1993-04-23

Hon. Bill McKnight (for the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance) moved: that Bill C-93, an act to implement certain government organization provisions of the budget tabled in the House of Commons on February 25, 1992, be read the third time and passed.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: I have received notice of a question of privilege.


Mr. Simon de Jong (Regina-Qu'Appelle):: Madam Speaker, my question of privilege arises out of debate concerning Bill C-93.
During report stage debate, the government introduced some new figures. The debate very much hinged on the efficiency and cost savings to be achieved by bringing the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and the external cultural program into the Canada Council.
We heard testimony from Treasury Board, the Privy Council as well as Finance in committee stating there were no savings. We tried as well to bring in the minister and the people from the Canada Council in order to allow us to verify whether there would be any savings and efficiencies. We were not allowed to do that. During the debate the government introduced a new set of figures, claiming some $5 million per year in savings will be achieved.
It is important as a member of Parliament that I know where these figures come from and that I have an opportunity to review them because they are important in determining what position we will take on this bill. It is also important to the academic community because, as would members on this side of the House, it would like to see greater efficiencies and cost savings. We would like to see that this is proven.
I believe my grounds for the question of privilege are that my ability to perform my duties as a member of Parliament have been infringed. As well, the authority and the dignity of Parliament and of all members have been offended by the action of the government. The action in question is the introduction of new and previously unavailable and arguably withheld evidence to the House. The lack of the evidence in question affects my judgment as a member and potentially the judgment of my party. In short I have a right to examine the evidence and to draw conclusions, a right I tried to exercise in the committee without success.


Mr. Don Blenkarn (Mississauga South):: Madam Speaker, I am at a loss to understand the view of my friend from Regina on this matter.
During the committee hearings government witnesses indicated there would be a considerable saving in combining these agencies. Rather than two separate boards of directors of 21 each there would be one board of directors, reducing the total number of combined counsel from 43 to 21. That is an enormous saving.
Currently there are two administrative and support structures with personnel, financial information and the rest. The member was advised of all this in the committee hearing. All can examine the committee report. That has now been quantified at $5 million in years four and five of this program.
I do not understand the member for Regina-Qu'Appelle raising this as a question of privilege. It may be a matter of debate, whether he listened to the debate or

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not. It certainly is not a question of privilege and I think that the claim ought to be dismissed out of hand.


Simon Leendert de Jong: Madam Speaker, I think an examination of the record of the committee hearings will show that documents obtained under freedom of information from Treasury Board showed zero savings. I assume that conceivably by bringing various boards together there are savings on one hand but there are also costs associated on the other. That is why I assumed Treasury Board came to the conclusion there would be zero savings in years one, two, three, four and five.
The savings figure of $5 million a year was never once mentioned in committee. The government now claims at this very late stage of the progress of the bill through various stages that there is going to be this type of saving. I suggest if that is the case, this bill go back to committee for further discussion.
As it stands now I feel my rights as a member of Parliament have been infringed on and I do have a question of privilege.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: I do not think we have a prima facie case of privilege. In fact, we were moving, it seems quite rapidly-and I think the hon. member will agree-towards the debate that is about to start.
I did not have time, from the moment we received the notice that the hon. member would raise this question of privilege and the opening of the sitting, to go back to reading what had happened in committee.
On the other hand, I do believe that we will have time at this point to debate all these different points as we proceed with third reading. However, I must tell the hon. member that although he may have a grievance that is real, I do not think at this point that it is a prima facie case of privilege.
Nonetheless, I will ask the clerk and his officers to look into the matter and, if required, we will get back to the House with another ruling. For the time being, I do not think that this is an appropriate question of privilege.


Mr. Iain Angus (Thunder Bay-Atikokan):: Madam Speaker, on this point. Am I to understand from the comments you have just made that during the course of third reading debate you will interrupt if you determine after consultation that a different decision is appropriate and at that point in time we will deal with the matter? In any case, am I to understand that you will report back to the House prior to the completion of third reading of this particular bill?


Madam Deputy Speaker:: As I have just said, I do not think at this time that there is a prima facie case of privilege.
Should our clerk through a study of whatever happened in committee advise me otherwise then of course we would come back to the House.
I must tell the hon. member at this time we do not see a question of prima facie privilege.


Iain Francis Angus: Madam Speaker, I understand and accept that. It becomes a moot point if this House has already triggered a vote on third reading of this particular bill and then a decision is made after that. Therefore my question is: Will you indicate before that point in time if as a result of your review there is any change in your decision?


Madam Deputy Speaker:: If there should be a change in my decision I would definitely come back to the House before 2.45 p.m. when we have to vote. Otherwise there would be no reason for it, would there?


Mr. Jean-Marc Robitaille (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of State (Finance and Privatization)):: Madam Speaker, I welcome the opportunity to begin the debate at third reading of Bill C-93.
We on this side of the House have worked relentlessly to reduce the size and cost of the federal government. We have restrained federal spending, including public sector wages. We have implemented the Spending Control Act and the debt servicing and reduction account to ensure that fiscal responsibility is a matter of law. By privatizing over 20 Crown corporations we have reduced the public payroll by 50,000 employees. Nevertheless, we
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realize, as do Canadians, that the task of streamlining the federal government and making it more efficient is not yet complete. Bill C-93 is a further step in that direction.
Bill C-93, the budget implementation bill, is the second of a series of omnibus bills designed to give effect to the government streamlining measures announced in the 1992 budget. The first one, Bill C-76, received royal assent on April 2, 1993 and a third one, Bill C-92, dealing with the Income Tax Act and other technical measures is proceeding to second reading in the other place.
The purpose of the Bill C-93 is to reduce government overhead and to provide services to Canadians more efficiently. The Bill includes the necessary amendments required to give full effect to the budget decisions affecting 14 organizations.
Contrary to the campaign which my friends opposite have waged with their filibuster of this bill in the House and with their allies through the media, this bill is not simply a "cuts" exercise, and its success will not be measured only in the calculation of dollars and cents over the short term.
As we are bound to repeat once again for the benefit of the opposition, there will be savings over the longer term as the size of government is reduced and overhead costs are diminished, and this is precisely what Canadian taxpayers wish to see.
More to the point, these changes are part of our broader commitment to smaller, simpler, more cost-effective government, able to provide Canadians with the programs and services they need in the challenging circumstances of the 1990s and at an acceptable cost of delivering them.
I want now to review some of the more contentious issues raised in earlier debate with respect to specific organizations addressed in Bill C-93.
The positive features of Enterprise Cape Breton Corporation or ECBC will be retained after the Corporation is merged with the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, commonly called ACOA. In particular, financial assistance will continue to be available for new and existing businesses that are likely to make a substantial contribution to industrial development and employment opportunities in Cape Breton Island outside of the coal
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producing and steel industries. ACOS's new statutory powers will be restricted to Cape Breton Island and a portion of mainland Nova Scotia around the town of Mulgrave.
Dissolving the ECBC and carrying over its specific statutory powers to ACOA will eliminate a duplication in program delivery and the administrative overlap which that duplication entails. ACOA clients in Cape Breton will be the beneficiaries of increased efficiency in promotion, financial assistance and development of industry on the island.
During debate on this part of the bill on Tbesday, April 20, 1993, the member for Regina-Qu'Appelle made reference to estimates of the costs and savings to government from the merger of ECBC with ACOA. I refer to page 18151 of Hansard. Specifically he stated that the merger would cost the government $1 million over five years.
The $1 million cost figure referred to by the member for Regina-Qu'Appelle was an early estimate of costs which was made prior to the February 1992 Budget and prior to any specific knowledge of the parameters of the integration of ECBC into ACOA. That estimate assumed far greater job losses and severance costs than will actually be the case, since most of ECBC's employees will be transferred to ACOA.
It is now estimated that there will be no additional costs to government as a result of the merger. The corporation, like any responsible corporation, has set aside annual contributions for employee termination benefits. There are sufficient resources in this fund to pay all anticipated severance costs associated with the merger.
With respect to savings it is estimated that the annual savings to government from merging ECBC with ACOA will be at a minimum $250,000. Saving could reach up to $1 million annually on the successful divestiture of ECBC'S industrial park and farm operations.


Simon Leendert de Jong: I rise on a point of order, Madam Speaker.
I am sorry to interrupt the parliamentary secretary but again he is quoting figures that were not available in committee. I wonder if the hon. member would be willing to table those figures in the House so we can all see the source of his figures from which he claims to have these savings.

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Jean-Marc Robitaille: Madam Speaker, I was simply saying that the Enterprise Cape Breton Corporation had set aside some funds for severance pay. The costs associated with the merger or integration of the corporation and ACOA will be paid but out of the funds set aside for that particular purpose.
I take note of my hon. colleague's question and will see when I am through with my speech if I can provide these documents and confirmations to the House.
Questions were also raised in debate at report stage with respect to the future of ECBC's industrial park and farm operations. The member from Cape Breton-The Sydneys stated at page 18150 of Hansard that at present, ACOA has no provision to own land but ECBC does. He is correct. However, he neglected to inform the House that ECBC's power to acquire or hold land will be transfered to ACOA as part of the provisions of Part II of Bill C-93.
With respect to the future of the two properties identified by the member, the industrial park and demonstration farm, it is the government's objective to assist private-sector operators to take over these operations.
I trust these clarifications put to rest once and for all any residual anxiety about the nature of the programs for ECBC Cape Breton.
This is strictly a legislative initiative to streamline the administrative component of program delivery, simplify the access to information for the business community on the island and improve the quality of service to all Cape Bretoners.
Next I want to deal with what appears to be the most difficult aspect of the bill for my friends opposite to get their minds around, Part III-the integration of the Canada Council with the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and the international relations programs.
In spite of efforts by members on this side of the House to set the record straight, the opposition speakers continue to characterize this section of the bill as an empty exercise motivated by fears of the government having to cave into right wing political pressure.
They are, of course, entitled to their opinions, but I am here again today to tell the House that this government will not be put off from finding reasonable and prudent ways to relieve the burden on the Canadian taxpayer whether the pressure is coming from the so-called right or from any other self-serving lobby.
This merger, once the transition has been completed, will result in increased efficiency in the delivery of programs and services. I am talking about grants to artists, promotion of the arts and the provision of scholarships in the social sciences and humanities and enhancing our capacity to project our national personality and the expression of our culture abroad.
The opposition continues to demand of us why are we proceeding with this merger. The answer remains straightforward and has not changed since they first posed the question at second reading: to improve program delivery and reduce overhead. Let me say one last word about the operation of the councils. It is important to recall, as my colleague from Winnipeg South told the House on Wednesday, the Canada Council worked well as one council for over 20 years.
Over time, the council developed a structure adapted to the two clienteles with the creation of an Academic Advisory Panel as a parallel to the Advisory Arts Panel, and the establishment of a separate administrative staff to deal with the academic community.
The differentiation of roles between the two was fully understood and accepted by the two bodies and their relationship was characterized by mutual respect.
It is also significant to note that in its appointments to the new council, the government of the day took the Canada Council as its model and gave the new body, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, a predominantly lay composition and similar budgetary and expenditure practices.
The merger of the two councils in no way represents a lesser commitment to the academic community. The government is on record as saying that the interests of all its clients will be protected. Social research will in no way be compromised, as opposition members tried to say.
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Both the Canada Council and SSHRC are granting	Councils and the international programs. One more
councils, both have well-established peer review struc-	time, once the transition is complete, ongoing savings of
tures. The distinct peer-review structures will remain in	approximately $5 million annually are expected from this
place after integration. However, as my friends opposite	measure, in all probability starting three years after the
conceded on several occasions in this debate-and again	integration, that is, in the fourth and fifth years,
as late as Wednesday afternoon at continuation of report	Hopefully, this is the end of the phoney "no savings"
stage-there is a need to streamline government to deal ' as painful as it may be for the opposition to abandon with the growing fiscal pressures on the public purse. xt-
Simply put, one more time, we no longer need and can no longer afford a separate council for each sector. This has no relationship to the level of appropriation for the grants and contributions which the three sectors receive or to the level of funding for the respective programs which they deliver. For more than 20 years, the Canada Council included both councils and operated very well. We know that this can be done again while protecting the interests of all three client groups-the arts, the social sciences and humanities and the international academic and cultural relations programs. Despite the protestations to the contrary of my friends opposite, the structure of Bill C-93 is clearly designed to reflect this intent.
Furthermore, the government never said that the Council would have only one vote for appropriation purposes. While the ministers of the Treasury Board will decide how many votes there will be, I can once again assure the House, and especially the opposition, that they have taken into account the wishes of the granting councils management and the views of the client organizations and will continue to do so.
I have been truly astonished at the tenacity of members opposite on the question of savings associated with the merger. They managed to get their hands on an outdated, pre-budget estimates draft and totally distorted its meaning. That may be understandable for people who are not familiar with the bureaucratic processes involved in our parliamentary routines for voting appropriations. I can even appreciate the political expediency involved in their behaviour which implies, "Look, don't bother me with the details. The answer you are going to give me is not one I want to hear, because it does not suit my line of argument."
What totally floors me is when the members opposite continue to cling to their story line in the face of clear statements telling them that there will be significant ongoing savings resulting from the integration of the
I would like to come back to that amount of $5 million which my colleague from Winnipeg South and I put forward here in the House. We clearly said, and I clearly said in my speech at report stage, that it would be inadvisable for the government to try to detail the savings and how they would be made, since the new Council, like any Crown corporation, must operate at arm's length from the government.
I was listening a few moments ago to the question of privilege raised by the hon. member and I would like to remind the Speaker that the Canada Council is an independent Crown corporation and that, on the issue of savings, it is up to the Council itself to determine how these savings will be realized. Therefore, we are not in a position to give further details at this moment, nor are we required to do so.
I would like to refer to a letter from Mrs. Paule Leduc, director and president of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, to my hon. colleague from Regina-Qu'Appelle, of which I received a copy. With unanimous consent, I am prepared to table this letter, which I will read to you.

Dear Mr. de Jong:
Following our telephone conversation this morning concerning future savings resulting from the merger of the SSHRC and the Canada Council, I think we can reasonably expect that ongoing savings in the order of $5 million annually could be achieved after four to five years of the existence of the new combined agency.
I also expect that savings will occur earlier in the process, probably as soon as year three, but at this stage I cannot give a definite amount.
It is premature for me now to identify in detail how those savings will be achieved, but we can already identify that integration of corporate and administrative services, the sharing of a single location, as well as some program rationalization will combine to reach a target of that magnitude.

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That letter is signed "Mrs. Paule Leduc, director and president, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council". I could table the document with unanimous consent of the House.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Is there unanimous consent for the hon. member to table that letter?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Jean-Marc Robitaille: Madam Speaker, I hope this confirmation by Mrs. Paule Leduc will dispel the doubts that the opposition is trying to cast on the savings this merger will bring.
As we said on Wednesday, it is normal that in the first few years of operation there are costs associated with the merger. Nevertheless, we expect, based on the preliminary judgement which the management of both councils has given us, that reduction in overhead will result from a streamlined program structure with three-year funding instead of annual grants, simpler and more flexible financial management, co-location under one roof, rationalized common services-by that I mean personnel, financial and information-and the return to one governing body, one council, instead of two.
I congratulate my friends opposite for the entertainment they have provided the House and the public with their misleading attacks on this merger. We have been patient and have tried to correct the record a number of times. Now-enough is enough. There are significant ongoing annual savings asssociated with the merger in part III of Bill C-93 over the long term.
We have told the members opposite the magnitude of those savings and when we expect to begin to realize them. That should be sufficient. I know it is more than sufficient for the taxpayers of Canada.
I have one final point on the specifics of the recent debate on this bill. I am referring to the point raised by the honourable member for Regina-Qu'Appelle on part VIII of the bill and the debate on Motion No. 67 on Wednesday.
Although, this is a highly technical area of intellectual property litigation, I think that in his remarks on cost recovery, the member has confused user fees, passthrough costs and awarding of costs for frivolous proceedings. That would appear to be the case with his statements in Hansard on pages 18260 and 18261.
He argued that SOCAN will have to absorb the cost of frivolous proceedings brought against them. This is not the case. I refer the honourable member to page 80 of the Bill. Section 12 of the new Intellectual Property Tribunal Act clearly provides the Tribunal with the discretionary power to award costs against nuisance proceedings of this sort.
Therefore, I believe that SOCAN's fears in this regard are unfounded.
Moreover, Madam Speaker, you will allow me to point something out with reference to a remark the hon. member for Regina-Qu'Appelle made about me as recorded in Hansard of April 21, 1993, page 18260 and I quote:
Mr. Speaker, I really tried to follow what the parliamentary secretary was saying but I am afraid I am going to have to wait until I read Hansard tomorrow. I think what the parliamentary secretary was doing was just reading out what bureaucrats had told him to read out.
It is a technical amendment. There are technicalities in it.
The hon. member for Regina-Qu'Appelle went to
say:
I am not quite certain the parliamentary secretary totally understood what he was saying but I suspect what was happening is that he was given something to read by some bureaucrats. It sure sounded bureaucratic to me.
I regret the hon. member had difficulty understanding properly what I was saying. He said that I was referring to notes prepared by bureaucrats and he is right because I was indeed referring to notes prepared by public servants and by my staff; these notes are only aimed at giving good, detailed explanations to the hon. member because of our concern, as a government, to explain properly the positions and decisions we take, and I regret the hon. member had difficulty understanding. Hopefully he would have read Hansard, but I must assure him I never read here a text or refer to notes without fully understanding their meaning.
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I will come back with some explanations in a language which, hopefully, will be better understood by the hon. member for Regina-Qu'Appelle.
The thing is very simple. The government has a user pay policy. Take passports, for example. There was a time when even passports were subsidized, that is to say that the fees charged to the user were less than the production costs. Then the government came up with a policy to apply the user fee principle. The same principle applies to the Intellectual Property Tribunal.
And in that instance, we are only saying that SOCAN and other users will have to bear the operating costs of the Intellectual Property Tribunal.
Second, this particular amendment which would have added the word "user" or "consumer" could have been interpreted in such a way as to impose a tremendous administrative burden on the Intellectual Property Tribunal which, by law, would have had to take upon itself the tremendous burden of billing for its services.
I believe that SOCAN, which represents around
35,000	members, should bear the costs connected with using the Intellectual Property Tribunal and then charge its members. That way, the Intellectual Property Tribunal does not have to be laden with such a burden.
I believe I have now dealt with the main concerns which the opposition has raised with respect to Bill C-93. I also think it is important to remember that there are seven other parts to this bill and that they have drawn very little attention during our proceedings. In fact, there are sections of the bill with which the opposition have expressed their support, like the winding up of the Veterans land administration and its integration into the Department of Veterans Affairs.
As I mentioned at the beginning of my remarks, Bill C-93 is in line with the government policy, with the economic statement and with the 1992 budget aimed at providing Canadians with better services for less, at streamlining administrative costs and in the end at alleviating the tax burden of the people.
Ever since 1984, every bill presented with that intent, namely to slash government spending, to reduce the machinery of government and therefore administrative costs, everyone of those bills was systematically opposed
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by the Liberals and the New Democrats and now by the Bloc Quebecois.
We introduced bills on privatization. The Liberals voted against the privatization of Nordion and Tethra-tonics, Bill C-13, second session. On third reading, they opposed the sale of government shares in Telesat Canada proposed in Bill C-38. They did not support the privatization of Petro Canada, Bill C-84, second session. The Liberals voted against the act respecting the control of government expenditures which was meant to cap government spending, Bill C-56, third session. They opposed Bill C-26, third session, a legislation to improve the efficiency and accountability of the public service. That bill also includes other measures that would create better employment opportunities for women, natives, handicapped persons and visible minorities. They voted against.
The Liberals did not endorse the amendments to the Patent Act which will promote pharmaceutical research and development, Bill C-91, third session. They voted against some substantial amendments to the Bankruptcy Act, Bill C-22, third session. Finally, if we look at the legislative package put forward by this government to streamline expenditures, which is the wish of the Canadian people, I think it is clear they systematically voted against it each and every time.
This is not surprising. When a party like the Liberal Party is in power for so many years and when we see that over a period of 12 years the deficit grew from $1.8 billion in 1969-1970 to $38.5 billion in 1984-1985, with an accumulated debt of $200 billion, it is not surprising.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: The hon. member for Ottawa-Vanier rises on a point of order.


Mr. Gauthier:: Madam Speaker, I have been listening very carefully to the hon. member's speech on Bill C-93 at third reading and I have to ask myself the following question: does the rule of relevancy require that we pay special attention to the bill not under consideration?
Until the hon. member launched an attack against the Liberal Party, I thought he was only being a bit partisan. However I would like the member to concentrate on the subject matter of Bill C-93 and explain to us how the government will sell that bill, which is bad for Canada, to the people it will affect.

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Jean-Marc Robitaille: Madam Speaker, I think the House has always had some leeway with regard to arguments behind our government policies in every debate which takes place in the House. I have been here since the beginning of the week to debate this bill and I have listened to speeches from my colleague's friends as well as from other hon. members which were far from relevant to this debate. As far as I am concerned I think I have kept my remarks well within the scope of the debate on Bill C-93.
What I am trying to explain is the filibustering the liberal opposition has been doing on Bill C-93. What I am trying to show here is that every bill like Bill C-93 has systematically been opposed to by the New Democratic Party and the Liberal Party.
What I was trying to say before I was interrupted by my colleague was that it was not surprising to see constant opposition against bills which are aimed at reducing spending while, in 12 years, the Liberal government kept increasing expenditures at the rate of 14 per cent. I was referring to an example which is really rather interesting. In 1974-75, Mr. Jean Chretien stated on page 7138 of Hansard of July 2, 1975 the following: "We have decided that restraint is necessary. In order to exercise restraint we had to cut back on planned expenditures". That year, expenditures went up by 28 per cent.
Systematic opposition by the Liberals to Bill C-93 is part of a tradition that has lasted for more than 25 years, and I can understand that.
In conclusion, I want to state once more the importance, for the Canadian people, that governments do everything that is needed and take fair measures to reduce government spending, streamline administrative costs and increase the efficiency of services for the Canadian people.
As I said, a recent survey in Terrebonne clearly indicated that this is the way we should go. Throughout this country, Canadians who work 40 hours a week or more and strive to make ends meet tell us that the tax burden is unbearable. They are fed up with taxes and they are sick and tired because we do not make appropriate decisions to streamline our costs and expenses and save money whenever it is possible.
We should never forget that public funds do not come from another planet, or from the opposition members' pockets but from all Canadian taxpayers. I think there is a constant lack of good faith on the part of the opposition. If only the opposition had supported the government in its spending cuts, even once, if the Liberal and NDP opposition had only once made suggestions about spending cuts. Instead, for nine years now-you have been here all that time, Madam Speaker, you know what has been going on-all we have seen in this place is filibustering without any consideration for the Canadian taxpayers' ability to pay.
Bill C-93 is in keeping with the approach set out in the 1992 budget where we announced that 40 organizations would be eliminated as the services delivered by these organizations are already provided by the private sector and that others would be consolidated. Tliis Bill C-93 responds to the 1992 budget. It will rationalize the delivery of several services to Canadians, contribute to more efficient government and reduce the burden of government on Canadians. That is something that we all want in this House and that all Canadians want as well.
Therefore, I urge all members of this House, on either side, to pass this bill so that it can be sent quickly to the other place and that we can finally achieve these savings.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: There will not be any questions or comments during third reading. Before we continue I would like to direct this comment to the hon. member for Regina-Qu'Appelle.
Our Clerk has looked at Hansard from the committees. We have come to the conclusion that there might be divergences of opinion and there might be points for debate, but on the point brought to my attention this morning by the hon. member there is no question of privilege.
[Translation\


Mr. Ronald J. Duhamel (Saint-Boniface):: Madam Speaker, like my colleagues, I recognize that you are a very fair person. You will no doubt note that our friend opposite has delivered a political speech which was not bad but he failed to provide rational arguments in support of the bill before us today.
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For one thing, he mentioned that the Liberals opposed the bills his government introduced in this House. Liberals always oppose bills that do not take the people into consideration.
This is the kind of bill that the Tories have introduced. They talk about cutting expenses. They are very concerned and talk about it often. It is very easy to cut expenses on the backs of others. That is what this government has done. The hon. member referred to misleading attacks. It is the government which is being misleading and I can prove it. He quoted a letter from Paule Leduc, a very honest letter where she says it might be possible to save a few dollars in the not too distant future.

He did not admit that particular saving could have been achieved if the government had simply asked these organizations to reach a particular precise budgetary target. It is not as a result of what the government is doing. It is because these organizations will be forced to reach targets, and my hon. colleagues know that full well.
They know full well that this will go down in the annals of history and the annals of government as the silliest, the flimsiest, the most superficial bill that has probably ever come forward. It has been a botched job right from the very beginning. The government is trying to put some glitz to it, a bit of shine. There is no glitz; there is no shine. It is a deceptive and destructive bill. It is one that will haunt this government.
Let me make one point very clear. No one in government is opposed to streamlining if it is going to save money, if it is going to bring about increased efficiency and effectiveness. However there are no savings here. There is no increased effectiveness or efficiency. There are no studies to show it. When we questioned the witnesses from Treasury Board and the Privy Council, and I shall share the quotes shortly, they had nothing, no studies. They admitted they had nothing. They were honest men and women, and I appreciate their honesty. They might have chosen to do something else but they chose to tell the truth and by telling the truth they have exposed this government's project.
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Just so that people are very aware of what is happening here, let us look at what is going on. The government has decided to streamline, initially it said to save money. Then when it was found out that was not true in reality, what did it do? It started to go for increased effectiveness and efficiency. When that did not come forth then it tried to pretend that we in the opposition were being unfair.
Let us remember that what the government is doing is in fact trying to kill organizations that in some cases were already dead. It is removing organizations that have been dormant for years. Worst of all, dynamic and vibrant organizations were taken out completely because the Economic Council of Canada could not stand the heat. The government could not take that kind of criticism. One of the worst decisions it made was the merger of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada with the Canada Council.
Let us remember this bill is wide ranging. It talks about the Agricultural Products Board. It talks about the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency. It talks about the Canada Council for the arts and for research, the social sciences and humanities. It talks about the independent review commission for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Intellectual Property Tribunal. It also addresses the Canadian Commercial Corporation and Emergency Preparedness Canada. It talks about the International Trade and Procurement Tribunal, the Petroleum Monitoring Agency and the Veterans' Land Administration Act. It is a wide-ranging bill. The government has failed, absolutely and totally failed to make its case.
Because of its vastness and because it is complex the government has tried to suggest to Canadians that there were savings, that this was a good move and that this would be more effective. We know it is not true. We know what this bill is all about. It is about killing those agencies that are dead, removing and killing those that are dormant, and sapping the strength out of those that are vital and dynamic because they were a threat to government.
This bill is about trying to reach the Reform Party agenda. They are kissing cousins and I shall have more to say about that.

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Madam Deputy Speaker:: The hon. member will be able to pursue his remarks after Question Period and Routine Proceedings.
The House will now proceed to members' statements pursuant to Standing Order 31.


STATEMENTS PURSUANT TO S. O. 31
Mr. Gilbert Parent (Welland -St. Catharines-Tho-rold):: Madam Speaker, I rise to outline again the difficult economic circumstances in my riding due to the adverse effects of the free trade agreement, cross-border shopping and, most significant, the huge lay-offs in major industries such as GM.
My constituents are very disillusioned with the empty promises of this government and are looking for help at this time in connection with a local project known as the Peter Street bridge in Thorold. The Peter Street bridge is a vital link in Thorold and is now under threat of closing due to extensive repairs which are required to ensure its safe use by not only my constituents but the thousands of tourists who use it every year.
I urge the government, mainly the St. Lawrence Seaway Authority which has jurisdiction over the bridge, to extend its financial assistance to my riding and fully support the initiatives of the mayor and members of the city council of Thorold in their attempt to provide their city not only with a viable link but especially-


Madam Deputy Speaker:: The hon. member's time has expired.


NATIONAL VOLUNTEER WEEK
Mr. Barry Moore (Pontiac-Gatineau-Labelle):: Madam Speaker, National Volunteer Week, this year from April 18 to April 23, is a special opportunity for us to pay tribute and give recognition to all those individuals who volunteer their services in their local community.
Today I would like to join these communities in paying a special tribute to the contribution made by volunteers to community life.
To our volunteers I want to say thank you for your dedication and commitment. What you have accomplished deserves the respect and admiration of us all.
I would also like to take this opportunity to congratulate a young lady from my riding, Annie Galipeau, a resident of Messines, who won an award in the Dramatic Arts category at the YTV Gala held last night at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa.
Congratulations, Annie, and good luck.


CLAM FISHERY
Mr. Bill Casey (Cumberland -Colchester):: Madam Speaker, clam fishermen on the Bay of Fundy shore near Five Islands are very concerned about the clam resources and want the establishment of a season to ensure a sustainable and viable fishery. The fisheries committee of the West Colchester Development Association has recommended that a season from approximately May 15 to October 31 be established in order to prevent overdigging and allow for the replenishment of clam stocks.
This committee is made up of residents in the area who are involved in the clam fishery and are very knowledgeable about the resource and the conditions. I support this committee in its efforts to protect the resource and will be urging the minister and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans to accept this sensible recommendation at a meeting in the area to be arranged in the very near future.


YTV AWARDS
Hon. Herb Gray (Windsor West):: Madam Speaker, yesterday evening hundreds of thousands of Canadians were impressed and entertained as they watched the live broadcast on the YTV network of the fourth annual YTV achievement awards. These awards to young people 19 years of age and under demonstrate the talent, creativity, innovation, community service and courage of young Canadians. The winners exemplify the best of our country and convey a much needed message of optimism and hope for the future.
April 23, 1993

I would like to congratulate all the winners, but in particular I want to congratulate Tamia Washington of Windsor, Ontario who received the national vocal award. To Tamia and all the winners I say on behalf of all Canadians and myself: Congratulations, we are very proud of you. Felicitations et bonne chance a tous.


Mr. Doug Fee (Red Deer):: Madam Speaker, any time that I have risen in this House the words I have spoken have been my own. However, pursuant to an agreement that some of us entered into yesterday the following words were suggested to me by an outstanding group of young people who are employed by this House.
Last night in the spirit of friendliness and healthy competition members from both sides of the House joined together to face the pages in an invigorating game of the great Canadian sport of hockey. While it was a delightful experience for everyone, the pages once again proved their worth by tearing apart the MP squad as though we were a group of amateur bowlers. Their complete domination of the game left us cold and left the ice melting. These fine young people should be thanked, not only for the enjoyable evening but also for not rubbing it in our faces.


WINNIPEG, MANITOBA
Mr. Bill Blaikie (Winnipeg Transcona):: Madam Speaker, Winnipeg residents are anxious to hear confirmation of the federal government's support of a third core area initiative. Both the provincial and city governments have already indicated their desire to participate in the third phase of this very successful program.
The two preceding core area initiatives have greatly benefited the larger community of Winnipeg by enhancing social and community services downtown and by encouraging job creation, work experience and training as well as the growth of small business. However there
remains the need for new programs and development in the city.
Government cutbacks, high unemployment and the recession have had a devastating effect on the economy of Winnipeg. The demands on service organizations have increased dramatically while funding continues to shrink.
The people of Winnipeg are eager to haul themselves out of this recession but they need a commitment and some encouragement from the Conservative government, and they need it immediately.
Repeated efforts to get an answer from the minister responsible have so far proved unsuccessful. I call on that minister to answer and answer positively, and to invest in the future of Winnipeg and not allow it to continue to deteriorate safe in the knowledge that the Conservatives will not be around after the next election.


TELECOMMUNICATIONS
Donald Alex Blenkarn: Madam Speaker, when 976 service was first proposed the Bell Telephone Company opposed its introduction but the CRTC forced it to carry 976 service and at the same time created a situation in which anyone who objected to 976 service would have to pay a $4 a month service charge to have the service blocked.
Now postcards with gorgeous pictures of escorts encourage people to phone a 976 number. All sorts of people are facing a big surprise when their telephone bill carries a $10 or $15 charge for a sex service call.
It is clearly time for the CRTC to eliminate 976 service from the services offered. This service is not needed and it is clearly being abused.


Mr. Joe McGuire (Egmont):: Madam Speaker, the fishing season is almost upon us and most of the wharfs in my riding of Egmont, P.E.I., are still in such a state of disrepair that the safety of the fishermen using them is in jeopardy.

April 23, 1993
I and fishermen's associations have brought this situation to the attention of the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans on many occasions. The only responses so far have been a few band-aids supplied here and there, leaving us now with wharfs that have deteriorated to the point where it will cost millions to restore them to safe operational conditions.
I ask the minister to get personally involved. We now have a situation in which defeated provincial candidates, a Public Works employee and an unelected member from the other place are making announcements to the media on the minister's behalf, and we do not know if those announcements are true or not.
Fishermen need to know who is in charge and what is going on. They want to know what is going on in other Egmont harbours that need repairs.
While spending large amounts of money after eight years of neglect may seem like a cynical vote buying gesture, I would advise the minister to set that concern aside and do the repair work so that the fishermen in P.E.I. can work from harbours that are functional and safe.


FUR TRADE
Mr. John A. MacDougall (Timiskaming-French River):: Madam Speaker, today the federal government has announced its renewed investment in one of our country's most significant industries, the fur trade.
The Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development and the Department of the Environment have committed $12 million over the next five fiscal years to assist the Canadian fur trade to adjust to changing market realities and respond to the advancement of the management and humane trapping of fur.
Thanks must go out to individual trappers across the land, the trappers' organizations and the Fur Institute of Canada for their representations to the government. Thanks must also go out to the ministers of environment, international trade and DIAND who ensured that the support was secured for another five years.
Our Canadian government is proud of the fur industry. We are proud that Canada will continue to be leaders in the development of humane trapping and ranching methods and will continue to be leaders in the exporting of a beautiful quality fur product.


NATIONAL DEFENCE
Mr. Len Taylor (The Battlefords-Meadow Lake):: Madam Speaker, this morning the media reported that three members of the Armed Forces under investigation for the March 16 beating death of a Somali man have been released from all forms of custody but the release is not an indication of whether or not charges will be laid.
A fourth soldier continues to lie in hospital in critical condition as a result of circumstances that may be connected to the March 16 incident.
I and members of that young soldier's family join with other concerned Canadians in wanting to know the truth about what is happening in Somalia.
I therefore repeat the call to the Minister of National Defence made by my colleague from Victoria for an independent public inquiry into this and earlier incidents which are now coming to light. My constituents and I want to know what is happening within the military command in Somalia and why information which the minister admitted to having about these incidents has been deliberately suppressed.
I would ask the Minister of National Defence to respect the wishes of the family involved and immediately establish the public inquiry.


ROSSER, MANITOBA
Mr. Felix Holtmann (Portage-Interlake):: Madam Speaker, Rosser is a municipality and town west of Winnipeg which I represent and live in. It is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year.
This area of Manitoba with its rich farm land has become home to many pioneer families and immigrants, such as my parents and many others.
The historic development of Rosser is fascinating as well as intriguing. General Thomas Lafayette Rosser was a classmate at West Point with the famous General Armstrong Custer. They fought opposite one another in the U.S. civil war, yet later renewed their friendship. About seven years before General Rosser surveyed the CPR line from Winnipeg to Saskatchewan as chief engineer he was preparing to lead a volunteer force to rescue General Custer at the Little Big Horn, but he was too late.
April 23, 1993

I am sure all Canadians are grateful to this great, colourful American general for his contribution to the early development of Manitoba.
I also would like to congratulate Reeve Allan Bea-chell, his council, and many volunteers for making the 100th anniversary of Rosser a lasting and memorable success.


OTTAWA LYNX
Mr. John Manley (Ottawa South):: Madam Speaker, April 17 was an important day for Ottawa.
Last Saturday marked the return to Ottawa of professional baseball as the Ottawa Lynx took the field in the International Baseball League. The first pitch was the culmination of years of effort by Howard Darwin, a dedicated entrepreneur and sportsman whose leadership and commitment to his community have benefited the people of Ottawa for many years and in many ways.
My 10-year old son and I were in the stands for that first pitch, a strike by the way. While the weather was cold and wet and the Lynx came up one run short we had a great evening, and without a doubt the fans loved every moment.
With inexpensive ticket prices Howard Darwin has brought families of this region a great activity to share. It is an opportunity to eat popcorn, hope for a foul ball and, most of all, build memories together.
Ottawa city council deserves credit for undertaking the building of a wonderful facility for our new team. The stadium does not yet have a name but surely nothing could be more appropriate than Howard Darwin Stadium in recognition of an individual who successfully pursued his dream for his community.


FRENCH-LANGUAGE NEWS
Mr. Jean-Pierre Blackburn (Jonquiere):: Madam Speaker, the campaign for the leadership of the Conservative Party has given us another prime example of what
is lacking in the media sector. Large sections of the French-speaking population in Quebec and Canada were unable to watch the broadcast of this event in French. For instance, Wednesday's debate was not carried in the Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean area.
What amazes me is when I hear some people say we do not need this kind of service and that we would be better off improving CBC programming.
Do they not realize we will soon be invaded by 300 American channels? Are they aware of a plan now on the drawing board to set up a second English language news network in Canada, while nothing is being done for French-speaking viewers?
It is time to correct this imbalance. The CRTC should intervene to promote and facilitate the establishment of a French 24-hour news network.


CANADA POST
Mr. Brian L. Gardiner (Prince George-Bulkley Valley):: Madam Speaker, Canada Post, well known for closing rural post offices, has now decided to close outlets in urban centres.
The corporation is currently planning to set up a franchise network in Prince George, B.C. which will mean the closure of post offices on 5th and 15th Avenues. At best the corporation says it might keep mailboxes open at these locations and that it will set up a business service centre.
Surveys I have conducted in the business community show that it wants to keep the service. Downtown Prince George needs the traffic generated by people going to the post office. It would be regrettable if Canada Post is not a partner in the renewal of downtown Prince George.
I call upon the minister responsible for Canada Post to use the powers given him in the Canada Post Corporation Act to tell the corporation to stop the closures and listen to the public and business community about the need to keep our post offices open.

April 23, 1993
Oral Questions


GOVERNMENT OF ONTARIO
Jean-Robert Gauthier: Madam Speaker, we have just heard that the New Democratic Government of Ontario has finally made an announcement. It will be cutting 11,000 government jobs in the public service. It will close down the Oxford Regional Centre for the developmentally disabled in Woodstock. All 18 of Ontario's international trade offices will be eliminated. Colleges of agricultural technology at Cen-tralia and New Liskeard in northern Ontario will be closed. Twenty-five offices of the Ministry of Natural Resources will be shut down. Grants to municipalities will be cut.
To show how incompetent it can get, the NDP government is closing down a centre for the disabled and is destroying the careers of 11,000 public servants in Ontario to pay for its own stupid mismanagement.


DUTY-FREE GASOLINE STATIONS
Mr. Ken James (Sarnia-Lambton):: Madam Speaker, last August I was approached by one of my constituents, Mr. Rob Montanino, with a proposal to establish dutyfree gasoline stations in communities along the Canada-U.S. border.
His proposal was well developed. In principle it would afford both departing Canadians and our American visitors the opportunity to purchase their gasoline on this side of the border. There is the potential for a net benefit of course to our economy and to our border communities.
On his behalf, I submitted Mr. Montanino's proposal to the Minister of Finance and his officials for their consideration last October. Although the minister expressed some reservations and some operational hurdles in his response of January 28, 1993, Mr. Montanino's proposal in my mind is worthy of further examination.
I hope that the minister will continue to look at well-developed proposals like Mr. Montanino's which seek to improve the economic situation of our communities on the competitive cross-border front line.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Hon. Lloyd Axworthy (Winnipeg South Centre):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Acting Prime Minister.
I would like to begin by quoting from the statutes of the defence department. At the very beginning it says that the minister is responsible for the management and direction of the Canadian Armed Forces and the development of policy on national defence.
Yet we have a minister who has known of four serious incidents and has never reported them, has taken no action whatsoever to clear up what her own chief of defence staff has said is a breakdown of loyalty and discipline, and has rejected all calls for better preparation, training or equipment for troops. She now states as part of the new politics of exclusion that it is better if she does not come to Parliament to answer questions.
I ask the Acting Prime Minister, how can Canadians have any confidence with the serious problems affecting our peacekeeping troops in Somalia that the conduct of the defence department will be dealt with when the minister believes she does not have to be accountable to the people of Canada and to Parliament?
Is it not time that this government appointed a new minister who recognizes the need to manage the department and be responsible to the people of Canada?


Hon. Harvie Andre (Minister of State and Leader of the Government in the House of Commons):: The hon. member is distorting what the minister of defence said and is misleading the House and the Canadian public about the circumstances.
As the Judge Advocate General stated yesterday, the minister of defence under the National Defence Act has certain duties that are similar to those of a judge. What the minister of defence said in respect of these incidents, two for which the investigations are carrying on, is that they could possibly lead to court martial legal proceedings. In respect to those incidents which have been the subject of many questions in this House, she is very much circumscribed in terms of what she can relate to the House without prejudicing the individuals involved in order to ensure that justice prevails.
April 23, 1993

It is in that context she said it would be easier not to respond to those questions because of the possibility of causing harm to the judicial process and the questions of fair play, the charter of rights and all of those things which come into play in view of her responsibility. She will be in the House on Monday and Tuesday.
The rest of the department and its operation, the Canadian Armed Forces as has always been the case and particularly under this minister, is running very well.


Lloyd Axworthy: Madam Speaker, when it comes to raising questions in the House, they are not questions about the specifics of a particular investigation. They are about the conduct of the minister, the department, the impact on our peacekeeping troops and whether under these circumstances they are able to do the job for which they are assigned. Surely, a minister who says that it is better not to be in the House is one who is in direct violation of her responsibilities to live up to that mandate.
This is what I want to ask the minister directly. We have another major problem. Our troops in Bosnia have been given a new mandate to protect civilians against potential attacks. Yet by all expert judgments they have neither the equipment nor the numbers to fulfil that mandate. That puts them at serious risk. It is a matter of grave concern to us all. There has been no report, no explanation and no accounting from the minister of defence to this House of Commons or to the Canadian people on that very grave and serious circumstance.
I want to ask the minister, when are we going to find out what new rules of engagement our troops in Bosnia have been given? Will they be given new equipment? Will there be other troops provided to help reinforce the new mission that they are given? Has support from the United Nations been obtained for this mission? Most important, where is the Minister of National Defence to answer these questions?


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, in the preamble to his first question the hon. member said that the Canadian Armed Forces is not able to do the job assigned to it.
Oral Questions


Lloyd Axworthy: Because of the equipment.


Harvie Andre: No, he was talking about Somalia and in general the Canadian Armed Forces. I would ask him to provide the evidence that the Canadian Armed Forces is not the efficient, capable and the world's best peacekeeper we all believe it to be. He is saying something else. I wish he would provide proof before he makes that accusation.
With regard to Bosnia and Srebrenica, in particular, the Canadian military now in Srebrenica is there to enforce the ceasefire, to disarm the Bosnian Muslims and to provide humanitarian aid to the wounded and weak. It is performing that role admirably. Obviously if there is a full-scale attack by the Serbians or the Bosnians it will not be able to defend Srebrenica. However that is not its mandate from the UN.
In terms of other countries being invited, the objective is very simple. It would like to raise the stakes to put a situation where there is a multinational force there so that any attack on the city by the Serbs or the Muslims would be, in essence, an attack on the entire world. It raises the stakes and the cost of any such attack, therefore increasing the likelihood that it will not occur. If the Canadian forces are attacked, they are the most experienced peacekeepers in the world. They are aware and capable of protecting themselves.


Lloyd Axworthy: Madam Speaker, I have a quick response to the minister when he asks about the concerns we raised. The concern was raised by the chief of defence staff himself. He said there was a breakdown in discipline and leadership of our troops in Somalia. It would seem to me that any government or any minister who had any interest at all in the welfare of those troops would be in a position to respond to that very serious concern raised by the chief of defence staff.

We are faced with a crisis of confidence on the role of Canadians in Somalia, with high risks for troops in Bosnia, and a Minister of National Defence who stays away from Parliament and fails to recognize the seriousness of these events for Canadians.

April 23, 1993
Oral Questions
I want to ask the Acting Prime Minister to take immediate steps to replace the Minister of Defence with someone who recognizes the responsibilities of her position and will report to the House on the very serious events involving Canadian peacekeepers.


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, the hon. member was engaged in his earlier comments in a practice which does not really help to better understand the situation.
He takes a comment from the CDS on a specific instance in Somalia and generalizes it to the comment he made that the Canadian Armed Forces is not able to perform the task assigned to it. That is absurdity and there is no evidence to substantiate that.
The unfortunate incidents in question are being fully investigated. The hon. member should allow that investigation to proceed without prejudicing it by making these wild accusations and extrapolations.


Lloyd Axworthy: It is the
government that is incompetent, not the militaiy. It's the minister of defence.


Harvie Andre: The reality is that our troops in Yugoslavia, by all accounts from everything I have heard, are performing admirably. They were asked to go into Srebrenica because of their quality, experience and ability. How the member translates that into some sort of crisis that the military is coming apart, is incompetent and that only by answering the hon. member's questions in this House can these problems in Yugoslavia be cured is absurd.


Mr. David Dingwall (Cape Breton-East Richmond):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the government House leader.
The Minister of National Defence disagrees with the chief of staff of national defence. That minister should be here either to defend that particular chief of staff or to deny those accusations. Last night the Minister of National Defence said that it was good she is not in the House of Commons to answer questions.
Why does the government think it is good that the Minister of National Defence will not answer questions about the military mandate given to our forces in Bosnia? Why does the government think it is good that the minister does not answer questions about the role of the troops in protecting 30,000 refugees in Bosnia? Why is it that the Government of Canada believes Parliament be denied answers from the Minister of National Defence on these most important matters affecting Canadian troops as well as our international reputation?


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, of course the Minister of National Defence never said any such thing.


Mr. Milliken:: You better read the quotes, Harvie.


Harvie Andre: The Minister of National Defence said, as I indicated earlier, and I do not know if the hon. member was at the briefing by the Judge Advocate General or not. If he had been he would have heard the Judge Advocate General confirm that the Minister of National Defence has certain judicial responsibilities in respect of military justice and in that respect it is most inappropriate for her to be discussing or answering questions. Indeed, the difficulty is that inadvertently, through the kinds of questions that have been coming in this House, something might be said that would prejudice the case. It was only in that context. To extrapolate from that the suggestion that covers the entire gamut of DND operations is absurd. She said no such thing.
The hon. member also said in his preamble that the Minister of National Defence disagrees with the CDS about the fundamental operations and therefore-


David Charles Dingwall: If she doesn't she should be here. Where is she?


Harvie Andre: The hon. member makes absurd allegations and then demands that the Minister of National Defence come here to answer these absurd allegations. Make reasonable questions and perhaps you will get reasonable answers.


David Charles Dingwall: Madam Speaker, the minister opposite is trying to build a case and trying to shield the Minister of National Defence in that opposition members somehow are asking specific questions with regard to possible criminal
April 23, 1993

investigations as to who did or did not do what. We are not asking for that kind of information.
Why does the government think it is good that the Minister of National Defence is too busy to answer questions about her own personal role and about ministerial responsibility? Is it not the responsibility of the Minister of National Defence to answer questions when there is a crisis of confidence in the minister's management of the Department of National Defence? Is that not her responsibility?


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, there is no crisis of confidence in the Department of National Defence. However there is a crisis of confidence in the Liberal Party because of what the polls are saying. Let us make it abundantly clear what this is all about. This is not some new-found concern about the capabilities of the Canadian Armed Forces on the part of the Liberal Party.
In respect of the particular details of the incidents that have been asked about in this House and so on, I have provided all of the information I possibly can without prejudicing the cases. The Minister of National Defence would provide exactly the same answers to those questions because there is a prescription in terms of what answers can be given to those questions.
I am sure hon. members, deep in their hearts, when they get past worrying about the polls, will recognize that it is most unreasonable to be pursuing these kinds of questions.


Mr. John Brewin (Victoria):: Madam Speaker, the people of Canada are going to judge the government House leader very harshly for turning this into a very partisan issue in the way he just did. There are differences across this House, but to suggest that my friends on the right are raising this matter because of the polls is beyond belief.
When our peacekeepers are on the front lines in Bosnia and Somalia there are legitimate concerns. Let me suggest that with the very serious events taking place now in Bosnia and Somalia, none of which would interfere with the investigation or the legal proceedings and all of which have to do with the duties and the responsibilities of the Minister of National Defence under the Defence Act and, above all, have to do with
Oral Questions
our peacekeepers in the field, the minister should be here in the House to respond.
Will the government not agree that her primary duty is for the safety and reputation of Canadian peacekeepers and her first responsibility is to the people of Canada, to the House of Commons and to our peacekeepers and their families to answer questions about these matters?


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, the hon. member said there are serious problems in Bosnia in respect of our peacekeepers. There are serious problems in Somalia in terms of their ongoing role.
Other than those incidents which are being investigated and which we talked about earlier, what are these serious problems that are not being addressed? What is the crisis?
He then proves my point. Instead of asking about these particular serious concerns he claims are there, he turns around and asks a question designed to damage the reputation of the Minister of National Defence. I think that proves the allegation I made earlier.


John F. Brewin: Madam Speaker, let me ask some precise questions about the situation in Srebrenica. First let me say that all members of this House fully support our heroic peacekeepers there and fully support the United Nations establishing a protected enclave there.
The questions are these, and I would be very interested if the minister were prepared to give us some specific answers. Have the Canadian forces in fact been ordered to defend Srebrenica as indicated today in the media? If so, who made the order? Is it accepted as a valid order under the security resolution by this government? Can the government assure Canadians that Canadian troops have not been put in a completely indefensible position and that the government has in fact been successful in getting other UN members to have their troops in that enclave to join in the defence of Srebrenica?


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, the answer to the first question is no, the Canadian forces have not been asked or ordered to defend Srebrenica against a full-fledged attack by either side.

April 23, 1993
Oral Questions
They are there attempting to maintain the cease-fire and providing humanitarian aid. As I indicated earlier, there have been discussions with the British and French officials. The Secretary of State for External Affairs has had discussions with the British and French to see if we could internationalize the forces in Srebrenica, thereby escalating the price that would be paid by any aggressor that attacked the town itself, making it an attack on the entire world.
It is quite clear that the 150 Canadian troops could not defend Srebrenica on their own. If they are attacked, as I indicated earlier, given the long experience of the Canadian Armed Forces they are capable of taking necessary action to protect their own welfare.


John F. Brewin: Madam Speaker, the answer seems to be different from that of the Secretary of State for External Affairs who was quoted as saying she was making every effort to try to get other countries there.
I would appreciate it if the minister could clarify that. While he is on this feet, it would be appreciated if he could tell the House that. He asked for some specific questions.
In December, when our forces went to Somalia, it was reported that no rules of engagement covering our forces in Somalia had been adopted by the Government of Canada, by cabinet. I would like to know if rules of engagement have subsequently been adopted by the cabinet and, if so, would the minister explain to the House precisely what they say in respect of dealing with unarmed Somali, three of whom have been reported killed by Canadian forces in Somalia?


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, the rules of engagement are rules of engagement that apply to all the forces in Somalia. Indeed to give out the details of the rules of engagement would risk compromising the operations in Somalia. It would be contrary to the agreement we have.
However, a broad outline of the rules of engagement could be provided to the hon. member. I will look into providing him with a briefing if he truly is interested in that.
In terms of the rules of engagement, as I indicated they are international rules of engagement. We have agreed to them along with all the other countries that are participating in this operation.


Mr. Jesse Flis (Parkdale-High Park):: Madam Speaker, there are certain rules and regulations that are secret, but policy and the role of a minister are public policy and for public knowledge.
The Official Opposition has the highest respect for all peacekeepers around the world. We are asking serious questions and we demand serious answers. The minister should not be making light of our questions as he did previously.
A spokesperson for the Department of National Defence stated this morning that the 150 Canadian peacekeepers are too ill equipped and outnumbered to provide any defence of the town of Srebrenica. Two Canadian platoons sent from Tuzla to reinforce the Canadian troops were turned back by Serbian forces. France and Britain have ignored Canada's SOS for more troops.
What plans does the government have to ensure the safety of our peacekeeping troops and prevent a wholesale slaughter of the now defenceless Muslims?


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, I dispute absolutely the allegation or the accusation by the hon. member that we have treated lightly the serious questions. The serious questions we have treated seriously, but there have been a lot of less than serious questions answered which we have treated with the respect they deserve.
In terms of the 150 peacekeepers in Srebrenica, as I indicated earlier of course that is not a sufficient force to defend Srebrenica against an all-out attack by either side. I indicated that. That is not the intent. That is not the purpose. That is not why the Canadian forces are there. They are there to observe the cease-fire, to implement the cease-fire and to provide humanitarian aid. So far the cease-fire is holding.
I have told the hon. member that the Secretary of State for External Affairs has talked to her French and British counterparts about getting troops from those countries in there to internationalize the force. They have not said no. They have not responded to the request. To translate that into a firm no, as the hon.
April 23, 1993

member did, is a distortion and not helpful to the understanding of this serious situation.
If in fact the Canadian troops are attacked as a result of a breakdown in the cease-fire and so on, they are the most experienced troops in the world in terms of defending themselves and would take necessary action to defend themselves.
We are not expecting that. We are not hoping for that. The cease-fire is holding. We are endeavouring through diplomatic means and other means to make alterations so that the cease-fire will become permanent and we will be able to make that an internationally protected enclave.


Jesse Philip Flis: My supplementary question is for the same minister, Madam Speaker. His answers are just confusing the mandate even more.
Yesterday the Acting Prime Minister rose in the House and declared unequivocally that the mandate of the Canadian UN peacekeeping forces in Srebrenica is simply to disengage both sides. "Our troops will protect themselves only and not the inhabitants of the town", he said.
Today we learned from the media, not from the minister of defence, that the UN has ordered Canadian troops to defend Srebrenica which goes far beyond the original mandate of using force only to defend humanitarian convoys, which he just said earlier in his response.
Will the minister clarify for Canadians what is the main goal of the Canadian troops in Srebrenica? Is it consistent with the original mandate given by the United Nations? Canadians have a right to know.


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, I guess I will repeat it for a third time.
The troops are there, as I said yesterday, which is entirely consistent with what I said today, to implement the cease-fire which is holding. They are there to help in disarming the Muslim troops who have given up their arms. They are there to help provide humanitarian aid. They were never there and they have not been ordered to be there to protect Srebrenica against an all-out attack from either side.
Oral Questions


Jesse Philip Flis: That's not what the UN said today. You have been around long enough to know better.


Harvie Andre: The hon. member will not allow me to give an answer. He takes these little snippets here, exaggerates them to extreme and then lectures me on not treating him seriously.
I recognize that it is a serious situation. I would ask the hon. member to recognize that the role of the Canadian troops there is well understood by anybody who chooses to understand. What we are trying to do through diplomatic means and through co-operation of other countries in the UN is to make the thing stable on a more permanent basis.


EMPLOYMENT
Ron J. Duhamel: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Acting Prime Minister.
Roughly two months ago it was the removal of the sea cadets school in Lake Winnipeg with the loss of six permanent jobs and 47 seasonal jobs. Just now I have been informed that the government plans to close the instrument check pilot school in Winnipeg and move it to Ottawa.
For the knowledge of hon. members, this school provides advanced pilot training in instruments for night landings to pilots. Dismantling of the sophisticated training infrastructure has already begun. They have started moving it to Ottawa. This move affects seven professionals and several support staff.
Why is this government continuing to remove high quality, highly skilled, value added jobs from Manitoba? Why continue to pick on Manitoba?


An hon. member:: Because they don't like you.


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, I do not know what the hon. member is suggesting. I will have to look into the details of the specific changes.
The Canadian Armed Forces, in view of the fact that we are not able to give them the necessary budgets to carry on in the manner we would all like to see them carry on, ise rationalizing, making its operations more

April 23, 1993
Oral Questions
efficient and so on. From time to time operations are moved from one location to another.
Winnipeg remains the headquarters of the air wing of the armed forces and will continue to remain. The presence of the military, the air force in particular, in Winnipeg and Manitoba is assured for as long as anybody can see into the future.


Ron J. Duhamel: Someone said they don't like Manitoba; I am starting to believe it.

The government is again abandoning Manitoba, and this is not good news. We still remember the aerospace contract we lost a few years ago. I want to ask the minister why the government is penalizing Manitoba, and Winnipeg in particular, by relocating this vital industry, the aerospace industry.


Harvie Andre: Madam Speaker, of course the hon. member who is a representative from Manitoba is veiy worried and very interested, and quite rightly so, in the defence activities in his province because of the jobs that are created there.
Therefore he surely must be pleased that such a large proportion of the subcontracts on the EH-101 are going to Winnipeg first and will generate so many high-tech, high quality jobs. He must be absolutely delighted with the information put out recently by the Minister of Agriculture pointing out that, I think, Manitoba is only second in the country in terms of the provinces in regard to the amount of federal assistance, federal contributions and federal activities that go to that province.
I think the hon. member in looking at the position of Manitoba vis-a-vis the other provinces in Canada must be very delighted at how generous this government has been to his province.


Mr. David Barrett (Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Minister for International Trade or his surrogate.
Currently the United States, Canada and Mexico are engaged in negotiations under an agreement known as the North American free trade agreement. Parallel accords are part of that agreement. The United States has stated clearly that it will not sign an agreement without parallel accords regarding labour, health and safety standards and the environment.
Currently after second reading in this House we have sent the bill to committee where already we have been notified of closure.
How can we deal with the bill in committee with closure when we do not have in front of us or in front of the House the content of even the drafts of the parallel accords? How can we go ahead with it when the parallel accords have not even been presented to the House?


Hon. Gilles Loiselle (President of the Treasury Board and Minister of State (Finance)):: Madam Speaker, I would like to remind the hon. member what my colleague, the Minister for International Trade, has said very often in the House, that NAFTA stands on its own. As for the parallel accord, we were way ahead of the Americans and the Mexicans in wanting to explore these issues.
The hon. member should allow me to remind the House of the very extensive consultation that has taken place. The standing committee had 27 meetings, 203 witnesses appeared and there were 93 submissions.


David Barrett: Where are the parallel accords?


Gilles Loiselle: There was a subcommittee that looked at all these issues. It held 29 meetings, heard 124 witnesses and studied 95 submissions. I could continue with the number of days spent in this House looking at these issues.
NAFTA stands on its own. It has been studied fully and we are prepared to move ahead with it.


David Barrett: Madam Speaker, this is a miracle that should go down in world history. The suggestion by the minister is that NAFTA has been considered fully by these committees and these hearings right across Canada. However we have never seen the drafts of the parallel accords. How can we study something we have never seen? That is the miracle that should go down in the records.
April 23, 1993

The government has stupidly passed the bill at second reading, sent it to committee and abandoned its bargaining position on the parallel accords by notifying Mexico and the United States it is prepared to go ahead with anything.
How does the minister justify putting Canada in jeopardy with this legislation by asking a committee of this House and the Chamber here to deal with a bill of which not all of the details have been presented and on which the negotiations have not been completed?
If he has not abandoned our policy at least he has abandoned our leverage on the parallel accords and that leads to a sellout of Canadian interests.


Gilles Loiselle: Madam Speaker, of course I disagree with the view of the hon. member.
The parallel accords have not been signed, do not exist and so they cannot be brought in front of this House. The treaty exists, has already been signed by the three countries and should proceed.


David Barrett: That is my point. They do not exist.


Gilles Loiselle: When the parallel accords are developed-they are parallel-we will look at them. We are the country pushing for these kinds of agreements and we will be glad to bring them to the House when the time comes.


AIRLINES
John Paul Manley: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Transport.


David Barrett: That is sheer stupidity. You have abandoned our position.


Mr. Mazankowski:: Get thrown out and you will get a little attention.


Some hon. members:: Oh, oh.


An hon. member:: Order.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: Thank you. I would very much like to hear the hon. member for Ottawa South.
Oral Questions


John Paul Manley: Madam Speaker, the Competition Tribunal in its decision yesterday warned: "Existing charter carriers, even if they expand upon Canadian's exit, cannot compensate for Canadian's removal. The possibility of new entry is remote and will not provide adequate competitive discipline to Air Canada".
My question for the minister is this. Does he have any plan to deal with the emergence of a domestic airline monopoly which has been predicted by the Competition Tribunal in its decision?


Hon. Jean Corbeil (Minister of TVansport):: Madam Speaker, I do not know on what basis the hon. member reaches that conclusion.
The matter is being examined at the present time by the NTA. There was a decision yesterday by the Competition Tribunal which I understand is going to be appealed by Canadian Airlines. We cannot conclude as the member erroneously does at this time that there is imminent danger of a monopoly.


John Paul Manley: Madam Speaker, I presume from the minister's answer he rejects the conclusions of the Competition Tribunal which I quoted.
No one is asking him to comment on the substance. What I would like to know is whether he continues to believe, as he claimed in the House a year ago to do: "It is in the best interests of consumers and the travelling public in this country to have two airline companies".
What is this minister's bottom line for the Canadian airline industry?


Jean Corbeil: Madam Speaker, the bottom line is that we should let the present process proceed through the different tribunal and quasi-judicial agencies. When it is finished we will know exactly what the situation will be at that time.


OZONE LAYER
Mrs. Marlene Catterall (Ottawa West):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Deputy Prime Minister.

April 23, 1993
Oral Questions
Already this year on the few sunny days we have had in Canada we have seen the results of an unusual number of Canadians who have been out in the sun, obviously unaware that the ozone layer over Canada has thinned to such an extent that the risk of sunburn and cancer is at record levels.
The Minister of the Environment has known for some time that we face increased danger this spring and summer. Why has the Minister of the Environment failed to launch a massive and aggressive campaign to warn Canadians of these new dangers and how to protect themselves and their children from the new risks of sunburn and cancer as a result of the thinning ozone layer over Canada?


Hon. Mary Collins (Minister of Western Economic Diversification and Minister of State (Environment) and Minister Responsible for the Status of Women):: Madam Speaker, I would like to bring to my hon. colleague's attention that that in fact is what the minister has done.
We have introduced two programs that deal with providing information to the public about the ozone layer. One is called the Ozone Watch Program where every Friday there is a reporting of just what is the status of the ozone layer. We get that through all the media sources.
The second program is called the UV index and was launched in May of last year. We get that information on a daily basis. Every day we get the information about what is happening and how Canadians can take measures. We encourage Canadians, particularly those who are subject to sun, to take protective measures.
I would like to add one more thing. The real issue is how do we deal with this problem effectively in terms of reducing the substances which add to the problem. That is where Canada really is in a leadership position, not only through the implementation of the Montreal protocol but the co-operative work that is now going on between the federal and the provincial governments. We are all coming to grips with introducing the consumption and-


Madam Deputy Speaker:: I think the minister will have an opportunity to continue later.


Marlene Catterall: Madam Speaker, my supplementary question is for the same minister.
A minister who is serious about reducing health costs would have mounted a major prevention campaign this spring to warn Canadians about increased dangers to their health. A minister serious about stopping destruction of the ozone layer would have reacted when only one Canadian province met its obligations under the national action plan to protect the ozone layer.
I ask the associate minister when we can expect national leadership from the Minister of the Environment, given the risk that we now know exists to our health and to our children's health?


Mary Collins: Madam Speaker, I can assure my colleague that is exactly what is happening. We are providing the information. We are one of the leading countries in being able to provide it. We are also taking steps to deal with the long-term problem.
I remind my hon. colleague that eight of the ten provinces now have the appropriate regulatory environment by which they will start the recovery of the substances which contribute to this problem.
We have set our goals. We have set our standards. We have the plan of action in place. Obviously Canada is one of the leaders in this field and will continue to be a leader under the minister's very progressive policies.


THE BUDGET
Hon. Lome Nystrom (Yorkton-Melville):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance and concerns his budget of Monday.
As the minister knows, a majority of the provincial governments have brought down their budgets. The federal budget is later than they had expected.
In light of the debt crisis and the problems the provinces are having, can the minister give us a guarantee that on Monday in his budget there will be no unilateral changes to the formula for transfer payments? It is very important to the fiscal position of those governments and jobs in the provinces like Saskatchewan, Manitoba and others.
April 23, 1993


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Madam Speaker, the hon. member will just have to wait and see. I think he recognizes, as he alluded to it, that all provinces recognize the serious national debt problem we face.
.(1155)
I noted this morning the provincial treasurer of Ontario brought out an expenditure control plan which affects all the sectors of government spending in Ontario. I noted that he said: "We must deal aggressively with the debt problem so that it does not overwhelm the economy". I think that is a view shared by all governments in Canada.
It is also noted that Ontario has cut transfer payments to the municipalities. It has cut its payments in lieu to education and social services-


William Hunter (Bill) McKnight: As has Saskatchewan.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: -as has Saskatchewan. This is in recognition of the tight fiscal situation in which we all find ourselves.
Bearing those things in mind, we will always ensure that the interests of Canada are taken into account. We hope we will be able to bring forward a budget that has balance and is achievable.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: You have not done anything for nine years. Why the conversion?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: For nine years members opposite voted against every restraint measure that we brought forward.


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Madam Speaker, the reason I asked the question is that in the past the government has been offloading its debt problems on to the backs of the provinces.
Saskatchewan for example is $500 million short of where we would have been without the changes in the formulas for transfers to the provinces.
As a supplementary question I want to ask whether this minister, who is the Deputy Prime Minister and who has a lot of clout across the way, can give us an assurance that in the future as long as this government is in office there will not be unilateral changes to the formula for transfer payments at all.
Oral Questions
If there are any changes, will there be consultation with the provinces ahead of time?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Madam Speaker, the hon. member referred to the province of Saskatchewan.
Transfers to the province of Saskatchewan have grown at a rate of 7.4 per cent per year since 1984-85. It is the largest rate of increase of probably any of the provinces, amounting to something like $1,450 per person.
That is 7.4 per cent per year when over-all program expenditures of the government were growing at 4 per cent or less.


LOBSTER FISHERY
William D. (Bill) Casey: Madam Speaker, my question is for the parliamentary secretary to the minister of fisheries, clams and lobsters.


Some hon. members:: Oh, oh.


William D. (Bill) Casey: The Cumberland North Fishermen's Association has unanimously asked the DFO to increase the minimum lobster size in the Northumberland Strait area. It has asked this over and over again. It is strictly as a conservation measure at its own expense.
Is there any way this area along the Northumberland Strait can be designated to have an increased minimum lobster size?


Mr. Ross Belsher (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Fisheries and Oceans and Minister for the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency):: Madam Speaker, I appreciate the question is being asked on behalf of the fishermen in the Northumberland Strait.
It is a very contentious issue in the total area. In the adjacent province fishermen do not want to see the carapace size raised at this time. There have been extensive consultations but they were not able to be concluded in time to make an announcement for this spring.
Consequently the minister at the end of March said there would be no increase in size in any of the areas this year. The short answer to his question is no, it will not happen this year.

April 23, 1993
Routine Proceedings


NATIONAL ACTION COMMITTEE ON THE STATUS OF WOMEN
John Alexander Frances MacDougall: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Deputy Prime Minister.
Earlier today I learned that the incoming president of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women first is not a Canadian, and second does not have a work permit for this country.
Does the Deputy Prime Minister believe that the immigration department should review this person's work status in Canada? Does the Deputy Prime Minister believe that the taxpayers of Canada should be funding such an organization with an illegal immigrant as its head?


Mary Collins: Madam Speaker, I do not think it would be appropriate for me to comment on the first part of the member's question. That question should be put to the Minister of Employment and Immigration.
I could comment on behalf of my colleague, the Secretary of State who is responsible for the women's program, about the purpose of that program. It really is not often well understood.
I know my colleague will disagree with many of the policies or statements of NAC. I do from time to time as well. Nevertheless we have a women's program in place which has been absolutely critical to the advancement of the legal, economic and social equality of women in this country.
There are many women's organizations from the Association of Women in Universities to the National Women's Council, including NAC that count on certain elements of support from that program. It enables both them and the government to work in partnership toward achieving that equality.


Madam Deputy Speaker:: We will finish with a single question. The hon. member for Haldimand-Norfolk.


LAND CLAIMS
Mr. Bob Speller (Haldimand-Norfolk):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the minister speaking for the minister of Indian affairs.
The minister of Indian affairs is aware that I brought to his attention the crisis surrounding the Dunnville Dam and Weir Rehabilitation Project which stems from 20 unresolved land claims presently being reviewed by the Department of Justice. The first four are related to Dunnville. Until these claims are settled, chances of an agreement to make the necessary repairs on the dam and weirs are minimal.
Will the minister instruct the Department of Justice to give the issue priority status in order to minimize any environmental damage that might be caused by the delays?
Is the minister prepared to speed up the decision on these land claims? Is he committed to fast tracking these claims in order to help remove this crisis?
Hon. Bill McKnight (Minister of Energy, Mines and
Resources): Madam Speaker, on behalf of the minister, the hon. member is fully aware that the Dunnville dam and weirs are a provincial-municipal responsibility. The Welland canal claim which impacts on that area is a high priority claim.
The hon. member and other members of the House understand the priority the government and the minister have put on settling outstanding land claims on behalf of Indian people. Since 1984 the government has settled more land claims and disputes put forward by Indian people in the last nine years than had been done in the previous quarter century.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Harvie Andre: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to table, in both official languages, a number of Order in Council appointments made by the government pursuant to the provisions of Standing
April 23, 1993

Order 110(1). These are deemed referred to the appropriate standing committees, a list of which is attached.


THE BUDGET
Harvie Andre: Mr. Speaker, while I am on my feet, pursuant to Standing Order 83(2), I ask you to designate an Order of the Day for a budget presentation on Monday, April 26, 1993 at 4:30 p.m.


GOVERNMENT RESPONSE TO PETITIONS
Ross Belsher: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36(8), I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the government's response to 35 petitions.
[Editor's Note: See today's Votes and Proceedings.]


Douglas Fee: Mr. Speaker, at the request of several members of the House I would like to table the official score sheet of the hockey game between MPs and pages last night.
Several members have expressed interest. Some were not able to play because of age, physical condition or duties and I know they would be interested in knowing that this tradition is continued. It was a very interesting and hard-fought game.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I am sure we have unanimous consent for that. What was the score?


An hon. member:: The score was 8 to 7.


Douglas Fee: Mr. Speaker, if it was not for a referee from Hansard who was a little blind and missed my goal in the third period we would have tied the game.
Routine Proceedings HOUSE MANAGEMENT
88TH REPORT OF STANDING COMMITTEE


Ross Belsher: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present the 88th report of the Standing Committee on House Management regarding the selection of votable items among Private Members' Business.
Pursuant to Standing Order 92(2), this report is deemed adopted when laid upon the table.


[Stage Direction]
12TH REPORT OF STANDING COMMITTEE
Jean-Robert Gauthier: Mr. Speaker, it is my duty and honour to present, in both official languages, the 12th report of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts.
This report deals with the issue of tax arrangements for foreign affiliates. Pursuant to Standing Order 109, the committee requests the government's response to this report as soon as possible.


[Stage Direction]
13TH REPORT OF STANDING COMMITTEE
Jean-Robert Gauthier: Mr. Speaker, while I am on my feet I also have the honour to present, in both official languages, the 13th report of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts.
The committee has considered Vote 35 under Finance in the Main Estimates for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1994 and reports the same.
We are very proud that our estimates have been tabled to the House and hope all committees will do the same.


Douglas Fee: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present the report of the legislative committee on Bill C-118, an act to amend the Export Development Act, without amendment, in both official languages.

April 23, 1993
Routine Proceedings
[Editor's Note: See today's Votes and Proceedings.]


PETITIONS
Mrs. Suzanne Duplessis (Louis-Hebert):: Mr. Speaker, I have a petition to the honourable Elouse of Commons in Parliament assembled.
The undersigned residents of the metropolitan area of Quebec City humbly sheweth:
That the Miranda family should have Canadian resident status. The family consists of Mrs. Carolina Miranda, her son Samael, and little Gonzalo Ignacio who was born here in Canada.
Mrs. Miranda and her son Samael are from Guatemala. Although under an agreement, Guatemalan nationals are able to return to their country, it has been confirmed by the Quebec-Central America Committee, Amnesty International and other organizations that the human rights situation in Guatemala is not improving.
Mrs. Miranda is afraid her son Samael will be kidnapped and used as a hostage, to try to flush out his father, Armanda Castillo, a Guatemalan who disappeared several years ago. He is apparently still alive and being sought by people who, since then, have killed two of his brothers, Samael's uncles.
Considering that Samael has adjusted to life in Quebec, plays hockey and speaks French like all little Quebecers, and considering that Gonzalo Ignacio was bom in Canada and thus has Canadian citizenship, your petitioners humbly pray and call upon Parliament to consider this a humanitarian case and keep this family in Canada.


Ron J. Duhamel: Mr. Speaker, the petitioners who signed my first petition ask the government to delay the decision with respect to the merger of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council with the Canada Council.
They point out that Canada's greatest challenges today are in the area of social problems, whether we talk about
the deficit, the debt, poverty, unemployment, social assistance, food banks and many others. They simply ask the government to defer the decision and study it again. If it then feels this is a good decision then it should go forward. However, to date the government has proven no savings and no increased effectiveness, and therefore that is their request.


Ron J. Duhamel: Mr. Speaker, in my second petition I have a group of petitioners who ask Parliament to ensure that the CRTC makes absolutely certain that the use of foul language, abuse and violence on radio and television does not occur. They point out that it goes contrary to their efforts to raise their families in a particular way. They also emphasize that it is not necessary to use foul language to entertain in English or in French.


Leonard William (Len) Taylor: Mr. Speaker, I have the duty and privilege of presenting a petition pursuant to Standing Order 36 signed by residents of my constituency from the communities of Hafford, Goodsoil, Pierceland, and Blaine Lake, Saskatchewan.
The petitioners acknowledge that studies have shown a link between violence in entertainment and desensitization to violence in our society. They note that part of this culture of violence is a serial killer board game which has as its point murdering defenceless children and adults.
The petitioners state that the laws of Canada do not deal with material such as this and they call upon Parliament to consider amending the Criminal Code of Canada so that violent and degrading material, such as the serial killer board game, can be kept from being distributed in Canada.


QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER
[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk)
Ross Belsher: Mr. Speaker, the following questions will be answered today: Nos. 466 and 467.
April 23, 1993


Mr. Boudria: With respect to the Department of Finance, (a) how many persons are employed to administer the goods and services tax (b) what does it cost to administer the tax?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: With respect to the Department of Finance, (a) none, (b) nil.


Mr. Boudria: With respect to the Department of National Revenue, (a) how many persons are employed to administer the goods and services tax (b) what does it cost to administer the tax?


Hon. Otto Jelinek (Minister of National Revenue):: (a)
It is forecast that in 1993-94 there will be approximately 4,400 full-time equivalents in Revenue Canada to administer the goods and services tax.
(b) It is forecast that in 1993-94 it will cost approximately $390 million in Revenue Canada to administer and collect the GST.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The questions as enumerated by the parliamentary secretary have been answered.


Ross Belsher: I ask, Mr. Speaker, that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.


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


Some hon. members:: Agreed.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS

[Stage Direction]


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Mazankowski that Bill C-93, an act to implement certain government organization provisions of the budget tabled in the House of Commons on February 25, 1992, be read the third time and passed.
Government Orders
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I believe the hon. member for St. Boniface had the floor. He has 34 minutes remaining. There are no questions or comments.


Ron J. Duhamel: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate being given the opportunity to continue my address on Bill C-93. As I pointed out, it is a massive bill that attempts to give a very false impression. The government is trying to suggest that it is streamlining government. It is saying that it will save money and bring about increased efficiency and effectiveness. Of course this is blatantly false.
No government official has given any proof of that. What is worse, there have been no studies to show it. We have called upon them time and time again. We know full well it is an attempt to reach the Reform Party's agenda, the Conservatives' kissing cousins.
There are no savings. There is no proof that there are. There is no increased effectiveness or efficiency. There is no proof that there is. There are no studies, but now in a moment of panic all of a sudden we see new figures appearing. Obviously the big hand of someone has come down and said: You better buttress our case. That is your job. I am sorry for the government, but it is too late.
Treasury Board officials provided no proof. Mr. Speaker, you should have been there because you would have felt, as I did, that it was so sad to see these poor officials out there trying to defend the indefensible.


An hon. member:: Hung out to dry.


Ron J. Duhamel: They were hung out to dry. Then they brought in the big shooters from the Privy Council and I thought perhaps we would get some answers then. To be perfectly frank and without being unkind in any way, the best I can say is that it was no better than the first set of proofs. It was probably worse. In some instances it will cost more money to the Government of Canada. That is part of the testimony that was made.
Who is opposed to this bill? The government likes to pretend that it is us on this side of the House, and that is true. However virtually everyone who has been involved in this is opposed to this bill. The government has absolutely dismally failed to produce any shred of evidence, but what is worse, it has failed to produce even one credible witness who would say this is a good idea. That is how bad the government's case is.

April 23, 1993
Government Orders
I think you would agree with me, Mr. Speaker, that when one has such a flimsy case one should withdraw, one should restudy, one should reconsider, one should consult and one should see what could be done.
This bill deals with a number of agencies but let me focus on just a couple of them. For example, Enterprise Cape Breton Corporation was an economic development tool in one of the regions of the country that needs this kind of assistance. It is a region where the unemployment rate is high and where the number of people who require social assistance is high. What does the government do? It merged it. For what reason? To give the impression that it is doing something significant.
Let us go to one of the more contentious parts, which is the merging of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council with the Canada Council.

In fact, Bill C-93 calls for the merger of several agencies operating in a totally different way. As you know, Mr. Speaker, Canada is faced with numerous serious social problems such as family violence, environmental problems, constitutional uncertainty, native issues, new reproductive technologies, illiteracy, sexual abuse, to name a few. These problems cannot be solved without contribution from social sciences and humanities.
The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, created in 1977, was given the responsibility for the programs managed by the Social Sciences and Humanities Division of the Canada Council. It got that responsibility. The government is now trying to eliminate an efficient human sciences research framework. That is what it is doing. The government proposal to merge this agency with the Canada Council is a step back and will in no way help to improve the level of federal support for human sciences research. It is unfortunate because we already have serious problems. Funding is inadequate and the social sciences and humanities community was never consulted about that merger. There was no consultation at all. I urge government to postpone the decision to merge the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and the Canada Council. It would be a courageous gesture on their part and I ask government members to consider it.
As you know Mr. Speaker, in 1978, the government decided to create the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council as an entirely separate agency from the Canada Council. Over the years, we saw them develop very different traditions. In the area of social sciences, scientists work mainly within universities. They have developed a research activity and project evaluation system based on the scientific tradition of peer review. That is very important and we should not let it disappear.

I understand that it is one group testifying against the other and talking about efficiency, savings and effectiveness. Let me use an analogy. It will be appreciated.
Say I have doctors telling me that this is what I have from a physical, emotional or what have you perspective and that this is the treatment that I need. Say, on the other hand, that there are well intentioned people telling me something diametrically opposed to this. That is the case here. I am going to go with the doctors. I am going to go with what they say and not with what the well intentioned people say.
The doctors on these issues have told me something about the merging of Enterprise Cape Breton with the Atlantic Opportunities Agency, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council with the Canada Council, the program for Canadian Studies Abroad also with the Canada Council as well as the Agricultural Products Board with the the Ministry of Agriculture as well as the winding up of the Canadian Copyright Board and the transferral of the functions of the Registrar of Trademarks that are currently exercised by the Trade-Marks Opposition Board into a new tribunal to be called the Intellectual Property Tribunal. It is that the current government deserves to be slapped with a nasty malpractice suit. That is what it deserves.
These mergers make as must sense as merging the regressive Conservative Party with the NDP. That is as much sense as it makes.
April 23, 1993

Government Orders

In any case I think it is very clear that this merger was denounced by all concerned. All the organizations that know about the situation of social research in Canada, as well as my party and the party to my left, have asked that Part III, which is the part that provides for the merger of the Canada Council and SSHRC, be withdrawn or, at least amended significantly. Of course, the government carries on and turns a deaf ear to the unanimous appeals made by the academic, scientific and artistic communities.

The government has opted for one stop shopping in its hopes to save money. I wish it were so. It hopes to recoup the popularity of the Canadian people. Unfortunately for those involved in Canada as a whole, this type of one stop shopping may well result in confusion rather than efficiency. That is exactly what is going to happen. One knows that.
There is another reason why I do not like this bill when we talk of effectiveness. Let me say why I do not think that a whole lot of thinking has gone into this. For example, we have had no assurance that the peer review of the government will continue, which is a fundamental principle with respect to research. We have no assurance that the board that will eventually be struck will be representative of the significant people who understand the new mandate. To that effect, I put in an amendment and the government rejected it.

This bill is so full of holes that one could drive a Mack truck through it and one big Mack truck, I assure you.
With regard to the removal of the academic relations division and the Canadian studies program from External Affairs, one can say that this useless transfer will generate more expenditures, while reducing the effectiveness of the programs. Let me give you just one example. The Deparment of External Affairs uses the diplomatic bag to reach the numerous foreigners who are linked to programs under the responsibility of academic relations. By being transferred to the Canada Council, this division will no longer enjoy that privilege. This represents tens of thousands of dollars more in postage, for each program. Do you see the contradiction? It is an obvious contradiction.
The International Council for Canadian Studies is concerned about this section of the bill on four counts. First, there is no assurance that the program of Canadian studies abroad will be maintained at its current level. There is none whatsoever. Second, its integrity may not be preserved separately from domestic programs. That is a serious one as well. Third, the essential link between foreign policy and priorities and program policy and delivery will be jeopardized. Fourth, the program will be more costly and less effective.
The fusion or merger of SSHRC with the Canada Council risks, as a parade of witnesses before the committee clearly pointed out, negating the progress that has been made. Just take a look at what is happening.
The government created separate councils in 1978. They proved themselves to be fiscally lean and responsible and then the government throws them back together. Those people still have the gall to call themselves the Progressive Conservative Party.
In my opinion such a bill has proven once and for all that the party across the floor is indeed the regressive party of Canada. It has taken several ingredients that simply do not mix, put them together and thrown them against the wall hoping that they will stick.
In committee the following groups made up of responsible people opposed the bill: The Canadian Conference on the Arts, the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada, the Canadian Federation of the Humanities, the Social Science Federation of Canada and the Canadian Association of University Teachers as well as most university presidents.
That is an impressive list of witnesses. Not one single witness had anything positive to say about this merger.
It is also worth noting that no studies were forthcoming. I want to stress this; there were no studies. Can one imagine going after a change like this with no studies as to the financial savings? Treasury Board officials did point to a $1 million start up cost for one of those initiatives. Can one imagine that? This once again has insignificant savings over the long run. If there was a $1 million start up cost savings in the long run, then one could argue that-

April 23, 1993
Government Orders

< (1225 )
Moreover, a group of academics from four Canadian universities, namely Laval University, University of Quebec in Montreal, University of Montreal, University of Quebec in Trois-Rivieres and the University of Ottawa, rightly attacked shamelessly this bill in a Montreal daily, because they demonstrated, once again, that there would be no savings and that it would not be possible to increase the efficiency of that body.

I suppose it is quite appropriate for people to say: "Oh, yes, you think that; you are the critic; you are in fact in opposition". However, what has been said about this bill by other responsible people? I have an article here by Hugh Winsor dated February 27, 1993. He refers to two civil servants and says:
The government again responded by sending civil servants from something known as the machinery of government section of the Privy Council Office to the barricades.
That was the second set of witnesses because the first set of witnesses failed dismally. Referring to one senior government officials he said:
Why these particular 46 groups were chosen was not for him to say. His only concern, as an expert in government organization, was whether or not the merger was doable.
It is important to note whether or not it could be done. Referring to the other senior civil servant, and I appreciate this fact:
His sidekick- even admitted that it didn't really matter to a government bent on streamlining and reorganization for reorganization's sake whether the clients of the two agencies in question liked the change.
It did not matter.
Service to the public was a secondary consideration.
This article was by Hugh Winsor. This is not Ron Duhamel the member for St. Boniface. This is Mr. Winsor.
Is that all? Oh, no. We have an article entitled: "Ottawa's shotgun wedding wounds two agencies". It wounds them, perhaps even fatally. Let me quote from this article:
Many in the academic community see a real danger that SSHRC will face the deep budget cuts that have affected the cultural community.
That is what they fear. This is a smoke-screen for exactly that.
Despite their strong opposition of Bill C-93, academic and cultural organizations have not behaved inflexibly in this dispute.
That is a laudable point. That is an honourable position. They have not behaved inflexibly.
A number of amendments to Bill C-93 have been proposed, the most important of which would ensure that parliamentary allocations for academic research and international programs are kept separate from endowment funds to support the arts and culture, and that the new council is well and fully representative of the various communities served.
This is by Claude Lajeunesse and Keith Kelly. This is what these people are saying. These are not irresponsible people. These are highly respected Canadians.
Is that all? No. None other than Jeffrey Simpson says that the Canada Council merger fails the basic test of common sense. Let me quote:
Nothing in the country could replace the Economic Council-
-or nothing to do with the agencies in question. The Ibries, circa February, 1992, were simply feeling antsy about the Reform Party, especially in western Canada. As a sop to this sentiment, the agencies were axed and Bill C-93 took form.
The basic problem with the bill-one pointed out by a parade of witnesses before a Commons committee-is that the Canada Council, SSHRC, and External Affairs' cultural policies have quite different missions. Lumping them together will make things harder for both the expanded Canada Council and for the groups that deal with it.
As I indicated before it makes as much sense as trying to merge the party that forms the government that calls
We have not talked a whole lot about that.
-or the Science Council.
The agenda had little -
He is speaking about government.
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themselves Progressive Conservatives-I call them regressive Conservatives- with the NDP. It makes no sense.
Bill C-93, driven by politics but rationalized on grounds of
efficiency, may turn the Canada Council into one of those proverbial
camels that emerged from a committee trying to design a horse.
Have you heard that story, Mr. Speaker?
The opposition parties are quite right to kick up a fuss.
That is what Mr. Simpson says. The opposition parties are quite right to kick up a fuss because the government has been dishonest.
I have relayed what some notable Canadians and journalists have said. Let me give some excerpts from committee testimony. We had eminent people such as the assistant secretary of the Treasury Board. I will not go any further. Let me give some quotes: "Bill C-93 is a modest proposal, if you like, from a savings perspective". Did one hear that? "But one will not know what, in reality, has happened until it has". One does not know what is going to happen until it has happened and then it may be too late to correct what has happened.
Let me give another quotation: "C-93 is very much a housekeeping bill". If that were all. I ask if one can tell me whether or not the new board membership will be sufficiently diverse to represent all of the various interests. The Treasury Board has no comment: "I do not have any comments about any of the program budgeting issue in the estimates".
It goes on in response to another question. This is important: "That is an estimate which is in some respects one of the weaker estimates which we have". That was with respect to the merging of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council with the Canada Council. "We are expecting the numbers which will result, the savings which will result in the SSHRC and Canada Council amalgamation to be generated essentially by the management when this is done".
We all know that those organizations could have been called in and told: "Here are the budgetary savings we need. Bring us a plan". We did not have to go through all this major surgery, but we did because they wanted to try to impress Canadians.
That is why we see the moral fibre falling out of this. I asked: "Are there studies? If there are, can and will they
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be tabled?" I said I was not clear on that in spite of my repeated questioning. Here are some of the responses: "The estimates of savings were made by the officials acting in preparation for a budget. There would be no studies which I understand could be released on that subject". Later on in the testimony: "We have no particular studies on costings of these savings". These are statements by senior officials from Treasury Board and Privy Council. It is not the hon. member for St. Boniface who said that. This is the testimony they gave. Is that not deplorable?
I want to share as well a letter I received from the Canadian Federation for the Humanities. Actually it was addressed to the Leader of the Opposition. I want to read three paragraphs:
As you will know from earlier correspondence and various press releases, Canadian Federation for the Humanities strongly opposes passage of part III of Bill C-93. So does evety other academic and artistic group in Canada-no group has endorsed the government's policy.
We have tried to deal in a very reasonable way with the government, meeting them more than half-way on their policy that ways must be found to reduce wasteful government spending. We have simply asked the government to accept that the proposed merger of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) and the cultural exchange programs of External Affairs with the Canada Council could easily cost taxpayers millions of dollars and serious losses in productivity.
The government has consistently been unable to produce any evidence that would support its contention that this merger will produce net savings. Their projections are based solely on the belief that mergers must inevitably produce savings.
That is an assumption and is not a proven one. It goes on:
This sort of inflexibility, in our view, is disastrous. We favour a much more empirical, though no less vigorous, approach to the management of federal expenditures.
This is the Canadian Federation for the Humanities, a highly responsible group staffed by the finest men and women in the country. Why are we doing this? To meet the Reform agenda.
I have a letter as well from the Social Science Federation of Canada. I want to share a few of its remarks. This is an open letter to the members of Parliament: "The savings are ridiculously small. The merger brings together two agencies that operate quite differently. The merger provides no guarantees for continued effective support for social sciences research.

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The amalgamation has taken place without any consultation". I could read more of this into the text but I think I have made my point. "Again we are not at all opposed to sensible, indeed vigorous, economies in the administration of the present councils. The country obviously faces an urgent financial problem, but we are convinced that the costs of this merger greatly outweigh the benefits" and the letter is signed by Robert Nadeau, president.
These are responsible men and women from some of the country's most prestigious organizations and this is what they had to say.
Everyone will be interested in this. There were government members who recognized they had no case. There are sensible government members; I have never said otherwise. They recognized that they had no case. Then they started talking to their political masters to see if there could not be some sort of compromise, some sort of understanding, some sort of meaningful solution.
We had proposed, as had the party to the left of me, that perhaps we could strike part III, just set it aside and study it again. Then if the facts proved that the government's agenda was correct we would go forward. Of course we had a lot of confidence that that was not so but the government did not want to take the risk. Some members wanted to take the risk. They talked to their political masters, but the political masters came down with their big hands and said no, no, no. It stopped at that. We had an opportunity to do what was right.
When I saw that the government would not be sensible, would not remove part III in spite of all of the evidence from the senior bureaucrats at Treasury Board, from Privy Council, the journalists, the various organizations, university presidents and all of those national organizations that are held in high esteem, I asked what it was that could be done. Could there still be something done?
I thought of amendments. Let us at least talk to the organizations and see what amendments might perhaps make a bad thing a little less bad. I moved amendments which would substantially improve the bill as well as address serious concerns expressed by the various communities involved.
For example, I proposed a name change which would much more adequately reflect the composition of the new council. Did the government even look at that? No. I also proposed that separate budgetary appropriation votes be held so that funds to be used for arts were designated as such, so that funding for the social sciences and humanities were used for that purpose and so that money to be used for the administration of the council was used for that purpose. Did the government look at that? No.
These are reasonable proposals: change the name to reflect the various realities; have separate votes to give some additional security to those who are being deeply shaken with these changes. Through amendments supported by the Social Science Federation and the Association of Universities and Colleges, I also proposed that board membership be representative and that board members have a certain degree of expertise in the areas in question. That is what I proposed.

I suggested changing the name to reflect the reality of what was happening, to ensure that these various organizations could be identified. I proposed that separate budgetary appropriation votes be held so that we could see exactly how much would be spent in each sector.
Mr. Speaker, it is important and I know that you understand and are sensitive to it. I also suggested ensuring that any appointees to a board of directors to represent the organization and help run it should come from the various sectors that were merged to be part of this new entity.
I also asked that the men and women chosen be people who know the field, in order to avoid partisanship and appointing one's chums, one's friends and family members and so on. I wanted to ensure that there would be men and women-and there are many here in Canada- who thoroughly understand these different sectors and can give them outstanding leadership, because that is what it will take and you realize that because, frankly, this is a creation that does not stand up.

The government even refused that.
I had difficulty in understanding why it would refuse rescinding part III. I had a great deal of difficulty particularly after I saw some colleagues who were willing to talk, but they wanted to save face. I do not think it was
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a good enough reason in view of all of the evidence, but I thought surely they would look at some of those amendments.
I made those amendments with respect to the merger of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council with the Canada Council, but I also made additional amendments with respect to the review. The organizations told me that my amendment with respect to the review was superior to the government's. Would it look at mine? Absolutely not. It was as bone-headed as it could be and went forward with what it had.
SOCAN had contacted me because it was concerned with the wording in certain sections of the bill and felt that it would be unfair. Did the government look at that? No. Copyright tribunal individuals had difficulties and suggestions were made. Did it look at those? No. One can see how reasonable the opposition has been. It has been extremely reasonable. Let me review the large parts.
This bill was presented a long time ago as a result of budget decisions made by the government. People asked what was going on because there had been no consultation. We recognized immediately that key organizations such as the Economic Council of Canada were being removed. Everyone knows the government needs help in the area of the economy. When there are 1.5 million people unemployed, 2.7 million people receiving welfare, over 2 million people being fed by the food banks this year, a deficit that is over $30 billion and a debt that has almost tripled since 1984, the government needs expert advice, but no. It zaps those councils and those associations that could have been of great assistance to it.
We tried to rescind the most critical part. What happened? Nothing. We put forward reasonable amendments to try to fix it a bit, to make something terrible at least more or less palatable. What did government do? It was totally inflexible. Totally, totally inflexible.
Of course, the government comes to this House today suggesting that it is we, the opposition. Well, I am sorry. Yes it is we the opposition, but it is also all those organizations I mentioned and many others throughout the land who are saying that this is no good, that there are no savings, that this is a smoke-screen and there are
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no increased efficiencies or effectiveness. This is a government agenda to try to get Canadians to rally to its cause.
With this kind of smoke-screen and with this kind of deceit and manipulation, it is not going to happen. It is not going to happen. The government has been unreasonable. It had plenty of opportunity to fix it. It had many opportunities and it has failed. It would not listen.
I for one am deeply disappointed. I would have thought at the last minute that common sense would have set in. No, in spite of the fact that all witnesses were against it, not one single credible witness was brought forward, despite statements quoted today by its officials that this was a bill that would not save substantial moneys. Even one of the politicians said that it was primarily a symbolic measure. I thank that hon. member for having been that honest.
The government wants Canadians to trust it. Yes, one of the leadership contenders said that. "Trust me." Believe you me, Mr. Speaker, Canadians are not going to trust this government any more because of the decisions it makes.
Initially, the parliamentary secretary pointed out that Liberals have consistently opposed legislation which his government has put forth. We will continue to oppose legislation that does not put the people of Canada first. This bill does not put the people of Canada first. I will not support it and my colleagues will not support it. Canadians will not support it or this government at the next general election.


Simon Leendert de Jong: Mr. Speaker, it is really not with pleasure that I rise today on third reading of Bill C-93. In fact it saddens me.
Unfortunately what I suspect is being completed here today makes it a sad day. It is a sad day for research in this country. It is a sad day for the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. It is a sad day for the external cultural programs of our country. As well it is a sad day for our parliamentary tradition and our parliamentary institution.
The area of the bill we are debating that concerns me most is part III. It brings together the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, the cultural programs of

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External Affairs, the old Canada Council and folds them all into a new agency.
It is sad because the motivation behind this-I will come back to that at length in a little while-is purely political and short term. The idea grew out of the minds of a few people in Finance. We understand there was no consultation with the appropriate departments or ministers. Certainly there was absolutely no consultation with the social scientists and the humanities nor with the arts community. It was a decision made solely by a few individuals in Finance.
As has been pointed out over and over again in discussions in this House, when we had officials from the government, the Privy Council, the Department of Finance and Treasury Board none of them were able to give us any justification for the statement that there would be cost savings. In fact we obtained through freedom of information the government's own estimate of what the savings would be. That document showed there would be zero savings in the next five years.
I tried in committee to get the head of the new Canada Council as well as the ministers in front of us but that was turned down by government members on the committee.
I kept asking why they were doing this. The only rationale was it might save us some money. When we pushed them to prove this to us they were not able to do it. It was finally admitted by somebody from Privy Council that it was doable.
How sad it is that public policy on something as important as this is being determined purely on the political notion that it somehow or other might appease the right wing and that the right wing might continue to support the Conservation Party. That is the only rationale which really makes sense.
The parliamentary secretary lambasted us earlier in his comments. He said we are making the accusation that the government's motivation is purely political in order to appease the right wing.
I am not making that charge. My party and the opposition has not made that charge. The person who said that was Conservative Senator Finlay MacDonald. He is quoted in The Globe and Mail dated February 27, 1993: "The whole exercise might be nothing more than a
symbolic act to protect the party's right flank from the attacks from the dreaded Reform Party, to cause sufficient pain and spill enough blood to impress the voters. If true this might be good politics in the short term but it is not good public policy in the long run". Despite the accusations of the parliamentary secretary it is a Conservative senator who has made this charge.
Why are we so upset with this? First of all a few people in Finance who I suspect have no notion or understanding or appreciation what the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council is all about made this unilateral decision.
It is important to the social scientists because in 1987, as a result of recommendations of the Lamontagne royal commission looking into science policies, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council was separated from the Canada Council. It was done after much discussion and consultation. At that time it was considered a victory for the social sciences because the social sciences and the humanities were recognized as a legitimate form of scientific inquiry, that the social sciences was a science and not an art. This is important. It is important we recognize that the social sciences and the humanities are a legitimate form of scientific inquiry and how important they are in this day and age.
We all hear about how fast the world is changing, the globalization, the scientific and technological changes. All of our lives are thrown into this mad rush of constant change. Our societies and our cultures are in constant total change. The only thing constant is change; psychological change, economic change, cultural change, technological change.
As we try to live with this, as we near the end of this millennium, it is essential for us as human beings if we are going to survive to begin to get an understanding of these forces of change. We need to use the best methods and tools available to us as human beings, which are our scientific tools, in order to begin to get some understanding and some grasp of these tremendous forces that are creating such a horrendous change in our lives.
I remember a few years ago attending the habitat conference in Vancouver and listening to Buckminster Fuller. He stated that most of the major discoveries which have occurred in the history of the human race
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occurred in his lifetime. I think that conference was in 1975.
What we see here today is the government, through its short-term political agenda, now moving the clock back. It is now stating that the social sciences are not really a proper scientific body and that they belong with the arts. We hear government members saying this. We heard the member from Winnipeg. I am sorry but I do not know her constituency. She said in the House the other day that the social sciences and the humanities were with the Canada Council for 20 years and what was good enough then is good enough now.
I am frightened when I hear such points being raised in the House of Commons of Canada. It is scary because one of the important tools, as I mentioned, in which we can begin to survive and get some control over the changes affecting our lives is through proper research, study and investigation of the social sciences. To again think of them as really being like the arts is a step back. It is a step that weakens one of the important tools we have as human beings.
What are some of the areas in which the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council are involved? It is involved in some of the research programs that deal with physical and monetary policy, urban development, productivity, economic and strategic planning, managing for global competitiveness, scientific and technological policy, family violence, the aging population, racism, sexism and youth unemployment. All of these are questions that concern social scientists. The type of debt we have is a question that concerns social scientists. It requires scientific study so we can begin to work our way out of the tremendous debt problem we have both at the federal and provincial levels. What the sciences attempt to do is minimize the human harm.
I could go on and on as to the importance of the social sciences. I wish that members of the Department of Finance would recognize that and would recognize the distinctiveness and the importance of keeping distinct research in the social sciences and the humanities.
They did not because of the reason that Senator Finlay MacDonald mentioned, because of short-term political interest. I would tend to think that is quite misguided because I do not think one Tory will save his or her seat
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from the Reform Party because of what is being done today. But because of that the barbarians of the finance department were at the gates and they raped and plundered, if I may use those terms, all that has been built up since 1978, the work of establishing the social sciences and the humanities as a legitimate form of scientific research.
The government today is trying to justify all this, trying to put modest clothing over this bare political work and attempting to justify it by saying that it is going to save money. The parliamentary secretary lambastes the opposition saying we are not interested in saving, we are not interested in efficiency, we are plundering the pockets of the taxpayers, we are trying to hold up debate, we are filibustering, we are doing all sorts of terrible things.
I suspect that the parliamentary secretary, having been devoid of reason, uses the broad brush of slander. What he said is not true. In fact, if we look at his own comments we find the contradiction. Earlier on in his comments he mentioned that members of the opposition are supportive of parts of Bill C-93 because they do away with some agencies that should have been done away with a long time ago.
We are also very much interested in savings and efficiencies. We recognize the horrendous debt that is like a cancer choking and killing public programs. Of course we have to come to terms with that. We are saying that what the government is attempting to do in part III of Bill C-93 does the very opposite; it does not produce efficiency, it does not save money.
It is not just us saying it. We heard the testimony from members of Finance and from the Privy Council saying no, there were no efficiencies. But the government now has come up with the $5 million a year figure. Let me deal with that.
It first was raised at report stage. The parliamentary secretary said he had information that we are going to save $5 million a year. On Wednesday he invited us to phone the Canada Council and confirm this and I did. I phoned them yesterday morning and I talked to Dr. Paule Leduc. From my notes, this is what I have. She said yes. She confirmed that they had met with the Treasury Board and they made some quick analysis. She said it is difficult to say how much is going to be saved, but it is possible that over five years $5 million could be saved.

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What a difference from what we hear government members saying. They talk about saving $5 million a year. They say it as though next year we are going to save $5 million, and every year after that we are going to save $5 million. What Dr. Leduc told me on the phone, according to my notes, is that it is possible that over five years $5 million can be saved. She said it was impossible to give more details because they are only now preparing the documents and reviewing all the programs. She said again that it is impossible to put any numbers now. It is too soon. Then she said that $5 million per year is not what she said at all. I asked her whether she had ever said or concluded that $5 million a year could be saved. She said that that is not what she said at all.
I spoke to her at 11.37 yesterday morning. Last night just before I went home I checked my fax machine and that was at 5.59.1 faxed this letter that the parliamentary secretary has now tabled. The letter is quite different from what was said to me over the phone.
I wonder who got through to Dr. Paule Leduc. What is going on here? All at once we see that there can be savings realized. In the first paragraph she said: "I think we can reasonably expect that ongoing savings in the order of $5 million annually could be achieved after four to five years of the existence of the new combined agency".
It is really close in terms of $5 million over the next five years, but then in the next paragraph she back pedals a little more by saying: "I also expect that savings will occur earlier in this process, probably as soon as three years, but at this stage I cannot give a definite amount".
That is all veiy intriguing. Of course what is missing in here is any discussion about what it costs.
Mr. Speaker, I see you are indicating that my time is rapidly expiring, so with your indulgence, Sir, I will quickly terminate my remarks.
What we have here is new information that was not given to us in committee. We asked for it. At report stage and now at third reading we have this new information. It is not complete, far from it. The justification for this bill is to save money, and yet there is serious doubt whether it does that.
Properly speaking, this bill should be referred back to the legislative committee so that we can find out what the real savings and costs are. After all, the justification for this bill is to save money. We maintain that it is not going to save money. All the social scientists, university professors and the whole academic community from coast to coast are totally up in arms about it. The arts community is up in arms about it. I commend the arts community for coming to the aid of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. They are all up in arms about it.
The justification ends up that it has to save money. There is serious doubt about this. New information has been introduced. Therefore I move:
That the motion be amended by deleting all the words after the
word that and substituting the following therefor:
Bill C-93, an act to implement certain government organization provisions of the budget tabled in the House of Commons, February
25.1993,	be not now read a third time but be referred back to the legislative committee for the purposes of reconsidering clauses 35 through 71 inclusive and that the Legislative Committee on Bill C-93, an act to implement certain government organization provisions of the budget tabled in the House of Commons, February
25.1993,	be reconstituted for the purpose of this reconsideration.


Ron J. Duhamel: Mr. Speaker, first, I want to thank my colleague for the remarks he made and with which I identify as well as the amendment. My questions are as follows.
The government was given an opportunity to rescind part III. The government was given an opportunity to accept certain amendments that would have made a bad bill a little less bad. The hon. member has just given it another opportunity that it should accept. If it was smart it would accept to take it back to committee and start all over again which is what those various organizations actually want.
They did not even say to the government: "Do not do it". They said: "Just delay it and restudy it. If you can come up with your savings, increased effectiveness and efficiency, which you have not been able to do to date, then do it". However the government has not been able to do that.
My question is this. This government has a flimsy case, no basis, no one standing up and defending it and not one credible voice. Why in the world would it not seize those opportunities that we have given it to let it save
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face to do the right thing for those various organizations? Why?


Simon Leendert de Jong: Mr. Speaker, my friend and colleague from Winnipeg raises a very good question. It is a question that I also raised several times in committee: "Why are you doing this?" It is a type of political macho I suspect. The government figures it has set its course and lo and behold it is not going to be moved away from this at all.
I find it politically stupid on the government's part. It is really dumb and stupid. Here it has just totally upset all of the academic community. I have a petition of 1,700 social scientists who are eminent scholars. Lettivar published a list of 40 from the University of Ottawa, McGill University and the University of Montreal. From coast to coast, artists, academics and everybody is totally upset with something they have grave difficulty justifying in terms of saving dollars and cents on. Yet this politically macho government says: "No, we are going to stick our ground". I find this politically stupid.
It would be politically smart if the government would say it made a mistake or at least say that with all these eminent people objecting to this it would have a second look. I think the government would win much credibility because then it would appear at least to be open. We talk about a new type of politics where individual members of Parliament can have some input. Then it could say: "You see, we are practising the new politics. We are in fact consulting. This is the new politics of inclusion. We are practising this". The government has a golden opportunity to demonstrate this.
I challenge all the leadership candidates. I notice that one was here earlier today. I challenge them. Where are they going to stand on this? This is their opportunity to give flesh to the notion of the new politics of being open. It is not as the parliamentary secretary was suggesting, done by painting us with a black brush: "This is only political manipulation on the part of the opposition". No, it is not so.
We co-operated with regard to many parts of Bill C-93. It is the part that every reasonable person in this country is standing up and objecting to that we are giving the government the opportunity of now saying let us practise the new politics here.
Let us see if this does save money. Let us see if this does create efficiencies. What more does it need? Every expert, including its own officials in its own departments, admits that it is not going to save money and is not going to increase efficiencies.
For God's sake, listen to some reason. Get off the high horse and practise the open, inclusive, new politics, please, gentlemen.


Ron J. Duhamel: Mr. Speaker, I was particularly heartened to see the academics, the scientists and people from the arts working together on this.
It was heart warming to see people from various different constituencies come together, have dialogue and bring forward cogent arguments. However, I have another question.
I think the biggest piece of evidence indicating that the government is in trouble and that it has not made a case comes when all of a sudden we see some new figures floating up to suggest that there is more there than there was before. I want to ask my colleague to comment on this.
If Treasury Board and Privy Council officials could not come up with the facts then, why are certain figures coming up now? It is my feeling that those members think they are sinking. They are trying to patch that boat. I wonder if my colleague would care to comment on that. Is that what is happening? Is that why we are getting these different messages?


Simon Leendert de Jong: Mr. Speaker, I certainly believe so. That is why I raised a question of privilege earlier in the day and that is why I moved the amendment. I wanted to get it back to committee to study these new figures because they are important.
Are there really savings? If so, let us have a look at them. We did not get them in committee. We tried. I tried and the hon. member tried to get the minister in front of the committee. We tried to get the head of Canada Council in front of the committee to explore fully what the savings are.
Now we hear that there is going to be some $5 million a year saved. I have some serious questions. Dr. Leduc says as well that this saving will occur by bringing the administration together.

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Here is one of the questions I would ask in committee as well. There was also a verbal commitment made by the government that it will keep separate administrations between the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and the Canada Council. Verbally, the government has been veiy committal. Even though it did not accept the amendments that would put flesh to that it said: "Trust us. We will keep social sciences and humanities separate from the Canada Council".
However, if all at once it is going to start saving $5 million a year in administrative costs, I wonder how much of a separation there is going to be. Are they indeed going to be melded together? Are some of the worst fears of those in the social sciences and the arts going to be realized?
These are questions that have to be explored in committee. Again, I agree with the hon. member. Where do these figures come from at the 12th hour? The government produces these new figures. There are contradictions in what was said to me over the telephone and what hurriedly got to be a fax late last night delivered to me.
There are all sorts of contradictions. There are all sorts of questions that need to be asked. That is why again I urge that when this House votes on my amendment it should give serious and positive consideration to my amendment.


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


Some hon. members:: Question.


Mr. Soetens:: Mr. Speaker, I have a point of order. I thought you were rising to deal specifically with the amendment. If that is what we are dealing with, I was not going to rise. If there is going to be continuing debate I am ready to speak.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: The question is on the whole bill, but if there is going to be debate then the hon. member for Ontario has the floor on debate.


René John Soetens: Mr. Speaker, I truly thought you were rising on the amendment, to put that one on the record.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: I must say I thought the House was ready for the question. I did not see anybody rising. I am sorry I did not see the hon. member rising, but if it is on debate the hon. member has the floor.


René John Soetens: Mr. Speaker, I do want to speak on this very important bill, Bill C-93. I want to speak on it for some very fundamental reasons.
We have heard from many Canadians, whether they are in my constituency, across Canada or opposition members, as surprising as that may sound, that government has to find ways of controlling its expenses, it has to eliminate duplication, and it has to cut the levels of service. It must do so not so that there are fewer programs but that there is a more efficient way of delivering those items to the Canadian public. Bill C-93 is a direct result of some of those requests by Canadians.
The minister in the budget of a year ago, in February 1992, announced we were going to make a number of changes to the way in which the government delivered some of its programs through some of its agencies.
I am pleased that the government is doing that. I find it interesting in terms of the members of the opposition that come election time we will have one party talking about how it is going to reduce the deficit and the debt as part of the GNP but yet it will not identify how it is going to do it.
Today in Ontario the NDP have finally recognized that it cannot spend money like drunken sailors and it has to take some responsibility for its actions. It is going to wind up a few things, and that is most appropriate.
The difference between us here in Ottawa, the Government of Canada, and the Ontario NDP, the Government of Ontario, is that in Ontario it chose last year to spend the money and now it has to explain how it is not going to spend it, how it is going to withdraw some of the spending it did.
Well, here we are. We did not spend the money in last year's budget. We said that rather than spend it we are going to find ways of reducing our expenditures. These changes marginally affect the 1992 budget, but they have ongoing implications in years two, three, four and five as we get into the implementation of these changes.
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Those kinds of savings, a dollar here, a dollar there, are very important to the over-all budget of Canada. I do not want to suggest that there are only dollars involved in these savings because there is substantially more than that.
It is important to understand the process from where we start because while we sit here and debate the issues that face Canada there are new issues that we face all the time. There are new problems that our constituents are demanding we face and that we find funds to deal with. That is always a challenge because the taxpayers at the same time argue we need new programs. They want these issues dealt with but they do not want us to spend any more money because they do not want us to raise taxes.
The Government of Canada implemented a bill called the Spending Control Act. That bill basically limited the amount of money the government can spend each year. That bill went out some four or five years into the future and said that each year we can increase by about 2.5 per cent or 3 per cent. That bill was put in place.
That bill said if we want to fund a new program, if we want to solve a new problem that has come along, if we want to spend some more money we are going to have to take that money from somewhere else in the system.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: Unless they amend the act.


René John Soetens: The member is obviously right. Parliament is ultimately its own master, but the fact of the matter is it set a policy that we believe in.
I note the opposition is totally opposed to spending controls. Not only is it opposed to spending controls, it votes that way in the House, but when it had the chance to be the government in Ottawa it increased spending by 14 per cent or 15 per cent a year.
When the Liberals got kicked out of Ottawa and unfortunately took over in Ontario they increased spending in Ontario by some 13 per cent or 14 per cent a year and the NDP, which said that it would show how to control it, managed to do the same thing in the first year. In the second year it said how great it was because it only increased spending at 6 per cent when the inflation rate was 2 per cent.
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The NDP can take credit for saying that in its last budget it increased spending less than had been increased in the previous seven years of Ontario government history, but it spent money it did not have. It did not want to raise taxes, even though it did, and now it has to announce that the money it announced it was spending last year, the year before and the year before and the thousands of employees that it keeps adding helter-skelter for no reason, now must be cut back. If the NDP had made the decision two, three and four years ago it would not have that problem.
We made those decisions two, three and four years ago. It was not easy for us to say to our public servants: We are sorry, your salary is frozen. We got the static. Certainly in my riding as an MPI got the static. We froze the salaries of the federal Public Service while the provincial public service was getting salary increases of 8 per cent, 10 per cent and 12 per cent. Nobody knew where the money was coming from, and it is rather evident today that the provincial government still does not know where it is coming from. It is now trying to figure out ways of not having to pay the salaries by some new thing called a social contract. It will be interesting to see just what that says. Is there some polite way of saying to people: We are sorry, you cannot have a raise? I guess they will find out what it is. It will be interesting to see.
The member for Kingston and the Islands really wants to participate in this debate. I have no doubt that as soon as my time is up he will get up on his feet and have some really energizing ideas about how he agrees with us controlling our spending. I will ask him maybe to stand up and indicate whether he agrees that we ought to control spending because that is fundamentally what Bill C-93 is about. It controls expenses.
In Canada we have a multiplicity of boards and agencies which no longer serve a purpose or serve a purpose that can be delivered in a different fashion. Bill C-93 proposes to amalgamate, to change, to consolidate and to allow some things to be delivered in a different fashion.
All the speakers seemed to have spent an awful lot of time discussing the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. I am sorry that the government is even keeping the group going because if I took some time to do a survey of my constituents to see just how much money this group ought to get my constituents would say to give it nothing. I might have some sympathy for that position, but I also understand that although

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some of these agencies may not serve a purpose that I personally agree with there are other interests and other needs that need to be served in Canada and this agency does that.
The member talks about reports about phone calls and whether there will be a saving as a result of the merger of the Canada Council and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. I noticed that the parliamentary secretary tabled a letter from the Canada Council on that very subject this morning.
It is important to understand that we have operated in a fashion so that all these boards and agencies are at arm's length from government. We give them a certain amount of money, a budget, and they are to operate as they see best with that money.
I have a copy here of a letter that was issued by Paule Leduc. It is really quite clear and I do not know why the member would question this. I would like to read two paragraphs from it because it is rather relevant and it is from the Canada Council. The letter reads:
Following our discussions concerning future savings resulting from the merger of SSHRC and the Canada Council I think we can reasonably expect that ongoing savings in the order of $5 million annually could be achieved after four to five years of the existence of the new combined agency.
It is also expected that savings will occur earlier in the process, probably as soon as year three. But at this stage I cannot give a definite amount.
The letter goes on a bit but the important point is that we are setting the stage. We may not today see a specific saving that results in a reduction in this year's budget but we all know as members of Parliament that three, four or five years from now there are going to be people out there saying: We want x, this is something new and we need some money to deal with it. The Government of Canada will want to respond to that.
What I read here is that there could potentially be a saving of some $5 million in this program which could be used to reduce the taxes of all Canadians, which I am sure many of us in this House would like to do, or the $5 million could be used to satisfy the concerns of the
member for Kingston and the Islands. I am sure he has some pet project for which he would love the Government of Canada to come into his riding and spend some money. Unfortunately he will not be here in three or four years to encourage that $5 million to be spent, but needless to say when we have the ribbon cutting in his riding we will probably send him an invitation if he is still in Kingston.
I think it is important. Why is the government doing these things? Let us talk about the Canada Council and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.


Ron J. Duhamel: It is trying to get elected and you know it.


René John Soetens: Now we are hearing from Manitoba. It is always interesting to have input from members on the other side. They continue to oppose any method of government restraint. They will stand up and argue against billion dollar cuts. Here they are arguing about one that is not necessarily going to cut a program. It is going to save through efficiencies in the delivery of the programs some $5 million. They are arguing against that. It does not come as a surprise to me because they would argue against anything that saves money. They would certainly argue in favour of everything that spends money as long as it is being spent in their ridings.
Why is the government doing this? The two councils have the same function. The Canada Council and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council have the same function. They are both granting councils. By granting councils we mean that they take taxpayers' money and give it to somebody for a project, whatever that project is. They decide whether the project is worthy or not. They both use a process of review in which they bring individuals into the process to determine whether the program or the idea should be funded, whether they should give a grant. It has worked in the past. They were together for some 25 years. Why should they not be together today?
Bringing them together will in the long run, as has been clearly indicated by Dr. Leduc from the Canada Council, save the taxpayers some $5 million.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: What utter rubbish.
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René John Soetens: They are opposed to that over there. Of course the member for Kingston and the Islands says nonsense. He is not interested in saving money. That is what the nonsense is about in this debate.
It goes a little further than that. We will arrive at the $5 million saving by combining two administrative and support structures, things like personnel, financial, and information. We are going to roll that all into one agency. We are going to have a single governing council of 21 people rather than two councils for a combined total of 43. That is an excellent saving.
They will not need double the space. They will use less space and therefore lower the costs. There will be streamlined procedures and simpler, more flexible financial management.
We can make all those changes and not affect the interests of the artists or social scientists.
The mandate of the new council will combine the powers and functions of the two existing councils and maintain the arm's length relationship with the government. Hopefully in the budget next Monday the Minister of Finance, if he takes some advice I have extended to him, will make sure it has a little less money to deal with. That would be just fine as well.
Whatever money it will have to deal with it will be able to do so at arm's length from the politicians, whether they are Conservatives, Liberals, the NDP, Reform, Bloc Quebecois, Independent, or whoever else sits on that side of the House. Those are very positive steps.
There are some other things in this budget. I realize the opposition thinks there is only one agency being wound up. After listening to their speeches one would certainly have that impression. There are some other agencies that are being wound up that are very good. Some of the wind-ups do not save an awful lot of money. If it is possible to reduce one person here, two people there and four in another area, all those things cumulatively add up to a very beneficial saving. Conversely what has happened in Ontario with the NDP, as we have found, is that one person is added here, one person there, six here, eight there and ten there, or 500 here and 1,000 there. Before we know it we have to figure out how to find 8,000 positions or 10,000 positions to cut. That is the problem the NDP in Ontario has to face.
We in Ottawa are saying that we realize the problem and that is why, certainly in the last two budgets and hopefully in the one next Monday, we will continue to find places where we are prepared to tighten the budget as it should be done.
One agency that is being wound up is the Petroleum Monitoring Agency. Its functions are being undertaken by the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources which will continue to analyse confidential reports from the industry on the state of petroleum supplies and pricing.
Do we need that separate agency? Do we need two or three people or in fact the eight people involved in that particular agency? I would suggest we do not need that. Do we really care? I do not care who owns the gas station at the end of the street. If I see a gas station I am going to pull in and I am going to buy gas.
I am not opposed to foreign investment. Maybe others in this House are and that is fine. That is their prerogative. I know that in my constituency and in many constituencies across the country foreign investment has played an integral part in providing opportunities for jobs, development, new initiatives and new ideas. I do not think we particularly need this agency. I would be quite happy to have it go.
Another one that is going is Emergency Preparedness Canada. We have a Department of National Defence. Hopefully it can handle whatever emergency we might have to deal with. This group is being rolled back into the Department of National Defence. It will deal with co-ordination of civil emergency preparedness. In this day and age of reduced problems we have to take control.
The Procurement Review Board, the Canadian Commercial Corporation, Agricultural Products Board, Enterprise Cape Breton Corporation and the Intellectual Property Tribunal and a whole series of other boards are being wound up. That is absolutely great. I wish I had more time to convince all these people opposite about the merits of this bill, but I respect my time has now ended.


Mr. Phillip Edmonston (Chambly):: Mr. Speaker, I was listening to my colleague with a great deal of interest. Most speakers on this side of the House, if not all of them, have said there has not been any concrete proof

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that this reorganization would give the savings alleged by the government side.
Different figures have been bandied about: $5 million a year and $1.5 million a year. Let us just cast these figures aside and look in a general sense at what this means.
The government is trying to create an atmosphere that it wants to trim, cut and streamline. If I could see one shred of evidence this is in fact what it is doing, I could vote for this legislation, but that evidence is lacking. When we do not see an apparent benefit, why change the structure?
There are some benefits. I would ask my colleague to consider the benefits of reorganization in a different sense, benefits which are obvious to most Canadians and things that the government could do right away. I am not going to be talking about the helicopter situation. I do not know how many times we have spent the $5 billion or $6 billion over and over and over. Other things could be done which would probably be more logical.
I have a question for my colleague. Why not combine the Ministry of Finance and Revenue Canada? Why not give the provinces that already are dealing with tourism this power completely, not have a Tourism Canada and let the provinces be responsible?
Over the past 25 years I have dealt with the Department of Consumer and Corporate Affairs as a consumer protection advocate. Why not let it be decentralized and let the provinces be responsible for corporate affairs as they are right now for financial institutions and for consumer protection? I have been very much impressed by what the provinces have done in the area of consumer protection.
I am saying this in a non-partisan way to my hon. colleague. Has he considered it? Would he be able to vote for an elimination of the doubling up of services which are costing us so much nowadays?


René John Soetens: Mr. Speaker, it is certainly a very appropriate question. I will very quickly respond to it.
Although the hon. member has not seen the savings that may emanate from Bill C-93, his colleague did receive a letter from the Canada Council indicating savings of some $5 million. There were savings of about
$1 million by the consolidation of the RCMP Public Complaints Commission, which is very important, and the Canada Commercial Corporation savings of $1 million. He is voting against savings which are small but nonetheless there.
Now he asks me whether I would support the merger of finance and revenue. Mergers of a number of departments would be very appropriate. For example, merging the Revenue Canada operation of sales tax with the provincial operation of sales tax would be very important. That proposal would be interesting in that it makes an awful lot of sense. I am sure we will bring that forward in our next mandate. Unfortunately the hon. member will not be here. However, if he were here, I know full well he would be standing on his feet, voting against the very proposal that today he asks us whether we would support.
A number of those kinds of ministries could be folded into each other if they are federal jurisdiction. In some cases we may do some things federally that can be better done provincially. I would hazard to say that some things which are done provincially may be better done federally. We have a massive shopping mall complex in my riding that went bankrupt because the financial institution providing the funding was not regulated federally. I am not sure it might not have happened anyway, but at least we have federal regulators who may have prevented it from happening.
When that institution went broke it took some 5,000 senior citizens' money out of the Niagara Peninsula with it. By letting the federal government regulate all financial institutions, whether they are banks, trust companies or insurance companies, by letting it take on the whole gamut, we would benefit by a reduction of duplication.
I know full well that when we bring those ideas forward in the next Parliament, those who managed to survive the next election on the other side will rise to their feet to vote in opposition to every one of those ideas.


Ron J. Duhamel: Mr. Speaker, my colleague mentioned the Expenditure Control Act. I was wondering if he could comment on the efficiency of the act when virtually every single year since they have been in government they have had a deficit in excess of $30 billion. Just to make sure we understand each other,
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that is over $30,000 million short every single year. What an efficient piece of legislation.
Would he not agree that the Expenditure Control Act is flawed? Just as with this one they pretend it is going to be doing something it is not going to do to try to persuade Canadians that they should come back to their side. Canadians will not be fooled. They will not be fooled again.


René John Soetens: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is absolutely right. We have had some very large deficits in the country, all of them a direct result of compound interest on the debt left by the opposition.
It is interesting. The spending control bill he is critical of basically says to the government that-


Ron J. Duhamel: Nobody believes that any more. It is nonsense.


Mr. AUmand:: The Canadian people will decide. Let's have an election.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Order, please. I cannot hear the hon. member. The hon. member for Ontario has the floor. Anybody else who wants to get up for a question or comment will have a turn.


René John Soetens: The spending control act in fact takes the existing programs of the Government of Canada and says that they will not spend more than about 2.5 per cent in each of the following three years. That bill only came into effect last year. I note that it really was not very well supported by the opposition at that time.
When the minister brings down his budget next week I presume he will stick to the requirement that we will not exceed the limitations within the spending control act. I look forward to the member suggesting next week that the government was right on, that it honoured its spending control commitment not to increase spending even though I know that if there are some cuts in the budget, and I hope there are, that member, along with his colleagues, will stand in the House and vote against every one of those spending cuts without even knowing what they are.
I can say today that the people on that side of the House will vote against every spending cut. As brilliant, as well conceived, as much as it is wanted by the people
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of the country, those members over there will stand to vote against all our cuts.


David Charles Dingwall: Mr. Speaker, I am happy to participate in third reading of Bill C-93 and being able to follow my learned and distinguished colleague from Ontario. He has made a number of observations on government restraint and government cutbacks as they relate to the deficit.
My colleague opposite comes to this Chamber with great sincerity and with perhaps a sense of false security about his future which is obvious to all those who understand the political nature of the country. We also know that repeatedly the hon. member for Ontario has shown himself to be a man who has focused himself and his political career, short lived that it will be, on the elimination of the deficit.
The hon. member in achieving his goal of deficit elimination has not been very successful because he and his colleague, particularly the President of the Treasury Board who happens to join with us today, have been inept. I am forced to use the word and regrettably so, but I am sure you will understand, Mr. Speaker. They have been incompetent in understanding the game or the practice of how to reinvigorate an economy which has been in recession for an extended period of time. I have listened and I have learned from members opposite that they do not possess the political will or the know-how to address the issue of deficit reduction.
Deficit reduction is directly related to economic growth. Without economic growth there will not be a reduction in the deficit. Somehow the President of the Treasury Board and the Minister of Agriculture who travel the world in various forms have not learned or do not understand that we must have a growing economy to reduce the deficit.
We have heard from minister after minister, leadership candidate after leadership candidate, that their only purpose in public life is to cut, cut, cut. If we were to follow the logic of the opponent of the President of the Treasury Board, the Minister of the Environment who says he will eliminate the deficit in four years, we would have to get rid of old age security. We would have to do away with medicare. We would have to do away with veterans affairs. Is that what they want in this country? I think the answer is no.

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I am a little reluctant to say anything further on the remarks of the hon. member for Ontario who is not here at the moment, but he has made some outlandish statements with regard to controlling the deficit. He makes specific reference to Bill C-93. In his remarks he said: "Another board that will save lots of money is Enterprise Cape Breton Corporation".
I spoke on this matter at second reading as well as at report stage and I presented a number of amendments thereto which unfortunately were not accepted by members opposite. Nevertheless, I think it is worthwhile to note that that particular agency was earmarked to be a tool for economic development on the island of Cape Breton.
It is not I but the Tory senator who for all practical purposes is now running the campaign for one of the leadership hopefuls, the Minister of National Defence. The senator in question is Senator Lowell Murray of the other place. He is the gentleman who said not less than five years ago in the Hansard of the other place that Enterprise Cape Breton Corporation was a nation-building exercise. It was a nation-building measure, to be certain. That is what he said then. It was to foster economic development in an area of the country stricken with high unemployment. In fact, just the other day the statistics became available. It is 29.4 per cent, a shamefully high level of unemployment.
What is the government's response to that? It does away with the very corporation it put in existence several years before which had the mandate to increase, develop and facilitate economic development. Now it is doing away with that. It does not make sense. It does not make sense to the people in Saskatchewan. It does not make sense to the people in Quebec. It does not make sense to the people in Ontario nor the Canadians who happen to live on the island of Cape Breton.
I would have thought that since the senator in the other place is such an influential individual that the Minister of Finance would have seen his way and said: "We better go back and look at what has been said about this corporation and maintain it for its purposes are laudable. Its goals ought to be achievable and its results, if obtained, will have an immediate and positive impact on a society of our country", but that has not happened at all. In point of fact the Government of Canada is
doing away with it because it does not enjoy the support. I say so. You, Sir, being a distinguished and learned person of this Chamber might find my remarks to be somewhat cynical.
However, that agency is no longer in existence because it does not enjoy the support of the federal cabinet minister from Central Nova. It does not enjoy the support of the province of Nova Scotia, particularly the premier, Mr. Don Cameron. Those two individuals have been grossly, and I underline the word grossly, negligent. They have shown wanton disregard for those individuals living in that area of the country. By not standing up and fighting openly and publicly for the reinstatement of this agency, that for me, my constituents and the people living next door to me is a demonstrable sign that the compassion one expects from a national government just does not exist for those across the way.
I say that with great regret because there are good Tories. There are good Tories in my district. There are good Tories on the island of Cape Breton. I ask my good Tory friends: Do you agree with this measure to choke off this agency whose sole purpose was to create and enhance economic development? Do you now agree with the government of the day that it is no longer useful to maintain this particular operation?
I would have thought that the Minister of Agriculture would have stood in his place today and taken me to task for some of the comments I have made about him and his role in terms of the government cutbacks. However it falls now to the President of the Treasury Board to stand in his place and say that his colleagues have done the right thing, that the senator in the other place was either lying to the people of Canada, in particular to the people of Cape Breton, or as they say in my district and I say with great regret, that the senator in the other place was being careless with the truth.
We know that not only was he careless with the truth but he was also doing it for the sole political purpose in 1988 of trying to win seats in the province of Nova Scotia. Today they are capitulating to the provincial government of Don Cameron by doing away with Enterprise Cape Breton. The sole reason is that it is a political manoeuvre by the provincial premier and the hon. member from Central Nova. It is to punish those of us who have seen the wisdom as hundreds of thousands of Canadians have registered from coast to coast that the government
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opposite is not just incompetent, it no longer deserves the support of the Canadian people.
We are being punished as a society. The President of the Treasury Board has a great knowledge of the distinct society and what it means for the province of Quebec. I hope he will tell those individuals in Cape Breton who also believe themselves to be a distinct society in many respects as to why they are being denied the opportunity to fully participate in the Canadian economy. I hope the minister will have the intestinal fortitude to stand in his place moments from now and defend this reckless and wanton disregard for a people whose region has an unemployment rate of 29.4 per cent.
Is it fair, Mr. Speaker? I know you, Sir. I have known you for a long time. You are distinguished and you are learned. You are responsible and fair. Is it fair? Is it fair to cut people adrift?
Now the minister will stand in his place and he will take out one of his pieces of paper and he will say: "This is what we have given those people down there. They are on Canada pension. They are on Canada pension disability. We have done this for Devco and we have done that".
We are not looking for handouts. We are looking for an opportunity to participate fully in the Canadian economy. We do not need any minister of the Crown doing the shameless things that have been done to the people of Cape Breton over the last number of years and more recently with the elimination of this particular development agency.
I say through you, Mr. Speaker, to all ministers opposite. I stand here today and I speak for those thousands of young people who are without work, whose only hope is to migrate out of that area to somewhere else. Then again the Canadian economy is so weak that there is nowhere else where the talents they have to offer can be accepted. I speak for the senior citizens down there who wish that their sons and daughters had an opportunity to make a meaningful life and to participate fully in the Canadian economy. I speak for the coal miners and all of those resource people in my constituency and other constituencies who wish to have meaningful work so that they can make a contribution to their
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community, a contribution that many of us take for granted.
However, cutting this agency adrift will do absolutely nothing to enhance economic development. It will retard economic development on the island of Cape Breton.
I hope as this debate comes to an end the real reason will be given clearly in this Chamber. It is that we are being penalized in Cape Breton by the minister from Central Nova and the premier of the province, Don Cameron, because of the way in which we have voted in previous elections.
This was supposed to be the new wave, a different way of doing business, but it is the old practices of the Mulroney government at best, the Diefenbaker regime, and of course the Stanfield years in the province of Nova Scotia: Hit often but hit low; hit those that are least able to stand for themselves and hit those areas of the country that are least able to engender and to foster economic development.
That is what Bill C-93 does. It eliminates the Enterprise Cape Breton Corporation. It eliminates those jobs and that purpose from government and from the national government. When I hear the hon. member from Ontario who stood in his place not moments ago and just made a passing reference, does he wonder why there is such antipathy? Does he wonder why there are such ill feelings toward other regions of the country, when we are treated like second class citizens? We do not want to be treated like second class citizens, because we are not second class citizens. It is high time that the government opposite took that into careful consideration when planning its mandate and election platform.
I fear that with this continual erosion of an economic base and the consistent and persistent battering of a community that there are very few alternatives left for that society to take. I make mention of civil disobedience, not to condone it, make no mistake about that.
However, I have seen far too many unemployed young people, far too many students who do not have sufficient income to pursue a post-secondary education, far too many senior citizens who do not have sufficient moneys to care for themselves and their families, far too many residents without the appropriate housing, far too many municipalities without the appropriate infrastructure. I

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have seen an uncaring, unwilling and untrusting government which has once again played its hand in a very negative way against the people of my district and indeed the people of Cape Breton.
Mr. Speaker, in the time that I have remaining which you have indicated is approximately 20 minutes-oh, two minutes, I am sorry. I thought there might be unanimous consent for me to continue.


An hon. member:: There is.
An hon member: There is not.


David Charles Dingwall: I say to the members opposite that I will be travelling in the province of Nova Scotia during the next number of weeks. I will be in my own district campaigning on behalf of my party. I am sure hon. members opposite will be doing the same. I have never said and I have never played the game that the Tories opposite have been playing. I said in this House and in the public forum that it is a shameful act for the Government of Canada to play one poor region off against another poor region.
I want to say that some day, somewhere, in the next number of years there will be the opportunity for a debate with the provincial premier and I hope the member for Central Nova, if he has the intestinal fortitude or the guts, as we say in my district. I will have the opportunity to debate and discuss with them in an open public forum the ways in which they have divided our province.
I say to the House with all the sincerity I can muster, that it is not fair, it is not just, it is not in the public interest to be devastating one area of a province to assist another at its expense. It is a shameful act. It will be remembered as a shameful act. It will be written as a shameful act.
I will be there, whether in public life or not, defending the best interests of a people whose over-all objective is not to seek handouts from the Government of Canada but to be full partners in participating in the Canadian economy and making a contribution to their community as their ancestors have done and as generations of Cape Bretoners have done before them.


Philip Edmonston: Mr. Speaker, I would like to comment briefly on what was said by my hon. colleague.
He said the government was incompetent in the way it planned its budget. I must say I agree with him, but I was somewhat surprised at the reaction of one of our government colleagues, who said that whenever the opposition had a chance to vote in favour of cutting or streamlining government spending, they systematically voted against these measures.
I have been here for only three years, but I remember that at one point, we did have a unanimous vote in the House, when members of the various parties endorsed and supported a number of government bills.
I have the following question for my colleague: would he agree that the government is wrong to say that the opposition always opposes the government? Could he mention a few instances of almost unanimous co-operation on certain bills? As you know, we are here to protect the interests of all Canadians, not to oppose legislation as a matter of course.


David Charles Dingwall: Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for the question. He asked an important question.
My colleague should not be sucked into the ideology of the right which says in its essence, in its very form, that the only manner in which a deficit can be cut is to eliminate programs. Yes, there are programs. Yes, there are cuts that one could say, intellectually speaking that is, that we would agree with. However, where the Canadian economy is at the present time has to be one aspect of a much broader picture.
There is a crisis with the deficit but there is a crisis in unemployment. There is a crisis with interest rates in terms of the spread between Canada and the United States. The monetary policies of the government have not added anything. The mere fact is that the government has said its sole purpose was to fight inflation. You must have not only one goal, you must have several goals. It must be a balanced approach. Yes, there has to be deficit reduction, but it cannot be done in isolation
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from other things. We cannot forget the unemployed, as my leader said quite aptly.
If you listen to the Minister of National Defence and the Minister of the Environment, Mr. Speaker, by getting rid of Veterans Affairs, old age security and medicare and have an unemployment rate of 25 per cent, you know what you have, you have a revolution on your hands. People are not going to put up with that. Therefore, it must be a balanced approach.
I say affirmatively to my colleague in answer to his first question that it must be part of a balanced program taking other matters such as unemployment, interest rates, property values, what have you, into consideration.


Simon Leendert de Jong: Mr. Speaker, I am enjoying the comments of the member from Cape Breton. I think the point I made when discussing report stage is that while the government again justifies the move as one with increased efficiencies, the documents obtained under freedom of information do not show any savings whatsoever. That is the estimate of Treasury Board.
Earlier today we heard the parliamentary secretary white-washing the study from Treasury Board, saying it was done before the government announced this decision. I find this strange reasoning on his part because Treasury Board figured it was going to cost a million dollars to do away with the Enterprise Cape Breton Corporation.
I also appreciate his remarks that we are going to have increased inefficiencies. It is going to prevent the local people from having some control over their own destinies and development. While we have seen the government attempting to cut the deficit and the budget by slashing and burning, invariably it has had the opposite effect because the accumulated debt has doubled during its mandate.
Obviously its attempts at deficit reduction has the opposite effect. I would suspect as well that the move they are making with the Enterprise Cape Breton Corporation will have the opposite effect. It will not increase efficiency but will increase inefficiencies. It will not save money. It will cost more money. As well it will further create the sense of lack of power of the people of Cape Breton.
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I know the member is a senior member of the Liberal Party and involved in decision-making. Earlier today I was made aware that the Canadian Federation for the Humanities has addressed a letter to his leader, asking if the Liberals should form the next government or be involved in forming the next government, would a Liberal government undertake to dismantle what Bill C-93 does. Of course the humanities are particularly concerned with the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council being folded into the Canada Council.
During second reading of this bill I asked a member of the Liberal Party what the position of the Liberal Party would be and was given the assurance that a Liberal government would undo what this government is attempting to do in Bill C-93.1 wonder if the hon. member for Cape Breton can give us as well the assurance that a Liberal government would do everything in its power to separate again the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council from the Canada Council.


David Charles Dingwall: Mr. Speaker, there were a lot of questions in the preamble to which one could respond. In essence my hon. friend has asked me as a lonely MP in a great political party whether or not I believe this could be reinstated or restored under a Liberal government. He used a phrase which I think I have to explain "if" we become the government.
I would hope that my hon. friend, when we are on that side of the floor and they are over here as the Official Opposition in the next Parliament, will support us in our attempts to reinstate the pith and substance of Bill C-93 which has, I believe, far-reaching concerns in terms of the efficiency of the government but also certainly will have, if it goes through as I anticipate it will, negative effects. The answer to my hon. colleague's question is that we will attempt with urgency, dispatch, vigour, enthusiasm but within a sense of realism, the objectives that we believe to be important.
I emphasize that some of those objectives have been edified by my colleague from St. Boniface. We will attempt as best we can to try to reinstate some of the agencies that the government has done away with.
I would hope reciprocally that my colleague to the far left will support us in our attempt as we become, after the next election, the government and the NDP becomes

April 23, 1993
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the Official Opposition. The members across the way will become the third or fourth party.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: Mr. Speaker, I am sorry that no member of the government sees fit to rise to participate in the debate at this stage. I can understand why.
We have had two apologies from the government for a bill that frankly ought not to be before the House. It is really a shocking piece of legislation and I have had occasion to say so before.
I am delighted to have this opportunity to participate today in spite of the absence of government members from participation. I am glad to see some here. It is unusual on a Friday afternoon to have so many. That is very nice.


An hon. member:: They came to hear you Peter.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: I would like to think that was true. It probably is not but I appreciate the thoughtfulness of his comment.
I know the President of the Treasury Board may have come for my speech because I know he enjoys my speeches. That is all right. I do not want to be immodest, as the hon. member would suggest.
What surprised me as I prepared my remarks for today's debate was the amazing fact that I found a newspaper article to support the Liberal Party's position from a Tory pamphlet writer. Our good friend, Jeffrey Simpson, who writes a frequent column in The Globe and Mail and who is invariably writing columns that support the government's position, has written one that criticizes the government's position on this bill.
I urge the ministers and the members in the House on the other side to heed what Mr. Simpson said. Normally, as they all know, he is writing apologies for the blundering errors and gaffs that the government makes on such a regular basis. Today he has written something which says the government has made a mistake. He says the opposition parties are quite right to kick up a fuss. That is the concluding statement in the column. We are getting up and kicking. We have been kicking on this but the government has brought in closure as it usually does on unpopular measures.


Ross Belsher: Time allocation, entirely different.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: It restricts debate. Lately on every unpopular bill the government has used closure.
The extraordinary thing is the government House leader who pretends to be so interested in Parliament got two bills through the House the other day with practically no debate. Things just went sailing through, three bills in one day. Yet we have closure for the rest of the week on both stages of this bill.
I suggest this is not the way to run Parliament. This is an abuse of the process of the House. One day on third reading and a Friday at that is not enough time for debate on a bill of the importance that parts of this bill have.
I see the hon. member for Ontario sitting there and grinning from ear to ear with this Cheshire cat grin.


René John Soetens: I wanted to hear your speech.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: He has come back for my speech. I recognize that. I enjoyed his and I know he enjoyed my heckling.
I want to say to him that his speech was not convincing. He talked about some of the parameters of the bill as ones that would produce great savings for the Government of Canada. We are saving $15 million by this tremendous package that we are passing today. I believe it is $15 million over five years.


Ross Belsher: It's a start in the right direction.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: I can understand why the government House leader is using closure. He does not think this bill is very important. In some ways it is not because it is not saving veiy much money. It is probably costing us more to debate it in the House than it will save over the five years.


René John Soetens: Sit down then and we'll double the savings.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: That is beside the point. It is typical of the government and it is typical of the Government Expenditure Restraint Act it introduced, which was a lot of nonsense too, as I suggested to the hon. member in his speech earlier. I want to talk about this bill. There are some positive aspects to it. I have said that before. I said it at second reading stage. What is wrong with this bill is that the government is merging SSHRC with the Canada Council.
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There was evidence tendered before the legislative committee that studied this particular bill. I wish the hon. member for Ontario had read the evidence before that committee before he made his speech. I think he might have recanted some of the statements he made. Really, he got carried away.
What happened in this case is that the minister quailed at the prospect of appearing before the committee to try to defend this policy. He sent some of his minions to appear before the committee to try to explain away the government's policy.
These minions were left in a terrible position because I suspect that they had the brains to disagree with the policy. I suspect that they realized that somebody had thought this up the night before the budget and stuck it in at the last minute in some effort to make it look as though the government was doing something to save money by abolishing some 40 organizations. I think that is what the government trumpeted in the budget speech. It was going to merge, amalgamate or phase out all these government organizations. This is the second bill we have had in implementing the budget in that respect.
In spite of all that, in spite of all this window dressing, the total savings as a result of these changes amounts to $15 million over five years. That is $3 million a year if I have figured that out correctly. What a bonanza: $3 million a year when the deficit is $35 billion a year. This is this government's idea of saving money and cutting back.
The government says that we vote against all its efforts to save money. I think that even it might understand why we voted against saving $3 million when it is running a deficit of $35 billion, which it told us would be gone by this year when it had its first budget back in 1984.


René John Soetens: You and I were not here.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: The hon. member for Ontario is right. He and I were not here. Here is the interesting thing. I was not here back in the Trudeau years either, which he and the Prime Minister keep blaming for all the country's ills. Yet he points at me every time and says: "It is those big spending Liberals". He puts me into this kettle of fish.
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I fully support my party and I am not embarrassed by the record. I could suggest to him that he ought to be ashamed of his government's record. It was not just pre-1988 because the same blundering incompetence has continued uninterrupted without even a suggestion of a hint of change since 1988. It has carried on right until now and that is why we have this serious financial crisis in Canada. This bill is supposed to be doing something about it but in fact it is doing almost nothing.
Look at the estimates that were presented in committee. The hon. member for Ontario in his speech this morning said that this particular item, this SSHRC-Can-ada Council merger, was going to save $5 million over five years. Where he got this figure, I do not know. Certainly the minions that the minister sent to the committee did not come up with that figure. I would like to quote Mr. Patriquin from page 33 of issue number 1 of the committee's proceedings.
The hon. member is waving some paper at me. I am sure the government members have dug up something since because they had to go and do some research to back up the answers that could not be given at this committee.
Let me read what Mr. Patriquin said in answer to the question:
The estimates of savings were made by the officials, acting in preparation for a budget, and there would be no studies that I understand could be released on that subject.
I presume Mr. Patriquin said that because the government does not release pre-budget studies. Fine, but I suspect also that there were not any. Then he said:
There are other studies that have been referred to that were the genesis of at least one of the proposals referred to earlier, which is indeed in the public domain, I believe. But we would have no particular studies on costing of these savings that are to be released. It has essentially been part of the normal resource allocation process in government.
In other words, for this particular item it had almost nothing to back up the calculated savings.
In fact, earlier on Mr. Patriquin in his testimony suggested that of all the ones they had costed, all the ones they had predicted savings for, this was the one that was least well prepared. In other words they really had no idea that they would save anything whatever by amalgamating SSHRC with the Canada Council.

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As my very distinguished colleague from Mount Royal pointed out in the course of her questions before the committee, these two bodies that had once been together are now divorced. Somehow the hon. member for Ontario was trying to suggest that because they had been divorced then it was logical to put them back together.
That makes as much logic as suggesting to some married couple that has been divorced that they should remarry. They may want to, but if they do not want to we do not force them. Yet the government is forcing these bodies to do that. Neither wants it, neither asked for it and neither was consulted as to whether they would even consider it. The government just announced this silly policy in a budget speech. The Minister of Finance did not know what else to suggest because he was so bankrupt of ideas on how to save any money and how to manage the Canadian economy in any sensible way. This whole bill is a disgrace.
I have an open letter that was sent by the Social Science Federation of Canada to some members of Parliament who had the good sense to oppose this bill. It is signed by some 25 veiy distinguished Canadian academics who are appalled that the government would proceed in this high-handed way to deal with the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.


René John Soetens: From Queen's.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: One of them is from Queen's, the hon. member for Ontario is correct, but most of them are not. Most of them are from other universities across the country. I realize there may not be one in Whitby but I suspect that if he looked and dug a little deeper he might find that some of these people live in his constituency. In any event, there are people from the University of Toronto, University of Ottawa, University of British Columbia, Universite de Montreal, Acadia University, Sir Wilfred Laurier University, University of Guelph, Carleton University, Dalhousie University, Universite Laval, University of Regina, University of Calgary and I could go on.
These people are appalled that this government would fail to listen to the voices of Canadians in the social science community of this country who feel their independence is being done away with and who see, in the short-sighted goal to save possibly $500,000 over five years and no more, that this government is selling them
down the river. It shows a complete disregard for arts funding in this country and for interest in the arts and social sciences. By lumping these two together the government is ignoring the pleas of these people to leave them alone and let them continue to do their jobs. Indeed, all they get met with is a group of cuts.
I see my very distinguished colleague from Winnipeg South Centre has appeared to participate in this debate. Given the time limitations that I fear may be in place because of the use of closure, I would be happy to give the remaining 10 minutes of my 20 minutes to him so that he could make his remarks subject to the question and comment period that I know will follow.


Ron J. Duhamel: Mr. Speaker, I just have a very brief comment and question for my colleague.
My colleague has indicated that a number of prominent Canadians have condemned this particular bill. Does he know of any prominent Canadian from any of those communities, the artistic, academic or research communities, who has supported this bill? If so, would he please name that individual.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: Mr. Speaker, I will admit to knowing one. It is the government House leader. I understand he has a Ph.D. in chemical engineering. I believe Dr. Andre has supported this bill.


Some hon. members:: Who?


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: Dr. Harvie Andre, the government House leader. However he is the only academic of any stature that I am aware of who has supported this bill.


Ron J. Duhamel: I did say academic stature.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: The hon. gentleman does have a postgraduate degree so I am giving him the benefit of the doubt. I realize he is no longer an academic, but I understand-


An hon. member:: I do not think he ever was an academic.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: The hon. member says perhaps he never was an academic. I do not know, but I thought that perhaps many years ago, before his election to Parliament, he was an academic. I do not know what profession he had, but I know that he has these excellent qualifications. He is the only one I know of who supports this bill. No one that I am aware of who is currently teaching in a university supports this bill. I have not
April 23, 1993

heard any support come from the university community in my constituency. There are two of them there.
Queen's University and the Royal Military College are both in Kingston and the Islands and I have had no support indicated for this bill from anyone in those two academic institutions. I have not received any letters of support for this bill from any other academic in any other part of Canada. I have had a fair bit of correspondence on this and I believe it was all in opposition. None of the letters were in support.
To answer my hon. friend's question, aside from the government House leader, whose academic stature could perhaps be questioned as he has been a politician for a long time, I am aware of no one who is supporting this bill.
Frankly, I think if he were not in this House he probably would not support the bill either. However, because he is a member of a cabinet that slashes and cuts all over the place I guess he is supporting it.
I have just been handed a note. There are two other members of the cabinet who have doctorates. The Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development apparently has some academic qualifications, and he supports it. The Minister of State for Small Businesses also has a doctorate, and he supports it. However there are other academics in this House, including the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre who is about to entertain us with his speech. I know he does not support this bill. He has told me how awful this bill is and I am sure he will want to tell the House how awful it is. I am looking forward to his address.


Lloyd Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, I particularly want to thank my colleague from Kingston and the Islands for his generous invitation to share with the House the very stimulating and passionate exchanges we have had about this bill over the past several months. I can say that I do represent that small but doughty group of people in the House of Commons who came from academic life, albeit a long time ago, and who find the purpose of this bill to be both nonsensical and particularly galling in terms of the objectives set out by the government.
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It is interesting that we are debating this bill when a new budget is about to be presented on Monday. There is a very important lesson to be learned in this debate about how not to do budgets. I recall vividly the grand announcements made by the Minister of Finance about all the new mergers, integrations and combinations he was going to make in order to save taxpayers' money.
Bill C-93 was a direct product of that commitment, but lo and behold there is no money to be saved. This is a massive renovation that will substantially undermine the academic external university relations of this country and is to no purpose at all other than cosmetic reasons. It is simply action for its own sake. This is a government that has lost any connection between ends and means. It is unable to relate a piece of legislation to an objective. It is all done with the purpose of trying to create the illusion of action. The end result is to undermine, weaken and erode some very substantial institutions in this country.
I want to speak in particular to an aspect of the bill that has been brought to my attention and which I feel sorrowful about. That is the way in which the international academic relations program of the Department of External Affairs is being tom away from the international foreign policy agency of our country and merged into a new creation without any particular rationale given. Certainly nobody was talked to and nobody was asked for their opinion.
It comes at perhaps one of the most important turning points in the history of this country. We are beginning to realize the impact of globalization and are beginning to understand that the security, prosperity and well-being of this country is now very dependent upon our establishing a whole range of links throughout the world.
One of the most important connections we can make is in the area of academic exchange through having other countries understand more about Canada and having teachers and researchers working in their countries to ensure they understand the benefits of Canadian science, social sciences, humanities and culture. One of the most effective programs for undertaking that outreach on behalf of Canadians to the rest of the world has been the international academic relations program which has ensured a very constant and creative flow of people and ideas emanating from Canada around the world. It is part of our foreign policy. Foreign policy is no longer just a group of diplomats meeting in embassies to talk about

April 23, 1993
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affairs of state. Foreign policy is now about the environment. It is about the movement of people. It is about the exchange of ideas. It is about developing new relationships between business and labour and universities and cultural organizations. One of the great and important impulses in the world ahead will be to broaden and enrich that diversity of connections and linkages.
At the time when an institution had been put in place, had been tempered by experience, was in a position to begin developing and expanding its role, what does the Conservative government do? It lops it off, turns it into a new agency, and the end result will be this. This new creation, whatever it is called, CHARC or CASH, I forget what the the acronym will be, is going to have to develop its own international outreach, its own officers, its own officials working in an international context which will compete with our own embassies abroad. We will now have a duplicate of function rather than an integrated function. We will be creating a competitive agency, having to go through all the pangs of start-up, getting new relations established, hiring people and beginning to reinvent the program all over again.
As a serious, rational thinker, Mr. Speaker, can you accept that as good public policy? Does that make sense in your eyes? It certainly does not make sense in the eyes of a wide range of institutions around the world. I have a file full of letters from different universities and research institutes around the world saying this is folly, this makes no sense, the government has gone cuckoo.
If people abroad can recognize that I guess the question is why cannot members of the caucus recognize it? I say to these members, if in the so-called time of constraint you had a legitimate case to make that actually large amounts of money were going to be saved, that it was going to be more efficient and more effective and more realistic and more rational, then all right. However every single piece of evidence, all testimony, every representation made by everybody who appeared before the committee or who have written letters, have said it simply is not going to work.
I put that on the table as an exhibit and a caution, that when we come to the next budget exercise and hear all the grand announcements on Monday, with the great
waves of applause emanating from the government benches about the new rationalization, remember Bill C-93. Remember what it does and does not do. It will not save money. It will create duplication, more bureaucracy, more competition at less cost and saving, and undermine a perfectly good program that has worked effectively on behalf of Canadians.


Philip Edmonston: Mr. Speaker, I listened with a great deal of interest to my colleague outlining his reasons for not supporting Bill C-93. He feels, as I feel, there is not sufficient proof to show there would really be that much saving or that much efficiency. I agree with him. I have not seen any proof either.
There has been ample opportunity through the hearings in committee and through the letters we as members of Parliament have received. We have not received one letter showing that there would be substantial savings. If you do not have this kind of proof I do not see how you could support legislation, a bill that purports to make for efficient government administration or one that is supposed to save money.
I have heard that we are talking about $5 million, one and a half million dollars per year. Different amounts of money have been bandied about, and I am not sure really whether those numbers are verifiable or not, but there are some numbers that are verifiable.
In my comment I would just like to say the government will have the opportunity to show how it can streamline, how it can get lean, how it can cut into the deficit with the budget we are expecting some time next week.
There are certain things we could suggest here. One is not to pass Bill C-93 because it is certainly not the kind of approach we would like to see taken, but there are some things the government could do.
Being from Quebec, everyone knows the province of Quebec has been one of the most vociferous provinces in its demands that duplication of responsibilities, organizations and ministries be reduced as much as possible. In a spirit of non-partisanship and in the spirit of just looking logically at the situation, earlier I had asked one of my colleagues on the government side whether we could not look at perhaps fusing the Department of Finance and Revenue Canada.
April 23, 1993

I would also look at areas such as devolving to the provincial side the control of regional development. That would be very important. It would no longer be a slush fund where different ministers just before an election could create a Hibernia or all sorts of other programs which really do not have much bearing in reality or are not commercially sound.
I believe it is time for us to seriously look at cutting the expense of government but not necessarily the programs. We begin by sending a message to the electorate that we are serious about cutting certain government expenses that can easily be done away with. That is before going into the programs because then there would be no choice. If we do not move right away we will not have to trim programs but we will have to start eliminating them and I do not want to do that.
The question to my colleague is this.


An hon. member:: It is about time.


Philip Edmonston: You are right it is about time.
Does he see anything positive about Bill C-93? One of his colleagues said earlier in committee that he mentioned there were some positive aspects. Does he see anything positive at all or is it just entirely negative?


Lloyd Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, as I said in my remarks perhaps the most positive thing about the bill is its demonstration of how not to go about streamlining, rationalizing or making change. It has become more of an exercise in futility than an exercise in frugality and that has been part of the problem.
The necessary groundwork was not undertaken to develop an effective program on which we would give grants to culture, social sciences and international academic organizations. No one was consulted. No examination was done. No one was asked for their opinion. It was simply a fiat from the Department of Finance and the minister. I do not know the particular grudge it has against these organizations.
I think it was concocted more in the bowels of a public relations agency in trying to create the fantasy that something was being done to save the taxpayers money as opposed to a serious policy analysis. If there is any heuristic value in this motion-I find it hard both to say the word and attribute such a noble motive to the
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government-it would be as a good way of how badly it governs.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Questions and comments are now terminated. Shall I call it 2.45 p.m.?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: It being 2.45 p.m., pursuant to an order made Wednesday, April 21, 1993 in accordance with the provisions of Standing Order 78(3), it is my duty to interrupt the proceedings and put forthwith every question necessary to dispose of the third reading stage of the bill now before the House.
The question is on the amendment. It is the pleasure of the House to adopt the amendment?


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


Some hon. members:: No.


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


Some hon. members:: Yea.


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


Some hon. members:: Nay.


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


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Pursuant to the order made Thursday, April 22, 1993, the recorded division stands deferred until six o'clock p.m., Tuesday, April 27, 1993.


Peter Andrew Stewart Milliken: Mr. Speaker, a point of order. The hon. member whose motion was to be debated in private members' hour today unfortunately has fallen ill. She fell ill yesterday and was unable to notify the Speaker because of her illness that she could not proceed today.
Accordingly, the private members' hour will be cancelled when three o'clock arrives. I am willing to call it three o'clock for that purpose. In light of the fact that she is ill, I wonder if there might be unanimous consent to allow her motion to stay in the order of precedence at the bottom of the order of precedence rather than be stricken off the order of precedence altogether.


Some hon. members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paproski):: Accordingly this House now stands adjourned until Monday at eleven o'clock a.m., pursuant to Standing Order 24(1).


[Stage Direction]
The House adjourned at 2.46 p.m.
[Stage Direction]
Monday, April 26, 1993