cost only a few cents. For me, $5 million is not a few cents, it is an impressive amount.
Therefore I would say that protecting our society, maintaining our culture and respecting the Canadian historical development are all key and important matters.
Estimates define the financial format, the financial face, the thinking of a government. If you look at what this government has done, it has once again spawned a budget that desperately tries to achieve zero inflation and zero deficit. In actual fact the gap is far more serious and is far from zero. It lacks any kind of respect for Canadians and how they are facing everyday life for the
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most part. The rich get richer and it quickly impoverishes most people in our society.
We have had to face, as I have said, the worst recession since the thirties. We are drowning in a national debt that is now upward of $490 billion.
From the time of Confederation to 1984 our total debt was under $200 billion. From 1984 until now, nine years, it has more than doubled. It is over $450 billion. Who did it? This government that does not even know how to manage. It has managed to more than double the national debt since it came to power.
When I hear about these great Tory managers who have not been able to do anything other than double the debt, and certainly have not managed to reduce the deficit, I would ask, along with the 38 tax increases, how come all my constituents, and I am sure all theirs too, want to know where all those tax moneys are going.
We have become the most overtaxed nation in the industrial world. That is what it states in the OECD. It is not me speaking. I did not look at those figures. I am telling you what the figures say and what the international world is saying. These numbers are real. They have hard, concrete impact on Canadians and on Canadian families and to many people who are struggling in my riding.
I want to know when this government will stop its stubborn pursuit of zero inflation and start to care about the unemployed people trying so desperately to find work in an economy that has been ravaged by enormous lay-offs in the private and public sector and non-stop bankruptcies in the small and medium sized business sector.
The budget is deadly silent on the whole question of job creation. There are no training programs that have been implemented for workers, no transition mechanisms from old jobs to new and no training for the 1.5 million unemployed in our country let alone addressing those 2.6 million Canadians who are on welfare. It is a disgrace for thousands of Canadians who have to join them every week.
Unemployment in my riding is staggering and particularly in the visible minority sector and among young people, people who are fighting discrimination every day, trying to enter a work force that still shrinks every day because of this recession.
What is there in this budget to give them hope except a wait and see and, as I said, trickle down philosophy? I would suggest that in the line-ups at the food bank, which we should be closing not opening and enlarging, not many of those tummies are going to be filled with the kinds of policies we have seen from across this floor. Not too many new homes are going to be built. The waiting list for social housing gets longer all the time. Those who are suffering from a disability are also finding it very difficult.
If this is how we are going to build the program of prosperity I would hate to think of what is really going to take place because it is really a program of austerity. For the millions of unemployed, studies have estimated that there could be a savings to the government. For every one million people who are employed we would save $25 million. Therefore, if this government is really serious I would suggest that it sit down, figure out some kind of a vision for the future and put people back to work so that they can get off welfare and unemployment insurance and demonstrate through their will to work that they can make this economy grow. That is how to make this economy grow and how to make the wheel turn.
This Conservative government came to power buttressed by a single message: less government.
You do not have to write him his questions. Believe me he has been in this long enough he can write his own questions. Excuse me, Mr. Speaker, I could not help but note the sort of crib note that is being written over there.
Little did Canadians know that less government meant less for themselves. Due to the inaction of the Tories the indelible impression that is imprinted on the minds of Canadians is that government is not working for them. I can say nothing is truer than that.
The government has no comprehensive plan that aims to encourage investment in research and development, no long-term strategy designed to create jobs, no blueprint which proposes to revive the economy in an equal way.
The Liberal Party has some very good plans and I suggest that they could be very helpful in putting people back to work. We shared them with this government. We have offered all kinds of help to this government but this government is not willing to put Canadian people back to work and that is a shame.

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Rather than concentrate on the measures that would help improve the economy from infrastructure through youth programs these Tories have cut funding to social housing. They have cut out so many things it is a disgrace.
As a matter of fact while waiting for my turn to speak this evening I was looking through a book called How Ottawa Spends, published in the interest of a more democratic Canada. The edition comes out every year. This is the 1993-94 copy. These are not my facts and figures; they come from there. They are quoted also by The Toronto Star. They point out that the Tory government has used the policy of stealth to siphon billions of dollars from the country's social programs with minimal political costs. For that I would say they are rather shrewd: how to write pretty packages but do not look to the contents because they are weak or empty.
The program spending has been constrained, frozen, or reduced in social housing, legal aid, unemployment insurance, health care, social insurance, and post-secondary education among other areas. This is what these authors have said. They say the Mulroney Conservatives have fundamentally changed some foundations of modem social policy in Canada, terminating the family allowance program, abolishing the universality of the Old Age Security plan and ending federal contributions to the unemployment insurance scheme. I am quoting from Michael Print, James Rice and Ken Battle.
The result has been damaging to the social safety net and weakening to the bonds of nationhood. I think we are going to pay very seriously for these very shortsighted measures.
Somewhere by the way amidst this muddle of tax controls and empty promises we have lost track of the cultural and social institutions that have come to identify us as Canadians. What else would really identify us as Canadians over time?
I would like to see what the government has done in its spending estimates and in particular those relating to the ministry of communications and culture.
I do not want to repeat myself ad nauseam but maybe it might get through the thinking of this government when I say that culture is the way we live wherever we live, it is
whatever language we speak, it is how we eat, it is how we dress, it is how we go to work, it is how we play, it is how the games are involved, as well as it is the visual arts, the plastic arts, the music, the dance, the songs, it is pop culture, modem culture, as well as the traditions that have come in. It certainly includes an expression of multiculturalism, the diversity that is this country. In the French language and in French Quebec there is diversity as there is in francophonie across Canada, the same way there is in English, anglophone, and allophones.
The very essence of our national identity and the bedrock of our national sovereignty and pride is the way this expression is made. It gives meaning to the lives of every Canadian. It enriches the country socially, politically and economically.
I would suggest that the increased globalization and advanced technologies that are tearing down national borders, creating what Canadian economist Marshal McLuhan aptly called the global village, has become a reality.
The industries that manufacture the messages and imagery that creates the national and international cultural atmosphere has grown greatly in size and breadth and productivity capability over the last 50 years. New technology, satellites, semi-conductors, microchips, fibre optics, digitization are driving these industries at a dizzying pace.
This is industry, like agriculture is industry, like fishing is industry. Cultural matter is industry. It is big bucks. It is big money and it could be a big earner in Canada if we would get our act together and figure the whole thing out. It is also what helps to identify us in the world.
They are expanding cultural industries, they are merging, transnationalizing and becoming a significant component of the global economy. They have had a more powerful impact on our children and grandchildren than either World War I or World War II.
We deposited a study today on the implications of violence on television that demonstrates the pervasiveness of this medium and the importance it has in our lives and the variety of issues that can be addressed through this medium.
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To meet these challenges we need more than ever national commitment to cultural development. Without a commitment the Canada we know and love and are so proud of will not survive.
Past Liberal governments put a lot of policies into place which the government then went about systematically cutting. We put in Canadian content regulations for radio that are known to have fostered the domestic pop music industry.
Bill C-58 provided a tax break for business advertising in Canada so that we developed a magazine industry. They were instrumental through tax incentives, Canadian content regulations, the creation of the National Film Board and Telefilm Canada. We have encouraged through these mechanisms growth of the Canadian film and television industry.
We have created the Canada Council which has been desperately crying for more money which they fundamentally need if we want to build a base and grow in our artistic endeavours. They have been the key to nurturing creative talent in the performing and visual arts.
As a result of these far-sighted initiatives, film makers, writers, artists, designers, architects, musicians and performers today are winning international acclaim. Yet what have we done?
After 35 years of sustained achievement in the arts and winning all kinds of awards in every field of artistic endeavour, the majority of our artists have had to survive on a shoe-string. The Conservatives come in here and cut, cut, cut. They are drastic cuts. They have been the deepest in indirect subsidy cuts which were in place for most of the eighties through such programs as the capital cost allowance in film and the postal subsidies in publishing.
For example, the GST and postal subsidies cutbacks have taken away some $200 million in the past year, a far larger figure than the $19 million publishing program announced by the Minister of Communications last year. When the loss of such programs were factored in, the cuts from 1984 to last year amounted to 24 per cent while defence spending rose 38 per cent.
A year ago our standing committee talked to and expressed our real alarm at the evidence that Canadian investment in these cultural industries had been diminishing in real terms. We called for a halt to that trend.
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We recognized the potential for growth and identity and waving the Canadian flag with a sense of pride. We said: "Increase it 5 per cent per year".
What have we done? The April budget continues to cut and extend all the cuts for an additional three years to 1997-98. Program cuts of 10 per cent to grants and contributions for 1993-94 and 1994-95 will remain as announced in the December economic statement.
However the cuts will be further increased to 15 per cent and 20 per cent for every year thereafter. This will result in a total cut of $246 million over the next five years. I think that is disgraceful.
The budget also hits the CBC, cutting $50 million from its budget in 1994-95 and $100 million a year for each year thereafter. Obviously they do not like public broadcasting.
It is also interesting to note that the government is making cuts to cultural spending at 10 per cent over the next two years as compared with an operating cut of 3 per cent for government expenditures. A great example. The Canadian Conference of the Arts points out that the government imposes a standard of restraint upon the cultural sector that it is not even willing to impose on itself.
I was very distressed to learn recently that the government is continuing to ravage Radio-Canada International, RCI, which is our international voice to Europe, South America, the Middle East and Japan. It reaches about 10 million listeners, including Canadians overseas. It is a Canadian voice to our people overseas. It is the link. It is the promotional tool. It is the economic and social values that are being cut.
RCI which used to be controlled through the Department of External Affairs, which at least selected its languages, has now been transferred. In 1990 its funding was taken over by External in the amount of $13 million. It was declared to fall under grants and contributions. Therefore the RCI budget will be cut by 10 per cent in 1993-94 and 1995. It will be cut 15 per cent by 1995-96 and 20 per cent for every year after that. With an annual budget of less than $13 million these cuts are going to be the death of Radio-Canada International.
We are smaller than Holland. We are smaller than Finland. For goodness sake, do we not have any sense of pride in reaching the people, such as Canadians who are

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working overseas and our soldiers who are out there around this world? No.
The heartless, cold-blooded member has no care whatsoever about this. We merged Canada Council and SSHRC. We cut Canada Council which is so important to the lifeblood, the growth and development of a pool of talent for Canadians.
By the way, the cost which was not supposed to be very much to move, renegotiate the lease, change the computer system and negotiate the labour contracts is in excess of $9.2 million, more than $500,000 annually for this great saving by putting SSHRC and Canada Council together. It was a marriage they did not want. They had undertaken a divorce and now the Tories are forcing this remarriage. Thank goodness the Senate put in an amendment that might make some sense. It might force this government to review a very stupid undertaking.
I will conclude. I have lots more I could say but, Mr. Speaker, you have told me that this is the end of the line. It is the end of the line for many of us with this government. It is the end of the line hopefully as far as the people of Canada are concerned. We can wave bye-bye like Madam Denis did to the Prime Minister as he tried to cut old age security: "Bye-bye, Charlie Brown", "Bye-bye mes amis". That is the end of this government hopefully and not soon enough.


Charles A. Langlois: Mr. Speaker, I will be brief, because there are a few other members with questions for the hon. member for Mount Royal as well.
First of all, I would like to say to the hon. member for Mount Royal that the electoral district of Manicouagan, on the north shore of the St. Lawrence, east of Baie-Comeau, extends as far as Blanc-Sablon and includes the towns of Fermont, Schefferville and the Inuit villages on Ungava Bay. In Manicouagan, we have people who work in iron ore mines, forestry and fisheries. These are
all people who work day in, day out to earn a living and pay considerable amounts in taxes to the Government of Quebec and the federal government. Perhaps the hon. member for Mount Royal should know more about a riding like mine where people work very hard to pay taxes and support the federal government's programs.
I would like to get back to a remark by the hon. member for Mount Royal that between 1867 and 1984, the federal deficit was $200 billion. I would like to ask her, and I will have another question as well, what the cumulative deficit was in 1980 and what it was in 1984, when her party lost the election and we Conservatives took over. I will give her a chance to answer this question in a minute.
I would also like to point out that when the Conservatives came to power in 1984 the federal government had an operating deficit of $16 billion, which means that the Liberals were borrowing $16 billion every year to pay the groceries. I may point out that in 1989-90 the federal government's operating deficit, the difference between total revenues from taxes, customs duties and taxes on corporate profits, and government expenditures, which was $16 billion in the fall of 1984, at the end of the
1984-85 fiscal year had been replaced by an operating surplus of about $10 billion in 1989-90. So, between 1984-1985 and 1989-1990, our government has turned around the government current account from a $16 billion deficit to an operating surplus of over $10 billion in 1989-1990. The surplus even reached $14 billion and I can tell you that at the end of the 1992-1993 fiscal year, even in times of recession, the government current account still shows a $9 billion surplus, which means that since 1989-1990 our operating budget has been in the black not in the red as it was under the Liberals in 1984-1985 when we were swept into power.
I will conclude by putting a second question to the hon. member for Mount Royal. She should remember that in 1976, 1977 or 1978, some time maybe before she came here, but surely at least at the time that she came here, the political party she belongs to and which then formed the government put in place a price, profit and expense control policy to try to contain the then galloping inflation. In the end it did not work. I would like to ask
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her to tell us what kind of policy her government put in place at that time to control inflation. She and her colleagues complain about our interest rate policy, aimed at lowering inflation, but what did her government do in 1979 to try to fight inflation and control its increase?


Sheila Finestone: Mr. Speaker, I will answer. Do not worry. I took note of the remarks and I can assure him I will answer in due course.
First of all, I know the member for Manicouagan. You came to the committee on culture and you came to mess things up regarding Bill C-62. I remember pretty well where you are coming from, where your interests are, and I will never forget what you did either.
But regarding Manicouagan, I can tell you that I have toured this area and that I know it fairly well. I have a niece who has been working as a school teacher in Blanc-Sablon for the last four years. It is beautiful where you come from. I went fishing there and I enjoyed the locals. I know a few of the Cree who live there as well as their chief and a few women.
Regarding your questions on inflation and what we did beween 1976 and 1978, I can tell you that we created jobs. You know, jobs, jobs, jobs. It is us, the Liberals, who created the jobs. Not only did we create jobs, but go and ask ordinary Canadians if they had a better life in the sixties and the seventies than now. Did they keep more money in their pocket than they do know?
I must tell you that they felt much better then, even during the recession in 1981 and 1982 when we went through a world-wide recession, whereas the one we are in now is the direct result of the government's policies and that makes all the difference in the world.


Ms. Margaret Mitchell (Vancouver East):: I would like to congratulate the member on her very passionate speech on a very important subject. I would like to ask her, since I have a special interest as she knows in multiculturalism, to relate a little bit about multicultur-alism and Canadian culture generally.
We know that part of our culture and our ethics in Canada is to respect diversity. But it seems to me that regardless of which ethnic group or which language group or which region of Canada we come from, we still must have some kind of common bond which is Canada,
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which is greater than the sum of all of us. It is very hard to describe what that is.
I wondered if she would like to make a stab at saying whether or not Canada has a distinct culture and what this might consist of. Also what can we be doing to more effectively promote a distinct Canadian culture?


Sheila Finestone: Mr. Speaker, I visited the riding of the hon. member for Vancouver East and had a very good time in that area. We had some fun together. Her question is one that would take time to examine because it has many parts to it.
With the development of a proper distribution and marketing responsibility held in the hands of Canadians, we could improve the visibility and the star-making potential the Americans are so good at.
One must recognize that our screens, whether it is theatre, television or video, have less than 5 per cent of any Canadian content yet we have more talent per square inch in Canada than almost any other country in the world.
I guess by our regional nature we have in the making- and I would put it that way-we are in the making of an extraordinary cultural expression indigenous to ourselves. It is not old enough yet to have passed all the tests of time.
It is certainly there in the field of creative writers as we win prizes all around the world, in French and English. Certainly we win in the field of song and in the field of dance. Of course we have on the French side some extraordinary creative works which have gained world prominence.
It is hard to say that it is strictly Canadian but it is an amalgam of the region in which one lives. Canada is a regionalized country as well. Whether one is of a visible minority or white but with a diversified background, which is found in all shades of the spectrum, there is an approach that expresses a sense of sensitivity, tenderness and care that is particular to Canada. It differs from the rest of the world.
One hears it expressed in song, in music and in writing. Our great expanse of geography and territory, the grand north, the cold weather, all those factors play into it. Now I am getting into a whole philosophical trend and I do not want to do that right now.

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Jesse Philip Flis: Mr. Speaker, just before coming to the Chamber I had a call from Patrick Lyons of the alumni at Woodsworth College, University of Toronto. He was calling the alumni to raise funds because he said that this had been the lowest funding the University of Toronto had had in 10 years.
I wanted to ask the hon. member whether the Quebec post-secondary institutions are faced with the same critical problem of the federal government reducing transfer payments to post-secondary institutions. What implications will this have on our future as Canadians?


Sheila Finestone: Mr. Speaker, with the cuts in transfer payments right across the land, of course there has been cutting in the post-secondary educational field. It has impacted right across this country.
The implications are in a globalized world of economic development and growth where technology, excellence and value added are the keys. If we do not develop the intellectual capacity of our students at this point so that we can became increasingly more competitive, we are doing and rendering a disservice unto ourselves. That is what this government has done. It has rendered Canadians a disservice in this manner.


John Paul Manley: Mr. Speaker, my colleague has been expressing concern about cuts. She no doubt will want to look for areas in which cuts can be made and I have some suggestions for the Department of Communications that perhaps she would agree with.
Does the hon. member think that this government that talks about deficit reduction was wise to spend $30,000 on public opinion research in the Department of Communications? This was to check key indicators estimating the economic impact of copyright violation.
There were public opinion surveys on programs such as an audience reaction to the film Nurses, a study of pre-recorded video cassettes in health and social services sectors in Quebec, a study of the use and purchase of pre-recorded video cassettes in the francophone educational market of Ontario. Is this a good way to spend our scarce cultural and communications dollars?


Sheila Finestone: No, not at all. I thank my hon. colleague for all the information he was able to bring about this supposedly competent, careful, caring government and the fact that for $5 million we did not get anything of much value at all.


Mr. Darryl L. Gray (Bonaventure-Iles-de-la-Made-leine):: Mr. Speaker, it is soon to be nine years that I have had the honour and privilege of representing my constituents in the House of Commons. And I am still astonished to listen to the Official Opposition.
With all due respect-because we do all respect in this great Chamber-I am astonished to listen to the hon. lady speak about government cuts and government debt when $200 billion was spent by the Liberal Party up to 1984 having assumed government with zero national debt.
The hon. member has the audacity to speak about the mean Tories trying to get the debt under control. I understand how my constituents feel when they listen to debate in the House of Commons. One side stands up and the other side contradicts it. They mislead the people with the mention of cuts in culture and communication.
The national debt we inherited in 1984 was $200 billion. Had we not had to pay just the accumulated interest, today we would have an extra $40 billion to $50 billion to help all those interest groups and departments of which the hon. member has spoken.
The hon. member said it was $200 billion and that we have doubled it. If I recall correctly in 1984 the Liberal Party left an annual deficit which was very close to $40 billion. We have tried just to continue to pay the interest on the waste of the previous government. If my calculations are correct, and they quite often are, speaking as a small c Conservative, had the Liberals remained in power our national debt today with their programs and policies would be in excess of $700 billion. That is a very conservative estimate.
When talking about government expenditures, the hon. member has mentioned that the Liberal policy prior to 1984 was jobs. They did create jobs in my constituency. It was called the national picnic table project. You worked for 10 weeks either building picnic tables or

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cutting bushes. The young men and women who worked on the projects received no job training, only to get their 10 weeks in stamps, no job formation. To keep in line with the times, $200 billion was squandered with nothing in return but a make work project.
We have dealt very efficiently in trying to cut our expenditures since 1984. As my hon. colleague from Manicouagan has stated, we have cut government expenditures and government operations and turned them into a surplus.
Canadians realized in 1984 that votes could no longer be purchased by wasting money. Votes could not be purchased by making false promises. Fiscal restraint had to be brought into order. That is what we began in 1984 and we continue today.
With the main estimates for 1993-94 and with the budget of the Minister of Finance we attempted to meet two goals, two important challenges for Canadians: the challenge of restraint and the challenge of reform.
After the 1984 election it was very difficult when the Progressive Conservative government said it must impose some types of restraints. It was very difficult and very unpopular. The former manufacturing tax was hidden and no one knew what they were paying so we introduced the goods and services tax. It was very unpopular but very open.
We listened today to the Official Opposition with great interest on this side of the House with regard to what its tax policy is. At one point its hon. leader said it would scrap the GST. Next time around the hon. Leader of the Liberal Party said the Liberals would study it for two years. Then there was another statement that said perhaps that tax should be hidden.
They were thrown out in 1984 partly because the tax was hidden and Canadians wanted to see what they were paying up front. The final part of the party platform is that it will go to an all-party committee. The Liberals have formed the government for most of our over 126 years of existence and they have never listened to anyone but themselves. What would ever make Canadians believe they would listen to anyone except their own group?
We have continued in the ways of restraint, a very difficult problem and very difficult for all Canadians. During the past eight years this government has sold or
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dissolved 20 Crown corporations and has wound up, merged or consolidated another 40 government organizations. This is a remarkable record and one we are continually striving to improve upon. Nonetheless this government is not content to dwell on its past successes. Rather we are thinking about the future.
In 1992 this House approved the Spending Control Act, legislation significantly limiting program spending for the next five years. Be assured the spending plans outlined in these main estimates are well within the limits prescribed by that act. In fact the Minister of Finance has announced that the limits within the act will be trimmed even further in order to bring them into line with the reductions set out in our recent budget.
Canadians have said time and again that we must cut our spending and that they want more bang for the buck. We have been doing that. We have responded with a total of $30 billion in spending cuts within the last budget and a reduction in the cost of government by $1.2 billion by 1997-98. This is in response to what Canadians have told us must be done. These are difficult steps to take and as I stated earlier many times unpopular. We must demand that taxpayers get value for their dollars.
To continue on with the spending estimates, the Prime Minister initiated Public Service 2000. I would imagine that on many occasions the Public Service is not always in love with the politicians and perhaps vice versa. Public servants are doing their part. They realize that they too are on the payroll of all Canadians. They are being asked at the same time as everyone else to produce more with fewer dollars. They are implementing new ideas and making limited dollars work harder for the benefit of all Canadians.
The government is also working toward removing the obstacles that block Canadians from dealing easily with the Public Service.

In French, we have the term guichet unique.

The single window concept will allow several services to be attained at the same place. This is a very innovative idea with much less cost to Canadians who need both services and information with regard to the federal government. Canada's public servants are working harder to establish a more client-centred environment in order to serve all Canadians. Our government is dedi-

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cated to making a Canadian system work and making our system work with limited resources.
We have mortgaged our grandchildren and children to come. This cannot be continued. It must be known, and all Canadians widely accept it, that we must do more with fewer tax dollars.
In her closing remarks the hon. member talked about cuts in several departments. Choices must be made. Choices will have to be made by all Canadians and by governments as to what can be afforded, what we can pay and what we cannot pay. I believe strongly that all Canadians wish to participate in government operations. All Canadians wish to contribute in their own way, be it physical, intellectual or monetary. All Canadians must be required to contribute to the betterment of the well-being of our society.
It is indisputably clear to every member of this House that this government has had the courage of its convictions and has established an unswerving course toward fiscal responsibility. We are a government that will live within its means and in this way provide a secure future for all Canadians.
The budget reductions found in the main estimates before us today are only one of many steps toward a more prosperous tomorrow and the removal of the burden of the national debt from the backs of those to follow us.
We have had a passion for reform and many times have been criticized for not going far enough. It is very difficult to make drastic cuts without influencing some sector of our society.
In the early eighties there was a horrible recession. In the late seventies I was building a house and the interest rate on my mortgage was 22.75 per cent. The excuse by the government of the day at the time was that it was a hard recession and we needed the high interest rates. Like all Canadians, I paid the price. We borrowed from Central Mortgage and Housing at 22.75 per cent.
We have just come through a very difficult, very long and very hard recession. For those Canadians who follow Canadian government and Progressive Conservative policy we have had two years of a difficult world-wide recession and our interest rates today are about 6 per cent. As a non-partisan member of this House, there has
to be something right there. The previous recession was not judged to be as severe as the recession we have just come through. Yet interest rates then were 22.75 per cent and now they are 6 per cent. Our policy must have something going for it.
A Canadian family paying a $500 mortgage with interest rates 10, 12, or 14 points below what they were under the Liberals when we were coming out of a mild recession is saving in excess of $50 per month. I should take the opportunity to congratulate the President of the Treasury Board and our Minister of Finance for our sound fiscal policy.
It becomes difficult when we debate in the House of Commons, as Canadians listen, who is going to do what. Our party has the fiscal policy, the fiscal will and the political will. We have shown it in the past and we will continue to do so in the future. No, program parties and false promises will not fly with Canadians in the next election campaign.
Canadians have put the challenge to us, the government, and we have risen to the occasion. With the estimates tabled here today our government will truly be providing more for less. Moreover, we will be steadfast in our commitment to control spending, eliminate waste and contain the cost of government.
These main estimates are a reaffirmation of this government's long established tradition of responsible stewardship of Canada's finances. As we continue toward the year 2000 we have laid the basis and we will continue to do the groundwork for a better, safer and richer Canada.


Brian L. Gardiner: Mr. Speaker, I will be brief. I appreciated listening to the hon. member's comments. I have a question for him about the estimates for Forestry Canada, which I have in my hand. I served on the forestry committee with my colleague and I know he is concerned about the future of our forests in Canada.
The estimates outline some of the highlights of Forestry Canada for all different parts of the country including British Columbia and Quebec. The forest agreements have helped a considerable amount in my province and in the member's province. I would like to ask the member, knowing his concern about this particular issue, the concerns he might have about the government's
June 2, 1993

announcement that when these agreements expire they will not be renewed.
I know the member has some concerns about the resource communities that are dependent on forestry and mining. I wonder if he could give us some indication in what direction we might be going in this regard. I have a sense, maybe misplaced, that what we might be looking at in this Parliament before the next election is a change in the cabinet line-up and in particular the Minister of Forestry or maybe doing away with that department. I wonder if the member has any particular insights into that and also some of his concerns perhaps about the expiry and eventual doing away with the forest agreements.


Darryl L. Gray: Mr. Speaker, my colleague asks about the forestry programs we have in place, particularly in British Columbia and the province of Quebec. One of the difficulties, as has been stated at first ministers' conferences, is the duplication of programs.
One of the suggestions made and I think widely accepted is to eliminate duplication in jurisdictional powers among the ministries. In the long run it would be better to have a division of these powers so that the provinces know what they are doing, what they are responsible for, and the federal government knows what it is doing. We do not need two bureaucracies.
As my hon. colleague knows, and I can speak with more authority coming from the province of Quebec, the Minister of Forestry in the province of Quebec, the hon. Mr. Albert Cote, has asked for some time now to have exclusive provincial power over forestry. This is one solution, but the solution is not 100 per cent fair because we have to go through the transition period.
I would tell my colleague it is difficult with the cutting in the different departments. The only way we can arrive at a solution is to increase taxes and cut government spending. People are taxed enough. We can only cut so much. The forestry area has been asked to absorb the 10 per cent cuts like other departments.
It becomes difficult but I believe that by working with the provinces, the federal government and the forestry sector in our own provinces we will arrive at a solution.
Supply
Again as I mentioned earlier in my speech we must learn to do more with less dollars.


Mr. Derek Lee (Scarborough-Rouge River):: Mr. Speaker, I listened to the hon. member and I heard him say that his government was committed to living within its means. I am sure I heard that.
I know that the hon. member this evening will rise in his place and vote in favour of estimates and a government financial program that involves a deficit of some $38 billion. That is not living within one's means. I would have to admit that the government and Parliament have failed to live within their means for a whole lot of years.
Having said that, I want to point this out to the member and ask for his comments. One of the major functions of this place, of this Parliament, is to approve and appropriate every single dollar that is spent by government. We authorize the tax and the expenditure. That procedure is called estimates.
Every year the estimates are brought into the House and placed with committees that are supposed to review the estimates and make comment. If I am not mistaken, not one committee of this House has completed its function in reviewing the estimates in this critical year and not one committee has reported back to the House on the estimates in this critical year.
I will premise my question to the hon. member by saying that this party has made some reform proposals to help this place do its job better in dealing with estimates. I am asking him what he has done, what he will do as a backbencher in that party, what his government has done or what it will do to reform this place and permit Parliament through its work appropriating and authorizing government expenditures?


Darryl L. Gray: Mr. Speaker, to go back to my earlier remarks, I mentioned that we passed the Spending Control Act, one of the acts passed to control government spending.
With regard to my hon. friend's comments about the individual committees and the estimates, it is a well known fact with the committee reform brought in by this government that committees have much more power than they had in the past.

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I am not in a position to speak on behalf of all committees but there is a window that is open for all committees to study estimates. At the same time all committees have an opportunity to invite and look at any types of legislation they so desire.
With the votes coming tonight in the House of Commons, my hon. friend should realize that in all committees there are three official parties and if any one member for any party including the government side, but usually it happens in opposition, uses delaying tactics in the committee then of course we run out of time.
I not sure if that answer is sufficient to my hon. colleague but of course when we get into the vast amount of expenditures it is very difficult to get down $4.80 or $480 as his hon. colleague spoke about this afternoon. It is very difficult when you start questioning every expenditure.
I would assume it was the good will of the government that brought in committee reform and government reform. As we get ready to sit and form the next government we will again become more and more independent and give all members of the House more authority in questioning how we spend Canadian tax dollars.


Jesse Philip Flis: Mr. Speaker, I am sure the hon. member was present in 1983 until the Prime Minister was elected leader of the Conservative Party. The leader then predicted he could reduce the deficit to about $3 billion by the year 1990. In fact, by the year 1990 the deficit was 10 times that to the tune of $30.5 billion.
He was in caucus. He supports the leader. What happened? Why did he not insist in caucus that his leader live up to the promise made during the leadership race?


Darryl L. Gray: Mr. Speaker, I was indeed at the convention in 1983 and the good Lord willing I will be in 1993.1 guess it would not be fair to say who I am supporting but we know that the province of Quebec has been known to produce some great statesmen.
When we took the reins of power, we might be excused in saying the books were not the same. We have
introduced more measures of restraint than the former Liberal government did since Confederation.
My hon. friend mentions $3 billion. We cut government spending. We stopped frivolous spending. We moved into job creation and job training, something that was never done before. We went through a world-wide recession with a $30.5 billion deficit while they went through boom years with a $40 billion deficit.
We went through the worst recession known since the 1930s and came out with a 6 per cent interest rate. They went through a mild recession with an interest rate of 22.75 per cent. That is good sound fiscal policy.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: Mr. Speaker, I will be Charestable, I mean charitable and ask him a short question.
In 1975, the time of the last balanced budget in Canada, the deficit was $55.8 billion. In 1993 the present deficit is $458 billion. Would the member tell the House the names of the two political parties that were in power in the years between 1975 and 1993?


Darryl L. Gray: Mr. Speaker, one of the parties was not the New Democratic Party. It had one opportunity in Ontario and we see what it has done in three short years. Thank God for that.
As I explained earlier with the $200 billion deficit, the accumulated debt we received in 1984 and the accumulated interest on it, we have brought the annual deficit down to $30 billion. If the Liberals had stayed in power we would now owe today in excess of $700 billion.
We are down in government operations and spending to a surplus of $9.7 billion which is something that was never seen until the Grits got hold of a zero deficit and squandered $200 billion. Another 10 years of Tory government sound fiscal policy and everything will be under control.


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Mr. Speaker, I want to say a few words in this debate today. We have a bit of time before 10 o'clock p.m. for my friend from Okanagan-Shuswap if that is okay with the Chair.
I believe the debt and deficit problems in this country are now getting very serious. Let us look at some of the basic facts. In 1975 which is only 18 years ago the national debt was some $55.8 billion and the annual interest
June 2, 1993

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payments on that debt were $3.9 billion. Eighteen years later after nine years of Conservative government and nine years of Liberal government the national debt had gone from $55.8 billion up to $458 billion. That is $458 billion in 18 short years. Our interest payment now on that debt per year is no longer $3.9 million but is $39.5 billion. It is 10 times as high as it was some 18 years ago.
This debt is being run up for two or three major reasons by Liberal and Conservative governments. It is being run up because for many years we have not had a proper jobs policy where we put all our energies and imaginations to work to create long-term jobs for the Canadian people. The best way to pay down a debt is to have jobs for the people of this country.
Second, in the last four or five years, particularly between 1988 and 1991, we have had a high interest rate policy in this country. The bank rate has been much higher than it should have been, particularly for shortterm interest rates in Canada. As a result we are now paying billions and billions more in interest on our national debt. Our national debt is much higher because of high interest rate policies.
At times the bank rate in this country was 5 per cent higher than the bank rate of the United States. When that happened the economy slowed down which created more unemployment. We had higher interest payments on the national debt, municipal and provincial debts and personal and business debts right across this country.
For those two reasons in particular we have seen in this country a national debt that is now much higher than it should be. We have a national debt that is the second-worst of the G-7 countries and almost the worst in the OECD. That is the legacy of the Conservative government across the way. That is the legacy it has left us after nine long lean years in power.
Another reason why we have a large debt in this country is that we have had a tax system that is very unfair. Wealthy people have been getting many tax breaks for family trusts. Large corporations have many different loopholes. There is exemption for capital gains outside of the family farm, the residence and small business. There have been exemptions for entertainment. There have been many, many exemptions. On the revenue side we are collecting less money than we should because of tax breaks for wealthy people.
At the same time there have been hand-outs for the wealthy. In the last budget, tabled only a month or so ago, there was some $3.3 billion in subsidies for business and much of that was for large business. Over the years we have seen many, many hand-outs by the government to their large business friends such as the Reichmanns, Olympia & York, the Campeau Corporation and many other corporations. They built their ivory towers, their huge buildings and many of them were very unproductive. Now they are in massive debt as well. But many of these things were built because of hand-outs and really corporate welfare for the rich. For those reasons we have a very serious problem now with our national debt.
Why address the problem? First of all, this debt costs us a lot of money in terms of workers. We did some calculations the other day and found, for example, that the average Canadian worker with a spouse and two children, earning the average wage in this country, ends up costing the Canadian government a lot more money if he or she is unemployed. The average worker will cost the federal government some $2,200 in forgone income tax, $730 in reduced federal sales taxes, $730 in forgone pension and unemployment insurance contributions, $6,700 in unemployment insurance benefits claimed, and some $2,300 in the federal share for new welfare claims. That is the average cost of one worker being unemployed to the federal government in this country, a worker who made the average salary with a spouse and two dependants.
For the provincial governments this is what that average will cost: $1,150 in forgone income tax, $850 in reduced provincial sales taxes and $2,800 in the provincial share for new welfare claims.
If you add that up, Mr. Speaker, the total cost for the average unemployed worker in this country for the federal and provincial governments in a year is $17,500. That person is not paying the income tax he or she would be paying, that person is not paying the sales tax GST or other excise taxes they would be paying if they were working. That person in turn is drawing either unemployment insurance benefits or welfare from one of our provincial or territorial governments.
What a human waste, just in terms of the dollars and cents that worker costs this country and loses this country in terms of being unemployed. This does not even include the human cost, the human misery of someone walking the unemployment lines in this country, trying to find a job and applying time and time again

June 2, 1993
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and being turned down time and time again by employers. The human cost is not even measurable but that is the cost of the policy of the government across the way.
Why address the debt, the human costs, the cost to the government and the cost to the country? We should also address the debt because it threatens the government's ability to act. When one-third of our tax dollar, when one-third of our budget goes to pay the interest on the national debt that leaves very little money to pursue employment and social programs.
A large part of the debt is owed to wealthy people and when the deficit goes up in many cases it is a transfer of wealth to the wealthy, creating more inequality and inequity.
Why address the debt? If we do not address the debt we are not going to get the bankers off our backs. And when the bankers are on our backs we are not going to have the money to create new social programs. We are not going to have the money to protect our social programs, the Canada Pension Plan or the medicare we have today. Those are the reasons why we have to address the debt.
We must address the debt because more and more of our debt is now being held offshore by foreigners. Some
22.5	per cent of the federal debt today is held by foreigners. A few years ago it was well under 10 per cent of the federal debt being held by foreigners but today more of that money is going out to Paris, Zurich, New York and Chicago. There might be some wealthy Republican in Phoenix, Arizona driving a Cadillac who is clipping his coupons and making money off a provincial government or the federal government of this country.
Finally, on the provincial level, some 35 per cent of the debt is now owed to foreigners.
There are many things we can do. We can be spending more wisely, spending money on job creation, bringing down interest rates, cancelling things such as the helicopter program, cutting out many of the subsidies for big business in this country.
Those are things we can do. If we do not do it we are going to see Conservative governments in the future attacking social programs. We are already seeing Preston Manning talking about this across the west, attacking social programs, old age pensions, the Canada Pension Plan and eventually medical care.
Those are some of the reasons why we should be addressing the debt. I would like to leave the rest of my time for my friend from Okanagan.


Mr. Lyle Dean Mac William (Okanagan-Shuswap):: Mr. Speaker, I do thank my colleague for the opportunity to share the time with him, because this is a very important matter of debate.
The fact is that for the last four years we have found ourselves in the midst of the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement. What we have found is a nation that has been racked by a protracted recession, a nation that has been burdened by a spiralling national debt and a nation that has experienced a painful and extended restructuring of its economy.
There has been a growing sense of desperation in this country. There is a sense that something must be done to free us from the kind of economic straitjacket that threatens to strangle our economy and also our ability to control our national destiny.
In the past four years we have witnessed a dramatic decline in job creation in Canada. The increase in the number of unemployed in this country has exceeded 530,000. The national unemployment rate has climbed to an unprecedented high of 11.6 per cent. There are 1.6 million Canadians out of work.
This recession is different from other recessions. The fact is that a substantial number of the jobs that have been lost will not come back. They are gone for good. Sixty to 70 per cent of the jobs in Canada's manufacturing sector are gone for good because the plants have simply closed up and moved south of the border. That has been the reality of the free trade agreement.
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Since the FTA has come into effect our industrial base has been seriously eroded in virtually every sector. We see factories all over Canada curtailing operations, being abandoned, moving south of the border, or simply being converted to distribution and storage functions. The most immediate effect of the free trade agreement has been the deindustrialization of Canada.
As Peter C. Newman said a while back in Maclean's, we are about to become the only country in recorded history to actually reverse the traditional evolution from underdevelopment to a manufacturing economy.
In the list of the top 13 industrial powers in The Economist registered in 1991, Canada stood dead last. Its position has not changed much since then in terms of its economic output. By May of last year we had lost over
568,000	jobs in our goods producing sector since the free trade agreement was signed.
In 1980 Canadian manufacturers served some 73 per cent of our domestic market but by 1991, to show how it has changed, that percentage was down to some 56 per cent. Something has clearly gone wrong with our national economy.
We all know that the bottom line of the production of any economy is its gross domestic product. That is simply the total value of all goods and services that are produced. When we look at information from StatsCan in the three years before the free trade agreement came into effect our GDP grew by an average of 12.5 per cent. In the three years subsequent to the FTA coming in that growth had virtually collapsed to a minuscule 0.1 per cent growth.
The question has to be asked: what is going on? Canada was supposed to have benefited from free trade. The agreement was supposed to have opened up new market opportunities. We were supposed to have gained access to that great American market. What it turns out to be is that the FTA is really more about where new investment was going to locate rather than in obtaining any greater access to American markets.
Canadians were repeatedly told that the free trade agreement would produce new investment, new jobs and greater economic activity. What they were not told was that it would all be south of the border.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: It being ten o'clock, it is my duty pursuant to Standing Order 81(16) to interrupt the proceedings and put forthwith every question necessary to dispose of the business of supply.
The question is on the motion of the President of the Treasury Board respecting Vote 1. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: No.


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


Some hon. members:: Yea.


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


Some hon. members:: Nay.


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


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Call in the members.
And the division bells having rung:


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Before proceeding with the taking of the division on the motion, I would like to tell the House that our Speaker was released today from the hospital.


Some hon. members:: Hear, hear.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: He will be recuperating in British Columbia for a few weeks. He asked me to thank each and every one of you for your prayers and for your good wishes. He hopes to see us all very soon.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: I declare the motion carried.


Gilles Loiselle: That the Main Estimates for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1994, laid upon the table Thursday, February 25, 1993, except the items disposed of earlier this day and less the amounts voted in Interim Supply, be concurred in.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.
++NAYS


Some hon. members:: On division.
Members


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Allmand	Althouse
Anawak	Angus
Arseneault	Assad
Axworthy (Winnipeg South Centre)	Belair
Bellemare	Benjamin
Bevilacqua	Black
Blaikie	Boudria
Breaugh	Brew in
Caccia	Catterall
Clancy	Crawford
Dingwall	Duceppe
Duhamel	Ferguson
Finestone	Flis
Fontana	Foster
Fulton	Funk
Gaffney	Gagliano
Gardiner	Gauthier
Grey (Beaver River)	Guamieri
Harb	Harvard
Harvey (Edmonton East)	Heap
Hovdebo	Hunter
Jordan	Keyes

Gilles Loiselle: That the Supplementary Estimates (A) for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1994, laid upon the table Ihesday, May 25, 1993, be concurred in.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: On division.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
June 2, 1993
Gilles Loiselle: that Bill C-134, an act for granting to Her Majesty certain sums of money for the Public Service of Canada for the financial year ending March 31, 1994, be read the first time and printed.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Pursuant to Standing Order 69(1), the motion is deemed adopted.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.


Gilles Loiselle: that the bill be read the second time and referred to Committee of the Whole.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: On division.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the second time and the House went into committee thereon, Mr. Paproski in the chair.
Steve Eugene Paproski: Order. House in Committee of the Whole on Bill C-134, an act for granting to Her Majesty certain sums of money for the Public Service of Canada for the financial year ending March 31, 1994.
Shall clause 2 carry?
Clause 2 agreed to.


Steve Eugene Paproski: Shall clause 3 carry?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: On division.
Clause 3 agreed to.


Steve Eugene Paproski: Shall clause 4 carry?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: On division.
Clause 4 agreed to.


Steve Eugene Paproski: Shall clause 5 carry?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: On division.
Clause 5 agreed to.


Steve Eugene Paproski: Shall clause 6 carry?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.
Supply


Some hon. members:: On division.
Clause 6 agreed to.


Steve Eugene Paproski: Shall Schedule A carry?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: On division.
Schedule A agreed to.


Steve Eugene Paproski: Shall Schedule B carry?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: On division.
Schedule B agreed to.


Steve Eugene Paproski: Shall clause 1 carry.


David Charles Dingwall: Mr. Chairman, can the President of the Treasury Board give assurances to this House that the bill is in the usual form of a supply bill with no additions or no alterations?


Gilles Loiselle: Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to inform the hon. member and the House that the form of this bill is the same as that passed in the previous years.
Clause 1 agreed to.


Steve Eugene Paproski: Shall the preamble carry?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: On division.


[Stage Direction]
Preamble agreed to.
Steve Eugene Paproski: Shall the title carry?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: On division.


[Stage Direction]
Title agreed to.
Bill reported.
Gilles Loiselle: that the bill be concurred in.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: On division.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Gilles Loiselle: that the bill be read the third time and passed.

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Madam Deputy Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: On division.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the third time and passed.

Mitchell
Nunziata
Ouellet
Peterson
Pickard
Rideout
Robinson
Rompkey
Skelly (North Island-Powell River)
Stewart
Vanclief
Waddell
Young (Acadie-Bathurst)-89
Nault
Nystrom
Parent
Phinney
Proud
Riis
Rocheleau
Saint-Julien
Speller
Tobin
Venne
Wappel

[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from Tuesday, June 1, consideration of Bill C-101, an act to amend the Canada Labour Code and the Public Service Staff Relations Act, as reported (with amendments) from a legislative committee.
Madam Deputy Speaker:: Pursuant to Standing Order 45(5)(a), the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred division on Motion No. 3 at report stage of Bill C-101, an act to amend the Canada Labour Code and the Public Service Staff Relations Act.


PAIRED MEMBERS
Some hon. members:: Agreed.
Berger	Charest
Copps	Dick
Edwards	Halliday
Hopkins	Hirner (Vancouver Quadra)
Vezina	Walker


Madam Deputy Speaker:: I declare the motion lost.


Hon. Marcel Danis (Minister of Labour) moved: that the bill, as amended, be concurred in.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt this motion?


Some hon. members:: On division.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Madam Deputy Speaker:: It being 10.44 p.m. the House stands adjourned until tomorrow morning at 10 a.m. pursuant to Standing Order 24(1).


[Stage Direction]
The House adjourned at 10.44 p.m.
[Stage Direction]
Thursday, June 3, 1993