How can the Minister of Canadian Heritage fulfil her ministerial responsibility and protect the two official language minorities, when she in fact refuses to acknowledge that Canada has a real problem in the assimilation of francophones outside Quebec, as Statistics Canada figures prove beyond a doubt?
Hon. Sheila Copps (Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Canadian Heritage, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, if the hon. member really wants to know what I said, he can read the minutes of the committee in which I said, following the comments by the minister, Ms. Beaudouin, that the problem of anglicization exists throughout the country, including in the Province of Quebec.
Mr. Gilles Duceppe (Laurier-Sainte-Marie, BQ): Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Canadian Heritage has said a lot of things, so many things that she was awarded the Montreal Gazette's brickbat of the week. No mean feat.
Some hon. members: Hear, hear.
Mr. Duceppe: I would recall some statistics for her: the rate of assimilation of francophones in New Brunswick is 8.7 per cent; in British Columbia, 72 per cent; in western Canada, 55 per cent; in Ontario, 37 per cent and in the City of Hamilton, her city, 65 per cent. These are Statistics Canada's figures. And this is why associations representing francophones in English Canada have criticized the minister's remarks.
Instead of concealing the problem, by promoting bilingualism, does the minister not think it is time to recognize the facts, to open her eyes and to perhaps offer some solutions?
Hon. Sheila Copps (Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Canadian Heritage, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, if the member is really interested in the well-being of the francophone community across Canada, I would ask him to contact his counterpart, the Quebec minister of education, who has introduced a system that discriminates against francophones outside Quebec in French language post-secondary education.
Mr. Gilles Duceppe (Laurier-Sainte-Marie, BQ): Mr. Speaker, Quebec introduced a system of higher costs for out of country students, as did Ontario. In Ontario, it is good management; in Quebec, it is discrimination.
In the case of out of province students, Quebec charges them the average cost of education in Canada, which means that it costs even less for an Ontarian than studying in Toronto. Those are the facts. It is time the minister woke up. If she wants to talk money, we will talk money.
Does the minister not think that one way to meet her responsibilities, because she does have responsibilities although she may not realize it, is to look carefully at the use the other provinces make of the money intended to go to educating official language minorities that went to other things, like heating schools or setting up public washrooms in Kingston?
Hon. Sheila Copps (Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Canadian Heritage, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I asked the hon. member, who, I assume, supports the policy of his colleague, the hon. member for Québec-Est, who supports a policy of bilingualism across the country, which we support, whether he is prepared to acknowledge that the education policy of his counterpart in Quebec City, Pauline Marois, discriminates against 1,500 students registered at Laval, the University of Sherbrooke and the University of Montreal. Most of them are francophones who wish to continue their studies in their own language.
Why is the Government of Quebec a part of such discrimination against Canada's francophones?
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Mr. Jean-Paul Marchand (Québec-Est, BQ): Mr. Speaker, the minister keeps hammering at Quebec because she cannot do her own job properly. That is the problem.
Marcel Beaudry, president of the National Capital Commission, said before the Joint Committee on Official Languages that Ottawa was, to all intents and purposes, a bilingual city. However, only last summer the Fédération des communautés francophones et acadienne condemned the national capital's English unilingualism.
Considering that the assimilation rate of francophones within the federal capital has reached 30 per cent, does the Minister of Canadian Heritage not think it is high time she reminded Mr. Beaudry that it is part of the NCC's mandate to actively promote linguistic duality?
Hon. Sheila Copps (Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Canadian Heritage, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, one thing is certain and that is that someone who refers to francophones outside Quebec as paraplegics in wheelchairs is hardly in a position to say anything about the state of the French language.
That being said, what I said, and what is falsely denied by the hon. member for Québec-Est is that now, and this was not the case 30 years ago, 99 per cent of francophones outside Quebec who wish to be educated in their language have that possibility, thanks to federal policies.
Of course the policies are not perfect. But if the hon. member wants to victimize francophones in this country, I think he is barking up the wrong tree.
Mr. Jean-Paul Marchand (Québec-Est, BQ): Mr. Speaker, I challenge the minister to prove that 99 per cent of francophones outside Quebec have access to education in French, when there are only 50 per cent. This is a shameless falsehood on the part of the minister who is supposed to be responsible for this sector.
Some hon. members: Oh, oh.
The Speaker: Dear colleague, I suggest it would be more appropriate to refrain from using words like ``falsely'' or ``falsehood''. I would ask you to be very careful about your choice of words.
Mr. Marchand: NCC leases provide that tenants who are businesses or government agencies must advertise and provide services in both official languages. According to Mr. Beaudry, they cannot act on these clauses because they have never been enforced.
Are we to conclude that the Official Languages Act is no longer valid because it has never been properly enforced in Canada, outside Quebec?
[English]
Hon. Sheila Copps (Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Canadian Heritage, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, you will understand my pleasant astonishment at the spectacle of the Bloc Quebecois' supporting the use of bilingual signs across the country. We think that is an important step forward.
If the member for Quebec Est is honest in the comment that he made the other night to the committee that he supports bilingualism across the country, in every part of the country, including the province of Quebec, I would encourage him to intervene with the minister of education in Quebec who has introduced a two tier system of tuition which discriminates against francophones outside Quebec.
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First, Greenberg stores announced they are closing 5 stores in New Brunswick and a possible 19 others in Nova Scotia and they have placed the blame squarely on the harmonized GST.
Then we hear about the 16,000 New Brunswickers who have signed a petition to dump the tax and then a report comes out showing how rents in Nova Scotia will go up, hurting the old, the young and the poor, those least able to absorb a tax hike.
Finally, at the end of the week Ontario's finance minister put a torch to any possibility of Canada's largest province hitching a ride on this Hindenburg.
Why will the finance minister not finally admit that his hope for a nationwide harmonization deal is dead? Will he kill it now in Atlantic Canada before it kills any more jobs?
Hon. Paul Martin (Minister of Finance, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, in terms of the Greenberg stores, the fact of the matter is the stores, indeed all retailers in Atlantic Canada, will gain as much if not more as a result of the introduction of input tax credits than any other cost.
At the same time, the minister of finance in New Brunswick stated very clearly that he is prepared to sit down with any of the retailers in New Brunswick, as indeed are the other ministers of finance, to make sure tax inclusive pricing is introduced in a way that will not cause hardship but that will in fact give consumers what they want.
The issue nonetheless that remains in this House is why the Reform Party has supported in House of Commons committee and in fact in its own official program, all 18 versions of its own official program, tax harmonization. Why is it prepared to support it in principle but when Atlantic Canada wants to do it in order to
make its small and medium size business more competitive, to give it an opportunity to get a leg up, the Reform Party in an act of blind attack against Atlantic Canada refuses to accept that very good measure?
Mr. Monte Solberg (Medicine Hat, Ref.): Mr. Speaker, Reformers are standing up for Atlantic Canada. My question is why do we have all these Atlantic Canadian MPs sitting over here using up perfectly good oxygen but not standing up for their constituents.
Despite a billion dollars in hush money the facts of this political deal have started leaking out. Everything is going up in price: new houses, rents, heating fuel, children's clothing, gasoline. Nova Scotia's opposition leader says this deal will mean $53 million in new gas taxes in Nova Scotia. Even Nova Scotia's finance minister admits that municipal property taxes are going to have to rise because of this deal.
Why is the finance minister allowing this tax attack on the hard pressed people of Atlantic Canada when it is clear that it will hurt the poor and it will kill jobs?
Hon. Paul Martin (Minister of Finance, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, the hidden agenda of the Reform Party is very clear. It comes out in its body language, it comes out in the words it uses.
The hon. member uses the words hush money. Any time money is transferred to Atlantic Canada it is hush money. It was not hush money when Ontario received stabilization payments from the federal government. It was not hush money when western Canadian grain farmers were given the support for agricultural payments. It was not hush money for the Reform Party when the Alberta tar sands were given a very important deal that would create jobs there.
But transfer a penny to Atlantic Canada and it is hush money and the reason is the Reform Party refuses to take a pan-Canadian view of this country. The Reform Party refuses to understand that the regions of this country support one another.
The problem that exists here is that the Reform Party simply has given up on Atlantic Canada while the Liberal Party has not. We believe in Atlantic Canada.
Mr. Monte Solberg (Medicine Hat, Ref.): Mr. Speaker, the fact is the Liberal Party has made a career of creating divisions in this country, which is why it is not willing to come up with $3 billion for Ontario and the other provinces.
The devil is in the details. A copy of this deal says a cut in the provincial portion of this tax requires the unanimous consent of all provinces involved.
When was the last time we had unanimity on anything in this country? But a rate increase only needs a simple majority. That is one of the reasons the finance minister himself opposed harmonization back when he ran for the Liberal leadership. This deal entrenches higher taxes forever.
Why has the finance minister compromised his own belief that harmonization guarantees higher taxes forever and, in doing so, why did he sell out the people of Atlantic Canada?
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Hon. Paul Martin (Minister of Finance, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I would simply ask the hon. member to go back to the byelection which took place in Labrador when the Reform Party was prepared to stand up and speak for Atlantic Canada. Now all of a sudden, having lost that byelection as well as every other election in Atlantic Canada, Reform members are taking out their vengeance on Atlantic Canadians, saying ``we will not allow you to have a lower tax rate, we will not allow you to have lower consumer costs, we will not allow you to break away from a cycle of dependence, toward independence''.
The hon. member asks when was the last time we had unanimity in this country. I will tell him. It was when Canadians from coast to coast to coast said ``the Reform Party has had it; it is going down the drain''. They do not want to have anything more to do with those vicious policies it stands for.
Last Friday, the Toronto Star reported that the Minister of Canadian Heritage was against sponsorship by tobacco companies, even at the cost of killing cultural and sporting events like the Du Maurier Downtown Jazz Festival in Toronto, the International Film Festival in Vancouver, the Formula One Grand Prix and all summer festivals in Montreal and elsewhere.
How can the minister say such things when her mandate is to promote the cultural interests of Canada and Quebec?
Hon. Sheila Copps (Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Canadian Heritage, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I said the same thing as the hon. member who spoke on behalf of the Bloc Quebecois two weeks ago.
Mr. Pierre de Savoye (Portneuf, BQ): Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Health announces he will be making a statement, but then nothing happens; the Minister of Canadian Heritage has it all wrong. We in the official opposition, in the Bloc, are the ones saying: ``The priority is health. That is clear''. But at the same time, the question I am putting to the minister is as follows. There are cultural and sporting events at stake. She has a duty to look into finding a solution. What solution, if any, can she offer this House?
If she has one, let us hear it right now. Otherwise, let the people be the judge.
Hon. Sheila Copps (Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Canadian Heritage, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I was following what the hon. member representing the Bloc Quebecois in this issue was saying. I was actually following her advice.
When will the Minister of Finance do the right thing, stop the unfair burden on future generations and make the CPP a fully funded system?
Hon. Paul Martin (Minister of Finance, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, as the hon. member knows, when the finance ministers met there was, by and large, a consensus for the necessity of having a fuller funded plan and that, in fact, the moneys should be invested at arm's length from governments by an independent investment group.
To the extent that deals with the member's question, I believe there is consensus across the country on that particular issue. Hopefully we will be able to move to consensus right across the board because I believe that all members of the House would agree that the Canada pension plan is indeed an essential pillar of the Canadian retirement system. I would suggest that all provincial governments, as well as the federal government, deal with this as quickly as possible.
Mr. Herb Grubel (Capilano-Howe Sound, Ref.): Mr. Speaker, higher job killing premiums are the cornerstone of the Liberal reform of the Canada pension plan. Lower job creating premiums for employment insurance are overdue and demanded by nearly everyone except the Minister of Finance.
Will the minister do the right thing for future generations and today's workers and commit himself to a package of simultaneously higher CPP and lower EI premiums, a package which does not increase job destroying payroll taxes?
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Hon. Paul Martin (Minister of Finance, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I am sure the hon. member knows that the employment insurance plan and the Canada pension plan are quite separate. They are not linked, as indeed are health levies, education levies and workmen's compensation, which are all payroll plans in the provinces. For that reason the Canada pension plan must be dealt with on its own.
I have a little difficulty with the member's question, how it reconciles with the Taxpayers' Budget brought forward by the Reform Party which states: ``To ensure that savings from reform of UI translate into deficit elimination, the Reform Party recommends the establishment of a permanent reserve fund for the UI. Until the budget was balanced, funds from this reserve would be applied against the deficit''.
Has the Reform Party changed its mind or does it still hold to this statement?
This morning, a coalition of organizations, including the Canadian Hemophilia Society, renewed its request for access to the documents the Krever commission wishes to examine. These documents, including draft regulations on blood products, go back to 1984, when the Liberal Party was in power and the current Prime Minister was Deputy Prime Minister. According to testimony given by certain senior health officials, the draft regulations were blocked at the highest level.
How can the minister explain his stubborn refusal not to table these documents, unless it is because their publication could be embarrassing to the present government?
Hon. Sheila Copps (Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Canadian Heritage, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, it is not a stubborn refusal, it is a legal requirement.
Mrs. Pauline Picard (Drummond, BQ): Mr. Speaker, the Canada Evidence Act gives the minister the required authority. Under the terms of that statute, the minister may ask the President of the Privy Council to intervene in order to overturn a decision by the Clerk of the Privy Council to refuse to make these documents public, and to have them finally turned over to Judge Krever so that he may get to the bottom of this tragedy.
Hon. Sheila Copps (Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Canadian Heritage, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, section 39 of the Canada Evidence Act stipulates that cabinet confidences may not be disclosed for 20 years, meaning that it is unfortunately impossible for us under the law to meet this demand.
[English]
Ottawa routinely sends individual entitlements and benefits directly to other Canadians, including GST rebate cheques, child benefit cheques, pension cheques and so on.
Why is the minister afraid to give treaty Indians a choice about how they want to receive their treaty entitlements, either directly from the government or from the chief in council? Why is he denying Indians the same rights as every other Canadian?
Hon. Ron Irwin (Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, let me explain this to the hon. member. First, treaty land entitlement is direct to the individuals through a process.
But under treaty we have not yet scoped out the meaning of health, the meaning of education, the meaning of economic development. There are four processes going on in this country that I hope would have something.
What the hon. member wants me to do-I explained it to her colleague last week-is pay the money directly to 300,000 or 400,000 aboriginal people. We do not deal that way. We deal government to government. We do not do that with provinces. Provinces do not do that with municipalities. They elect people. They decide on the priorities, whether hospitals, schools or roads. This is the way they do it.
Certainly the hon. member is not suggesting that the Minister of Finance take the money he collects and send a cheque to each Canadian so they can decide what to do with the money. The people elect us to come to the House of Commons to make decisions. Aboriginal people elect chiefs in council to make decisions. It is quite simple.
Miss Deborah Grey (Beaver River, Ref.): Mr. Speaker, I have an example. The First Nations accountability coalition is comprised mainly of treaty Indians who receive old age pension cheques. They are now able to speak out because they are not totally beholden to the chief and council for their survival. Their pension cheques have given them a real voice and real power for the first time in their lives. These people are demanding financial accountability of their own leaders. I am not asking this, they are asking.
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Some of them have been threatened and beaten; some have had their houses shot at. When they complained, the minister's own
officials in Saskatchewan told the coalition: ``Do not take it personally; it is happening all over''. This is not good enough.
When will the minister finally give authority to the auditor general to look into these complaints of financial mismanagement? When will he make sure that aboriginals are treated fairly and equally in this country?
Hon. Ron Irwin (Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is probably the last person to be asking that question. These are the same types of questions which are asked of the Minister of Justice. Reformers take one isolated case and say because this happened, people cannot handle their own responsibilities and that we should look at what is happening.
Reformers refuse to look across the country at the 80 per cent of First Nations that do a good job of managing. They refused to look at the B.C. treaty process which was a success and which Reformers opposed. They refused to look at the Manitoba dismantling which they opposed and which is a success. They refused to look at treaty scoping out and they even refused to support legislation in the Yukon. Yet they come here and ask when there is going to be fairness for the aboriginal people. They are the wrong people to be asking that question.
There is seemingly endless pussyfooting around the urgent action awaited in eastern Zaire and the international community's hesitation casts some shameful doubts on its willingness to act. After three days of meetings, the governments represented in Stuttgart must now assess the options that have been defined.
In the context of an estimated 250,000 refugees still stuck in eastern Zaire and another 300,000 having gone west, could the minister give us an update and tell us which option he favours to resolve the current deadlock?
Hon. Lloyd Axworthy (Minister of Foreign Affairs, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, following weekend talks, we received the recommendations made by the military groups. As we speak, the Minister of National Defence is in Washington. I myself am consulting with several European and African ministers to determine the best way to implement the recommendations developed by the military groups in Stuttgart.
Mr. Pierre Brien (Témiscamingue, BQ): Mr. Speaker, with Kigali still opposed to any intervention by a multinational force on its territory, could the minister tell us how many more meetings
will be needed and how much longer refugees will have to wait before the international community takes action?
[English]
Hon. Lloyd Axworthy (Minister of Foreign Affairs, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, the hope is that an agreement among the various coalition partners can be arrived at within a matter of a day or so.
The meetings which were held last week were very important in terms of determining the needs. Last week there was a high level of confusion about how many refugees were left, what their condition was and where they were located.
That decision was consolidated during the meeting at Stuttgart. The Minister for International Cooperation held a very good meeting in Geneva which helped to co-ordinate the assistance plans for Rwanda. We are presently talking with a number of the coalition partners to determine exactly what the most appropriate response would be based on the information arrived at this weekend.
I share the hon. member's degree of frustration. It is important that we move as quickly as possible to help, but we cannot move by ourselves. We must move in partnership with the other coalition members. That is what we are working on at the present time.
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Hon. Don Boudria (Minister for International Cooperation and Minister responsible for Francophonie, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, on Saturday, over 135 officials from 20 countries met in Geneva, in addition to organizations representing 15 multilateral groups, to discuss the humanitarian assistance effort in Rwanda and in eastern Zaire. Several proposals were put forward.
A follow-up meeting will take place in Kigali, in a few days. I hope to be able to make an announcement to this effect, perhaps in the next 24 or 48 hours. Meanwhile, the following measures were approved: increasing support to professional monitoring of human rights protection.
Some hon. members: Excluded.
Mr. Boudria: No, Mr. Speaker, hundreds of thousands of people do not want this to be excluded.
The list goes on: increasing legal assistance to victims and, third, providing help to promote peace and reconciliation in Rwanda.
I believe that the Minister of Transport's suggestion that he might remove the domestic fuel tax if they accept the restructuring plan is offensive. These employees should be able to see the value of their sacrifice in advance and know that the overall restructuring plan will work. That means the fuel tax should be removed before they make their decision.
Will the minister do the honourable thing and remove the aviation fuel tax in the manner promised with the introduction of the GST before Canadian's employees have to make their final decision?
Mr. Stan Keyes (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Transport, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I want to remind the hon. member that this government is taking the same position that it has taken now for almost a month. The Minister of Transport did not go to British Columbia to try to broker a deal between Canadian Airlines and its union. He went there to listen. The Minister of Transport did not go to British Columbia to write a cheque. The minister is there to listen.
To quote the Minister of Transport, there is no role for government until such time as the company is made essentially profitable. Government involvement now with money or anything else will not solve the chronic restructuring problem.
Mr. Jim Gouk (Kootenay West-Revelstoke, Ref.): Mr. Speaker, I do not know why the government is listening now; it never listened before. Reform has been calling for the removal of the federal fuel tax on aviation gas but the federal tax is only part of the problem. An international treaty on air transport, agreed to by 184 countries including Canada, prohibits taxation of fuel used for international air transportation. The federal government has complied but a number of provincial governments have not.
Given that this provincial aviation fuel tax on international flights contravenes the treaty signed by Canada and compounds the competitive problems for Canadian air carriers, what action if any has the minister taken to have this provincial tax removed? If he is
finally talking to them about that, why did he wait until Canadian was in such deep financial trouble?
Mr. Stan Keyes (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Transport, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I want to help the hon. member out. He is a hardworking member of the transport committee.
Maybe he has not met with his leader for a while but his leader spoke on CBU AM radio in Vancouver and said: ``In keeping with our philosophy that government should stay out of the marketplace and stay out of business, if Canadian is to survive, it will survive because it is successful in implementing a business plan to make it profitable''.
In any of the speeches that have been made by his party or by the government there has been no mention about foreign investment and nothing about eliminating taxes. It is there in Reform's 1995 blue book: ``Eliminate regional development as a goal of transportation policy''. There is no mention by the leader of the third party on tax cuts on fuel. None of that. Where is the member coming from? Let Canadian do the job of restructuring itself, then we will listen to the proposals.
For close to seven years now, a number of stakeholders from the Quebec City region have been asking the federal government to amend the Criminal Code to allow cruising ships on the St. Lawrence River to operate a casino and to be allowed to call at ports, including the port of Quebec.
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How can the minister justify his government's slowness to introduce the required amendments to the Criminal Code, given that it would result in major economic spinoffs for the whole Quebec City region?
[English]
Hon. Allan Rock (Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, this idea comes up from time to time. There are advantages. There are also policy considerations.
If the Government of Quebec has a formal request to make of us to amend the Criminal Code in this regard, I would hope it would be forthcoming. So far to my knowledge no such formal request has been made. If it has a request to make, we will be happy to consider it and discuss it with the other provincial governments and other parties that are affected.
[Translation]
Mr. Michel Guimond (Beauport-Montmorency-Orléans, BQ): Mr. Speaker, I understand the minister would support a private member's bill to be tabled to this effect by the Bloc Quebecois.
Given that a number of jobs would be created, we wonder why the minister cannot allow cruising ships to close their casino just one hour before they arrive at the port of Quebec. It is not that complicated.
Hon. Allan Rock (Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, this issue comes under provincial jurisdiction. Therefore, if the Government of Quebec has adopted a position regarding it, I would be pleased to be apprised of it.
If I receive a formal request from the Government of Quebec, I will be pleased to give it proper consideration.
We are not sure why the minister has not tabled his anti-smoking legislation. Is it because the minister has no clout at the cabinet table? Is it because he is fighting with other ministers in the cabinet? Is it that there are too many high level Liberal lobbyists? We cannot be sure, but the truth is the legislation is not here. Maybe the minister has adopted roll your own targets like the finance minister.
Canadians do not want any more ifs, ands or buts. When will we see this legislation tabled in the House of Commons?
Hon. David Dingwall (Minister of Health, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, soon.
Mr. Chuck Strahl (Fraser Valley East, Ref.): Mr. Speaker, over the weekend according to Statistics Canada figures, 657 more young people started smoking and another 219 people died from smoking related illnesses. We are not talking about soon or some cute little response here. We are talking about human lives.
Will the minister give us a date as to when we can expect this legislation? Do not give us this nonsense about crossing your i's and dotting your t's, or is it crossing your t's and dotting your i's.
Hon. David Dingwall (Minister of Health, Lib.): Yes, Mr. Speaker, some people do have their i's crossed.
I want to tell the hon. member that what is shameful on the floor of the House of Commons is the hypocrisy of the Reform Party when its own critic has said clearly that the resolution of this problem is not with legislation but with education. Now we have the hon. member standing in this place wanting to have legislation.
I say to the hon. member that we will have our legislation package ready to go very soon.
For several months now, we have been hearing that the federal government was going to get more directly involved in promoting job creation.
Could the Minister of Human Resources Development tell us what steps he has taken, in co-operation with the government of my province, the Province of Quebec, in order to stimulate job creation?
Hon. Pierre S. Pettigrew (Minister of Human Resources Development, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, naturally the Government of Canada and the Government of Quebec both wish to help as many unemployed people as possible re-enter the job market. One way in which our governments want to help Quebecers find work is to facilitate the exchange of information between employers and workers, by working closely with partners in the private sector.
I would like to give one example of how the governments of Canada and of Quebec have worked together, in an activity sponsored by Défi Emploi in the region of Témiscouata. In this region, the Government of Canada and the Government of Quebec have worked with local dailies, which have agreed to advertise jobs free of charge.
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You will be pleased to learn that this Défi Emploi project in Témiscouata has been a success. Of the 557 jobs advertised, approximately 469 have been filled, a success rate of 84 per cent. This means that 469 men and women have thus found jobs when our governments work together.
The information commissioner, John Grace, recently declared that a number of government ministers were urging their officials to break the law on purpose by refusing to make public within 30 days replies to requests for access to information.
What action does the minister intend to take to ensure that his foot dragging colleagues get serious and observe the provisions of the Access to Information Act?
[English]
Hon. Allan Rock (Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I know that all of my colleagues make their best efforts in good faith to comply with their obligations under the law. Sometimes the complexity of a request or the difficulty in amassing the necessary information is such that the time limit is not fully respected. However, the record of this government is clear. We take these responsibilities very seriously and we make our best efforts to provide whatever information is required as soon as practical.
[Translation]
Mr. Michel Bellehumeur (Berthier-Montcalm, BQ): Mr. Speaker, surely the commissioner was not just making idle comments. There must be a problem.
When will the justice minister propose amendments to the Access to Information Act for the purpose of strengthening the coercive authority held by the information commissioner over officials, political staff or ministers who deliberately take their time making documents to which we are entitled to have access under the act public?
[English]
Hon. Allan Rock (Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, these matters are always under review. We are happy to discuss with interested parties ways in which the law can be improved. However, we are satisfied that for the most part the statute works well now. As I say, we make every effort in good faith to comply with its spirit, its intent, as well as its letter.
Is the minister now saying that the rule of law does not apply to this minister when he grants orders in council to powerful people?
Hon. Allan Rock (Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, nothing has happened since Friday last to add any legitimacy to the position expressed by the hon. member. He was wrong then and he is wrong now.
The order in council that was made granted a leave of absence to Madam Justice Arbour. That is entirely permitted by the Judges Act. The fact that Madam Justice Arbour is pursuing other duties is also permitted under the Judges Act.
What is prohibited by the Judges Act is that Madam Justice Arbour would accept money from sources other than the federal government. That she has not done and she will not do so until Bill C-42 becomes law. That legislation is intended to amend the Judges Act so that Madam Justice Arbour can take up the duties, with pay from the United Nations, for which she was appointed.
I might say that she was appointed by the United Nations Security Council in a unanimous vote. This country was honoured that a judge of the court of appeal for Ontario was appointed to this position, a position of world leadership in terms of morality: chief prosecutor of the war crimes in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia.
Mr. John Williams (St. Albert, Ref.): Mr. Speaker, the end does not justify the means. Regardless of what the minister is saying today, he did say before the Senate that he had absolutely no power to grant this order in council as the law currently stands and he is in violation of section 55 of the Judges Act which prohibits other employment. It has nothing to do with salary.
Since the minister has granted a special dispensation to Madam Justice Louise Arbour, will he acknowledge that the appearance of impartiality by Madam Justice Arbour will be seriously compromised when she returns to the bench if she is judging cases that involve the Government of Canada?
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Hon. Allan Rock (Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, this concern makes no more sense when it emanates from the hon. member than it did from some of those in the Senate who expressed it also. I do not understand it frankly. I simply do not understand it. It does not make sense.
The United Nations wanted a judge from this country for the role because with judges it has impartiality. It wanted a Canadian judge because of our reputation in the world order. It wanted this judge because of her integrity and her reputation for fairness and competence. By unanimous vote of the security council it chose her for this role.
We found that although she is permitted a leave of absence to take up the duties she cannot be paid by the UN without a change in the statute. The UN does not want us to pay her because it fears that will undermine her independence in the World Court. We propose a change to the statute and all we hear from this member is a bizarre and, in my view, incorrect interpretation of the statute which might cause difficulties in having this woman do an important service for humanity.
Will the hon. member and his party stand down so that we can get this job done for the world?
The banks will be announcing another $6 billion profit, a record. We hear members of the Liberal caucus making progressive noises in the finance committee about the banks' service charges and interest rates charged on Visa cards. But the real question is: What is the government going to do?
Will the Minister of Finance commit his government to putting a ceiling on interest charges on Visa, Mastercard and the other credit card companies? Will he act?
Hon. Douglas Peters (Secretary of State (International Financial Institutions), Lib.): Mr. Speaker, it is nice to know the NDP has an inside track on bank profits because none of the banks has announced their profits yet this year.
The government is committed to ensuring that the banks do their fair share to support the economy. By that I mean paying their fair share of taxes. These are the highest taxed corporations in the country. Indeed they pay large corporate taxes. They pay a special capital tax for large institutions besides their corporate taxes. They paid a billion dollars in taxes in 1991 and 1993 and more this year.
That is one of the ways we have made sure that the banks play out their role in the community.
After three years of Liberal government, Canada is experiencing the longest period of high unemployment we have known since the thirties. Nevertheless, the Liberal government continues to put a surtax on employees through the unemployment insurance fund.
I simply want to ask the Minister of Finance whether he thinks it is legitimate for the government to use the unemployment insurance fund to reduce its deficit?
Hon. Paul Martin (Minister of Finance, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, that takes the cake. When the Conservative government came to power in 1984, unemployment insurance premiums were $2.30, and when we came to power in 1993, they were about to reach
$3.30. We have reduced them annually, but the Conservatives increased them every year they were in power.
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It is beyond belief. It must be very difficult to be the leader of the Progressive Conservative Party and have to swallow oneself whole every time he stands up and denies the record of his government in office. Every single year it was in office unemployment insurance premiums went up. Every year that we have been in office unemployment premiums have gone down.
He represents a government that was prepared to impose on the Canadian people the highest level of taxation that they have ever had. Yet they also gave them the highest deficit. At least the leader of the Progressive Conservative Party should have the courage of the Reform Party and outline from where his tax cuts will come. Let him admit that he will cut health care-
Some hon. members: Oh, oh.
Some hon. members: Hear, hear.
The Speaker: I would also like to draw your attention to the presence in the gallery of a delegation of chairmen of regional assemblies from the North West Region of Russia led by Mr. Vladimir A. Torlopov.
Some hon. members: Hear, hear.