We had a chance to get it right. We had a chance to stand with the community of nations and fulfill the promise of the treaty to ban cluster munitions. As my hon. colleague has mentioned, Canada played a significant role. We got a reputation globally as being willing to step out ahead when there was the Ottawa process to deal with land mines. It is in that vein that we are going to go forward and deal with cluster munitions.

As was just mentioned, it is estimated that between 95% and 98% of the casualties from cluster munitions are civilians. Of that, 40% are children. These are not weapons of war. These are monstrous tools of destruction for the innocent, and Canada should rightly be at the forefront in ensuring that such munitions are never used again.

I want to quote from the treaty, which we have actually signed. We have signed this convention, and the legislation before us is required as a tool to bring that treaty into force for Canada. For ratification we need a domestic law. Unfortunately, this domestic law has tilted in the wrong direction.

Let us just look at the language of the convention. Canada has signed this treaty. As a state party to the convention, we are:

In this vein, we continue to have the language of commitment, of concern to protect human life from weapons that are designed specifically to destroy human populations, civilian populations, and do damage to the innocent.

The operative section of the convention is very important, and I want to return to it for a few of the things that the bill fails to do. Article 1, the general obligations and scope of application, commits Canada to the following:

The third part of this important paragraph is really significant. It states:

Those are the key operative phrases. Then we have Bill C-6, which is largely a carve-out that says we were just kidding when we said “never under any circumstances”. We have a bunch of circumstances in which Canadian Armed Forces are going to be working alongside one of our military allies. It is clearly intended. As my hon. friend mentioned, so far the United States has not ratified this treaty, so we know that we might be in a theatre of operations—as we now describe wars—with our allies, namely the United States. They might be using cluster munitions, and we would want to safeguard our ability to work alongside them.

I will acknowledge and I do accept that this is a large and important move for this particular Conservative administration, because it so rarely changes any bill. My hon. friend, who is the parliamentary secretary, moved in committee to remove the opportunity for any Canadian soldier or military operation to actually use the weapons, but the bill still allows us to participate, to be alongside in a shared military operation with an ally that is not a party to this convention.

There was other language put forward in various presentations to the committee that would have protected Canadian operations if they were in such a shared military operation with a non-party state. There was other language that would have worked very well. Human Rights Watch suggested that we could replace clause 11 with the following:

That would have vouchsafed. That would have been the protection the Canadian military would have needed for the circumstance for which we have created a far too aggressive exemption in clause 11.

It is a great tragedy that we had one amendment. I have to say that one amendment in the current context of this particular Parliament, coming from the government, is unusual and it was welcomed, but it did not go far enough to rescue this from being, as my hon. friend has said, the weakest of all the implementing legislation of any nation that has so far signed this convention.

It leaves us in a position that is really rather shameful.

I want to return to one of the other areas. I mentioned that in the convention language, we are obligated as a convention party to do nothing to assist or induce anyone to engage in an activity prohibited here.

A great number of nations have, in interpreting that section in which we are prohibited from assisting, interpreted it very clearly to mean that there should be a ban on investment. There should be no investments allowed. In order to comply with this treaty, Canada should ban anyone from investing in any of the operations of any of the providers of cluster munitions.

There is nothing in this legislation that stops companies in Canada or investors in Canada from actually assisting through their financial investments. That is the kind of amendment that should have been included, and it is not here.

I pointed out that the following nations have actually ensured, through legislation, that no investment in cluster munitions be allowed. That is included in legislation from Belgium, Ireland, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Samoa, and Switzerland.

As an interpretive decision, so too have other nations said that they understand this convention to mean that they must not allow any investment in cluster munitions. In taking the interpretive decision, the U.K. and a larger group of nations, including Germany, Norway, and many others, have decided they cannot understand this convention without understanding that they have to ban investment in cluster munitions.

We have lost the moral high ground here. We are slipping down to where we have signed a convention that says we are completely committed to never, under any circumstance, use or encourage or assist in the spread of these deadly, immoral weapons of assault on civilians. We will never do that, we say, yet somehow, when we read Bill C-6, we feel that we have crossed our fingers behind our backs. We mean “never” most of the time, but sometimes we are going to be in a theatre of war and we do not want to be too bound by our word under the convention to ban cluster munitions.

In this place we still have time to remedy that. The hon. member for Ottawa South has put forward an amendment. The Green Party has put forward an amendment. Should this House assembled decide that Canada can reclaim the moral high ground, we still have time.

We have the moral courage. We are Canadians. We stand for peace. We believe that children should not be blown up because they find a piece of metal and think they can recover that scrap metal to buy their family supper.

We are, by God, Canadians, and we stand for peace, and we stand against war, and we stand against cluster munitions. Bill C-6 says “not really”. Let us amend the bill here and now at third reading and report stage.

Paul Dewar: Mr. Speaker, the global stockpile of cluster munitions and submunitions totals approximately four billion, with a quarter of these in U.S. hands right now. In 2006, 22 Canadian Forces members were killed and 112 were wounded in Afghanistan as a result of land mines, cluster bombs, and other explosive devices. This is a real question for us right now, for reasons I just mentioned, if we do not get this right and we do not implement this treaty. I believe it is not just about this treaty, but it is about a precedent we are setting when it comes to international treaties. I would like her comment on that.

In committee the Conservatives said that it would not happen. They said we would never have a situation in which one of our generals would order one of our Canadian Forces members to go in theatre with a member state that had cluster munitions. However, I do not think that is good enough. It is about the precedents we are setting by undermining the treaty. I would like to hear her comments on that as well

Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, for my hon. friend from Ottawa Centre, I would love to believe that the hypothetical would not arise, but we are living in a time when the basic understanding of how a civilized country behaves seems to be slipping between our fingers.

Our greatest ally and friend is the United States. I have great respect for Barack Obama and I think he is a wonderful and inspiring human being, except he has ordered more unmanned drones to commit illegal murders in other countries than any previous U.S. president. We seem to be taking a very mild approach to the threat of torture. I never thought I would hear a Canadian minister of the crown speak of the possibility that because other things were a bigger threat, the government did not really mind if somebody got information by torture.

There is a lot of moral relativism going on right now in relation to whether we are a civilized country and stand for anything. I believe we are. I believe we always will be. However, this kind of climb down from the treaty commitments that we made, bringing forward legislation that is so weak, indicates that we are prepared to say one thing and do another, because when push comes to shove, we do not stand for anything. I do not think that is what Canadians want to see.

Kevin Lamoureux: Mr. Speaker, I have had the opportunity on many occasions to sit down and have discussions with a former minister of foreign affairs, Lloyd Axworthy. Lloyd played a very important role in terms of the land mines deal that ultimately demonstrated that Canada, if it did it right, could play a very strong leadership role on issues of this nature.

Could the leader of the Green Party provide some comment on the leadership role Canada could play if it chose to do so? What I reflect on is the land mine treaty deal in which Canada did play a critical role, and that is why we are where we are today with the land mines.

Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, this is one of the lines of our former minister of foreign affairs Lloyd Axworthy to whom the member refers. He used to say that we punched above our weight. We really do. We are a relatively small population of the globe, a relatively small economy, yet Canadian leadership has accomplished so much historically. That is not a small thing.

Going back further, before he was prime minister the former minister of foreign affairs, Lester B. Pearson, resolved the Suez Crisis in such a way that he won the Nobel Peace Prize. In that exercise, he created the concept of having a peacekeeping force. It is not for nothing. It has been Canadian leadership in drafting the UN charter, the UN Declaration on Human Rights, the Law of the Sea.

If we look around the world at some of the fundamental documents that speak to multilateralism and improving the life of a community of nations through a system of rules and respect, we see that Canadian leadership has always been there. Now we are losing ground. We are losing our global reputation. I see it every time I go to a climate negotiation. It breaks my heart when people look at our accreditation and say, “Oh you’re Canadian. Why do you people even bother coming anymore?”

We need to reclaim that global leadership. If we accept the amendments before us, we can begin to rebuild that reputation.

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In the member’s view, with the amendments the Conservatives have now put forward, does he agree with me that while it is a less awful bill, it is still not a good bill?

Kevin Lamoureux: Mr. Speaker, absolutely. That was well put. It is important we recognize that there was an incredible amount of opposition to the legislation and the manner in which the government brought it forward and attempted to pass it through the system. The way in which the government has treated our elections law is incredible.

As has been pointed out, I would suggest that even with the changes that have made, the legislation still has fundamental flaws. The most significant one is that it has not brought forward the ability to allow Elections Canada or the Commissioner of Canada Elections to compel witnesses. That is a serious flaw. Without that change, how can we possibly support the legislation?

The reason the public wanted to see the election law changed in the first place was to deal with issues that came from the last federal election. Without the ability to compel witnesses, even if we pass the bill as it is today, the election law will be weaker than what it was prior to its introduction. Elections Canada and the commissioner have recognized that point.

Therefore, I would plead with the Prime Minister to have a free vote and then I ask all Conservative members to balance it and vote against the legislation.

Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, I rise in report stage to speak, initially, to my two amendments. I had hoped to have substantive amendments at report stage, but members will recall that the committee was allowed to violate its own rules by rejecting my right to speak to my amendments as they were all gavelled through, all being rejected.

I want to express thanks to the minister for being willing to listen to the extraordinary course of denunciation for Bill C-23 at first reading. Unfortunately, even with the number of government amendments that were accepted at committee, the bill falls far short of being what is required to go by the name of a “fair elections act”.

Briefly speaking to the amendments I put forward at committee, which were defeated, it is a shame that we missed the opportunity to open a discussion on getting rid of first past the post and moving to proportional representation. I think most Canadians would be shocked to find that the leaders’ debates are not controlled by anybody, and that the opportunity to create a fair system, as presented at committee by Democracy Watch, was not supported by any party other than the Green Party.

On the requirements for people to bring so many different kinds of ID, we still do not have the kind of system that is as reliable as the election system before the Conservatives’ first round of amendments back in 2006. I wish we had ensured non-partisan poll workers.

There were numerous amendments from the Liberals, the New Democrats and the Greens on many of these points, for fairer financing and to take steps to increase voter turnout. I also put forward an amendment in the committee to shift the day of advanced polling from a Sunday. I will try again with the amendments I have before you, Mr. Speaker.

All the amendments from any opposition party were defeated at committee, with one exception, which was one when the Conservative leader on the committee pointed out that the Conservatives had been prepared to do that themselves had they had the chance.

My two amendments would do one thing, which would be fantastic, and that would be to remove the name of the political party from the ballot next to the name of the candidate. This would do a lot to reduce the excessive control of political parties over the electoral process. We used to have elections with just the name of the candidate, right up until about 1970.

I want to devote the rest of my time this morning to why we had the demand for a fair elections act, and how this bill falls far short. The initial attempt, and this was mentioned by other members in this place, the initial cry for reform of our electoral process, was in response to efforts at electoral fraud.

The amendments I put forward at committee, among those of Liberals and the New Democrats as well, called for giving Elections Canada the investigative tools it needed, such as subpoena powers, the ability to look into efforts, or deliberate efforts or actually successful efforts, at voter fraud and electoral interference that changed the course of elections. These amendments were defeated.

People have been very quick to assume that the so-called robocalls affair is now settled and nothing untoward took place there. Because the bill remains inadequate to the task of investigating electoral fraud, we can continue to have events like the 2011 robocall scandal without the tools of Elections Canada to respond.

In the time I have remaining, I want to ensure that it is understood we have not once, not twice, but three times seen quite scandalous interference in our electoral process, that if we had heard of these stories from some third world country, with some kind of tinpot dictatorship that ran fake elections, we would just shake our heads and say, “I guess that is how it happens in other countries”.

The first example was the 2005-06 election, when we had the deliberate interference in the election by our state police, the RCMP. We never got to the bottom of why Commissioner Zaccardelli broke all RCMP protocol and issued a press release during that election. According to a finding of fact by the Commission for Public Complaints against the RCMP, Paul Kennedy, the interference of the RCMP both violated its normal procedures and changed the course of the 2006 election. We had no investigation because there were no subpoena powers to call Mr. Zaccardelli to explain himself.

Second, we had an event that took place in Saanich—Gulf Islands in the 2008 election. I was not personally involved, but it was very clear, and there were multiple complaints to Elections Canada and the RCMP, that a robocall effort targeting NDP voters changed the course of that election and allowed a Conservative to be re-elected when all evidence suggested that he would not have been.

The Liberal candidate was neck in neck with the Conservatives. There was no NDP candidate on the ballot as he had withdrawn. An election eve round of phone calls went out spoofed as though they were from the NDP. The spoofing term is one I have learned. It is the technical term for using the home fax number, as it turned out, of an NDP volunteer to make it appear the calls originated from the NDP, urging people to get out and vote for a candidate who was no longer capable of election because he had withdrawn from the race. That changed the course of the election. Elections Canada was asked to investigate, but basically threw its hands up and said that it could not find anything, that there was nothing to see, so we should move on.

If members detect in my presentation that I am critical of the failure of Elections Canada and the RCMP to get to the bottom of that, everyone can bet I am critical. They utterly failed to defend the integrity of the election process in Saanich—Gulf Islands in 2008, and they did it again in 2011 with the robocall scandal. Thank goodness, The Council of Canadians took the matter to court. Other than Federal Court judge Mr. Justice Mosley, we would not have somebody as a finder of fact going over all the evidence and giving us clear foundational information of what occurred. Right now, the Commissioner of Canada Elections, Mr. Yves Côté, in his report of last month, once again told us that there was nothing to see, so we should move on.

Let me review what Mr. Justice Mosley found, because it is important to put it on the record to understand why this bill is so inadequate and why it should have the powers of investigation to ensure that crimes like this are properly investigated. Mr. Justice Mosley found as fact that “…there was a deliberate attempt at voter suppression during the 2011 election”. That was at paragraph 177.

At paragraph 224, he wrote:

At paragraph 246, he stated, “I find that the threshold to establish that fraud occurred has been met…”.

At paragraph 253, he said:

As well, he stated at paragraph 256:

On the matter of a smoking gun and who is responsible, essentially in this case we have a smoking gun. We know that thousands of calls were made, including in my own riding and across the country. I wrote Elections Canada with my concerns about these widespread attempts at voter suppression immediately following the May 2011 election. Who was responsible? I have made no accusations as to who I believe is responsible, but Mr. Justice Mosley found as fact the following, at paragraph 245:

What kind of democracy is this? We have the evidence of a Federal Court judge, thousands of complaints from Canadians across the country, a Commissioner of Canada Elections who says that there is nothing to look at here and everyone should move on, and we have a bill before us that would do absolutely nothing to prevent the illegitimate use of robocalls in future elections.

I concede to the minister and support the part of the bill that sets up a robocalls registry within the CRTC, but it is not sufficient to deal with the illegitimate use of robocalls and to protect Canadians, Canadian democracy and the integrity of our electoral process. This bill falls far short. This is a dark day for democracy.

Kennedy Stewart: Mr. Speaker, would the member care to comment on the happenings in the committee that was reviewing the bill?

The member proposed that we have a study on proportional representation, but the Liberals voted against it in committee in a recorded vote. We, of course, supported the motion that we should include a study of proportional representation in the bill. Would she comment on the Liberal rejection of this notion?

Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, yes, I was disappointed. It was a very modest proposal that we open discussion toward proportional representation, which was not supported by the Liberals. I have to say that I was also very disappointed—although the hon. member for Toronto—Danforth did put forward an explanation that was somewhat persuasive as to why his party would not support my amendment—that no one supported my amendment to have some rules to ensure fairness in the leaders debate. I was not without my disappointments throughout the committee process.

I think we need to continue to work to get rid of the perverse first past the post voting system. I commend the NDP for its strong position on that, but I think we need to persuade more Liberal and Conservative members. Within both of those parties, I know there are many members who find the current system quite perverse and would like to see real reform.

Wayne Easter: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the remarks of the leader of the Green Party. I think she hit the nail on the head with her last comment, “This is a dark day for democracy”, in terms of the possible passage of Bill C-23.

The member outlined a number of examples in her remarks, and I would add to that with two areas that the Conservative government has undermined. Canada at one time was seen as a model to strive for in terms of how we held elections, Elections Canada, and so on. The same thing with Statistics Canada; we used to be seen as one of the best in the world, but under the current government, we are seen as one of the worst.

I have two questions for the member. One, given how seriously Bill C-23 undermines our ability to police elections and investigate foul play, does it make it possible for a government to either buy or steal an election? Two, should we be calling for United Nations observers in Canada for the next election?

Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, I am going to assume the last part of the question from hon. member for Malpeque was somewhat ironic and so I will address the first part, which is: should we be concerned?

I believe based on everything I have studied, and I have really dug into what happened in Saanich—Gulf Islands in 2008, that it was a pilot project in seeing whether the use of robocalls could change the course of an election. Elections Canada and the RCMP failed to get to the bottom of it. Some of the complainants told me that the RCMP told them that it could not figure out who was responsible because the phone number originated from the United States.

Had that been a child pornographer or a human trafficking ring, I would like to think that we would have investigated who originated those phone calls. The idea that because they originated from the U.S. we could not find out, or that it was really small potatoes whether it was Gary Lunn or Briony Penn who won that election, is not the case. It is very large indeed in Canadian democracy when a fraudulent robocall marketing attempt can change the course of an election.

I believe that the failure to investigate Saanich—Gulf Islands in 2008 led directly to a more widespread use of robocalls in voter suppression in 2011. I shudder to think what the failure to properly investigate what happened in 2011 will mean for future Canadian elections.

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I want to ask my colleague from Winnipeg North a question that I do not believe has come up today. It is an example that blows a hole through the argument the Conservatives are making that nothing needs to be done about CSEC, that it is using legitimate means to intercept communications that come from foreigners for appropriate security reasons.

How do they explain that Canada was caught spying on the Government of Brazil through CSEC? It intercepted communications to Brazil’s department of mines, in an apparent effort of industrial espionage, to assist Canadian mining companies dealing with Brazilian mining companies. There was no legitimate security interest in doing this. I would ask my hon. colleague whether that incident does not bolster the need for parliamentary oversight.

Kevin Lamoureux: Mr. Speaker, I thank the leader of the Green Party for supporting the motion. It is somewhat sad that the only time that this becomes a topical issue is when we hear of something that has inappropriately taken place, such as the report with respect to Wi-Fi, where it appeared that Canadians were being monitored in some fashion or another.

The point is that we do not know for sure either way. That is why it is critically important that we do have a parliamentary group that deals with the issue in terms of oversight. Only through that can we provide unequivocal assurance to Canadians that their privacy-related issues with respect to CSEC are being protected.

That is why I would encourage the government not to just wait for news reports; we can be proactive in dealing with this issue. It would not be costly. Canadians would value a government that would protect their privacy. At the end of the day, there is nothing to be lost by accepting this motion and passing the private member’s bill that we have suggested.

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The Deputy Speaker: The member for Parkdale—High Park has the floor, not the leader of the Green Party. Therefore, I will recognize the member for Parkdale—High Park.

Peggy Nash: Mr. Speaker, maybe the Green Party will answer that question at some point.

Let me just provide another example of what the government is doing. It created the Canada Employment Insurance Financing Board in order to take the politics out of financing employment insurance. That was at a time when Liberal and Conservative governments had plundered $57 billion from the premiums paid by working people and employers across this country into the EI fund. The government created an independent fund to get away from those politics. It put the fund at zero, so there was no money. It was immediately in deficit, and ultimately, the premiums had to be raised. Now it wants to get rid of this board, this outside agency it created, and go back to being able to play politics with EI funding. It is shameful. It is a disgrace. It opens up the premiums paid into this fund, which ought to be going to unemployed workers and ought to be the best adjustment program Canada has during a time of insecurity and high unemployment. Instead, it uses them to play political points by having bigger surpluses or lower deficits than it would otherwise have. It is shameful. That is another measure included in this bill.

Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, I was not sure if my hon. colleague had given the member for Parkdale—High Park a promotion or demotion by making her leader of the Green Party.

However, on this particular debate, the Green Party and the NDP are on the same page. We completely lament the fact that this is an omnibus bill once again, with multiple sections that were very much deserving of a full parliamentary review and full and proper hearings in committee.

I want to begin my analysis of Bill C-4 in presenting the various amendments I have made for deletions with two fairly brief points to the substance of the abuse of Parliament that omnibus budget bills represent.

We have heard it said by Conservative members in their talking points that this is nothing new. In every debate we have on budget omnibus bills, we are told this is normal. However, although I have only been a member of Parliament since 2011, I have been around a long time, and I know that we have never had budget omnibus bills of the staggering length of these bills until the current administration. It is only under the current Prime Minister that we have seen an omnibus budget bill top 200 pages.

Between 1994 and 2005, there were occasions of omnibus budget bills, and they were averaging 73 pages. The first big whopper of an omnibus budget bill occurred under the current Prime Minister in 2009. The 2010 budget omnibus bill was almost 900 pages.

Then, by 2012, the Conservatives started a new process. Ironically, my very first question in the House once I was elected was on the 2011 budget. I asked the Minister of Finance if he was planning the abuse of process constituted by an omnibus budget bill. He said he was not. Well, 2011 was indeed the last year in which we did not see omnibus budget bills. By 2012, the Conservative administration had started this new practice of putting forward two omnibus budget bills. It now refers to it as a tradition, almost like having Easter in the spring and Christmas in December. It is a tradition, apparently, that we are now going to see a 300- to 400-page spring omnibus budget bill, followed by 200-, 300-, or 400-page fall omnibus budget bill. The government has done this now for 2012 and 2013.

What this does is make a mockery of Parliament. I cannot put it more strongly than that. The idea that we would have disparate, unconnected bills, many of them never mentioned in the budget, that do substantial damage—this one in particular to labour relations, previous ones to environmental concerns—is an offence to Parliament. There is no excuse for it.

Second, I know there has been a lot of public interest in the fate of members of Parliament like myself and my party. I quite clearly represent a party with fewer than 12 MPs; I represent a party with one MP. However, I am a party in the House. So are my colleagues in the Bloc Québécois, and so are four independent members of Parliament. We were treated differently, since there were multiple motions carried through multiple committees to require that substantive amendments be submitted at committee, where we are not members and do not have equal and full rights of participation.

I will set that aside for now. That is why all of my amendments presented today are deletions. I did have substantive amendments I would have liked to present at report stage. I had 26 substantive amendments that I did present to the finance committee, and they went through a very quick ritual slaughter. I would have liked for the people of Canada to know about those amendments. I would have liked to have brought them forward at report stage.

Before I move to the specific parts of the bill that Canadians need to know about, I want to make an overarching comment.

As the only member of Parliament for the Green Party, one of the great advantages of having to watch everything while also doing due diligence on behalf of my constituents is that I am able to see everything in a comprehensive overview, not just in silos. There are themes here. There are disparate bills, but the manoeuvres are the same. The manoeuvres go in the direction of increasing ministerial discretion, reducing objective criteria, removing boards and agencies that have independent expertise, and putting bills forward instead to systems of political whim.

That certainly was the case in budget omnibus Bill C-38 and Bill C-45. They reduced criteria, letting the minister of environment or the minister of natural resources make decisions without guidance.

In this particular omnibus budget bill, we see it happening quite a lot again. I will mention just a few of the areas.

Under the Canada Labour Code changes, which my friend from the official opposition already referred to, the changes go in the direction of removing health and safety officers and leaving decisions about health and safety up to the minister.

The same kinds of changes have happened in immigration. In Bill C-4, we see substantial changes in part 3, division 16, to the expression of interest system, basically for immigrants who are coming by way of economic advantage. The decision-making would now increasingly be by ministerial discretion.

Another area where we see ministerial discretion replacing an objective system is in division 14, in which we would repeal the Mackenzie Gas Project Impacts Act and replace it with a very similar Mackenzie gas project impacts funds act. In this change the one big difference between the two acts would be to replace an objective corporation, a regional organization that would make decisions about where the funds go, entirely with ministerial discretion.

My friend and colleague from the NDP, the member for Western Arctic, had this to say about it, because he has a lot of expertise in this area. He said:

There was an independent body set up by the Conservative government through an act of Parliament to manage this money and ensure that it was managed in a correct and careful fashion, following the procedures that had been set up and the planning that had taken place in these communities over a period of two years, from 2006 to 2008.

Then I have another excerpt from his quote:

What we have now is a move to a system that would have a Conservative minister handing out cheques for particular projects as he or she deems appropriate.

Before diving into the specifics of Bill C-4, I wanted to raise into higher profile a consistent ideological theme: moving more and more decision-making in our system of government, which is a parliamentary democracy, away from Parliament, and at the same time moving decision-making of ministers into more and more discretion with less and less guidance.

Those of us who have practised law at any time know that administrative law provides a certain amount of accountability whereby a minister has to follow certain prescribed considerations or in fact delegates authority to expert boards. Less and less will we see this. More and more will we see ministerial discretion. As well, we know that ministers do not really exercise discretion, not in this administration. They do what they are told by the people at PMO, who I think one Conservative described brilliantly as a series of Stepford wives who insist on certain decisions being made a certain way.

To raise my concerns in brief, this bill would do serious damage to the health and safety provisions of the Canada Labour Code. It would change the definition of danger and the ability to refuse dangerous work. It would remove the health and safety officers.

As well, a different section of this bill would change the Public Service Labour Relations Act, again for more ministerial discretion about which aspects of public service work would be considered to be essential and therefore not open to the usual recourse that trade unions have in negotiations.

We see changes to the Immigration Act to increase ministerial discretion. I would like to cite concerns from the Canadian Bar Association on the immigration law section. They wrote to the committee:

The CBA Section has concerns about the limited consultation on this important change to Canadian immigration law and policy. Bill C-4 would substantially change the way in which economic immigrants are selected to come to Canada. The Bill would remove these changes from Parliamentary scrutiny and approval and give what appears to be unilateral authority to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration to change selection rules and procedures.

Another section of the bill that has gotten very limited public attention is the section that appears in part 3, division 7, which is in aid of getting rid of our deficit by selling off assets. This is the sale of 20,000 hectares described as the Dominion Coal Blocks land.

My amendments at committee, had they been approved, would have provided some conservation protection. These lands are among the most ecologically significant in Canada. They are the blocks in the Flathead Valley and Elk Valley. They are an integral part of what is called the Crown of the Continent, right near the Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park, which is an international peace park on both sides of the border.

The Flathead has been protected by the strange reality of its ownership by the federal government over these years, but it is now to be sold for coal mining. We need to ensure that careful concern is applied to the conveyance of these lands and to ensure that we do not contaminate adjacent park areas. This is a concern already expressed by the United Nations.

Kevin Lamoureux: Mr. Speaker, I have to again try to emphasize, as the member has done, the importance of the immigration and other legislation that has been incorporated in this bill. I have argued in the past and will continue to argue in the future that this is the wrong way to bring in legislation. By doing it this way, we are not allowing for proper procedures on substantial pieces of legislation.

For example, when the leader for the Green Party makes reference to immigration changes, that should have been stand-alone legislation that would have had a second reading at a committee of its own. The committee on immigration would have dealt with it. We would have had stakeholders and witnesses come to committee to provide comment on it, and then it would ultimately come back there. There would have been a more wholesome debate on the whole issue of that specific change.

I wonder if the member could highlight for people who might be watching what has been lost as a result of not having that separate stand-alone legislation for the immigration component and for other pieces.

Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, it is going to be very hard to know what was lost. We do know that in previous omnibus budget bills, even drafting errors were not corrected. We have seen this rush to pass legislation in a hurry, and if the disparate parts do not get reviewed by committees that have developed expertise in this area, they come back to the government’s attention, even within six months, as mistakes.

At the simplest level, haste makes waste, and they end up coming back with amendments to fix things. This bill includes amendments to fix mistakes the government made last time in the employment insurance system for fisheries, fisheries families, and their income.

What is important to drive home is that at a more fundamental level we see a systematic, transformative change in Canadian legislation, away from well-considered and well-developed legislation operating under criteria and controls to a system that could very easily become completely manipulated through the Prime Minister’s Office, a system in which ministers have nothing to do but follow through with their directions while the people who actually understand the system are precluded from the decision-making.

Peggy Nash: Mr. Speaker, one of the over 70 changes through this legislation would be to public sector collective bargaining rights. Unlike in the private sector, the government wants to give itself the unfettered right to deem certain workers as essential workers in the federal public sector. This could have the impact of their deeming the majority of workers in a bargaining unit to be essential workers, thereby essentially denying them normal collective bargaining rights and the normal right to strike. Coca-Cola cannot do that with its bargaining, but it is what the minister is proposing to do.

Does the member have any comments about the impact this would have on public sector collective bargaining?

Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, this legislation, as with other pieces of legislation we have seen in this Parliament, would strike directly at the heart of collective bargaining. I will admit a bias, because part of my past work history included working for a union side labour firm and working for labour unions and in collective bargaining.

The principles of collective bargaining are important. If the tools that a labour union and an employer have at their disposal are roughly equal, the employer has the right to lock out and the trade union has the right to strike. If that aspect of collective bargaining is removed, essentially it becomes a system of the employer dictating terms. The employees have no recourse.

In healthy democracies and healthy economies and in places where civil society is healthy and there is less of a gap between the wealthiest and the poorest, the strengths of the trade union movement are one of the clearest indicators of a healthy society and a robust middle class. Striking at the heart of collective bargaining for federal employees, as this bill does, is not in Canada’s interest.

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