Rob Merrifield

[Petitions, February 9th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to stand, pursuant to Standing Order 36, to present three petitions on behalf of the residents of Yellowhead.

The petitioners say that a strong family is the foundation of a strong country. They ask that the government preserve the definition of marriage as between a man and a woman.

All three petitions say the same thing and all are from very concerned citizens of Yellowhead.

[National Parks, February 9th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, our national parks, including Jasper National Park in my riding, are being neglected by the government. Infrastructure is crumbling and maintenance is suffering. Park employees are doing their very best with the little they have but the problems are only mounting.

All we have heard about parks from the government is that it wants more of them, but it is failing to care for the ones it has. More money is needed in the upcoming budget to maintain and improve the parks' crumbling infrastructure.

One question should be asked: Why is Parks Canada's budget being used to maintain interprovincial truck routes, like the Yellowhead Highway? If the federal government expects Parks Canada to continue to maintain the Yellowhead Highway out of its operating budget, it should increase Parks Canada's budget accordingly.

Jasper Park is a jewel of the Rockies and a national treasure. Let us keep it that way.

[Marriage, December 14th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, freedom of religious expression is a Canadian right that Canadians are not prepared to compromise. The Minister responsible for Democratic Reform said that public servants should be disciplined or fired if they do not perform same sex marriages.

Why would the government force public servants to forfeit their religious beliefs to satisfy the bigoted view of the Liberal Party?

[Forestry, December 13th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, I wish to thank my hon. colleague for bringing this take note debate to the House. He has represented his constituents in a very important way. If it were not for his concern on this important issue, we would not have brought the attention that we have this evening to this important issue.

I hope that not only were Canadians watching the debate, but that our Liberal colleagues were watching or listening. It is important to realize that this is devastating many constituencies and constituents in the British Columbia area, but that it also brings fear to ridings like my own in Alberta.

I applaud my colleague for bringing this debate to the House. It is a very important issue that we should take very seriously because it has far reaching repercussions.

[Forestry, December 13th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, those were interesting comments. With regard to the fires, we do not let a fire go until it gets so large that we cannot deal with it. That is the way the government has dealt with the pine beetle problem in British Columbia. We should deal with it in its infancy stage.

When it comes to what part of the plan the government is not dealing with, there is no plan for Parks Canada. There is no plan for the pine beetle getting into Banff and Jasper National Park which is right in my riding. If the member wants to know how the government plan is not working, it is not dealing with it in its infancy stage in the national parks.

The government cannot point to the British Columbia or Alberta governments. It can only point to itself in a mirror because it is the federal government's jurisdiction. The federal government must deal with the problem with regard to the parks. There is a natural buffer between the forest that is being challenged by the beetle and the national parks. It can be dealt with very simply in that stage.

If the government is really serious about finally stepping up to the plate and finally doing something about it, then that is what the government has to do. It has to get serious about dealing with it, not only in British Columbia where the problem has devastated so much of the forest already. It must try to contain it as we would a forest fire. Then we must stop it from going into the national parks. To date, the government has no plan for the national parks.

I would encourage the government to not only deal with the 10 year plan that is before it, step up to the plate, and fund it appropriately, but also deal with its own jurisdiction which is within the national parks. This infestation must not devastate another province like it has the one that the government has just neglected.

[Forestry, December 13th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to stand and be heard in this take note debate tonight, which hopefully is going to draw attention to the problem of the pine beetle in British Columbia. However, we need to take a look at this issue not only from British Columbia's perspective but from my riding's perspective as well, because the pine beetle impacts it also in a very significant way.

The forest industry is a large economic driver in my riding. It is an important part of the livelihood of many individuals who live in my riding. Let me put it this way. I have a geographically large riding made up of a significant number of communities and there is not one community I can think of in my riding that has not been impacted in a significant way by the softwood lumber industry or the forest industry in one way or another. Because of that, we are looking across the mountains. My riding is in Alberta and reaches from Edmonton to the B.C. border, and through Jasper National Park, by the way.

I will talk a bit about the parks, the impact or lack of impact of this crisis and what is happening on the other side of the mountains. Looking across the mountains into British Columbia we can see the devastation that is being caused by the pine beetle. Speaker after speaker this evening talked about that devastation and how it has impacted their communities. It really is something that we should consider.

My colleagues have talked about the lack of resources being applied to the problem in British Columbia and how that is so different from the ice storm or perhaps the SARS crisis, which also impacted other areas of this country in a significant way. By the way, SARS did impact our area of the country in tourism.

There is a difference with regard to the impact and the amount of dollars applied from the federal side of things with regard to the ice storm or SARS; that is, it did not take years and years for the government to get to the table to address the problem. When the ice storm hit, emergency relief was available. When SARS hit, emergency relief was available to deal with it as soon as possible.

Let me say, though, that the pine beetle infestation hit many years ago and this thing just started to grow. It is a lot like a fire. If the problem is not addressed at its infancy, it will grow and become an animal that is uncontrollable in a very short time. That is what we see with a forest fire and that is what we are seeing with the pine beetle.

This issue was left. It was neglected. Because of that, it has grown into a crisis beyond belief. It is now a challenging problem. Timber worth up to $9 billion has been destroyed already and it is possible that will be up to $16 billion. Also, that does not count the amount of timber that is in jeopardy in my province.

We are becoming very alarmed at what we are seeing with regard to the pine beetle, because it is starting to get through the parks. We have seen over the last year signs of the pine beetle getting into Willmore Wilderness Park, a provincial park in the Grande Cache area.

That is very significant because it means that the pine beetle leaped the Rocky Mountains. It is not the first time this has happened. It happened in the 1940s and between 1977 and 1986, a few decades ago. It was neglected back then, just like a fire that is neglected. It turned into an absolutely massive problem that created thousands of dollars' worth of losses in timber.

This can be dealt with in two different ways, or in three or four different ways, I suppose. One of the ways is to just leave it alone, cross our fingers and hope that we get minus 40° for a couple or three weeks. That should arrest the problem. That is one approach. That has been the approach of this government for the last number of years. We are not convinced that it is an appropriate approach.

We do not do that to a forest fire. Our timber is too valuable to just leave it. When a fire starts, it has to be aggressively attacked. We attack the fire so that we can protect the forest for future generations. When a forest is gone we lose the watershed, we lose the potential for good soil, we lose water quality, and we lose the natural ecosystem of the entire forest and the land around it. This has massive repercussions on the natural environment of both Alberta and British Columbia.

To just neglect it and not deal with it is not an option. That is a plan that just does not work and has not been working in the past. We have to do something similar to what we would do with a forest fire. We have to aggressively attack it. This forest fire, this pine beetle infestation, is out of hand. It is not a forest fire, it is a pine beetle infestation, but it has caused a massive disruption of a massive area of land and we have to attack it with a significant amount of resources.

Therein lies the problem. The B.C. government has come forward with a plan, but we see little support from this federal government. We are wondering why the government is not there. Why is the federal government not trying to work hand in glove with the provincial government? It could be said that it is provincial jurisdiction and started as provincial jurisdiction and the federal jurisdiction should not butt in.

Perhaps the government can claim that in British Columbia, but it cannot claim that in the national parks. Jasper and Banff National Parks are 100% federally supported and are within federal jurisdiction. It is a natural buffer between the forests in Alberta which are outside of the park and the beetle problem in British Columbia. It is a natural place for us to arrest it, at least at that border, so it does not jeopardize more forests heading west, which is the direction these beetles are moving.

I put this on the table and challenge the Liberal government to wake up and realize the potential of the hazard. It cannot turn around and blame a provincial government for it. It can only look at itself in the mirror. It is on record that we have a problem now in the national parks, which are 100% within the jurisdiction of the Liberal government, and it needs to deal with it.

Right now the national parks have said that it is a natural disaster, that they will leave it alone and let it run its course. We have seen the devastation that has occurred in British Columbia by letting it run its course. We do not say that if a fire breaks out, whether it is in the park or out of the park. There is only one time we would do that in a park, and that is if we want to control some of the old forests. We do not do that by allowing a beetle to get completely out of control as we have seen in British Columbia.

With regard to solving the problem, we need to aggressively attack it. We need to have a government that realizes exactly the problem. We have seen tonight in this debate, as others have spoken from different constituencies, how devastating this is to their ridings and to British Columbia. They have put that on the table. Hopefully, this evening we can raise some awareness of it and bring to the attention of the government in power that it has to get serious about the problem.

I understand a 10 year provincial plan has been brought forward. We have seen no commitment by the government to support that plan. We challenge it to do that. That is the least it can do, even if it is long after it should have been addressed. It is similar to SARS, or an ice storm, or other natural disasters that we have seen across the country. We do that as Canadians. When a natural disaster devastates an industry, we try to do what we can. Yet for some reason British Columbia has been left out. It is almost as if Ottawa looks at the forests in British Columbia as hinterland and does not worry about them. That is exactly what they are, hinterland, and they are being destroyed before our eyes. We have a government that talks about Kyoto, that talks about carbon credits, that talks about how it is an environmentalist, but it is turning a blind eye to protecting an environment that is being devastated by this beetle, This is not only about the environment. It is about the hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of timber and the jobs that go with it, including the livelihoods of families, communities, et cetera.

We have to get serious. We cannot allow the neglect that happened before. In the forties this beetle caused problems in Alberta. The governments turned a blind eye to it and let it run its course. It caused massive amounts of damage. We saw it again from 1977 to 1986. We cannot allow it to happen again. We have to deal with this at its infancy. While it is not in its infancy in B.C., it is in the parks and in Alberta. Now is the time to act.

I encourage the government to get off its backside and do something creative and constructive for the benefit of Canadians in this part of Canada.

[Firearms Program, December 9th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, in my hometown a 22-year-old woman was selling crystal meth. She was attacked by a sword-wielding 17-year-old high on this addictive drug. Two lives were ruined.

When the minister is voting on the additional $80 million for the firearms registry tonight, he should consider that the money would add one additional police officer to every one of the 308 constituencies for five years. This would go a long way to combat illegal drugs.

How does the government justify wasting money on a gun registry, when the money is needed for the front line crime fighters?

[Supply, November 23rd, 2004]

Mr. Chair, on a point of order, this is committee of the whole and I addressed my question to the minister.

[Supply, November 23rd, 2004]

Mr. Chair, that will be interesting to see. We will wait with bated breath for that one.

I would like to get on to hepatitis C because the announcement was just made. It was something that was worked on by the health committee. We brought forward a motion in committee. We got a unanimous decision and brought it to the House. This minister actually shut down debate in the House when his own members wanted to debate this issue.

He says it is a complex issue. It is a complex issue. It is not really complex as far as the issue goes. The issue is very clear. The government either compensates or it does not compensate. That is the issue. How we do it is a little complex, fair enough, but there was a debate that was supposed to take place in the House. It was asked for twice and the minister shut it down. There were 400 individuals who should have been compensated outside that window who are no longer alive today because the minister and the government decided that it would not compensate.

Would the minister explain why he shut down debate and when will these victims begin getting the cash? That is really what it means.

[Supply, November 23rd, 2004]

Mr. Chair, that is not giving us a date. The minister is saying a report is going to happen. He has confirmed what I have just said. When can we expect catastrophic drug coverage for Canadians? That is really what the average guy on the street wants to know.