1993-02-17

Mr. Guy Saint-Julien (Abitibi):: Mr. Speaker, the effects of the recession are being felt in Japan, where businesses are limiting overtime and cutting staff. Bankruptcies are at the highest level in six years: there were 14,167 in 1992, compared to 10,723 in 1991.
According to some economists, Japan's economy has never been worse since the 1973 oil shock and businessmen are calling for lower taxes and a recovery budget.
Hundreds of firms have laid off contract, term or part-time workers hired in boom times. Other companies are encouraging employees to leave by taking early retirement.
These staff cuts subsequently affect small retailers and small and medium sized businesses, which are the backbone of the Japanese economy.


INTERNATIONAL YEAR OF INDIGENOUS PEOPLES
Mr. Robert E. Skelly (Comox-Alberni):: Mr. Speaker, on December 10, the beginning of the International Year of Indigenous Peoples, the Australian Prime Minister apologized to aboriginal Australians for the damage caused to them by colonization.
A few days ago Bill Clinton drew attention to the fact that many American children experience conditions like those found in Third World countries such as Haiti and Bolivia.
In Canada, we have witnessed incidents such as substance abuse at Davis Inlet, high suicide rates at Big Cove, a rash of sexual assault charges at Sandy Bay and racist taunts of young Micmac hockey players.
When is our Prime Minister going to follow the lead of
U.S. President Clinton and recognize that many aboriginal children in Canada live in Third World conditions?


LITERACY DAY
Mr. Ken James (Sarnia-Lambton):: Mr. Speaker, as all members have been made aware, today is Love Literacy Day. With the support of the Minister of Multiculturalism and Citizenship, Frontier College, the Canadian Alliance for Literacy and the Movement for Canadian Literacy, we are focusing attention on this day.
It is a most appropriate time to pay tribute to the literacy organizations and the many volunteers who are active on this vital issue. The Canadian Alliance for Literacy, composed of national organizations working for literacy, brings together advocates for the promotion of literacy in Canada.
It is partnerships among funders such as the National Literacy Secretariat within the Department of Multiculturalism and Citizenship as well as provincial governments. It is partnerships between the non-governmental organizations, business, labour and governments.
Canadians and the organizations which support the literacy movement are the front line champions of literacy. On behalf of the Government of Canada and all Canadians, I offer my sincere gratitude for their efforts to achieve full literacy for all Canadians.

Love Literacy Day is an opportune time for recognizing the indispensable importance of literacy volunteers and their organizations to Canadian society.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
Mr. Stan Keyes (Hamilton West):: Mr. Speaker, constituents have brought to the attention of some members of the House that the Department of External Affairs circulated a data input form inviting Canadians to document breaches of humanitarian law in the former Yugoslavia.
The form states that: "Canada will draw on information gathered by this process in preparing a report to the UN Secretary-General" and should be mailed to an Ottawa post office box.
The form asks for the name of the person filling out the form, a description of events such as "rape, torture, execution, unfair trials and so on". It also calls for names and commentary on individuals who have allegedly committed breaches of law under the heading "Perpetrators".
How has Canada become involved in this witch-hunt which smacks of McCarthyism. Imagine someone in Canada who knows someone or some people in the former Yugoslavia they do not like. They attribute all sorts of atrocities to them and get others to do likewise.
How is this information verifiable? Is Canada to be party to this potential kangaroo court? More important, how can this Draconian measure be condoned by this government? I ask the Prime Minister to direct his ministers to put a stop to this shameful exercise.


TOBACCO SMUGGLING
Mrs. Lise Bourgault (Argenteuil-Papineau):: Mr. Speaker, ridicule will finally kill society.
Rich tobacco smugglers can buy real estate and other property with complete peace of mind, owing to a defect in the Criminal Code that does not provide for the seizure of goods acquired from the sale of smuggled cigarettes.
The warehouses of flue cured tobacco producers are robbed in broad daylight by criminals who sell the contraband in our famous flea markets. Distributors and retailers lost over $150 million in 1992 because of this illegal trade.
The governments in Quebec and Ottawa lost almost $1 billion in 1992, $450 million for Quebec and $500 million for Ottawa as its share of the tax that would have been collected in Quebec. Imagine the disaster for all of Canada.
Crime has increased 100 per cent and Canadian smokers have become the accomplices of organized crime, something which has not been seen since Prohibition. This has been going on since July 1991 and it is time to stop it.
Quebec and Ottawa must drastically cut taxes in order to kill the black market. The Criminal Code must be amended to prevent these criminals from laundering money obtained from smuggling, the exits from the Indian reserves must be controlled and above all, Quebecers and Canadians must stop buying contraband cigarettes; otherwise, the governments alone will be unable to wipe out this evil.


MEMBERS FOR SKEENA AND CHAMBLY
Mr. Mark Assad (Gatineau-La Lievre):: Mr. Speaker, the French define politics as war in peacetime.
Indeed the member for Chambly and the member for Skeena seemed to be at war with each other. But upon checking, we found out that the member for Skeena was misquoted and so was the member for Chambly.
What I make of that is that people were misquoted. At least they agree that they disagree. I would ask both hon. members, the one for Skeena and the one for Chambly, to realize that this is not a battlefield but a place of peace.


PETITIONS
Mr. Benno Friesen (Surrey-White Rock-South Langley):: Mr. Speaker, last fall the member for Surrey North filed a petition with the House containing the names of people who purportedly were objecting to the provisions of Bill C-86.
February 17, 1993


[Stage Direction]
I thought it would be a good idea for the people who had signed the petition to get information from a government member too. I wrote to them and gave the government position on Bill C-86. Lo and behold, 15 per cent of the letters were returned to me by the post office, saying no such person or no such address.
It may be the post office did not look far enough. It may be the post office should have looked at the tombstones in the local cemetery for some of the names. After all, some elections have been won that way. I am sure the member for Surrey North would not do a thing like that but I do think, Mr. Speaker, you have a problem with some of the petitions.
Mr. Sergio Marchi (York West):: Mr. Speaker, the government continues to say the recession is over but as we know few Canadians believe them. Certainly not those Canadians living in metropolitan Toronto.
Despite these very proud Tory declarations, the economic malaise in the metropolitan Toronto region, an indispensable part of the national economic fabric, continues virtually unabated.
This Friday the metro chairman, Mr. Alan Tonks, will be convening an economic summit of all three levels of government, business, labour and the Canadian public.
The Conservative government is sending four ministers to the conference. I would suggest the time for empty words is over, the time for inaction is over, the time for staying a course that is clearly not working for Canadians in Toronto and across the country is over.
Torontonians want change. They want action. They want a proud government that is prepared to intervene, to stimulate the economy and to get this indispensable part of the Canadian machinery going again.
Between the Tory government in Ottawa and the NDP government at Queen's Park, Toronto is being sold out.


Mr. Barry Moore (Pontiac-Gatineau-Labelle):: Mr. Speaker, the Conference Board of Canada has predicted a year of relative labour peace in the Canadian work place.
Low inflation and the leadership of the federal government in exercising fiscal restraint has meant that bargaining priorities have shifted to such important work place improvements as access to job training and other non-monetary benefits.
Flying in the face of these positive developments is the president of the Public Service Alliance of Canada, Mr. Daryl Bean, who has vowed to take money from a $1.25 million collective bargaining account to target certain candidates for defeat in the upcoming election.
I wonder if PS AC members are aware of Daryl Bean's intention to endorse and to work for the election of Bloc Quebecois candidates.
It strains all credulity to see PS AC's endorsement of a party that is committed to the demise of Canada and with it the disappearance of some 45,000 federal jobs in Quebec. If I were a member of PSAC, I would demand my money back.


Mr. Cid Samson (Timmins-Chapleau):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to recognize the members of Mouvement Action-Chomage, some of whom are here today, for the role they have played in raising the public profile of the sweeping and destructive changes planned for the UI Act.
Mouvement Action Chomage can tell many horror stories of their experiences with the UI system, problems which will escalate under the new legislation.

Mouvement Action-Chomage has done an excellent job of informing the public about the proposed amendments to the Unemployment Insurance Act and Bill C-105. I urge them to keep on fighting with the same enthusiasm and determination they have shown so far.

We still have much to do to kill this bill.


Mr. Stan Wilbee (Delta):: Mr. Speaker, for the past several weeks, Canadians from all areas and walks of life have been outraged by the systematic rape of women in Bosnia to create as much social and racial disruption as possible.
The degradation of women has been one of the most sickening atrocities of this conflict that has had more than its share of new lows in human behaviour.
Many people from Delta have called or written demanding that the Canadian government do more to stop this type of outrage in the former Yugoslavia.
The Government of Canada would be delighted to stop this senseless conflict but there has to be some initiative on the part of the combatants themselves. Therefore I appreciate the fact that Canada is sending 1,200 more troops to the area to try and help the helpless and to use their well-honed skills in peacekeeping to restore some sanity and humanity to this sick country.


Mr. Guy H. Arseneault (Restigouche -Chaleur):: Mr. Speaker, municipalities across this country are being faced with a new problem.
The government has frozen federal grants in lieu of taxes.

Furthermore, to avoid paying any tax increases on government property, the government has frozen the federal grants it has been paying in lieu of taxes.
Once again this Tory government is asking Canadian taxpayers to bear the brunt of its financial mismanagement. This government refuses to take the responsibility for its own mistakes and has failed to keep its promises.

The time has come for the government to stand up and take responsibility for its mismanagement of the economy. It is time for the government to stop asking others to pay for its mistakes, to live up to its commitments and provide fair and just grants in lieu of taxes to Canadian municipalities.


Mr. Chris Axworthy (Saskatoon-Clark's Crossing):: Mr. Speaker, a single mother in Saskatchewan who is raising three of her own children and two foster children went back to school when her pre-schooler caught her pretending to read. She is determined to learn to read but she should not have to do it alone.
In 1991 the government made a commitment to five million Canadians who have low literacy skills, promising to cut illiteracy rates in half by the year 2000. Today we are no closer to that goal.
Illiteracy is one of the greatest barriers to productivity and full employment in Canada. Some 38 per cent of Canadians have difficulty with everyday reading and are likely to be unemployed or underemployed. The resulting poverty has huge social costs.
Illiteracy costs Canada over $14 billion annually. Today is Love Literacy Day. It is time the government made literacy a top priority. It is time it invested in literacy programs as part of Canada's job strategy.


Mrs. Christine Stewart (Northumberland):: Mr. Speaker, one year ago an important Trenton employer, Stouf-fers, announced the permanent layoff of 171 employees, a severe blow to a community already devastated by other plant closures and layoffs.
Special assistance was requested from federal departments in order to assure that the unemployed, the affected community businesses and the community at large would have every advantage to successfully adjust to the harsh economic reality.
Pursuant to this request an employment and immigration officer from the regional office visited Stouffers on April 6 and April 9, 1992 met with management and employees and provided misinformation which has cost 85 employees two to five weeks of unemployment insurance.
The case was appealed last month, but the board of referees refused to take any responsibility for the department's error. This is grossly unfair. I have asked the employment minister on many occasions to address this injustice. There has been no response.
February 17, 1993

Citizens cannot be made to pay for government bungling. We demand that the minister respond with fairness and compensation. How can we ever have confidence in proposed unemployment insurance changes without justice now?



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Hon. Jean Chretien (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Prime Minister. We heard that the chairman of the Quebec Tory caucus claimed a victory on Bill C-105, saying that they had obtained major concessions on a bill that is highly controversial in this country. However, the government House leader said these were only minor changes which did not in any way alter the substance of the bill.
My question to the Prime Minister is: Whom are we to believe? Who is telling the truth: Andre Harvey or Harvie Andre?


Hon. Bernard Valcourt (Minister of Employment and Immigration):: Another profound question.
Mr. Speaker, for the information of the Leader of the Opposition, we said before that we were prepared to make some improvements in the bill because we do not agree with the Liberals' position that unemployment insurance benefits should be paid to people who quit their jobs without just cause. However, we want to ensure that people who do have valid grounds to leave a job are protected. That has always been my position.
In fact, if the hon. member remains in the House this afternoon he will witness the tabling of a bill proposing certain amendments to improve the situation for Canadian workers.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, for two months the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Employment and Immigration have claimed that this bill was perfect and that the Liberal Party, the NDP and even the Bloc Quebecois were completely
Oral Questions
wrong. Now they have changed their minds and the government is showing that it does not support the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Employment and Immigration.
If this bill is changed substantially will the Prime Minister inform this House that the Minister of Finance will come forward soon with a budget in order to rectify the situation? Will he tell Canadians exactly about the Canadian economic situation? Or, will the Prime Minister in the fifth year of his mandate, well into the fifth year of his mandate and with all the confusion that exists in the government, go to the Canadian people in an election and let the Canadian people decide?


Right Hon. Brian Mulroney (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, we cannot call an election because the Leader of the Liberal Party has said there cannot be an election until he makes up his mind on the GST.


Some hon. members:: Oh, oh.


Martin Brian Mulroney: Let us know. Make up your mind. Tell us where you stand on the GST. Tell us where you stand on free trade, yes or no, and you will get your election. You will not like the results but you will get it.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, if the Prime Minister would dare to call an election, if he would not chicken out, we would be very happy.


Some hon. members:: Hear, hear.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: In 1983 the Prime Minister said: "The fundamental British tradition in this country calls for an election not in five years but within four years so that the people can judge the actions of this government".
When will the Prime Minister do what he was preaching in 1983 and again in 1988 when he said it has been the Canadian tradition to call an election after a government has completed four years of a mandate? When will the Prime Minister read his own words, not chicken out and call an election?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, I said he will get an election just as quickly as he stands up on the floor of the House of Commons and tells us once and for all what he is going to do about the GST.

February 17, 1993
Oral Questions
Where are you going to get the $18 billion without the GST? Where do you stand on free trade? Have the guts to stand up and tell the Canadians the truth and then-


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Hamilton East.


Ms. Sheila Copps (Hamilton East):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the minister of employment and it concerns the changes to the unemployment insurance legislation.
Why is the government saying one thing in the French language and another thing in the English language vis-a-vis changes to the unemployment insurance? Why is the change called minor?

We know the hon. member for Jonquiere has already said these are substantial and important changes. However, the government House leader has said they are very minor changes. Whom are we to believe: Andre Harvey or Harvie Andre?


Bernard Valcourt: Mr. Speaker, as a resident of the only officially bilingual province in Canada, I can assure the hon. member that the message is the same in English and in French: a person who without just cause, without provocation, without justification, quits his or her job will no longer be entitled to ask Canadian workers and employers to pay for his or her benefits.

Translated into the other official language of this country that is the same thing. A person in Canada who without reason, without justification, without provocation leaves a job cannot expect other hard working Canadians to pay him unemployment insurance benefits.


Sheila Maureen Copps: Mr. Speaker, the government's backtracking on Bill C-105 proves the minister was wrong about sexual harassment.


Some hon. members:: No, no.


Sheila Maureen Copps: He was wrong to accuse unemployed workers of spending their winters in Florida.
I would therefore like to ask the minister a straight question: Does he consider these new changes to be major or minor?


Bernard Valcourt: Mr. Speaker, no measure the government takes is ever taken lightly. It is always a serious matter because at the end of the day Canadian taxpayers will always have to foot the bill one way or another.
I hope the hon. member is prepared to support the measures we have taken and the measures we are about to take this afternoon to amend the legislation because they will benefit people who are subject to harassment, either sexual or otherwise. The purpose of these measures is to ensure that this legislation is implemented fairly and squarely for the benefit of Canadians and that contrary to what the Liberals would allow, unless they change their position, a person who quits voluntarily, without just cause, will not receive unemployment insurance benefits paid for by other taxpayers.


Hon. Audrey McLaughlin (Yukon):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Prime Minister.
The Minister of Employment and Immigration has indicated that he will be bringing in new proposals on unemployment insurance, but it seems to me Canadians have made it very clear that they want a denunciation of the Draconian measures the minister has formally proposed. In fact members of his own caucus have not agreed with these. The Canadian Human Rights Commissioner has expressed concerns about women and other vulnerable groups in our society and how they might be affected.
Rather than trying to just eliminate terminator one to bring in terminator two, will the Prime Minister simply withdraw the changes to UI and bring in a real job plan to address unemployment? That is the issue in Canada, the rate of unemployment.


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, I think all members of the House are waiting with bated breath for the announcement of deficit reduction programs that my hon. friend is going to announce. I want to make sure that I do not miss that.
What is being done in the House today is perfectly consistent with appropriate parliamentary procedure where the members of caucus, members of the Liberal Party and members of the NDP put forward their points of view and the minister seeks as reasonably as he can to accommodate those.
February 17, 1993

Oral Questions
However there will be no change in the fundamental principle that I have enunciated from the very beginning in respect of the nature of this bill. It is what the minister has just stated, namely that someone who leaves his or her job without reason, without justification and without provocation ought not to expect that ordinary workers and men and women in Canada would continue to pay unemployment insurance benefits for them.


Audrey Marlene McLaughlin: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary for the minister. Canadians will not be satisfied with minor changes. This bill is unacceptable and it is flawed. The problems this bill will create are quite obvious.
That is why I would like to put this question to the minister. As the minister is aware, people who quit their jobs without just cause are now penalized by a waiting period of up to three months.
Can the minister give the House the assurance that the bill he will table today will not include the same Draconian measures under another name?


Bernard Valcourt: Mr. Speaker, I repeat. If we accept the NDP's proposal the only alternative is to increase unemployment insurance premiums and slow down economic recovery in this country by increasing the deficit.
Canadians, whether they are employed or unfortunately unemployed, know that we must take steps to control the deficit. The underlying principle of the government's proposal is that although a person who quits his job without just cause has the right to do so, and I respect that decision, that person should not expect other workers, other Canadian taxpayers to pay him unemployment insurance benefits.
Perhaps, as has already been suggested, there should be another social program for these people, but definitely not the Unemployment Insurance Program.


Audrey Marlene McLaughlin: I have a supplementary question for the Prime Minister, Mr. Speaker. The minister is simply saying he is going to bring in basically the same measures and force people on to
social assistance at provincial and territorial expense. That is hardly dealing with the basic problem.
If the government wants to save money under the unemployment insurance system I would suggest that the Prime Minister bring forward a plan to get Canadians back to work. When does the Prime Minister propose to bring in such a plan to put Canadians back to work and address unemployment instead of attacking the unemployed?


Martin Brian Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, the employment rates have improved quite appreciably. The news has been good on the employment front in the last number of months.
There have been some 161,000 full-time new jobs created in the last five or six months, particularly some
57,000	in December. Manufacturing sales are up. Our exports are up. More important, our unit costs compared with the United States in the first six months of this year are down by 5.2 per cent ensuring the competitive nature of what is taking place. Our industries are on a better footing. We have much better opportunities for selling abroad, thereby creating jobs at home.
If my hon. friend looks at the numbers available I think she will see there is reason for even the NDP to take some encouragement in what is taking place. The last thing I think she would want us to do would be to follow the example of the Ontario government which put forward a billion dollar job creation program and created 675 jobs.


HEALTH CARE
Mr. Rey Pagtakhan (Winnipeg North):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the minister of health. In 11 days the minister in a secret deal will hand over to a private corporation the administration of non-insured health services for our First Nations people, ignoring their advice, their treaty rights to quality health care and their right to self-government.
Will the minister explain to Canadians why he has refused to take the advice of our First Nations' people and why was the whole tendering process conducted behind a curtain of secrecy?

February 17, 1993
Oral Questions


Hon. Benoit Bouchard (Minister of National Health and Welfare):: Mr. Speaker, first I have to say that the member is wrong. We have consulted about what has been implemented following the report by the Auditor General in 1987 on the lack of adequate management and control of the non-insured health benefits for aboriginal people.
We implemented a national program directive and administrative procedure coupled with implementation of an health information claims processing system under contract with Ontario Blue Cross. It is already being done in Ontario, Saskatchewan, and Quebec and moving in Manitoba and phased in in other provinces.
Everything has been done normally. There is more resistance in Manitoba. We have had consultations and we will again. However, we will proceed.


Mrs. Ethel Blondin-Andrew (Western Arctic):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the same minister. He may have listened but I do not think the people were consulted. The contract for non-insured native health services was given to Blue Cross by selected tender. I am sure that was not the advice given. First Nations were not even offered a chance to bid.
In the last round of constitutional discussions the minister and his government claimed to have endorsed the inherent right to self-government. Can the minister explain how this new health policy furthers the cause of self-government?


Benoît Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, I believe the government is always committed to self-government. That operation is not basically directed to applying that principle or not. This operation has been necessary because once again there was a lack of control in the way payments were made and information was given. Therefore, based on tenders provided, when Ontario Blue Cross won the contract we decided to move.
The aboriginal peoples have been involved. In Saskatchewan, Ontario and Quebec it is working normally. I believe that it should work normally in Manitoba where I admit we have more problems today. We are continuing to work with the leadership in the province.
My colleague will understand that to provide a better administration of what represents $100 million for aboriginal people, the best way is the one we are presently using. We intend to continue to do that with the collaboration of the aboriginal people.


INDIAN AFFAIRS
Hon. Lloyd Axworthy (Winnipeg South Centre):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to raise a question with the Prime Minister. Five years ago a federally funded report warned of an epidemic of child sexual abuse breaking out on the reserves in Manitoba. That report was ignored.
Today, sadly, on the Sandy Bay reserve there are over 50 cases of child sexual abuse pending. There is a continuing pattern of suicide among young people and the breakdown of families continues at an atrocious rate. The minister still refuses to respond to the pleas for help.
I want to appeal to the Prime Minister this afternoon to instruct the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development to pay attention to these calls for help for better counselling, better treatment and better housing conditions so that we can break this vicious cycle of poverty affecting this native community and native communities right across Canada.


Benoît Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, I have been informed of the problem raised by my colleague. I know the department of Indian affairs has been sensitive to the problem.
However, my hon. colleague knows that in the Department of National Health and Welfare the government recently decided to put up $160 million in order to deal with the social problems in Indian communities particularly. Some of our targets relate particularly to family violence, child abuse and sexual abuse.
We are now working with the leadership of the aboriginal people and in that case I would like to assure my colleague that we will act very quickly.


Guy H. Arseneault: Mr. Speaker, recent events at Big Cove, at Davis Inlet and at numerous other communities across the country illustrate that aboriginal Canadians are crying out for our help, yet this cry is falling on deaf ears.
February 17, 1993

In the case of Big Cove the federal government has yet to take any action on a coroner's inquest recommendation calling on the federal government to develop community-based mental health programs.
Will the Prime Minister give the residents of Big Cove his assurance today that he will personally take this file under his consideration and that the tragic crisis facing this community and others will receive his government's immediate action?


Benoît Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, it is very sad what happened in Big Cove yesterday. I am sure the whole House will join with me when I offer our condolences to the tribe or the band itself.
Two proposals were submitted by the band in January that were not given to the federal level, my own level. They were turned down by officials at the maritimes office. I called the chief last night and said I would personally look after the proposals made.
This afternoon I can say I have instructed the official on the two proposals turned down last month and they were accepted this morning.


Mr. Howard McCurdy (Windsor-St. Clair):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Prime Minister.
A Mexican government-supported development bank is openly supporting an operation to buy up U.S. companies and move them to Mexico in order to make big profits using cheap labour. Canada will be next.
Are members of the government going to sit on their collective butts while a Mexican government gang of carpetbaggers comes into this country to take jobs and move them down to Mexico, or will this government take action to protect Canadian jobs under NAFTA?


Hon. Michael Wilson (Minister of Industry, Science and Technology and Minister for International TVade):: Mr. Speaker, possibly my friend should cool his rhetoric before he gets the facts.
The fact is that the Mexican government is not going to be involved in that bank.
Oral Questions


Howard Douglas McCurdy: Well, Mr. Speaker, the fact is that the prospectus of the company involved indicates clearly that the Mexican bank will be involved in it.
About this there is no doubt: the Mexican Minister of Commerce has been in Montreal selling cheap Mexican labour. In the meantime the president of ACOA-sup-ported Canadian Helicopters Ltd. says he is very much attracted by the cheap labour in Mexico, the lax labour standards and the lax environmental standards in the Mexican work place.
Does the government-


Some hon. members:: Oh, oh.


Howard Douglas McCurdy: I have all day, Mr. Speaker.


An hon. member:: No you do not.


Mr. Speaker:: That is sometimes a pious hope here. The hon. member will put his question, please.


Howard Douglas McCurdy: My question for the Prime Minister is: Does this government not realize that NAFTA is going to launch a tremendous Mexican sting operation, which is already evidenced, to come up to Canada to sell cheap labour in Mexico even at the expense of some of the poorest parts of this country?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, the next time my friend, the Secretary of Trade from Mexico, comes to Canada I am going to ask my friend to join us. The hon. member has just taken what was said totally out of context. What we did do yesterday was visit Canadair Challenger operations, SR Telecom and the AMF operation which re-manufactures rail cars and diesel engines.
In each case these companies are actively selling successfully into Mexico, generating jobs back here, generating work for people who are paid Canadian salaries and able to compete against what my hon. friend refers to as low salaries in Mexico.
The point of the matter is that my friend should get his facts straight and should put out a balanced position as to what the attitudes and policies of the Mexican government are. I think we were very successful yesterday in helping create jobs for Canadians in Mexico who will take advantage of the North American free trade agreement.

February 17, 1993
Oral Questions


PUBLIC DEBT
Mr. Paul Martin (LaSalle-Emard):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance.
In 1984, when this government took office, the net public debt was 46 per cent of the Gross Domestic product. Today it is more than 62 per cent. Yesterday, the C. D. Howe Institute told us that we are on the verge of a financial crisis. For example, the European Community has set a threshold of 50 per cent for its new members.
Given that this debt is the result of its policies, what exactly is this government's objective and when does it think it will reach this objective?


Hon. Don Mazankowski (Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, the plain fact of the matter is that this government has been operating in the black since 1987. What has been the drag is the inherited debt we took over from the Liberal government. If there had not been a debt inherited, today we would have a surplus of $20 billion.
We have cut the deficit from $38 billion. As a percentage of GDP we have cut it from 8.7 per cent to about 4.8 per cent. We are on a fiscal track which will bring the budget into balance as soon as we can get some growth into the economy.
The fact of the matter is the problems with Canada today result from the inherited debt that was left by the Liberal government. When the Liberal Party suggests that it has a plan for deficit control, its record was an average increase of program spending of 14 per cent over the last 15 years. We have cut it to below the rate of inflation.


Paul Edgar Philippe Martin: Mr. Speaker, the problem is not the inherited debt of a decade ago. It is the nine years this countiy has lost under this government.
This government loves to cite the C. D. Howe Institute. Let me cite from the C. D. Howe report referring to this government: "When the economy was booming in 1988, they increased spending and cut taxes; when we went into a recession, they increased taxes and cut
spending. They have made the booms worse and the busts worse".
What will it take for this government to stop blaming others? What will it take for this government to realize that we are indeed in a crisis and it is a direct result of eight to nine years of gross economic mismanagement by this front bench?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, if the hon. member wants to quote from the C.D. Howe report, I can do that too.
Ed Neufeld said: "I was listening to the year-end speech of one of our political leaders," and that happened to be the Leader of the Opposition. "Very gently, he was saying: 'Let's just accept more inflation'. 'Accept more inflation'-there are a lot of people who are-ready to hear that message". As a matter of fact, he wants to abandon Canadian monetary policy. He wants the Americans to run our monetary policy.
I ask the hon. member where has he been on the 12 or 13 bills that we have brought in to contain expenditures? He has voted with his party against every single solitary measure.
It is rather interesting that the Leader of the Opposition did not raise this question. When he was in charge of the cash register as President of the Treasury Board, he increased program spending at the rate of 16 per cent per year.


Hon. Herb Gray (Windsor West):: Mr. Speaker, I also have a question for the Minister of Finance.
Yesterday on television he said that his government had not added five cents to the public debt since it was in office. In 1984, when the government took office, the public debt was $168 billion. Now, almost nine years later, it is over $423 billion.
As far as I am aware, we have only had his Conservative government in office in those nine years. So I ask the minister: When is he going to stop trying to fool Canadians and the truth of what has been happening since his government has been in office? That is that it has created an economic mess for Canadians. Canadians simply do not believe him when he tries to blame all this mess on others than himself.
February 17, 1993


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, let me try to explain to the hon. member. The debt that we inherited was something in the vicinity of $200 billion. The member knows that you have to pay interest on that debt. He knows that interest compounds upon interest and that it accumulated to $400 billion plus.
We have been operating in an operational surplus since 1987. As a matter of fact, I repeat, we have not added one red cent to Canada's national debt. As a matter of fact, we have reduced it by $20 billion plus.


Herbert Eser (Herb) Gray: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the minister.
Surely the minister will not try and hide the fact that he and his government have supported the interest rate policy of the Bank of Canada and that interest rates are a cost of government along with all the other costs.
Why does he try to hide the fact that the public debt has moved from $168 billion to more than $423 billion since his government has taken office? Why does he not recognize that and also recognize that a major way of dealing with it is to create more economic growth and jobs for Canadians?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member suggests that we should have lower interest rates. That is true.
When he was occupying the government benches, we saw interest rates go up to 22 per cent and 23 per cent. We have tried to do two things. We have tried to contain government expenditures against the wishes of the opposition parties. We have tried to contain inflation. The key to bringing interest rates down is to bring down inflation.
The hon. member is suggesting that we should have higher inflation and that we should spend more. That is not a recipe for lower interest rates. That is a recipe for higher interest rates.
Oral Questions


TOBACCO SMUGGLING
Lise Bourgault: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada. The Criminal Code does not provide for the seizure of goods acquired through profits generated by the illegal sale of smuggled tobacco products because this activity is not recognized as a form of organized crime. In practice, this means that some Mohawks could buy the Manoir Richelieu with the money made from the lucrative black market for cigarettes and open a nice casino which Quebec would otherwise not allow them to own.
So as not to make fools of us all in this House, will the minister urgently introduce a retroactive amendment to the Criminal Code and eliminate this unacceptable loophole which enables criminals to launder the money made by smuggling cigarettes?


Hon. Pierre Blais (Minister of Justice, Attorney General of Canada and Minister of State (Agriculture)):: Mr. Speaker, my colleague raises the important issue of smuggling. I must remind all members of this House that the Minister of Finance has tabled Bill C-102, which reinforces the legislation on smuggling.
However, it might also be appropriate to remind Canadians who are listening that smuggling is a crime. It is difficult to fight smuggling because people who buy cigarettes, among other contraband items, do not complain. I believe that if all of us in this House made Canadians aware of the danger to society of giving in and buying smuggled goods-and I am speaking to members on both sides of this House-we would probably increase their awareness of the issue. It is quite serious that Canadians snap up smuggled goods so easily.
I thank my colleague for her question and I must tell her-


Some hon. members:: Order, order.


Pierre Blais: Mr. Speaker, look at what goes on on the other side when we discuss serious issues. We are giving a great deal of attention to this matter and we hope that our colleagues will co-operate by supporting Bill C-102.

Oral Questions


NATIONAL DEBT
Hon. Lome Nystrom (Yorkton-Melville):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance. It concerns the C.D. Elowe document.
One of the comments made in the document is that the debt crisis is now a federal-provincial crisis and that in this country we have only one taxpayer, whether federal or provincial. The transfer of federal debt to the provinces through cutbacks and transfer payments does not help.
In light of the fact that the federal government has cut back by billions of dollars in transfers to the provinces over the last number of years, is the federal government planning in its next budget to reverse that policy and keep its commitments to the provinces rather than transferring its debt to the provinces of this country?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, I agree with the observation that there is only one taxpayer. I have been saying that for quite some time. I am glad that the opposition members across the way have picked it up, thanks to the C.D. Howe Institute.
The hon. member says that we have cut transfer payments. That is wrong. It is absolutely wrong. Transfer payments continue to grow. As a matter of fact in the last "Fiscal Monitor" which was just issued for the third quarter of 1992-93, he will see that major transfers to other levels of government have grown by 7 per cent this year and major transfers to persons, 4.8 per cent.
That does not sound like a cutback to me. That is a substantial increase, much larger than the over-all growth in program expenditures.


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Mr. Speaker, the House knows that the rate of increase in transfers to the provinces has been cut back by billions of dollars. In Saskatchewan alone this year, offloading will cost my province some $538 million. That is more than the provincial deficit.
In light of those facts, and this is information that I have from the federal government department, is the federal government willing to reverse its policy and keep its commitments to the provinces rather than jeopardize the credit ratings of the provinces of this country? This is happening not only to Saskatchewan but to many of our provinces.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased that the hon. member clarified his question when he in fact admitted that there were not cutbacks to provincial transfers.
As a matter of fact, there has been some reduction in the over-all growth of program expenses commensurate with the other disciplinary measures that we have had to take upon ourselves in terms of reducing federal government expenditures.
Just for the record in terms of cash payments, transfers to the provinces, in 1984-85 it was cash plus tax transfers something in the order of $25 billion. That is now about $39 billion. That does not sound like much of a cutback.
Of course I understand that the provinces, and particularly his home province of Saskatchewan, are facing some very serious financial difficulties. I have met with the Minister of Finance, we have talked and we are attempting to work and co-operate with him.
I would ask the hon. member to go back to his provincial colleagues and ask them to reconsider the harmonization of the GST which would have provided a major benefit to the people of Saskatchewan and provided revenues to the Government of Saskatchewan. It may have been able to capitalize on some of these jobs that are being created through NAFTA and through the free trade agreement.


PICKERING AIRPORT LANDS
Mr. Rene Soetens (Ontario):: Mr. Speaker, in the 1992 budget the government announced it would proceed with selling some of the surplus airport lands in Pickering. Recently the government held an information session in the riding to explain to the people the process, but lacking from that was a time frame.
February 17, 1993

Can the Minister of Transport tell the constituents of Ontario riding when they will be able to buy back their farms and homes?


Hon. Jean Corbeil (Minister of TVansport):: Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for putting this question. As he knows, over 200 million square feet of land has to be disposed of as a result of this decision by the Government of Canada.
As he aptly said, we did consult with the people at the site a couple of weeks ago. It is part of the process in order that we can present a proper submission to Treasury Board. As soon as this is done, which should be within the next few weeks, the process will be finalized.


PROPERTY TAXES
Mr. Alfonso Gagliano (Saint-Leonard):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance. When we met with the mayor of Montreal, we learned that the government had promised that no change would be made to the system of paying grants in lieu of taxes to municipalities for services provided to federal facilities.
Why did the government not keep its promise to Canadian municipalities? Why did it make this announcement when most municipalities had already adopted their budget for 1993?


Hon. Elmer M. MacKay (Minister of Public Works):: Mr. Speaker, my colleague knows that the grants in lieu of taxes expenditure for our government has been rising at an unacceptable level. The Minister of Finance has indicated the necessity for a little bit of restraint.
As a matter of fact, I met with the Federation of Canadian Municipalities. We are very sympathetic to the difficulties that they are undergoing and we intend to work with them as closely as we can.
I want to point out that with respect to the city of Montreal, last year the account that we had to pay was around $8 million. This year it is about $13 million. Under its new system, the present system of taxation, the mill rate has gone from about 52 cents to $2.06. The
Oral Questions
member can understand, I am sure, that something had to be done to bring a reconstruction and a more equitable means of assessing the federal government for some of these facilities.


Alfonso Gagliano: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary question is for the Minister of Public Works, then. The freeze on grants to municipalities in the Montreal region involves cuts totalling some $15 million. How can the minister impose these cuts totalling nearly $15 million on taxpayers in a region with over
225,000	unemployed? These Montrealers are unemployed or on welfare. Is that not enough? Why should they also have to pay higher municipal taxes?


Elmer MacIntosh MacKay: Mr. Speaker, I have tried to explain to my colleague opposite that we are prepared to do everything we can to accommodate the municipalities within the constraints that the Minister of Finance has been obliged to put on us.
To compare a reasonable assessment for grants in lieu of taxes with the unemployment rate of a city, I think he would agree, is rather like comparing apples and oranges.


Hon. Lucien Bouchard (Lac-Saint-Jean):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister for International Trade.
I understand that the government recognizes the need to negotiate supplementary agreements which would add guarantees on minimum standards, wages and the environment to the main North American free trade agreement. If that is so, I commend him for it.
The minister must have felt the need for these guarantees even more yesterday when he heard his Mexican colleague boast in Montreal, where unemployment is 14 per cent, about the merits of Mexico's plentiful labour supply.

February 17, 1993
Routine Proceedings
Can the minister assure us that the Government of Canada will not sign the main treaty until the parallel agreements have been negotiated?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, my hon. friend has distorted what the minister of trade from Mexico said in Montreal yesterday and I would ask him to reconsider what he has just said.
Regarding the supplementary agreements, we will be starting the discussions on these agreements in the middle of March. This has been agreed among the United States, Mexico and ourselves just today. At the same time, we will be considering the legislation in this House, as will they be in the United States Congress and the Mexican Congress.
These will all move together at around the same pace and we will be able to consider the implications of each as that process continues.


Lucien Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, I quoted an article from the daily Le Devoir on what the Mexican secretary allegedly said in his speech.
As for the supplementary accord, the minister knows very well that the process can easily be derailed and that the expected deadlines might not be met, in which case he must consider the possibility that the government will have to decide whether or not to sign the treaty alone. The minister has enough experience to know that if he wants to win from the Mexicans the kind of concessions we need for the environment and minimum labour standards, he must not give them what they want right away but rather negotiate on both items with them at the same time.
The Americans are doing that, as Mr. Kantor said recently. I ask the minister why he leaves it up to the Americans alone to fight for environmental protection and Canadian workers.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I said this morning that we had agreed with the Americans and the Mexicans to continue discussions on the environment and on labour as well.
We made some proposals on these accords a year ago and I think that now, with the new American administration, it is possible to have a discussion on these accords.
As I said, these discussions will begin in the second week of March.


POINT OF ORDER
Ms. Lynn Hunter (Saanich-Gulf Islands):: Mr. Speaker, in response to a question in the House yesterday on the North American free trade agreement, the Minister of the Environment characterized an internal environmental review as an environmental assessment. I invite him to correct that impression.


Mr. Speaker:: I am sorry, the invitation may or may not be accepted, but that is not a point of order. That is a continuation of debate.


Hon. Jean J. Charest (Minister of the Environment):: Mr. Speaker, for the sake of clarification, it should be made very clear that the government undertook to do a federal environmental assessment of the NAFTA. It was public and it was known by all the members in this House who are interested in that issue.
I was surprised by the comment of the member yesterday, because when I commented on this environmental assessment that had been made public, she was in the room at that time or I thought she was. At least, it was somebody who looked a lot like her.


Mr. Speaker:: The difficulty with this is that it is another way of extending debate. It is getting around the rules and I do not think we can do that.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Mr. Charles A. Langlois (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Industry, Science and Technology):: 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.
February 17, 1993

[.Editor's Note: See today's Votes and Proceedings.]



ENVIRONMENT


Hon. David MacDonald (Rosedale):: Madam Speaker, I have the honour to present the sixth report of the Standing Committee on Environment, in both official languages, in relation to the appointment by the United Nations of Elizabeth Dowdeswell to the position of Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Program, UNEP. Elizabeth Dowdeswell is the third person and the second Canadian to hold this prestigious position, succeeding Dr. Mostafa D. Tolba from Egypt who in turn replaced the original director, Maurice Strong.
The challenges facing Ms. Dowdeswell are daunting. The problems facing humanity can no longer be categorized as simply environment or economical or only affecting a country or a single continent. The solutions are complex and transgress international borders and cultures, ultimately affecting every human being.
It is a tribute to Canada that of the three UNEP executive directors two have been Canadians.
Our committee has worked closely with Ms. Dowdeswell during the course of its series entitled "Our Changing Atmosphere" as well as in the activities leading up to and including the earth summit. Members have been impressed by her thoroughness, determination and judgment, qualities which will serve her well in her new position.
We therefore wish to congratulate Ms. Dowdeswell on her election to this most senior international position in the environmental field. We wish her, on behalf of all Canadians, courage and success in what might very well be the most challenging times facing our global environment.
Routine Proceedings



GOVERNMENT EXPENDITURES RESTRAINT ACT, 1993 NO. 2 MEASURE TO ENACT

Hon. John McDermid (for Minister of Finance) moved: for leave to introduce Bill C-113, an act to provide for government expenditure restraint.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Pursuant to Standing Order 68(2), the motion is deemed adopted.
Mr. McDermid (for Minister of Finance) 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.



MEAT IMPORT ACT


Mr. Ken Hughes (Macleod) moved: for leave to introduce Bill C-406, an act to amend the Meat Import Act.


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


Kenneth Gardner Hughes: Madam Speaker, this bill proposes that Canada amend its Meat Import Act to increase our control over offshore imports and consequently defend our industry against possible U.S. trade sanctions.
I am introducing this bill after speaking with many beef producers who want the government to defend our industry against this potential threat. It is really a defensive measure. By doing so this bill recognizes that the Canadian and American beef market is becoming a single market. Harmonization of certain standards, procedures and import regimes will reduce the risk of trade conflict between our two nations and the industries of those two nations.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Mr. Hughes 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.

February 17, 1993
Routine Proceedings



JUSTICE AND THE SOLICITOR GENERAL


Charles A. Langlois: Madam Speaker, I think you will find that there is consent for the following motion. I move:
That the subcommittee on the recodification of the general part of
the Criminal Code of the Standing Committee on Justice and the
Solicitor General be authorized to report directly to the House.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

Mr. Jim Fulton (Skeena):: Madam Speaker, I have the honour to table dozens of petitions from thousands of Canadians that have been certified pursuant to Standing Order 36 regarding the James Bay II project.
The petitioners say that whereas the boreal and Arctic ecosystems of the James Bay area consist of fragile ecosystems which are home to a rich variety of wildlife, including endangered and rare species such as the threatened eastern Hudson Bay population of the beluga whale, the endangered eastern populations of both the wolverine and peregrine falcon, and numerous migrating birds and large mammals extinct in most parts of the world, such as the lynx, the river otter, and the fresh water seal.
Therefore the petitioners humbly request that Parliament take any and all actions to halt the construction on James Bay II at least until a thorough global environmental impact study on James Bay II and other hydroelectric projects draining into the Hudson Bay watershed has been done.
This was kindly co-ordinated by Diane Murray from OPIRG Carleton.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
Sheila Maureen Copps: Madam Speaker, I would like to present a petition on behalf of two Canadians, Christine Lamont and David Spencer, who have been sentenced to 28 years each in a Brazilian
prison, suffered miscarriages of justice, cruel and unusual treatment in Brazilian prisons, and discrimination in sentencing and parole.
Therefore the petitioners call upon Parliament to ensure the Prime Minister requests the Government of Brazil to expel Christine Lamont and David Spencer and return them to Canada in accordance with Brazilian law.
It is signed by hundreds of people.


JAMES BAY II
Lynn Hunter: Madam Speaker, I am honoured to present a petition on behalf of 500 people from all across Canada. The lead signature is that of David Suzuki.
This petition concerns James Bay II. It says that whereas hydroelectric dams built in increased concentrations of mercury, methyl mercury and other dangerous substances in aquatic systems, mercury is a neurotoxin known to bioaccumulate and bioconcentrate in plant and animal tissues up the food chain, and is even in minute amounts very dangerous to long lived animals such as humans and belugas.
These petitioners ask Parliament to halt all construction on James Bay II, at least until a thorough global environmental impact study on James Bay II and other hydroelectric projects draining into the Hudson Bay watershed has been done, and to protect the unique Canadian ecosystems found in the James Bay area.


SERIAL KILLER BOARD GAMES
Mr. George S. Rideout (Moncton):: Madam Speaker, it is my pleasure to present a petition pursuant to Standing Order 36 concerning serial killer board games. People in my riding are petitioning Parliament to consider amending the Criminal Code of Canada so that violent and degrading material such as serial killer board games can be kept from being distributed in Canada.


YOUNG OFFENDERS
Hon. Alan Redway (Don Valley East):: Madam Speaker, I have a number of petitions representing literally a ton of signatures but only a small part of the petitions signed by 140,000 Canadians. These petitions were initiated by Stu and Margaret Garrioch of Calgary in memory of their son, Ryan, who was stabbed to death by a young offender.
February 17, 1993

These petitioners call upon Parliament to replace the Young Offenders Act with an updated Juvenile Delinquents Act and to lower the minimum age to 13 years.


JUSTICE
Robert Evans Skelly: Madam Speaker, I have a petition from several hundred people on central Vancouver Island in memory of Dawn Shaw, a little girl who was raped and murdered in my constituency. They note that the present justice system fails to protect children in our communities who are increasingly becoming victims of sexual assault.
They ask that a number of things be done by Parliament: That sentences for sexual assault offenders be lengthened, that the law be changed to permit DNA samples to be taken from suspects of sexual assault, and that those imprints be kept in a national data base. They also call for the names of released sexual offenders to be registered with the police and the community of residents and that those names be distributed to those people having responsibility for children in the community.
This petition from several hundred people in my constituency is submitted to the House of Commons to request that those changes be made.


BILL C-91
Robert Evans Skelly: Madam Speaker, I have a second petition, again from hundreds of people across the country who note that the Conservative government, through Bill C-91, seeks to end the licensing of further no name generic drugs in Canada. This will result in tremendous costs to provincial and private drug programs.
The petitioners call on Parliament not to proceed with Bill C-91 and to repeal Bill C-22 passed in 1987. In this way Canadians would have the benefit of lower priced generic drugs and provincial and private drug plans could serve Canadians without being forced to charge higher fees or to provide less coverage.


REQUEST FOR ELIMINATION OF VIOLENCE IN OUR SOCIETY
Guy St-Julien: Mr. Speaker, I would like to table a petition from residents of Val-d'Or,
Routine Proceedings
Sullivan, Senneterre, Saint-Edmond and Riviere-Heva, in the riding of Abitibi, who say that films depicting violence on television are dangerous and therefore unacceptable because they act as a stimulus for violent behaviour.
The petition also says that all toys that incite children to play violent games are unacceptable and their manufacture should be banned. It is also pointed out that the repeated broadcasting of news about acts of violence on television, on all channels, and on radio may act as a stimulus for further identical violent behaviour.
Therefore your petitioners humbly pray and call upon Parliament to pass the appropriate legislation in order to eliminate violence in our society and thus protect our children and give all citizens a better quality of life.


QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER
[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)
Charles A. Langlois: Madam Speaker, the following questions will be answered today: Nos. 427 and 434.


Ms. Copps: Regarding the purchase of new frigates for the Canadian Armed Forces, how much steel is being purchased for the program, and from which companies is it being purchased?


Mr. Patrick Boyer (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of National Defence):: The prime contractor for the Canadian Patrol Frigate Project, Saint John Shipbuilding Ltd. of New Brunswick, will have purchased approximately 30,000 tonnes of steel by the end of the program. The two suppliers are Algoma Steel Corporation Ltd. and Marshall Drummond McCall Inc.


Mr. Peterson: Regarding television advertising by National Defence for ads aired in Canada (a) between January 1 and September 15, 1992 (b) between September 15 and October 26, 1992 in each case (i) what was the total cost of these ads (ii) of that amount what was paid for out of the National Defence budget?


Patrick Boyer: (a) (i) $86,334; (ii) all.

February 17, 1993
Supply
(b) (i) $3,681,600, including "Keeping the peace" campaign $3,572 million; (ii) all.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: The questions as enumerated by the parliamentary secretary have been answered.


Charles A. Langlois: Madam Speaker, I ask that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Is it agreed?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


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


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Shall all notices of motions stand?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


Mr. Don Boudria (Glengarry-Prescott-Russell) moved:: That this House condemns the government for its continued failure to establish and to adhere to a clear and high standard of public sector ethics, for its incessant inability to function within the framework of existing legislation, guidelines and standards and for its reluctance to bring forward strict new codes and legislation with regard to conflicts and other public ethics matters.
He said: Madam Speaker, it gives me pleasure to participate in this debate. It has to do with holding the government accountable for its behaviour now and for the last eight and a half years.
Let me read the following quote. It comes to us from an article by Jack Cahill written in The Toronto Star.
I must have another ten thousand. Will be the last time of calling. Do not fail me. Answer today.
This was the telegram sent in 1873 by Canada's first prime minister, Sir John A. Macdonald, to the solicitor for Canada's foremost businessman, Sir Hugh Allan of Montreal.

Nothing really changes. On May 24, 1986, Pierre O'Neill wrote the following in an editorial in Le Devoir: "After being out of power for generations, the Tories have always failed to exercise moderation in their use of it. Between the defeat of John Diefenbaker in 1962 and Brian Mulroney's victory in 1984, they only had a taste during the short reign of Joe Clark in 1979. Today, the urge to dispense political favours is so great that after only 20 months in power, we can say they have definitely overindulged. Never in political memory has a party been rocked by so many scandals and resignations in so short a time". That was a quote from Pierre O'Neill in Le Devoir.
The article also says, and I quote: "The Conservatives led by the Prime Minister [across the floor] also have an obsession: they live in fear of losing power in the next election. And that fear is not unfounded. Consequently, they tell themselves that they must go all out and take advantage of what little time they have left. Bypassing the bidding procedure in order to take advantage of those who get contracts worth less than $30,000 is lucrative but insufficient.
Therefore, they decided to apply the system to the winners of major contracts. It is from this list that party solicitors can now identify their victims. They pay them a visit and demand a kickback of 5 per cent of the value of the contract awarded to them. Those who refuse to pay kickbacks are blacklisted and can forget about any new contracts. This is what Mr. O'Neill wrote in 1986.
You know, Madam Speaker, if some members do not believe Mr. O'Neill, I can tell them that he was not the only one to raise this issue. Let me refer to a statement made by the member for Megantic-Compton-Stans-tead, who was a Conservative member of Parliament in 1991. He said, and I quote: "Companies interested in contracts must contribute money to the Conservative Party fund. Then, there are the declarations made by Suzanne Blais-Grenier, who was also a Conservative
February 17, 1993

Supply
minister at one time and confirmed the existence of such a kickback system.
Let me also quote another source. This time I am referring to something Marcel Adam wrote in La Presse: "Since they came to power five years ago, the Conservatives have constantly confirmed their deplorable lack of public morality and parliamentary ethics. With their weak moral standards, they are becoming one of the most corrupt parties to head a federal government and taking us back to a time that we thought had ended decades ago.
As far back as I can remember as a professional observer of public life, which is about 30 years, I cannot think of a regime showing signs of corruption so early and being so unscrupulous about the rules of ethics and the parliamentary system". This is what Marcel Adam wrote on May 27, 1989.

I want to turn to what Don McGillivray, Southam News columnist, said on February 2, 1990. He said the following about the Brian Gallery affair. We remember that conflict of interest case and the subsequent resignation of one Brian Gallery. Mr. McGillivray said:
Is there no end to the parade of cabinet ministers, members of Parliament and appointed officials who use positions of public trust to advance their private interests?
He said further:
And until Gallery's resignation as Canadian National director and vice-chairman was announced Thursday in the Commons-
And he used the Prime Minister's name:
-was in his usual posture of stalling for time while he tried a political counter-attack: "The Liberals are not seeking justice. They want a lynching. They're not going to get it in the House of Commons".
Referring to the member for Roberval who was the transport minister at that time, he said:
And Transport Minister-backed this play by indicating scepticism about the letters signed by Gallery and produced in the Commons by the opposition parties: "The honourable member says he has a letter. They always have letters".
I have another story. This one was written in The Gazette of Montreal on December 16, 1989. It has the pictures of six prominent Conservatives. Because some of them are still sitting in the House I will not refer to them. I will only refer to the others who are no longer with us. It identifies the following:
Edouard Desrosiers, the former Tory MP for Hochelaga- Maisonneuve, faces eight charges, including a corruption charge relating to $2,000 the Crown alleges he received from a company doing business with the federal government.
It continues:
Richard Grise, the Tory MP for Chambly, was sentenced to one day in prison, three years' probation and fined $20,000 in May.
He admitted operating a complex kickback deal that put the employees of a friend's company on the government payroll. He also admitted taking kickbacks from builders.
Michel Cote was fired as supply and services minister in 1988 after failing to report a $256,000 loan from a friend who was a government contractor.
Roch LaSalle quit the cabinet in 1987 following reports of influence peddling -
Andre Bissonnette was dumped as junior minister of transport in January 1987 for alleged involvement in a series of questionable land flips in Quebec -
Suzanne Blais-Grenier, the minister of state for transport, stepped down in December 1985 at Mulroney's urging after press reports of her lavish spending abroad.
Sinclair Stevens quit as a minister of regional industrial expansion in May 1986 after reports that his wife, Noreen, had negotiated a $2.6 million loan for his family companies from Magna International, an auto parts company that had received grants from Stevens' department.
A royal commission found that Stevens had violated conflict of interest guidelines 14 times while in cabinet.
He is trying to overturn the decision. It continues:
Robert Coates quits as defence minister in February 1985 -
It goes on and on. The next story is by Geoffrey Stevens, national affairs correspondent with The Gazette, dated February 25, 1990. He said:
Brian Gallery, a personal friend of the Prime Minister Mulroney, resigns as vice-chairman of Canadian National Railways following reports that he tried to influence CN to keep buying ads in publications that he owns.
What's going on? Hardly a week passes, it seems, that someone in the Mulroney ambit-MP, minister or patronage appointee-is not being investigated for something or charged with something or being forced to resign from something.
Eventually the gentleman resigned, a close friend of This is what was said at the time by Mr. Geoffrey the Prime Minister.	Stevens.

February 17, 1993
Supply
You will recall, I am sure, Madam Speaker, some years back the Prime Minister made promises to the Canadian people about patronage and about what he considered to be the moral thing to do with regard to appointments. Those promises were made during the 1984 election campaign. I kept a log of those promises along with the patronage appointments after the election of 1984 and put them in this booklet which was then known as The Black Paper on Tory Patronage.
Let me quote the following from the person who today is the Prime Minister. On May 24, 1983 he said:
There'll be jobs for Liberals and NDPs too, after I've been Prime Minister for 15 years and I can't find a living, breathing Tbry in the country.
That was from The Globe and Mail. It quoted the person who today is the Prime Minister. On July 9, 1984 the same person is quoted as saying:
I commit myself to setting up criteria for quality which will impress the Canadian people.
That was his commitment about patronage. On July 16, 1984 he talked about patronage again and again I am referring to the man who is now Prime Minister. He said:
The method of making appointments could be corrected by dramatic measures-We are going to bring in a brand new dimension to them of objectivity and representation and fairness for all Canadians.
I want to refer to what The Toronto Sun said on March 22, 1985 after the original orgy of patronage that all Canadians were subjected to by the Prime Minister. Referring to the Prime Minister he said that he "is a sincere man-from the teeth on out. Take his solemn pledge late in the election campaign when he devastated" the member for Vancouver Quadra "over patronage". The Prime Minister's promise to end it all played a major part in his massive victory".
The next sentence he uses is unparliamentary. I cannot quote it. He says: "The Prime Minister has been simply shameless in dispensing patronage. Hardly a day passes without news of yet another fresh batch of Tory hacks being rewarded for their partisan inclinations". That is from The Toronto Sun story at the time. Again, the things they say about the Prime Minister in some of the quotes in there I cannot repeat on the floor of the
House because Madam Speaker would not allow them and I do not blame her. They are simply not parliamentary-
I want to talk about the next thing here. It is a story from La Presse on November 21, 1984: "The Prime Minister created 10 provincial committees and a national committee to consult cabinet on political nominations. That is after promising that something would be done to make things better; he appointed a committee of Conservatives in each province".
Let me tell you, Madam Speaker, how one of those committees work. Again, this is from the same story: "The Quebec committee will be presided over by Fernand Roberge, manager of the Ritz Carleton in Montreal and a close friend of the Prime Minister". Listen, Madam Speaker, to who the members are: "Other members include ministers Roch LaSalle", the member for Frontenac, "and Marcel Tremblay", the member for Quebec-Est. "As well, PC party militants Michel Cogger, Jean Bazin, Marc Dorion-all three lawyers- also Mario Beaulieu, a Clark supporter and former Union Nationale member, and Gisele Morgan sit on the committee. The national committee consists of Norman Atkins, organizer of the big blue Ontario machine and who led the election campaign last summer. Bernard Roy, chief organizer of the Quebec campaign, has since become principal secretary to the Prime Minister. He will also act as chief of staff in the Prime Minister's Office".
Those were allegations that were made at the time by La Presse.
Madam Speaker, you may think that the Tories were bad and they were. You may think they have reformed their ways. Unfortunately, they have not. Very regrettably, they are still the same.
I want to quote what Stevie Cameron, a well known journalist, said on January 31, 1987: "If the Prime Minister has a single friend who hasn't been appointed to a board, commission or agency or who hasn't been awarded the title of Queen's Counsel or hasn't been given a fat contract or a Senate appointment, that friend deserves to be annoyed". That is what she said at the time.


Mr. Andre:: Wow, Stevie Cameron.
February 17, 1993


Don Boudria: It goes on and on. The minister across the way says that is Stevie Cameron. If it came to believing Stevie Cameron versus the hon. government House leader across the floor, I know who I would believe. I would believe Stevie Cameron.


Harvie Andre: You two have fun swimming around in the mud together.


Don Boudria: Madam Speaker, I do not think I have said anything unparliamentary and perhaps the minister could do the same. He may not like what I am saying, but it does not mean that it is untrue. I have not accused him personally of anything wrong.


Harvie Andre: I haven't heard any truths yet.


Don Boudria: Madam Speaker, I will go on here with quotes from other newspaper articles. From March 24, 1989: Claude Levasseur, campaign manager in the riding of Trois-Rivieres was convicted in Quebec provincial court of influence peddling. The court was told that Mr. Levasseur appointed land surveyer Jean-Marie Chaste-nay of Cap-de-la-Madelaine and requested a $2,500 kickback for a $50,000 contract accorded to Chastenay. Chastenay taped the conversation with Levasseur and turned it over to the police. That person entered a plea of guilty and was sentenced.
The Prime Minister is going to say it is not true, I suppose.


Harvie Andre: What constituency was he from?


Don Boudria: What constituency? I am glad the minister asked. He is the campaign manager and partner even today of a cabinet minister across the way. He is still a partner with him or was as late as three weeks ago. The minister across the way wonders what he does.


Mr. Michel Champagne (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Forestry):: Madam Speaker, I have been listening very closely to my colleague for Glengarry- Prescott-Russell and I find the connection he is trying to make between a case which was adjudicated and the present case involving a minister of the Crown to be far-fetched.
Knowing my colleague for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell, I am sure he does not mean to insinuate that there might be something more to it since he could say it
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outside of this House. However, for the time being, I think that he should stick to what was said and avoid inuendos concerning the implication of a minister of the Crown in a case that was heard and adjudicated without the said minister or ordinary citizen at the time being called to testify in any way whatever as there was no indictment at the time. I think that the member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell should be extremely careful when he makes such remarks.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: In view of the subject matter of the motion brought forward today by the hon. member, I think that the latter part of the observations by the hon. member for Champlain is filled with wisdom and that it would be desirable at all times for everyone, on either side of the House and from all three parties, to be extremely careful not to make accusations which cannot be substantiated.


Don Boudria: Madam Speaker, I agree with the point raised by my colleague for Champlain. I did not say that in that case the minister had been charged. But, granted, his point is well taken.

As it pertains to that particular person and I agree.
I now wish to turn to the broad question of public sector ethics and morals. At the request of the hon. member for Beausejour, I have prepared a platform document on what our party proposes to do on that issue and I want to share it with the House of Commons.
Here are some of the recommendations and I will read some of them into the record. It is my view and the view of my colleagues, that the recommendations on the special joint committee on conflict of interest should be adopted. That has been on the Order Paper now for close to four years and it has gone through two different times of dying on the Order Paper. It has been reintroduced and it was the subject of a special committee and has been left lying there for six months.
I also believe that the spouse of a member of Parliament ought to be required to disclose assets on his or her own part. I believe that a special committee should be struck to study and report on the salaries and benefits of legislators. I believe that the Department of Supply and Services and Public Works should be merged to form a federal department of government services in an effort to reduce cost.

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The agency of record ought to be eliminated. A government advertising bureau should be established within the government to handle government advertising contracts and to end the kind of despicable practices that we have been subjected to in recent weeks on the issue of the unity advertising.
I think the advertising bureau that I have just suggested should be placed under the auspices of the newly created department of government services. I believe that a new system for government advertising needs to be established to ensure non-partisanship and fairness.
The next point. An independent commission of inquiry should be established to mandate the present awarding procedures of contracts and tendering thresholds as outlined in the Treasury Board guidelines.
There are a number of things that should be changed, not the least of which is that we must increase the amount Of control that we have right now over lobbyists in Canada. That is an issue that I will address in committee in a few moments from now.
Those are some of my and my colleagues' recommendations toward improving public sector ethics in this country. My colleagues will read more of these recommendations into the record in a few minutes.


Charles A. Langlois: Madam Speaker, I listened to most of the speech of the member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell and I would have thought he would have expanded more on the motion before us today. It is an opposition motion. After all, it was presented by his party, but his speech contained mostly references to rather old newspaper articles. He mentioned names liberally and I think that is unfortunate.
I would also like to mention before asking my question that the opposition has the opportunity to hold a debate in the House about motions that it considers important ones. I am a young parliamentarian, but I think that we should use the time of the House to discuss subjects that are important for the country, for the nation, for taxpayers and for government itself. I realize this is not
what will happen today since between now and eight o'clock tonight, if the debate keeps going in the direction set by the member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell, I fear the time of the House will be spent very uselessly.
I would like to put a question to the member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell: Could he tell me if he agrees with the methods used before 1988 by the party of which he is now a member, the party which formed government at that time? Does he agree with the methods used by the leader of the Liberal Party, which was the ruling party during those years, for nominating senators and various other officials to public functions?


Don Boudria: Madam Speaker, I am glad to hear the question of the hon. member. He referred to 1988. I think he meant 1984.
He is asking me if the system for Order in Council appointments in 1984 and prior was better to the one established since. No, of course not.


Mr. Blenkarn:: So it is better now.


Don Boudria: No, it is the same. It has not changed.
The point is in 1984 the person who is now Prime Minister promised radical new measures to change those. He has done nothing of the sort.
The only thing we have had is an Order in Council review process that gives no power to a committee, not even the power to make a recommendation to the House of Commons under the Order in Council that happened.
If the minister across the way disagrees with that, I challenge him to go to the transcript of the Standing Committee on Consumer and Corporate Affairs and Government Operations where he will see the motion that I proposed at the time to recommend to this House that Dalton Camp not be hired to work in the Privy Council Office. The motion was ruled out of order because there was no mechanism by which the committee could make that recommendation to the House.


Harvie Andre: You are talking about different things. It was a totally different thing.


Don Boudria: It was an Order in Council review.


Harvie Andre: No it was not. Be honest now.
February 17, 1993


Don Boudria: That is under the authority for which we reviewed.
The member for Manicouagan asked questions about the tone of the debate today and what else we would do. I see that as a perfect opportunity to continue giving some of the recommendations of my party to improve public sector ethics and morals. I want to share these thoughts.
The rational system of awarding government contracts ought to be further implemented in all ministries in order to allow small business a greater opportunity to receive government contracts.
I believe the government should establish a central registry of awarded contracts subject to security requirements. The detail of any contract awarded by the government should be open to public scrutiny.
My policy and that of my colleagues is we want to ensure that federal government contracts are awarded on an equal basis and that members of Parliament be excluded from the involvement of the awarding of contracts, that political exempt staff not be stationed in regional offices of departments as they were at one period with the Department of Public Works.
There should be established within the House of Commons non-partisan nomination and confirmation procedures for Order in Council appointments such as the officers of the House, and that the committee reviewing those should have a veto power.
That the members of the House of Commons should be able to scrutinize deputy ministers and other individuals such as heads of Crown corporations and regulatory agencies. The House ought to be able to give recommendations in regard to those appointments which it cannot do right now.
A nomination procedure ought to be developed for the appointments of Citizenship Court judges. That does not exist right now.
There should be no registration fees imposed on tier 1 or tier 2 lobbyists. I believe that professional lobbyists should be required to disclose in a public register major expenses and fees with a description of the lobbying activity.
The Lobbyists Registration Act should be amended to ban contingency fees.
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Professional lobbyists should be obliged to declare all of their lobbying efforts whether a fee was charged or not. It should be compulsory that lobbyists disclose fees charged to a client along with the amount and the form of any payment made.
I could continue and elaborate further if you wish for me to do so, Madam Speaker.


Rey D. Pagtakhan: Madam Speaker, as usual we learn a lot from my colleague from Glengarry-Prescott-Russell.
I would just like to say that if a government violates ethics, it makes Canadians lose faith in our political system. That will be the end of our nation.
My colleague was talking about the need for a central registry for the awarding of contracts. Would the member briefly comment on the 23 contracts awarded by the department of health as audited by the Auditor General that 22 of those 23 contracts were illegal and cost Canadians millions of dollars?


Don Boudria: Madam Speaker, that is actually a very good case in point of some of the things I have been advocating.
The Auditor General indicated in his annual report and since then we have seen case after case of government contracts awarded with no regard to the tendering procedure, not even any due regard for a proper invitational procedure where such is the procedure to be used right now.
In some of those cases that procedure should not be in existence anyway. The procedures have been breached. In the cases at the department of health it was flagged right in the Auditor General's report.
Surely members across the way cannot accuse me of innuendo, of creating those circumstances. The Auditor General of Canada is the person who has said so. These are not figments of my imagination nor the imagination of the member across the way.
This is wrong, dead wrong. The government has to reform those practices. It must do so even if it is at the 11th hour of the dying days of this administration.


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, the contracts in question were, according to the Auditor General, not done by the bureaucratic procedure set down. Did the Auditor General suggest that in

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fact this money was illegally or fraudulently obtained and abused? If so, why would the hon. member suggest that charges were not laid against these people who fraudulently obtained these funds and misused them, wasted these millions of dollars as alleged by the member for Winnipeg North?
Or, was it in fact that the Auditor General was merely pointing out that the bureaucratic procedures were not properly followed? Did the Auditor General say that there was fraud, theft and millions of dollars of taxpayers' money abused? If so, who are the people who did it? Why were they not charged?


Rey D. Pagtakhan: The RCMP-


Harvie Andre: It is not concluded yet. No one has been charged and there is no proof of theft.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Order, please.


Rey D. Pagtakhan: Read the report.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member for Winnipeg North was recognized earlier. I am sure that he could have the floor later on some time today.
It would be appreciated for law and order and for respect for this House if he would refrain from screaming across the floor and making accusations at this time.


Rey D. Pagtakhan: On a point of order, Madam Speaker.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: If there is a point of order I will listen to it.


Rey D. Pagtakhan: Madam Speaker, the government House leader alluded to the question that I posed and indicated my riding. He knew that there were only two-


Madam Deputy Speaker:: The hon. member is engaging in debate when he does not have the floor. I have just asked him to please wait until it is his time to debate to rise and make his views known.
There is a minute left for the hon. member for Glengarry- Prescott-Russell.


Don Boudria: Madam Speaker, the Auditor General did indicate in his reports that the procedures had not been used. The minister may categorize those as merely bureaucratic. I do not believe that such is the case. That is actually a criticism of his own colleague, the President of the Treasury Board, who sets down those rules which
are necessary for the good and proper awarding of the contract.
When I asked the question in the House some months ago, the government refused to answer the question that I raised on this very topic. If my memory serves me right, it was the government House leader himself who told me he could not answer because the whole issue was the subject of a police investigation.
I rest my case.


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, I would just make the point that there is a far cry between that and the blatant statement that millions of dollars of taxpayers' money were wasted in some fraudulent manner. That is an accusation of malfeasance which I do not think should stand unchallenged. We have a tradition in this House: When you charge somebody with violating the law you put your seat on the line. If that charge turns out to be untrue, you resign.
It is instructive, I think, that on this supply day-


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member should know that a point of order refers to the rules of this House. I would like to know which rule of the House the hon. member is now invoking.


Rey D. Pagtakhan: I cannot cite a specific rule. I beg your indulgence, but I will tell you, Madam Speaker, that I was alluding to the report which indicated that there were illegal violations, violations of several laws. I can show you the page later on, Madam Speaker.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: The hon. member is debating. The hon. minister has the floor.


Harvie Andre: I think it is instructive on this supply day, which is a day provided under the rules for the opposition to deal with the question of supply, i.e. the spending of public funds, that it should decide to raise this subject. I checked the record and over the last two years not once, not on one occasion has the opposition used a supply day to talk about what is intended for that purpose, namely to talk about government spending, how they would do it better and so on. But that is not surprising.
The hon. member stood up and listed alleged illegal activities, improper activities by various people. He managed to slander and libel several people, listed them from newspaper articles. Some had been charged, some had been found innocent. In our system once you are
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found innocent, you are found innocent. However that did not prevent the hon. member from again accusing them of being corrupt and rotten. Even though a court of law in this country had found them innocent that did not prevent the hon. member from standing up and again slandering them because they had once been charged. Once charged, in that hon. member's mind, they are guilty.
Then he talked about, and I will get to the advertising in a moment, patronage appointments. He talked about the Prime Minister's commitment. The first thing the Prime Minister did was to establish a parliamentary committee headed by Jim McGrath which established that all GIC appointments are reviewable by committees of the House, a major innovation.
Then he said: "Ah, but he talked about Dalton Camp". Dalton Camp was a contract employee for the Prime Minister's Office in the same way as I have employees in my office and he has employees in his office. Is he suggesting that all our employees, including his employees, must be approved first by a committee of the House? What an absurd suggestion. The hon. member enjoys slandering, libelling, maliciously condeming people who are not here to defend themselves, using this institution with its privileges and its immunities to unfairly slander people and to suggest that if anybody had the temerity to be involved in partisan politics for the Progressive Conservative Party, they are unfit for public office.
It is funny that he did not complain about the appointment of Aideen Nicholson to the Immigration Appeal Board or George Henderson to the Veterans Appeal Board because they are former Liberals, or Ian Deans. It is only if you have been involved with the Progressive Conservative Party that you are corrupt. Otherwise you are okay.


Mr. Kilgour:: Like 99 per cent of your appointments. Tell me what the word sophistry means.


Harvie Andre: The hon. member should write another book that nobody can read rather than sitting there.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: The hon. member for Edmonton Southeast will be seeking the floor shortly, I imagine. He may want to be able to make his case without being interrupted all the time. I think it would be
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wise and generous of him to extend the same courtesy to the hon. minister when he has the floor.


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, the hon. member when quoting these various authors quoted Stevie Cameron. Stevie Cameron once wrote-


David Kilgour: Now he is going to slander Stevie Cameron who happens to come from a Tory family.


An hon. member:: The minister does not even know her.


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, you have to resort to a gag soon for that hon. member. Stevie Cameron dealt with an interior decorator, Giovanni Mowinkle, who said: "Do you know what size the closets are at 24 Sussex Drive?" There was this great two full page piece in The Globe and Mail about the size of the closets, the number of pairs of shoes and how this was such an outrage.
After the article came out, a couple of things happened. One thing was that Giovanni Mowinkle skipped the country with the RCMP hot on his trail. The second thing was the the editor of The Globe and Mail, the same Geoff Stevens who was quoted by the hon. member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell, was fired as editor.


David Kilgour: Just say something substantive, Harvie.


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, I do welcome the opportunity of this debate to deal with a subject that the hon. member alluded to at the end and that was advertising and the alleged, in his mind, his words and his accusation of impropriety, illegality, patronage and whatever of the advertising contracts. Let me deal with that for a moment.
Prior to 1979 advertising was done by individual departments that selected an agency and ran their own campaigns however they saw fit. Not suprisingly, in those days Liberal governments chose Liberal agencies. They wanted to pick people they had confidence in. That is understandable.
In 1979 the Clark government brought in the advertising management group, something that it is apparently in the Liberal platform to do after the next election. Well, it exists. That advertising management group co-ordinates all the various advertising campaigns by the various departments to make sure that we do a media buy that gets the best price for the government, to ensure that it hits the right audiences, that the contracts are honoured

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properly and so on. It was a scheme that the Liberals carried on in 1980 after they were returned to office and is in place today. They of course appointed somebody they had confidence in to head up the group on contracts and we did the same thing. The individual is Mr. Bob Byron, with 35 years experience. I quote a civil servant: "Civil servants who deal with him say that he will have forgotten more about advertising than I have learned in my lifetime. He is an expert and full value according to civil servants for all he does".
In addition, what the government did in 1984 was establish a process for selecting agencies. It is notoriously difficult for government, and I was supply and services minister at the time, to contract for professional services. You cannot ask for closed tenders from lawyers, engineers, architects, accountants or advertising agencies because it does not work that way. You do that if you are having somebody build a building. You give them the plans and say: "Give us a tender; we'll cut the envelope". You cannot do that for professional services because there is something called quality that goes into it.
What industry does in terms of advertising is ask several agencies to come forward and make a pitch, to come forward with suggestions as to how they would handle the advertising campaign the client has in mind.
We put in a process where a department wants to run a campaign. We will have a committee of civil servants hear the pitches and make a recommendation. It is as fair a system as we know how to devise. It has been working pretty well, a lot better than the system before it.
The Citizen with its intrepid reporters, Kennedy and Cobb, wrote a piece in regard to the major contracting on national unity and the 125th anniversary. The headline is: "Ad contracts given without bids, sources". Sources say without bids.
What in fact happened was that the minister responsible, who happens to be a senator, sent a letter to the editor saying the article was wrong. As a matter of fact there was a committee of five public servants, Gagnier, Guite, Parkins, Uteck and Cardinal, who listened to pitches from six agencies, Academie, Burghardt, Wolo-wich, Crunkhorn, Camp Associates, La Boite a Idees, Palmer Jarvis and Publitel and in fact awarded two of
them, Palmer Jarvis from Vancouver and I think it was Publitel from Montreal with the contracts.
Did that satisfy the reporters that they were wrong? Absolutely not. They went on. The first thing was they went to Daryl Bean and asked what he thought of the contracting. He was outraged that there was ho competition.
You can forgive Daryl Bean because he was given the same false information from those reporters. Not resisting an opportunity to scream in outrage, he reacted. We know Daryl Bean. I see that he is committed to helping the Bloc Quebecois in the next election, which is interesting too.
What really did happen? After being given these names, these reporters phoned and talked to some of the civil servants. I want to relate a little bit of the conversation they had with one civil servant who is a 30-year veteran. He says that he worked for the Diefenbaker government, the Pearson government, the Trudeau government, the Clark government, the Trudeau government again, the Mulroney government, and if the next government is the Rhinoceros Party he will work for them. He says that nobody knows how he votes. He has no partisan leanings.
In answer to this intrepid reporter, he said that he had no colours and that tomorrow nobody would know if he voted pink, blue, yellow or any different. He said: "All I am saying to you is that the system that is in place now, and I speak strictly as a public servant, is a helluva lot better than it was 10 years ago. It is a helluva lot more honest than than it was 10 years ago". That was the testimony of a 30-year public servant.
Did that turn off our intrepid reporters, Messrs. Bernstein and Woodward, who are digging in? Not at all. After this they wrote another piece saying: "Ah, but they didn't file a report". The policy statement says that they did it over lunch at Henri Burger's. "Jeez, my goodness, a business lunch. Oh, horrors".
What absolute nonsense.
The hon. member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell stands and refers again today to evidence of corruption in advertising and says that this government has no interest in being fair and having competition. We have had the testimony of five public servants, the one in particular who said: "The system in place is a hell of a lot better than it was 10 years ago and a hell of a lot more
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honest"; I underline more honest than it was 10 years ago. Does that make a difference? No.
Why possibly could these reporters not have reflected that in their story? Why would Messrs. Kennedy and Cobb not reflect this truth?
Yesterday we had a deuce before the consumer and corporate affairs committee. The committee is looking at the Lobbyists Registration Act. One of the lobbyist, a fellow by the name of Michael Robinson, a well-known Liberal activist, said and I am quoting from the minutes:
There's some evidence that the partisanship may have been part of the motivation.
He was speaking of the motivation of the reporters. He continued:
After two or three stories that appeared in The Ottawa Citizen I received a phone call from Gord Ashworth who, as many of you will know, is campaign director for the Liberal Party but also was very active with many of us in the referendum campaign and the nature of the conversation was that it was a phone call to say that he had just finished talking with Mark Kennedy, who is one of the journalists for The Ottawa Citizen, who was asking him questions about advertising during the referendum campaign with a view, I assume, to write more stories for The Citizen and, in the course of that conversation, asked Gordon if I, personally, was upset at the stories that had appeared in The Ottawa Citizen. And when Gordon suggested that yes, indeed, I was less than happy with the coverage, was reassured by Kennedy that I shouldn't be upset because the purpose of these stories was not to get to the Liberal Party but in fact to embarrass the Tory government.
He went on to say:
And I find that a strange commentary from a journalist and it certainly makes me suspicious about at least what part of their motivation may have been.
The Ottawa Citizen writes an editorial saying that what it is looking into is government ethics. I humbly suggest it should do a little consideration of journalistic ethics if that is not an oxymoron when applied to these people. They think they have Bernstein and Woodward here. What they have is researchers for the NBC program Dateline.
He said the purpose of these stories was not to seek out the journalistic goals of who, what, where, when and why, but to embarrass the Tory government. On the front page of this great national newspaper are stories by these two reporters who seek not the truth, who seek not to inform the public, but who seek by their own words to embarrass the government. Is that not wonderful? Are we not wonderfully served by such an institution?
This brought back to my mind a conversation I had with the late Marjorie Nichols. Speaking to me in some desolation one day-she had written an article that was actually complimentary about something the government had done-she said she was heckled and abused by her own colleagues in The Citizen. To write an article that actually said something good about the government was considered intolerable to her colleagues like Don McGillivray who has never had anything good to say ever about anything, even if he has to contradict himself. Then she also went on to say, in some disgust at the quality of the journalism around here: "You know, Harvie, this country has the strength to survive its politicians. It may not have the strength to survive its media". If this is the kind of standards we are going to get, these words are so true.
Perhaps a less pejorative interpretation could be put on those remarks which gets to another bigger problem. I was reading a review of the book: Reinventing Government: How the Entrepreneurial Spirit is Transforming the Public Service by R. I. G. MacLean who at the time was working with the Ontario government on a two-year assignment. He was talking about bureaucracy and how bureaucracy stifles because bureaucracy is after process, process, process, process. It is not about results; it is process and how stifling it is. He made the following observation:
Each part of a bureaucratic organization has a mandate and operates within a set of rules. Lacking an objective assessment of outcomes, conformity becomes the measure of performance. This is what bureaucrats call accountability. The typical response to suggestions that we might get more done with fewer rules is that the rules are necessary for accountability to the public. This is a complete fallacy. The rules are all about accountability for inputs - the approvals required for spending. There is no accountability for outputs-what that spending achieves.
One bureaucrat was not following that procedure at least, Mr. Guite who was talking to Mr. Kennedy. He said: "Look, we followed a competitive process here. It is more honest than anything we did 10 years ago and The Ottawa Citizen is saying you did not provide a written report", i.e. the process. That was enough for them to conclude that the thing is corrupt and enough for them to continue in their ongoing efforts to embarrass the Conservative government.

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Is that not a nice job to have? "What did you do today?"
"I embarrassed the government today".
"Wow, what an accomplishment. How are you serving the people, your readers and so on? Did you supply them with truth today?"
"No, not necessarily, but I embarrassed the government".
"Were you honest today? Did you give them the five ws: who, what, why, when and where?"
"No, but I embarrassed the government. By cracky, I got them".
"Wonderful".
For example, Stevie Cameron, wonderful. She must feel proud: "Hey, God, I got three reputations; I've destroyed three people this week. Alleluia, what a week". Shakespeare said: "Steal my purse, you steal trash. Steal my reputation you steal my life". She and too many like her think it is honourable to go around stealing reputations.
The hon. member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell, by naming off people in this place who have been found innocent and implying they are still guilty because they have been charged, is engaging in the same kind of behaviour. Then they wonder why this place does not get the respect it deserves from the public. Well, you get it by being fair, by being honest; you do not tolerate corruption but you do not accuse people of corrupt practices because they did not follow the interpretation of the rules that you put to them.
The hon. member for Winnipeg North is right. This place will come apart if we continue to engage in this kind of uncontrolled, irresponsible mud-slinging that is too often a part of what happens here.
If we treat each other with respect and if we do not assume that everybody on the other side is a crook and a thief; if we make sure that our accusations are based in fact, not suspicion; and if we do not immediately yell hurrah when we have reporters like Kennedy and Cobb out maligning people, we have a chance of regaining
some of the respect we have lost. If we do not do it, unfortunately this institution and this country are the losers.
I regret that we would spend a valuable day on such a subject, but in a sense I am grateful to the hon. member for giving me a chance to put these facts on the record.


Mr. Lyle Kristiansen (Kootenay West-Revelstoke):: Madam Speaker, I would like to pose a couple of questions to the government House leader and to make a couple of comments.
I have a hunch that I do not represent many of the official views of most political parties in Canada by the position I am enunciating, but personally I have been disturbed over the last number of years at the call for strict, legislated regulatory guidelines making law out of standards of practice and ethics in government.
There are problems, one of which was evidenced to a large degree in the province of British Columbia in the last few years. We had a premier who had difficulty, it appeared, understanding the difference between standards of public conduct and standards of private business conduct and how we ought to keep them apart.
That is something elected politicians surely have to make a determination about for themselves, with their own standards and what they think are good standards. Ultimately it is up to the electorate to make a judgment whether any given government has stood the test of a generally held view of what is acceptable public conduct among politicians.
I can recall a discussion I had with a previous minister between 1980 and 1984. He is now a senator from the province of New Brunswick. We were discussing something outside this area. He said: "Every time any one of us is in opposition and we see what we think is an abuse, we say there has to be a law, there has to be a regulation, and we have to tighten things up. All it ends up doing in the long run is having cabinet ministers who cannot sometimes yield to common sense appeals because they are bound up in red tape, regulations and laws".
Personally, and I suspect I speak on behalf of a lot more people in the body politic out there than we sometimes care to recognize, I wish that more politicians
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would simply say: "Look, I have done what I have done. Here is my record. Judge me on it. It is up to you to decide what our standards of conduct should be".
As an individual member of the House of Commons there are some things in the record of this government, in its earlier years particularly, I find profoundly disturbing. There seems to be an extraordinary number of people, more than ever before in our history, who have ended up before the courts. I suspect that sort of thing is likely to happen to any party that gains a huge influx of new members with no previous political and public life experience. They do not understand when they come here in those kinds of numbers the difference between standards of conduct acceptable in the public realm and those in the private sector.
Those are comments more than they are questions. I suspect we will have some agreement. I hope it is not simply because the government House leader is sitting on that side. It is a view which I think is important to express. I would like to hear a response of the government House leader on it.


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his comments because I absolutely agree. I think he is dead on. We do have that tendency. The moment it appears a rule is broken the outcry is for tougher rules.
If we were to use the analogy of traffic by-laws, that every time someone breaks a speeding by-law we get tougher speeding laws, soon no one would be able to drive. We would soon constrict things and make it impossible to get about. We do that, the member is right, and the outcome is disturbing.
One reality in all this is that the message is very clear. The way to stay out of trouble is to follow each and every rule to the absolute nth degree. No matter that doing so produces bad value for the government, produces something that is awkward and is not responsive to the real situation or that the rules may not be appropriate in the real situation. We cannot get into trouble for sticking to the rules rigidly but we can sure waste a lot of money.
I mentioned in my speech a quote from that fellow MacLean who reviewed the book Reinventing Government. He really talked about it. He said that we should concentrate on outputs, not inputs, and that rather than say all the processes must be followed to the nth degree we ask what happened. I can be a tad partisan. Some of
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the malfeasance we have been accused of on this side is that we have done things contrary to the rules.
The fact of the matter is a better test to me for fraudulent activity is: "Did you personally enrich yourself or your friends at the expense of the taxpayer?" If one breaks the rules to provide better value for the taxpayer in terms of the program or whatnot, if it goes out to whomever, make it immigrants or whomever, surely it is almost something to be applauded.
Around here, this is all that needs to occur. It is what Kennedy and Cobb were talking about. They feel there was a technical breaking of the rules. That to them is equivalent to corruption. That is what I found despicable about that whole string of articles. They had the testimony of public servants who said it is a more honest system than what we had 10 years ago. I know that when I was over there I struggled with the system.
How does one contract for services? How does one find a fair way to decide which engineer to hire, which accountants or which lawyers? It is very tough.
For advertising, we have come up with this scheme which duplicates the private sector. To have these guys say that we are all corrupt because in their view we should have provided a written report-that is how they read the rules and therefore that is evidence of corruption-is a misstatement.
If this thing were to blow up and become a fact, we would have to write a new set of rules which would be the kind of bureaucratic imposition you are talking about. It serves nobody's purpose.
I would agree with you. Maybe the member and I could talk some time about how we could bring about that attitude and that result.


Donald Alex Blenkarn: Madam Speaker, yesterday in Question Period the minister indicated that the government would be bringing in a bill dealing with the report of the special joint committee of the Senate and the House dealing with conflict of interest.
I was wondering if that bill would contain the amendments that were recommended to the government in the conflict of interest report as an amendment to the Parliament of Canada Act. I was wondering whether he

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would also be accepting the amendments to the Criminal Code that were suggested in that report.


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, we certainly do intend to bring the bill forward.
I understand that the final draft is literally hours away. I am expecting to receive it and I will table it as soon as possible.
On the specifics, I can give you this general answer. I cannot give you the specifics but I can give you this general answer. The bill will reflect the recommendations of the committee of the House which the hon. member chaired and which was as a unanimous result.
There are one or two things where our legal advisers said we might have difficulty doing this or that. There was no dispute among cabinet colleagues with respect to the fundamental recommendations of the hon. member's committee.


Mr. Jack Iyerak Anawak (Nunatsiaq):: Madam Speaker, it was a very moving speech by the hon. House leader of the government.
With all the signs of being angry at our daring to question the antics of the government and his comment about more people refraining from those kinds of antics, it just strikes me that I do not have the ability to do all that and look very mad. .
If that is what he wants in the House, would he be prepared to be the first to refrain from having those kinds of antics?


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, I will accept the hon. member's criticism if he will agree to talk to his colleagues from Newfoundland in particular-including the mustachioed one from Newfoundland-I think he knows who I am talking about. Some of the others have damaged my eardrums over the years.
I do get angry about the subject. Frankly, the false accusation of malfeasance is one of the things that offends me most about public life. Argue over policy. Argue over issues. Argue over approach. However, false accusations of malfeasance and impropriety is to me going at a person's reputation and I consider that dirty pool.
The hon. member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell the day I was in the House asked about the post office. He said: "You aren't closing all your rural post offices. You left a couple open in the Prime Minister's riding. That's evidence of patronage". Then he went out and repeated it to the press. He knows-I believe he knows and I could have told him-that he left six of them open in his riding.


An hon. member:: He forgot that.


Harvie Andre: He forgot that. It is so easy to stand up here and say, "patronage". As a matter of fact there are five open in the Prime Minister's riding, but six in the hon. member's riding of Glengarry-Prescott-Russell. It is this easy flinging of the accusation of patronage, of illegality, of malfeasance, of corruption that I think destroys the reputation of all of us, damages this institution and damages the country. Yes I do get angry when people do that.


David Kilgour: Madam Speaker, I would put it to the House that the minister who just left does not get it.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: The hon. member was just given the floor and in the first 20 seconds figured out a way to do something that, as a veteran member of this House, he knows he should not do and that is to mention the presence or absence of any one person on the House. I would appreciate the hon. member being a little more careful. I will give him the extra 20 seconds.


David Kilgour: They told me that the minister might return if I coaxed him that way.
I would like to start if I may with a quote from somebody whom I think a lot of us have a lot of respect for, the late Adlai Stevenson. He said: "Public confidence in the integrity of the government is indispensable to faith and democracy. When we lose faith in the system we have lost faith in everything we fight and spend for".
Every member in this House and everybody who is sitting in the gallery or sitting around the House knows that this House of Commons and members of Parliament have never been held in lower esteem in the history of our country than right now. I think I saw a poll recently that pointed out that 9 per cent of Canadians have a great deal of respect or considerable respect-some such term-for members of Parliament.
February 17, 1993

Why is it that we have reached a new low in all parties with having good men and women run for their parties in the election? We seem to be having fewer problems than the others but I think it is a problem all parties are having.
Let me suggest that those opposite look on the public trust-and have shown this since 1984-much the way a vulture looks on a sick cow. Has there been a single government in our entire national history that has earned the opprobrium of Canadians more than this one opposite now.
Let me just pick up a few examples of the kinds of things that Canadians are concerned about. Here is article from The Globe and Mail on February 21, 1990: "$670,000 for trip by MP to Costa Rica".
It states: "The government spent $296,000 for the military aircraft and crew used to transport the entourage and equipment which included flying two armour-plated Oldsmobile limousines from Ottawa to Costa Rica, and $136,000 more or less for travel expenses of officials accompanying Mr. Mulroney".
Here is one from The Toronto Star of December 6,
1989.	It states: "External Affairs Minister Joe Clark spent $165,438 for a pair of trips to Paris and London. Clark and three officials could not get a commercial flight to Paris in August because the minister had to attend a late session of the Progressive Conservative Party annual meeting. The Challenger dropped them off in time to attend a conference in Cambodia and return to Ottawa. On return to Ottawa, it was empty. The cost was $85,000.
There are so many stories, Madam Speaker, it is hard to know where to stop. Here is one en frangais.

It is another article in French by Marcel Adam, published in La Presse on May 27, 1989, and I quote: "Since they came to power five years ago, the Tories have continued to display a deplorable lack of public morality and parliamentary ethics. They are morally so lax that they are acquiring a reputation as one of the most corrupt government parties to sully federal politics, at a time when we thought such practices were no longer tolerated".
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Here is one dated February 2, 1990 from The Ottawa Citizen written by Don McGillivray, whom the government House leader does not seem to like. I will not name any names. We will just keep this general.
Is there no end to the parade of cabinet ministers, members of Parliament and appointed officials who use the position of public trust to advance their private interests?
Here is another one from La Presse.

It is dated November 8, 1990, under the heading: "Two out of three Canadians believe favouritism and corruption are on the increase in Ottawa", and I quote: "Nearly two-thirds of Canadians, 65 per cent, state that favouritism and political corruption are increasing in Ottawa, while only 6 per cent claim the tendency is less widespread than it was in the past."

Here is one from The Gazette of May 24, 1991. One could pick up the paper almost any week and find a similar story. The headline read:
Company founded by Mulroney aide got $700,000 job.
Just two months after the $700,000 'strategic management review' of the Canadian International Development Agency was given to Secor Inc. of Montreal, company founder Marcel Cote quit the Prime Minister's office and rejoined the firm.
There has been a steady stream of scandals, blatant patronage appointments and questionable ethical behaviour on behalf of cabinet ministers since 1984. Let me quote from the former leader of this party, John Turner, who spoke in Montreal in March 1987 about what he called a crisis of confidence in the political system itself:
By confusing personal, party and public interest, the Mulroney government has undermined the very foundation of the state. In today's system there is a clear distinction made between the state, the Prime Minister and the party with the majority. Despite the strength of their 1984 victory, the Conservatives do not have the right to use their position, which should be above partisan interests, for personal gains. The state exists for the common good and not for the personal interests of a few. We cannot remain passive in the light of this situation for I am certain that no one can run a country without the confidence of the people. This confidence must be earned.
He went on to talk about the people here being the trustees of the democratic institutions: "We must strengthen them, not undermine them". He talked about the need for a code of conduct to dictate honest behaviour and so on.

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It is a big file. I might though, on the subject of conflicts of interest, ask those opposite to tell us what happened to the proposed conflict of interest code that was brought in September 5, 1985, when our Prime Minister said: "We have taken great pains to ensure that the new code leaves no doubt that the ultimate responsibility for the ethical standards of the federal government rests with the cabinet, and more particularly with me".
Wow. That is reassuring, is it not? It is 1993 now. Where is the code? Where do you start? Here is a quote from May 4, 1985: "Following the example set by Michael Wilson, it has been learned that the External Affairs minister Joe Clark's brother, Peter Clark, has been given all outside legal work awarded by the federal ' government's Calgary Olympic office".
Not to be outdone by the Wilson family, it has been revealed that External Affairs Minister Joe Clark's sister-in-law, Marcia Clark, was appointed as a temporary member of the National Parole Board.
She is now a full-time member.
The head of the riding association of the Minister responsible for Constitutional Affairs and/or his campaign manager now sits on the National Parole Board. The brother of the member for Athabasca sits on the Parole Board. What qualifications do any of these three, or virtually any of the Parole Board appointees made by this bunch opposite, have to make decisions on what amounts to a life and death situation for the 14 Albertans who were killed needlessly because of bad decisions by the National Parole Board since 1986? It is a trough for the boys and girls.
Here is another one from June 4, 1985:
Justice Minister John Crosbie continued the Conservative government's nepotism with appointments for his sons, Michael Crosbie and Chesley Crosbie, via the law firms -
And so on. Those boys need work. Here is another one from October 11, 1985:
Secretary of State Walter McLean has managed to spend more than $100,000 on a trip to Africa with his wife.
The list gets so long and boring, but they just do not get it.
I would suggest that three-quarters of this bunch opposite are going to lose their seats because they just do not understand that Canadians are not back in the Duplessis era. They are not back in the 1950s in Quebec, Manitoba or British Columbia. Canadians have moved
on. They would like to have some respect for the people who get elected to this House.
There are exceptions. I can see one or two here. There are many people in this House on that side who are honest. However, the leadership comes from the top and there is no leadership on this issue. There is misleadership at the top on this issue.
What are we going to do about it? As a new government it is becoming increasingly evident that we are going to have to do a lot of things. I hope we will start with an ethics in government act, akin to what the American Congress introduced after Watergate. I hope we will do the kinds of things that President Clinton has done by having pre-employment contracts with appointees that prevent lobbying and influence peddling after people leave those positions.
The Canadian public is so mad at us collectively because of these acts, which I would say come from the leadership at the top of this government, that it is going to take us years and years to regain the confidence of our fellow citizens.
I do not know why we cannot have an ethics in government act or why we cannot have a conflict code that has some teeth to it. We simply must do this before this place will have the respect of Canadians again.
I would like to state some things I would like to see done, and I am speaking personally. I would like to see the recommendations of the Special Joint Committee on Conflict of Interest enacted. I know this is a controversial issue but I think that the spouses of members of Parliament, given the unique position we have, should have to disclose their assets.
The Departments of Supply and Services and Public Works should be merged to form the department of government services with absolute honesty and transparency in the way it does business with the public.
The Agency of Records should be eliminated. A government advertising bureau should be established to handle all government advertising contracts.
There must be a more rational system of wording government contracts in all ministries in order to allow small businesses a greater opportunity for access to them. There should be a central registry for all awarded contracts. Subject to security requirements the details of
February 17, 1993

any contract awarded by the government should be open to public scrutiny.
Surely members of Parliament must be excluded from any involvement in the contract awarding process.
There should be established within the House of Commons a non-partisan nominating and confirmation procedure for Order in Council and other appointments.
Right now if an Order in Council appointment is referred to the energy committee, of which I am a member, we have no right to stop the appointment. We can have a little hearing. We can ask questions. My understanding is that whether we like it or not once the Order in Council is signed that man or woman is appointed and it is, in effect, just window-dressing for these committees to pretend to review these appointments.
If this Parliament is going to regain a meaningful place in society we should be able to scrutinize the appointments of deputy ministers and of appointments to Crown corporations and certain regulatory agencies.
We should also have the right to veto appointments as we saw happen recently south of here in the case of the proposed attorney general, Ms. Baird.
There should be no registration fees imposed on Tier I and Tier II lobbyists. Individuals should be free to petition and give feedback to public officials. Professional lobbyists should be required to disclose in a public registry their major expenses and fees along with a description of their lobbying activities. Contingency fees are simply unacceptable for lobbyists.
I think I have probably said enough. If I made one point I hope it is that Canadians are very, very angry. Any of us who goes door knocking in our ridings knows how angry Canadians are at us about our pensions and perks. There is a constant stream of newspaper articles describing abuse of office or worse.
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The only way we are going to regain the public trust is by introducing very tough ethics in a government act which will basically do what the United States Congress did after Watergate.


Donald Alex Blenkarn: Madam Speaker, the member recited a great number of articles alleging all sorts of nastiness.
I noticed that all of those articles were in the period prior to 1988 when the member ran for the Progressive Conservative Party in the last general election, and he certainly knew about them at the time. Having known about all these terrible revelations why did he put his name up and accept the letter from the Prime Minister to make him a candidate in that election on behalf of the Progressive Conservative Party?
If he was really concerned about these terrible ethical matters that he has revealed today he would not have run for the party that allegedly made these terrible errors, would he? Maybe he can explain to this House why he accepted the Prime Minister's nomination in 1988.


David Kilgour: Madam Speaker, when I was expelled from the caucus after the GST vote the Prime Minister was quoted as saying that he would not sign my nomination paper if I attempted to run for the party again.
I assured him that he would never have that problem because as long as he was leader of the party I would never have anything to do with the Conservative Party.
I would remind the member for Mississauga South that in 1986 when I "left the caucus" for a period of nine months two reasons were given. They were the abuse of office by the government of the day and the lack of attention to the problems in the west.
I have some affection for the member. He may not want me to say that in public but if there were more members on that side of the House who had the candour and the outspokenness of the member who just spoke this place would be held in more esteem than it is at present.
One of the troubles with his caucus is that there are too few people like the member who are prepared to say what is on their minds either in here, in the caucus or

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anywhere else. The member for Abitibi is a member of Parliament who everybody in the House can and should admire. He is an example to all of us. The members of the House should try to be more like him.
The trouble with the system is that the way to get ahead in it is by "apple polishing" the right hon. gentleman who sits there.
Until members of Parliament take pride in being members of Parliament instead of being aspiring ministers, parliamentary secretaries or ambassadors, our system will not be the kind of House that the member for Mississauga South and I would both like it to be.
[Translation\


Charles A. Langlois: Madam Speaker, I again listened very carefully to what the member for Edmonton Southeast said. I noted in his comments to the House, especially at the very beginning, that he gave a detailed list of spending by Cabinet ministers on official trips. Of course if ministers of the Crown, representing the Government of Canada, go outside the country, it costs money. According to the member for Edmonton Southeast, we would have to conclude that this type of spending is unethical, a form of misconduct and contrary to the interests of Canada and of this House.
If that is what the member for Edmonton Southeast thinks of the value of the representations made by representatives of the government and of Canada when they travel abroad to defend our interests, pursue our foreign policy, strengthen our ties with our allies and open new trade opportunities, if that is unethical and misconduct on the part of government members, I have serious doubts about the judgment of the member for Edmonton Southeast.
If he has such a keen sense of integrity and is so scrupulous, I have a question for him. He accuses members of this caucus of lacking integrity because they do not speak up to denounce abuses. Could I ask him whether he was so scrupulous when he decided to quit the Conservative Party, even though he was elected under that banner in 1984 and 1988? Did he have the decency and the integrity to obtain his constituents' agreement for changing to a party other than the one they elected him for?


David Kilgour: Madam Speaker, veiy briefly, I would say that it is a question of judgment, a question of respect for the public and for the federal government's lack of money.
I gave Mr. Clark as an example. He has to take a government plane to attend a Conservative Party meeting. As a Canadian of Scottish origin, I think that it is very easy to make such trips on regular flights. I do not have the article on hand, but I think that he spent something like $67,000. To me that is an abuse of power.
As for running in a by-election, I said when I was expelled from the party by the member and his colleagues that if the Prime Minister would sign a contract to call a by-election within three months or less, I would be very glad to run. Knowing the Prime Minister very well, I knew full well that if I resigned my seat, he would make me wait a year, maybe more. Since I have four children, I really like to get paid at the end of the month.


Charles A. Langlois: Oh, that's it.


Howard Douglas McCurdy: Madam Speaker, let me first of all say that this motion, which is a Liberal opposition day motion, would not find itself naturally within the context of my critic area. Let me say more about it. It is not the kind of debate that I find great pleasure participating in at all.
I just do not like and never have liked mud slinging and scandal mongering. In all the time I have been in this House I have not jumped to the conclusion that what the press prints about a member is necessarily true. All of us in this place are human and all of us are going to make mistakes. By and large the newspaper reports put into the record today constitute a record of human error, the perpetrators of which to one degree or another have been punished.
We talk about corruption in Canadian politics. It is time that this be put into the proper context. Much of what has been said and the impression of Canadian politicians has been created to a very large degree by the reports of what happens on the other side of the river. I know that some will look askance at that remark, but the fact is a culture has grown which says that politicians are corrupt and are never to be trusted because they are always putting money into their own pockets.

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The average Canadian is absolutely convinced that most of us are here because it is going to make us rich and famous and when we get through here we are going to be not quite so famous but infinitely richer. It just is not so.
I live in Windsor, Ontario. Every Sunday when I look at the Detroit Free Press News I see reports of crime and criminal activity, the corruption of one politician or another, whether it be a mayor, a member of council, a police commissioner, or whomever. Corruption is as American as apple pie .You can see it every day, day in and day out. When talking about corruption, we are in the minor leagues of the minor leagues.
Consider for example the savings and loan scandal. Consider the number of reports of congressmen and senators lining their own pockets. Think of the reality of members of the U.S. Senate or Congress raising money for a campaign and when they resign they put the money in their pockets. Look at the kind of situation that creates.
It is true that kind of image of politicians affects how Canadians think of us. I think it is far more important to consider how Canadians weigh us in terms of our functions here to the extent to which we represent principle, to the extent to which we represent the people who elect us and to the extent to which we act consistent with principles that have been identified with us and with our parties.
The hon. member for Edmonton Southeast who has been so passionate in his condemnation of the Conservatives and what he sees as so much corruption better weigh the impression he has created about politics by his own acts. I am not talking about corrupt acts or anything of the sort. I am not talking about patronage. I am not talking about lining his own pocket. But what are we going to say about the principles of conservatism if you are a Conservative for many years and you get into a pique and you cross the aisle? What does that say about what he stands for? Is he a Conservative or is he a Liberal?
If a tragedy should beset this country such as the election of a Liberal government, the moment his government acts just like any other government and his
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colleagues are found to be just as human as the Conservatives will he then become a New Democrat?
I will tell you the answer to that. No. No, because we will not accept him. We will not accept him because politics and belonging to a party is something other than being merely comfortable. If he were so upset about the behaviour of Conservatives he should have stayed there and changed things if he was a Conservative. But of course he is not a Conservative, he is not a Liberal, he is not anything. He is what he chooses to be. When he was thinking about all of this corruption-


An hon. member:: Madam Butterfly.


Mr. Volpe:: I rise on a point of order, Madam Speaker. I think it is traditional in these debates that we try to stay off the personal as much as possible. We are getting to a point here where, without naming the member, we are making some rather personal references. I think that goes beyond the requirements of debate.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: The hon, member might have wanted to listen to one of his colleagues a bit earlier today. We will be careful.


Howard Douglas McCurdy: Thank you for that, Madam Speaker. What can be more personal than standing in this House and categorizing the innocent and the guilty alike as political criminals of one sort or another. That is what is wrong with this.
I wonder whether the hon. member for Edmonton Southeast was altogether conscious of the past of his own party and how his former leader ended up losing an election. Remember what the penultimate Leader of the Official Opposition had to say. "I had no choice". Do you remember, Madam Speaker, the wave of patronage appointments of the kind that the member for Edmonton Southeast dislikes so much being made as a dying government tried to pay off all who had supported it.
Do you remember a Liberal senator who faced charges of fraud? If the hon. member really believes what he said about public trust, private benefits and condemnation of people who leave this place to go out into the outside world and take advantage of their political standing, what about Judy Erola.
Let us talk about public trust. What about the Leader of the Official Opposition? What about the member for Vancouver Quadra who sits as a member of the board of

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directors of Curragh Resources, a member who is supposed to consider what happened at Westray like all of the others in an objective fashion?
We could go on with this, but as I said yesterday, that House is a Liberal house and a house of glass, silence within. They have a curious cast willing and able to condemn others but not to see the wrongs that they have perpetrated themselves. I do not condemn them for having within their number people who are going to make mistakes and people who we would prefer not to have here.
Just in case the hon. member thinks that I am not being completely fair and non-partisan in this, yes the Ontario government has had its difficulties and we have had a circus of condemnation of that entire government on the basis of the errors of a few. Even as I stand here, in the province of Saskatchewan, some MLAs are being accused of improper use of government funds. This transcends a party but it should be put in proper perspective.
I see where Henry Kissinger said that 90 per cent of politicians give the other 10 per cent a bad name. That is the kind of stereotype we hear about. It is less than 10 per cent of politicians who give 90 per cent a bad name. Most people in this place are here because they believe they have something to contribute to the country. We should not engage in a game that tarnishes the whole endeavour of politics in the way this kind of debate does. We are collaborating with those who, to their own advantage, would like to take politics down to the lowest level. I submit that the hon. minister was correct. All too often the press gives itself the power to run a country by words and condemn those who really have the responsibility all too much.
Unless I be misunderstood, I am disappointed and I think hon. members on all sides should be disappointed that the rules and the ethical guidelines that the Prime Minister introduced in 1985 were not followed by proper legislation governing conflict of interest and that we have not yet adopted a set of ethical guidelines for all of us in here. If you have any doubts about where my party stands, we support it.
I have to agree with my colleague sitting here that it is not rules, regulations and bureaucracy that will do it. It is to have a commitment that this life we live is not a life to advantage ourselves. I mean in the sense of lining our pockets, but I also mean in terms of making others on the slimmest of suspicions be the object of punishment and calumny for political advantage. That is wrong.
The highest form of ethical behaviour is to come to this place and behave in a fashion that reflects well on the people of this country, but more than anything else we are here to act for the welfare of a nation of which we must be proud or we would not be here.
I think it would be the preference of most Canadians that we stop the name calling. Oh, no, that does not mean to disregard the wrong that we do, but it is about time we put more emphasis on those things that matter most to people. We must engage, as we were elected to do, in the process of governance and representing those who sent us here.
I hope that I do not have to get into a debate ever again which is reflected in name calling, scandal monger-ing and accusations of guilt of those who have not been proven guilty. If there is wrong-doing, let us root it out, but let us root it out on the basis of fair definitions of appropriate conduct in this place. The best way to do that is if the government were to introduce Bill C-43 and get it adopted in this House as soon as possible.


Giuseppe (Joseph) Volpe: Madam Speaker, I am so happy to hear the member finally get to the points at issue in the debate. If he was really sincere about talking about conflict of interest guidelines or about those practices and regulations that are going to bring honour to members in this House, then he might have followed his own advice and turned his oratorical skills in that direction at the very beginning.
It is unfortunate that we engaged in cheap, partisan shots that have a very selective view of the history of this House, of all three parties and of individuals who have served in this House.
I am not going to descend to the same kind of name calling by innuendo practised by members of his own party, but if he cares to learn some of those names, I will be happy to give him a list. I must say that if the road to Heaven and to propriety is paved with self-righteous indignation, the hon. member on this issue at least would probably be behind the wheels of a Lamborghini.
February 17, 1993	COMMONS DEBATES


Howard Douglas McCurdy: Madam Speaker, I do not know whether the hon. member was here when the hon. member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell was here and listed name after name, read from newspaper article after newspaper article as if every one of those articles reflected the truth.
I simply felt that it was appropriate to point out, to even it up, one or two examples of actions or involvements of members from his party just as, and I am afraid he must have missed it, I cited members of my own party.
At the core of it all this has nothing to do with whether members are Liberals, New Democrats or Conservatives. As my hon. colleague indicated, in the human character of this place there is the inevitability that human weaknesses will be exhibited.
t
There can be no higher plane than to stop this nonsense. There would have been a higher plane if the Liberals had come into this place and said something about what they are going to do about unemployment or what they are going to do about integrity in government. What I mean by integrity of government is telling people what they stand for and then pursuing what they stand for.
This is a party that in government or out cannot make up its mind about what it stands for. It has no other way of behaving than to engage in an almost constant parade of name calling.
It must stop because it hurts us all.


Donald Alex Blenkarn: Madam Speaker, it is with a great deal of sadness that I stand on this side of the House to answer one of the most spurious resolutions ever put before this House.
When I worked with the hon. member for Glengarry- Prescott-Russell on the special committee this House established with the Senate in connection with the review of Bill C-43, and a conflict of interest report that we filed, I thought that he had given up being the chief honcho of the rat pack. He apparently has not. Apparently he decided today to dig deep, dig it out, spill it out and swirl it out in his usual old fashioned slimy way. I sometimes wonder why he does not go out of this House
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and say some of the things he says in this House. I suspect he would be sued on many occasions.
The kind of thing that the member was saying today, the kind of detail of this debate, does us no good.
In today's Quorum there is an article about Senator Nurgitz, who was speaking to a reporter about leaving the Senate. He said in an interview that he resigned from the upper chamber. The article says:
He was not driven from political life but he admitted that he was tired of the politics and public scorn. He said he would have quit even if he hadn't received a judicial appointment.
Further on in the article it says:
Prominent Quebec businessman Claude Castonguay,-
who was a Senator in this place-
-who recently gave up his seat, also complained it was difficult getting respect from people once they realized he sat in the Senate.
The article then goes on to say:
Dr. Wilbert Keon, a world renowned heart surgeon, recently lamented he no longer enjoys the public admiration or respect he once did because he is now Senator Keon.
What has happened? What we have done in this place, what the rat pack has done, and what this kind of resolution before this House does is defame members of Parliament. In so doing, it defames all of us. It hurts all of us. It tears our reputation down. That was the finding of the joint committee of which the member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell was a member.
The introduction of that report says on page 1:
Service to the Canadian public has always been the highest calling of a Canadian citizen. Traditionally, Parliament has attracted dedicated men and women, from diverse sectors of Canadian life, to serve their country and fellow citizens with integrity and commitment. As intimate observers, as well as participants in the political realm, we can affirm with confidence the honesty, integrity and commitment of the vast majority of Canadians who represent Canada in Parliament. But we know that it is no longer sufficient to state this fact, however emphatically. The cases wherein a few individuals have abused their positions of public trust have bred scepticism and, worse still, resignation to dishonesty and unethical behaviour as an attribute of politicians and political life.
We believe this does a disservice to all those who are dedicated to public service, who believe that it can still be the highest calling of the democratic citizen. The tradition of political philosophy from Plato to today has sought the parallel between the city and the citizen. The integrity and justice of the political life of the nation both mirrors and is mirrored in the integrity and justice of the inner lives of its citizens; the moral health of one is reflective of that of the other.

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Our committee sat from the middle of December through until June 1992 when we filed a report with this House. That report was a unanimous report representing all of the parties in this House and the parties in the Senate. The committee had 21 members. That is a lot of members on a committee and that is a lot of members from whom to get a unanimous report. We recommended that we amend the Parliament of Canada Act by creating the concept of a jurisconsult. I want to quote from an article about the jurisconsult written by Barbara Kagedan, who was our chief researcher on the committee. It is from the Canadian Parliamentary Review winter 1992-93 issue, Volume 15, No. 4 on page 21. It says:
Once a member has made the required disclosure to the jurisconsult, has taken any further steps recommended by the jurisconsult to ensure that the obligations under the act can be fulfilled, and filed the public disclosure statement, then the jurisconsult will provide a written certificate to the member, confirming that the disclosure obligations have been satisfied. If subsequently an issue is raised whether a particular asset or interest was properly disposed of, or appropriately placed in a trust, and those steps were taken at the direction of and in accordance with recommendations by the jurisconsult, then the member can rely on the certificate to demonstrate his or her compliance with the act.
The second advisory role of the jurisconsult is to assist members as issues of possible conflicts of interest arise during their term in Parliament, or their tenure as minister or parliamentary secretary.
I am going to stop there for a moment. The concept is that when a member is elected he will make a disclosure of all his assets and all the assets his wife has if he knows what she has. Obviously there is no way we can insist that because a person marries someone we can force a disclosure. If they are not married we cannot force a disclosure, that is impossible to do. The member's disclosure is of all the assets he owns and all the assets he knows his wife owns.
The disclosure is of two kinds. There are personal assets, like a house, a cottage and so on, and there are business assets which are listed in detail. If it comes to shares in a company it may be a significant interest or an insignificant interest. It is a question of disclosure, and that disclosure is made public.
Once the disclosure of probable conflicts is made the jurisconsult can give members a letter saying that as long
as they behave themselves in this fashion anything they do is fine. We are not going to be insisting, as is presently in the current rules for parliamentary secretaries and ministers, that they report to Georges Tkai, the Deputy Registrar General. Mr. Tsai is a good fellow, but he has a lot of specific rules. Anybody who is appointed to cabinet or to be a parliamentary secretary has to fill in this great application. I looked at it and said: "Oh my gosh, could I ever fill that in? I do not know". I had Georges Tsai do an application for me in blank and it was interesting. All my private business activities were apparently okay because I was not a director.
I go to director meetings by invitation and I make decisions. I may help make the decisions but I was a shareholder so that was okay. I have 200 shares in the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce. By George, I have to sell those. Do you know something? I even belong to a golf club and they give me my membership free. "You cannot do that," says Georges Tsai. Why not?
These silly regulations in the current rules that cabinet ministers and parliamentary secretaries must comply with are crazy. They make no public sense. The new jurisconsult proceeding will enable members to make a declaration to the jurisconsult and he can determine if there is really a conflict of interest.
If I belong to the Mississauga Golf and Country Club because my neighbours would like me to belong to that club-I do not play golf anyway, I just eat occasionally- then surely there is no conflict of interest in my membership in that club with my duty as a parliamentarian. It would not matter if I was a minister either. It does not affect the Government of Canada.
Conflicts of interest or possible ownership or possible membership does not affect the way you operate in an honest, straightforward way as a member and it should not be a matter of disclosure, disclaimer or divestment. That is the general tenor of this whole report.
The government has said that it approves the report. The minister said today that it is in the final stages of drafting and he hopes to be able to introduce new legislation on this issue almost immediately. People will sit back and ask: "Why was it not done earlier? After all you received the report in June". Members must appre-
February 17, 1993

date that this House was involved in a very protracted debate and consultation with the country on the referendum debate all fall. Really, we have not had much time.
I suspect the bill will be produced well before Easter. I hope, because the report had the unanimous backing of all parties, that it and the legislation that comes from it will be approved and put through possibly on a Friday with one speaker from each side. It is the kind of thing we all want and need. It has a lot of flexibility and it does not make a series of rules that are impossible to comply with.
We looked at the American situation and felt that was the case there. We looked at the British situation where they do not have any rules and felt that we could not really go along with what they had. What we have proposed is a take-off from what is available for members of the Quebec legislature, the Ontario legislature and in British Columbia. What we have is a system that we think will work far better than anything to date.
The jurisconsult will be appointed for a seven-year period. He will be responsible to Parliament. He will report annually to Parliament. He will publish in a fair way the assets of members so we may take a look at them. They might not be in detail. It may say that you own shares in a certain company but it will not tell you exactly how many. It will only be disclosed as a significant interest or an insignificant interest or a minor interest. It will be a fair, complete disclosure with no hiding.
Members are not elected to get rich here. Nobody gets rich being a member of Parliament. People think it is a grand job but vice-principals in public schools earn what we earn. This is not a job to get rich on. One is not going to line one's pockets being a member of Parliament. One cannot make money in the job. You do it because you want to do something for your country. That is what you are here for.
I find it disgraceful when members of Parliament stand up in this place and accuse members of some action or the rumour of some action for no reason at all. Take the Sinclair Stevens case. There was no crime committed. There was no charge that could be laid on Stevens but he was convicted in the press and by this House. I think that issue was deplorable and disgraceful. I say that not
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because of any great, long friendship or anything, although he is a friend.
I want to say that those rabid attacks by the rat pack with the allegations and insinuations drove a good person out of politics. Perhaps the judgment of Mr. Justice Parker is correct but I must say that there were no rules. There was an anticipation or possibility of a conflict and the anticipation and possibility of conflict created a conflict.
We had before the committee another member of this House who has a great deal of commercial experience and background, the hon. member for LaSalle-Emard. He ran for the leadership of the Liberal Party. He has a great deal of business experience and his family is heavily involved in a number of activities through Canada Steamship Lines. He owns certain preferred shares- voting shares are with his sons in a voting trust and so on-but the fact of the matter is that he does not take part in that company at all.
However, under the current rules of Georges Tsai, he could not be a member of cabinet. Why? Canada Steamship Lines is a public company, so he would have to divest.
Under the current system, many people who could be attracted to public life and who could offer Canada a great deal would be denied the right. Canada would be denied the right to have them.
Our proposal under our conflict of interest suggestion by our unanimous committee report will make it possible for the member for LaSalle-Emard to be a cabinet minister and possibly even something better than that at some stage in his career. I wish him luck. My colleague says that it will be many years from now. Perhaps it will be many years from now.
I want to conclude by saying that we have come to grips in this Parliament with this issue. The Prime Minister has come to grips with this issue. To have this debate today on a matter that I think we have come to grips with in a unanimous fashion, that the member for Glengarry- Prescott-Russell knows will be brought before this House in legislation before Easter, is an absolute disgrace.
I want to know something from the resolution. Where is the incessant inability to function within the framework of existing legislation guidelines and standards? I do not know of any item ever brought to this House and to this debate with the incessant inability to function within the framework of existing legislation, guidelines

February 17, 1993
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and standards. I do not know where the reluctance is to bring forward strict new codes and legislation with regard to conflict of interest. I do not know where we have the continued failure to establish and adhere to clear and high standards of public sector service.
The resolution is a crock. The resolution does Parliament no favour. This is despicable. It is the kind of resolution that the Liberal Party ought now to stand with their next speakers and denounce. It is not a resolution that does any of us as parliamentarians any good. It hurts all of us. It is the old story of dig out the laundry, spread it out, cough it up and slime it out.
I say to the members of the Official Opposition that I think they ought to recant right now. I think they ought to withdraw this resolution.


Mr. Dennis Mills (Broadview-Greenwood):: Mr. Speaker, I listened to the member attentively. He knows I have a tremendous amount of respect for him. Quite frankly, I thought a lot of his remarks and ideas on how we could improve the existing rules concerning conflict of interest and lobbying guidelines, et cetera, were right on the money.
If I remember correctly, it was either yesterday or today that the member stood up in this House during Question Period and put a question to his own government House leader urging his government to move forward on the issue of ethics in government, which is the conflict of interest package. I wonder how that question that you put forward to your government House leader is any different from today when we are basically assisting the question the member advanced to the government House leader yesterday by saying that it is a matter of urgency and it is pressing.
I certainly support the view that there should not be any personal name calling. I think my record in this House on that issue stands by itself, but I do believe that the issue of trust in government and the fact that the current systems are not working-this is acknowledged by the member-is something we must address. The House is about to adjourn and once again another four-year period will have lapsed and some of the very concerns that the member has mentioned repeatedly in
this House over the last eight years will not have been addressed.
I think to tiy to bring it to a head is a constructive exercise.


Donald Alex Blenkarn: Mr. Speaker, I want to remind the member that the government House leader made a pretty clear declaration as to what would happen. It is not perhaps unknown to him that I might even have checked as to what was happening with the legislation before I asked the question.
I make no apologies for that because sometimes the way to get something across in this House is to do it that way.
I want to say this to the member. We are going to have a bill that was approved by this House unanimously. I do not think it does the system of Parliament any favour to have someone stand here and read old press clippings naming, slurring, slandering, gouging up and burping up accusations against individuals whether they are correct or incorrect or proven or not proven.
I think we have to understand this as members of Parliament. If we want to have public respect then we have to act in a respectable fashion one to each other.
I do not believe there is any merit in accusing someone of something unless it can be proven.
The minister earlier today on this issue said to a member: "If you are going to make the accusation, make it. Remember the rule around here. If you cannot prove your allegation, you resign. You put your seat on the line".
That was always the rule around here, but people slither around it. The slithering around hurts us all. It tears away at our reputation.
The member for Broadview-Greenwood did pretty well. He can do it very well. He does not have to be here to earn $64,000 a year. As far as he is concerned that is probably penny ante. He does not make a big thing out of being a member of Parliament but he works darned hard at it. He does not want his reputation slandered by people saying: "Parliamentarians did this. Parliamentarians did that. This member did that. That member did this".
February 17, 1993

Everybody sits back and says: "What did you do, Broadview-Greenwood? How much did you get in your pocket? If you did not, the other guys got some. What is wrong with you?" That is the kind of thing they say. That is what hurts us all.
I think this is a disgraceful debate. It should never have been brought forward. It does not do any of us any good. It does not accomplish anything and it does nothing for the development of a better Canada.


Lyle Stuart Kristiansen: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the member from Mississauga a question. He understandably seems to be placing a lot of faith in what appears to be an all-party agreement to set up a code or new standard of ethics. He hopes it will be settled by just one speaker from each party.
I want to repeat some of the reservations I had earlier. Part of my experience with recent events in British Columbia is if you have a written legislated code of ethics and standards all you end up doing is providing a certain list and as long as someone in public life does not fall within the definition of those things that are listed in that code, they think they are free and clear.
I am not at all sure that we would be much better off, whether the public would accept it or not, to adopt the British system. I think within parliamentary democracies, its standard of public conduct among government officials and ministers is to almost immediately step aside when any kind of legitimate accusation is made until the matter is settled. The perception in Britain is much greater.
Maybe I am just too far away from its press. It has a pretty active press and we hear about a lot of the rest of it. My hunch is that its standards are perceived to be much higher than those in the United States which are going further and further toward codifying, regulating and listing all the shalls and shall nots.
I am worried about selling the public and ourselves a false bill of goods simply because we cannot come to an agreement to put this issue on the shelf and put it behind us by unanimously agreeing to some grand thing called a code of ethics.
We must be willing to look at the public at election time and between elections and let them have it right
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between the eyes, and say: "If you are fed up with the standards that you think exist in public life, then you are the people who are responsible for it. You make sure that apart from the issues of the economy and others, it is one that you take seriously when you judge the kind of people who individually you want to elect regardless of party when you come to cast your ballot".
We have to place the responsibility with them in as open a way as possible and in a way as unregulated as possible. Unless we have a standard of ethics of public office and public conduct, I do not think we are going to solve our problems.
I would like to get some response. I know we have some agreement.


Donald Alex Blenkarn: Mr. Speaker, in the committee we analysed the British system.
The British system, as the member may know, is indeed quite free. There are no written rules really. The trouble is that members are permitted to serve on boards of directors of corporations dealing with the government, to be actively involved lobbying for a particular activity. They do not need a lobbyist registration act, the members of Parliament act as lobbyists.
I do not think that we would want to do that. I have real grave concerns about the British system.
What we have with the jurisconsult approach is a much more flexible arrangement. It is really a well respected person who becomes jurisconsult who really runs the show. To some extent it is like the British Columbia system, though quite a bit more restricted than that. We had some difficulty with some of the ways things could happen in British Columbia, some of the ownership arrangements, selling arrangements, dealing arrangements and so on.
We analysed British Columbia thoroughly. We analysed Ontario and Quebec thoroughly. We had the former premier of Ontario and other members of the Ontario legislature from all parties as witnesses to our hearings. They seemed to have developed in Ontario and in Quebec a system of controlling these matters in a far more civilized and sane fashion than we have to date.
In Ontario they have a commissioner who is a former judge. You disclose to him and if you are accused of something, you are tried by him. He operates as judge, jury and executioner, so to speak.

February 17, 1993
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Our jurisconsult will essentially have the same type of powers. That may seem a bit strange. Former Mr. Justice Evans operates on a part-time basis. Ele does not have to be there full time. It is a pretty easy one-man show.
We looked at the situation in Canada right now with the current office that Georges Tsai runs. He has 20 bureaucrats there. They look after-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I regret the hon. member's time has expired. The next two speakers will divide their time 10 minutes each.


Ms. Albina Guarnieri (Mississauga East):: "There will be jobs for Liberals and NDPs too after I have been Prime Minister for 15 years and I can't find a living, breathing Tory in the country". Those were the boastful words, Mr. Speaker, of the Prime Minister in 1983. Mind you, if you look at the polls after only nine years, the Prime Minister may already be having trouble finding living, breathing Tories in Canada.
Of course, when it comes to hand-outs for cronies and backers, this government is flush with jobs and contracts. We in opposition shudder eveiy time we hear that someone is leaving the Prime Minister's Office. It cannot be long we say before we find the government contracts headed in the same direction.
We remember the Prime Minister's former director of strategic planning who was in the PMO just long enough for a $700,000 contract to be given to the firm he once founded. Once this was achieved, this Tory friend was quick to quit the PMO and repurchase his interest in his old firm. I suppose he was one of the living, breathing Tories the Prime Minister was looking for.
Last year was a time of great suffering for many Canadians, particularly the 1.5 million unemployed and the thousands upon thousands of small business people who were forced into bankruptcy. People lost their homes, sometimes for lack of only a few thousand dollars.
Perhaps the Minister of Employment and Immigration should have made a revision of his definition of just cause for quitting a job.
He should have included contracts being awarded to an employee's firm as reason to pull out of the Tory well on the next slush bucket.
It must have been quite disorienting for unemployed Canadians to hear one TV ad after another saying that Canada was number one.
Canada must indeed be number one in taxpayer funded political advertising. We are told $21 million was spent to confuse the unemployed into believing that the policies of this government were not the cause of their misery. They repeatedly heard the slogan: "Yes, we can". It should have said: "Yes, we can give contracts to our Tory friends. Yes, we can cut welfare".
There is no money for health care and education, but we can spend millions on feel-good TV ads. Yes, this government can spend millions on nothing while spending nothing on millions, the millions of Canadians on social assistance.
We cannot remove from our consciences that during the life of this government an organization gave a giant donation to the Conservative Party. A questionable loan guarantee worth millions was reciprocated and ordinary hard-working coal miners lost their lives.
The question is whether the interests of Canadians are served by the expenditures sanctioned by this government. There can always be mistakes if circumstances are misinterpreted. However when expenditures are driven by the interest of Tory supporters and their individual businesses, the interests of Canadians are indeed ill served.
We cannot possibly keep track of all Tory friends, associates and donors. Recent history should teach us to wonder about Tory blunders. Premium Automotive is one such blunder.
Ministers stood one upon the next to denounce the scoundrels they had trusted with such a handsome dip into the public purse; loan guarantees and five years of tax breaks not to mention $1.2 million that Canadians will have to repay. Their Tory sanctioned investment vanished in the night or so we were told.
Can Canadians be sure that Premium Automotive was funded for its products and not its contacts? Perhaps we will never know.
The Prime Minister once said that Canada is open for business. We have to wonder if open for business meant up for sale.
February 17, 1993

Whether it is a public ad contract given to a Tory firm or jobs critical to the public interest, handed to organizations, the interests of taxpayers are not being served but sold. What is most disturbing is not that firms are favoured by their Tory connections but that the cash they receive serves no valuable purpose for Canadians.
Earlier this month this House debated a bill asking Parliament to borrow another $8.2 billion to be flushed down the Tory drain. The only certainty is that taxpayers will have to pay this money back at some considerable premium in the years to come. What is also certain is that these funds will be squandered away in the usual Tory way.
What new treasures can we expect from a new round of borrowing? Of course we can never be sure how this government will end up spending its new cash. Scarcely two years ago, we were told about the wonders of this government's green plan. Environment is a priority we were told.
This December the same government continued the defoliation of the green plan by cutting another $172 million of proposed spending. But can we find $21 million for useless TV ads? The Prime Minister's answer: "Yes, we can". Rather than use money it borrows to help extinguish the recession, this government continues to allow business after business to be engulfed in bankruptcy.
The most puzzling spending choice of all surrounds the refusal of the government to pay the $250,000 legal bill for the Stevenson family, whose efforts and personal expense have caused all Canadians to be aware of how little this government has done to protect society against criminals who prey on children.
How can we understand that the Stevenson inquest was not worth government funds but millions can be fluttered away on self-promotion? We wonder how this can be. How can we have unprecedented dependence on welfare, the need for every government dollar so great, and yet millions squandered for ads?
This is a government that pleads poverty to the poor and the needy by asking where it can find the money, but when it comes to its political friends the only question is where does it send the cheque.
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Don Boudria: Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to the excellent discourse of our colleague, the member from Mississauga-
She will know of another member for Mississauga who made a speech a little earlier today. I will be generous and call it a speech. Probably she will have listened attentively to those remarks.
I want to ask my colleague if she will give her comments on the government's so-called dedication or interest in bringing in new conflict of interest rules. I ask her to bear the following in mind: that in 1987, after the then minister, Sinclair Stevens, was found in breach of the conflict of interest code on 14 separate counts-by the way he had his legal bills paid for by the government-the government produced a bill called C-46, then C-112 and now it is called C-43. The bill died on the Order Paper twice and another one will probably die on the Order Paper when this session adjourns in a few weeks.
Does she agrees with the other member for Mississauga that the government is all gung-ho about new conflict of interest rules or does she agree with me that sue years of waiting for conflict of interest rules is long enough, that it shows a complete lack of interest on the part of this government and if it ever moves ahead with the issue it will be a form of deathbed repentance because we will be only weeks away from an election?


Albina Guarnieri: Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague has a talent for making excellent points in the questions he asks.
There is a great deal of public scepticism about the integrity of this administration. The member for Mississauga South earlier made the comment that it does no good to point to the countless number of newspaper articles which delineate the fraud and put this administration into ill-repute. He is quite right, it does denigrate this entire establishment.
As a first-time member I value the privilege of serving in this House. It really does not serve anyone well to have members of ill repute being singled out. However, there is a great deal of scepticism about the honesty and integrity of this government to proceed with any worthwhile measures which will curtail future colleagues from behaving in a fashion that is not worthy of this House.

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Dennis Joseph Mills: Mr. Speaker, quite frankly I have a difficult time participating in this debate because it is a tough issue. There is not a party in this House of Commons or a party anywhere in the country, in any legislature for that matter, that does not have its difficulties with the issue of trust.
I have been part of a government where we have had problems with scandals, nothing to the extent that we have seen in the last few years, but the bottom line is today we have reached such a level of distrust in our system that we must address the issue.
I was reading an article by Sissela Bok, who is a professor of ethics at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. At one point in her remarks she makes the following statement: "Public officials and candidates for public office bear special responsibility for the damage". She was referring to the damage related to the lack of trust.
The topic of her essay was today's "school for scandal". She is talking about everyone in business, government and all walks of life. Studies show that high school students claim they have this natural tendency. Sixty-six and two-thirds per cent of students in a study at a particular university said when the temptation for cheating was put to them, many said they would take it.
This is a problem not just in government, this is a problem within our whole society. Ms. Bok writes: "In a democracy it is not enough for citizens to respond by voicing their distrust of government and the press. Their categorical and often unthinking dismissal of all politicians contributes greatly to the problem. By opting out of serious participation in the political process they help corrupt the process".
This is the point I would like to make during the few minutes I have. I think one of the problems we have in this country related to trust is the fact that there are so many Canadians today who just do not get involved in the process.
I speak for members on all sides of this House. I worked on the Hill from 1980 to 1984 and I would watch members of Parliament debate in this House until 10 o'clock at night.
I was elected in 1988.1 see members of Parliament on all sides of this House work their guts out for their constituents. I know of hundreds of examples of members of Parliament trying to put forward issues at town hall meetings in their communities and the public just does not get involved. They do not get out and work with their members of Parliament. We are only as good as the interchange we have with the people that are part and parcel of our community.
It is all well and good for the public and the press who are as much a part of this issue of distrust as any politician is. In fact it is the interaction of the press with the political culture that can quite often create a sense of distrust in the nation that is in fact 50 times greater than the actual reality.
I realize in this life perception is reality, but we have to go right back to the very root of this problem. The very root of this problem is the fact that the Canadian people have to get involved in the political process.
I am not necessarily pitching today that they get involved with the Liberal Party. Get involved with any party. Just get involved with the process. That is the one thing that irritates me.
We have all these people who are constantly criticizing politicians and constantly blaming everything on politicians but they have to realize they are part of the process too. We are only the agents or witnesses for our constituents in this House of Commons and we need their interaction and support. I think the Canadian people should get more involved.
I know hundreds of people, including businessmen, in the city of Toronto who have the time and resources to get involved in the debate on public policy. However, the closest they ever get to participating in public policy is when they make a donation. Because they make a donation or send a cheque to their local MP or the party, or they attend a fancy dinner they think that wow, they are participating in the political process.
Well, that is really not enough. We have to get the situation going in this country today where people of all ages are involved. I appeal especially to our teachers. I see many educators who do in fact get involved in the process. Students are brought to Parliament Hill day in and day out, but there are still tens of thousands of teachers who probably never even thought of busing their students to Ottawa or to a provincial legislature. It is only when the kids, the parents and the whole business
February 17, 1993

community are involved that this situation is going to improve.
I support the member for Mississauga South. I certainly support my colleague from Glengarry-Prescott- Russell who has developed a beautiful substantial paper on ethics in government where we finally get at the lobbying system in this country. There cannot be a member of Parliament in this House who does not support the fact that we need some renewal on the Lobbyists Registration Act. Well, let us get it done. Let us get it done before we go to the street.
I am sure many members on all sides agree it is time to bite the bullet because the issue of trust in this country has reached a crisis proportion. However, it is not just a job for those of us working in this Chamber; it is also a job for the Canadian people to get involved in the political process.


Michel Champagne: Mr. Speaker, I listened very carefully to what the hon. member said in his concluding remarks about this having gone on long enough and that it was time to do something this year and make some changes. He may wish to recall that in 1973, the government at the time published a green paper on conflict of interest. The President of the Privy Council was Allan MacEachen. The green paper gave a definition of conflict of interest that was not included when Bill C-62, an act respecting the independence of Parliament, was tabled in June 1978. The bill lapsed when the session ended on October 10, 1978.
On October 16, 1978 the government came back with another bill, Bill C-6. This bill died on the Order Paper on March 26, 1979 upon the dissolution of Parliament. It was not until May 1, 1980 that the new Liberal government, elected in 1980, tabled rules of conduct similar to those tabled on August 1, 1979. However they did not apply explicitly to spouses and dependent children. Until 1985 we had a code of ethics drawn up by the Liberal government in power at the time. In 1985 the government, through the Prime Minister, tabled a code of ethics for ministers and parliamentary secretaries.
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I would like the hon. member to understand that the committee of which I was a member worked extremely hard to improve the existing code of ethics. Bill C-43 was referred to us after first reading. We heard a number of witnesses, but my point is-and that is what I would like the hon. member to understand-that we did not point an accusing finger at anyone. We made a fundamental distinction. As the hon. member said, and I know he was not referring to anyone in particular, perception is extremely important. There is a tremendous difference between breach of trust and fraud which are covered by the Criminal Code, and a potential conflict of interest, whether real or apparent. That is covered by the code of ethics. Our experience has been that, except in one case, conflict of interest cases did not get beyond the initial stage and in other cases, charges were dropped. As for criminal charges-this is a comment, and if the hon. member would care to listen I will be brief-in some cases these were dismissed because of lack of evidence.
Perhaps the hon. member would like to consider the following in connection with the report by the joint committee. If the government decides to go ahead and table a bill is the hon. member prepared to work together with members of all three political parties on introducing a new code of ethics that reflects the current issues and the needs of all members?


Dennis Joseph Mills: Mr. Speaker, the short answer to that question is absolutely yes. All of us on this side of the House will work with the government on this particular issue. I also want to say, going back to the 1970s and before, that I am not condoning that period. We probably could have and should have done a better job.
However, there is something totally different going on today. There is a lobby industry in this country that we all know is now in excess of $100 million a year, which is more than the total of the incomes of all of us in this place. They are working on public policy in and around us. Many of us do not even know what is going on.
As we approach this reform we are talking about we have to make sure we get it right once and for all.

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Mr. Jim Jordan (Leeds -Grenville):: Mr. Speaker, it has been suggested here this afternoon that this motion should never have come forward. It has to do with integrity in government. The last NDP speaker suggested it was very painful for him to get up and talk about this, but he seemed to enjoy it very much once he got going, if there was anyone here to witness it. All afternoon the Tories have been suggesting that this motion should never have come forward.
I want to ask my colleague from Broadview-Greenwood, if it should not come forward then in what forum would it be decided to discuss integrity in government? If this is not the forum, what is? Would this not be the appropriate place to discuss it if the wording of it was not just right? That is something we could discuss. Talking about integrity in government when there is so much cynicism today about politicians I would think there is no more appropriate forum to discuss it than here in the House of Commons.


Dennis Joseph Mills: Mr. Speaker, I do not think the government is really reviewing the commitments of the Prime Minister. Let us forget the fact that we condemn the government because that is part of the interaction. Let us talk about the substance of the motion which reads in part: "That this House condemn the government for its continued failure to establish and to adhere to a clear and high standard of public sector ethics". It was the Prime Minister who in 1985 made this one of his priority issues. Without the condemnation words, the rest of these words are pure Brian Mulroney.


Mr. Howard Crosby (Halifax West):: Mr. Speaker, I want to address the subject brought forward by this motion which is public sector ethics. First I want to make a comment on the bringing of this motion before the House of Commons this very day.
As most members I am sure are aware, and I hope the public is aware, we have a process in the House of Commons known as supply. Supply is the voting of funds to the government. It is what the taxpayers will be required to turn into the public coffers out of their pockets to support the services and programs, that we through the Parliament of Canada provide to the people of Canada at their expense.
Everybody in Canada knows the difficulties we are facing financially, the burden of our national debt, the difficulties caused by our annual deficit. In fact I am sure if members opposite asked Canadians one by one what was the major concern or the number one issue, each one would say it was the economy. In fact in the presidential election there was a phrase: It is the economy, stupid. The concern about the economy is on the mind of every Canadian.
Supply days provide the opposition with the perfect opportunity to bring these economic issues and concerns to the floor of the House of Commons. Unemployment across Canada which is of great concern to all Canadians and presumably to the members of the opposition, the state of the national debt as I have said, job opportunities, employment opportunities for Canadians, programs to create employment opportunities, could all be debated in this House this very day. However the opposition chooses to bring before this House for a day-long debate the question of public sector ethics.
Nobody is saying that public sector ethics is not important. Nobody is saying that it is not important for Canadians to have confidence in their parliamentarians, in their government, but surely members of the opposition recognize and realize that the number one issue out there among our fellow Canadians is the state of the economy, the concern for employment and that sort of thing.
While I am prepared to debate and consider ethical problems I would rather be addressing the subject of concern to all Canadians, that is the state of the economy and the opportunities for employment for our young Canadians. However since members of the opposition choose to bring to this House of Commons the subject of public sector ethics let me debate that point.
I was asked by the government House leader to participate in this debate and I understand why. I have a long-standing interest in the subject. In years past I have brought before this House of Commons legislation on the subject of conflict of interest and ethics. I have debated the issue on several occasions.
I should have known that was the least concern for members of the opposition, that is to say the establishment of a code of conduct for members of Parliament, for government officers and officials. All they wanted to
February 17, 1993

do was rehash cases of the past, cases that the government might find embarrassing, cases that are of concern today, cases of mismanagement and cases of mischief.
If we were to catalogue cases of mischief let me say the opposition has no monopoly on them. We have a few over here and we do not have to go very far back. We can pin them right on present members. As a matter of fact, interestingly enough in this very Elouse of Commons when I was debating my own private member's bill to establish a code of conduct for members of the government and others, I had occasion myself to refer to some of these situations. My great friend the former member for Winnipeg-Assiniboia, Mr. Dan McKenzie, participated in that same debate and I would like to refer to the Hansard for that day, March 20, 1984.
In the debate on ethics Mr. McKenzie wanted to give an example of conflicts and he referred to the Minister of Transport. Now it may not be known who the Minister of Transport was at that time but the name of Mr. Axworthy appears in brackets. He is a current member for the Winnipeg area. He was then the member for Winnipeg-Fort Garry. The Minister of Transport transferred the auditing of Canada Ports Corporation from the Auditor General of Canada to, guess who, a friend of his in Winnipeg, a Liberal hack. Ethics? Was there a concern on the part of the Liberal members for ethics in 1984? Apparently not.
As a matter of fact in that same debate we raised the subject of Mr. Coutts, a former executive assistant to Pierre Elliott Trudeau. He gave an interview to a reporter for a national newspaper. The inference of the interview was that if people had immigration problems they should call Jim Coutts and he would call the immigration minister, the member for Winnipeg South Centre. When Jim calls people like the then immigration minister they listen.
If we want to talk about mischief, if we want to talk about ethics, we can talk about many people. However, that is not going to solve any problems. That is not going to restore the confidence of the Canadian public in Parliament or in government.
The only thing that will restore the confidence of the Canadian people is a recognition by elected officials that they have a responsibility to the public and that they are
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willing to live by an ethical code of conduct. They will only demonstrate that by continued service in observance of that code of ethics.
It may well be, and I and many other persons in this place have wrestled with this problem in the past, that there is a real need to codify a set of rules as guidelines for members of Parliament, members of government and government officials. Many attempts have been made to do that.
However, there was never an attempt made to put those rules, those regulations and those governing principles into legislation prior to 1988 when the Prime Minister of Canada introduced a bill in this House attempting to codify rules of conduct as a guideline for members of government and other government officials.
That bill was introduced in February 1988 so that all of those involved and interested would have an opportunity to see a statutory code of the kind that I have described. That was the first time that anyone ever brought to the floor of the House of Commons an actual piece of legislation dealing with matters of public ethics.
Unfortunately, time ran out in that particular Parliament and Bill C-114 lapsed. However, it was subsequently introduced again. Through Bill C-43 we had the opportunity to view, examine, debate and discuss a further statutory code of conduct.


An hon. member:: Bill C-43 was never debated.


Howard Edward Crosby: We had the opportunity. It was brought forward for debate.


An hon. member:: No.


Howard Edward Crosby: I am sure if all members were in agreement that the provisions of Bill C-43 were exactly the kinds of provisions that would solve the difficulties that we now realize exist in terms of public trust-but that was not the case. People immediately gave indication that there were flaws in Bill C-43.
I myself was very concerned with the definition of dependent. I happen to believe that in the 1990s women have a very special place and position in our society, and that includes spouses of members of Parliament or any other person or official. I am not prepared to accept as part of the code of conduct that my or anyone's spouse has to accept any particular rules simply because of the office or position that I or anyone else holds. I realize

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that is a very debatable point and that other people have other views. I respect those other views.
I take the position, and it is my honest belief, that a spouse does not have to accept a set of rules or a code of conduct merely because of the marriage to a person upon whom those rules of conduct are imposed.
I could go on with Bill C-43 and point out other areas of difficulty. However, it is like all legislation that is brought before any legislative chamber. It has to be debated, considered and if there is agreement and concurrence to the subject matter of the bill then it can pass. I have never known any member of the opposition to stand in his or her place and say that this bill can be passed at any particular point in time. It can be brought forward for debate. If it was, I would have objections to the bill and I am sure other members would have objections. I am sure members of the opposition would say that it does not go far enough. The mere fact that it has not been processed and passed by this House is no reflection on the good will that is involved in the preparation of the bill and the codifying of those rules of conduct.


An hon. member:: I cannot believe that.


Howard Edward Crosby: The member says he cannot believe it, yet he is a member of a party that held office for years and never made any attempt to codify the rules that govern public officials or government members in the form of a statute. Nobody has told me that Bill C-43, its predecessor, Bill C-114, or the private member's bill that I introduced had such universal acceptance that it could be brought forward and passed.
There are codes of conduct that have been established, that have been written down, that could be brought forward, that could be passed and that could be made law. Any one of them is going to have a measure of defects and a measure of merit, but if it does not accomplish the purpose of satisfying the public concern about the trust they place in elected officials then it will not accomplish the goal for which it was established.
That is the point that I want to make. Unless the members of Parliament can agree that all of us and all members of government should be governed by a code, unless we all agree on what is the proper and appropriate code to govern us, it will not be successful because people will simply fail to observe it and will find ways
around it and will use their ingenuity to avoid the provisions.
There is no magic to enacting, as a code of conduct, as a set of public principles or public ethics, a statute that will then not be observed, will not be effective and will not create trust among members of the public.
I have never directed my mind to the question of whether the legislation before the House in the form of Bill C-43 would accomplish those purposes. However, nobody in the opposition has ever asked me to bring the bill forward and nobody has ever said that if the bill is brought forward it will be passed. Nobody has ever agreed to make the kinds of changes that I would want to see made.
It is just like any other legislative measure. If it does not have obvious support, if it is going to run into difficulties, if it is going to be debated, if it is not going to be given second reading, if it is not going to be brought before a committee and if it is just going to cause more strife, then it is understandable why it would remain on the Order Paper.
Let us look at what is needed to restore the confidence of the public in our political leadership and in our elected representatives, not just at the national level but right across the country. Certainly the people of Canada have a right to expect that their elected representatives will not involve themselves in any business affairs of any kind that will affect their judgment on the issues brought before them. That is what we call conflict of interest and that is the first thing to cover in any kind of ethics legislation. We must have clear provisions that would prevent any elected person, any member of government or any official from becoming involved in a matter in which their own interests affect their decision making.
I have tried many times to construct that kind of provision and it is difficult if not impossible. The most we can do is indicate the obvious situations, such as an interest in a contract, a personal interest in a transaction involving the sale or acquisition of property and that sort of thing. However there are all kinds of subtle ways in which a person can have an interest in a matter and yet not violate statutory conflict of interest provisions.
The best way to deal with the matter is to simply spell out what the offensive acts are and then impose a penalty. When that is done it simply becomes another penal statute and the code of conduct ends up competing with the Criminal Code, the Parliament of Canada Act
February 17, 1993

and all the provisions that prohibit a certain conduct and make it an offence.
In areas of trust in which we are not dealing with specifics, like the illicit taking of funds or other clearly criminal acts, it is very difficult to draw that line between what is acceptable and what is not acceptable.
What happens, and what has happened in Bill C-43 and every other piece of legislation that I have ever seen, is that you end up turning it over to some person to make a judgment, and maybe the member can enlighten me if he knows differently. That would be permissible in many cases but if we are going to maintain the independence of elected representatives, if we are going to maintain their ability to stand up for their constituents, for the oppressed and for people all over the c mntry who have problems then the last thing we want to do is place them under the control and supervision of a panel or individual that can make judgments with respect to their conduct. That would put an independent elected person into a kind of servitude.
Frankly, if that is what is necessary to restore public confidence in elected representatives then we are in serious trouble. If the public is going to elect somebody and then say: "But in your day-to-day activities, in the way you handle the affairs that are brought to your attention, you must answer to some official who is appointed to preside and monitor your activities" it will make members totally subservient to the judgment of that official. They will have to say to themselves: "Before I take this action I had better confer with the board of control and decide whether it thinks this is right or wrong".
We are grappling with a difficult problem. When we talk about codes of ethics and public ethics we are talking about a subject that has created havoc for centuries, from the days of Caesar and the Roman senate. There is no magic way to assure the public that it can have total reliance on those whom it elects. But the public does have the right-
Now we hear from the NDR For years we thought it was the Conservatives and the Liberals who were the bad persons. We thought the NDP were pristine and pure.
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The difference was that it never got into government. We did not know what it was doing.
Then it forms the government in Ontario, Saskatchewan and British Columbia. Then we find out what is going on with the NDR Then we find out about hiring friends as executive officials. Then we find out about giving contracts and about firing public officials and replacing them with political friends. What else do we find? The only problem with the NDP was that it did not have the opportunity to perform these unethical acts. Now that it has the opportunity it is performing them in spades. When members of the NDP stand up and give us lectures on ethics we can ask: "Hey, but does that apply to Bob Rae and his staff? Does that apply to the premier of Saskatchewan and his political appointees and contractors? Does that apply in British Columbia?"
Now they are not so clear about these ethical standards. Now that they are involved in a few little mischief making activities they are not so quick to debate this subject. What they will learn is what we have learned, which is that honesty and integrity come from within. They come from the people and from the persona of each individual. If they do not have it inside them then there is no any legislation that will legislate it for them or for the people of Canada.
The answer is that we should work toward some code of ethics. We should continue the task of writing a code that is acceptable and effective. I think that is what the Prime Minister wants and that is what he intended by introducing the bill for discussion.


René John Soetens: Mr. Speaker, I rise not to participate in this debate, though I have listened to it for a long time. Following the comment of the hon. gentleman my concern is that this debate is serving no useful purpose.
What bothers me more is that we do not even seem to have a quorum in the House to have it happen. I would point that out. It is in my opinion, according to Standing Order 29(1), that there is a lack of quorum in the House.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I will ask the Clerk Assistant to count the members present.
And the count having been taken:

February 17, 1993
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The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: There being 20 members present, not including the occupant of the chair, debate shall accordingly continue.


Don Boudria: Mr. Speaker, I have listened attentively to the comments of the member for Halifax West. They were quite good comments. He indicated in his remarks that rules regarding conflict of interest in themselves are insufficient to make people behave properly. I think he is right.
Rules are not a substitute for good behaviour. Rules are there in addition to the first prerequisite, which is of course to have a disposition to obey whatever rules exist and whatever moral code one should have. One cannot be confused with the other. I agree with the member. Just the same, even if he is an hon. member, which he is, it does not mean that we should not have conflict of interest rules.
I want to ask the member a very specific question. He indicated that no member had asked for this conflict of interest bill to be brought before the House. I point to page 15047 of the current session Debates in which I asked the following question:


Don Boudria: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Deputy Prime Minister and it concerns the government's so-called commitment to ethics in government.
In February 1988 the government introduced a conflict of interest bill and has allowed it to die twice on the Order Paper.
Given that nearly five years has passed since then, is the government in its dying days in office ready to commit itself again to conflict of interest legislation?
That was as late as December 10, the second last day before Parliament adjourned at Christmas. I say to the member, and I give him the opportunity to correct the record, that what he indicated earlier is not factually correct. He will know that.
In terms of the government's commitment to adopting conflict of interest rules, as I just indicated the government first introduced a bill in 1988. It was Bill C-46 which died on the Order Paper. In the new session the government introduced another bill that was identical to the first one, Bill C-114. It died on the Order Paper. A year later the government introduced yet another bill,
Bill C-43-it is still on the Order Paper-the subject of which has now received the unanimous agreement of all parties in a report. That happened in June of last year.
Does the member honestly think it is reasonable after five and a half years of delay to have had nothing happen yet? It has been six months since a unanimous report of a committee and nothing has happened yet. There has not even been a debate in the House. None of the three bills I have mentioned including Bill C-43 has ever been debated in the House of Commons, contrary to what the member said a while ago. Does he honestly think that is reasonable?


Howard Edward Crosby: Mr. Speaker, perhaps I did not choose my words carefully enough. I do not know if I used a plural or a singular. I agree with the member that there have been efforts made to bring a bill forward, possibly by him and possibly by other members.
He knows as I do the process and procedure in the House of Commons, that the House leaders of all parties get together and agree on a matter being processed in the House of Commons. It is that kind of undertaking I am talking about.
If his House leader confers with the New Democratic Party House leader, gets the consent of independent members, gets the consent of other interested parties, presents that to the government leader and says we are ready to go ahead, and that is refused, I would consider that a matter of real complaint.
As long as members stand in their places or committee members get together in a committee and make a recommendation, I think the member knows that is not necessarily going to advance the bill, or any bill or any measure in the House of Commons. There has to be agreement through the appropriate channels. I was referring to that kind of initiative.


Lyle Stuart Kristiansen: Mr. Speaker, I would like to draw to the attention of the member for Halifax West that maybe he was not present in the House during some earlier parts of this debate. There was an attempt on the part of some of us, particularly myself and the member for Essex-Windsor, to tiy to stop this debate from degenerating to the lower levels where it had a propensity to go earlier.
February 17, 1993

In doing that my colleague for Essex-Windsor in particular pointed out that one of the problems we have had in the province of Ontario is the election of a provincial government with a very large crop of inexperienced political people. There are particular problems when it comes to what we might loosely regard as standards of conduct or a singular lack of appreciation of some of the things done and not done in public life as opposed to those done in the private sector.
In my earlier remarks I pointed out that I thought it was what caused the deluge of court cases on the government's backbenches in the earlier years of its mandate from 1984 onward. It had a large influx of members, particularly from one province, with no previous political experience.
Rather than rules and regulations maybe we ought to be asking members of political parties across Canada to take care when they are nominating candidates for public office to nominate people with some level of experience either in elected office or in political activities so that we nominate people and elect people who have some appreciation of the standards of conduct that ought to be expected within political bodies.
Until we are ready to address the voters, hit them right between the eyes and say it is their responsibility in terms of the conduct of public officials, particularly the people they elect, we are not going to solve the problem.
According to my experience, if we draw up a lot of rules, regulations and codes of conduct, we provide a list of specific offences, and as long they do not come within those narrow definitions they think they are free and can take advantage of it.
That is the kind of situation we had a few years ago in the province of British Columbia with a premier who did not understand the difference between good conduct and bad conduct.


An hon. member:: Dave Barrett.


Lyle Stuart Kristiansen: No, it was not then. Until we address those kinds of problems and not just the legalities of specific codes of conduct, we will not solve the problems we have been faced with during the last few years.
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I hope the member will appreciate that we have tried to raise the level of this debate and keep it away from the list of names that were unfortunately read into the record earlier by the Official Opposition. We have tried to lift it out of the gutter and get it into some kind of discussion of principles.
I am afraid, because of his not paying attention to that, we might degenerate into a name calling affair again which would not be in the best interest of democracy or of this House.


Howard Edward Crosby: Mr. Speaker, at the outset of my presentation I specifically said that I had come here hoping to debate the merits of conflict of interest and code of conduct legislation but I knew that other people had other reasons. I agree with virtually everything the member has said.
Let me take this opportunity to talk about Bill C-43. It is not by any means perfect legislation. It contains very much the kinds of problems that the member just articulated. If we make a series of rules and somebody falls between them they think they have escaped any ethical damnation when in fact in the eyes of the public they have done something wrong. In the case of Bill C-43, I would support it except for the provision about spouses because I do not think it is consistent with the modem theory of married couples and their respective rights. Some statements in Bill C-43 are less than onerous: "Members will refrain from accepting any benefit, the acceptance of which might erode public confidence and trust in the integrity, objectivity or impartiality of a member". Does that mean we can accept benefits that do not do that? Give me a break. It is not an easy subject and I do not think it will ever come up with any kind of legislation.
Getting back to my friend in the Liberal Party and his statement that members want to go ahead with legislation, I do not really think that is the case. I think individuals in the House can study a piece of legislation and say it is better to enact it than not to do so. However, I find it hard to believe that there is anything close to unanimous consent on Bill C-43 or any other code of conduct for the very reasons members articulated.


Mr. John R. Rodriguez (Nickel Belt):: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to participate in this debate on a motion put by the Official Opposition:

February 17, 1993
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That this House condemns the government for its continued failure to establish and to adhere to a clear and high standard of public sector ethics, for its incessant inability to function within the framework of existing legislation, guidelines and standards and for its reluctance to bring forward strict new codes and legislation with regard to conflicts and other public ethics matters.
I want to deal with the last part of the motion, "other public ethics matters", and participate in the debate. Before I begin I should take up where the member for Halifax West left off.


Howard Edward Crosby: I am leaving.


John R. Rodriguez: He says he is leaving. That is fine. It seems to me that when the government wants to show leadership it has a responsibility to prosecute its legislation. The fact of the matter is that it did bring in Bill C-43, the subject matter was referred to an all-party committee and that all-party committee reported last June.
If the government wants to show leadership and it indicates veiy clearly that it means business, it should bring forward the legislation and so indicate to the House leaders of the opposition parties.
That is not the concern I have. I want to talk about family business. The folks are watching. It is 6.35 p.m. and therefore this is a family show. Folks, the kids can stay up and watch and listen because we are talking here about family business. They will see it unfold as I talk about the family business.
For any government to establish ethics in government and restore the confidence of the people in the process, not just in this government but in the process of Parliament, three pieces of legislation are necessary. First, an Election Expenses Act, which we have. Second, a conflict of interest law, which we do not have. We all remember the Sinclair Stevens affair. Have we forgotten it? How quickly we forget. Third and by no means least, effective lobby legislation. That is the family business I want to talk about today.
Along with that is the great existential question of our time: Is it better to know the Prime Minister or to be the Prime Minister? That is the question, dear friends. The government was elected in 1984.1 saw the picture; I saw the movie. We saw the greatest insurgency of lobbying going on on the Hill.
Frank Moores who had helped the Prime Minister get here, a good buddy of the Prime Minister; Mr. Gary Ouellet, who shared lodgings with the finance minister, in fact helped the Prime Minister in his struggle against the former Prime Minister and leader of the Conservative Party.
Suddenly all sorts of stories started to break. Mr. Moores was reported to have obtained somebody a lobster fishing licence for $2,000 when the licences were no longer being issued. He told us today in committee it was $500 a month for four months. I figure that is $2,000 for a fishing licence. He was to arrange a meeting with the minister so that he could get the licence. The same Mr. Moores was appointed to the board of directors of Air Canada. There he was acting as a lobbyist for an airbus manufacturer and lobbying Air Canada to sell them airbuses.
We only have to put on the record the Prime Minister's own words about lobbying. In 1985 he said in this House:
The fifth component of this comprehensive approach to public sector ethics is the undertaking of this Government to introduce into the House of Commons, at an early date, legislation to monitor lobbying activity and to control the lobbying process by providing a reliable and accurate source of information on the activities of lobbyists.
We did have the Cooper committee in 1986. We studied the question and made recommendations. We recommended what we thought was a good start to lobbying control. We said that we should note the specific issue on which the lobbyist was lobbying the public office holders.
We believe that a lobbyist is a lobbyist is a lobbyist and that tiers are not enough. We did not envisage Tier I and Tier II lobbyists. They did. We recommended that the registrar of the lobby registry have the power on a random basis to verify the information on the lobby registry. We were interested in knowing what they were spending on a campaign to obtain the item for which they were lobbying and how much money they spent on it.
We did not get any of those things. What we got in Bill C-82 is now the law of the land. It is the business card. The only information that is on the registry you can get on the business card. That is what it is known as in the lobby industry.
However the proliferation continued. The GCI, Government Consultants Inc.-have you noticed how they always have these very fancy names and government is always mentioned-is part of the family. It was Gary Ouellet, Fred Doucet and his brother. The only thing that I have a problem with is with Gary Ouellet today. I
February 17, 1993

said to him: "You got Maz a doctorate. I want you to get me a doctorate. I want a hat like the one you got for Maz that says: "Doctor Maz". I want a hat for me that says: "Doctor John".
He had Fred Doucet and his brother and like amoeba they just split. Fred has gone off and formed his own company with his brother Gerry.
Another great lobbyist in Ottawa, Jon Johnson, who is a great Tory as well, helped the government as a consultant on the free trade agreement. The Prime Minister appointed Mr. Johnson's sister a senator. He called Fred Doucet the eighth wonder of the world. He started a lobbying firm and within the space of about four years made it into the top ten largest lobbying companies in Canada.
Then of course came 1989 and who starts the lobbying first? Among others was one Hughie Segal. He started a firm called Earnscliffe. That has some sort of gothic resonance to it. Like Heathcliffe, Earnscliffe has some gothic resonance. In that firm is Harry Near. He is one of the principal's of the firm and is on the national campaign committee of the Conservative government. Billy-the-kid Fox, who used to be press secretary to the Prime Minister, is in this firm and he too is on the national campaign committee of the federal Conservative Party. He appears every Thursday morning on Canada AM. He is defending the government's position and appears along with Michael Kirby and Gerry Caplan, one the Liberal, one the NDP. This guy, Mr. Fox, is coming up here and lobbying public office holders.
Mr. Doucet is lobbying public office holders. Mr. Ouellet who is hoping to get placed on the national campaign committee of the Conservative Party is up here lobbying public office holders.
When I raised this I said, is the optics on this not bad? They do not see anything wrong with this. I cannot understand why any person who is prosecuting a private interest would then turn around and approach his political friends, his political colleagues, public office holders, to get a contract or to get a procurement, or to get legislation changed, or whatever.
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Today Mr. Ouellet and his colleagues came before the committee and said we had it all wrong. He said the public did not care about those things. It is only a few people up here in Ottawa and the press.
Mr. Speaker, you have been in politics a long time and you know that the people care, just as the people care through every one of us here. We represent the public interest and not only must the public interest be separate from private interest, not only must it seem to be separate, it must in fact be separate.
This company that came before us today, GCI, one of its members is a retired general. He was a deputy minister of transport and the provincial governments and the federal government hired him to co-ordinate some policy for transportation in Canada. Within two weeks of having finished that contract, he had as a client one of the interests in the shipowners association. Does anybody see anything wrong with that or is it just me? I do not think so.
The perception of the public is that these lobbyists were here in Ottawa, proliferated like rabbits and are nothing but escort services for clients. That is what I think.
I can just see it. I am sure if an aeronautics company hires Billy Fox to be their consultant it is not because he knows all the intricacies of aeronautical engineering. He does not. What he does know are important people in high places. That is the perception.
When we were dealing with conflict of interest, one of the things that came out was that even if there is an appearance of conflict, then there is conflict. That is the argument that Sine Stevens never understood.
In spite of the fact that there may not have been any communication between him and his wife at night in the sanctity of their room bordered by a space six feet by four feet, even when they talked on a Saturday evening about the Christian gold coin and other ways of making money, even if that did not happen and I will accept his word that it did not happen, the perception was that his spouse was going off to a client of the department of which her husband was minister to get an interest-free loan.
The perception was there. Where there is perception, there is reality. Mr. Speaker, you have been here a long time. I am sorry to hear you are not going to run again.

February 17, 1993
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You are one of the finest quarterbacks the government ever had. Mr. Speaker, you know that in politics perception is reality.
I cannot for the life of me understand that these people would say: "Oh well, we do not do these things". That might be so. That might very well be so but there is the perception. In the New Testament there is a saying: "No person can serve two masters".
When Bill Fox goes on that Thursday television show in the morning defending the government, who is he representing? Whose interest is being represented? Is it the party's interest, his client's interest or the public's interest? When that same person comes to a public office holder and makes a pitch, whose interest is represented?
He has to choose. If he wants to be a lobbyist, then he must be squeaky clean and give up trying to help this government defeat itself. He has to choose. They should recognize they do not need his help. They are doing fine, thank you.
I understand as if by some unexplained extrasensory perception word has gone out in the lobbying circles. Government is not going to give any procurement contract unless you have people on the opposition side in the lobbying firm.
What do you think they have been doing? Ask the member. What do you think any self-respecting lobby firm headed by a bunch of Tories would go out and do? What do you think they would do? I ask you. I hear the answer you have given me. Of course, you have to get Liberals on board, Every single one of them has a Liberal in their stable. Okay.
We had, for example, and I may as well put it in print, Fred Doucet, who just signed up, and J.J. Blais, who used to be a minister here. He is now a lobbyist for them. They signed up Judd Buchanan. Then we have Earnscliffe. They have signed up Michael Robinson. Then we had a group, I think it was Jon Johnson's group, GCL. They signed up David Collenette. He is a candidate for the Liberals now. He is a candidate, a lobbyist, a former cabinet minister and he is a honcho in the Liberal Party in southern Ontario appointing candidates left, right and centre.
The point is that they are covering the waterfront. When they notice the Titanic going down, the rats start
swimming toward the Titanic. It is the first time I have ever seen a rat swim toward a sinking ship. Mr. Speaker, you have to see something wrong with that and we have to do something about it. We have to clean up the act. We have to know specificity. We have to know who is doing what to whom, for how much and how they are doing it.
This is a family show. I did not say anything wrong. Mr. Speaker.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The hon. member did not say anything wrong. It is just that his time has expired.


Jack Iyerak Anawak: Mr. Speaker, I just have one short question for the hon. member who just spoke on the issue of ethics in the government. It may be considered more a hypothetical question than anything else.
The question is does he believe that ministers of the Crown should not lie to the public and then take a lie detector test to prove that they lied?


John R. Rodriguez: Mr. Speaker, I certainly think that ethics in government is absolutely important. It is not just for the backbenchers; it is for the frontbenchers as well. It is for the bureaucracy we direct. It must be reflected in the rules we have. I think it is important that those of us who hold office recognize that and we march to that drummer.
We are in a field that is very different from running a corporation in the private sector. We are dealing with the public's business. I think we have to demand the highest ethical behaviour of members of Parliament, whether you are in the cabinet or whether you are a lowly backbencher, all of us. I make no apologies for anybody. I think we have to conduct ourselves in the long run.
I know what the member is getting at. It will be the constituents of that minister or of that member who will have to decide if they want that minister or that member representing them.
On the question of lobbying, I want to point out that lobbying is not like any business. It is dealing with the public interest.


Don Boudria: Mr. Speaker, I had almost forgotten about Shelly over here until my colleague reminded me.
February 17, 1993

I asked a question of our friend from Nickel Belt. I noted his remarks about Gothic residence and the name Eamscliffe. I am not going to ask him what that means because I am not sure anyone could define it, other than it sounds like it comes from a grand place with a pointed ceiling. I wonder if the member could perhaps give us his opinion on certain aspects of the lobbyist legislation because it is that sector which after all he has referred to.
I am one of those who believe that contingency fees should be disallowed. In Ontario lawyers cannot charge contingency fees. My learned colleague from Kingston and the Islands is here immediately beside me. He knows that that is the case, although perhaps that will change shortly. In any case, I think that these fees should be banned.
I also think that the fees and disbursements of lobbyists as well as the exact subject matter should be made public. It should be the exact subject matter because if someone is lobbying for a helicopter, it is important for the competing interest to know that they are not lobbying about snow removal contracts or something. The competing interest has a right to know that someone is trying to convince the government to buy a helicopter or to buy some other product or to repeal Bill C-91 or to enact Bill C-91, whatever.
It is important that we have the precise information and in addition that we know how much is spent in the process of achieving that goal.
I want to ask our colleague if he would be so kind as to react to those suggestions. I think I know already how he feels about them, but I would like him to put it on the record for us.


John R. Rodriguez: Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for the question. I have no problem, first of all, with the specificity of the issue. That is absolutely paramount. It is not enough to know that the lobbyist was up here talking about the environment and not knowing what the specific item is and that it had to do with meeting the minister. I think it is important to know what the specific issue is. We recommended that.
Second, we also recommended that there be no contingency fees allowed. I agree with my colleague there should be no contingency fees whatsoever. I think
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it offers the greatest enticement to walk the line very closely.
Third, the hon. member asked about disbursements and fees. That is absolutely essential. There is no little cushy deal like one of the witnesses said today. They do not want to disperse that. They do not want to put that on the record. They do not want to disclose it because they do not want their competitors to know what it is they are going after or whatever. I think that is the whole purpose of the lobbyist registry, so that there is a transparency that is not just apparent but is in fact real.
I may also say to my colleague, and I will share it with him, that the lobbyist registry ought to be taken out from under the auspices of a minister of the Crown and put under someone who has reporting abilities to the House, possibly the Chief Elector Officer, the Auditor General or the Clerk of the House of Commons. That I think is also important. It must not be seen to be under the control of a politically elected minister of the Crown.
There were other issues. I think, and I am sure my colleague agrees, that the most important one is to have a rule that forbids close relationships in terms of the political parties and at the same time coming back and lobbying the government. I think we have that for public servants. They have to be out of the Public Service for a period of time before they can actually come back and lobby their departments.
I think we should make it off-side for any person who is coming to see public officer holders on the Hill to hold any active political office. If we are talking about creating an environment where nothing less than the highest standards are expected, then in fact we can go down that path and it does not matter.
I outlined some of the family connections that are going on here. I did the family business. I think Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman is the best model for this lobby activity right now.
In Death of a Salesman, Willy keeps talking about how great a salesman he is. When his son asks him how he does it, Willy says he has connections. That is the motto of the lobbyists: I have connections. Hire me and I will get you the fishing licence, I will get you the airbus sale, I will get you whatever, whatever, whatever.


Don Boudria: Madam Speaker, I will just ask one last question of our colleague. On the last point that he made about whether or not lobbyists should have a legal right to be involved in

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political parties, I am just wondering how one would stop it.
First of all, if they choose to get involved in political parties, if that is what they want to do, they will still be volunteers without having offices or titles but they will still be there. As much as I agree in the spirit of what the member wants to do, I am not sure how we could achieve it.
I want to ask about another issue and that is this whole business of intermediaries because this is a loophole in the lobbying registration system, at least as I see it.
Right now if I want to hire a lobbyist or if company x wants to hire a lobbyist and company x does not want it to be known that the lobbyist was hired, all it has to do of course is hire a lawyer or an accounting firm and then have the accounting firm hire the lobbyist. In that way the only person who is registered is the intermediary as opposed to the end user, if I can put it that way.
Does my colleague agree with me that is an insufficient registry, that the actual person who is to be the beneficiary of the lobbying is the one that should be registered?


John R. Rodriguez: Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague and I remind him what I suggested about people who are actively involved in terms of a political party.
We have this problem with respect to banks and financial institutions. We pass laws regarding governance of those institutions and what kinds of relationships they can have. A term they use all the time is arm's length. I think it is important that we strive to establish that we parliamentarians and the people of Canada do not think highly of people who on the one hand go out and work for their political parties. There is nothing wrong with them having a party card in their back pocket but in this lobbying business you have got to make a choice because lobbying is not like any other business. It is not like school teaching. It is bordering on influence peddling.
It is a fact. One of the lobbyists coming before our committee said that in fact we made influence peddling a legal activity under the Lobbyists Registration Act. We have to be very careful.
On the question of intermediaries, of course, you are right. You have got to have who the beneficiary is going to be of the lobbying activity. I might also add that we should make sure that we do not allow coalitions. Often time you could have the coalition for clean air as the client of the lobbyist but we do not know who is in that and they are lobbying for a change in legislation.
You do not know who is in that coalition. It could be the worst air polluters going in the country, but they are all hidden under the clean air coalition. I think it is important to have the specific beneficiary of the lobbying activity and we should know and there should be full disclosure of who are members of the coalition.


Howard Edward Crosby: Madam Speaker, I would like to make a comment with respect to the whole matter of lobbying.
The member has pointed out the term influence peddling. There is a provision of the Criminal Code making influence peddling an offence and that is the difficulty of articulating an offence like that. If you can get paid for exercising influence and avoid the provision of the Criminal Code, you are apparently in a legitimate enterprise. I do not agree with that at all.
I would like to ask the member in relation to lobbyists and experience that he has had with them, should we not be focusing more on the people who are hiring lobbyists? Frankly I think in many cases they are not getting legitimate services from lobbyists. They know they are not getting any legitimate services from lobbyists and yet they are willing to pay large amounts of money for whatever services they are getting which could very easily fall into that category of so-called legitimate influence peddling.
Therefore, I hope that when he is examining lobbyists and the lobbyist legislation he pays a little attention to what the persons who are hiring lobbyists are doing. What role are they playing? If they are actually providing funds to lobbyists knowing that they are not getting any legitimate service for that then I think that they should be called to account.


John R. Rodriguez: Madam Speaker, I think the point the member has made is an excellent one.
February 17, 1993

We are attempting to get the clients of lobbyists before our committee. One of the reasons that clients may very well be going to lobbyists is because they think the lobbyist has got some connection. Maybe that is why they might keep paying out-like a tithe-the money to the lobbyist. They think that he has some magic elixir.
What adds to that is when the person is seen Thursday morning on television across the country on CTV and he is defending the government's position. This is the same person who is the lobbyist. Right away, in his mind, the client wants success for his project. He wants the contract. He wants the procurement. He wants the change in the act. Therefore, if he has to pick, he will pick someone he thinks has influence or a pipeline to the Prime Minister's office or to a cabinet minister. He thinks that and that is why he will do that.
What if we can level the playing field? We heard from Sam Hughes with the Corporation House lobbyists who came before us this afternoon. I consider Sam to be a fine gentleman and probably the epitome of what a professional lobbyist is. He derided this connection because, from what you have said, people will go on paying for somebody if they think he can buy access for them so that they can get to the minister.
I think that when we do the things that I suggested about separating the activities on behalf of a political party, whether it is the NDP, Liberals or Conservatives, then we are making the playing field more level and putting some professionalism back into lobbying.


Mr. Derek Lee (Scarborough-Rouge River):: Madam Speaker, this is to the member for Nickel Belt to whom I have listened intently. He made reference to a former deputy minister who had worked for I think the Canadian Shipowners Association. I was struck by the facts of that case because it shows how incestuous the relationship can be.
I was just wondering how the member would comment on this where that particular former deputy minister was retained by the Canadian Shipowners Association in 1991 to lobby the government. However, before the end of his contract he went to work for the government. He was retained by the government to do work for the government and did not even bother telling the Cana-
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dian Shipowners Association. Ultimately his contract expired or was terminated.
Could the member comment on that incestuous relation aspect of lobbyists that we are trying to get a handle on here?


John R. Rodriguez: Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for the question.
What happened was that former General Ramsey Withers was given a contract by the federal and provincial governments to be a consultant and to co-ordinate a transportation review. That ended because he registered with the Canadian Shipowners Association as a client on December 12. Two weeks prior to that, the contracts with the governments had ended. He then took the contract two weeks after with CSA.
He recognized when he was a deputy minister-he left the government in 1988 as a deputy minister-that he should wait a full year before joining this consulting firm GCI. He went from government to GCI in one year.
When he had the contract and was working for the government he had a client within two weeks. What is striking about the client is that the client was one of those who was an interested party. I am not saying that Ramsey Withers in any way did anything dishonest. I am making that crystal clear, but it is perception that we have to deal with.
In politics, perception is reality. When dealing with lobbying, one is actually walking that very fine line-my colleague from Halifax West pointed this out-between making a representation, advocacy and influence peddling. It is a very fine line.
In lobbying the line is very fine indeed. These people, for a price, have to go and convince somebody to change a law or make a tax change or get a contract. You have to understand the sensitivity of that. There has to be a lot of transparency.
As someone said, sunlight is the best disinfectant in the business of lobbying.


Michel Champagne: Madam Speaker, I am very inter-

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ested to speak on the motion of my colleague from Glengarry-Prescott-Russell, which reads as follows:
That this House condemns the government for its continued failure to establish and to adhere to a clear and high standard of public sector ethics, for its incessant inability to function within the framework of existing legislation, guidelines and standards and for its reluctance to bring forward strict new codes and legislation with regard to conflicts and other public ethics matters.
I will come back later to the wording used by my colleague to show that, in some respects, he may have gone a little too far in his assertions.
I believe it is important to take part in this debate which gives an opportunity to government members and to all members of this House to correct the impression that politicians are usually corrupt. I believe that, unless proven otherwise, no member of this House was elected with the intention of defrauding the government or pursuing his own personal interest or those of his friends.
I will not speak for other members, but personally, when I ran for office in 1984, it was primarily because I was convinced that I could do important things to improve the quality of life of Canadians and of my constituents. I was convinced then, and I still am, that I was going to Ottawa, to my riding and to all Canadian provinces, to serve and promote the collective interests of the people, and not my personal interests, not the interests of my party or those of my party's friends, but first and foremost the interests of every Canadian.
I came here to work with a great national party and I came with the deep conviction that we could implement policies for the short, medium and long term which would enable the public to benefit more from the initiatives taken by the government.
Of course we could argue about the value of those policies because ours is a multi-party system. We could discuss certain issues, but that is not the purpose of this evening's debate. Rather, I want to say that I do not consider myself a corrupt politician and I do not think that my colleagues are corrupt either. When I work for my constituents I do not think that I am working for my personal interests or for interests which will benefit me personally, and I believe the same is true for my colleagues.
Again, Madam Speaker, when you look at the work done by every committee and every member of this
House, I believe that unless proven otherwise, they are all basically honest and work to the best of their knowledge, first and foremost to serve the interests of the people who elected them, as well as the interests of the people of Canada or their province, depending on whether they work at the federal or provincial level. I want to stress that particular point today because people are inclined to believe-at least that is what we have heard since the beginning of this debate-there is no legislation regulating the conduct of members or public servants or people who work in government. I think they are greatly mistaken. In the course of this debate, there has been no reference to the fact that the Criminal Code of Canada applies to members of Parliament.
Madam Speaker, if you will allow me, section 122 of the Criminal Code provides: "Every official"-and according to a Supreme Court judgment official also includes members of Parliament-who in connection with the duties of his office commits fraud or breach of trust is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years, whether or not the fraud or breach of trust would be an offence if it were committed in relation to a private person.
In one of the papers submitted to the joint committee on Bill C-43, a bill dealing with conflict of interest, our researcher wrote, with respect to breach of trust and fraud under Section 122: "Whether or not the fraud or breach of trust would be an offence if it were committed in relation to a private person. The Criminal Code explicitly applies stricter standards of conduct to a holder of public office than it does to a private person".
This makes it quite clear that members of Parliament in general and those elected to this House in particular do not assume, as some opposition members have done, that they are above the law or that their position gives them the power to avoid the provisions of any laws that may apply, such as the Criminal Code. They do not, because it says in section 122 and in the working papers we received that politicians, that members of Parliament are subject to stricter rules than a private person where fraud, abuse of power and breach of trust are concerned. I do not think that point was made today.
February 17, 1993

Often the perception we have of the work of members of Parliament is based on certain assumptions. People assume or wonder about the relationship between so-and-so and a member of Parliament or a minister. The seeds of doubts are sown and people often forget there are a number of very strict and very clear-cut laws that apply to everyone, including members of Parliament, and that there is also a code of conduct.
As far as the code of conduct is concerned, I will report on this later on, because the hon. member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell said in his motion that so far nothing had been done. I will show that something has been done. Often people fail to make a distinction between criminal offences and offences related to the performance of one's duties. The committee on conflict of interest has been concerned with the code of ethics. Our purpose was to help politicians avoid any potential conflict of interest, either apparent or real, in the course of their daily work.
In committee we all agreed we must ensure that no member, whether he is a senator, minister or parliamentary secretary, is above the law because of any legislation that may be passed subsequently. He is a citizen like any other, and by drawing up a conflict of interest code, by drawing up a code of ethics, we demand that his behaviour shall be as irreproachable as that of anyone else. The general public should be able to look at his record and say that the hon. member for x has performed his task with honour and dedication.
We were unanimous. Fortunately in committee-and I want to stress this today-we have always been very careful not to mention specific cases not to name names because just as in society at large people do make mistakes, even serious ones. I think that the courts have ruled in some cases. In other cases the code of ethics or the conflict of interest code was brought out. In other cases there was no prosecution at any level for lack of evidence. Our legal system is based on evidence and the presumption of innocence.
We never mentioned names because when a member of any party is suspected of doing something unethical unbecoming of our profession, all members suffer and all members of this group bear the consequences. In the conflict of interest committee we wanted to find the
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essential points for legislation that would give members the leeway they needed to work with peace of mind, knowing that there are rules to protect them but which they must obey in order to keep an image intact and serve their constituents with dedication.
My colleague from Glengarry-Prescott-Russell says in his motion which I will quote: condemns the government for its continued failure to establish. He refers to a code of ethics. In 1985 the government and my Prime Minister put in place a code of ethics instead of guidelines. Now a code of ethics is much stricter and must be obeyed. A document from the registrar's office says that the conflict of interest and post-employment code for public office holders requires them to comply with nine principles.
According to the speeches this afternoon and the terms of the motion of the member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell, the government has not brought forward clear and strict guidelines for public office holders. The code which has existed since 1985 stipulates nine points, which I will take the time to quote, first of all for members of this House, but especially for the Canadians who are listening to us and have the impression that there are no rules. The code says that any public office holder, be it a member of Parliament, a parliamentary secretary, a minister or a senator.


Don Boudria: Not a member of Parliament.


Michel Champagne: My colleague from Glengarry-Prescott-Russell says "not a member of Parliament". He is right. We want to include it in the recommendation that was submitted whereby this code would henceforth apply to all members of Parliament without distinction. Of course this would include parliamentary secretaries, ministers and senators.
I will continue my quotation: "They shall perform their official duties and arrange their private affairs in such a manner that public confidence and trust in the integrity, objectivity and impartiality of government are conserved and enhanced. They have an obligation to act in a manner that will bear the closest public scrutiny, an obligation that is not fully discharged by simply acting within the law. They shall not have private interests, other than those permitted pursuant to this code, that would be affected particularly or significantly by government actions in which they participate. On appointment to office, and thereafter, they shall arrange their private affairs in a manner that will prevent real, potential or apparent conflicts of interest from arising, but if such a conflict does arise between their private interests and

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their official duties and responsibilities, the conflict shall be resolved in favour of the public interest. They shall not solicit or accept transfers of economic benefit, other than incidental gifts, customary hospitality, or other benefits of nominal value, unless the transfer is pursuant to an enforceable contract or property right of theirs. They shall not step out of their official roles to assist private entities or persons in their dealings with the government where this would result in preferential treatment to any person. They shall not knowingly take advantage of, or benefit from, information that is obtained in the course of their official duties and responsibilities and that is not generally available to the public. Public office holders shall not directly or indirectly use, or allow the use of, government property of any kind, including property leased to the government, for anything other than officially approved activities; and they shall not act, after they leave public office, in such a manner as to take improper advantage of their previous office".
These are the nine principles of the Conflict of Interest and Post-Employment Code for Public Office Holders. In contrast with the motion of my friend, which is neither clear nor strict, this is something which is extremely clear and extremely strict. All parliamentarians are subject to this code and must submit a report annually to the Office of the Registrar to make sure that we abide by the nine principles while performing our duties.
I think we also forgot that during these last few months, all three political parties have been working very hard. It is strange how much difference there is between what is said in committee and what is said in the House. We worked hard to clarify what constitutes a conflict of interest and to try and propose something which would be in keeping with the desire of parliamentarians to give a better image of the situation. The conflict of interest committee even thought that spouses and children of parliamentarians should be subject to full public disclosure. Everybody would have the right to see what they own.
We received a representation, as my colleague for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell will recall, from the Parliamentary Spouses Association and they were fairly divided on this matter, quite divided, as a matter of fact. We were told, and that is what I was getting at, that even if we imposed stricter rules and set penalties more severe than the ones already provided under section 122 of the Criminal Code in cases of fraud, if the individual's perception of our position did not change, we would have solved nothing. In this respect, I very sincerely think as a government member and as a member who simply likes his job, that in the last few years, and I do not want to make a value judgment, there has been a tendency to lead people to believe that there was favouritism going on and that it was a crime.
Some individuals who worked on some issues rather than on others were suspected of being dishonest. In the last few years there have been attempts at introducing the notion of criminal wrongdoings in what might only have been a conflict of interest, with all that it implies under the conflict of interest guidelines. A conflict of interest is not a criminal act, depending on its nature. Obviously I would never support defending a member of this House or a parliamentarian who would have received money for his own benefit for services rendered. The legislation is clear about this, I do not have to defend this point. It is mentioned in the Parliament of Canada Act, the Canada Elections Act and the Criminal Code.
We are governed by many laws and, contrary to what some might think, that we have no rules and are above all laws, I will repeat, because I did not name all of them before. We must abide by the Standing Orders of the House of Commons, the Criminal Code, the Parliament of Canada Act, the rules of the Senate and the Canada Elections Act. All those laws dictate our conduct.
Over the years for partisan reasons I would say those motives could turn against us eventually. We let Canadians believe that conflict of interest was a criminal act. There is no solution until we implement a system or until we reach an agreement concerning our own conduct. Of course we have immunity on both sides of this House, so I am not judging one party more than the other. Everyone is aware that some of the things we hear could not be said outside the House, as we have seen in the past.
February 17, 1993

Finally, I feel it is important to mention in this House that since 1984 our government has endeavoured to establish a clear and high standard of ethics and to make sure hon. members, especially those with special functions, abide by them. We have introduced Bill C-43, created a joint committee of the Senate and the House of Commons, worked hard and tabled a report, and now we hope to be able, in the coming months, to pass conflict of interest legislation which will raise the level of debate in this House so that the intentions of any parliamentarian making allegations are crystal clear.
This afternoon several allegations were made. I think that a shame because most of the people referred to were not here to defend themselves. Of course, in most cases, with very few exceptions, no proceedings or actions were taken. As far as conflicts of interest are concerned, I would say that two people were directly affected by the Conflict of Interests Act. A lot of names were mentioned by both opposition parties and some of us. If we want to enhance the quality of parliamentary proceedings, we must, first and foremost, make a distinction between criminal activities and conflicts of interest. Thanks to the Prime Minister, we have worked hard to improve parliamentary proceedings and project a better image to the Canadian public.


Charles A. Langlois: Madam Speaker, I think the last 20 minutes during which the hon. member for Champlain spoke were certainly the best 20 minutes in this debate. From listening to him closely, I must say that I found it refreshing to hear the comments of the member who has been in this House since 1984 and been a parliamentary secretary for several years now. He is recognized as a member who does his job very well and honestly. He is at work regularly and defends the interests not only of his constituents but also of all Canadians.
As I was listening to the member for Champlain, I had the opportunity to refer to a document that I have here, written some time ago by Barbara Kagedan who did some research and published this document on public duties and private interests which can of course give rise to comments on conflict of interest.
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Earlier in the day, opposition members tried to show that our government has done nothing in the area of conflict of interest and ethics, nothing to implement measures that would put members above all suspicion. On reading this document I realized that the Liberal Party's record when it was in government was not very enviable. The first reference in the document I have in my hand is to July 1973.
At that time the Hon. Allan MacEachen, then President of Treasury Board, tabled a green paper entitled "Members of Parliament and Conflict of Interest". This document was studied in a committee of the House of Commons and in a Senate committee but was never debated in the House. It was only studied in committee. In 1978 legislation was tabled but it died on the Order Paper.
In 1983, five years later, then Prime Minister Trudeau set up a task force that studied the subject, but again nothing came of it. Only in 1985 did we see some action, which was initiated by the Prime Minister of Canada.
Therefore I find it rather far-fetched to say that our government has done nothing. Our record should be compared with that of the party that preceded us.
I would now like to ask my colleague from Champlain a question. For the benefit of the House and the public record, since he has been a parliamentary secretary for some time already, could he briefly state the rules that he must obey from the time he is sworn in as a parliamentary secretary?


Michel Champagne: Madam Speaker, I will provide a very brief answer to my colleague by saying that those nine rules which must be followed by parliamentary secretaries and ministers are very strict.
I also want to remind the hon. member and my colleagues-I will not read all those rules again because it would take too much time in this House-that the second of those rules states that he has "an obligation to act in a manner that will bear the closest public scrutiny, an obligation that is not fully discharged by simply acting within the law".
I believe that says it all and in our mind, at least in mine, as soon as we have a law which provides more, we will be able to tell ourselves, as politicians and government members, that we have kept our promise and that the Prime Minister, through his bill-because Bill C-43

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is the Prime Minister's bill-fulfilled his promise to establish a code of ethics which would be much more precise and more closely followed by all politicians in this House.


Derek Vincent Lee: Madam Speaker, before I get into my remarks I want to take note of the subject of the debate tonight. This is an opposition motion which states:
That this House condemns the government for its continued failure to establish and to adhere to a clear and high standard of public sector ethics, for its incessant inability to function within the framework of existing legislation, guidelines and standards and for its reluctance to bring forward strict new codes and legislation with regard to conflicts and other public ethics matters.
That is a mouthful. I am going to try to touch on each of the areas referred to in the motion.
This grouping of topics is not the first choice on everyone's list. Some of these issues are sometimes difficult to talk about in the House. Usually they are raised by opposition. I sit in opposition. We now embark on an exercise where the opposition has to raise certain matters. It really is our duty to because often government members are not prone to dealing with them. I want to divide my remarks into four categories.
The first one is public ethics matters. When I came to the House in 1988 in my first or second week here I asked a question during Question Period about a conviction of a previous member of Parliament in a breach of trust situation.
Frankly, I was surprised at the non-answer. The government was virtually unable to reply in any reasonable fashion to the questions: What was the government going to do? What kind of a standard was it holding out, how did it propose to account to the public for that kind of situation, that kind of an offence where a member of Parliament had seriously transgressed. I must admit to my naivety at that time?
Since that year the list has grown to two and a half pages. I have to read the list so the public has a sense of what we are trying to grapple with. There is one issue involving an MP for fraud, conspiracy and breach of
trust. That MP was acquitted. There is a second MP convicted for charges of corruption. There is another MP guilty of fraud and breach of trust. There is another MP charged with fraud and breach of trust. That process is not completed. Another MP was convicted of conversion of $7,000 or $8,000 in cash. Another MP was charged with fraud, breach of trust and forgery. That MP was acquitted. With another MP it was fraud, breach of trust and conspiracy. For another MP it was investigation for fraud and conspiracy. Another MP was guilty of tax evasion. Another MP faced three charges of fraud and related charges. Two assistants to MPs were charged with fraud and influence peddling.
There are several charges involving matters of personal failings which I do not refer to here. I am thinking more in terms of failures in the realm of drinking and driving, which are very serious but that is not the kind of charge I am talking about here. This list looks more like a rap sheet in a police station than it does a list of MPs. I am concerned about that.
Right off the bat I have to say I am very familiar with the biblical exhortation that he who is without sin should cast the first stone. I am not going to comment on my own situation. I do not believe I have committed a criminal offence yet and I hope that I never will.
However, what is happening here is the government is failing, and the Prime Minister perhaps is failing, to set a standard that Canadians can see prevails within the House of Commons. I think their failure to do that has been conspicuous throughout the four years I have been here. I do not recall him standing in this House and dealing with these kinds of issues and setting a standard.
It seems to me the standard which is held out and was referred to by the member opposite who spoke prior to me is the Criminal Code. Now surely the standards in this House and in the other place are higher than the standards of the Criminal Code. When government members speak in this debate they have from time to time simply pulled out the Criminal Code and said: "This type of activity happens to be a breach of the Criminal Code. There it is in section x, y, z. Go ahead and charge them and convict them". I think the issue is more serious than that and we can do better than that. I am urging the
February 17, 1993

government through the Prime Minister to tell Canadians what those standards are.
As I sit in this Elouse now I have a sense of my own personal view of what this standard should be, but I think we want to look to the Prime Minister for leadership.
We cannot do anything about these events after they happen. Once the crimes are committed that is it. We are not going to go back into the early education of people. We cannot do that in this Elouse, in the formative years of MPs or anyone else in the country. We have to deal with these realities as they are now.
Therefore, I call upon the Prime Minister to articulate in this House the standard that he is setting for all of us in this House, not just government members but all of us.
The second item I want to address is patronage. This is covered by this opposition motion today. I can deal with it fairly succinctly. I am disappointed the promise that was held out to Canadians back in 1984 has never been fulfilled. I have two quotes. One was made by the Prime Minister in May 1983 and it has been referred to in the debate today. He did say there would be jobs for Liberals and the NDP too, after he had been Prime Minister for 15 years and could not find a living breathing Toiy in the country. That was in May 1983. Later he did in a manner retract that and say he had been speaking to Tories at a convention. That may be true but it is on the public record.
Then he did make a fairly decent promise to the electorate in July 1984 when he said: "The method of making appointments could be corrected by dramatic measures. We are going to bring in a brand new dimension to them of objectivity, representation and fairness for all Canadians".
My goodness, that is just about exactly what he did do. He did do it in a dramatic fashion. These are not my words but several years later, in 1987 it was written in The Globe and Mail that: "If Brian Mulroney has a single friend who has not been appointed to a board, commission, or agency, or has not been awarded the title of Queen's Counsel, or has not been given a fat contract or Senate appointment, that friend deserves to be annoyed".
The promise of rectitude, the promise of reform, the promise of doing things differently, the promise of making appointments, always quality appointments have
Supply
never been fulfilled in this place. I will be honest. I am less concerned about patronage appointments that are quality appointments. Just because a person is of the same political stripe as the government it should never disentitle somebody from being appointed. I and all Canadians want appointments to be quality appointments.
About three years ago one of my colleagues tried to measure the balance in the appointments. At the time the reference was roughly one in 100 appointments that was not a Toiy. I cannot personally verify that. That is second-hand information, but somebody made a reasonable attempt to measure that and that is not good enough. Canadians expect there to be more quality appointments available outside the realm of the Progressive Conservative Party.
I know from time to time the Prime Minister makes a big deal about the odd appointment that is not Tory. There have been some of those and I accept that. I do not think he has ever fulfilled the promise he held out to Canadians seven or eight years ago.
As I see it there are two bottom lines in the way these appointments should be made. The first is that we demand quality. The second is that we require accountability in the appointment process. We need to ensure that when appointments are made they are reviewed by the House in some mechanism, by committee. Appointments can be reviewed to a great extent by committee but most committees do not have enough time to get around to them. We have the job to improve on that. There is no mechanism to set aside the appointment but just to review it. So there they are: quality, we insist on it; accountability and review of the appointment, we insist on that.
I do not think people are going to believe the Prime Minister any more when he talks about his promise of accountability and fairness in the appointment system.
The third area I want to talk about is that of the lobbyists. Today several speakers from both sides of the House have discussed what is becoming a very serious public interest issue for Canadians. Many Canadians frankly are not aware of how serious it is.
We need to know who is dealing with whom on public policy issues and on government business and contract issues. We do not know that well enough now. There is a need to regulate further the lobbying efforts that affect government decisions.

February 17, 1993
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I have to think that Canadian taxpayers are very frustrated now. If they are not I think they would be if they knew they paid good money to send a member of Parliament to Ottawa to monitor government, to make propositions on public policy to government and to speak for them in government as government deals with public policy and spends the taxpayers' dollars.
Now the public finds out that lobbyists, which is now a $50 million to $100 million per year industry in this town, are doing as much or more to influence government decisions on policy and contracts than MPs do. That guestimate of $50 million to $100 million is almost more than the public is spending on Parliament itself. We are not able to track that money or that influence peddling, all of which is said to be above board. It is not illegal. It is being paid for by lobby interest groups that want their piece of the pie in Ottawa.
I want to make some constructive suggestions. I have only a couple but I feel very strongly about them. The first is that our current registration provisions are inadequate. Registration requirements are minimal and we need registrations that show the lobbying agencies. Where they have more than one client we need to know who the clients are.
Where the lobbying group is a public interest group such as the Dairy Council, a farmers' public interest group or lobby group, it does not mind registering. We still do require them to register. We want to know they are there. We want to know what they are doing. Of greater concern is the professional lobbying groups, the agencies that will work for anybody, for any purpose, for a dollar. Sometimes it is for lots of dollars.
This brings me to the issue of the contingency fee. Ordinarily I would hope the lobbying firm would have an hourly rate when it is hired to work for someone. It might be 50 bucks an hour. It might be 100 bucks an hour. It might be 1,000 bucks an hour. Whatever it is I think the public wants to know how much it is.
The problem we have now is that we have lobbying firms operating on a contingency fee basis. This means if a person says to the lobbying firm "I want that $10 million contract, go and get it for me", the lobbyist says: "I will get it for you but you have to pay me 10 per cent". If the lobbyist and the applicant are successful, the
lobbyist will take 10 per cent off the top. That is $1 million out of a $10 million contract.
That is a heck of a way for government to spend its money. If to spend 10 million bucks it has to peel off the first million and give it to a lobbyist, there is something wrong about it. My point is that a contingency fee that is payable only if they got the contract and made a big, fat percentage must end. Contingency piggy-backs on the taxpayers' dollar is inappropriate. It adds to the price of the contract. It makes the lobbyist simply a hired gun who does not give a damn about public policy and distorts the orderly process of the government decision making when there is $1 million in fees to throw around.
The contingency fee should be banned. We would have a strict regime of hourly rates. Most firms would not mind showing what their hourly rates are. In every case the client knows where there is an hourly rate.
Last, I want to deal with appointments. I want to point out a failure in one area of appointments. The Prime Minister has the right to appoint members to the Security Intelligence Review Committee. Those particular appointees are this Parliament's watch-dog in our security intelligence service. The act requires the Prime Minister to consult with each leader of the parties in the House before an appointment is made. What is the Prime Minister doing? He is sending a letter one or two days before the appointment is made in which he says to the leaders of the other parties whom he is appointing. In at least two cases the letter did not arrive before the appointment was made. That is not consultation. That is not following the spirit or the letter of the law in relation to appointments to positions of public trust and positions representing this Parliament.
I make note of that on the public record. I am not going to let the Prime Minister get away with it much longer. I am going to make him account legally if I have to for those appointments. I have warned him once. He has had one warning. It is not just a breach of the law. It is a breach of the spirit of the law. I call upon him to do it the right way next time. It is only in that way the system will work.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: It being eight o'clock p.m. it is my duty to inform the House that pursuant to Standing Order 81(17) proceedings of the motion have expired.
February 17, 1993

Pursuant to Standing Order 30(6), the House will now proceed to the consideration of Private Members' Business as listed on today's Order Paper.



PRIVATE MEMBERS' BUSINESS


Mr. Ian Waddell (Port Moody-Coquitlam) moved:: That, in the opinion of this House, the government should consider the advisability of introducing legislation on the subject of euthanasia and, in particular, of ensuring that those assisting terminally ill patients who wish to die not be subject to criminal liability.
He said: Mr. Speaker, those of us who enjoy good health have difficulty contemplating life as an incurable invalid. In pain perhaps and worried that we might be a burden on family and on society, without hope and even without dignity. We say when and if we reach that stage they will pull the plug, won't they?
But who are they? How will they know how to do it? How will they do it? What if one's family or someone else objects? What is it: withholding food and water, withholding treatment, withdrawing treatment, administering poison?
In medical ethics and bio-ethics classes, in legislatures just last week, for example in the Dutch Parliament, in editorials and letters to the editor columns, in hospitals and in hospices, these questions are being asked more than ever before. The reason is the ability of modem medicine to extend life.
People used to die at home mainly of communicable diseases. They received good palliative care from concerned family and friends. Now people die in hospitals surrounded by batteries of life saving equipment. Seventy-five per cent of deaths are caused by chronic, degenerative diseases such as cancer, heart disease, AIDS, strokes and Alzheimer's disease.
These illnesses are different from the killers of the past in part because they cause extensive physical and emotional suffering prior to death. Also new technology gives us the ability to extend life well beyond the point when death was confined to the home.
Private Members' Business
Most people know of some family member, neighbour or friend who has died after battling, with the help of the latest technology, a long illness. We are beginning to ask ourselves: I hope to God that I do not have to go through all that. The question is whether the quality of life in these last days is worth the effort to keep the patient alive.
Canadians just over a year ago saw Nancy B go to court and successfully assert her right to refuse life sustaining treatment. Perhaps members recall the case on the news. This is often called passive euthanasia.
As I speak, Sue Rodriguez, a woman from North Saanich, British Columbia, with ALS, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, which is also called Lou Gehrig's disease after the great baseball player who died of it, is now in court seeking the right to have another person assist her in ending her life. This is called active euthanasia.
Suicide is no longer illegal in Canada, although I remember when it was illegal to take one's own life. It is still a crime in Canada to assist a suicide. In section 241 of the Canadian Criminal Code it says: "Every person who (a) counsels a person to commit suicide or (b) aids or abets a person to commit suicide, whether suicide ensues or not, is guilty of an indictable offence and is liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 14 years". It is illegal to assist a person to commit suicide. If one actually administers a fatal injection, for instance, with the intent of killing a person, one could be liable to a charge of first degree murder.
Last week by a vote of 91 to 45 the Dutch Parliament guaranteed physicians immunity from prosecution if those doctors follow strict guidelines for mercy killings. In Holland however euthanasia is still punishable by up to 12 years in prison. The Dutch guidelines specify that euthanasia can be applied only to a patient suffering a "perpetual unbearable and hopeless" condition who requests it repeatedly and while lucid. A second medical opinion must be obtained. The doctor must document the entire decision-making process including why euthanasia was chosen and how it was carried out and submit it to the district coroner's office after death.
I am not advocating the Dutch system. I am just pointing out there is a system in place in law in a western European country by a vote of the Dutch Parliament last week.

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I want to remind the House that in a videotaped statement sent to a parliamentary committee of this House back in November, Sue Rodriguez had this to say:
I want to ask you gentlemen, if I cannot give consent to my own death, then whose body is this? Who owns my life?
ALS is a particularly horrible disease. Phil Bissell, president of the Victoria Chapter of the ALS Society of B.C., recently described the disease as follows:
One woman is now at the stage where she cannot move a muscle. Every day she gets propped up in front of a television at the foot of her
bed.
Bissell said, according to a newspaper article, that he saw her eyes move once at a meeting but that is the only time he has ever seen her move. He also said:
When some people lose the ability to swallow, they refuse to be fitted with a stomach tube and die in about 10 days. That means starving to death.
Later Sue Rodriguez had this to say:
Despite my losses, I do not want pity. All I ask of my fellow Canadians is understanding and compassion. Understanding that they too may some day be in a position similar to mine.
I believe this subject raises complex legal, ethical and moral questions. I also believe that this matter ultimately belongs here for debate, here for decision, here in the House of Commons. Lately the House has fallen into the situation of reacting or responding to issues that are decided in the courts. A good example is abortion. I say Parliament should not be afraid to deal with these matters.

Why do we need an act of Parliament? Because until now, many patients have had to turn to the courts in order to get the permission to die with dignity. I already mentioned the case of Nancy B., in Quebec City. Nancy B. had asked the court to have the life-support system that was keeping her alive unplugged. Those kinds of procedures require a lot of energy, time, effort and even money on the part of patients. We have to pass a law that would eliminate all those problems and protect physicians as well. Right now, in this kind of situation, physicians can be accused of murder under the Criminal Code. We have to change that.

There are already a number of private members' bills before the House. Bill C-203 of the hon. member for
Fraser Valley West-and I see him in the House tonight-has already been debated. It made it to a committee after the House. Unfortunately it was blocked coming out of the committee by some members and it never got back to the House for a vote.
That bill is restricted to the withdrawal and cessation of treatment and the provision for palliative care. It would have allowed physicians to follow patient directives without fear of legal repercussions. That could be called a more passive euthanasia.
Bill C-261, standing in the name of the member for Saskatoon-Clark's Crossing, would have gone further and made provision for doctor-assisted suicide. It was debated in this House for one hour and that debate is now finished.
Both bills were very specific in restricting any life-ending procedures to voluntary circumstances. The patient must be making the request of his or her own accord.
Both members, and I want to congratulate them, have done much work on this matter. They have carried the debate at a very high standard.
The member for Burnaby-Kingsway has also quite recently tabled a private member's bill.
I believe that my motion is unique because not only has it won the draw to be debated but an all-party committee of the House made it a votable motion. We could have a vote before the summer recess, but it depends on whether the House is prorogued or what happens.
We are now in the first hour of the debate and after another hour and 40 minutes we are to have the vote.
I worded the motion very carefully so that the government, this one or a future one, would get a clear sense of the House and hence of the Canadian people on this issue. I anticipate some good debate on the motion. Indeed I can anticipate some of the arguments against it: The possibility of abuse, a slippery slope, the Hippocratic oath, and so on. Needless to say, I think these arguments can and will be rebuffed.
I would draw to members' attention a good book on the matter, for those who still read books. It is called The Right to Die: Understanding Euthanasia by Derek Humphry and Ann Wickett.
February 17, 1993


An hon. member:: There is nothing like an objective opinion.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: I will just read part of the book at page 313 to show what it talks about. It says:
The right-to-life movement argues: If euthanasia is permitted in limited ways today, however tightly controlled by law, what is to stop groups and/or governments in the future from taking things a step further and introducing compulsory death for, say, the burdensome, the poor, the handicapped, the sick, and the elderly? Also, they argue, the availability of euthanasia as a lawfully and socially acceptable release will inevitably make it a duty for those old people who have "served their purpose" to die. The right to die becomes an obligation to die. Lastly, euthanasia laws could be manipulated by unscrupulous individuals to eliminate the sick/elderly who are a burden, especially if they have money to bequeath.
Then it continues:
Countering this, right-to-die advocates claim that the rule of the law has no purpose if society cannot, by and large, enforce it. Those who misuse euthanasia laws will merit punishment as for any other crime. Where is the sense, they argue, in telling a person dying of throat cancer that euthanasia cannot be made available because Nazi Germany murdered thousands of people in the 1940s using a method labelled "euthanasia"? The lessons of history are there to be learned, and the Nazi experience has taught society how not to let government slip into the hands of an irresponsible minority.
I am not going to go into all of this tonight because I do not have the time. I anticipate that the debate will discuss the pros and the cons. However, I am trying to set the tone of the debate. The status quo is unacceptable. I suspect that physician and other-assisted suicide is going on in the country right now. This question should not be dealt with by the courts on a case-to-case basis. Just think of the poor patients. Not only are they terminally ill but they must find the energy to raise the money, instruct the lawyers, face the questions and so on. That is a pretty awful situation.
This is essentially a non-partisan issue in terms of the tone of the debate, although partisan in that people have many different viewpoints. I hope that all members of the House will be free to vote following their own beliefs and understandings of the issue. In other words, I hope there is a free vote on the issue.
The World Health Organization uses a holistic definition of health which includes its spiritual, emotional, family, environmental and physical aspects.
Canadians want to be active participants in their own health care so the issue of quality of life has come to the
Private Members' Business
forefront of Canadian consciousness. The flip side is the quality of our death, which makes us face the issue of euthanasia. These are hard issues to face.
Surely someone who wants to end their life with dignity and cannot do so because of the nature of their illness, as in the Rodriguez case, should have the right to make that choice. Of course there must be controls to make sure that the choice is not taken advantage of. Legislation, if written, must be carefully crafted to prevent abuse but the principle stands.
This motion says that if there is a clear reasoned choice then in law that should be respected and those who assist the person in carrying out that choice should be protected. This is a very important debate in the House. Yes, there are other issues such as unemployment and all kinds of other issues. Yes, as a Parliament we have to pursue them.
David Suzuki, from Vancouver, said that politicians in the future will be measured in terms of their ability to deal with the more complex questions and the public wants us to do that. That is why it should ultimately be done here and not ultimately in the courts.
I also feel on reading the material on this matter and hearing other debate that the public is concerned about this issue because it is well aware that medical technology has changed. In their own lives people are well aware of some family member, some relative, some neighbour, or some friend who has been terminally ill, has suffered for a long time and has been kept alive by the new technology. Perhaps dignity was not there in their death. They are afraid. We are all afraid of death. We are all afraid that we might have to face the same situation. That is why it is important to clarify the matter.
My motion states, and I repeat it:
That, in the opinion of this House, the government should
consider the advisability of introducing legislation on the subject of
euthanasia -
I worded that very carefully, "should consider the advisability"-
- and, in particular, of ensuring that those assisting terminally-ill
patients who wish to die not be subject to criminal liability.
That directs the government. That is not the status quo, and that is probably what the vote will be on in the House if the vote comes to the House. Members will

February 17, 1993
Private Members' Business
have to search their own consciences to decide on that matter.
This is a debate that's time has come. We must deal with this issue as a country. I am very pleased because I anticipate that we are going to deal with it in a fair minded, high-level debate in this House of Commons.


Mr. Robert Wenman (Fraser Valley West):: Mr. Speaker, who will choose for you? Who will choose for me?
When I was conceived it was a choice by my father and mother, or perhaps an accident, but it certainly was not my choice. When I was a child I was cared for by my parents. I was protected by my parents. I was protected by the state. I was given the support of teachers, doctors, pastors and a full range of community services because I grew up in this great and wonderful country. My community nurtured me so well and added to my family values. My country has protected me ever since.
As a man I began to make my own choices and then learned to live by the consequence of those choices. Surely the ultimate freedom in a free and democratic society is when an educated rational man or woman has become self-actualized in creating, making and living with the results of their own free choice. Is that not what we are trying to create by law here? The capacity to make free and rational choices and the stage that we can make these free and rational choices and then we become mature. When we are mature should we not have the right of free choice to make our own decisions in what might well be our own end times?
Why should our right to free choice as rational men and women be stolen from us just because we have become terminally ill? That does not mean we lose our capacity to think, to feel, to suffer. I resent that this right is not my right before the laws of Canada. Why should the doctors of Canada, the medical profession and medical technology make the decision for me?


An hon. member:: They do not. They refuse to.


Robert Lloyd Wenman: But they do. Well you should have joined us through the whole of those committee hearings.


An hon. member:: I was there. It is a legal fact. I was there.


Robert Lloyd Wenman: Why should the state, if not the medical profession or the government, decide for me? That is even more threatening. I want to protect myself through law from the medical profession. I want to protect myself through law from well-meaning state and government laws.
Most of us in this room and everyone listening will become terminally ill because as technology improves the occurrence of terminal illnesses as opposed to sudden illnesses becomes more and more probable.
For those who do not understand I will try again. Terminal illness is when you are diagnosed with a disease there is no cure for. There are more and more curable diseases. More often now, more and more people are dying of terminal illnesses.
I want to preserve my right that should I become terminally ill I might at one point in the suffering process of my death say that enough is enough. Let me go. Leave the final decision between me and my God. Make me comfortable and let me go.
I must shout right now in this House because of the great fear I have of lying powerless and helpless in an extended terminal care bed somewhere and not being able to shout. Instead the decision would be made for me by well-meaning doctors, by the state, or even a wellmeaning family.
That is why I brought in Bill C-203.1 wanted that right of protection from the state against the state and against the medical profession and against the technology so that I could make a decision between myself and my God.
Even at some point in the life and death process it seems science and technology and the state are fighting against death but prolonging suffering. I do not think that was the intention of God when He gave us medical science. He gave it to save our lives, yes, and He gave it to give our lives comfort and He gave it to give us comfort as we pass from death to life again.
We, the political representatives in this House of Commons, or at least too many of us, are filled and paralyzed with fear, fear for our own, our family's and our friends' deaths, fear of change, fearful even of discussion. Those of us who are here tonight will discuss death, but I can tell you that this is one of those great unmentionables. The only time we talk about death is when we have to face it. We face it in the hospital corridors and in the quiet whisperings in the funeral
February 17, 1993

parlours. It has to be faced now while we are in good health and while we have the capacity to act with compassion.
It is time to put fear aside. It is time for courage. This is not an easy decision for Parliament to make. It is not an easy decision for us to frame. I know it is hard. I know my bill may not be quite the right answer or quite the right motion, but let us make a decision about whether we have the right to withdraw surely and truly from treatment if we are terminally ill? Does a doctor have the right to be protected if, in fact, he gives us maximum comfort from pain and suffering? This is common practice in Canada today. We must either charge the doctors or change the law, but let us not live in this grey, middle area or we will be, as some of the others say, on that slippery slope.
This is the inevitable life and death question for all of us and all those we love and care for. Since I first raised this in the House of Commons I have had members of Parliament from all sides come and tell me: "I want to get up and speak on this but I will cry because I went through it with my parents" or "I went through it with a friend and I saw them suffer more than they needed to suffer when they were begging to be let go." It does not occur too often, but if it occurs one time it is too many and I know it occurs many times in many people's lives.
This motion may not be quite right but I urge a free vote. If this is the method to get the discussion going, let us at least get the discussion going in this Parliament. Let us resolve to act in this Parliament and, if not in this Parliament, to ready ourselves to do what the majority of Canadians want, which is to die in peace.


Don Boudria: Mr. Speaker, I must say that I never thought, until not long ago, that we would be having this debate tonight in this Parliament. I think I can say that I have some knowledge of the issue, having lost my father and my mother-in-law, my wife's mother, in the past 18 months, both from a cancer. I had to suffer the loss of beloved family members who both died from very serious dis-
Private Members' Business
eases. They were not the first, but they were recent cases.

What we are discussing today is not whether a doctor has to provide treatment against the will of a patient. That is not so. That is not what we are debating tonight. It is not even in the motion. What we are not debating either is whether or not a patient has the right to refuse medical treatment. Clearly a patient has that right and is protected by the Criminal Code of Canada. A patient has that right, Mr. Speaker.
What we are, however, debating is whether we will give the right to any human being to kill another human being. That is the debate that we are having right now.
We can say: Yes, but it is not just any ordinary human being, it is a human being who is going to die anyway. Perhaps that is so. It is a human being in the case of what is happening in Holland now whose life is not worth living. I am not exaggerating the point when I read this headline entitled, "Euthanasia for newborns who face 'poor quality of life' gaining acceptability". That is what we are dealing with and that is what we are debating tonight.
Why are we debating this? We are debating this because of an unfortunate person who is very ill in British Columbia and who I believe has been used by others in a propaganda campaign on this issue. That is sad for all of us as a society, and it is particularly sad for that woman. Of course I am referring to Mrs. Sue Rodriguez.
Last week it came to our attention that the so-called protector of Mrs. Rodriguez who came here to testify on her behalf admitted to newspapers that he had forged the signature of Mrs. Rodriguez on certain documents. Yet that person is the one who asks us to trust him or others like him with the life of an individual when he was not even trustworthy enough not to forge the signature of someone else. That is why we are here, because of that. It is sad, but let us bear it in mind when we are having the discussion.
I see an hon. member who is a medical doctor. He will no doubt have other concerns as well, such as the trust between the patient and the medical practitioner. What does it do to the medical practitioner when we have a situation such as the one that exists in Holland where people will decide whether or not to enter a hospital

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Private Members' Business
based on their chances of escaping euthanasia if they go there. What does that do to the trust that exists between the medical profession and the patient? I do not think it does it much good. I do not think the doctors who sit in this Chamber, or elsewhere, would think it does much good either.
In Holland there are some 10,000 cases of active euthanasia per year. In Holland there is a virtual absence of hospices and palliative care, and the two are linked. In Great Britain where there is a good level of palliative care, and there is never enough of course, there is a virtual absence of euthanasia. In other words, euthanasia has been the quick fix for the lack of care provided for the dying. That is what this is all about.
We had before the committee that studied Bill C-203 Dr. John Scott who directs what I believe to be the largest palliative care hospital in Canada, le Centre Elizabeth-Bruyere, here in Ottawa, who talked to us about that issue.
Dr. Scott told us what he thought of euthanasia. He is not in favour of it. He has assisted people in the last stages of their lives more than any one of us has or probably ever will. He said: "Unrelieved suffering in Canada urgently needs to be addressed by palliative care strategy which includes widespread education, research and bedside services. The fear and the pain of dying can and must be relieved in Canada".
Dr. John Scott totally rejected euthanasia, mercy killing, assisted suicide, or anything like that as a solution.
At the same time, we should all pray for Mrs. Rodriguez. We should think of others who are suffering from this disease. I am thinking of Judge Sam Filer, an Ontario court judge, who is also suffering from Lou Gehrig's disease.
From a report that I have, in 1989 Judge Filer suffered a respiratory failure. The medical profession asked his wife: "What do we do with him? Do we revive him?" His wife allegedly said: "I will take care of his quality of life, thank you very much. You take care of saving his life". They revived him. Today, even with the difficulties that the judge has in communicating, he says that he is glad to be living. Do you know what he also says? He says that
eight or ten years ago when he became sick, had someone asked him at that time: "Would you want to live like this 10 years from now?" he would have said: "No".
Who will change Mrs. Rodriguez' mind if she could sign a document like that and if there were no criminal law to protect her? Who would save her? Is it John Hofsess? I hardly think so.

Mr. Speaker, it is true that this is a difficult issue. It is for me as it is for all members of this House, and I do not take it lightly. I must also say that it is much easier not to talk about it than to talk about it. It is difficult for all of us, even for those who claim that they have the courage to talk about it. However, we must voice our opinions. Whether we are afraid of the issue or not, we must do everything to protect the human life.
I would like to conclude with a quote from a Law Reform Commission report concerning the need for legislation protecting the dignity of human life. The quote reads as follows: "The repression of unlawful actions is neither the only mission of the law, nor even its main mission. The law is the expression, in the fullest meaning of the word, of the type of society to which we belong".

That is quite true. That is the purpose of law, to state where we stand as a society.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I did not want to interrupt my friend during his very interesting speech.
I know he did not want to make allegations to the contrary, but with respect to using Mrs. Rodriguez, I know he will note that my motion has been on the Order Paper since May 15, 1991.


Mr. Ross Belsher (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Fisheries and Oceans and Minister for the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency):: Mr. Speaker, tonight this House is considering the motion put forward by the hon. member for Port Moody-Coquitlam.
The last half of that motion reads:
-of ensuring that those assisting terminally ill patients who wish to
die not be subject to criminal liability.
February 17, 1993

This is an extremely sensitive issue that does not easily fit into political positions based on ideology. Supporters for and against this motion can be found in all parties and across the social and political spectrum in our Canadian society.
There is much discussion in Canadian politics and society about individual rights and freedoms. The public and politicians are bombarded with messages which remind us of this. However, within the past, current and I suspect future political discourse, there has rarely been acceptance of an absolute supremacy of individual rights.
Notwithstanding the distinction between passive euthanasia which involved the cessation of treatment and active euthanasia which involves positive, contributing actions leading to death, the people supporting the acceptance of euthanasia and mercy killing would like our society to set aside the principle that intentionally taking the life of another is wrong. They want us to set that principle aside.
I would like to quote from a thoughtful article in The Ottawa Citizen of January 18 written by Susan Zimmerman, a lawyer who has been involved with the McGill University Centre for Medicine, Ethics and the Law. She wrote:
If euthanasia is an acceptable option for the terminally ill, should it also be offered to the chronically ill, the severely disabled and the elderly? Should the physicians routinely offer death as an alternative to treatment? Should they be the ones to decide when to raise death as an option?
Acceptance of euthanasia in any form means that death becomes an option where currently it is not. How will we measure the insidious shift this will entail in social attitudes toward the weak, the infirm, the elderly and the dependent?
This article suggested that an acceptance of euthanasia might lead to a change in what society considers a life worth living and what is an impairment which would justify actively ending a life.
Another article in The Ottawa Citizen today suggests that in the Netherlands-the Netherlands has been quoted here this evening already-these decisions are not just being considered for the terminally or chronically ill, but also for newborns. When a child is bom with a severe physical or mental disability, parents and doctors consult and make a hypothetical determination about
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that child's quality of life. Based on that decision they can proceed through a number of steps to put the child to death.
I realize that a single story in a newspaper cannot give the full story, but the idea in itself is extremely disturbing and something to be feared.
The issues which physicians and medical ethics experts deal with when discussing euthanasia are admittedly complex and often lacking in clear definitions. There is active and passive, voluntary and involuntary euthanasia, as well as doctor-assisted euthanasia. Even more confusing is determining acceptable and unacceptable levels of suffering and whether these assessments can be made on behalf of those people who are unable to indicate their situation to caregivers and to loved ones.
Reviews of the law covering euthanasia have been carried out in the recent past. In 1983 the then Law Reform Commission of Canada recommended against decriminalizing voluntary euthanasia. The commission recommended that the offence of counselling, aiding or abetting suicide should not be removed from the Criminal Code or revised.
In the past years there have been a number of developments in relation to terminally ill persons, chronically ill persons and persons who are unconscious and in what physicians call a persistent vegetative state. Public consensus is continuing to develop regarding issues relating to cessation of treatment but no consensus has developed on issues involving euthanasia and aiding suicide.
The Quebec case of Nancy B. involved an incurably, but not terminally, ill woman who had failed to respond to treatment and who wished to have the hospital disconnect the respirator which was keeping her alive. The court found that under the civil law of Quebec the patient had the right to refuse treatment and that this did not conflict with the provisions of the Criminal Code.
Although surveys in the United States and Canada have found people sympathetic to the situation in which some incurably or terminally ill persons find themselves, when referendums were held in the United States that specifically allowed voters to decide whether they wished to decriminalize euthanasia and aided suicide, the voters were unwilling to take this step. They may have remained unpersuaded of the need for such action and

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they may have also been concerned about the effect it could have.
Neither has the case been made for decriminalization. Court decisions have made it increasingly clear that generally approved medical practices such as administering palliative care for pain relief even when it may also have the effect of hastening the death of terminally ill patients is not murder. Removing a respirator at the request of a patient is seen by most as an accepted practice. Withdrawing drugs and food from patients in a persistent vegetative state at the request of a patient's family has been recognized as an extension of the patient's own right to refuse treatment. In all these situations, treatment has not been successful and all that remains is to make the patient as comfortable as possible or to grant the request of the patient or his or her family to cease any further attempt to treat. Most people involved in the medical profession suggest more importance should be placed on palliative care for the relief of pain instead of forcing people to look at the issue as a choice between a quick painless death and a slow painful death. Palliative care to relieve pain is intended to relieve symptoms, not to sedate patients and hasten death.
There is a need in Canada and that need is to consider how best to promote a palliative care strategy which includes widespread education, research and bedside services to relieve Canadians of the fear of pain and dying.
The danger is that where physicians decide to practice euthanasia or aid in suicide, their patients might not be aware of the option of appropriate and effective palliative care. Similarly, there is little incentive for the health care systems to promote and support palliative care. Where doctors are known to assist suicide or provide euthanasia services, in this sense there is a danger that euthanasia may then be regarded as a cheap substitute for palliative care.
In conclusion, with this motion before us we have a challenge facing us as parliamentarians and citizens. It is an ethical question which forces us to look at ourselves, and I for one, as the representative for Fraser Valley East, cannot bring myself to support the motion or the sentiment surrounding it. I do not want to set aside the
principle that intentionally taking the life of another is no longer wrong. Therefore, if I have the opportunity of voting on this, I will be voting against this motion.


Mr. Tom Wappel (Scarborough West):: Mr. Speaker, this is a very emotional subject, one that is going to bring out deep beliefs and deeply held feelings. I think we can discuss this matter on the level of the legalities involved.
I want to spend a few minutes looking at the wording of the motion and talk about some definitions. The motion says: "That in the opinion of this House, the government should consider the advisability of introducing legislation on the subject of euthanasia". That is the first part of the motion. What does euthanasia mean? How can we consider the advisability of bringing forward legislation on a subject unless we know precisely what we are talking about? Let us have a look at some of these definitions.
In a recent article in a newspaper, the author tried to put forward some definitions. The definition for active euthanasia was put forward. Note the adjective. There is not just euthanasia, but it would appear that there are different types of euthanasia. "Active euthanasia-the deliberate termination of the life of a human being who is ill, usually by injection or overdose of medication by a physician or surgeon at the patient's request". Let us look at that definition for a moment.
The deliberate termination of the life of a human being. That is a sanitized way of saying the deliberate execution of a human being, the deliberate killing of a human being. Let us make no mistake about it, that is exactly what it is. The termination of a life is its execution or its killing, usually by injection or overdose of medication, but not necessarily.
Then the author assumes that it will be by a physician or a surgeon as if execution or killing is somehow justified because it is performed by a physician or surgeon. Yet, if we look at this motion we will see that the words physician and surgeon do not even appear.
In the second portion of the motion it says: "and, in particular, of ensuring that those assisting terminally ill patients who wish to die not be subject to criminal liability". It does not even mention that physicians and surgeons assisting terminally ill patients not be subject to criminal liability. Just "those". It could be anybody. It could be a nurse assisting a doctor. It could be a brother.
February 17, 1993

It could be an aunt or an uncle. It could be anyone under the terms of the very wording of this motion.
Is that what we want to do? Do we want to have just anyone terminate, execute, kill an ill person? The third part of the definition states: "at the patient's request".
We talk about Holland and the experience that the Dutch have had. Recently there were headlines in the newspapers trumpeting the great news for humanity that the Dutch Parliament approves law sanctioning euthanasia.
Here are the guidelines to protect us from ourselves apparently: The request for euthanasia must be made entirely of the patient's own free will and not under pressure from others. The patient must be spoken to alone to ensure the decision is voluntary. These are patients who are dying, who in many cases are in agony. Are they going to be thinking straight? Are they going to have the ability to determine this on their own? Of course not.
The patient must be well informed about his or her situation and must have been able to consider the alternatives. Oh yes, because of course in the throes of a terminal illness they are going to be sitting there rationally listening and adding up the ledgers a and b and the debits and the credits columns to make a rational decision.
The patient should have a lasting longing for death. Requests made on impulse or based on a temporary depression cannot be considered. What is a temporary depression? What is a lasting longing for death? Who is going to decide? There is no answer in the Dutch legislation.
The patient must experience his or her suffering as perpetual, unbearable and hopeless. Virtually any doctor will tell you that there is virtually no disease known to man where the pain cannot be controlled. If there is a disease where the pain cannot be controlled, I say doctors should be looking for ways to control the pain, not to execute the patient.
Another guideline: The physician must consult at least one colleague on the patient's request. In other words, if the patient has the wherewithal to say: "Hey, by the way
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do you mind checking with a colleague", then the doctor has to check with a colleague.
A well documented written report must be done stating the history of the patient's illness and meeting the carefulness requirements. Note the code words, the carefulness requirements. This is in the Dutch legislation. This is the dramatic jurisdiction that we should be considering as our model.
What happened in Holland? In 1990, 1,030 Dutch patients' lives were terminated. They were killed without their consent under these guidelines. Of 22,500 deaths due to withdrawal of life support, 63 per cent of them, 14,175 living patients, were denied medical treatment without their consent and 12 per cent of them, 1,701, were mentally competent but were not consulted. They were killed without consultation. They were executed without consultation.
The common law provides very clearly that absolutely no one has to accept treatment. If treatment is forced on you against your consent that is an assault against your person and the doctor can be charged criminally or face a civil suit. No one has to accept treatment. The argument that my friend, the member for Fraser Valley West, put forward that we are inflicting life on people is specious to say the least.
We do not have to get into religion. Of course if we mention religion there are those who will say, "You are imposing your religious views on others".
All we have to do is look at the medical facts and we have to listen to some doctors. This is what Dr. Gordon Dickey, President of the Ontario College of Family Physicians says: "Doctors are in the business of caring for patients. Euthanasia as I understand it is killing people and killing people is morally wrong and not something that physicians should be involved in".
The member for Fraser Valley West however did mention the word "God", something that we do not often mention in our society today. He mentioned his God and I know his God because He is the Christian God. I remind him and people listening of precisely what his God has already said in one of His 10 very simple rules: "Thou shalt not kill".


Godfrey Stanley (Stan) Wilbee: Mr. Speaker, I do appreciate the opportunity of at least starting a little speech here tonight to talk on this very fascinating subject.

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I think the fact that many members stayed at this hour of the night to listen to the debate indicates the interest that there is in it.
We recognize also that there is a Gallup poll that has been done which shows that 75 per cent of all Canadians favour euthanasia but when you look at that poll more closely you will find that euthanasia is not very well defined.
When we were holding hearings on the bill, from the member for Fraser Valley West we discovered that there are many different aspects of euthanasia and many different definitions. I think when we look at this bill that a motion should be made for the government to initiate legislation to discuss euthanasia.
Immediately we would have to ask what the need is. What are the manifest needs for such legislation in this House at this particular time? I have not had any great numbers of letters or phone calls or anything from my constituents. We have not seen any great outcry from the newspaper and the popular press.
What we do have is a couple of very significant court cases that have occurred in the past and are occurring at the present time, particularly Sue Rodriguez. I appreciate the clarification of the sponsor of this motion that the motion was put in prior to the time that Sue Rodriguez went to court.
What concerns me when I watch the television proceedings of the Rodriguez case in Vancouver is that I see a very ill woman who we all must sympathize with. All around her I see lawyers, politicians and various activists who all have some particular benefit to be gained or have some agenda that they want to see served. The real question on my mind is whether this woman is being manipulated. She has expressed a desire to end her life when the time comes. I have a real concern for this woman in that area.
I think there is some evidence for that in the headlines of The Vancouver Sun on February 2. The head of the Right to Die Society admitted that he had forged Sue's initials on a letter. In it he said that the Saanich woman said the letter does not represent her viewpoint and was sent without her knowledge. The fellow that did that is the executive director of the Right to Die Society that is backing Rodriguez court challenge to have the law prohibiting assisted suicide struck down. He admitted: "My actions were both inappropriate and unethical. I think we need to look at that with care.
The member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell mentioned a judge in his area. I have a constituent, a Mr. Roy Slater, from Ladner, the founder of the ALS society who was told 12 years ago that he only had a year or two to live. Yet in that time he has founded the ALS Society. As head of the retired civil servants, he has been active in Indian missions and he has been active in his church.
About one year and a half ago, I went to the Willow Chest Centre at Vancouver General Hospital for what I thought was my last visit with him. Just about six months ago we went to a dinner in his honour put on by the ALS Society. One and a half years ago, he could have been terminated but he chose not to and he is continuing on.
I will continue this speech at the next hour.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The hon. member will have six minutes remaining in his speech.
The time provided for the consideration of Private Members' Business has now expired. Pursuant to Standing Order 93, the order is dropped to the bottom of the list from the order of precedence on the Order Paper.
It being nine o'clock p.m., this House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 10 a.m., pursuant to Standing Order 24(1).


[Stage Direction]
The House adjourned at 9 p.m.