2011-02-09

The Speaker: It being Wednesday, we will now have the singing of the national anthem led by the hon. member for York West.
 [Members sang the national anthem] 
Mr. Patrick Brown (Barrie, CPC): Mr. Speaker, I want to take this opportunity to recognize an exceptional volunteer. 
Bill Dwyer spent his early years with the British army, where he fought in Italy during the Second World War. He was later posted to Base Borden and was part of the Canadian army for 20 years.
After a lifetime of serving in the armed forces, Bill then continued to serve his community through his outstanding fundraising efforts for charitable causes.
As of 2010, Bill played an active role in the Greater Barrie Chamber of Commerce, the Optimist Club of Barrie, the Kiwanis Club of Barrie, the Rotary Club of Barrie and has been a long-time volunteer at the Royal Victoria Hospital.
At the seniors awards gala in Barrie this year, he was given the award of heroism for his efforts. Bill has raised $517,000 since 1982 for the Terry Fox Foundation alone.
Today I want to give a special thanks to Bill Dwyer who has done so much to support charities in Barrie and raise awareness for causes close to his heart.
The EconomyHon. Gurbax Malhi (Bramalea—Gore—Malton, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, our economy is underperforming as the unemployment rate for the month of January in Ontario increased to 14.4% among the young adults. Despite giving $6 billion to big corporations, the government cannot create jobs and is killing them by increasing tax burdens in the form of EI payroll taxes on all small businesses. In fact, its $6 billion tax cut ignores 95% of the two million active businesses in Canada.
People in the region of Peel feel that the government is ignoring them too. The unemployment is high in this region but the government does nothing. Six billion dollars in tax cuts will not result in $6 billion worth of economic growth and jobs. Affordable housing and jobs in the region of Peel are much more needed than the corporate tax cut.
The government also needs to take concrete steps to create jobs for youth and give incentives to small businesses so that they can create more jobs for the unemployed families that are starving, under stress and are worrying about their future.
Marie-Josée GrenierMs. Nicole Demers (Laval, BQ): Mr. Speaker, at the beginning of this year, a long-time staff member of the Bloc Québécois, Marie-Josée Grenier, accomplished an exceptional feat: she climbed Mount Kilimanjaro.
Marie-Josée is a caring and committed woman. We were therefore not surprised when she decided to take on this new challenge in support of the Arthritis Society and people suffering from this painful condition.
Although she was already in good shape, she had to train physically, mentally and emotionally for an entire year before facing the challenge of climbing this 5,895-metre mountain in Tanzania known as the roof of Africa.
I had the privilege of meeting with her upon her return last week. As I took her in my arms, I could feel her passing on to me some of the unique energy possessed by those who do not let anything stop them from achieving great dreams. Her eyes said it all. They sparkled with the pride of accomplishment and the desire to do more.
Thank you Marie-Josée for showing us that anything is possible.
Bob MonksMr. Brian Masse (Windsor West, NDP): Mr. Speaker, Windsor lost one of its treasures yesterday with the passing of the iconic Bob Monks. Bob, one of Windsor's most notable citizens, was universally loved and known to virtually everyone. His art can be found in our homes, offices and restaurants and truly represents a graphic history of the people and places that define Windsor-Essex. 
A charismatic man whose riveting ability to tell our stories made him a great historian, teacher and media personality. A piece of Bob's art proudly hangs in my office and is a source of inspiration.
Bob was as man of impeccable class and kindness who allowed me to share his work with my entire riding in the 2010 calendar. Windsor is deeply saddened with the news of his passing but we are comforted by the gifts he left behind.
He will always be remembered for his art and his love for our local history but it is his incredible spirit that will be his lasting legacy. 
I and the member for Windsor—Tecumseh offer our condolences to the Monk family. An entire community mourns with them and we thank them for sharing Bob with us.
Architecture AwardMr. Rod Bruinooge (Winnipeg South, CPC): Mr. Speaker, this week, the Canada Council for the Arts announced the winner of a prestigious architecture prize titled, “Prix de Rome in Architecture for Emerging Practitioners”.
The prize was awarded to Samantha Lynch, a University of Manitoba graduate who demonstrated exceptional potential in contemporary architectural design.
As co-chair of the post-secondary education caucus, I applaud the University of Manitoba for upholding a spirit of excellence in delivering exceptional educational opportunities, and the Canada Council for the Arts for recognizing the potential of architecture students across our country.
I ask the House to join with me in applauding Samantha Lynch for her receipt of this prestigious award, and I wish her all the best in 2011 as she begins an internship at an internationally acclaimed architectural firm.
HealthHon. Hedy Fry (Vancouver Centre, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, once again, Vancouver and B.C. are at the forefront of HIV-AIDS research and innovation. 
Yesterday, The New York Times gave kudos to the “test and treat” pilot program pioneered by Dr. Julio Montaner, head of the HIV-AIDS clinical trials at St. Paul's Hospital. 
The three-year pilot program, fully funded by the B.C. government, gives free anti-retroviral drugs to all new HIV positive cases. One dose lowers the amount of virus in the blood, making the person 90% less infected. This is prevention and treatment in one.
 The New York Times credits this program, plus the city's safe injection site, for Vancouver's lowering infection rates, while other cities in North America are increasing. 
The UNAIDS agency has officially set “test and treat” as its global goal. 
Despite those facts, the Conservative government continues to cut funding to the national AIDS strategy and continues to sue to close Insite. What a missed opportunity.
Highway 407Mr. Colin Carrie (Oshawa, CPC): Mr. Speaker, in 2007, with the Government of Ontario, the Government of Canada announced the FLOW initiative to improve transit and strengthen the economy in the GTA. This initiative included a written commitment to extend Highway 407 from Brock Road in Pickering to Highway 35-115. The Government of Ontario agreed to a fixed completion date of 2013.
However, in June, the Government of Ontario announced that the extension would only be completed on an “as needed basis”.
This extension is extremely important for Oshawa and the GTA. It would ease the traffic burden currently held by Highway 401 and would assist in job creation and encourage private sector investment in Durham region.
The failure to extend Highway 407 in a single phase will greatly increase the amount of heavy traffic congestion on the streets of Oshawa and cause unbudgeted road infrastructure expenditures in excess of $300 million.
This is unacceptable to the city of Oshawa and I, along with the residents of Oshawa, demand that the Ontario government live up to its promise and complete this project.
Young People of Montcalm Youth Employment CentreMr. Roger Gaudet (Montcalm, BQ): Mr. Speaker, young people from Carrefour jeunesse-emploi in Montcalm are visiting Parliament Hill today.
I would like to acknowledge the courage, perseverance and motivation of these young people who are engaged in a very important process. They decided to seek the resources they need through the Cap sur l'avenir, Youth in Action and IDEO programs to help them take their future in their own hands and to discover their place in society.
These young people have an iron will and are holding onto the hope that one day that will be valuable, responsible and autonomous professionals. I believe that they will, and that is why I want to congratulate these young people.
I would also like to mention the excellent work done by the people at Carrefour jeunesse-emploi in Montcalm. In my opinion, Carrefour jeunesse-emploi is one of the best tools available to help our young people prepare for the future.
Donna WattMrs. Shelly Glover (Saint Boniface, CPC): Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honour a constituent and dear friend, Donna Watt, who passed away on December 31 at the age 66. She leaves behind her devoted husband, Donn Watt, her two children and two stepchildren.
Donna was a strong and compassionate woman, born and raised in my riding of Saint Boniface. She lived to love others and to serve her family and community even as her health was failing due to leukemia. She had a favourite saying, “Make your dash count”. The dash refers to the little horizontal line on our gravestones, the one between the date we are born and the date we pass away. The dash represents everything in between and how we choose to live it. So, as Donna suggests, we should make our dash count.
Toward the end of her life, Donna told her family, “I wouldn't change a thing. I've been so blessed to have experienced deep sorrows and tremendous joys”. Donna made her dash count.
I am inspired by the strength of her husband, Donn, who I know misses her dearly. I assure him that Donna and her dash live on in the loving memories of those who knew her.
We do not just mourn her passing, we celebrate her dash.
Mental IllnessHon. Carolyn Bennett (St. Paul's, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to recognize Bell's Let's Talk Day, an initiative dedicated to fostering a national conversation about mental illness in Canada.
Roughly one in five Canadians face mental health challenges and they often suffer in silence. Many fear the stigma associated with the term “mental illness”.
It touches all our families. I am proud of our son, Ben, who turned his personal experience into his play, Indifferent Eyes. It is a story of the drastic measures taken by a man suffering from depression in order to be better understood.
It is because of brave Canadians, like Clara Hughes, Roméo Dallaire, James Bartleman and Margaret Trudeau, who have opened up about their struggles, that we can begin to chip away at the terrible stigma still associated with mental illness. It is about finding solutions to problems.
The government and the Mental Health Commission have long promised an anti-stigma campaign. Canada needs a comprehensive mental health strategy. What, by when and how?
We thank Bell and Clara Hughes. It is time for the government to act.
Canada's Economic Action PlanMr. Jacques Gourde (Lotbinière—Chutes-de-la-Chaudière, CPC): Mr. Speaker, it would have been unfair to keep the regions of Quebec from benefiting from the success of Canada's economic action plan. If it had been up to the Bloc, nothing would have happened.
By presenting unrealistic demands, the Bloc leader and his members are looking for yet another excuse to reject the next federal budget and trigger a useless election that Quebeckers do not need.
Even though the Bloc voted against the money invested through the economic action plan, we took action at the start of the global economic crisis to help stimulate job creation, cut taxes for the middle class and seniors, improve the employment insurance program and help our businesses weather the crisis.
Our actions brought concrete results in every region of Quebec. Each time it had the opportunity, the Bloc voted against our measures, but later tried to take credit for our achievements.
We know that all Quebeckers in the regions will remember the Bloc's tactics.
Violence Against WomenMs. Libby Davies (Vancouver East, NDP): Mr. Speaker, the 20th annual Downtown Eastside Women's Memorial March will be held February 14.
A lot has happened since that first march, but the sad fact is that women are still very much at risk.
Women from the Downtown Eastside organize and lead this march because women, especially aboriginal women, face physical, mental and emotional violence on a daily basis. We gather together each year to support Sisters in Spirit and the Walk for Justice to show that we care.
I recently spoke at the Missing Women Commission in Vancouver and asked Mr. Oppal to utilize the public inquiry as a community process, where those most impacted by these tragedies have a voice. They can guide the way for what needs to be done to avoid further tragedy.
I also challenged him to not ignore the issues of poverty, racism, and inequality that underlie the violence experienced by these women. If we do not address these issues as a community, as a country, then real change will not occur.
TaxationMr. Ed Komarnicki (Souris—Moose Mountain, CPC): Mr. Speaker, the Liberal leader has a plan to raise taxes. He is openly and unambiguously calling for a $6 billion tax increase, not a tax freeze, a tax hike. 
The Liberal leader is demanding his new tax hike be included in the next budget. And if we do not raise taxes, he will vote against the budget to force an election. 
It is a reckless and dangerous tax increase that will stop our recovery in its tracks and hurt job creation. It is no wonder he is proud to call himself a tax and spend Liberal.
Canada's continued job growth again shows our economic action plan and our low tax agenda are getting positive results for Canadian families.
We need to continue with our government's low tax plan to protect and create jobs, not the Liberal leader's high tax agenda which will stall our recovery, kill jobs and set hard-working Canadian families back. 
That is not the Conservative way. That is the wrong-headed Liberal way.
International Development WeekMs. Johanne Deschamps (Laurentides—Labelle, BQ): Mr. Speaker, this being International Development Week, I would like to pay tribute to everyone who works so passionately, relentlessly and with such conviction to improve the living conditions of millions of people living in extreme poverty. 
Many Quebeckers and Canadians devote a great deal of effort to helping developing countries achieve the millennium development goals. Over the years, many NGOs, unions, teachers and students from Quebec and Canada have built relationships and partnerships with their global counterparts. Their excellent work, expertise and compassion are recognized and very much appreciated in those countries.
So that they may pursue their objectives, the Government of Canada must honour its commitment to allocate 0.7% of its GNP to official development assistance by increasing the development budget.
On behalf of the Bloc Québécois, I would like to thank everyone who is directly or indirectly involved in international development.
Dennis ForanMr. Marcel Proulx (Hull—Aylmer, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I would like to pay tribute today to the memory of Dennis Foran, a great community builder in the Outaouais region, who passed away last January 30.
Dennis worked for E.B. Eddy-Domtar for over 50 years, but it is his dedication as a volunteer that I would like to salute today.
In 1971, Dennis, his wife Polly, and a group of generous volunteers founded a non-profit organization known as Aydelu. Its mission was to run the old barn sitting on 17 acres of land. Aydelu created major sports facilities for young people and the community along with a multi-purpose hall.
Dennis presided over Aydelu for 24 years. He was known as the ambassador for Aydelu for which he begged and borrowed. Dennis, his wife, and a few other volunteers even mortgaged their houses for the construction of the Frank Robinson Arena.
Dennis also participated in the Aylmer Interclub for over 10 years. Dennis was one of the pillars of the modern Aylmer. 
My deepest sympathies to his wife and family. Goodbye Dennis and many thanks. 
Victims of CrimeMr. Scott Armstrong (Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley, CPC): Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the government operations committee accommodated an NDP request to hear from the Church Council on Justice and Corrections.
When asked if those who rape children should be put in prison, the NDP witness said, “Not necessarily.” That position represents a disturbing glimpse into the ideology which underpins the coalition soft-on-crime approach.
Unlike the NDP, our Conservative government believes that those who commit heinous crimes against our children should not be free to roam the streets and victimize others.
 Sadly, we see a pattern emerging here. The member for Ajax—Pickering cares more about inmate morale than he does about victims rights. The member for Vancouver Kingsway tried to remove all references to victims of crime legislation. The member for Outremont tried to block any legislation which would allow fraudsters to have extended parole.
When will the coalition care more about victims than they do about criminals?

Oral Questions
TaxationHon. Michael Ignatieff (Leader of the Opposition, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, the government is pressing ahead with corporate tax cuts that Canadians do not support and the country cannot afford.
Borrowing $6 billion to hand out to the richest corporations in the country makes no sense when it has just landed the country in a $56 billion deficit.
When will the Prime Minister listen to Canadians, reverse those corporate tax cuts, and give middle-class Canadians a break instead?
Right Hon. Stephen Harper (Prime Minister, CPC): Mr. Speaker, what the Liberal leader proposes is a $6 billion tax hike in order to pay for his spending proposals that the country cannot afford, and that makes absolutely no sense.
We have an economy that is creating jobs. We have a low tax plan. We are going to move forward, creating jobs for Canadian families.
Michael Ignatieff: Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister will have to explain to the country how the country cannot afford family care, but it can afford billions on prisons and billions on jails.
The Conservatives' tax cuts will benefit only 5% of Canada's richest corporations. Small businesses are not getting anything. Worse yet, their payroll expenses are going up. Small businesses are paying more so that corporations can pay less. 
How does the Prime Minister justify that?
Stephen Harper: Mr. Speaker, on the contrary. The Liberal Party leader is proposing a $6 billion tax hike in order to pay for his election promises that the country cannot afford. We do not have to raise taxes on employers in this country. Our economy is creating jobs for Canadian families thanks to our low tax plan. We will continue to secure Canada's recovery. 
Michael Ignatieff: Mr. Speaker, we have tax breaks for the richest corporations. We have tax hikes for small business. We have no break for the ordinary middle-class family. Family care is too expensive. The government is spending 40% more over the last five years and has no credible plan to get this deficit under control.
The whole story just does not add up. When will the Prime Minister listen to Canadians and reverse these reckless economic choices?
Stephen Harper: Mr. Speaker, the story that does not add up is the plan of the Liberal Party leader to raise taxes on employers, to raise billions of dollars of taxes on Canadian consumers, and to use that to increase spending even further. None of that makes sense.
 Our spending has been targeted at creating jobs. It is succeeding. We do not need $6 billion more in tax hikes from the Liberal Party.
Hon. Scott Brison (Kings—Hants, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, the CFIB has said that cutting corporate taxes is not a priority for small business. Instead, small businesses want payroll taxes to be held where they are or cut, and they want help to hire more Canadians.
On January 1, the Conservatives ignored small business and hiked the EI tax rate by 5%. Why are the Conservatives punishing small businesses with job-killing payroll tax hikes in order to cut taxes for the richest corporations?
Stephen Harper: Mr. Speaker, unfortunately for the hon. member, he has raised an issue of fact. The fact is that the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, the small- and medium-sized businesses of this country, is absolutely opposed to the tax hikes proposed by the Liberal Party that would raise taxes on over 100,000 Canadian small businesses, absolutely opposed. He can check with Catherine Swift if he is not sure about it.
Scott Brison: Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister is misleading Canadians once again. CFIB's Vice-President Corinne Pohlmann has said publicly, “corporate tax cuts are not in our top 11 [priorities]”.
More than 80% of CFIB members will not benefit from the Prime Minister's corporate tax cuts. Instead, small businesses want lower payroll taxes and they need help with training.
Why are the Conservatives giving away $6 billion to Canada's biggest, most profitable corporations while killing jobs and punishing small businesses with an $8 billion tax hike?
Stephen Harper: Mr. Speaker, everybody here can do exactly what I did. He can talk to the Canadian Federation of Independent Business and its president, Catherine Swift, who is absolutely on the record saying it is opposed to the tax hikes proposed by the Liberal Party on business, absolutely opposed. 
There is not a single business organization, not a single credible voice in this country, that supports the tax hikes proposed by the Liberal Party.
Shipping Radioactive WasteMr. Gilles Duceppe (Laurier—Sainte-Marie, BQ): Mr. Speaker, the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission has admitted that the decision to authorize the shipping of radioactive waste on the St. Lawrence River was based on information provided by Bruce Power, the company involved in the project. So much for rigour and objectivity.
The Government of Quebec, the Bloc Québécois, the Parti Québécois, mayors and environmentalists are all opposed to shipping radioactive waste on the St. Lawrence River. How can the Conservative government go against this Quebec consensus?
Hon. Christian Paradis (Minister of Natural Resources, CPC): Mr. Speaker, public hearings and an additional round of written submissions took place throughout the fall, and the Government of Quebec did not signal any concerns at that time.
I spoke to my colleague, Minister Arcand, this morning and I offered to have the commission give briefings to all the appropriate officials. I extend the same offer to members of the House of Commons. Perhaps they will finally understand the facts and stop manipulating perceptions, as the leader of the Bloc Québécois has done for too long. 
Gilles Duceppe: Mr. Speaker, according to the Conservative government and this ineffable minister, all those opposed to shipping waste by water are waging a campaign of fear. The Bloc Québécois is waging a campaign of fear, the Government of Quebec is waging a campaign of fear, international experts are waging a campaign of fear, even American senators are waging a campaign of fear.
Does the Prime Minister realize that the only person who is comfortable with the idea of shipping radioactive waste on the St. Lawrence River is his minister? And that is not a comforting thought.
Christian Paradis: Mr. Speaker, for the Bloc Québécois, this is another issue they can use to divide the people. The Bloc does not care a fig about the integrity of a scientific institution, of a quasi-judicial body like the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. 
Paragraph 48—I see that he has not read the decision—states that the exterior surface of the steam generators has a lower surface dose of radiation than a package of medical isotopes. Such packages are delivered in hospitals every day. Such deliveries are common.
I repeat that his so-called consensus does not exist. We deal with the Government of Quebec, and I will be happy to have the commission brief Quebec government officials so that they can thoroughly evaluate the decision.
Ms. Paule Brunelle (Trois-Rivières, BQ): Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Natural Resources is trying to sound reassuring and is downplaying the risk of transporting nuclear waste on the St. Lawrence River by telling us that we are trying to instill fear in members of the public. But what the minister is not saying is that these generators, which are the size of 16 buses, would exceed by up to 50 times the international limits for the transport of radioactive waste.
How can the minister  be so out of touch and maintain that this is not an issue?
Christian Paradis: Mr. Speaker, I repeat, we have to look at the facts. Once again, I urge the hon. member to, first, read and, second, understand the report. Then, if she would like, she can attend a briefing session, which the commission will offer to all members of the House of Commons.
Once again, we are concerned that members' false perceptions of the facts will cause public panic. This is irresponsible of them.
Mr. Bernard Bigras (Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, BQ): Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Natural Resources needs to remove his rose-coloured glasses and take into consideration the fact that the St. Lawrence River and the Great Lakes are the biggest storehouse of fresh water on the planet, that this is a highly urbanized area, and that those living there do not want to have to pay the price of a possible environmental disaster and Ontario's energy choices.
Does the minister realize that due diligence requires him to listen to the public, municipal mayors and the Government of Quebec, who do not want the St. Lawrence to be used for the shipment of radioactive waste?
Christian Paradis: Mr. Speaker, I urge the environment critic to simply put on his glasses and read the report. The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, a quasi-judicial body made up of scientists, based its decision on scientific evidence. Those are the facts. I have asked commission representatives to give a technical briefing to those who are interested, including members of the opposition. I hope that they will attend.
SecuritiesHon. Jack Layton (Toronto—Danforth, NDP): Mr. Speaker, the proposed TSX merger and takeover has Canadians worried. Canadian companies need access to foreign capital, but not at the expense of our own capital markets.
Will the Prime Minister take steps to ensure that this is a merger of equals and not a takeover, that there is access for smaller firms and that regional interests are respected? After having so badly mismanaged securities regulation, will he ensure continued Canadian oversight by Canadian authorities of our stock markets?
Stephen Harper: Mr. Speaker, I am not sure how the leader of the NDP can blame the federal government for securities regulation since right now it is regulated by the provinces, which is something we are trying to change.
The fact is this is a complex transaction. There is a law in place, the Investment Canada Act, that will look at these matters. The provinces themselves also have some approval processes. Until those things are done, I will not comment on this transaction.
Jack Layton: Mr. Speaker, we cannot trust the guarantees given by the financial community about this transaction. The TMX CEO said that he came to build the Toronto Stock Exchange, and now he is selling it.
Let us look at what happened in Montreal when the stock market merged with Toronto. The merger did not produce the expected results and the derivatives did not compensate Montreal for the financial exodus to Toronto.
Why would it be different with London?
Stephen Harper: Mr. Speaker, as I just said, this is a complex transaction. There is a legal process in place, pursuant to the Investment Canada Act. The provinces are currently responsible for regulating these issues. They also have their own processes. It is not appropriate for the government to make a comment at this time.
Jack Layton: Mr. Speaker, we are being told that we should trust the Minister of Industry on this, but we have seen that he cannot be trusted when it comes to making the right decisions on foreign investments. The Conservatives cannot tell the difference between beneficial investments and damaging takeovers. We are talking about a takeover, not a merger, despite the spin.
Will the Prime Minister commit to public hearings, to full transparency, so finally Canadians could have some role in making this decision themselves, not just leaving it to the Minister of Industry?
Stephen Harper: Mr. Speaker, we live to see everything when we hear the leader of the NDP in a patriotic defence of Canadian stock markets.
There is a law in place. The minister and the government will follow the law. It is a complex matter and it will be adjudicated according to the laws of our country.
Sales Tax HarmonizationMr. Marc Garneau (Westmount—Ville-Marie, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, discussions have been dragging on for months now between this government and the Government of Quebec concerning compensation for the harmonization of Quebec's sales tax. Depending on the day, the minister blows hot or cold, and sometimes both. Everything seems to be in place to sign an agreement, give or take a few commas, but the government continues to put up obstacles, to the detriment of Quebeckers.
What is the government waiting for to settle this matter?
Hon. Ted Menzies (Minister of State (Finance), CPC): Mr. Speaker, I might remind the hon. member, who appears to be fairly new to this file, that harmonization is a provincial decision. The province has asked us to seriously consider it harmonizing its tax. The federal government is in negotiations with the Government of Quebec. Those continue in good faith. We look forward to a successful outcome.
Marc Garneau: Mr. Speaker, I am not sure the government understands what harmonization means.
It is a question of fairness. This has gone on long enough. I would hope that the minister is not playing political games with Quebeckers on such an important issue. I hope that he is not planning on buying Quebeckers with their own money by using the harmonization agreement to sugar-coat the next budget.
Will the minister commit to settling this matter once and for all and stop playing cat and mouse?
Ted Menzies: Mr. Speaker, we are negotiating in good faith, as I have said. Both parties are negotiating as we speak. There are a number of issues that remain unresolved, and that is disappointing.
 We would like to see Quebec have the same opportunity of harmonization that other provinces have had. We look forward to those discussions being completed as soon as they possibly can, and perhaps have a successful outcome.
Public SafetyMr. Mark Holland (Ajax—Pickering, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, when it comes to the cost of the megaprison agenda, Conservatives have said “just trust us” before. A bill that they said would cost $90 million was revealed by the Parliament Budget Officer to cost between $10 billion to $13 billion. Now they are hiding the costs of another 18 bills, breaking the laws of the House to bury billions in a California prison system that failed there and will not work here. 
Before the Conservative lock and load on another failed Republican policy, why will they not come clean on these costs, put them on the table so Canadians can see just how they will gut the priorities of Canadian families?
Hon. Vic Toews (Minister of Public Safety, CPC): Mr. Speaker, our government has been very clear that the cost in terms of the prisons has been $2 billion over five years. We have been very clear in that respect.
However, what I would like to know from that member is why he never considers the cost to victims of criminals who are out on the street, criminals who are dangerous to ordinary law-abiding citizens. That individual tours prisons and talks about the poor morale among prisoners, with never a word to the victims they victimized.
Mark Holland: Mr. Speaker, I think it has been approximately two days since the Conservatives attacked me personally. That is quite a long time. However, that is what they do. When they are out of the truth, when it is long behind them, they resort to personal attacks because that is all they have.
However, it is not me who is saying this disastrous megaprison system will not work. It is the entire world. Britain is trying to undo the mess. The prime minister there recognized that it turned prisons into crime factories. In the United States, the father of megaprisons, Newt Gingrich, says that it is a complete disaster. 
If every right-wing leader in the world says that the system is broke and it will not work, why is the Prime Minister standing alone?
Vic Toews: Mr. Speaker, what I can only say is there is an individual who thinks it is all about him. We are actually concerned about the victims. We wonder why that individual consistently stands up against the interests of victims and always for the interests of prisoners.
 We are concerned about the rehabilitation of prisoners, but we want to ensure that rehabilitation takes place without jeopardizing the safety of law-abiding Canadian citizens, men, women and children.
SecuritiesMr. Daniel Paillé (Hochelaga, BQ): Mr. Speaker, when the Montreal stock exchange was taken over by the Toronto stock exchange, Quebec set conditions, and one of those was that the AMF would have veto power over the possible transaction between the Toronto stock exchange and the London stock exchange. However, under the Minister of Finance's federal securities commission project, the decision to sell our stock exchange to the English falls to Toronto alone. 
Will the Minister of Finance admit that the basic purpose behind his infamous securities commission project is to strip Quebec of its financial independence?
Hon. Tony Clement (Minister of Industry, CPC): Mr. Speaker, we have to consider whether the Canada Investment Act applies to this transaction.
We will be considering whether the Investment Canada Act relates to this transaction. There are meetings taking place today between the investors and Industry Canada officials. There will be other meetings over the course of the next several days. We will collect information that is relevant to the transaction and, in the first place, determine whether the Investment Canada Act applies to the transaction.
Daniel Paillé: Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Finance's silence speaks volumes. I wonder if Canada will be the only G8 country to have a Minister of Finance and no stock exchange.
First it was Quebec, Manitoba and Alberta, and now British Columbia opposes this plan. In fact, only Ontario supports the plan because only Ontario will benefit from this plan to centralize the financial markets in Toronto.
When will the federal government drop its predatory plan?
Tony Clement: Mr. Speaker, this matter concerns the Canada Investment Act. We have to consider all the issues and challenges. We also have to consider Canadian law. As the Minister of Industry, this issue is part of my portfolio. If there are any questions, I can repeat my answer.
Mortgage LoansMr. Robert Carrier (Alfred-Pellan, BQ): Mr. Speaker, in the March 2010 budget, the Conservative government promised to regulate the mortgage penalties imposed on owners trying to renegotiate their loans to take advantage of low interest rates. Nothing has been done since that announcement was made, and mortgage rates are beginning to rise.
What is the government waiting for to limit the penalties imposed on advance payments? What is the government waiting for to call the banks to order? 
Ted Menzies: Mr. Speaker, our finance minister recognized there were concerns regarding individuals perhaps carrying too much debt so we changed the mortgage rules to ensure Canadians were protected. We are always concerned about too much credit card debt or people investing in a home they cannot afford and can buy it in another couple of years.
The mortgage rules are very well accepted by Canadians as well as the industry. We are putting those in place to protect Canadians.
Robert Carrier: Mr. Speaker, let me clarify my question.
The extreme position taken by the banks discourages owners from repaying their mortgages in advance, encourages debt and slows down the housing market. The federal government's legislative mess enables banks to impose outrageous mortgage penalties at their own whim and pleasure. Cleanup is needed in this area.
When will the minister stop protecting the big banks at consumers' expense?
Ted Menzies: Mr. Speaker, I might remind the hon. member that Canada was one of the few countries that never put one penny of taxpayer dollars into our banking system during the serious recession that we just came through.
Our banks are in good condition. They are able to lend money to Canadians. Whether it is through mortgages or car loans, we encourage these banks to offer credit to Canadians but ensure they do it prudently.
Child CareMs. Judy Foote (Random—Burin—St. George's, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, struggling families are wondering how the minister can be so out of touch with reality. If she were in touch, the minister would know that 70% of working women with children two or younger need child care. Offering Canadians one-tenth the cost of monthly child care, and taxing it I might add, does not give Canadian families a choice in raising children.
When will the government get its priorities right and start offering real choices for families struggling to make ends meet?
Hon. Diane Finley (Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development, CPC): Mr. Speaker, we brought in the universal child care benefit specifically to help working moms and dads take advantage of the child care of their choice for their children. We actually believe that parents know best how to look after their children. Whether it is institutional child care, daycare, whether it is mom or dad staying at home or granny or a trusted neighbour, we believe parents should have the choice, and we are supporting that with our universal child care benefit.
Judy Foote: Mr. Speaker, if the government actually took the time to listen to Canadians, it would know that the cost of having a child in child care is upwards of $8,000 per year. The government thinks that a so-called child care benefit that provides less than $1,000 a year after taxes gives parents some choices or options.
Why does the minister not admit the Conservatives have written off their promise to create 125,000 child care spaces because she and the Prime Minister are ideologically opposed to early learning and child care outside the home?
Diane Finley: Mr. Speaker, our government recognizes and respects all forms of child care as long as it is the parents who get to make the choice for their children. That is what we believe in.
The Liberals have another approach. They believe that parents are not smart enough and do not care enough to look after their children. That is why they said that the parents would spend the money on beer and popcorn. That is why they said that the parents may have the money, but they use it for their own purposes.
Then the leader of the Liberals said he plans to scrap the UCCB, calling it, “wasteful and a terrible use of public funds”.
Social HousingMs. Raymonde Folco (Laval—Les Îles, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives have granted a seven-month extension of the $12 billion infrastructure program, yet they are refusing to extend the $400 million social housing program. Over half of those funds are needed for housing on first nations reserves. Despite two questions placed on the order paper, the minister is refusing to provide us with the list of approved social housing projects.
So I ask the minister again here today: when will she provide this information to Canadians?
Diane Finley: Mr. Speaker, as just one part of our economic action plan, we invested $2 billion in the construction and renovation of affordable housing for aboriginal peoples, as well as for seniors and persons with disabilities. According to the rules, if organizations have submitted an application to their province, if the province approves the project and construction begins by March 31 of this year, they will receive funding.
Raymonde Folco: Mr. Speaker, my question was “when”, and I did not hear a clear answer.
The government is willing to spend $6 billion a year on corporate tax cuts and $16 billion on fighter jets, but it cut $400 million for social housing when the seven month extension is given for just about every other project.
Once again, the biggest losers are the Canadians who are suffering the most. Has the minister never seen housing conditions on reserves? Has she no shame?
Diane Finley: Mr. Speaker, has the member an earpiece that actually works, because I just explained it.
If an organization has made a request, an application to their province and if their province has approved, the construction begins by March 31 of this year, or within three months of that, actually, then the groups will receive the funding to help these projects.
These are projects put in place to create jobs under our economic action plan and they provide a long-lasting benefit for our aboriginals, for our seniors and for handicapped people.
Canadian Wheat BoardMr. Kevin Sorenson (Crowfoot, CPC): Mr. Speaker, the Canadian Wheat Board is entering into another scheme to waste western Canadian grain growers' money. 
The Wheat Board is continuously protected by the coalition and now seems to be suffering from Liberal envy. It wants to become a shipping magnate, like failed former Liberal Prime Minister Paul Martin. Its plan? Spend $65 million, which will come out of farmers' pool returns, farmers' money, to buy a shipping company.
Why is the Wheat Board squandering farmers' money when farmers should have the freedom to opt out of this wasteful monopoly?
Hon. Gerry Ritz (Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board, CPC): Mr. Speaker, the member for Crowfoot is correct. This latest scheme by the Wheat Board would put a minimum of $65 million of farmers' own money at risk and will use farmers' pool accounts as a slush fund. It is unfortunate.
Farmers have not been consulted on this latest decision. I have constantly told the Wheat Board that farmers' money in the pool accounts is off limits to it. It should not be misappropriated like this. 
The Wheat Board must focus on getting a higher return for farmers, not go out and buy votes like this. That is why we continue to support an open market for Canadian farmers coast to coast to coast, and we will continue to do that. 
The EconomyMs. Irene Mathyssen (London—Fanshawe, NDP): Mr. Speaker, two weeks ago the Minister of Justice was all smiles when he came to a London manufacturing plant for a media event promoting corporate tax cuts.
Employees at IPEX are not smiling. Workers who had been used as a backdrop for the minister's photo op received layoff notices yesterday.
Over the last five years London has lost over 15,000 good paying manufacturing jobs.
When will the government start caring about working families instead of its reckless corporate tax cuts?
Tony Clement: Mr. Speaker, through budget 2010 and through the economic action plan, this government has been focused on jobs, including manufacturing jobs.
I might add that in the province of Ontario, for instance, there has been a great increase in manufacturing capacity, capability and manufacturing jobs. That is because we have been working on those things. That is because it is having an impact on the economy. 
We are investing in innovation. We are investing in creativity. We are investing in the people who make manufacturing strong, and we will continue to do so.
Mr. Thomas Mulcair (Outremont, NDP): Mr. Speaker, the reality is that 600,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost since 2000. A tax break does not help a manufacturer that is not making any profit, since it has no income tax to pay. That measure helps only the banks, which are making record profits and not creating any jobs, while the manufacturing sector has lost hundreds of thousands of jobs. 
When will the Conservatives understand that they are destabilizing the balanced economy that Canadians have been working hard to build since the second world war? Instead of helping those who do not need any help, like the banks, why not target sectors that are productive, innovative and creating real jobs for the future?
Tony Clement: Mr. Speaker, our record is clear. For instance, in January, GM announced over 1,000 new jobs in plants across Ontario. Also in January, CS Wind announced that it would be locating its new wind tower plant at the Valiant plant in Windsor, thereby creating 300 jobs, for instance. New jobs have also been created in Quebec.
That is our record. The plan is working. Every time the NDP had a chance to support our plan in this Parliament, that party voted no.
Government AppointmentsMr. Pierre Paquette (Joliette, BQ): Mr. Speaker, since 2006, the Conservative government has made hundreds of partisan appointments to the boards of directors of government agencies and crown corporations, not to mention the appointments of senators and even some judges, all to ensure that these agencies are in line with the Conservatives' ideology.
Will the Prime Minister admit that all these partisan appointments are part of a strategy to compensate the government's cronies and to ensure that these agencies become Conservative government mouthpieces?
Hon. John Baird (Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, CPC): Mr. Speaker, our government has one principal factor that we take into account when making government appointments, which is that the individuals are qualified for the appointments to which they are being appointed.
No government has done more to advance non-partisan appointments. No government has done more to ensure that people are qualified for the government appointments that we make. This government should be commended for those actions.
Pierre Paquette: Mr. Speaker, their only qualification is being close to the Conservatives or being Conservatives themselves.
These attempts at control through partisan appointments are even more worrying because a number of Supreme Court judges will soon be stepping down. A good way of avoiding partisan appointments is to agree to Quebec's demand that the government choose judges to represent Quebec based on a short list of candidates chosen by Quebec.
Will the Prime Minister agree to this longstanding demand from Quebec?
Hon. Rob Nicholson (Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, CPC): Mr. Speaker, all of the individuals we have appointed to the bench go through a process by which they are evaluated. All of the individuals we have put on the bench have met those qualifications.
They are an outstanding group of individuals, prepared to serve their Queen and their country, and they should have the support of the hon. member and his party.
Canada-U.S. RelationsMr. Jean-Claude D'Amours (Madawaska—Restigouche, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, the number of Canadians that must travel to the United States is high, whether they live in a border town, visit family or go south for the winter. The Conservatives did nothing to keep Canadians from having to show a passport to get into the United States. Today the Prime Minister is discussing a secret agreement and does not want Canadians to know about it.
What surprises will Canadians be faced with when they cross the border? What can Canadians expect to have to disclose in order to cross the American border?
Hon. Lawrence Cannon (Minister of Foreign Affairs, CPC): Mr. Speaker, as you know, last Friday the Prime Minister and the President of the United States signed an agreement that will allow us to work better together in the years to come to secure our borders and to keep pursuing economic prosperity for both countries.
This is a start, and I would ask my colleague to wait patiently. We will continue to maintain our excellent relations with the United States, for the benefit of all Canadians.
Jean-Claude D'Amours: Mr. Speaker, the secret agreement between Canada and the United States threatens Canadians' privacy. Why put their information in danger? Canadians do not want to share details about their finances or daily lives with the Americans. The Conservatives do not want Statistics Canada to force Canadians to fill out the census.
Do they think that U.S. Homeland Security will balk at gathering personal and confidential information about Canadians?
Lawrence Cannon: Mr. Speaker, I thought that my colleague would have taken five minutes of his precious time to read the statement guaranteeing sovereignty as well as privacy. 
I will be tabling the statement in a few moments. That way, he can read it.
Search and RescueMr. Nathan Cullen (Skeena—Bulkley Valley, NDP): Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives' reckless plan for Coast Guard vessels is putting the people of B.C.'s coast at serious risk. Their plan to replace the Point Henry from Prince Rupert and the Point Race from Campbell River with so-called motor lifeboats must be thrown overboard. 
How can the Conservatives justify their reckless cuts to the Coast Guard's lifesaving equipment? The new boats carry less than half the people, travel less than half the distance and can only stay on the water for less than a third of the time of the current ships. 
Can the minister justify why she would even consider replacing these vital Coast Guard vessels with dinghies that simply will not do the job?
Hon. Gail Shea (Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, CPC): Mr. Speaker, the Coast Guard's top priority is the safety of Canadians and our priority is also the safety of our very own crews. 
The previous government let our Coast Guard rust out or left the vessels tied to the wharf because it could not pay for the fuel. Since then, we have made an historic investment in our fleet, including five new Coast Guard vessels that were built in Victoria for British Columbians, and these ships are very capable craft.
Mr. Jack Harris (St. John's East, NDP): Mr. Speaker, one cannot last long in the cold waters of the North Atlantic. 
The defence committee heard last week in Gander and St. John's that Canada's two-hour search and rescue response standard after business hours was unacceptable. One survivor of a sunken fishing boat described how two others drowned 15 minutes before a DND helicopter arrived, having left Gander an hour and 20 minutes after being tasked.
Does the government agree that a two-hour response standard, longer than anywhere else in the world, is acceptable or will it commit to improving response time for search and rescue in Canada?
Hon. Peter MacKay (Minister of National Defence, CPC): Mr. Speaker, the Cougar helicopter crash of 2009 was a terrible tragedy. I know, like the member opposite, that all members here remember the victims of that crash and their families.
The Transportation Safety Board has now released its study. I have had a chance to look at that, as I know my colleague has. The Minister of Transport has directed his officials to respond to recommendations.
However, with respect to the basing of Canadian Forces search and rescue assets, they are optimally located to provide the most rapid response to areas where historically, statistically, incidents occur. The government is committed, of course, to improving upon effective search and rescue. That is exactly what we are doing and those assets—
The Speaker: Order. The hon. member for Elgin—Middlesex—London.
JusticeMr. Joe Preston (Elgin—Middlesex—London, CPC): Mr. Speaker, this Conservative government is committed to getting tough on crime and criminals. That is why our tough on crime agenda includes legislation to crack down on white collar crime and to protect the most vulnerable Canadians.
Can the Minister of Public Safety please update us on the status of Bill C-39, the early release for criminals and increasing offender accountability act?
Vic Toews: Mr. Speaker, I can tell the House that our government believes people convicted of serious crime should pay their debt to society. This includes white collar fraudsters who take money from Quebec seniors who have worked all their lives to simply enjoy their golden years.
We cannot understand why certain members opposite, the NDP and the member for Outremont in particular, would put criminals' interests ahead of their own constituents. That simply does not make sense to us. Our Conservative government remains committed to protecting victims.
TransportMs. Joyce Murray (Vancouver Quadra, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, Canadian authorities have no reliable way of tracking American oil tankers in the out-of-bounds exclusion zone off B.C.'s coast. In December, the Transport Minister incorrectly told the House that the zone is “closely monitored and strictly enforced”. 
Not so. On average, an Alaskan tanker enters these prohibited waters every single day. 
They have abandoned the 40-year policy banning tankers from B.C.'s northern inland waters and they are failing to defend the exclusion zone as well. 
Why is the government putting B.C.'s coast at risk?
Hon. Chuck Strahl (Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, CPC): Mr. Speaker, what is interesting, of course, is that the daily oil tanker traffic into this well-patrolled and well-controlled zone is exactly the same number of tankers that came through when the Liberals were in charge of this file. It is exactly the same. Now the Liberals think they have an issue they can drag through the water to see what they can pick up. 
The truth is that every ship that comes into Canadian waters has to report to the coast guard. Every vessel that comes through there is a double-hulled tanker. Every single one of them has to be inspected regularly. No tanker traffic is allowed on the inside passage.
These are the same rules that have been in place since the Liberals were in power. For some reason they are now dangling this one over the side hoping somebody will take the bait.
AfghanistanMr. Claude Bachand (Saint-Jean, BQ): Mr. Speaker, the Special Committee on the Canadian Mission in Afghanistan has learned that the Canadian government has awarded a contract of $1 million a year to a warlord in order to ensure external security for Camp Nathan Smith. This is beginning to look a lot like a protection racket.
How could this government resort to such an unacceptable practice? Do similar contracts with other warlords exist?
Lawrence Cannon: Mr. Speaker, the Government of Canada does indeed have contracts with private firms in Afghanistan. The goal of these private firms is precisely to protect assets and personnel. These firms have signed the Montreux document that outlines standards and best practices. 
Aboriginal AffairsMs. Jean Crowder (Nanaimo—Cowichan, NDP): Mr. Speaker, the federal loan loss reserve program for aboriginal businesses is falling apart. The pilot program has only used $4.2 million of the $15 million set aside to be loaned out by the banks. Last week, the Assiniboine Credit Union withdrew from the program altogether.
This Conservative program was highly flawed from the start. It excluded aboriginal financial institutions that have been successfully lending money to aboriginal entrepreneurs for 20 years.
Will the government now admit its mistake and invite the aboriginal financial institutions to join this fund?
Hon. John Duncan (Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, Federal Interlocutor for Métis and Non-Status Indians and Minister of the Canadian Northern Economic Development Agency, CPC): Mr. Speaker, improving access to capital is a cornerstone of our continued efforts to enhance the economic and business development prospects for aboriginal people across Canada. The loan loss reserve pilot program was created to address a gap in larger-scale commercial lending. This was an area that aboriginal financial institutions were generally not in. 
The program is currently being reviewed by an independent third party. The preliminary results of the review will be used in program renewal and renovation.
TaxationMr. Ben Lobb (Huron—Bruce, CPC): Mr. Speaker, the economy remains our government's top priority. Since July 2009, Canada's economy has created 460,000 new jobs. In order to sustain this growth, we need to continue supporting job-creating businesses. 
Since our government was first elected, we have lowered the small business tax rate to 11%, raised the amount that small businesses can claim under this rate to $500,000 and raised the lifetime capital gains exemption to $750,000. This was particularly welcomed by the owners of family farms who wish to transition their businesses--
The Speaker: The hon. Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister.
Mr. Pierre Poilievre (Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister and to the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs, CPC): Mr. Speaker, I just got off the phone with CFIB's Catherine Swift and, boy, did the member for Kings—Hants ever get it wrong.
As members will recall, CFIB strongly supported our tax reductions for job creators in 2007. The member for Kings—Hants said they had changed their mind. In fact, just yesterday they reaffirmed their support for the tax reductions. The reason they did not feel they had to put them in their top 11 priorities is that, “They were already done three years ago. We didn't think they were threatened”.
She will be calling the member for Kings—Hants.
Presence in GalleryThe Speaker:  I wish to draw to the attention of hon. members the presence in the gallery of the Honourable Paul Okalik, Speaker of the Legislative Assembly of Nunavut.
[Intervention]
Some hon. members:  Hear, hear!
POINTS OF ORDERLibby Davies: Mr. Speaker, I tried to deliver a statement today in the House on the very serious matter of the missing and murdered women in the downtown east side.
Apparently most of my statement was completely inaudible over the microphone because of mayhem by some members of the Bloc who I believe were probably reacting to a previous statement by the government side.
I certainly do not mind some objections being registered in the House. We are in a lively environment. However, when it renders another member inaudible, it is completely disrespectful and unacceptable.
We have certainly communicated our concern to the whip of the Bloc Québécois, but I am also raising it with you, Mr. Speaker, because I think it is important that all members be able to give their statements in a proper way. I think this is very much a part of statements and that, as Speaker, you need to be aware when a member becomes inaudible, because then what is the point of giving a statement?
I would like to draw this to your attention, Mr. Speaker, and hope that we can have better decorum.
Pierre Paquette: Mr. Speaker, I simply want to corroborate what my NDP colleague is saying. We made the same observation. We are party to the problem. We are well aware of this and we talked about it amongst ourselves today. During statements by members, there is far too much noise and far too much movement in the House, and I invite you to reprimand us.
The Speaker: Unfortunately, I am not a whip. At the same time, I must say there was a lot of noise today during statements by members and during oral question period.
But at the same time, I have to say that I could hear the hon. member for Vancouver East quite clearly despite the noise. I did yell “order” several times, and the noise level went down a bit and I could hear her. That is why I did not stand up and demand more silence.
I could hear what she was saying quite clearly. Whether that was on the microphone or whether it is because of the speakers behind me, I am not sure, but to me it was quite audible. Had it not been, I assure her I would have taken more steps.
I am sure the House leaders and whips, at their next meeting, could have a discussion about the noise level in the chamber. I know the whips are very effective at enforcing these kinds of matters.
We have a few other points of order arising out of question period.
Scott Brison: Mr. Speaker, earlier in question period the Prime Minister claimed that corporate tax cuts were a priority for the CFIB.
I would like to table two documents. One is a Canadian Press story from today's The Chronicle Herald in which Corinne Pohlmann, the vice-president of national affairs for the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, says:
 If you look at our website we have our Top 11 in 2011 and corporate tax cuts are not in our top 11. 
I would seek unanimous consent to table both that article and the CFIB's website, which clearly say that corporate tax cuts are not a priority for the CFIB, but cutting payroll taxes and investing in learning are priorities for the CFIB.
The Speaker: The hon. member is asking for the unanimous consent of the House to table a website, which I do not think can be tabled. I do not know how he could table a website, but there is a document.
Does the hon. member have the unanimous consent of the House to table the document?
[Intervention]
Some hon. members:  No.
The Speaker:  There is no consent.
Pierre Poilievre: Mr. Speaker, in order to help my hon. colleague, I have an additional quote from the CFIB:
 CFIB continues to support proceeding with the planned reductions in the corporate income tax rate and staying on track with current deficit reduction plans. 
 That quote was directly from CFIB, but I have another quote that comes right down to the point:
 —we cannot increase corporate taxes without losing corporate investment. If we lose corporate investment, we have a less productive economy.... That means fewer jobs. 
Oh, I am sorry. That one is by the member for Kings—Hants.
It is clear that Catherine Swift will be calling the member for Kings—Hants and encouraging him to go back to his original position, which was not very long ago.
Raymonde Folco: Mr. Speaker, during question period, when I asked the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development my second question, a number of my colleagues on this side heard the following:
“Does that member have an earpiece that actually works?”
I find sarcasm to be extremely inappropriate, and it pains me greatly to see a female colleague in the House make this type of comment to another woman, especially when the issue of social housing is so very important. I am asking the minister for an apology.
John Baird: Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development has always demonstrated great skill and ability in working on her files, and I know she cares a lot about Canadian children. I know that Canadian children demand an apology because for 13 long years the Liberals did not create any of the child care spaces they promised.
The Speaker: I am not sure the comments are out of order. They may have offended the hon. member somewhat, but to question whether a member's earpiece is working, well, sometimes they do and sometimes they do not.
Is the hon. member for Vancouver Kingsway rising on a point of order as well?
Mr. Don Davies (Vancouver Kingsway, NDP): Mr. Speaker, I am rising on a point of order arising from a statement made by the member for Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley. The member made allegations that clearly violated my rights and privileges as a member. The statement was almost incomprehensible. However, what was understandable was, first, factually wrong and, second, a violation of the Speaker's own rule against using members' statements to attack other members.
The member said that I “tried to remove all references to victims from crime legislation”.
That is 100% completely false. I defy him to come up with a single piece of evidence where that has ever happened. On the contrary, I have stood up and fought for the rights of victims in every piece of legislation in this House. Besides being untrue, it is absolutely cowardly for that member to raise allegations in a member's statement to which I have no right of reply.
 I would ask the member to do the honourable thing and retract his untrue allegation and apologize to this House for misleading this House and the Canadian people.
Vic Toews: Mr. Speaker, I know that the member against whom he is making those accusations is not in the House, but the member for Vancouver Kingsway was in fact instrumental in gutting the bill regarding the International Transfer of Offenders Act, removing the protections that we see as important for victims.
 The member says he has not done anything against victims, but I can indicate that it is clearly on the record. If the people of Canada go to that member's record and look at how he voted on criminal justice bills that defend the interests of victims, they will see that the member has consistently voted against the interests of victims.
The Speaker: It sounds much like a debate to me.
The hon. member for Vancouver Kingsway, I trust this will be a point of order.
Don Davies: Mr. Speaker, first of all, the member pointed out that another member had left the House. That in and of itself is a violation.
However, I would point out that the specific allegation is that I tried to remove references to victims from crime legislation. That is the allegation. That is what is 100% factually incorrect. The minister knows that and he is twisting this to respond to a different allegation. This allegation by this member was incorrect and it should be withdrawn. It is untrue and it is misleading the public and the people of this House. That is a disgrace.
The Speaker: I think there is a dispute as to the facts here, and I sympathize with the hon. member to one extent, which is that Standing Order 31 statements are being used as matters of debate, and in my view that was not the intention of having Standing Order 31 statements. I believe it would be better if members did not make reference to other hon. members in the course of these statements, but I have suggested that several times. 
I am sure that the House leaders and whips are looking at the matter from time to time, and the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs could always do it and we could get rid of Standing Order 31 statements if it wishes. The committee can change the rules or restrict the subject matter to specific options. That is for the committee to decide, and for the House to decide when the committee makes a report if, as, and when it does.
We will leave it at that for now.

Routine Proceedings
Declaration on Perimeter SecurityLawrence Cannon: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to table, in both official languages, the declaration issued in Washington by the Prime Minister and the President of the United States, entitled “Beyond the Border: a shared vision for perimeter security and economic competitiveness”. 
Westbank First Nation Self-Government AgreementMr. Greg Rickford (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, CPC): Mr. Speaker, under the provisions of Standing Order 32(2), I have the honour to table, in both official languages, copies of the Westbank First Nation self-government agreement annual report on implementation 2007-08. 
Abolition of Early Parole ActVic Toews:  moved for leave to introduce Bill C-59, An Act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act (accelerated parole review) and to make consequential amendments to other Acts.
 (Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed) 
Committees of the HouseMr. Lee Richardson (Calgary Centre, CPC): Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the fifth report of the Standing Committee on International Trade entitled, “Fact-Finding Mission to the European Union on the Benefits and Challenges of the Possible Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement between Canada and the European Union”.
Joe Preston: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Orders 104 and 114, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the 25th report of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs regarding the membership of committees in the house.
If the House gives its consent, I intend to move concurrence in the 25th report later today.
Criminal CodeMr. David Tilson (Dufferin—Caledon, CPC):  moved for leave to introduce Bill C-617, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (mischief relating to war memorials).
Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to introduce an act to amend the mischief provisions of the Criminal Code relating to war memorials. 
The bill seeks to add significant penalties for anyone convicted of mischief against a war memorial, cenotaph or other structure honouring or remembering those who have died as a consequence of war. Respect for those who have given their lives in a sacrifice for Canada is the responsibility of every Canadian. Anyone who wilfully damages or desecrates a war memorial should face stiff consequences. We owe it to our men and women in uniform and especially to those who have paid the ultimate sacrifice for Canada to protect these honoured places.
I would ask my colleagues to support the bill and to help protect Canada's war memorials and cenotaphs.
 (Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed) 
Committees of the HouseJoe Preston: Mr. Speaker, if the House gives its consent, I move that the 25th report of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs presented to the House earlier this day be concurred in.
The Speaker: Mr. Speaker, does the member for Elgin—Middlesex—London have the unanimous consent of the House to propose the motion?
[Intervention]
Some hon. members:  Agreed.
The Speaker:  The House has heard the terms of the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?
[Intervention]
Some hon. members:  Agreed.
The Speaker: (Motion agreed to)
PetitionsMr. Scott Simms (Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, once again I rise to present a petition to this House signed by many citizens in my riding, primarily from the Bonavista Peninsula area, from Port Blandford straight through to Trouty which was recently devastated by Hurricane Igor, as well as Port Union and the town of Bonavista itself.
The petitioners are calling for the permanence of EI pilot projects that affect their area. This allows them, for example, to use their best 14 weeks for employment insurance, as opposed to the last 14 weeks, which allows them to receive greater benefits, and, as a result, they do not to have to such things as banking hours and that sort of thing. Employers are calling for this, as well as employees, in this particular region. These are for targeted areas.
 Currently, the government has extended these programs up until the end of June. The petitioners are hoping that the government will see that this is a reasonable measure in these areas and that it will make these programs permanent.
David Tilson: Mr. Speaker, I have a petition to present to the House today asking the House to support Roxanne's law, a law that would empower women to press charges if they are coerced into an unwanted abortion.
Mr. Bruce Hyer (Thunder Bay—Superior North, NDP): Mr. Speaker, today I have the pleasure of presenting a petition on behalf of almost 2,000 residents of Thunder Bay, Sudbury, Longlac, Kaministiquia, Kakabeka Falls, Marathon, Neebing, Murillo and Toronto in support of bringing passenger rail service to the spectacular shore of Lake Superior in northwestern Ontario. It is almost five pounds of petitions. 
The petitioners call upon parliamentarians to support my Motion No. 291 to return passenger rail from Sudbury through Thunder Bay to Winnipeg and beyond. This world famous rail route was an important component of our local economy and a vital transportation link for thousands of tourists, businesspeople and residents in northwestern Ontario. 
Cutbacks to passenger rail service and bus service and rising fuel costs just underscore the need for us to bring back passenger rail. In addition, it is the most efficient way to travel and will be critical in reducing pollution and harmful climate change.
Hon. Bryon Wilfert (Richmond Hill, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36 I have the pleasure to present a petition with regard to a permanent resident in my riding. Unfortunately, at the moment he is under a death sentence in Iran. I have raised this issue in the House with the Minister of Foreign Affairs before and I have had several meetings with the acting chargé d'affaires of Iran. This individual has been put under a death sentence in Iran due to evidence which we view as false. Through no fault of his own, he went back to visit his dying father who, unfortunately, passed away.
The petitioners call upon the Government of Canada, particularly the Minister of Foreign Affairs, to intervene on behalf of Saeed Malekpour. The man is under a death sentence and that is absolutely unacceptable. We hope to have this issue resolved and that he will be returned safely back to Canada.
Mr. Massimo Pacetti (Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I have the pleasure to submit a petition signed by approximately 100 Canadian residents.
The petitioners wish to draw to the attention of the House that Canada owes its freedom to the efforts of our brave servicemen and women, that Canadians have a sense of pride in the accomplishments of our servicemen and women and that our servicemen and women deserve to be honoured for their sacrifices.
The petitioners call upon the House of Commons and Parliament to recognize Remembrance Day, November 11, as a general holiday throughout Canada with all the same legal provisions as general holidays, such as New Year's Day, Canada Day, Memorial Day in Newfoundland, Labour Day and Christmas Day.
I want to thank Mr. Vince Lacroce, the teacher at the local high school who assembled this petition.
Nathan Cullen: Mr. Speaker, it is my privilege to present two petitions signed by petitioners on Vancouver Island, the Southern and Northern Gulf Islands, the north coast of British Columbia, the Lower Mainland, Surrey, downtown Vancouver and throughout the entire province.
The petitioners urge the government to finally invoke a legislated moratorium and ban on tanker traffic on B.C.'s north coast and finally put into law a moratorium on offshore drilling off our pristine coast.
For many years, the current government and the one before sought all sorts of devious ways to undermine the expressed will of the people of British Columbia who, in poll after poll, more than 80% said that they did not want oil tanker traffic off their north coast and did not want drilling in their waters. 
Thee petitioners have brought this petition to the House of Commons both for economic and environmental reasons. It is about time that the B.C. Conservatives and the Conservative Party at large listened to the residents of British Columbia and followed their wishes expressly on tanker traffic.
Hon. Dan McTeague (Pickering—Scarborough East, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36 I have the pleasure to present a petition signed by a number of residents in the greater Toronto area who reinforce the leadership and efforts by my colleague from the riding of Richmond Hill.
The petitioners call upon the Parliament of Canada to urge the Minister of Foreign Affairs to intervene on behalf of Saeed Malekpour.
Mr. Malekpour is a permanent resident of Canada who is currently in prison in Iran and is potentially facing, as my good colleague from Richmond Hill suggested, the death penalty.
The petitioners believe Mr. Malekpour has been subjected to torture and has received very little in the way of due diligence and duty of care while in prison. He has been subject to a false confession. The petitioners urge the Government of Canada to engage with Iran to do everything possible to ensure that he receives a fair and transparent trial and is provided with appropriate legal counsel to defend himself against any charges made against him.
As the critic for consular affairs, I can say that this party supports this initiative and we ask that the government act as soon as possible, as do the petitioners.
Hon. Irwin Cotler (Mount Royal, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to table a petition on behalf of Saeed Malekpour, a permanent resident of Canada who has been languishing incommunicado in Iran in the notorious Evin Prison for two years under the shadow of death.
The petitioners note that Mr. Malekpour was forced to confess to fabricated Internet-related charges after enduring repeated tortures by revolutionary guard interrogators.
The petitioners also note that Mr. Malekpour has been denied access to counsel, denied access to his case file, denied the right to adduce evidence and denied any right to a fair hearing or fair trial.
Recently, after his wife made public a letter written by Saeed Malekpour to the head of the judiciary detailing the tortures endured at the hands of the revolutionary guards, he was charged with “conspiring with his spouse against national security” and is now under imminent threat of execution by Iranian authorities who have embarked on an unprecedented execution binge, having executed 65 people in the month of January 2011 alone.
The petitioners call upon Parliament to urge the Minister of Foreign Affairs to urgently intervene on Mr. Saeed Malekpour's behalf and to secure the suspension of this imminent execution and his release and his safety.
Mr. Jim Maloway (Elmwood—Transcona, NDP): Mr. Speaker, my petition has been signed by many Canadians who are demanding an end to Canada's military involvement in Afghanistan. 
In May 2008, Parliament passed a resolution to withdraw the forces by 2011. The Prime Minister, with the agreement of the Liberal Party, broke his oft-repeated promise to honour the parliamentary motion and, furthermore, refuses to bring it to a parliamentary vote in the House.
Committing 1,000 soldiers to a training mission still presents a danger to the troops and an unnecessary expense when our country is faced with a $56 billion deficit. The military mission has cost Canadians more than $18 billion so far, money that could have been used to improve health care and seniors pensions right here in Canada. 
Polls show that a clear majority of Canadians do not want Canada's military presence to continue after the scheduled removal date of July 2011. Therefore, the petitioners call upon the Prime Minister to honour the will of Parliament and bring the troops home now.
Ms. Martha Hall Findlay (Willowdale, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I rise today to present a petition on behalf of a large number of residents of Willowdale urging the Minister of Foreign Affairs to intervene on behalf of Canadian permanent resident Saeed Malekpour, a resident of Richmond Hill who is under a death sentence in Iran, and that the government appeal to the government of Iran to provide a fair judicial process.
Many Iranian Canadians in Willowdale and across Canada worry deeply about the safety and rights of friends and loved ones still in Iran.
I am proud to present the petition and to express our collective concerns on their behalf and on behalf of all Canadians worried about human rights and justice in Iran.
Questions Passed as Orders for ReturnsMr. Tom Lukiwski (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, CPC): Mr. Speaker, if the supplementary response to Question No. 532, originally tabled on December 15, 2010, as well as Question No. 524, could be made orders for returns, these returns would be tabled immediately.
The Speaker: Is that agreed?
[Intervention]
Some hon. members:  Agreed.
Ms. Siobhan Coady:  With respect to the government’s use of consultants and employment agencies: (a) what was the total amount spent on consultants and employment agencies during fiscal year 2009-2010; (b) what is the projected total amount that will be spent on consultants and employment agencies during fiscal year 2010-2011; (c) how much did each department or agency spend on consultants and employment agencies during fiscal year 2009-2010; (d) which consulting firms and employment agencies received contracts from each department or agency during fiscal year 2009-2010; and (e) for each contract in (d), (i) was it sole-sourced or awarded following an open competition, (ii) what was its value or amount, (iii) for what services was it granted, (iv) what was its duration?
[Stage Direction]
(Return tabled)
Mrs. Carol Hughes: With respect to the Economic Action Plan: (a) under the Infrastructure Stimulus Fund, in the riding of Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, (i) to date, what is the name and nature of each approved project, (ii) for each project, who are the partners involved and what is each partner's contribution, including the government's contribution, (iii) for each project, how much of the funding has flowed and to whom, (iv) what criteria were used to determine which projects were approved; (b) under the Building Canada Fund – Communities Component, in the riding of Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, (i) to date, what is the name and nature of each approved project, (ii) for each project, who are the partners involved and what is each partner's contribution, including the government's contribution, (iii) for each project, how much of the funding has flowed and to whom, (iv) what criteria were used to determine which projects were approved; (c) under the Building Canada Fund – Communities Component top-up, in the riding of Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, (i) to date, what is the name and nature of each approved project, (ii) for each project, who are the partners involved and what is each partner's contribution, including the government's contribution, (iii) for each project, how much of the funding has flowed and to whom, (iv) what criteria were used to determine which projects were approved; (d) under the Building Canada Fund – Major Infrastructure Component, in the riding of Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, (i) to date, what is the name and nature of each approved project, (ii) for each project, who are the partners involved and what is each partner's contribution, including the government's contribution, (iii) for each project, how much of the funding has flowed and to whom, (iv) what criteria were used to determine which projects were approved; (e) under the Recreational Infrastructure program in the riding of Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, (i) to date, what is the name and nature of each approved project, (ii) for each project, who are the partners involved and what is each partner's contribution, including the government's contribution, (iii) for each project, how much of the funding has flowed and to whom, (iv) what criteria were used to determine which projects were approved; and (f) under the Green Infrastructure Fund in the riding of Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, (i) to date, what is the name and nature of each approved project, (ii) for each project, who are the partners involved and what is each partner's contribution, including the government's contribution, (iii) for each project, how much of the funding has flowed and to whom, (iv) what criteria were used to determine which projects were approved?
[Stage Direction]
(Return tabled)
[Interjection]
Tom Lukiwski: Mr. Speaker, I ask that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.
The Speaker:  Is that agreed?
[Intervention]
Some hon. members:  Agreed.
Motions for PapersTom Lukiwski: Mr. Speaker, I ask that all notices of motions for the production of papers be allowed to stand.
The Speaker:  Is that agreed?
[Intervention]
Some hon. members:  Agreed. 
PrivilegeMr. Paul Szabo (Mississauga South, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I had given the clerk notice that I wished to present a few brief comments with regard to the matter of privilege raised by the member for Kings—Hants on February 7. The finance committee tabled its 10th report on Monday, February 7, and the member for Kings—Hants, pursuant to that report, raised a privilege issue. I want to concur with the arguments raised by the member for Kings—Hants.
I also want to incorporate, by reference, the matter of the privilege argument by the member for Scarborough—Rouge River in relation to the Afghan detainee documents on March 18, 2010, as well as your ruling thereon, Mr. Speaker, delivered on April 27, 2010. Within those presentations, there are substantive relevant documents and references, as well as precedents, which have bearing on the privilege matter before the House now.
The principle here is that the committee, by a motion, agreed to do certain work and to request certain information. In fact, that information would come from a number of departments. 
The request from committee, which is reported in the 10th report, was for the government to provide: five year projections on corporate profits; costing with regard to a number of justice bills; a number of pieces of information with regard to incremental cost estimates broken down by capital, operations, maintenance and other categories; baseline departmental funding requirements; total departmental annual reference levels; and detailed costing analyses and projections, including assumptions, for each of the bills and acts conducted in accordance with the Treasury Board guide to costing. These are all laid out in the 10th report of the finance committee.
The reason this matter was reported is that in all respects the government's response was that these were matters of cabinet confidence. This is the element that yet has to be examined and explored because there is a contention that it is cabinet confidence, but in my reading of some of the reference material, that is not the case. 
These pieces of information being requested in fact appeared in last year's budget. They also appear in various documents by the justice department and other officials, including the Parliamentary Budget Officer, with regard to the costing of certain matters. I will deal with those at the end of my comments.
There is no question that this has to do with the privileges of Parliament to call for persons, papers and records. The delegated authority is in Standing Order 108(1)(a) of the House of Commons and in rule 91 of the Senate of Canada. I will not dwell on those as they are well explained.
I took the opportunity to examine some of the arguments and references in the book entitled The Power of Parliamentary Houses to send for Persons, Papers and Records: A Sourcebook on the Law of Precedent of Parliamentary Subpoena Powers for Canadian and other Houses, which was written by my colleague, the member for Scarborough—Rouge River, and published in 1999. In looking at some of these extracts, I felt there were a couple of relevant references to precedents. 
The 21st edition of Erskine May, in reference to the enforcement by the House of its authority to send for persons, papers and records, on page 69, states:
 When any of these rights and immunities is disregarded or attacked, the offence is called a breach of privilege and is punishable under the law of Parliament. 
Further, Erskine May states in the 6th edition, on page 102-3:
 Each House also claims the right to punish as contempts actions which, while not breaches of any specific privilege, obstruct or impede it in the performance of its functions, or are offences against its authority or dignity, such as disobedience to its legitimate commands-- 
It goes on to say:
 Generally speaking, any act or omission which obstructs or impedes either House of Parliament in the performance of its functions, or which obstructs or impedes any member or officer of such House in the discharge of his duty, or which has a tendency, directly or indirectly, to produce such results may be treated as a contempt even though there is no precedent of the offence. 
This is a matter relating to the concept or the aspect of obstruction of members of Parliament to do their job through the delegated authority to committees. Obviously, we have the authority to call for persons, papers and records. What we do not have is the authority to act, should there be a refusal or an obstruction by a party to allow us to do our work. Why would that information be necessary?
It is necessary, not only for the committee but also for all hon. members, simply from the standpoint that once we have a budget out which has, for instance, tax cuts, leading right through to 2012 and a costing of that right through to 2015. Knowing what the assumptions were, the projections on corporate profits, and the projected tax rates et cetera, these are all relevant to the determination of those numbers. That budget has been presented. 
Also, with regard to the various justice bills, all of the bills referred to and for which information has been requested, they are all referred to as bills that have already been presented to the House and, in fact, are at various stages of debate. 
You must ask yourself, Mr. Speaker, if members of Parliament in committees are to do their job, are to hold the government accountable, are to scrutinize legislation, how can they do that without having the fundamental information on which those bills are based and the assumptions that have been made?
I will deal with the issue of what constitutes a cabinet confidence. One of the aspects is discussion papers and I will deal with that in a moment. I wanted to also deal with another reference. Maingot's 2nd edition, on page 239-40, states:
 Disobedience of rules of orders [of the House or committees] is an obvious contempt and would include...refusing to personally attend and to produce the documents requested by a committee...or otherwise disposing of them and refusing to answer questions put by the committee or by the House. 
Similarly, Greenwood and Ellicott, on page 33, states:
 It also follows from the wide powers which committees can exercise that, if ordered to produce a document which contains communications which were privileged before Courts of law...a person would be in contempt if he did not do so. Although these privileged communications are usually respected by committees, committees are not restricted in the same way as the Courts. 
Finally, Beauchesne's sixth edition on page 236 states in part: “Committees may send for any papers that are relevant to their Orders of Reference”. The material and the matters before the committee were, in fact, relevant to its order of reference. It goes on, “Within this restriction, it appears that the power of the committee to send for papers is unlimited”.
It goes on to say:
 The procedure for obtaining papers is for the committee to adopt a motion ordering the required person or organization to produce them. If this order is not complied with, the committee may report the matter to the House, stating their difficulties and obtaining the requested documents. It is then for the House to decide what action is to be taken. 
Those are precisely the facts in this case.
In response to the request by the committee, as I had indicated, the government has stated quite simply that this information is a matter of cabinet confidence. 
I would suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, that there is, and appears to be, a pattern of challenging the privileges of Parliament to call for persons, papers and records. And indeed, I want to give an example which I believe is relevant.
On August 26, 2010, the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons wrote to the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics. The committee had been working on a matter related to allegations of government interference on access to information requests. 
There were three points laid out in the letter, but the one that is relevant to this is the third point. This is a quotation from the letter from the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, dated August 26, 2010, to the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics:
 Third, Parliament's power to call for persons and papers has never been exercised to give a parliamentary majority access to such records and the internal communication of a parliamentary minority. Such interference would be unprecedented and abusive. We take the position that the power to call for persons and papers does not extend this far. 
In response, I asked the Law Clerk of Parliament to advise the committee on the arguments raised by the House leader in his letter. For the record, this is the letter of response from the Law Clerk, dated September 16, 2010, to myself as chair of the standing committee. 
In specific reference to the last point about the power to call for persons, papers and records, the Parliamentary Law Clerk opined as follows:
 Whenever the House or a committee adopts a resolution to require the production of documents, the resolution is always adopted by vote of a majority of the Members present. Thus, it has always been the case that a parliamentary majority can, by a resolution, demand access to records of the Government or a Minister. Secondly, a resolution for the production of documents by the Government or a Minister is not made against the minority present at the vote on the resolution but rather is directed at the Government or the Minister, as the case may be. 
Referring to the government House leader:
 It would seem that the Minister is invoking the circumstances of a minority Government to say that a parliamentary majority, demanding by a resolution the production of documents, cannot make this demand against the Government that has only a parliamentary minority. If this were the case, it would then mean that the House or any of its committees can never seek the production of documents from a minority Government. I am unable to find any authority for this proposition. 
I refer to a pattern with this government, certainly with regard to the ethics committee, in refusing to allow the staff members of a minister's office to appear before committee. Ultimately, they admitted in committee that the government, in fact, interfered. Some are under investigation and some have been fired. 
We had the case of the in-and-out investigation by Elections Canada that looked into the practice of the government. We had the government actually advise witnesses to ignore the subpoenas issued by the committee to them, and we had testimony that the government interfered with those witnesses; tampering with witnesses. Also, there are a number of other examples on the access to information side.
I want to turn to the issue of cabinet confidence. I looked at the Department of Justice's website under the title “A Comprehensive Framework for Access to Information Reform”. I printed out the second page where it says:
 The privilege associated with Cabinet confidentiality finds its expression in three statutes: section 69 of the Access to Information Act, section 70 of the Privacy Act, and section 39 of the Canada Evidence Act (CEA). 
It goes on to say:
 All three Acts describe a subset of Cabinet confidences called “discussion papers”. These are documents whose purpose is to present to Cabinet background explanations, analyses of problems or policy options. 
And this is important. It continues:
 If Cabinet has made a decision on the issue to which a discussion paper pertains, that discussion paper may no longer be protected once the decision has been made public, or after four years, if the decision has not been made public. 
The information in the discussion papers includes the information that has been requested by the committee. It has the information, the forecast, the rationalization, all the information that the cabinet would require to make decisions. In fact, last year's budget was tabled. The decisions were taken, whether it be on tax cuts or the government's agenda with regard to justice bills and to all the other matters that the committee had requested.
There is a court reference. In the Ethyl case, the Federal Court of Appeal held that form could not prevail over substance. It ruled that legislation not having been amended, the discussion paper provisions must continue to have effect.
The issue and the point to be raised is that the bills in question had been presented to the House and were in the public domain. Therefore, the discussion papers related to each and every one of those bills, to the budget information requested and to the Treasury Board information requested and all the items listed in the 10th report of the Standing Committee on Finance are not cabinet confidences, even according to the Department of Justice.
Committee members and all members of the House need information to understand the context and the data on which budget decisions and legislative proposals are based. That is the fundamental requirement for us to be able to debate with some knowledge and an opportunity to rebut and hold the government accountable.
Accountability, therefore, is under attack by the government failing to provide the information requested. Once presented for consideration by the House, the assumptions, data and projections, et cetera must be made available to Parliament so we can make informed decisions, which is the subject matter of our prayer each and every day, that we make good laws and wise decisions. That cannot be done in the absence of information.
The final point I would like to make is there have been a number of cases where clear breaches of parliamentary privilege have not been dealt with by the House. One of the examples would be subpoenaing of witnesses such as Dimitri Soudas. A subpoena was issued and he refused to be served. That matter was never dealt with. There are several others. Other cases, where there would have been matters of privilege raised before the House, were not reported to the House because of either a prorogation of the House or the call of an election.
I wanted to make that point because it is very important since the powers of Parliament to call for persons, papers and records is based on over 300 years of Westminster practice and procedure and experience. However, it is not codified. I do not want, for one moment, anyone to think that if a particular matter was clearly a breach of the privilege of Parliament but it was not brought to the House and therefore was a precedent in itself that it need not be was never the case. I want to reaffirm that.
Those are my comments. I understand other parties will be making further submissions.
 I very much appreciate your attention, Mr. Speaker, to the points I have raised and that the matter of privilege will be dealt with in expeditious fashion so both the committee and the House can do their job.
Tom Lukiwski: Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for Mississauga South for his intervention, a further intervention from the original question of privilege raised by the member for Kings—Hants.
As I said in my response to the original question of privilege on Monday of this week, the government will be moving quickly to develop a comprehensive response to the member's privilege. However, I must point out that since we now have yet a further intervention, a far lengthier intervention, we obviously need some time to examine all of the issues raised by the member for Mississauga South.
Hopefully that will not delay our process in developing our response unduly. However, as I am sure the member for Mississauga South can recognize and appreciate, we must review carefully all of his comments that he delivered here today.
Once again, Mr. Speaker, I assure you, and all members of this place, that we will be delivering our response to both interventions in due course. I thank the member for giving us one more opportunity to review his most lengthy comments and intervention.
The Speaker: I am sure all hon. members are dying to hear the comments from the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons on this matter when he is prepared. I am sure their patience will be exhibited plainly as we await those comments.

Government Orders
Strengthening Aviation Security ActHon. Julian Fantino:  moved that Bill C-42, An Act to amend the Aeronautics Act, be read the third time and passed. 
Mr. Brian Jean (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, CPC): Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to rise in the House today to sponsor Bill C-42 for third reading.
I want to preface my remarks with the observation that our government appreciates the importance of the legislation before us today. Along with our government, I want to personally thank the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, which heard testimony from a wide range of witnesses including Canada's Privacy Commissioner. I also thank many of the members who are in the House today for their hard work on the bill in seeing it come to fruition.
I have followed the debate in the House as well as at committee with a great deal of interest. I believe we have arrived at the appropriate balance between protecting our security while also protecting the civil liberties and privacy rights of Canadians, which is a balance that our government has been committed to achieving since first elected in 2006.
I am sure all hon. members would agree that the debates so far have engaged comments from a number of organizations, media outlets and individual Canadians, and it is good to have that debate. Some of these comments have been very helpful and have influenced some of the helpful amendments agreed to at the committee stage.
Some comments shared at the committees were, however, less helpful and may, in some cases, have generated some confusion. We certainly do not want Canadians or our counterparts in the United States to be confused. I therefore appreciate the opportunity to set the record straight on a number of fronts and to clarify what Bill C-42 would and would not do.
First and foremost, Bill C-42 will in essence do what was done by the previous Liberal Government of Canada in 2001 as part of our country's response to the tragic events of September 11. It will amend section 4.83 of the Aeronautics Act so Canadian airline companies will be able to comply with enhanced aviation security measures that have been introduced by the United States strictly in relation to its sovereignty rights.
In 2001 the then Liberal government amended the Aeronautics Act so Canadian airline companies could provide the U.S. government with passenger information for all flights scheduled to land in that country.
Bill C-42 proposes to amend the exact same section of the Aeronautics Act so Canadian airline companies can provide the U.S. with information for flights that overfly U.S. airspace on their way to destinations such as Mexico and the Caribbean. This is in accordance with the U.S. government's secure flight final rule, which was published in 2008 in response to the recommendations of the 9/11 commission and the intelligence reform and terrorism prevention act passed in 2004. Indeed, this directly applies to keeping the United States secure and keeping Canadians secure.
As all members already know, there are obvious security reasons why this is very necessary and why this government has moved forward with this initiative. As the final rule itself notes, flights which overfly the United States have the potential to cause harm due to their proximity to locations that may be potential terrorist targets, such as major metropolitan areas and critical infrastructure in the United States.
All countries in this world, including Canada, have the right under international law to determine who enters their borders, including who enters their airspace. Our counterparts to the south of the border have the legal right and obligation under international law to know who comes into their country, whether by land, air or sea. Canada has the same right and this Conservative government will do whatever it takes to enforce and protect Canadians and our legal rights of sovereignty of state. That point was put forward by the then Liberal transport minister in 2001 to pass the original amendments to the Aeronautics Act, which I would like to point out was accomplished in less than one month, and this holds true today.
 As I said, the truth of the matter is international law recognizes a state's right to regulate aircraft entering its territory.
The Chicago convention to which Canada is a signatory requires compliance with:
 The laws and regulations of each Contracting [state] relating to the admission to or departure from its territory of aircraft engaged in international air navigation, or to the operation and navigation of such aircraft while within its territory. 
The legal basis for requiring passenger information for all flights which fly over U.S. airspace is therefore very secure in international law and domestic law and the rights of sovereign states. This point was stressed by many witnesses during committee hearings.
What would Bill C-42 do? The bill would allow Canada to comply with international and U.S. law and it would provide Canadian airline companies with continued access to southern destinations without forcing them to fly around U.S. airspace. Imagine how expensive and difficult it would be or how many hours of additional travel it would be for Canadians travelling to southern destinations or even through Canada itself from point to point. In some cases, Canadian aircraft do overfly U.S. airspace.
The bill proposes to build on a number of initiatives already under way with our international partners to further improve aviation security, because this is a global issue.
Let me now turn my attention to what Bill C-42 would not do, or what it would not require Canadian travellers to do. Most Canadians watching today will be interested in this part.
I heard a discussion during committee deliberations related to the impact on airlines if the bill was not passed. If Bill C-42 does not pass, it could result in a devastating impact on airline companies in Canada, potentially killing jobs from coast to coast and jeopardizing the financial security of hard-working Canadian families in Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver, Winnipeg, right across the country. This Conservative government will not let that happen.
As the National Airline Council of Canada noted in committee hearings:
 —being denied access to U.S. airspace for overflight would be an unmitigated disaster for Canadian air carriers and our passengers...undermine the economic strength of the industry. 
 No one could be more clearer than that. This bill needs to be passed.
Bill C-42 has economic as well as security implications that would be very critical to our country if it did not pass.
Some suggestions were made during committee hearings that compliance with the U.S. secure flight program would force Canadians to give the U.S. government personal information such as race, religion or ethnic identifiers. The testimony from these people is pretty scary. In other words, there were suggestions that Bill C-42 might result in passengers being forced to give the United States information that could be used for racial profiling. That is wrong. That will not happen under this government's watch.
The U.S. final rule is very specific as well. It stipulates that airline companies must provide the U.S. government with a passenger name, date of birth, gender, redress number and certain passport and itinerary information only if it is available. 
For passport information the final rule is very specific and states that air carriers must transmit to the Transportation Security Administration, the TSA, the passport number, the country of issuance and expiration date of the passport. Itinerary information includes non-personal information such as flight number, departure time and arrival time.
The fully itemized list is on page 64,024 of the final rule for those hon. members who do not believe me and who want to check it out for themselves and want the source of this information. I encourage members of the NDP to look at the rule so they can quit fearmongering and scaring Canadians because it is not helping the debate at all. 
Nowhere in the final rule is there any mention of any requirement for airline companies to provide information such as race or religion. Quite frankly, this government and the Prime Minister would not stand for it. Nor is there a requirement to provide information such as addresses, phone numbers, credit card numbers, frequent flyer numbers or meal or seat preference. 
The second thing Bill C-42 would not do is force Canadian airline companies to provide the United States government with access to large amounts of passenger information which is personal or private in nature.
As U.S. Ambassador David Jacobson outlined in his recent letter to the committee, the only personal identifiable information being shared is name, gender, date of birth and, if available, a passport number. I thank the ambassador for that letter. It was very helpful indeed.
Let us move on to another issue to further provide clarity.
During committee hearings, I heard that Bill C-42 would require Canadian airline companies to pass along passenger information which could then be matched not only against the no-fly and selectee lists, but also arbitrarily and indiscriminately forwarded, for example, to police or immigration officials.
Again, the final rule, the U.S. rule, is very specific. It is laid out in black and white. It says that the purpose of collecting passenger information is to guard against possible aviation and national security threats. That is it. It is very clear. In fact, the Canadian government has asked for and received written assurances from the United States administration that passenger information will not be forwarded to other agencies except in extremely limited circumstances and then only for an aviation or national security purpose.
In his recent letter to the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, Ambassador Jacobson states:
 Secure flight information is not shared widely for law enforcement or for immigration purposes-- 
The letter went on to say:
 Any information shared is limited to an individual or limited group of individuals for a specific investigative purpose related to terrorism or national security. 
The ambassador points out in his letter that since the inception of the secure flight program, the transportation security administration has provided information about a traveller to federal law enforcement officials on only three occasions “to further a terrorism or national security investigation”.
How many people travel in our country or in North America? Hundreds of millions of people every year. Since its inception only three people have had that information passed on. This is after hundreds of millions of passengers have flown under the secure flight program.
Our government is committed to work with our international partners to help strengthen aviation security and to help strengthen the security of all Canadians to keep them safe. That is clearly our job and we are doing that job. We are committed to protecting the safety and security of Canadians and to crack down on terrorists wherever they may be, wherever they may live and wherever they may hide.
However, we are also committed to upholding the values and the beliefs which have made this the great country it is today. I believe even the NDP and the Bloc would agree with that.
We need to stay safe but we also need to uphold and strengthen the vital cornerstones of our way of life, such as due process, the rule of law and the preservation of individual civil liberties as well as the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and privacy rights. However, it is a balance. We will protect these rights. We will uphold these Canadian values. Bill C-42 does exactly that.
I also note the amendment to Bill C-42, supported by the government, that will mandate a review of the legislation after three years. That is not a bad idea. It is certainly one that the government thinks has some positive aspects to it and one that it will support.
I also want to highlight the amendment supported by the government that stipulates in the act that passenger information will not be passed to any government other than the United States government for overflight purposes.
Parliamentary approval, meaning that everyone in this place has to approve, is required should another country request passenger information for any overflights. There will also be a mandated review of these particular pieces of legislation.
Bill C-42 is very necessary. I think every Canadian agrees it is necessary. It is vitally important to our national airline carriers, the Canadian public and to our tourism industry. 
I know that all hon. members understand how important it is for Canada to continue to work with our international partners to further strengthen aviation security, so all members of the House and all Canadians can travel the world in safety and comfort with an expectation that our privacy rights, our persons and our families are going to be protected and kept safe.
I therefore urge all hon. members to give speedy passage to Bill C-42, as we did nearly 10 years ago for the previous Liberal legislation to amend the Aeronautics Act. This would ensure that Canadian airline companies can continue to access destinations such as Cuba, Mexico and South America in the most cost-effective and efficient way possible.
In conclusion, I want to thank the Liberal members who helped so much on the bill as we arrived at some good compromises. As well, I want to thank the Bloc members and I especially want to thank the NDP who have not, up to this point, filibustered anything and who have actually had some contributions which I would consider valuable.
We will see what happens later on, but I encourage all members to pass the bill so that we can move forward with the safety and security of Canadians in an efficient and cost-effective way for Canadians.
Hon. John McCallum (Markham—Unionville, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I thank the parliamentary secretary for his kind comments about the co-operation on this bill by the opposition.
I would like to mention a statement made in the House in answer to a question by the Minister of Public Safety. He was talking about Bill C-42 and he said:
 For our part, we have worked closely with the Americans to ensure this is implemented in a way that recognizes our security interests and the privacy concerns of Canadians. 
 Now it is up to the Liberal-led coalition to stop playing politics and support this needed bill. 
Given what he said about our co-operation, it sounds like the last comment by the Minister of Public Safety is something taken out of one of the crime bill folders or something of that nature.
There is a clear contradiction. Does the parliamentary secretary agree with the statement that the Liberal-led coalition should stop playing politics and support this needed bill? 
[Interjection]
Brian Jean: Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for his help in relation to getting the bill passed. He was very helpful, indeed. The member sees the need for this piece of legislation and I thank him for that.
Our expectation at all times, for the most part, is that the NDP will filibuster and waste everybody's time, and the Liberals will oppose everything we do. In this case, they saw the light and I appreciate them seeing the light and for not playing politics.
As is so important, we know that in a minority government we cannot get anything passed without the help of the opposition parties, in some cases all of them and in some cases one or two of them. I would appreciate the NDP coming on board to help us out with this legislation. If they do so without filibustering, I would thank them doubly.
Mr. Dennis Bevington (Western Arctic, NDP): Mr. Speaker, the bill has gone through a long process. One might ask why that is. The privacy and rights of Canadians are probably the most important issues we deal with in the House.
The parliamentary secretary said there was a lot of confusion created at the committee by various people. 
I would like to point out that when the Minister of Public Safety spoke to us about the bill, he emphasized that this particular information would not be used in the United States for any other purpose. Since then we have had countless amounts of information including from the ambassador, as my hon. colleague pointed out. In his letter he said that this information would not be “shared widely for law enforcement or for immigration purposes”. Certainly that is not a denial of the use of it for those purposes. It says they would not use everyone's name and information for those purposes. Quite clearly, the minister himself created that confusion.
The parliamentary secretary said that in negotiations if we could have convinced the U.S. we had proper security in Canada it has the ability within its laws to provide a full exemption for Canadian information on overflights. The parliamentary secretary said it would cost billions of dollars to accomplish the extra security required to get up to the standards of the U.S.
Where did the parliamentary secretary get the information to say that the costs to create a security system that would match up to the United States would be immense?
[Interjection]
Brian Jean: Mr. Speaker, it is like the NDP to suck and blow at the same time. On one part the members want us to stay away from the U.S. as much as possible and now they want us to integrate exactly the same security measures that the U.S. has.
This government is a Canadian government for the Canadian people. We are not going to take lessons from the NDP to make us more Americanized.
We are going to have a made in Canada solution and that is what this is. It is a made in Canada solution to protect our sovereignty and respect the sovereignty of our neighbours to the south.
The member for Western Arctic is my neighbour from my constituency to the north. His constituency is north of the oil sands. He is a hard-working member. He has been on my committee for some time and I appreciate his work. I wish he could get his priorities more in line with the priorities of Canadians because his are skewed. As long as he looks for those black helicopters and wears tinfoil hats that are so popular in the NDP, he is going to be dissuaded from the realities of life.
 In this case, the reality is the information on three people out of probably a billion or more has been passed on to U.S. law enforcement agencies. Three people out of a billion. I would take those odds any time.
Jim Maloway: Mr. Speaker, the government and the member simply rolled over for the Americans. 
In any normal negotiation if the Americans were asking for us for information, it would be logical to say that reciprocity would be in order. 
As the numbers indicate, there are 2,000 American flights over Canadian air space every day, but only 100 Canadian flights over the United States airspace every day. That would indicate the Americans have a lot to lose in this negotiation. I could see them backing off.
Imagine what the American airlines and public would do if they found out they had to provide that information to Canadian authorities in order to fly over Canadian airspace. It would have been dead in the water. The representatives of Congress in the United States would be getting calls from their constituents wanting to know exactly what our demands were and the exemption would have been given immediately. The government, as usual, rolled over for the Americans and said whatever they want, we will give it to them. 
These are all secret agreements and we do not know exactly what is being required. We only know based on similar agreements with other jurisdictions, for example, the agreement between the European Union and the United States, there is a different set of requirements. 
Clearly, if we are involved in transferring any information involving a PNR, it is information that goes beyond what we should be providing. 
The Canadian requirements for use of the PNR in the Canada-E.U. agreement have specific time periods for the disposal of data, and it is not 40 years. It limits the use of the data, limits the individualization of the data and renders the information anonymous. Therefore, security services can do what they want. They can build the profiles they are looking for without attaching it to any one individual. That probably would be acceptable. 
We have global standards for international treaties on PNR agreements and Canada is signatory to that. If the government is going to sign an agreement, those are the kinds of provisions to put in the agreement, but the government did not do that. 
Why are the Conservatives so poor at negotiating on Canada's behalf?
[Interjection]
Brian Jean: Mr. Speaker, I have to laugh at that. The evidence is clear. We heard this in committee. It is very clear. We have received exemptions from the U.S. that are unprecedented. This government has done extremely good work and I give my compliments to the minister in charge of that particular case, because we have received more exemptions than any other country.
However, let us talk about what would happen if that guy were in charge, if the NDP were in charge. The first thing that would happen is that the NDP would close our borders. We would go back to living in caves, back to the stone age. That is the reality of the NDP. It does not want to talk to international partners. It does not want to work with international partners. It just wants to close the borders.
The member proposed a bill of rights. If a plane were late by a couple of hours, passengers would get $25,000. For the rest of my life, I would just travel the Air Canada system and wait to get a couple of $25,000 hits a day. If that guy were in charge, we would not have an airline industry. The reality is that our borders would be closed, we would be living in caves, we would go back to the stone age. We would not manufacture anything because nobody would buy anything as they would have no money. That is the NDP way.
Nathan Cullen: Mr. Speaker, that is a revelation from the parliamentary secretary. I did not know he necessarily believed in the stone age. This is all new to me and something that is helpful to some of the constituents he apparently represents.
In Parliament we are being asked to vote on an agreement with the United States, which has its own interests as a country, and so be it. However, it is an agreement that the government will not show us. It is an understanding in a set of agreements about our privacy as Canadians and our sovereignty as a country, which the government will not display. We are supposed to trust the government. 
How can Canadians trust the current government after selling out to the U.S. so many times?
[Interjection]
Brian Jean: Mr. Speaker, I am sorry. My allergies are acting up; any time I get around the NDP and start hearing its members sucking and blowing, they start to happen. I do not have any Kleenex but this, hopefully, will be my last question.
Speaking of beliefs, I am a Christian. I am very proud of it. I am proud of my belief system, and I respect his belief system in the same way.
However, I will tell members what I do require, and what I think this government has required, from the United States. We have required that the Americans uphold and strengthen the vital cornerstones of our Canadian values, such as due process, the rule of law and the preservation of individuals' civil liberties, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and privacy rights. The NDP will never stand up for those things.
The Speaker: It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 38, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Nanaimo—Cowichan, Status of Women; the hon. member for Vancouver Kingsway, Correctional Service of Canada; and the hon. member for St. John's East, National Defence.
Resuming debate. The hon. member for Markham—Unionville.
John McCallum: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to once again speak about Bill C-42. I think that all the parties have shared their positions on this bill with the House.
Today, I would like to comment on some of the statements made by the Conservatives and New Democrats that I believe are incorrect.
I will start with the case of the Minister of Public Safety. I mentioned already to the parliamentary secretary that notwithstanding the fine words of praise by him regarding the healthy co-operation of the opposition, the minister said on Monday in regard to Bill C-42 that:
 For our part, we have worked closely with the Americans to ensure this is implemented in a way that recognizes our security interests and the privacy concerns of Canadians. 
 Now it is up to the Liberal-led coalition to stop playing politics and support this needed bill. 
I take exception to that language. As the minister's own colleague, the parliamentary secretary, had made clear, we in the Liberal Party and other parties, I believe, did work constructively from the beginning on this bill to make sure it was passed after an appropriate amount of scrutiny and several important amendments to strengthen the bill.
If I turn now to the New Democrats, in an attempt to scare Canadians about this legislation, they made numerous statements that I do not believe to be factually true. The first point I would like to mention is the statement made by the member for Vancouver Kingsway that this bill would allow the secret negotiation of data transfer with multiple countries. That is absolutely false. That member said in the House:
 What information would be forwarded is determined by requirements laid out, and it is fair to say, in hitherto secret agreements with other countries. Details of those agreements have not been released. 
That is untrue. The agreements are not secret. I can refer the member to part two of the U.S. Federal Register of October 28, 2008, which sets out the information and states: 
 For passengers on covered flights, TSA requires covered aircraft operators to request a passenger’s full name, gender, date of birth, and Redress Number (if available)— 
It goes on to state that:
 —passengers are only required to provide their full name, date of birth, and gender to allow TSA to perform watch list matching. 
Airlines will also be required to provide the TSA with itinerary information about flights, but only so that the TSA can prioritize these flights in its matching process. 
I would encourage the hon. members on the New Democratic benches to read the final rule so they can have a clear understanding of what the secure flight program actually is.
The member for Vancouver Kingsway was also wrong when he referenced other countries. This was one of the amendments that we made to the bill, which I think made it stronger. Originally, the bill would have allowed other countries to be added, along with the United States, to obtain information about overflights. However, we amended the bill so that only the United States was included. If any other third country wanted to receive this information, the whole thing would have to come back to Parliament and Parliament would have to amend the legislation further. It is totally wrong to talk about countries other than United States, because only the United States is covered in this bill.
Some members of the NDP also mentioned that the data would be held for 40 years. That again is wrong. For 99% of flyers, the data will be held for no more than seven days. If there is a potential match, it would be seven years, and for confirmed matches to the terrorist list, the data could be held for as long as 99 years.
Before I wrap up, I want to touch for a moment on the question of sovereignty. My education is in economics, not political science, but I am fairly certain that the control of U.S. airspace is not a matter of Canadian sovereignty. I can assure members and anyone else who is listening that if the U.S. government attempted to decide the rules for Canadian airspace on the grounds that it was its sovereign right to do so, nobody would be more upset than the NDP. Indeed, I would be as well. Therefore, how can New Democrats demand control of U.S. airspace?
I am not a big fan of this bill, far from it, but I do understand that the U.S. has sovereign control of its airspace. That is a question of international law. It has put these rules in place and Canada must now respond. It is not a pleasant duty, but we have to recognize international law. We are governed by law, and under international law a country has control over its own airspace.
There are important issues, but I want to make sure the record is set straight so that all members of the House and the members of the Senate who will soon receive the bill can debate it with the facts before them, rather than the imagined facts constructed by the NDP.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, and I look forward to any questions.
Dennis Bevington: Mr. Speaker, my colleague did bring up the issue of the regulations that the U.S. has for the information it wants to collect. That is correct.
However, what we are talking about is the agreement between Canada and the U.S. regarding the use of that information, the sharing of that information, the keeping of that information and all of those things. We have had no indication from the government of what those agreements are, how they are held in place, and what kind of surety Canadians have that their information will be used in a correct fashion. In fact, the only information we received at committee was that once this information were given to the United States, it would have the ability under its laws, under the Homeland Security Act, to use the information from foreigners as it saw fit. In fact, its privacy law does not apply to foreigners, so the information collected by foreigners does not apply.
When we talk about handing over the passenger name record, the U.S. government also has the ability, through the Homeland Security Act, to use that number to get all the information held on file and collected in computers in the United States.
Where is the agreement that limits the use of the information that Canadians are passing to the United States?
[Interjection]
John McCallum: Mr. Speaker, as I said in my speech, this is not a law that I particularly like, because it does raise concerns about privacy and issues such as those raised by the hon. member. However, for practical purposes, I think we had little choice but to pass the bill, and I think we made three substantial amendments that improved this bill.
I do believe as well that in the U.S. documentation it does state the length of time this information will be held, and it does state the limitations on other U.S. agencies that it will be shared with. The ambassador also gave certain assurances in this regard.
The member may simply say that he does not believe the Americans, but I think we have to have some faith in them, and when the U.S. ambassador makes commitments and commitments are made in U.S. texts, then I think we should believe them.
Jim Maloway: Mr. Speaker, the parliamentary secretary simply ducked and escaped my question about what efforts the government made with the Americans to look for reciprocity.
The fact of the matter is, there are far more American flights flying over Canadian airspace. A sensible negotiating approach would have been to ask the Americans to provide us with the same information we are providing them. Clearly, if they have some security concerns about airplanes going over their airspace, surely we, who share the continent with them, would have similar concerns and would want to be able to process their information. 
Had the government done this, we might have been looking at getting an exemption because of all the blowback the Americans would have received from their airlines and American passengers, because there are 2,000 flights flying over Canada versus only 100 over the United States. I just think that reciprocity would have been something the government would have asked for, if it were negotiating properly.
The parliamentary secretary says that we could not afford to process the information. How he knows this, I do not know, but it will cost the Americans half a billion dollars in computer systems to handle all of this information that we will be giving them. By extension, we could not afford the computer system to process their information because there would be so much of it. That was his answer.
In direct response to my question, he did not answer it at all. He simply attacked the air passenger bill of rights and misrepresented it. He could not even remember what was in that bill when misrepresenting that part of it and not answering the question.
Maybe the hon. member could fill in some of the missing answers the parliamentary secretary could not give.
[Interjection]
John McCallum: Mr. Speaker, it is certainly not my role or function to defend the parliamentary secretary. 
We did receive a briefing from transport officials, and it is true that the United States has said that it would not require us to provide this information if we had our own equivalent system that would take that information. According to the transport officials, to develop the same kind of system that the Americans have would cost hundreds of millions of dollars.
Nathan Cullen: Mr. Speaker, the Liberals have spent a lot of time downplaying this bill, saying how bad it is, and I get the sense from my Liberal colleague and from them in general that it is some sort of awful necessity. They are going to vote for it, however, even though they do not like it. They are going to vote for it for practical purposes even though they are worried about it.
The fundamental point here is the sovereignty question. How can Canadians protect their own information? How can we protect the privacy of Canadians we represent here in the House of Commons?
The member pointed to one alleviation of concern that we can somehow control what the U.S. will do with this data once it gets it. There is nothing that we have been shown that says that is true. One has to imagine a future where Canada's Parliament will tell Congress that we do not want it to pass on any of our information. We will not even get in the door and my hon. colleague knows that. The Americans have had a slow and serious downgrade in their own civil rights over the last dozen years, certainly since 9/11.
We have to imagine a future where all of the information on passengers on a flight from Vancouver to Toronto, or from Montreal to Halifax, that flies over U.S. airspace will be in the hands of our American colleagues. 
The problem that many Canadians will have with this is that the Americans need to know who is on the passenger list a full 24 hours in advance. Some people will want to get on a plane that same day. Can my hon. colleague imagine a future in which Canadians are denied access to a plane not going to the United States but another Canadian destination because the Americans insist on 24 hours notice? That is in the agreement.
I just do not know why the Liberals are so trusting of the Conservatives on such a Canadian fundamental and sacred right as privacy.
[Interjection]
John McCallum: As usual, Mr. Speaker, the NDP is confused on questions of fact. They talk about giving this information to the Americans on flights that go over American airspace between Toronto and Vancouver. That is false. That information is not required to be given for domestic flights within Canada even if they do pass over the United States.
The second point I would make is that the reason I do not particularly like this law is because I would rather we did not have to give the information to the United States.
What the member keeps forgetting to mention is that under international law, every country has sovereignty over the airspace above it. We could ask for the information. The U.S. could ask for information. The UK could ask for the information. Every country has legal sovereignty over the airspace above it. 
We cannot deny that the Americans have the right to request this information. They have the right to deny access to their airspace if we do not comply. This would create huge problems, huge costs, and much inconvenience for millions of Canadians who want to take flights to Mexico or to other places that require flying over U.S. airspace.
That practical reason is the reason why we did in the end support the bill, even though I would be happy if there were no such bill. That is why at the same time we strengthened the bill in three specific ways to alleviate concerns that others, including us, were having.
Dennis Bevington: Mr. Speaker, I am glad to have a chance to speak to this bill again because I am deeply concerned about this whole issue.
Clearly, the history of aviation security since 9/11 is one of continual movement toward more authoritarian structures and continual movement toward less privacy for Canadians. This is the movement that took place and we are all part of it. This Parliament has been part of it over the last decade.
I have seen a break in that, though, in the last week where we finally saw some rationality applied to one particular segment of our aviation security. It is not a rationality that is popular with everyone. People are concerned about it. Of course they are.
However, we do see that the dam is starting to break on the whole issue of aviation security and what is actually required by Canadians, by international travellers, what is useful to do, and what is something that makes sense in this age rather than simply a knee-jerk reaction to perceived incidents that may occur.
Why do we not want to support this bill? It is because we do not think the government has done enough to deal with the issue of sharing information with the United States. That is quite clear. We feel that what has happened here is invading Canadians' privacy, invading their rights in a way that we cannot completely understand. We do not know what the impact of this information is. We have not been given assurances. There are no provisions within the bill that outline how this information is to be shared. None of that was part of this bill.
This bill was very simple, a few lines changing the Aeronautics Act. It is a few lines. It is really very limited. With the negotiations that took place and what we heard in committee about the negotiations, there certainly were a number of issues that came to light. One of them was that the U.S. could provide a complete exemption for Canadian flights. If we matched equivalent security, the U.S. would provide that exemption.
Another one was the issue of reciprocity, which we have talked about quite a bit. That was not brought to the table. That was not used as a lever in the negotiations, quite clearly.
 Then we talked about the famous exemption that was given. This exemption, domestic to domestic flights, that was provided by the United States for Canadian flights leaving one destination in Canada and going to another was given by the U.S. That raised even more questions about security. Of course, with any flight that goes domestic to domestic, the security requirement for the information is simply a photo id, something that could be forged by the simplest of techniques and which really does not provide the same layer of sophistication in terms of the information that a passport on an international flight provides to any airline that is dealing with a particular passenger.
We saw the U.S. give an exemption for flights that would pass over the United States that had less security on them than international flights. This did not make sense. The exemption did not stand up to rationality. That always brings something into question. When rationality does not apply, what are the reasons?
Did we understand the reason last week when the Prime Minister went down to Washington to work on a perimeter security deal? Was the reason for an exemption on domestic to domestic that we are going to see traveller information shared completely within our countries, between intelligence agencies for the two countries? Is that what is going to happen? How are we going to determine the nature of that information? How are we going to determine how that information is going to be used?
We can see quite clearly that there is no control over the information we are giving out right now. There is none at all. It is simply give the information and let it be.
 That information does include the passenger name record. When it includes the passenger name record number, the U.S. government has access to the information on the computers, the Sabre and Galileo servers that are held in the United States. That is information that was also given at committee. 
Whatever information airlines have on passengers would be instantaneously accessible to the United States intelligence service through the beauty of computers. The seven day requirement that the information will be taken out after seven days really is quite meaningless in our computer age. There is plenty of time to do whatever we want with that information, the data mining that the European Union was so against, the data profiling was the real harmful thing that could go on with that type of information.
So, we have no recourse and no limitations on the information that we are giving. For Canadians falsely accused of something in the United States, there is no recourse. One of my colleagues talked about that with the existing system. It is not going to get any better. Many witnesses spoke in front of the committee. Many witnesses indicated their disquiet with what was going on here, with the impacts on the invasion of privacy.
We proposed some amendments. I put forward an amendment for a drop dead clause, as we did in the early part of this decade, where with contentious invasions of privacy through things like the Terrorism Act, we put in drop dead clauses. We said if there is a perceived need for information that goes beyond what is normal, if there are considerations that we put on the Canadian population that go beyond what we expect as our basic rights, then let us put a time limit on it. 
I put forward that amendment. The support for that amendment was not there from the two opposition parties and that amendment died. That actually has brought us to the point we are here in debating this bill.
In the last days since the Prime Minister's trip to Washington, the Liberal Party adopted two positions on information. One position was that it was going to vote to support the bill. The other being when, publicly in question period, the Liberal leader says things like: “Why is the Prime Minister even contemplating the surrender of Canadian privacy rights to U.S. Homeland Security?”, “What biometric information on Canadians will the Conservatives surrender to the Americans?”, and “When will the Prime Minister tell Canadians and Parliament the truth?”
Yes, we are after those answers, as well, on this particular bill. We wanted to see the agreements. We wanted to understand the safeguards that should be in place for any Canadian information shared with another country.
 Did we get it? No.
What do Canadians think? There was an interesting online poll in the Globe and Mail, which is not terribly reliable, but 67,000 responded to that online poll. The question was: “Should Canada and the U.S. collaborate more deeply on surveillance and data-sharing in the name of a so-called North American perimeter? Ninety-two per cent of those respondents said no; 92% of the 67,000 Canadians who had the opportunity to see the poll and to respond to it said no. That is a fairly significant margin of Canadians who are concerned about their personal privacy rights vis-à-vis information.
This is why the Liberal Party right now is quite conflicted on this issue. It is voting for a bill that is not tolerable to Canadian values, for whatever reason, perhaps the perceived threat to the Canadian aviation industry. 
Members were told there was a great need to bring the bill forward and get it completed by December 31 of last year so the U.S. would not stop the overflights of Canadian planes. That has not happened yet, and we are still a ways away from completing this bill. The NDP will continue to work on trying to get opposition members to come onside and recognize that the bill does not provide for a safe and secure use of Canadian information.
There are many other issues that tie to the bill. My colleague spoke of one that was really never mentioned, which is the inconvenience of the bill and the information shared according to the 24-hour requirement of the U.S. government for any of these overflights. If, for instance, Mrs. Jones is in Cuba enjoying the sunshine, her husband dies at home or becomes very ill and she has to return very quickly on a flight that day, what will happen to her? Will she be blocked from taking that flight?
This is a very important point. If the government had talked about putting in some reciprocity on the U.S. 2000 flights through Canadian airspace and the U.S. understood it would have to give 24 hours notice for any passenger on that plane, we would quickly be in a much more advantageous negotiation position with the United States.
Quite clearly, the government did not think this information was required when it went into the negotiations because it did not want to do this. It said in committee that it did not want to do this. The Minister of Public Safety said, “I didn't want to do this”. If he did not want to do this, then he must understand this is not required for security. 
What is it required for? Is this simply more of a knee-jerk reaction to the events of a decade ago and we cannot get our heads out of the sand and recognize that we are in a different time when we can look at security rationally and work with our neighbours to ensure the security we provide is useful, functional and it does not take away the rights of Canadians or Americans?
The NDP wants that. We want security that works for Canadians, not security that takes away the rights of Canadians.
Brian Jean: Mr. Speaker, I have several questions for the member. 
He said something at the end of his speech about not wanting to take away the security of Canadians. By not passing this law, is it not fair to say that we are actually impeding the ability of the Americans to guard their own sovereign space? The opposite would be true. If we do not respect the rule of law and the Chicago convention in relation to the right of Americans to have sovereignty over their airspace, how can Canada then say that it has a sovereign right over its airspace?
By not passing this law and filibustering, as NDP members seem to be doing, though I am not certain of that, is it not fair to say that they will impede the ability for Canadians to remain secure? It seems to make a lot of sense. If they cannot respect the U.S. law, how will the U.S. respect Canadian law?
[Interjection]
Dennis Bevington: Mr. Speaker, I defer to the perceived logic of my hon. colleague on this issue. I think that the logic may not be particularly well expressed by the member.
At committee, the minister said quite clearly that the government went into this saying this was not a security issue. It did not see the need for the U.S. to have this and that it obviously did not need the information for itself. Its determination, as Canadians, through Canada's security services, said this was not required. However, the U.S, it was required and the government submitted to the demands and that was what happened in the negotiations.
This was the evidence presented to us in committee. If the parliamentary secretary wants to change that evidence, he can come up with something else, but that is what we heard and I will leave it at that.
Paule Brunelle: Mr. Speaker, the protection of privacy is certainly a key element in any free and democratic society. Each week, we receive warnings on television, from our banks or from our credit card companies about the importance of not giving out our personal information because of the high incidence of fraud.
I would like to ask the hon. member a question. Since September 11, 2001, paranoia has become prevalent, and it seems that the fear of terrorism has led us to take things too far. Under this bill, personal information would be given not only to the United States but also to other countries. Is the hon. member not concerned that giving out this information could lead to situations of abuse and could take us in a direction that is not at all in keeping with our Charter of Rights and Freedoms?
[Interjection]
Dennis Bevington: Mr. Speaker, I cannot disagree with my colleague in any way. Whenever we, as a country, as a government, provide information to another country where there is no security to that information, where there are no treaties that have been signed that say quite specifically how that information is to be used, then we put the information of our citizens at risk. If the agreement is in a letter, in a form that the government cannot even share with the committee, what is it?
When we saw the letter from the U.S. ambassador, it was hardly comforting when he said, ”This information will not be widely used for other purposes”. What does that mean? Does that mean that 90% of the information will not be used for any other purpose, but 10%, or 99.9% or 0.1% will? This is hardly a thing that confidence is built on.
Julian Fantino: Mr. Speaker, I was not planning to rise, but I did hear a number of trigger words that piqued my interest.
In my earlier life I also was the chairman of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police aviation security committee and worked widely with police leaders and security executives in this country and internationally, including the United States.
I am afraid that talking about paranoia that emanates from an event that happened 10 years ago is basically putting blinders in front of our reality of today. It is absolutely critical that today we work co-operatively across borders and jurisdictions to ensure the travelling public, especially those who are actually travelling and those involved in the aviation industry, have every reasonable opportunity to be protected from what in fact is an active pursuit of terrorism. It is a reality and it is global in nature. If it is a small compromise to the entrenched rights and entitlements we all have, to be protected from unreasonable abuse or unreasonable sharing of information, it begs to say that we need to ensure we do all we can to make the aviation industry safe.
I do not understand how any of this could be a knee-jerk reaction, certainly not from the world I come from where I can speak directly to the kinds of information, the kinds of investigations and the kinds of issues that not only Canadian security agencies work on and are very concerned about but are equally co-operating and working with our international partners because of this being an international threat.
 I just do not think there is a reality happening here when we hear comments that portray what we are trying to do in the interests of Canadians is as a result of paranoia. It is an absolute legitimate responsibility governments have, given rise to the very serious threat that exists today, to engage in these kinds of activities.
[Interjection]
Dennis Bevington: Mr. Speaker, I feel honoured that my colleague has asked me that question. However, I would like him to know as well that through forum that we organized during the prorogation on aviation security and through the work the transport committee has done, we did make some changes this year, and I referred to those. What we heard from the witnesses who presented to us, and people from places that have gold-plated security like Israel, was that we were not necessarily doing all the things we should be doing and we may be doing many things that we did not need to do. That is the purpose of review and of anything we do.
I know after 9/11 there was an incredible angst in North America about the nature of security. It is funny that did not come after the Air India tragedy, but it did not. There were some things that happened after it, but 9/11 was an enormous personal affront to almost every North American. We have to recover from that and we have to look at our lives rationally because Canadians are the true north strong and free. We want our Canadian citizens to have the kind of lives that we all envisioned when we were younger, when we had freedom, the ability to travel and to work in many locations. Canadians were respected around the world for our openness. We do not want to lose that. Canadians are not about that.
I am willing to work with anyone to reduce the impact of world events on Canadians when it comes to their personal liberties and freedoms because I believe in those so strongly.
Mr. Michel Guimond (Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, BQ): Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise to speak to Bill C-42, which we examined carefully at the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities. I would like to begin by congratulating all of my colleagues on the hard work they did in an effort to strike a fair balance between two conflicting yet fundamental notions. I was going to say “to get at the truth”, but that would not have been the right expression. 
When I was a member of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs and the Board of Internal Economy, we took a very similar approach. There we talked about the safety and protection of people and goods. In this case, this bill is about aviation security. At the time, following the tragic events of September 2001, we had to ask ourselves what kind of security was needed within the parliamentary precinct, here on the Hill. What kind of security check should pedestrians be subjected to? For vehicles, it was pretty easy, but for pedestrians, it was a different matter.
On the one hand, the people watching us here this evening, our fellow citizens, my colleagues and their family members must have access to the place that exemplifies democracy. On the other hand, security measures must be in place to protect people. It is not just parliamentarians who need to be protected, but also pages, security staff and everyone who works in the parliamentary precinct. That is enough of the analogy I wanted to make with security here on Parliament Hill. 
I will not say that I suffered terrible insomnia or that I woke up at night in a cold sweat from anxiety, but I did put a lot of thought into this bill. I sometimes have the opportunity to go home to my riding by car. It is a 475 km drive from my office on Parliament Hill to my house. I usually use that time to decompress and reflect on many things.
When we studied this bill, we heard from opposite ends of the spectrum. We heard from those defending civil liberties, who stand up for the protection of personal information. There is a strong temptation, for a government or organization that receives personal information about people, to use it for inappropriate purposes. We joke about Big Brother watching you.
One of the fundamental elements of this bill is that it would have Canada provide the Americans with certain personal information about passengers on board aircraft flying over American territory. Those who defend civil liberties are very level-headed; they were not on a witch hunt. They told us that parliamentarians, members of the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, should think about the type of information that would be provided to the Americans.
As I mentioned in a previous speech, since the unfortunate events of 9/11 at the World Trade Center, no one has been crazy enough to say that the Americans got what they deserved. Anyone who says that has serious mental problems.
The young woman who worked for Xerox Corporation on the 85th floor, who was about the same age as our assistant clerk—the one who notes what we say off mike—and who was typing a report for her boss, did not deserve to have a plane hit her. She did not ask for that. She went to work that morning to support herself and perhaps to support her family. 
Since that event, the Americans have been seized by panic, a phobia, a psychosis about terrorism. I am not an expert on terrorism. However, we should ask ourselves whether we believe that terrorists will again use the exact same tactics they used on the World Trade Center.
The planes that crashed into the World Trade Center were American planes making domestic flights. In addition, the terrorist pilots were trained in American flight schools in Miami, Florida. Since that time, the Americans have developed such an obsessive fear that they see terrorism everywhere. It is true that protection is needed and that we must always be vigilant.
Supporters of individual freedoms and civil liberties asked the committee to ensure that there were certain protective rules. Apparently, the information that we will be providing to the Americans under this bill could potentially be given to 16 other American agencies that do not necessarily need it. Supporters of individual freedoms and civil liberties expressed another concern: what guarantee do we have that this information will be destroyed?
I spoke about Big Brother. Personally, I am not a conspiracy theorist and I do not think that our information is put on file and that we are monitored. That is being paranoid. I watched the Super Bowl and, when members of one team formed a huddle, I did not think that they were talking about me. I knew that they were planning their strategy. We must not think that Big Brother is always watching us. However, this does not change the fact that the Americans will have our personal information. What guarantee do we have that this information will not be shared and that it will be destroyed after a certain period of time?
The Minister of Public Safety testified before the committee. I asked him, without getting angry—a rarity—what guarantee we have that the Americans will destroy this information after a certain period of time.
He replied that the Americans had told him so. How reassuring. What guarantee do we have that our hair will grow by the end of the week? The dermatologist said so. The Americans told him so. What a great answer.
The committee members were split between two approaches. We met representatives from Canada's tourism industry and representatives from airlines. We organized a meeting with Air Transat, Canada's leader in vacation travel. When I was elected in 1993, I was the transport critic. We had Canada 2000, and since we were getting close to the year 2000, I think it became Canada 3000. They realized that the name would be outdated. Later, the company went bankrupt. Then we had Nationair, Nordair, Intair, which all shut down. Now, the number one company in vacation travel in Canada is Air Transat, a company whose head office is in Montreal, whose primary language of work is French and which has an important base in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal and a lot of pilots and flight attendants who are able to provide services in two, three or even four languages. Quebec is very proud of this.
We met with these people and they told us that, because the U.S. is a sovereign country, if we did not pass this bill, the Americans would prohibit us from flying through their airspace. Charter flights to the south or flights to London or Nice, for example, that leave from Halifax and take the Atlantic route do not fly through U.S. airspace. I am not picking destinations off the top of my head. Those are all destinations served by Air Transat. To go to Mexico or the Caribbean, for example, via the south corridor or the Atlantic corridor, the plane does not need to fly through American airspace. It is the same for Vancouver. Via the Pacific corridor, there is no need to fly through American airspace.
The people from Air Transat told us that if this bill is not passed, it will no longer be able to serve central Canada. It will no longer be able to offer flights from Calgary to Cancun, from Winnipeg to Puerto Vallarta or from Edmonton to Montego Bay, Jamaica, because those cities are in central Canada. They have no choice but to fly over the U.S. It would take four hours to fly to the Pacific Ocean and then fly south. A flight that normally takes three and a half or four hours with an Airbus 330 or 320 would take seven or eight hours. That makes no sense.
Something I thought of and have talked about before, but that bears repeating because some members were not here, is that we cannot forget that the Air Transat fleet includes Airbus 310s and 320s, and I believe it also has some Airbus 330s.
As it turns out, an Airbus with 350 passengers on board requires a little more time for taking off and landing. It is not like a Cessna that can touch and go and land in 150 metres. When landing in Montreal, depending on the runway being used—24 or 32—the pilot has to turn and fly over the U.S. It is the same thing in Toronto at Pearson airport. In other words, because of those flights, Air Transat would be doomed to bankruptcy.
As the Bloc Québécois transport critic, and with my colleagues who agree on this position, we had to take individual freedoms into account, but we also had to take into account feasibility and the viability of air carriers that have to use U.S. airspace. I moved an amendment that called for reciprocity. Many Americans fly through Canadian airspace and if the U.S. is requiring us to provide a passenger list, then we should be demanding reciprocity with the U.S. Unfortunately, my amendment was democratically defeated in the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities. I accept that, but I find it unbelievable. If it is good enough for the Americans, why would it not be good enough for us?
In any case, we are at third reading stage and, in closing, I confirm that the Bloc Québécois is voting in favour of Bill C-42.
Brian Jean: Madam Speaker, I thank the member across the way for his many hours of thought on the final outcome and how we arrived at where we are today.
My friend said, and the NDP also alluded to it, that if the Americans ask it of us then why do we not ask it of the Americans. Some people may not want to get into that debate. Hundreds of thousands of people a day travel the skies. Who will pay for the cost of taking that data from the United States and assembling it, and for what purpose? Just because the Americans ask for it should we ask for it?
Canada has a great tradition of protecting human rights, standing up for the world at large and standing up for people. We are in a different threat situation than the United States, but no less serious. However, if we do ask for that information,what will we do with it? Are we going to get it because we gave it to the U.S.? What is the purpose of that?
My understanding is that it would cost billions of dollars over time to get that data and to do something with that data. For what purpose? There is no purpose that I could defend to the people who voted for me to get me here today.
I appreciate the member bringing forward that amendment but I would like to know exactly what we would do with that data, because I see no great conclusion in relation to it if we were to receive it.
[Interjection]
Michel Guimond: Madam Speaker, I am greatly disappointed by the comments made by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities. He is saying that it would be expensive and would cost millions of dollars. In other words, because the Americans have the means, they can do it, but it would be far too costly for us. Yet the Conservatives bought full body scanners for airports. That cost money and that money was wasted. They should search people as they did before, by making us take off our shoes and belts. That would be just as comfortable as full body scanners. 
The Conservative government is using money as an excuse. It prefers to buy tanks and warplanes instead of getting its priorities straight. With this government, everything is expensive, except when it comes to buying tanks or warplanes for Afghanistan, even though we have no business being there. Then money is not a problem.
I will calm down because otherwise my supper will be ruined.
Hon. Joseph Volpe (Eglinton—Lawrence, Lib.): Madam Speaker, it would appear that members are still exercised about an issue that they have already agreed has passed. In fact, the Americans gave us notice some 16 months ago that the legislation that led to Bill C-42 would be implemented and put into effect in the United States last December.
This is not an issue of security. It is an issue of the government now trying to backtrack because it presented this last June and only now wants to put it into law. Just imagine being unable to protect Canadian sovereignty for all that period and then to come forward and say that it is a question of security. It is not.
The member for Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord has just indicated rather eloquently that this is a commercial issue. It is to prevent airlines from being sued for breach of privacy legislation by Canadians on Canadian carriers. It is an issue of sovereignty ceded to the Americans because of the government's incompetence and inability to negotiate what the Americans asked it to negotiate on 16 months ago.
I would like the member for Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord to elaborate on this. What this shows is that the $40 million spent on those special machines in 11 locations in Canada to provide greater aviation security meant nothing to the Americans and that the legislation to impose another $3.2 billion in aviation tax for security measures was unimpressive to the Americans, and therefore we have to go to this because our airlines will be exposed to harassment by Americans. That is what this legislation is about.
Michel Guimond: Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member from the Toronto region. I admit that I did not know how much the body scanners cost: $40 million. Given that we have to appease the Americans and that this government kneels before them as soon as they ask for something, the answer is sure to be “yes”. I would like to repeat what I said earlier: the government's fiscal priorities are misplaced.
I gave the example of how much the body scanners cost. We could talk about it on the eve of the budget. I would not want the Liberal members to think that I am trying to flatter them, but we should be making big business—the oil companies and big banks that make billions in profits and gouge us and raise the price of gas just before weekends and holidays—pay the taxes they really owe. The government would then have plenty of money to manage the information that I think we should require of the Americans for review and that we would have required of them had my reciprocity amendment passed.
Once again, money is an excuse. They say that they do not have any money. Instead, they should be saying that they do not have money for anything important but that they have money for things that do not make sense.
Dennis Bevington: Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for what he said today. I do agree with him that the proposed amendment may well have been a good bargaining chip in this whole deal. Quite clearly, if we look at the incidents of airline terrorism in the last two years, what we see is the one rather dubious individual with the underwear bomb who flew from Amsterdam over Canada to the United States. In reality, there has been no incident of a Canadian plane carrying a bomb flying over the United States.
What we have is a situation where there is probably a higher degree of risk of an American plane carrying a bomb to an American destination overflying Canada than there is of a Canadian plane flying to Barbados carrying a bomb with a bunch of Canadians on it. That is pretty clear.
I agree with my colleague that his amendment was a good idea but it should have been part of the government's negotiation package to get out of this deal. Does the member agree?
[Interjection]
Michel Guimond: Madam Speaker, I agree and I would like to take this opportunity to say that I appreciate working with my colleague from Western Arctic on the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities.
It could have been part of broader discussions and negotiations. My grandmother always told me not to cry over spilt milk. I agree that that could have been the case, but we now must deal with what is before us. A bill has been introduced and, as parliamentarians, we must make a decision.
I do not want anyone to think that the Bloc Québécois does not respect individual freedoms or that it is not sensitive to rights and freedoms. However, in this case, the two are diametrically opposed. We had to take a position. However, all my Bloc colleagues believe that individual freedoms are of vital importance.
Business of Supply[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from February 8 consideration of the motion.
The Acting Speaker (Ms. Denise Savoie): It being 5:30 p.m., the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the motion of the hon. member for Kings—Hants relating to the business of supply.
Call in the members.
[Stage Direction]
(The House divided on the motion, which was agreed to on the following division:)
Vote #162
The Speaker: I declare the motion carried.

Private Members' Business
Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Region of Northern Ontario Act[Stage Direction]
 The House resumed from February 2 consideration of the motion that Bill C-309, An Act establishing the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Region of Northern Ontario, as reported (without amendment) from the committee, be concurred in.
[Interjection]
The Speaker: The House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the motion at report stage of Bill C-309 under private members' business.
[Stage Direction]
(The House divided on the motion, which was agreed to on the following division:)
Vote #163
The Speaker: I declare the motion carried.
Federal Spending Power Act[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from February 3 consideration of the motion that Bill C-507, An Act to amend the Financial Administration Act (federal spending power), be read the second time and referred to a committee.
The Speaker: The House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division at second reading of Bill C-507 under private members' business. The question is on the motion.
[Stage Direction]
(The House divided on the motion, which was negatived on the following division:)
Vote #164
The Speaker: I declare the motion lost. 
Canadian Human Rights Act[Stage Direction]
 The House resumed from February 7 consideration of the motion that Bill C-389, An Act to amend the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Criminal Code (gender identity and gender expression), be read the third time and passed. 
[Interjection]
The Speaker: The House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the motion at third reading stage of Bill C-389 under private members' business.
[Stage Direction]
(The House divided on the motion, which was agreed to on the following division:)
Vote #165
The Speaker:  I declare the motion carried.
(Bill read the third time and passed) 

Routine Proceedings
Committees of the House[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from February 7 consideration of the motion
The Speaker: The House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the motion to concur in the seventh report of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration concerning the extension of time to consider Bill C-467, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (children born abroad).
[Interjection]
Hon. Gordon O'Connor: Mr. Speaker, I believe if you were to seek it, you would find agreement that members recorded as having voted on the opposition motion be recorded as having voted on the motion now before the House, with Conservatives members voting yes.
The Speaker: Is there unanimous consent to proceed in this way?
[Intervention]
Some hon. members:  Agreed.
[Interjection]
Marcel Proulx: Mr. Speaker, the Liberals vote in favour of the motion.
[Interjection]
Mrs. Claude DeBellefeuille: Mr. Speaker, the Bloc Québécois is voting in favour of the motion.
[Interjection]
Ms. Chris Charlton: Mr. Speaker, NDP members vote yes.
[Interjection]
Hon. Helena Guergis: Mr. Speaker, I will vote yes.
[Interjection]
Mr. André Arthur: Mr. Speaker, I am voting in favour of the motion.
[Interjection]
Hon. Maxime Bernier: Mr. Speaker, I am voting in favour of the motion.
[Stage Direction]
(The House divided on the motion, which was agreed to on the following division:)
Vote #166
[Interjection]
The Speaker: I declare the motion carried.

Private Members' Business
Seeds Regulation Act[Stage Direction]
 The House resumed from February 8 consideration of Bill C-474, An Act respecting the Seeds Regulations (analysis of potential harm), as reported (without amendment) from the committee, and of the motions in Group No. 1. 
The Speaker: The House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded divisions on the motions at report stage of Bill C-474 under private members' business.
The question is on Motion No. 1.
[Stage Direction]
(The House divided on the Motion No. 1, which was negatived on the following division:)
Vote #167
The Speaker: I declare Motion No. 1 defeated.
The question is on Motion No. 2.
[Interjection]
Gordon O'Connor: Mr. Speaker, I believe if you seek it you will find agreement to apply the results of the vote on Motion No. 1 to Motion Nos. 2 to 10.
The Speaker: Is there unanimous consent to proceed in this way?
[Intervention]
Some hon. members:  Agreed.
[Stage Direction]
 (The House divided on the Motion No. 2, which was negatived on the following division:) 
Vote #168
 (The House divided on the Motion No. 3, which was negatived on the following division:) 
Vote #169
 (The House divided on the Motion No. 4, which was negatived on the following division:) 
Vote #170
 (The House divided on the Motion No. 5, which was negatived on the following division:) 
Vote #171
 (The House divided on the Motion No. 6, which was negatived on the following division:) 
Vote #172
 (The House divided on the Motion No. 7, which was negatived on the following division:) 
Vote #173
 (The House divided on the Motion No. 8, which was negatived on the following division:) 
Vote #174
 (The House divided on the Motion No. 9, which was negatived on the following division:) 
Vote #175
 (The House divided on the Motion No. 10, which was negatived on the following division:) 
Vote #176
The Speaker: I declare Motion Nos. 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10 defeated.
Mr. Alex Atamanenko (British Columbia Southern Interior, NDP):  moved that the bill be concurred in at report stage.
The Speaker:  The question is on the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion? 
[Intervention]
Some hon. members:  Agreed. 
 No. 
The Speaker:  All those in favour of the motion will please say yea. 
[Intervention]
Some hon. members:  Yea. 
The Speaker:  All those opposed will please say nay. 
[Intervention]
Some hon. members:  Nay. 
The Speaker:  In my opinion the nays have it. 
 And five or more members having risen: 
[Stage Direction]
 (The House divided on the motion, which was negatived on the following division:) 
Vote #177
The Speaker:  I declare the motion lost.
Chris Charlton: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I believe if you seek it you will find unanimous consent for the following motion. I move:
 That, notwithstanding any Standing Order or usual practice of the House, the House proceed immediately to the consideration of Private Members' Business as listed on today's Order Paper. 

[Interjection]
The Speaker: Is there unanimous consent to proceed in this fashion?
[Intervention]
Some hon. members:  Agreed.
The Speaker: (Motion agreed to)
The Speaker:  It being 7:05 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper.
Criminal Code[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from November 4, 2010 consideration of the motion that Bill C-576, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (personating peace officer), be read the second time and referred to a committee.
The Speaker: When the bill was last before the House, the hon. member for Elmwood—Transcona had the floor. There are seven minutes remaining in the time allotted for his remarks.
Jim Maloway: Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to speak to Bill C-576 this evening. I want to compliment the member for Red Deer for his bill and all his hard work on the bill. I know this is the second hour of debate on the bill. It will go to committee, and I know that our caucus members, by and large, support the bill. 
The member for Windsor—Tecumseh, who will be speaking for our party, has indicated that he plans to introduce an amendment to the bill. I understand that the amendment will be favourably received by the member for Red Deer in this instance. So, it looks like the bill has a lot of potential to actually make it into law in reasonably short order, provided that the House does not dissolve into an election situation in the new few weeks.
The bill was brought about primarily because the member had a personal experience with someone in his constituency who was taken advantage of by someone who was impersonating a police officer by using flashing lights and wearing a police uniform. These were used as weapons to abduct a 16 year-old girl who had just earned her driver's licence and was driving alone. She was held captive for 46 hours and brutally assaulted before she managed to escape from her attacker.
The reality is that when we look for other examples of this type of activity, we see more activity like this than less. I am not sure whether it has to do with people watching too many movies on television or in the theatres, but the fact of the matter is that there are increasing numbers of instances where people are impersonating peace officers. 
The bill would make impersonating a peace officer in the commission of another offence an aggravating circumstance to be considered for sentencing purposes. It would add one clause to the Criminal Code following section 130. Basically, it reads: 
 The Criminal Code is amended by adding the following after section 130: 
 If a person is convicted of an offence under section 130, the court imposing the sentence on the person shall consider as an aggravating circumstance the fact that the accused personated a peace officer for the purpose of facilitating the commission of another offence. 
The bill directs the sentencing court to consider this as one factor when dealing with someone convicted of personating a peace officer. The sentencing would still basically be up to a judge, so there is no prescription here for minimum sentences or anything like that. On that basis, we are well disposed to the bill.
In terms of some of the other situations that are similar to this, impersonating a police officer is not something that is recent. We see this in history. People will remember the St. Valentine's Day massacre. Its anniversary will be coming up very shortly. It happened in the days of Al Capone when he had two of his shooters dressed as Chicago police officers. I think everybody knows and understands what happened in the St. Valentine's Day massacre. They managed to kill, I believe it was seven people of an opposing gang. 
In addition to that massacre, there have been other famous situations, including one involving John Dillinger.
John Dillinger had someone impersonate a police officer in order to get out of jail. Someone impersonated an Indiana state police officer claiming to come to extradite Dillinger to Indiana. He escaped from prison that way. This is not unheard of in history. Those are two famous examples and I have others in Mexico that I could get into.
In more recent times we have seen a number of examples of people engaging in activity like this because the equipment is easy to find. People search out sirens, equipment and handcuffs on the Internet. They are available in security supply outlets and stores. People have been able to obtain these types of disguises and equipment in order to commandeer people.
There is a case where a woman pretending to be a police officer stopped a motorist on an Ontario roadway and extorted money from him on the basis that he was speeding. It is only fair that the government starts to take a tougher approach to situations like this because this is an expanding sort of phenomenon. Over the next few years we may see more and more of this unless we take some proactive action against it now.
I commend the member for Red Deer for the bill. I can tell him that we in the NDP will be supporting it. We think it is one step closer to being more than just tough on crime but, in this case, smart on crime. This is one of the limited examples where we can say that the government has been both tough and smart on crime in bringing forward this bill.
Mr. Brent Rathgeber (Edmonton—St. Albert, CPC): Madam Speaker, it is indeed an honour for me to rise and speak today in support of Bill C-576, promoted and sponsored by my friend, the hon. member for Red Deer. I join in the comments of the hon. member for Elmwood—Transcona in congratulating the hon. member for his hard work on the bill and the likelihood that the bill will become law in a timely manner.
The bill has but one provision. It is a short bill, but it is an important bill. That provision would make the crime of personating a peace officer a mandatory aggravating factor in sentencing if the offence was committed for the purpose of facilitating any other offence.
Let me begin with the offence itself and a word about the terminology. The offence uses the term “personation”. This term was used when the offence was first enacted in 1913 and continues to be used today in the modern version of the Criminal Code.
In everyday speech, however, we often the use the “impersonation” rather than “personation” to refer to the act of pretending to be someone we are not. Members of this House should be assured that the two terms are synonymous. I will use the term “personate” because that is the language of the law and it is also the language of the bill before us.
Section 130 of the Criminal Code makes it a crime to personate a peace officer or a public officer. There are two ways that this offence might be committed. First, a person can falsely represent themselves as a peace officer or a public officer. This particular criminal offence requires a mental state associated with the acts and would therefore require proof that the person intentionally misrepresented themselves as someone if they did in fact not hold such an office. In short, the offence would require some evidence a person deliberately tried to deceive another person about their status as a peace officer or a public officer as the case might be.
The second way that this offence can be made is when a person who is not a peace officer or a public officer “uses a badge or article of uniform or equipment in a manner that is likely to cause persons to believe that he is a peace officer or a public officer”
Although worded differently, this second form of the offence is similar to the first form of the offence because both are based on a person falsely representing themselves as a peace officer or a public officer.
For example, a person falsely representing themselves as a peace officer would likely use a badge or other article of a peace officer's uniform or equipment. Likewise and similarly a person using a badge or other article of a peace officer's uniform or equipment that could lead others to believe that they are in fact a police officer is most likely deliberately misrepresenting themselves.
In both cases, some outward display of peace officer equipment would likely be present as would some evidence that the person's conduct demonstrated an intention to deceive others in regard to their true identity or status.
There is one additional aspect of offence which bears some consideration. The offence prohibits the personation of a peace officer as well as public officers. These are different terms, as I am sure members are aware. A peace officer is defined in section 2 of the Criminal Code and includes holders of particular offices, most importantly police officers and corrections officers. The public officer is also defined in section 2 of the Criminal Code and includes customs officers and officers in the Canadian Forces.
It should be noted that the aggravating factor proposed in Bill C-576 would cover situations where a peace officer is impersonated but not a public officer. The narrow application of the proposed aggravating factor makes sense from my point of view and from this analysis.
One can immediately see the purpose of the offence once its elements are understood. Public trust in various important government office holders and the institutions to which they belong is absolutely critical to the proper maintenance of society generally and key government functions such as income tax and customs collections, for example.
Any instance of a public officer or peace officer personation risks diminishing the public's ability to trust in these offices and institutions and risks undermining valid public functions. That is why deception in relation to one of these offices is prohibited no matter what the purpose of the deception.
For example, the proposed offence in Bill C-576 would cover personation of a peace officer to obtain information from someone or to gain easy access and entry into an establishment.
 Thankfully, peace officer or public officer personation does not occur very often. Every year there are typically between 120 and 160 charges laid under section 130 of the Criminal Code of Canada. This is a very low number when compared to other sections. The conviction rate ranges between 30% and 50% of those individuals charged.
However, the use of deception with respect to peace officers is especially troubling. Public trust in the police is essential for the proper functioning of the criminal justice system. The integrity of the uniform and the public trust in the office must be protected in their own rights. That is the genesis and the reason behind the bill that we are debating here this evening.
Canadians trust our police officers and our instinct is to be polite and responsive and to accept the authority of someone who appears to be a police officer. A police personator can approach, interact with and assert physical authority over others relatively easily by exploiting the trust Canadians have in peace officers. The reality is that members of the public would likely acquiesce to the authority of someone they believed to be a police officer.
Deference to police officers is certainly something that I was taught at an early age by my parents, and I would submit that deference to police officers is an essential element of the rule of law. Can anyone imagine a situation in which society does not trust police officers and people ignore the red and blue flashing lights when a police officer is trying to pull them over? It would lead to chaos and anarchy. As a result, police personation can be used, sadly, as a tool to facilitate the commission of serious offences that otherwise might be more difficult, if not impossible, to carry out when individuals who are not peace officers pretend that they are.
In the rare instance where police personation is used to facilitate the commission of a serious crime, such as kidnapping, sexual assault, theft or unlawful entry into a dwelling, it represents an extremely disturbing exploitation of the public trust in police and an even more disturbing violation of the victim's rights and interests. Members will know that this government and this member consistently and continually attempt to promote the rights of victims, and I would submit to this House that this bill certainly is in keeping with that motivation.
It is this situation that Bill C-576 seeks to address. The bill clearly identifies the situation of the false and deceptive use of the trappings of a police officer in order to facilitate the commission of another offence as one that must serve as an aggravating factor in the sentence imposed on the offender.
It is important to recall that, in determining an appropriate sentence, the court must always take into account all relevant, aggravating and mitigating factors. Members who are familiar with sentencing law will know that paragraph 718.2(a) of the Criminal Code describes a number of aggravating factors that apply to all offences. These include evidence that the offender, in committing the offence, abused a position of trust or authority in relation to his or her victim. In addition to the factors specifically listed, the sentencing court always retains the discretion to determine if additional circumstances revealed by the evidence are aggravating or mitigating factors that should be considered before the sentence is pronounced.
I would submit that police personation for the purpose of facilitating the commission of another offence is unquestionably a factor the court would consider to increase the sentence for the personation offence. A court would invariably treat the use of deception for the purpose of facilitating the commission of a serious crime against the victim, such as abduction, an aggravating factor for the more serious abduction offence. In essence, both offences work to aggravate each other and the total sentence imposed for all the offences in such circumstances should reflect the full range of harm caused by the perpetrator and suffered by the victim in these extremely disturbing cases.
 The court can already consider relevant factors as aggravating by virtue of its inherent discretion in sentencing, as I just mentioned, pursuant to section 718, but Bill C-576 would clearly identify this particular situation as one that must lead to a more significant sentence than if it were not present. The bill would expressly force the judge to apply his or her mind to personation and how it accommodated the commission of another offence. I hope all members will join me in supporting the bill. 
Hon. Marlene Jennings (Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, Lib.): Madam Speaker, I am pleased to take part in this debate at third reading of Bill C-576.
I had an opportunity to speak to the bill at a previous stage and expressed, as the official opposition justice critic, the position I am encouraging my caucus to take on this private member's bill, which is to support the bill.
We already know that the issue of identity theft has become almost an epidemic in Canada where people's identity is being stolen and frauds and thefts are being created.
What many people may not know is that in recent years there appears to have been an increase in the number of individuals who are personating peace officers in order to commit other crimes. There is the Penhold case, which was the subject of much discussion at second reading debate. My colleague from Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe, who sits on the justice committee with me, gave an eloquent speech in which he discussed the Penhold case. That case resulted in an amendment to the Criminal Code in order to establish a five year maximum sentence for someone convicted of personating a peace officer.
This bill would add the conviction of personating a peace officer to be an aggravating factor or circumstance in the sentencing of that individual of other criminal infractions or offences for which that individual was been found guilty.
As was explained just before my speech by one of the Conservative MPs, someone who personates a police officer in order to unlawfully enter a home under the pretext of executing a warrant search to seize certain stolen property would be believed by the owners of that home to be an actual police officer and that the police officer had the legal right to enter their home and seize property.
There was an article in the newspaper about some incidents involving two young men in Montreal. In March 2010, the police arrested two young men with the intention of charging them with extortion, theft and personating a peace officer. They were alleged to have set up their SUV with a siren and other accoutrements that would lead one to believe that it was an official police vehicle and they would intercept motorists on the streets of east end Montreal and inform them that they were part of an undercover operation. They would check licences and papers and, if the motorists had an expired licence or permit, the two men would tell the motorists that if they paid some money they would let them go, otherwise they would seize their car and the motorists would have to pay the towing charges, the storage charges and any extra fines.
 It is alleged that those two young men conducted such criminal activity over the course of approximately two weeks before a motorist became suspicious and called 911. The police were then able to apprehend the two alleged criminals, and I assume they have since been charged because in the report of March 3, 2010, the police spokesman said that they would be charged. 
That is a case where innocent motorists, innocent citizens, were lulled into believing that they were dealing with actual police officers and that these police officers were corrupt. One must understand how reprehensible this kind of activity is.
I do not think there is anyone who would not understand how reprehensible that kind of activity is. Not only was a crime being committed, but an additional crime of personating a police officer was being committed in order to facilitate the commission of other crimes, whether they be crimes of theft, crimes of property or crimes against persons, such as sexual assault.
As the Liberal critic for justice, I am recommending that members of my caucus vote in favour of this bill. I think I have explained succinctly why I am in favour of this bill and why I will be urging my colleagues to support it. 
Mr. Joe Comartin (Windsor—Tecumseh, NDP): Madam Speaker, I rise to speak to this bill, which I am certainly in favour of.
As we have heard from others, there is already a section in the Criminal Code that deals with the crime of impersonating a police officer.
There are two aspects to it. One is where a person represents him or herself as being a police officer and the second is where a person uses a badge, article or articles of the uniform to allow people to draw the inescapable conclusion that the person is a police officer. Those are already offences.
This bill would add a subsection that would require a judge, after a person has been convicted of those offences, to take into account as an aggravating factor if the impersonation had been used as a tool to commit another crime. 
When I first read the bill, I thought that is what judges would do in most cases. My initial reaction was whether it was really necessary, but what really convinced me to support the bill was the letter that I received from the member for Red Deer, the proponent of this bill.
He spoke in the letter about the need to reinforce the trust we all must have in our police forces and officers. I want to commend the member both for the letter and his initiative in this regard because it strikes at that point. Occasionally, there will be a judge who may not take this into account, though I think in most cases judges would. 
It is a way for this legislature to say, not just to the judiciary because, as I say, it is not so significant there but to the Canadian public, that if someone has committed such a crime and has used it as a tool to commit another crime, the legislature condemns that conduct and is asking the judiciary to make sure it takes it into account as an aggravating factor when a sentence is imposed. That is one of the reasons for supporting the bill.
 I do not think we can be too careful about the need for the legislature of the country to be very clear about its support for the criminal justice system generally and for the actors within the criminal justice system. It is very important that we ensure the Canadian public is always onside in the sense of feeling a great deal of confidence in our judges, prosecutors, defence counsel, and certainly in the police. 
In a large number of cases, the vast majority of Canadians will only come into contact with the criminal justice system through police officers. Unless people are called as witnesses or charged with an offence, they do not see the other actors. That is not to say the other actors are not important as they are crucial to the system, but the face of the level of confidence that we need in the criminal justice system is the front line police officer.
I had an experience when I was in Japan a few years ago on a public safety issue. I got the opportunity to spend a bit of time there observing the Japanese people, who have one of the lowest crime rates in the world, substantially lower than ours. I am exaggerating a bit, but on almost every corner there is a little structure that the street police use as their base. They are all over the place in the larger cities in particular. 
That allows those police officers who staff those small units to have immediate, intimate contact on a daily basis with people who live in those neighbourhoods or who do their business in those neighbourhoods. It is very obvious that the relationship is a comfortable one with the sense that a person could turn to these officers if there are any problems and they will be there to provide service to the citizenry of that country.
We look at how successful that is. It is their key ingredient in keeping their crime rates low. It is the kind of thing we would like to see adopted here and practised. We have been doing this on a fairly regular basis, moving our police officers out of the large, institutional settings, and more and more trying to have them operating out of neighbourhood settings.
My wife was working at the west end of the city of Windsor for a number of years. While she was there, one of the changes she saw in the crime rate, which was a fairly high crime rate, was that they moved just two police officers into the neighbourhood, into a house, and used it as a mini headquarters. It had a dramatic effect over the years in reducing the crime rate, a good deal of the crime rate, by the way, coming over from Detroit. However, because they were having that day to day contact with the citizenry of that area, that was really a great methodology for reducing the crime rate. 
If we have someone who would take advantage of that very fundamental, crucial relationship we need between the citizenry and the police officers and raise the mistrust level, then they have to be dealt with quite severely. The section here that is being proposed as an amendment very much goes to that fundamental change that we require in the Criminal Code to emphasize, to have this legislature emphasizing, how important it is to have that relationship rock solid.
We get the rogue police officers using physical force in excess, and that undermines it, but so does this in many respects. Whatever we can do in the way of amendments to the Criminal Code in our practice, funding police officers across the country, will ensure that relationship does not deteriorate. If it does in those first steps, we go to a chaotic society.
I have been in other countries where I have seen the fear in the citizenry because the police are either corrupt or they are abusive with their power. We can never go down the route of undermining them. 
We will be supporting the bill. I think all of my caucus is in support of this private member's bill.
We have discussed a little bit with the member for Red Deer about having an amendment to the bill that would be clearer with regard to the judicial responsibility to give reasons if this section is to be invoked. We have been having some discussion about that and we should see that at committee. I expect the bill to go to committee very rapidly and hopefully to be dealt with at the justice committee rapidly as well.
Those are all the comments I have, Madam Speaker. Thank you for the opportunity to speak to the bill.
The Acting Speaker (Ms. Denise Savoie): The hon. member for Red Deer, for his five minutes right of reply.
Mr. Earl Dreeshen (Red Deer, CPC): Madam Speaker, it is indeed a pleasure for me to rise today and close second reading debate on Bill C-576, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (personating peace officer). 
I am very aware of the significance attached to a private member's bill that proposes changes to the Criminal Code of Canada.
This bill was motivated by a horrendous act of deceit and torture that occurred in my riding, and the heroic actions of a brave survivor.
This bill honours such victims by recognizing that the disarming actions of their assailants are to be considered as an aggravating circumstance, for which the courts should hand out more appropriate sentences.
I am grateful to all of my colleagues who have spoken to this bill and have expressed their desire to move it forward. I truly appreciate the outpouring of support that I have received from this House; and on behalf of the brave family in my riding that has allowed me to share their story, I thank all members.
I am pleased that we have this consensus and are prepared to have this bill proceed to the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. 
As I have said, this bill is about sentencing. It speaks to the need for tougher penalties for this particular crime, in line with the fundamental sentencing principle of proportionality, which is stated in section 718 of the Criminal Code.
Victims must be assured that there will be serious consequences for criminals who have hurt them.
We need to preserve the trust and respect that citizens have for real, bona fide police officers. When citizens see a police uniform, they naturally trust and respect the authority that comes with it, and our laws must reflect this reality.
Therefore, we need to provide the courts the tools to deliver harsher sentences to criminals that breach the public's trust to cause harm.
I appreciate the contributions that have been made by all of my colleagues who have participated in this debate. I have taken under advisement the discussions surrounding the consecutive and concurrent sentencing.
If an offender were to receive a sentence for personating a peace officer, it might be served concurrently with another, lengthier sentence. Thus, a judge's finding of aggravation under section 130 may not be fully recognized in the concurrent sentencing.
On the other hand, consecutive sentencing would require the offender to serve each sentence, for each crime. These decisions, however, still rest with the courts.
I appreciate any input that the committee may have once it hears from potential witnesses. Any suggestions that would support the desired outcome, further the public's confidence in the justice system, and support the victims of this crime are worth considering. I would certainly take them under advisement.
The bottom line is that a sentence must be proportionate to the gravity of the offence and the degree of responsibility of the offender.
Bill S-4 increased the maximum sentence for this offence and now we should give the courts this tool to exercise the new maximum in the most serious of cases.
We know that there have been a number of incidents across Canada of criminals impersonating peace officers. It would be premature to say that this crime is increasing in frequency, as it may just be that it is being reported more, but the severity of some of the crimes that are being committed alongside section 130 offences are disturbing.
Only a few weeks ago, we heard of another case in Ajax where three men dressed as police entered a residence, handcuffed six people inside and ransacked the home.
This is a continuing, widespread and serious problem in Canada, and we as legislators cannot ignore.
In closing, I would once again like to thank my colleagues for their support. I appreciate that they too recognize the timeliness and necessity of this bill.
Too often it seems that Canadians only hear in the media about the negative aspects of Parliament; that there is little co-operation or consensus in this place. This is not true.
 As members know, there are many times that we as parliamentarians are able to work together in non-partisan ways to improve the lives and safety of Canadians. This is one of those times. Let us work together and recognize our spirit of co-operation.
I look forward to working with the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights where we can further our discussion.
The Acting Speaker (Ms. Denise Savoie): The time provided for debate has expired. 
The question is on the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion? 
[Intervention]
Some hon. members:  Agreed.
The Acting Speaker (Ms. Denise Savoie):  I declare the motion carried. Accordingly, the bill stands referred to the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. 
 (Motion agreed to, bill read the second time and referred to a committee) 

Adjournment Proceedings
[Stage Direction]
A motion to adjourn the House under Standing Order 38 deemed to have been moved.
Don Davies: Madam Speaker, the tragic death of Ashley Smith in a federal penitentiary continues to raise deeply troubling questions about the government's U.S. style plan for our prisons. Ashley's story is, first and foremost, a deeply personal tragedy for her family and her community. I know all members of this House recognize that and offer their sympathy.
However, the legacy of Ashley Smith prevails in the public eye as a symbol of everything that is wrong with the government's approach to prisons. 
At the young age of 15, Ashley Smith was inappropriately sent into the Canadian prison system. This young woman should have been placed instead in a community mental health setting. Instead of learning from this essential fact, however, the Conservatives still pursue a misguided policy of putting more and more people like Ashley into our prisons. Convicted of throwing a crabapple at a postal worker, she ended up dying in a federal prison cell at 19.
There is a groundswell of opposition that is building to the Conservative crime agenda. Countries around the globe are rejecting policies that inappropriately and needlessly lock up their citizens. They are looking to more effective approaches that focus on increasing mental health and addiction services in the community, and crime prevention. American states, like Texas and Oklahoma, staunch bastions of right-wing ideology, have seen their budgets broken by escalating prison costs and are now actively reducing their prison populations. Even conservative icon, Newt Gingrich, recognizes the failure of the lock-them-up approach. He states:
 There is an urgent need to address the astronomical growth in the prison population, with its huge costs in dollars and lost human potential. We spent $68 billion in 2010 on corrections--300 percent more than 25 years ago. The prison population is growing 13 times faster than the general population. These facts should trouble every American. 
Mr. Gingrich went on to say:
 If our prison policies are failing half of the time, and we know that there are more humane, effective alternatives, it is time to fundamentally rethink how we treat and rehabilitate our prisoners. 
Mr. Gingrich notes that conservative republicans are instead strengthening their probation system, deciding against building more prisons and choosing to enhance proven community corrections approaches such as drug courts. They are getting better results and reducing crime.
Increasingly, however, this Prime Minister stands alone on the world stage in pressing forward with his wrong-headed and dangerous plan to lock up more and more Canadians for longer prison terms.
The Church Council on Justice and Corrections has written to the Prime Minister on this issue as well. The CCJC is made up of representatives from every major Christian faith group in the country. It represents millions of Canadian Christians. Its letter to the Prime Minister reads:
 Proposed new federal laws will ensure that more Canadians are sent to prison for longer periods, a strategy that has been repeatedly proven neither to reduce crime nor to assist victims. Your policy is applying a costly prison response to people involved in the courts who are non-violent offenders, or to repeat offenders who are mentally ill and/or addicted, the majority of whom are not classified as high risk. These offenders are disproportionately poor, ill-equipped to learn, from the most disadvantaged and marginalized groups. They require treatment, health services, educational, employment and housing interventions, all less expensive and more humane than incarceration. 
The CCJC told the Prime Minister:
 Increasing levels of incarceration of marginalized people is counter-productive and undermines human dignity in our society. By contrast, well supervised probation or release, bail options, reporting centres, practical assistance, supportive housing, programs that promote accountability, respect and reparation: these measures have all been well-established, but they are underfunded. Their outcomes have proven to be the same or better in terms of re-offence rates, at a fraction of the cost and with much less human damage. 
The American right gets it, the Canadian faith community gets it and New Democrats get it. When will the government get it and abandon its failed crime policy that is divisive, fear based, astronomically expensive and completely ineffective?
Mr. Dave MacKenzie (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Public Safety, CPC): Madam Speaker, the matter that my colleague first raised is truly a tragic situation that occurred. If my colleague was not quite so partisan and he went back and looked at what he first said, he would understand that the issue he raised to begin with was an issue of mental health in the communities, which is a provincial matter. However, I am prepared to answer his issue with respect to Canada's treatment of mentally ill offenders within the Canadian federal correctional facilities.
While I am not at liberty to comment on any specific case under the provisions of the Privacy Act, I can assure the members that our government is committed to providing reasonable and effective levels of mental health services for offenders.
As members are aware, our government is concerned first and foremost with public safety. Correctional Service Canada contributes to public safety by managing institutions at various security levels, preparing offenders for safe release and supervising offenders under conditional release in the community. Part of this continuum of care is effectively addressing and treating the mental health needs of offenders.
 Correctional Service Canada routinely deals with high risk offenders whose needs are complex and diverse. This includes mental illness, drug and alcohol addiction, anger and violence issues. As for treating mental illness, when the mental health needs of offenders are addressed through assessment and treatment, public safety and the safety of staff and offenders are enhanced.
 This is why improving the capacity to address the mental health needs of offenders is a key priority for Correctional Service Canada. To fulfill this priority, the CSC has developed a mental health care strategy to improve the continuum of mental health care provided to offenders. The strategy is intended to address the mental health care needs of offenders at all stages of incarceration, from intake to transitional care for offenders being released into the community.
This mental health care strategy includes five key components: mental health screening at intake; primary mental health care in institutions; intermediate mental health care to address the needs of offenders who are unable to cope in regular institutional settings; intensive care at regional treatment centres for those who require that level of intensive care; and transitional care for release to the community.
In support of this strategy, the CSC has also implemented several management practices, such as the provision of mental health training to both mental health professionals and correctional staff.
Let me be clear. Our government is concerned about the mental health needs and treatment of offenders and is proud of the CSC's efforts to address this issue. Through budget 2008, and as part of the Government of Canada's plan to transform the federal correctional system, the CSC received permanent funding of $16.6 million annually for institutional mental health services, commencing in fiscal year 2009-2010.
Through these resources and support, this government trusts that CSC will continue to effectively treat mentally ill offenders within Canadian federal correctional facilities.
[Interjection]
Don Davies: Madam Speaker, the government's own documents estimate that 4,000 new prisoners will enter Canadian prisons in the next two to three years in the federal system. It is hiring 3,300 new staff. In that 3,300 staff, the documents show that it will hire 10 psychologists, one per province, and there is already a deficit of psychologists. That is the government's commitment to mental health.
This week even more individuals came out against the government's crime agenda. More than 550 physicians, social workers and researchers signed a letter to the Prime Minister expressing their opposition to the government's approach to crime. These health and social policy experts say that the Conservative approach is not scientifically grounded and will actually harm community safety.
The Conservative plan disproportionately affects aboriginals and young people. The lack of addictions and mental health treatment in prisons means putting more people behind bars for longer. This will do nothing to reduce the rate of crime.
 How much expert evidence will it take for the government to recognize that its plan is unacceptably expensive, ineffective and will do nothing to make our communities safer?
[Interjection]
Dave MacKenzie: Madam Speaker, through the whole six minutes of my colleague's talk I never heard the name “victim” mentioned once.
Let me clarify that this government, through Correctional Service Canada, is committed to achieving the best standard of care and correctional results for federal offenders with mental health needs. We aim to protect all Canadians, which includes ensuring the safe and effective treatment of mentally ill offenders both within correctional facilities and in communities across Canada.
 Through its mental health care strategy, Correctional Service Canada is improving the continuum of care for offenders by identifying and assessing the mental health needs of offenders and admission to a federal correctional facility, to treating those needs through mental health care services and programs within correctional facilities and ensuring that this care is carried out into the community once the offender is released.
 As a result of these measures, Canadians can feel safe and secure knowing that the mental health needs of federal offenders are being addressed through Correctional Service Canada's national mental health strategy.
Jack Harris: Madam Speaker, I rise tonight to ask further about a question I asked during question period on October 26, 2010, regarding the procurement of Chinook helicopters and other helicopters, the Cyclones, by the Department of National Defence and in relation to the Auditor General's report of fall 2009.
There is a familiar story here. The Auditor General reported that in 2006, based on meetings and discussions with Boeing and the market analysis, National Defence formally concluded that Boeing's Chinook was the only existing western certified helicopter in production capable of meeting its needs. It convinced Treasury Board that it was buying an off-the-shelf product and got approval for it. As a result, a sole-source contract was agreed upon, an ACAN, advance contract award notice, approved by Public Works and Government Service Canada, to proceed to buy the Chinooks.
The reality was the government did not really know at the time it would use the Chinooks for. The Auditor General said that after the ACAN was posted, the government negotiated with Boeing, looked at a schedule to produce these aircraft and had to develop a detailed statement of work. In order to do that, it had to know precisely what type of missions the helicopter would support, what it wanted the helicopter to do and the technical specifications needed to achieve it.
The Auditor General said that the evidence on the file was that there were uncertainties both before and after the decision that the Chinooks were the only ones we needed, such as which type of operations would be supported, whether land, maritime or special operations, what mission systems would be needed, the minimum number of helicopters and whether the helicopter would be located on one or two operating bases.
The actual specifications were not decided upon until 2009. Does that sound familiar? We have a situation with the F-35s. The Department of National Defence has decided the only military jet to meet Canada's needs is the F-35. When was that decision made? It was made about a month or so after the Minister of National Defence said in the House that there would be a fair, open and transparent process of competitive bidding. In fact, probably a month or two after, finally the statement of operating requirements, which is basically the first step in a bidding process, was decided upon by the Department of National Defence. All of it was done in the wrong order.
The Auditor General, to go back to the Chinooks and the process, said that the manner in which the advance contract award notice was given did not comply with the applicable regulations and policies and in her opinion the process was not fair, open or transparent. All of this is required, including a whole series of challenges and reviews that must go on before spending of this nature is approved.
We see the same thing here. The Auditor General called the projects undertaken by the Department of National Defence high risk. It resulted in a doubling of the expected costs to $11 billion. We have the same kind of risks with the F-35s. We do not know how much it will cost. We do not have a fair, open and transparent process.
Hon. Laurie Hawn (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence, CPC): Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the member for St. John's East for giving me the opportunity to bring further clarity to this issue.
First, as a key component of our Canada first defence strategy, the Chinook helicopters are the right aircraft for the Canadian Forces and will provide our men and women in uniform with an essential capability they need to carry out their important work either here, at home or overseas. The Chinooks currently deployed to Afghanistan have proven invaluable to the mission and are saving lives every day.
Second, to say that the department broke any rules on sole sourcing is patently false. The advanced contract award notice, or ACAN, is a fair, open and transparent procurement instrument that fully complies with Treasury Board rules. 
Furthermore, Treasury Board accepted that full estimates for in-service support of the Chinooks were not available when it authorized definition work to begin. These costs cannot be fully known until the aircraft are in service. The department provided complete estimates before Treasury Board gave its implementation approval and the procurement took place within well-established Treasury Board guidelines.
As indicated in the report of the Auditor General, the Department of National Defence agrees with the recommendations and is taking action to address each one. Now that we have addressed the situation with the Chinook, I would like to talk about the procurement of the F-35.
The member opposite would like to try to compare the acquisition process of the Chinook with that of the F-35, but in this respect there is no comparison. The choice of procurement process is guided by the operational requirements of the equipment being sought by the Canadian Forces. 
The F-35 procurement is a unique situation because of our membership in a partnership of nations committed to acquiring a common next generation fighter for the 21st century. Experts within the Canadian Forces and the Department of National Defence have rigorously examined all available aircraft in terms of capability, cost and industrial opportunities, and this review concluded that the F-35 was the only aircraft that met all the Canadian Forces' mandatory capabilities for a next generation fighter.
In total, 10 countries have followed the same process and come to the same conclusion: the F-35. This is not a coincidence. As such, we have committed $9 billion to the acquisition of 65 F-35 Lightning II joint strike fighters, an amount that includes not only the cost of the aircraft, but all of the associated weapon systems, supporting infrastructure, initial spares, training simulators, contingency funds and project operating costs.
Canada is purchasing the most cost-effective variant of the aircraft at the peak of production when the costs are projected to be at their lowest. We currently estimate the cost per aircraft to be in the mid-$70 million U.S. range. In 2016 dollars, the unit cost of buying new F-35s is only slightly more than the unit cost paid for the CF-18s in the 1980s. 
We expect the life cycle cost of the joint strike fighter to be similar to that of the CF-18 fleet, approximately $250 million to $350 million annually. Canada's cost for aircraft is not expected to change as a result of the extension of the development phase since the U.S. has been absorbing all of those costs so far.
DND continuously strives to capture lessons learned in undertaking complex acquisitions. Procurement of major military platforms is a complex process that evolves over time. Some who are now commenting have simply not kept up with that evolution.
We have taken a number of steps in recent years to improve and streamline the defence procurement process, allowing us to introduce and replace new capabilities faster than ever before, while also ensuring best value for money. As a matter of fact, we have reduced the implementation time to about half of what it was previously.
As always, the government continues to ensure that we procure the best equipment for our Canadian Forces so they can achieve mission success while ensuring that Canadian taxpayers get the best deal for their money.
[Interjection]
Jack Harris: Madam Speaker, I certainly agree with the parliamentary secretary that the Chinooks in use in Afghanistan have been very useful, but they were actually off the shelf. They were used Chinooks bought from the Americans that have been very useful and now are military surplus because we are looking for a buyer for them. We spent $286 million on them. They served our purpose and now we are selling them. There is nothing wrong with that. This is a different process altogether. 
As for the F-35s, other than Lockheed Martin that produced them, no one was ever looked at in terms of the specifications. After the SOR was developed in 2010, we had the other manufacturers before us at the defence committee. They said they had never been consulted or even asked whether they could meet the operational requirements. There were no detailed discussions with all of the manufacturers after the SOR was determined.
What the minister is saying is not correct. In fact, to go back to the Chinooks, the Auditor General happened to disagree totally with what the hon. member just said and what Treasury Board officials say. We have a serious problem with the procurement policies. The parliamentary secretary and the government need a reality check on procurement.
[Interjection]
Laurie Hawn: Madam Speaker, we are very careful about the people whom we employ to look at these projects. We have some of the best minds, the most experienced people with the most expertise, military and civilian, who looked at all the other airplanes and spoke with us. 
Of course, the other manufacturers are going to say they can meet the requirements. They are salesmen. That is what they do. That is why we hire people who can examine it and give us the kind of advice we need with no agenda. Their only agenda is to give the Canadian Forces the best equipment they can at the best price. By the way, it also gives Canadian industry the best possible opportunities for participation to create jobs for the next 20, 30, 40 years.
We are going to fly this airplane until past 2050. We have an obligation to give the Canadian Forces the best equipment possible to do the jobs we give them, and that is what we are doing.
The Acting Speaker (Ms. Denise Savoie): The hon. member for Nanaimo—Cowichan is not present to raise the matter for which adjournment notice has been given. Accordingly, the notice is deemed withdrawn.
The motion to adjourn the House is now deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly, this House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 10 a.m., pursuant to Standing Order 24(1). 
 (The House adjourned at 8:06 p.m.)