13025 OFFICIAL REPORT (HANSARD) House of Commons Debates VOLUME 147 NUMBER 201 2nd SESSION 41st PARLIAMENT Monday, April 27, 2015 Speaker: The Honourable Andrew Scheer HOUSE OF COMMONS CANADA (Table of Contents appears at back of this issue.) COMMONS DEBATES April 27, 2015 DEBATES Edited Hansard * Table of Contents * Number 201 (Official Version) Official Report * Table of Contents * Number 201 (Official Version) Compte rendu officiel * Table des matières * Numéro 201 (Version officielle) 147 201 27 04 2015 2015/04/27 11:00:00 House of Commons Débats de la Chambre des communes House of Commons Debates 41 2 The House met at 11 a.m.

Prayers PRIVATE MEMBERS' BUSINESS Private Members' Business (1105) [ English ] NATIONAL ANTHEM ACT The House resumed from February 23 consideration of the motion that Bill C-624,

An Act to amend the National Anthem Act (gender) , be read the second time and referred to a committee. Bill C-624. Second reading Ms. Linda Duncan (Edmonton—Strathcona, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to rise to support private member's Bill C-624 . This bill would change one verse only in the English lyrics of our national anthem. It would replace the words, “True patriot love in all thy sons command” with “True patriot love in all of us command”. That is with the intent of ensuring gender inclusiveness. The French version is not affected. The New Democrats strongly support gender equality.

The proposed legislation introduced by the member for Ottawa—Vanier reflects a long-standing goal which has been firmly supported over the years by initiatives by NDP MPs, including Judy Wasylycia-Leis, Svend Robinson, and most recently the member for Vancouver East . Since 1980, no less than nine bills have been tabled proposing this very change. Tradition is certainly important, but Canadian values of gender equality and inclusiveness have moved beyond mere sentiments and are now principles firmly entrenched in Canadian law.

We join in singing our anthem to express a common love of our nation, its values, principles and accomplishments. When the English lyrics of our national anthem were written in 1908, women had not yet been granted the vote. Much has changed since with women finally recognized as legal persons granted the right to vote, the right to run for elected office, and with a majorly expanded military role. I am proud to be a member of the caucus with the largest percentage of women.

I am equally delighted that over 50% of the New Democrat candidates in the current Alberta election are women inspired to run by a strong and eloquent female leader. While this symbolic change is important, we recognize that gender equality will only truly be actualized when governments address the gender gap in accessing education and employment opportunities through universally accessible child care, pay equity and a national strategy to end violence against women. While the French lyrics of our anthem remain as written in 1880, the English version has changed many times.

In 1913, the original neutral and inclusive version was altered from “dost in us command” to “in all thy sons command”. As our anthem was made official by statute, changes must now be made by Parliament. In 2010, the Prime Minister committed in the throne speech that the anthem would be rewritten to make the language more inclusive, and then he reneged on this undertaking. Many calls have been made since to recognize the modern role of women in our anthem, including notably by Sally Goddard, the mother of the first female military member killed in Afghanistan.

Canada claims to be a world leader in terms of the proportion of women in its military and the areas in which they can serve. According to the Department of National Defence website, the Canadian Armed Forces are highly regarded as being at the forefront of military gender integration. According to the department, women can now enrol in any CAF occupation and professes that all career opportunities are based solely on rank, qualifications and merit, not gender.

Women have been involved in Canada's military service and have contributed to Canada's rich military history and heritage for more than 100 years, which of course makes it additionally reprehensible that we would have reverted to this discriminatory language. It may be a surprise to many Canadians that the largest number of women served during the Second World War and many performed non-traditional duties. Since 1971, in response to the recommendations of the Royal Commission on the Status of Women in Canada, the department has expanded employment opportunities for women in the military.

With the passage of the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, women's military roles were again majorly expanded. Presently, women serve on a number of global operations ranging across the spectrum from peacekeeping and humanitarian assistance operations, presumably in Nepal today where our deeply heartfelt feelings are with the people there, through to stability, security, and peace enforcement operations.

According to the Department of National Defence website: Although the CAF do not keep track of the gender of deployed personnel, it is safe to assume that eligible women are likely to be serving on the majority of our missions. The history of Canadian service women is an important part of our national military heritage and their achievements contribute to the full and equal inclusion of women in our society and national institutions.

Be they men or women, regardless of race, religion or culture, CAF members share a common goal—protecting the country, its interests, and values while also contributing to international peace and security. Canada is a world leader in terms of the proportion of women in its military, and the areas in which they can serve. Among their allies, the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) are highly regarded as being at the forefront of military gender integration.

The Conservative member for Richmond Hill , in speaking to this bill, said that the government backed off on its announced change because its 2013 poll showed major opposition, yet a 2015 poll found 40% strongly supportive of the amendment and 18% somewhat supportive of making our anthem gender neutral. Only 13% expressed strong disapproval, a significant shift in opinion from two years back. It is time that our national anthem reflected the true role served by Canadian women in building and protecting our nation. Hon. Carolyn Bennett (St. Paul's, Lib.) : Mr.

Speaker, it is an honour to speak to this bill which is

an act to amend the National Anthem Act with respect to gender. The bill proposes a simple change in the English lyrics only. It proposes that “True patriot love in all thy sons command” become “True patriot love in all of us command”, therefore replacing only two words, “thy sons” with “of us”. There are all kinds of reasons that we would want to sing “in all of us command”. We love our country and all of its people. Our anthem is important to us, and we want to clearly include every Canadian. All of us are proud to sing O Canada, and O Canada should embrace all of us.

These two words that we want to reintroduce in O Canada are small, yet meaningful. We would ensure that more than 18 million Canadian women are included in our national anthem. After 1908, Judge Robert Stanley Weir amended his poem in 1913, 1914, and 1916. By 1913, he changed the second line of the poem to “True patriot love in all thy sons command”. Many believed the change was in response to the events leading up to the First World War, in which men and women from Canada proudly took part. We do honour the Canadian men who fought for liberty on those battlegrounds. We honour them and all who died.

We honour them in our anthem. However, Canadian women also served in the First World War, not as soldiers, but in other functions, especially as nurses, and many died. We have commemorated them in Parliament's Hall of Honour; however, we have not commemorated them in our anthem. In 1927, the 60th anniversary of Confederation, the government authorized Judge Weir's song for singing in schools and at public functions, but kept the second line from the 1913 version, not the original 1908 gender neutral version. Incidentally, other words were changed in 1927 and again in 1980, when it was enacted by Parliament.

The National Anthem Act was introduced, passed and given royal assent on June 27, 1980. The speed with which this was done did not allow sufficient time to deal with the outstanding concerns, such as the lack of inclusiveness of the English version. A lot has changed since we began commanding true patriot love from our native sons in 1913. Women were first granted the federal right to vote in 1918 by the government of Sir Robert Borden. Canada held its first federal election in which women were allowed to vote and run for office in 1921.

It was the year that Agnes Macphail was elected to the House of Commons, making her Canada's first female member of Parliament. There was the 1929 Persons Case, where the Famous Five succeeded in having women recognized as persons and thereby eligible for appointment to the Senate. A few months later, in 1930, Canada's first female senator, Cairine Wilson, was sworn in. Less than a minute into 1947, once the Canadian Citizenship Act came into effect, the first born Canadian citizen, Nicole Cyr Mazerolle, a woman, joined us.

The Royal Military College of Canada in Kingston started admitting women as students in 1980. Now, women serve as soldiers and just recently a woman, Ms. Christine Whitecross, was promoted to the rank of major-general. The adoption of our Charter of Rights and Freedoms in 1982 has led to the gradual and rigorous implementation of equality between men and women, which the charter guarantees. We would be taking a very important symbolic step by ensuring that our anthem respected our charter.

Let us remember and celebrate the fact that our Canadian women won more medals than our men during the 2010 Vancouver Olympic Winter Games. In 2013, the Restore Our Anthem campaign was launched to change the English words from “thy sons” to “of us”. The list of the campaign's endorsers is impressive. Former prime minister Kim Campbell, internationally renowned author Margaret Atwood, Senator Nancy Ruth, and former senator Vivienne Poy have lent their support to this campaign. Hon.

Belinda Stronach and Jacquelin Holzman, a former mayor of Ottawa, sing “all of us” already, as do I and a number of members of the House.

(1110) Even CFRA talk show host, Lowell Green, told the member for Ottawa—Vanier that he supports the change. Maureen McTeer, Canadian lawyer and author, wife of the Right Hon. Joe Clark, has sent the member a note supporting the initiative. Former MP and leader of the NDP, Ed Broadbent, also confirmed his support, and former Conservative Senator Hugh Segal is onside. We have come a long way. The strides made by women in our society have been significant and should be fully recognized. Our anthem should not ignore the increasingly important contribution of 52% of our population.

There are Canadians everywhere in this country in support of the change being advocated with this bill. We know this because we have the numbers. The results from the survey of Mainstreet Technologies are very different from the numbers cited by the government's poll of October 2013, because accurate language is used.

The questions and answers provided by more than 5,000 Canadians show solid support for a change in the lyrics from “in all thy sons command” to “in all of us command”: 58% of Canadians approve or strongly approve this change, and only 19% disapprove or strongly disapprove; the margin of error is 1.35%, 19 times out of 20. The poll questions and results can be seen on www.singallofus.ca. Last week, my hon. colleague from Ottawa—Vanier asked the government how it justified basing its position on the results of a question that misrepresented the current lyrics of O Canada.

As usual, we were treated to a disrespectful non-answer. The often-cited poll from Forum Research, in 2013, is the point of contention. When asking Canadians if they supported a departure from the existing lyrics, Forum got the original lyrics wrong. Even the Toronto Star , in reporting these numbers, did not catch the fact that the existing lyrics are “all thy sons command”, and not as was stated in the poll, “all her sons command”, as both organizations would have us believe. Wrongly, the Forum poll asked the sample of Canadians its view on changing the anthem from “all her sons command” to “all of us command”.

Today as we engage in the second hour of debate, and on the Wednesday April 29 vote on the bill, let us hope that a majority of MPs will vote to amend O Canada to include “all of us”. It is the right thing to do.

(1115) Mr. Rick Dykstra (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Canadian Heritage, CPC) : Mr. Speaker, I rise today to address Bill C-624,

an act to amend the National Anthem Act (gender). The official lyrics are based on a poem written in 1908 by Justice Robert Stanley Weir. Although changes to the original poem were made prior to the adoption of the national anthem, it must be mentioned that no changes have been made to the English version since its adoption. Bill C-624 proposes to change the anthem by removing the words “thy sons” and inserting the words “of us” in the English version of the national anthem. This line was inserted in 1914 by Robert Stanley Weir, the original author, and has remained unchanged for a hundred years.

The lyrics to O Canada are symbolic. The anthem in its current form is important to Canadians. O Canada is not only a source of pride and a reflection of our nation, it is loved by Canadians as it is. It is part of our historical legacy. As studies have shown, the anthem continues to be a sense of pride and belonging. A 2012 survey found that 78% of Canadians believe our national anthem is a great source of pride. Another poll conducted in the same year found that 74% of Canadians believe that our national anthem best reflects what Canada really is. The anthem is a very important Canadian symbol.

As more recent surveys have revealed, the majority of Canadians oppose changing the anthem to make it gender neutral. A 2013 study found that 65% of Canadians oppose the change, including 61% of women. Only 25% supported the change to gender neutrality. The sponsor of the bill correctly mentioned that this poll used the phrase “her sons” instead of “thy sons”. While this is correct, his reasoning is that Canadians who were asked the question over the telephone instantly thought this was a reference to our queen and opposed the change.

Considering that there was an oft-cited 2002 poll that showed only 5% of Canadians actually knew that our head of state was the queen, this line of reasoning shows the member is stretching this issue a little. The core question in the 2013 poll still asked Canadians if they wanted a gender neutral anthem, and 65% of Canadians said they did not. In fact, 61% of women in that survey said they did not want a gender neutral anthem. Supporting the bill could send a message to Canadians that their opinions do not matter and that Parliament does not want to listen to them.

O Canada is an anthem, and Parliament should not swap out its phrases without the support of all Canadians. I strongly disagree with the NDP member for Vancouver East , who in our previous hour of debate said that O Canada was “offensive”. That is the word that she used. I would point out that the person who sits next to her, the Leader of the Opposition , has been quoted as saying: I think that when you start tinkering with an institution like a national anthem that you're looking for problems [...] We seem to have agreed on the English and French versions as they are and I think that's probably a good thing.

I did not think I would stand up in the House and say that I agree with the Leader of the Opposition on too many things, but on this issue he has it right. He should share his concerns with the member for Vancouver East, who said in February that opposition to this anthem was “a no-brainer”. It is outrageous, regardless of one's position as to whether it should be changed, that someone would be calling our Canadian national anthem “offensive”. It is a source of pride for Canadians across the country. In fact, her own leader called the anthem “wonderful”.

He stated that the anthem should not be changed and that it is important to Canadians. While the position of the member for Vancouver East on the anthem is hers to hold, she should apologize to the House and withdraw the remarks she made about our Canadian national anthem.

(1120) I cannot think of another country, in any type of parliament or house of representatives, that would have heard any member stand up to say that about their national anthem. Our government is committed to recognizing women who have individually and collectively helped to build the strong, proud, and free Canada that we have today.

Every year, commemorative events, such as the International Women's Day, Women's History Month, and important events such as the Governor General Awards in Commemoration of the Persons Case, represent important occasions when all Canadians recognize the tremendous contributions that women make to all aspects of Canadian life. As an example, initiatives for the commemoration of World War I and World War II include recognizing the invaluable role that Canadian women played in our country's military efforts.

Canada recognizes and celebrates the instrumental role that Canadian women have played to build our great country during Women's History Month. During this month, we recognize the contribution of Canadian women and highlight their achievements in all areas of life: politics, sports, medicine, business, education, and it goes on.

That is not to mention the vital accomplishments of the Famous Five: Emily Murphy, Nellie McClung, Henrietta Muir Edwards, Louise McKinney, and Irene Parlby, women whose leadership in the fight for equality paved the way for future generations and whose statues stand just to the east of this building on Parliament Hill. Our government has done much to help ensure that the many contributions and achievements of women are recognized and that their remarkable role in society is highlighted. I do believe in gender equality, and so does everyone on both sides of the House.

We recognize and highlight the incredible and numerous contributions that women have made to the building of our beloved country. However, I do not believe that changing our national anthem is the way to accomplish this, and neither do the majority of Canadians, including the majority of Canadian women. Supporting the bill would also open the door to further proposals to changing the national anthem. It would open Pandora's box and weaken the anthem as a symbol. Given that Canadians have already spoken loudly and clearly on this issue, I will not support the bill.

I understand why the sponsor put the bill forward, and our government proposed a similar change in the 2010 Speech from the Throne. The reaction from Canadians was overwhelming. While some members of the opposition may claim from time to time that the government does not listen to what Canadians are saying, on this issue, immediately after learning of the reaction to the change in national anthem, we did react. Do not forget that this was shortly after our huge successes at the Olympics in Vancouver. There was sense of pride. The national anthem was sung many times across this country.

There was reaction to the moderate change we had put forward, not unlike the one made by the member. It was a reaction that led us to understand that this is a sacred anthem that is enjoyed by Canadians and should not be subjected to any form of change. The lyrics to O Canada are symbolic and deeply rooted in tradition. It is a great source of pride to Canadians. We have a responsibility to maintain and protect our national symbols. Our anthem is one of those symbols.

Any form of change to an anthem that is memorized, known, and sung literally hundreds of times a day in our country, and it does not matter the geography, should not occur. All Canadian citizens understand, know, and love what our national anthem stands for. They understand the importance, significance, and the symbolism of not changing the anthem. There are very few countries that delve into changing the symbol that is their national anthem. When we open the door to change, there are going to be those who line up, whether it be on this issue with respect to the anthem or another issue.

I believe that the best way to maintain the symbolism and importance of the anthem is to keep it exactly the way it is. Everyone understands it. Everyone knows what it stands for, and everyone loves singing O Canada.

(1125) The Deputy Speaker : The hon. member for Ottawa—Vanier will now have his five minutes of reply. Hon. Mauril Bélanger (Ottawa—Vanier, Lib.) : Mr. Speaker, I listened very carefully to what was said by the parliamentary secretary, and there are some errors in what he said. He said that the anthem had not been changed in 100 years, which is correct, but it was changed from 1908 to 1914. The original version included “us”. Therefore, to say that the anthem has not changed in 100 years is not exactly accurate because it has been changed a number of times in those 100 years, the English version, that is.

Therefore, he is not correct in saying that. When we talk about our symbols, our symbols tend to evolve just as our society does, and I will provide two examples. In 1921, King George V included the maple leaf in our coat of arms, which was not there before, because the maple leaf had become a symbol that Canadians respected. As well, in 1965 we changed our flag. There are two absolutely important symbols in our country and both have evolved to reflect the evolution in our society.

What the member fails to understand is that in the last 100 years there has been a significant evolution in the equality of genders in our society, including the 1982 charter, so on and so forth. Therefore, for him to say what he just did is not accurate, and to base it on a poll that has misrepresented the anthem is rather strange. The poll referred to in 2013 quoted “True patriot love in all her sons command”. The actual words are “thy sons”, not “her sons”.

The polling firm that did it should live up to its mistake and if it was not a mistake, acknowledge its intent to misrepresent our anthem in a question put to Canadians. The numbers that the government speaks of are faulty, and I hope my colleagues know now that if they actually follow the opinions of Canadians, they need to get it right. I too have commissioned a poll, which has been sent to most of my colleagues, and the results of this survey conducted by Mainstreet Technologies are very different because accurate language is used.

The questions and answers provided by more than 5,000 Canadians show solid support for a change in the lyrics from “all thy sons command” to “in all of us command”. The poll shows that 58% approve or strongly approve and only 19% disapprove or strongly disapprove. The other thing we need to know is that in 1980 the anthem was approved in one single day in both the House and the Senate, and there was a commitment made by the government of the day, a Liberal government—so I am rising beyond partisanship here because this is important—to review the anthem in the following session. The Hon.

Ed Broadbent at the time and the late Walter Baker, who represented both parties, agreed with that and wanted it to include “all of us”. The Hon. Florence Bird in the Senate made the same comment and it was confirmed that the government would do that. It never happened. Yes, we have had nine bills presented, but this is the first one upon which we will have a vote. I hope the members represent the true spirit of Canadians and the evolution of our society and vote in favour of this. I will provide an example.

Our parliamentary sensibilities are well ingrained about what happened on October 22, but the words that parliamentarians used the next day reflected the evolution of our society. Thirteen members stood in this place, including the Speaker, to congratulate the both men and women who so bravely came to our defence the day before.

They were the hon. members for Papineau , Haute-Gaspésie—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia , Ahuntsic , Edmonton Centre , Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke , Brandon—Souris , Durham , Surrey North , Northumberland—Quinte West , Lotbinière—Chutes-de-la-Chaudière , Yukon , the Speaker , and Burnaby—New Westminster . I want to congratulate those members for so effectively transmitting our thanks to both the men and women of our security service. It is important to be inclusive. Let us not forget that in 1914 only men served as soldiers. That is no longer the case.

Let us not also forget that it was only in 1980 that the House and the Senate started hiring women in our security forces. Let us be fair and include them in our anthem. Let us sing “all of us”. I would like to conclude by thanking the members for their consideration of an inclusive national anthem and I look forward to obtaining their support for this much-overdue initiative.

(1130) The Deputy Speaker : The question is on the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion? Some hon. members: Agreed. Some hon. members: No. The Deputy Speaker: All those in favour of the motion will please say yea. Some hon. members: Yea. The Deputy Speaker: All those opposed will please say nay. Some hon. members: Nay. The Deputy Speaker: In my opinion the nays have it.

And five or more members having risen: Division on motion deferred The Deputy Speaker: Pursuant to Standing Order 93 the recorded division stands deferred until Wednesday, April 29, immediately before the time provided for private members' business. Suspension of Sitting The Deputy Speaker : It being 11:34 a.m., the House will stand suspended until noon.

We will pick up government orders at that time. (The sitting of the House was suspended at 11:34 a.m.) Sitting Resumed (The House resumed at 11:59 a.m.) GOVERNMENT ORDERS Business of Supply (1200) [ English ] Business of Supply Opposition Motion—Government Advertising Mr. David McGuinty (Ottawa South, Lib.) Motion moved: That the House: (

a) recognize that (

i) since 2006, the government has spent nearly $750 million dollars on advertising, (ii) a great deal of this has been partisan advertising that serves no public interest, (iii) this is an affront to taxpayers who work hard and expect that the government will treat their money with respect; and therefore (

b) call on the government to submit all advertising to a third-party review process before it is approved, to ensure that it is an appropriate, proportional, and prudent expenditure of public funds. He said: I appreciate being allowed to proceed this morning with this important Liberal Party of Canada opposition day motion. I am very pleased to lead off this debate today. It is a very important moment for us as parliamentarians from all political stripes in the House.

The theme I will come back to in a few moments is that it is an opportunity for us to do right by Canadians and to improve in an area where there is a need to improve, an area where I believe all parliamentarians can come together to improve a particular expenditure system in the federal government. I want to begin by thanking my leader, the member for Papineau , for his probity, his support, his commitment to transparency and his commitment to doing something better going forward.

Despite the performance and practice of any previous government, we have before us an opportunity to improve the situation when it comes to this notion of government advertising and communication. I want to take a moment to reread this motion so Canadians get the fullness of its embrace. It reads: That the House: (

a) recognize that (

i) since 2006, the government has spent nearly $750 million dollars on advertising, (ii) a great deal of this has been partisan advertising that serves no public interest, (iii) this is an affront to taxpayers who work hard and expect that the government will treat their money with respect; and therefore (

b) call on the government to submit all advertising to a third-party review process before it is approved, to ensure that it is an appropriate, proportional, and prudent expenditure of public funds. I have always believed that all parliamentarians have an obligation to do everything they can to enhance trust and confidence in our democratic institutions and processes. The motion tabled here today would build on that simple yet powerful notion, and is predicated on a simple and powerful idea: respect for Canadians' tax dollars and, arguably, respect for Canadians' intelligence.

We learned just this month that the “Strong Proud Free” slogan that is currently bombarding Canadian television viewers is considered a cabinet confidence, and will be sealed from public scrutiny for 20 years. This tells us that cabinet is seized with communications, with outreach, with messaging, with its alignment with its own political priorities. If we ever needed confirmation that the government is seized with sloganeering, there is no better evidence available. Now we have an insane situation where not only is the sloganeering overt and public, but we are being told it is being overt, public and secret.

It is time to bring Canada's federal government advertising rules into the 21st century, and there is a solution. In addition to this motion, on October 24, 2013, I tabled my private member's bill, Bill C-544 , the elimination of partisan government advertising act. (1205) [ Translation ] My bill amends the Auditor General Act to provide for the appointment of an advertising commissioner to oversee the use of public funds for advertisement. Just like in Ontario, public interest messaging and other essential government advertising will not be targeted.

Appointing an advertising commissioner will enhance accountability toward all Canadians. My bill will be up for debate on June 2, and I hope that all parties will support it. [ English ] Over the last several years, in a spirit of non-partisanship, I have written to two consecutive finance ministers and offered them my bill to adopt as government policy as a low- or no-cost budget suggestion. Sadly, they have not taken up this constructive suggestion that would save the taxpayers millions of dollars while costing almost nothing to implement. There is a crescendo of voices now calling for action.

I would like to quote the Toronto Star from earlier this month, April 5, 2015: Using taxpayer money to lure Canadians to vote Conservative in the next federal election is a bit rich.... In Ontario, the Auditor-General’s office must approve all government advertising to ensure that it doesn’t promote a particular political party. The same should be done in Ottawa.

The...government should follow Ontario’s lead—and rein in some of its advertising spending while it’s at it.... [The member for Ottawa South] who is sponsoring a private member’s bill that would establish independent oversight of federal advertising, argues the...government ads—with their Conservative blue colours and imagery—amount to “propaganda.” He’s right.... The...government needs independent oversight of its advertising spending. And it needs to cut it, just as rigorously as it has cut so many more worthy initiatives....

Now documents obtained by CTV News indicate [the Prime Minister] plans to spend $7.5 million in May alone to promote its so-called Economic Action Plan. The new ad campaign is timed to air just after the release of the April 21 budget, and the government isn’t apologizing for it. The ads continue to waste “money that could be better spent on important services and programs. Money spent publicizing the economic action this year, for example, would have been better spent promoting rail safety, based upon the lessons learned from the Lac-Mégantic disaster.” The final numbers in 2013-14 illustrate this all too well.

In that fiscal year, the current government spent $42 million on economic action plan advertising versus $34 million on rail safety, and this at a time when the government is in full knowledge of the human resources constraints, the lack of inspectors, the challenges with the transportation of oil by rail, the safety risks going through our urban settings, and on and on. This is the kind of choice it has been making, using taxpayer dollars. The government could have kept the federally funded national round table on the environment and the economy operating.

The government could have ensured that our local Veterans Affairs offices stayed open to ensure that our veterans were properly supported and served after their service. I am not suggesting there is not a place for federal advertising, to inform Canadians of new government policies or for public service announcements. There is a role, a legitimate role, for that.

For example, governments need to recruit staff; governments need to hold competitions for contractors who are bidding on procurement opportunities to retrofit a building, to maintain roadways, to provide support for temporary staff or furniture fit-ups; or, for example, most important, to inform Canadians about important health issues or crises, such as the SARS crisis that hit Canada some years ago or the H1N1 viral outbreak. These are legitimate uses of taxpayer dollars for advertising.

(1210) However, what we are seeing, what we have concluded, and what, most importantly, Canadians have concluded is that most of the ads being propagated by the government are designed to promote the Conservative Party of Canada, simply, in its crudest form, to buy votes. The common look and feel, the colours, of the Conservative Party of Canada's political ads and government advertising is indisputable. Advertising executives know it, and they tell us that these are aligned with the Conservative Party's political ad buys.

At its core, this kind of advertising undermines the rules of fair play in our democratic system. We spend a lot of our time in this country assisting governments elsewhere, perhaps less than we should. I would certainly like to see more of it as an investment made by Canada. However, we do spend time supporting fledgling democracies and political parties around the world to show the way. Canada is the beacon. If one is looking to a model of democratic fair play, one should look to Canada. The problem is that the use of public resources in the advertising sector is an attempt to condition the Canadian public.

How? It is done by propagating overt and subliminal messages. Why? That is simple. It is to drive up the government's chances of electoral success. It knows it. It is shameless about it. It does not deny it. Here is another voice in support of that very assertion.

Errol Mendes, professor of constitutional and international law at the University of Ottawa and editor-in-chief of the National Journal of Constitutional Law , wrote in The Globe and Mail recently: Now in government—and outside the electoral period— [the Prime Minister] has found a way for his government to flood the media with partisan propaganda to the tune of hundreds of millions of our dollars. If such democratic subterfuge has the same effect of unfairness before an election, then the [Conservative] government is clearly undermining the spirit of a rule of law critical to fair elections.

He has, in effect, made the government a third party that is allowed to spend potentially millions of dollars, making the actual limits in the election period illusory to some extent. This deserves a profound rebuke by Canadians. Professor Mendes does not go as far as reminding Canadians about the litigation undertaken by the Prime Minister , before he was prime minister, before the Supreme Court of Canada arguing that there should be no limits on third-party advertising during Canadian electoral cycles. He lost that case, but we can see now what is happening is by subterfuge, using Professor Mendes' words.

By subterfuge, he is using public resources to do precisely what he tried to do with private resources before he became Prime Minister. [ Translation ] According to Public Works and Government Services Canada, federal spending is still out of control. The government spent more than $75 million on advertising in 2013-14.

The departments that spend the most are Employment and Social Development Canada, which spent $11.7 million to promote its training programs; Natural Resources Canada, which spent $11 million on a campaign to promote responsible resource development; and the Department of Finance, which spent $10.5 million advertising the economic action plan. That $72.5 million is 9% higher than the amount spent in the previous fiscal year.

With such dire needs across the country, with seniors who have to choose between buying medicine and buying groceries, not a single government member can look his or her voters in the eye and defend this reckless spending on propaganda. (1215) [ English ] Let me expand on this.

With so many needs in this country, with seniors deciding whether to fill their prescriptions or buy groceries, with wait times for surgeries lengthening, with kids with type 1 diabetes unable to afford insulin pumps, with exhausted front-line nurses and crumbling infrastructure, no member in this House of Commons in any party can look their constituents in the eyes and defend this continued wasteful spending on propaganda, not a single one. The Ontario Liberal government gets it. It continues to lead the way on this important issue.

In fact, on Thursday, Ontario budget 2015 was presented to the legislative assembly of Ontario, and it included the following. The Government of Ontario: will propose amendments to the Government Advertising Act, 2004, that would modernize and broaden the scope of the Act to ensure greater transparency about how the government communicates through advertisements and improve the process by which government advertisements are reviewed. Therefore, it can be done.

The proposed amendments support the government’s commitment to openness, transparency and accountability in the way government conducts business, including public advertising. Informed by the report of the Chief Electoral Officer, the Province will also move to strengthen rules around election-related, third-party advertising to protect the public interest. The Ottawa Citizen reported in September that the federal government is spending millions targeting Canadians with Facebook ads.

In the Liberal Party's call for a third-party review process, there is a need to ensure that all forms of advertising are caught: print, video, audio, billboards, pamphlets, Internet, and increasingly, social media. The Conservatives have gone so far as to use ad spots on the XBox video game system, which is unheard of in Canadian history, by any order of government. According to the Ottawa Citizen : The Tory government spends tens of millions annually on advertising and has been assailed for what opposition parties say is often a waste of taxpayer dollars on propaganda.

Part of the advertising blitz has included spending millions of dollars on government ads during the NHL playoffs. Canadians are not being fooled. They are growing weary of and hostile to all the economic action plan ads. Ask them about the billboards, and then ask them how they feel about $29 million being spent on almost 9,800 billboards around this country. The City of Ottawa, my home city, was forced to spend $50,000 to erect these billboards as a condition of getting infrastructure dollars. What does $29 million buy?

It could buy over 500 full-time public health nurses for one year, over 300 affordable housing units for Canadians desperately waiting for housing, or 15,000 doses of chemotherapy drugs at a time when Canadians are suffering on cancer treatment waiting lists. That is what $29 million could buy for Canadians at a time when they are in need. In fact, as reported in The Globe and Mail, eight polls commissioned by the Department of Finance between 2009 and 2012 “suggest the TV, radio, print and Internet ads are starting to fizzle—and annoying some people”.

In the most recently released survey, respondents say that it is “propaganda” and “a waste of money”, while fewer people than ever are taking any action after viewing the ads. These are the government's own polls. Perhaps the government should listen to the taxpayers of Canada and stop wasting their money on partisan advertising. Perhaps it should also stop advertising programs that do not even exist, which is the newest twist in the saga of the use of taxpayer dollars for political purposes. In closing, there is an opportunity for all of us to improve the way we manage and allocate scarce taxpayer resources.

This is a discrete, focused opportunity to make sure that any government of any political stripe today and in the future treats taxpayers' dollars with respect. I urge all of my colleagues to support the Liberal Party of Canada's motion to wrestle this challenge to the ground and to do right by Canadians.

(1220) Ms. Lois Brown (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of International Development, CPC) : Mr. Speaker, I find it just a little rich that this motion is coming from the Liberal Party. Let me read something to the House. It states: This Inquiry has arisen as a result of the significant concerns raised in the Report of the Auditor General to the House of Commons with respect to the sponsorship program and advertising activities of the Government of Canada.

According to her Report, there were failures of internal control systems, a lack of appropriate documentation justifying material expenditures of public money, the payment of large sums of money to private parties with no apparent value being received in return, a systematic disregard of the applicable rules including those contained in the Financial Administration Act, a lack of competition in the selection of advertising agencies, and a general bypassing of Parliament.

My question to my colleague is this: Did he never hear of the sponsorship program, and where on earth is the $40 million the Liberal Party owes to Canadian taxpayers? That is responsible control of Canadian taxpayer dollars, and the Liberals need to pay it back. Mr. David McGuinty : Mr. Speaker, I thank the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of International Development for that question. I do not think I can be nearly as negative as she can be. There is an opportunity here for her to step up.

This is an opportunity for all of us in this House to rise above this kind of dialogue and actually do something that will do right by Canadians. We have an opportunity to support a motion. The government can take the bill. The government can take other measures. It had a chance to put it in its budget. We are going forward. It is 2015. Our job as parliamentarians is to try to improve things for Canadians. This motion will improve things for Canadians. Mr. Mathieu Ravignat (Pontiac, NDP) : Mr.

Speaker, I certainly do not doubt the sincerity of my hon. colleague over there, but it is a little ironic that this is being proposed by the Liberal Party. I will provide a little history. When the Liberals were in power, they used government advertising for partisan advantage as well. In the year 2000, when health care reform was a major plank in the Liberal Party's platform, the Liberal prime minister at the time, Jean Chrétien, spent almost $2 million of public money on a two-month TV advertising campaign to promote the need for the reform. When did the Liberal government run the ad?

It was right in the middle of the playoffs. We have two parties behaving badly on the dime of Canadians, which is completely unacceptable. Why does my hon. colleague think Canadians can trust them? Mr. David McGuinty : Mr. Speaker, once again, it is important for all of us to look ahead. There is an opportunity here for all of us. For example, I could descend into the debate about NDP expenditures in different riding offices around the country, but that is not what we are here to do today. We are here to lift the debate up and take an opportunity in front of us to improve things for Canadians.

If my bill were ever passed in this House, and I offer up to the government that I am not proprietary about it, it would be an opportunity to bind any successive government, not just this government, going forward. Why would all parliamentarians want to come together to do that? It is because it is the right thing, and there is an opportunity for us to do so. This is about driving up confidence and trust in our democratic institutions and processes and the way we spend money, the scarce taxpayer resources sent to us every year by Canadians. That is the opportunity in front of us.

That is why we are debating this motion. I think we can get it right for Canadians. We can certainly do it better than it has been done in the past.

(1225) Ms. Elizabeth May (Saanich—Gulf Islands, GP) : Mr. Speaker, there is one kind of government advertising I would like to see a lot more of. I wonder if my friend could turn his attention to it. In budget 2015, there is reference to some spending at some point, with details to follow, to promote Canadian tourism. I was shocked when I discovered that the current administration has cancelled all advertising to encourage people in the U.S. market, which is our single largest tourism market, to visit Canada.

There has not been one penny spent by the current administration on encouraging our U.S. friends to come here for a holiday. We have a tourism season coming up. The only advertising in the U.S. market has been in favour of the Keystone pipeline. It was a $200,000 ad. One single ad in the The New Yorker was $200,000 and was all about the Keystone pipeline, but there has been nothing about tourism.

While I completely agree with the point my friend has made about using taxpayer dollars for Conservative propaganda, I do want to see this House come together to support getting some ads in the U.S. market as soon as possible for this coming summer season. Mr. David McGuinty : Mr. Speaker, I could not agree more with my colleague. That is why I spoke about legitimate expenditures, with respect to how advertising can be accomplished in this country if it is run through a third party review process. This is about ensuring that there is a third party review process.

In the case that I am proposing, it would be an advertising commissioner inside the Auditor General's office to make sure that these legitimate expenditures go forward. There is a need to advertise for tourism. There is a need to advertise for investment. There is a need to advertise for procurement, jobs and recruitment. There is a need to advertise when we have public health crises. These are profoundly important responsibilities for any order of government, and certainly a federal one. My colleague is right. We are not recruiting the way that we should be for tourism in the United States marketplace today.

We are not recruiting for investment purposes the way that we should be in the United States and foreign markets into Canada. There is a whole series of legitimate exceptions that would be able to go through a robust and neutral filter. What would not happen, if we had a proper third party review process, is common look and feel advertisements coming out with Conservative blue all over TV ads, aligned with Conservative blue ads of a political nature. There would be no red ads either, nor orange ads or political colour ads.

That way, we could drive up confidence and trust in our system so that Canadians feel better about what the government is doing with their resources. Mr. Frank Valeriote (Guelph, Lib.) : Mr. Speaker, it was just about a year ago when one of the most egregious examples of government waste on advertising was displayed on television. A woman, Jenifer Migneault , was seen chasing the veterans minister, begging for help. She had quit her job to look after her husband, who was at home and suffering terribly from PTSD.

The very same day, the veterans minister admitted in committee that they had increased the budget by $4 million that spring to advertise a program on which they had spent only $290,000. They did it again in the fall of last year with another $5 million. That money could have easily kept open all nine veterans offices that they just summarily closed last year. I want to add that to the list that the member for Ottawa South had given to us as yet another example of the gravity of this situation. I wonder if my colleague would like to comment further on that incident. Mr. David McGuinty : Mr.

Speaker, I thank my colleague from Guelph for his strong work on behalf of veterans and for advocating on their behalf. It is always important to juxtapose government choices one against the other. The government had a choice. It could spend $29 million on 9,800 billboards or keep our Veterans Affairs offices open to serve our veterans. That was a choice. It spoke to values, priorities and, quite frankly, commitment.

What we have seen with this example and so many more is so many profound, deep needs in Canadian society, including rail safety, transportation safety and all kinds of interesting and important opportunities, but the government is choosing to spend the money elsewhere. It is unfortunate. It can be stopped. There is a mechanism that is available to all of us in the House. That is why I brought forward this motion this morning.

There is a positive alternative where we can come together, all parties, once and for all, to create a third party review mechanism, such as an advertising commissioner inside the Auditor General's office, and all of this would stop.

(1230) Hon. Laurie Hawn (Edmonton Centre, CPC) : Mr. Speaker, I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in the House today on this motion. I would not suggest for one moment that the hon. member opposite brings this motion forward with anything other than the best of intentions. However, advertising campaigns are essential, for example, ensuring veterans and their families are informed about the services and benefits available to them as they transition to civilian life, and after that transition and later in life, when new needs related to service may become evident.

The government has proved an exceptionally good steward of taxpayer dollars. We need look no further than the fact that last week the Minister of Finance announced a balanced budget for this fiscal year. The evidence clearly shows that the government's fiscal bona fides are well established. With that in mind, I suggest Canadian taxpayers are well served by the government, and that what I prefer to call information campaigns greatly benefit veterans and their families. To ensure Canada's brave men and women are getting the support they need and deserve, we need to inform them of the services available to them.

To preserve the legacy of Canada's brave men and women, it is also important that Canadians are informed of their service and sacrifice. My question to the hon. member is this: Do we not owe it to those brave Canadians to publicly honour their service? Do we not owe it to those Canadian heroes to share their remarkable contributions with our great nation?

Do we not owe it to the families and descendants of those who served during the First and Second World Wars, the Korean War, in Afghanistan, Iraq, and the many peacekeeping missions, many of which involved combat and serious risk to life and limb, and our cold warriors? Do we not owe it to them to remember and encourage all Canadians to remember their service and sacrifice? Do we not owe it to veterans and families to inform them of the programs available to help them transition to civilian life or support them if they have sustained an injury during service? I believe we do owe it to them.

I believe that is the very least that we owe them. It is our responsibility to ensure veterans and their families are aware of what programs and benefits are available to them. Anything less would be a disservice to them and their families, to their sacrifice and a disservice to all Canadians. Canada has an extremely proud military history. I believe we can all agree on that. For generations, the men and women of Canada's Armed Forces have made tremendously positive impacts throughout the world, as well as here at home in the natural disasters that struck Canada in the form of floods and ice storms.

They support the historic national events, such as Olympic Games. They respond to worldwide natural disasters. Indeed, as we speak, there is the rapid deployment of a disaster alert response team to the tragedy unfolding and under way in Nepal. It is extremely important that we honour their work, that we remember their service and recognize the sacrifices they made in our name and on our behalf. It is even more important that they are aware of the benefits available to them to ensure they transition to civilian life with the utmost success.

The services and programs available to Canadian veterans are wide-ranging and among the best in the world. Veterans have access to a network of over 4,000 mental health professionals nationwide, top-of-the-line medical treatment and generous financial benefits. We need to communicate to Canadian veterans to ensure they are aware of the services and programs available to them. If veterans do not know about the benefits available to them, they will not use them. Canadian veterans need to know that they have career transition services available.

They need to know that they can access thousands of dollars each month if they have a serious service-related injury, or even that they have access to other services not necessarily related to injury but simply to their dedicated service over long periods of time. These advertising efforts do what is needed so veterans across our great country have the information they need.

Through this information campaign aimed both at veterans and Canadians writ large, we emphasize how the Government of Canada is committed to improving access to key supports and services, and reducing process delays, such as the recent announcement of hiring 100 additional case managers and 100 additional disability benefits adjudicators, and ensuring veterans have access to the full range of supports available to them. The facts show that this campaign was a success. Post-campaign analysis shows that the campaign reached 46% of the general population. That is a lot of millions of people.

Immediately following the launch of the information campaign, applications from veterans and their families for disability benefits increased 13%. People who need the benefits need to know, and this helped. More importantly, and this is where the rubber hits the road, the number of My VAC Account registrations increased by 28% during the campaign. That is people who are now signed up, and who are known in the VAC system, and who will be communicated with pre-emptively by Veterans Affairs Canada.

(1235) For the benefit of members who may not be aware, My VAC Account is an extremely valuable online tool for Canadian veterans and their families and every veteran should have one. Anything that helps to increase awareness of this tool, and especially anything that helps increase participation in it, can be deemed nothing less than an overwhelming success. That is not the end of overwhelming impacts with respect to this particular initiative. Comparing website visits prior to the campaign to those during the peak of the campaign, Veterans Affairs Canada experienced an 876% increase in web visits.

That is pretty darn impressive to me. Another example is the 2014 remembrance information campaign. This particular initiative invited Canadians to remember them and educated our nation on the service and sacrifice of all who have served our country in uniform. It encouraged Canadians to get involved in remembrance, to be active in their communities, to visit their local cenotaph on Remembrance Day, to go online and learn more about Canada's military history and to be more engaged in honouring the service of Canada's men and women in uniform.

A post-campaign evaluation said that 52% of Canadians recalled the campaign. That is pretty good awareness. That translates into roughly 14 million people, an increase of a million Canadians from the previous year. The same post-campaign analysis said there were 732,306 unique visits to the Veterans Affairs Canada website, compared to 518,990 in 2013. That is a pretty significant increase. On Facebook, the numbers were equally or even more impressive. On Remembrance Day alone, there were over two million video views in 24 hours and 3.25 million views overall.

On YouTube, there were 1.4 million vignette views, compared with 35,365 in 2013. That is a remarkable increase. All of these numbers matter because every time one of these videos is viewed that is one more person who is becoming more familiar with Canadian veterans, their achievements, their bravery and how they have made such a positive difference in our lives and the lives of people around the world. It is very important to point out that these efforts in no way take away from the benefits and services offered to Canada's veterans.

Each year, Veterans Affairs invests $3.5 billion, of which 90% goes directly to veterans services. Less than 1% of the total annual budget is used on information campaigns. This means that for every dollar spent on advertising, Veterans Affairs spends more than $800 on programs and benefits for veterans themselves. Again, I ask the House, how could anyone question the effect of this campaign? How could anyone suggest that this information is not beneficial to veterans and their families?

How could anyone suggest this information did not directly result in more veterans and their families accessing programs and services? It absolutely did. Another case in point is this campaign also informed veterans about other programs. As a direct result, more veterans come forward to apply for these very programs. Veterans can only apply for something if they know it exists in the first place. Sadly, not all veterans or families are familiar with the wide range of support information, services and programs that are available.

Through this advertising campaign, veterans and their families were informed about programs and services, such as career transition services, rehabilitation, financial support and mental health services. It also highlighted education supports, medical assistance and support services such as grass cutting, house cleaning and snow shovelling. Of the roughly 700,000 veterans in Canada only about 200,000 veterans and their families access programs and services from Veterans Affairs Canada.

Many of the numbers not receiving benefits are simply those like me who do not need services yet, but many are probably still unaware of what is available. We can do better, and in order to do so we have to inform and educate. We have increased awareness of the programs and services that may be available to veterans and their families. It can only help them and to suggest otherwise is simply wrong and short-sighted. It serves no one to have a robust program of benefits and services that veterans know nothing about. Our sole purpose is to communicate with and reach out to Canadian veterans in need.

Why the opposition opposes this is simply beyond me. To ensure Canada's brave men and women have the support they need to transition to civilian life, it is essential they are aware of what programs and services exist to help them. I also think it is important to highlight the practices of previous Liberal governments in any discussion of government advertising. Between 2002 and 2006, the previous Liberal government spent $270.6 million on advertising. I do not recall what colour those advertisements were but I am sure they were not just black and white.

That equates to about $6 million every single month on average. Some of those months were much more than the $7.5 million that was quoted by my friend from Ottawa South that the government is spending in May.

(1240) We would like to go back further in Liberal spending, but the Liberal government did not even track the amounts of money it was spending on advertising before 2002. However, someone who did track the funds was Justice Gomery. He found the Liberal government illegally handed out government advertisement funds directly to friends of the Liberal Party. I would like to read a portion of the Gomery report that I believe is quite relevant to the discussion at hand.

Under major findings, it states: To understand the evidence presented to the Commission and my analysis of it, the Fact Finding Report must be consulted.

It is those facts that allow me to draw the following conclusions: The Commission of Inquiry Found: clear evidence of political involvement in the administration of the Sponsorship Program; insufficient oversight at the very senior levels of the public service which allowed program managers to circumvent proper contracting procedures and reporting lines; a veil of secrecy surrounding the administration of the Sponsorship Program and an absence of transparency in the contracting process; reluctance, for fear of reprisal, by virtually all public servants to go against the will of a manager who was circumventing established policies and who had access to senior political officials; gross overcharging by communication agencies for hours worked and goods and services provided; inflated commissions, production costs and other expenses charged by communication agencies and their subcontractors, many of which were related businesses; the use of the Sponsorship Program for purposes other than national unity or federal visibility because of a lack of objectives, criteria and guidelines for the Program; deliberate actions to avoid compliance with federal legislation and policies, including the Canada Elections Act, Lobbyists Registration Act, the Access to Information Act and Financial Administration Act, as well as federal contracting policy and the Treasury Board Transfer Payments Policy; a complex web of financial transactions among Public Works and Government Services Canada (PWGSC), Crown Corporations and communication agencies, involving kickbacks and illegal contributions to a political party in the context of the Sponsorship Program ; five agencies that received large sponsorship contracts regularly channelling money, via legitimate donations or unrecorded cash gifts, to political fundraising activities in Quebec, with the expectation of receiving lucrative government contracts; certain agencies carrying on their payrolls individuals who were, in effect, working on Liberal Party matters; the existence of a “culture of entitlement” among political officials and bureaucrats involved with the Sponsorship Program, including the receipt of monetary and non-monetary benefits; a pattern of activity whereby a public servant in retirement did extensive business with former recipients of Sponsorship Program contracts; and the refusal of Ministers, senior officials in the Prime Minister’s Office and public servants to acknowledge their responsibility for the problems of mismanagement that occurred.

The Gomery report shed light on the corruption and mismanagement of public funds by the previous Liberal government. For Liberals to stand in the House and criticize our government's expenses on ads is the highest expression of hypocrisy. It is worth noting that the Liberals are rolling out pre-campaign ads that will air during the Stanley Cup playoffs. Imagine that: advertising in places where they know Canadians will be watching. What a concept. Sort of like of us when we placed information aimed at informing veterans where we knew veterans would be watching, and that is the Stanley Cup playoffs.

It is nice to know that Liberals are at least paying attention to what actually works. I am proud of all the government programs and initiatives that have been discussed here today. It is shameful that the members on the opposite side would oppose informing veterans of programs that would benefit them, or the other programs that we advertise about regularly, especially because when our government spends money on advertisements, it goes into advertisements. When the previous Liberal government spent money on advertisements, it went into the pockets of the friends of the Liberal Party.

They should be ashamed of themselves. I have appreciated the time to speak on this important matter and I would like to thank my hon. colleagues for their attention. I look forward to the rest of this debate.

(1245) Ms. Linda Duncan (Edmonton—Strathcona, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the remarks of the hon. member from my beautiful city of Edmonton and that he concentrated his remarks on the need to inform our veterans about services available to them. However, we need to recall that the money the government has been spending on advertising has not solely been on informing veterans of their rights and opportunities to be better treated when they return from service. A lot of this money has been spent on simply advertising the Conservative Party under the guise of building Canada, economic action plan.

What I found particularly reprehensible is the millions of dollars that have been spent on simply promoting one economic sector, one industrial sector, the oil and gas sector in the United States of America, and reportedly with very little result, having reviewed the usefulness and the deliverables on that advertising, yet not one dime has been spent on advertising the opportunities to diversify our economy, including promoting our burgeoning renewable energy and energy efficiency economy.

I would like the hon. member to respond to why they are not switching to diversify their ads instead of comparing themselves to the lowest common denominator. Hon. Laurie Hawn : Mr. Speaker, with respect to advertising and the oil and gas industry, that is the one industry, among many others but it is the primary industry that is giving us the quality of life we enjoy in Canada today, so yes, we are going to advertise. Yes, we are going to participate in the green economy. One might ask the people of Ontario how well that is working for them in terms of energy prices, which is not so well.

I concentrated on veterans, because as people know, that is one of my passions, but there are so many more things that we advertise. One on which I will actually be doing an S. O. 31 today, and I have just put out a press release and will try to do some more, is on the very fine city of Edmonton when it comes to the universal child care benefit. As we know there is a tremendous expansion and enhancement of those benefits for families. However, there are still 200,000 Canadian families who have not applied for those benefits.

In Edmonton alone, there are 9,834 families, representing 16,617 children, who have not applied for those benefits. They need to apply by Friday, May 1, of this year. That is the kind of thing we also advertise. We are not one-trick ponies. I know opposition members are fixated on the resource industy. That is just who they are, and that is fine. They are welcome to do that, but there are many more things that the government advertises well beyond veterans and well beyond families. Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Winnipeg North, Lib.) : Mr.

Speaker, I must say I am disappointed in the speech that the member for Edmonton Centre delivered. He tries to make it seem as if the government is doing nothing wrong with taxpayers' dollars when nothing could be further from the truth. We are talking about three-quarters of a billion dollars that the government has spent, much of it absolutely wasteful, more about patting the Conservative government on the back than anything else.

At a time when so many Canadians need support from the government, the Conservatives see fit to do nothing more than spend taxpayers' dollars, hundreds of millions of dollars every year, to pat themselves on the back. They are out of tune with Canadians. My question for the member is very specific. Could he tell us how the Prime Minister can justify spending $7.5 million this May to promote the government's own budget, not the details of the budget, but to pat the government on the back for presenting a budget, which I must say is fundamentally flawed?

Why is the government wasting 7.5 million taxpayer dollars to promote a bad budget? Hon. Laurie Hawn : Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the impassioned question from my hon. colleague. It is always entertaining to listen to him. I will go back to a couple of things I mentioned in my remarks. When we talk about dollars spent in promoting government programs, budgets, and that sort of thing, it is the same as the Liberal Party did before. There is no difference. He talked about the $750 million, which is over about nine and a half years.

That equates to about the same amount a year that the Liberals spent between 2002 and 2006, which was about $271 million. If one does the math, it is pretty much the same thing. His feigned outrage is always entertaining, I suppose, but it really masks the truth, that governments advertise for legitimate reasons. Certainly governments are going to promote their agendas. That is the right of every government. Taxpayers and voters will ultimately decide whether the government has done a good job or not.

With respect to the acceptance of the budget, although I do not have it with me, there is a long, long list of Canadians and organizations that say this budget is extremely praiseworthy and the work being done on behalf of Canadian families and all aspects of Canadian society. (1250) [ Translation ] Ms. Paulina Ayala (Honoré-Mercier, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, my colleague was explaining earlier why the government advertises: to ensure that veterans are informed about the services available to them. However, the best way to communicate with these people is to create a network, call them or send them personal letters.

That would be cheaper and more effective. Worse still, the Conservatives spent over $5 million on an advertising campaign on the war, and yet they closed the offices that served veterans. The Conservatives have $4.3 million to spend on advertising, while our veterans are left with fewer services. Is this advertising really for the veterans or is it for the Conservative Party? That is my question. [ English ] Hon. Laurie Hawn : Mr. Speaker, the premise of that question is absolutely 100% false. We are not advertising and promoting war. That is a ridiculous statement and the member should be ashamed of that.

With respect to benefits and services for veterans, they are absolutely not being reduced. They are absolutely increasing. There have been recent announcements of more case managers, more benefit adjudicators, the extension of the earnings loss benefit to lifetime, the increase in access to the permanent impairment allowance, and putting reservists on a level playing field with regular force members. We do reach out proactively with letters and contacts, but that is all part of the greater package, and advertising is part of that package.

At times like during the Stanley Cup playoffs is exactly the right time to advertise, because that is exactly what veterans are watching. They are watching the playoffs. The member should enjoy that. She should watch a game and lighten up. Mr. Scott Simms (Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, Lib.) : Mr.

Speaker, I would accept and agree with many elements that the member just talked about concerning the defence forces and advertising; however, the concept within our motion comes down to having that third party as an arbiter to look at the type of advertising that may be misconstrued as something that is political. By way of example, several years ago the Conservatives painted the words “economic action plan” on a GO train. There was absolutely no information anywhere on that train that told people what programs they could avail themselves of.

This is the type of thing that a committee would look at and say it was a bit much. It was just one billboard with three words that taxpayers are paying a lot for. The motion is for the concept of having that outside body to say that they have crossed the line there. Hon. Laurie Hawn : Mr. Speaker, Canadians are well educated when it comes to accessing the Internet and accessing information online. If people see the words “economic action plan” and they wonder what it is, they can google “economic action plan” and they will find all the things that cannot possibly be put on the side of a train.

When a train goes by at whatever speed it travels, people are not going to read details. They are going to see the main message that will drive them to other methods of obtaining more information that Canadians are all too familiar with and very good at. [ Translation ] Mrs. Anne-Marie Day (Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the member. At the height of the advertising campaign to commemorate the War of 1812, I would sometimes take the train, and the wine I was served was called '1812'. However, it was not really a wine from 1812; that was just a label.

The government helped pay for that wine to be served on VIA Rail. Can the member explain that? (1255) [ English ] Hon. Laurie Hawn : Mr. Speaker, advertising the War of 1812 and advertising Canada's military history is part of what every Canadian government has done and frankly should do. I may have missed the comment about the wine, but if the question was regarding advertising Niagara wine, that is okay too. The wine industry in Canada, in Niagara or British Columbia or other places now, is another important part of Canada's overall economy.

Any way we can get the word out about Canada's military history, about the contributions it has made to what we have today, about Canadian industry, especially things like the wine industry, which I particularly enjoy, is a good thing. [ Translation ] Mr. Mathieu Ravignat (Pontiac, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Newton—North Delta . Obviously, in the past, both Liberal and Conservative governments have run publicly funded, partisan government advertising campaigns in order to promote their own partisan interests. The abuse, particularly by this government, is unbelievable.

For example, the Conservative Party's 2011 election platform spoke of a Canada that is strong, free and proud of its history. The same keywords are used on the Conservative Party's website today. That is interesting. What is more, these keywords are also used in government advertising. The publicly funded advertising campaign for Canada's 150th anniversary celebration uses the same keywords in its slogan: “Strong. Proud. Free.”. The Conservatives have even refused to release the documents regarding the decision to use this partisan slogan in publicly funded ads.

A reporter asked the Treasury Board to provide any information related to the decision to use the “Strong. Proud. Free.” slogan, and he was told that there was a 149-page document submitted to cabinet to justify its use. That is a lot of pages. Imagine how long it took government employees to write 149 pages just so that the government could use a partisan slogan in its advertising. It is unbelievable. What is more, much of the advertising for the economic action plan does not provide any useful information about government services.

In a poll to evaluate the 2012 advertising campaign, respondents described the ads as propaganda and a waste of money. Those are not our words. They are the words of ordinary Canadians. Only six of the 1,000 respondents said that they consulted the actionplan.gc.ca website for more information. The Conservatives also wasted $2.5 million on advertising for a Canada job grant that did not even exist.

Advertising Standards Canada's standards council found that the government campaign, which ran during the NHL playoffs, was misleading because it was announcing a program that had not yet been negotiated with the provinces. It is unbelievable. Today, the Conservatives continue to waste money on promoting their campaign promises to adopt policies on income splitting, which benefits the wealthy, while these tax breaks do not even exist yet. The Conservatives are treating taxpayers with utter disrespect. Ads for the economic action plan have cost taxpayers more than $113 million since 2009.

That money could have been used to create an innovation tax credit, for example, to allow businesses to invest in machines and equipment and create jobs for Canadians. That is one of the NDP's good ideas. In 2013, the Conservatives spent $16.5 million on advertising natural resource development, millions of dollars of which was spent abroad. They are not even spending that money here in Canada. In March 2010, Conservative government officials met with representatives of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers; they agreed—it is lobbying, really—on an intense communication strategy.

In one year, that money could have paid for 11,000 home renovations under the eco-energy retrofit program to help Canadians reduce their heating bills. Imagine that. The Conservatives' hypocrisy never ceases to amaze us.

(1300) Since 2009, they have spent more than $40 million of taxpayers' money on advertising concerning tax relief for Canadians. They could have used that money to hold a national inquiry to obtain justice for missing and murdered aboriginal women. That would have been a good idea. Advertising for Canada's 150th anniversary will cost $12 million two years in advance of the celebrations in 2017. That money could have been used to keep the Kitsilano coast guard base open for 15 more years.

There is definitely a need for some of the government's advertising, such as advertising for government services for new Canadians. However, for the past few years, the government has been spending 10 times more on advertising for the economic action plan than on ads for government services for new Canadians. We have a duty to ensure that this advertising is not partisan. As for 2014, while Veterans Affairs Canada was closing its regional offices and depriving veterans who were suffering of services they were entitled to, the government spent $4.3 million on advertising.

Furthermore, poll results show that the advertising was not even effective. The government would have been better off investing this money in keeping the regional Veterans Affairs offices open. Moreover, the Conservatives spent more than $5 million on an advertising campaign for the War of 1812. That $5 million could have been spent on hiring dozens of rail inspectors to help prevent another disaster like Lac-Mégantic.

The Conservatives spent $1.5 million on advertising the apprenticeship program even before the program officially existed, thus blurring the line between partisan advertising and advertising for government services that actually exist. It is understandable that Canadians do not know whether or not a program exists and how to access it. The Conservatives did nothing to inform Canadians about the changes to employment insurance. It is quite impressive when you look at the numbers.

This government spent $86 million on advertising in 2006, $84 million in 2007, $79 million in 2008, $36 million in 2009, $83 million in 2010, $78 million in 2011, $69 million in 2012 and $75 million in 2013. We do not yet have the figures for 2014, but since it was a pre-election year, it would not surprise me to see that the government spent even more than it did in 2013. We will see. I have to wonder why the government continues to spend money on advertising campaigns, when its own internal assessments indicate that Canadians consider these ads to be a waste.

How can the government justify these expenses when it is shutting down service offices? If these campaigns are as useful and as non-partisan as the government claims, why is it so afraid of submitting these expenses to a third party review? Why did the Conservatives put money into this advertising, even though their own officials were telling them that the economic action plan ads violated Treasury Board rules? I also have to wonder why they do not want to release the documents related to the “Strong. Proud. Free.” slogan. The answer is simple: they have something to hide. Let us not kid ourselves, though.

The Liberals were no different. If that were not the case, they would not be trying to improve their image with this motion. That is what this is all about. I would like the Canadians watching us to know that there was abuse, and I am not just talking about the sponsorship scandal. In fact, previous Liberal governments used taxpayer money to finance partisan advertisements.

(1305) For example, the Chrétien government used $2 million in public funds to promote the need for health system reform. It too chose to do that during the hockey playoffs, just like the current government. If that party and its member are really serious about wanting to do something to address this problem, may I suggest they look at the Australian model, which has real teeth and truly respects taxpayers' money. [ English ] Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Winnipeg North, Lib.) : Mr. Speaker, I appreciate many of the comments made by the member.

However, I would reinforce the very important principle that my colleague has raised in a question, which is having a third-party process that would allow for a sense of independence and fair play in ensuring the tax dollars we are using to finance public advertising is done in the best interest of Canadians. In other words, at times we need to recognize that there is a line that needs to be drawn when an ad does more for political opportunists for re-election opportunities versus passing on and disseminating information that is important to Canadians.

One of the best ways to deal with that issue, as has been suggested in the motion, is to have a third party review government publicly-financed advertising. Would the member not agree? Mr. Mathieu Ravignat : Mr. Speaker, I guess anything done is a good thing, but there is more that could be done than what is proposed in the motion. [ Translation ] Actually, the federal government of Australia implemented the solution that the member for Ottawa South has put forward, but it failed. The Australians then created an independent communications committee responsible for reviewing government advertising.

That is a real solution. If we really want to do something, I suggest we do something like that. My hon. colleague mentioned that it is all about electioneering. It is very clear that the Liberals are using this motion to try to improve their image, but that is just not going to happen. Canadians will remember. Ms. Isabelle Morin (Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his speech.

He made it very clear that all of the money the government is currently spending on partisan advertising could have been spent on funds that would actually help Canadians meet their needs. Advertising dollars could be used to explain programs that actually exist, but this government is spending more money on programs that do not yet exist and on partisan advertising. My colleague spent a lot of time talking about a slogan that, strangely enough, is being used by the Conservative Party to explain other programs that are not partisan. This is all really confusing.

What really worries me today is that this motion was moved by a party that has a history of spending taxpayers' money on partisan advertising. This is what the then auditor general said: Between 1998-99 and 2002, the federal government [which was a Liberal government] ran more than 2,200 advertising activities with contracts valued at about $793 million, making it one of the larger advertisers in the country. It was the Liberals who did that. For decades now, we have gone from one government to another that both use the same tactics: taking taxpayers' money to pay for partisan advertising.

I find it absurd that that party is the one proposing these changes today. What does my colleague think of the fact that it is the Liberals, who also used partisan advertising, who are proposing this motion?

(1310) Mr. Mathieu Ravignat : Mr. Speaker, clearly, blue or red, it is all the same. Those are the old parties, and they have been in power too long. It is time to replace them with parliamentarians and a government that respect taxpayers' money and the opinions of Canadians, and that believe in informing Canadians about changes to their programs and services. That is what government advertising should used for: to inform people. [ English ] Ms. Jinny Jogindera Sims (Newton—North Delta, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak in support of this motion.

We have heard a lot about the advertising of government programs that do not even exist, and I think it is ironic when we get bills like this brought forward. However, I always say it is better late than never. It pleases me that the Liberal Party has brought this bill forward. In the past, both the Liberal and Conservative governments have been criticized very heavily for using publicly funded government advertising campaigns to further their own partisan interests. That is not news, and I am not going to go into too much of the history around that.

When the Liberals were in government, they acted just like the Conservatives. It is a bit strange sitting here, having the Conservatives say that they only kind of did what the Liberals did. What matters is that it is the public's hard-earned tax dollars that are being used for partisan advertising. Taxpayers do not mind when their hard-earned tax dollars are used to pay for programs. They do not mind when they are used to promote something that is good for all Canadians. What they do mind is when it is just purely advertising in order to promote a particular party. We all remember the sponsorship scandal.

I was not an MP at the time, but I can tell the House that it was a big topic of conversation. In my social studies class, it was a major topic of discussion for a good few weeks. It is time in Canada that we elect a government and a leader who have the experience and the principles, as well as what it takes to stop all of these scandals and mismanagement left behind by the Liberals, and now by the Conservatives. It is time for a principled government that will bring real change to Ottawa and get rid of advertising that is not necessary.

I have sat in the House today and listened to some of my colleagues from across the aisle, and I heard what a wonderful job they have been doing with Veterans Affairs. All of this advertising is to promote the programs they have. What I have found ironic is that they had to put them on during the hockey games because every veteran is out there watching hockey. I have big news for everyone: not everybody watches hockey.

I know that might be sacrilegious and that some people might get upset at that, but there are many people who do not watch, especially many who are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, and those who are coping with having left the battlefield and readjusting to civilian life. If we want to communicate with the veterans, surely we know who they are. Surely one way to communicate with them is directly. That would actually get to every veteran in a real way, instead of just throwing out the fairy dust and hoping that some of it lands in the right places.

Since I have been in the House, I have watched advertising for programs that do not even exist. I was the critic for employment and social development, as I am now, when the government was advertising the Canada job grant. The government had not negotiated a single agreement with any province, but we spent millions of dollars advertising a program that did not exist. To me, that is asinine and a waste of taxpayers' money. Canadians work hard to earn their paycheques. They pay taxes, which they do not mind, if they know that their taxes are being well used.

(1315) However, the taxpayers I talk with do not want to have their hard-earned money used to promote a particular party or for partisan advertising, especially to promote things that do not exist. We have already begun to see some of the advertising around income splitting. As far as I know, income splitting has not yet been passed by this Parliament. We know it is an idea the government has in its budget, but we have not finished debate on the budget. It has to go through the cycles of parliamentary legislation, and then it has to come back here to be voted upon.

Instead of dealing with real issues and spending money where it is needed, the government would rather spend money on advertising income splitting—the new income splitting, by the way—that would only benefit about 15% of the population, not those who need it the most. Constituents and other Canadians I have talked with coast to coast to coast tell me that they have been waiting years to hear about their appeals to the Social Security Tribunal. Some of these people are terminally ill and still waiting to have their appeals heard.

Surely some of this money would have been better spent on hiring extra people, if that is what is needed, in order to process the appeals in a timely manner. I am not against all advertising. I think there are some things that governments do have to advertise in a bigger way, on a larger scale. I heard another colleague mention tourism today. We live in a beautiful country. Of course, we should be promoting our country. I think it is wonderful to encourage people to come here, but also to encourage people within Canada to explore Canada as well.

However, what I find hard is why we have to spend millions of dollars promoting the oil industry in the U.S. when the oil industry makes billions of dollars in profit. Surely it is the job of the oil companies to promote themselves. Why would we take hard-earned money from Canadians who are working for $10, $12, $14 an hour, having to work two or three jobs in order to make ends meet, and use it to promote the oil companies in the U.S.? The oil companies make huge profits. That is called the government paying off its friends, and I think that is unconscionable when Canadians are hurting.

Let us talk about something else that the government should be highlighting: Campaign 2000. That was the year when Parliament unanimously agreed to take immediate action to end child poverty. Eradication of poverty or the proliferation of child poverty is still very real, whether it is in the north, in B.C., in the centre, or on the east coast. Think of the three-quarters of a billion dollars that has been spent on advertising. Some of that could have been used to address child poverty.

When it comes to child poverty, we have a government that is very fond of supporting our motions to end child poverty and agreeing they are a good thing. Then, when we get a budget, we do not see many resources targeted in that area specifically. What we see sometimes are policies that would grow the gap between the rich and the poor, the haves and the have-nots. I absolutely agree that we need to get this partisan advertising under control and that we need an independent body to review how it is done.

It is time for the Conservative government to stop abusing the tax dollars of hard-working Canadians to promote itself for re-election.

(1320) Mr. Ted Hsu (Kingston and the Islands, Lib.) : Mr. Speaker, my question starts with a comment about the government's spending plans that occurred back in November 2014. One of the topics in the video advertisement was about income splitting and changes to benefits that still have not been legislated in this House. My concern in particular is that at the end of this advertisement there has to be a thing that says “measures subject to parliamentary approval”. The problem is that these advertisements appeared as a kind of gateway to reading online newspaper articles.

If an individual reads it on an ordinary computer screen, or even more so on a mobile screen, there is no way one could read the tiny font that appears for a couple of seconds saying “measures subject to parliamentary approval”. I am wondering if my colleague has seen these ads and she could comment on the appropriateness of concealing the idea that these measures have not yet gone through Parliament. Ms. Jinny Jogindera Sims : Mr. Speaker, I have enjoyed working with my colleague on a number of issues. He always asks thoughtful questions.

I think this is a prime example of a government, even when it is found guilty by the courts and is reprimanded, wanting to circumvent. Instead of saying that they are not supposed to be doing this, the Conservatives came up with the idea of having a tiny little tag flash on the screen which nobody will have the time to read, or it is so tiny that people, especially in my age group, cannot read it. They carry on with doing exactly what they were doing before. It is a flagrant disregard for common-sense

interpretation when they have been found guilty, in order to carry on misusing the tax dollars of hard-working Canadians. Ms. Elizabeth May (Saanich—Gulf Islands, GP) : Mr. Speaker, I could not agree more with some of the comments about why the Canadian government is spending public funds to promote the oil industry in the United States. It is not as though it is a hardship case. It is a multi-billion dollar profit centre. We are spending money on ads for them, but in Canada as well, targeted to us in British Columbia.

I am sure my friend from Newton—North Delta will be able to immediately recall the ad for how fabulous the environmental protection will be with supertankers loaded with dilbit, which British Columbians do not want, and the great announcement from the Canadian government that these supertankers will now have to have double hulls, as though we can thank the current administration for this innovation. Double-hulled oil tankers have been required under international law since 1978.

What we have had in British Columbia to protect our coastline is a moratorium on supertanker traffic on the north coast since 1972, which the current administration just imagined away. It is as if we never had a moratorium at all. I wonder if my friend would comment on what looked like Enbridge ads, but were actually being paid for by our tax dollars.

(1325) Ms. Jinny Jogindera Sims : Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for the question that is targeted specifically to our beautiful British Columbia's pristine coastline. I have had the pleasure of travelling all over B.C., and up and down that beautiful coastline. For British Columbians, there is nothing more important than protecting our coastline and our waterways. That moratorium was there for a reason. The Canadian government now making sure that our tankers are up to international standard is not a cause to celebrate when maybe they should have had double hulls all along.

However, what is disturbing is that once again the government is very much engaged in partisan advertising, supporting the oil companies and the pipelines. What shocked me more than anything was that when we had the oil spill in Vancouver during that perfectly still day and a lot of damage was done, the company contracted out for the cleanup was Kinder Morgan. That is bizarre. Hon. John McCallum (Markham—Unionville, Lib.) : Mr. Speaker, I am sharing my time with my colleague, the hon. member for Labrador . I am pleased to rise in support of the Liberal motion.

We are calling upon the government to submit its advertising proposals to a dispassionate third party to ensure the advertisements are non-partisan. Under the Conservative government, experience has shown that this measure is urgently required. As has been pointed out, it has spent three-quarters of a billion dollars no less on largely partisan advertising since coming into power. We see this all the time if we watch the playoffs and other broadcasts. It is hard to avoid advertisements that are partisan Conservative ads relating to the economic action plan and other measures of this kind.

There are two principal areas on which I would like to focus. The first is that as a government, it is sometimes nice to have free reign over the advertising it can do because then it can bend it to the partisan and help its own cause a little. However, the Ontario government, under the leadership of then premier Dalton McGuinty, took the lead on this.

Even though for those reasons it might have been to the disadvantage of the Liberals, they proposed a law, which has been in place for some years now, with respect to a third party system that limited their ability to advertise to what was deemed non-partisan by this third party. Therefore, it is our view that it is high time that the federal government emulate what Dalton McGuinty did for Ontario and bring forward such an approach, even though it might limit its own freedom of action, just as it limited the freedom of action of the McGuinty government.

My colleague, the member for Ottawa South , has proposed a private member's bill, which would do just that, set out a third party that would have the ultimate say on what advertising was permitted and what advertising was not permitted. We in the Liberal Party support this measure. Even though we may well become the next government, we are happy to be limited in our ability to do partisan advertising, just as we recognize the Conservatives should also be so limited. We should all agree that this is the right thing to do whether we are or are not the government.

It is simply wrong to use taxpayer money to advance one's partisan interest through advertising. If the Liberal government in Ontario could do that, then the Conservative government in Ottawa should also do that. We, as the federal Liberal Party, are willing to do it even though it might cost us down the road should we become the government. If we look at today's polls. it is roughly fifty-fifty as to whether the Conservatives or the Liberals will be the next government.

Therefore, each of us should pass such legislation and agree to such a rule, even though going forward there is perhaps a 50% chance that one of us would be limited in our freedom of action, but at the same time doing what is right from the point of view of taxpayer funding. (1330) [ Translation ] The second issue I would like to address is that all this government advertising apparently does not work, according to the government's own findings. [ English ] They do not work. [ Translation ] Apparently, Canadians are not significantly influenced by all these Conservative ads. [ English ] The best example of that is something we would think no Canadian in the country could have escaped hearing about in the last several years, which is Canada's economic action plan.

The government is more concerned about the signs than the action. No matter where we go, we cannot help seeing these things. It does not matter what TV or radio station we turn on, we cannot help hearing about these things. This is one of the prime examples of the government using taxpayer money for partisan advertising, which should be stopped. The bad news for the government is that it does not work. According to polls commissioned by the government, when Canadians were asked if they had heard of Canada's economic action plan, one would have thought 100% would have said yes.

In the Ottawa bubble, it is impossible not to have heard of it. I would have thought a high proportion of Canadians would have heard of it, 99% or around there. However, the proportion saying no, that they had never heard of Canada's economic action plan, was 41% in 2010. Then the government did way more adverting, year after year. How did that number progress? Maybe it went from 41% to 81%? No. In 2011, it was 40%. In 2012, it was 42.6%. In 2013, it dipped down to 37%. Then it was 38%. Therefore, it is within the rounding error. However, 40% of Canadians have never heard of the economic action plan.

Difficult as it is for parliamentarians to believe it, that is a fact. The point is not only is the advertising a waste of taxpayer money for partisan purposes, but it does not even work very well. With all of this advertising, day in and day out, about the economic action plan, 40% of Canadians still do not have a clue what it is. It is the wrong thing to do, and it does not work. Those are two good reasons for the government to stop it. I have one more illustration of why it does not work. This is a survey. Again, it was a government appointed survey.

I think these surveys were brought in by the Liberal government, and they have continued to this day. This is a survey about the home renovation tax credit conducted in 2009. The question was, “Did you do anything as a result of seeing or hearing this advertising about the home renovation tax credit?” The percentage of people who said that they did not do anything as a result of this advertising was 74%. The major point is that partisan advertising is the wrong thing to do. We should put in place a legislative mechanism, as Ontario has done and as my colleague from Ottawa South has introduced in the House.

We in the Liberal Party, should we become government, would be perfectly happy and content to be constrained by such legislation. We think this should similarly constrain the Conservative government of today. It should act even before this law is proclaimed, and go to a third party to limit its advertising to items being non-partisan. We think there is a strong case for this, and we are putting our money where our mouth is and supporting this.

As a by-product, I would also make the point that for all this waste of taxpayer money by government advertising, it does not even seem to work very well. (1335) [ Translation ] Mrs. Anne-Marie Day (Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I was quite surprised to hear this kind of proposal for a review from the Liberals, especially on a special day like today, because the Liberals have a history of problems with sponsorship, as everyone recalls. This is a little like a criminal suggesting a new law to prevent crime. It is quite strange.

Would the Liberal member agree that is it rather ironic that they are criticizing the government, considering that his party was responsible for the sponsorship scandal? Hon. John McCallum : Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for her question on past events that occurred 10 or 12 years ago. Nonetheless, there is something else that happened much more recently and that is the fact that a large number of NDP members did not pay what they owe the government. They used taxpayers' money to pay for partisan expenses.

They broke the rules and they still have not paid what they owe to taxpayers. [ English ] The NDP is no longer the master of virtue vis-à-vis every other party in the House. The NDP should pay its own bills before it starts preaching to the rest of us. Mr. Rodger Cuzner (Cape Breton—Canso, Lib.) : Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments put forward by my colleague from Markham—Unionville. I want to share with him a sense of warning. If the boys in short pants hear they are only reaching 40% of the Canadian electorate with their advertising, they are liable to shovel a little more at it.

The rationale would be that the Conservatives are not spending enough. There is one thing he did not mention, and most people who contact my office talk about this topic. They are most annoyed with the fact that the government, under the current Minister of Public Works , who was with Human Resources and Skills Development at the time, to much fanfare, announced the Canada jobs grant. The government had not talked to the provinces about it. There had been nothing in place, but it took out $3.5 million worth of advertising on the program.

She got shuffled along and a new Minister of Employment and Skills Development. took over. He had to sit down and cobble together some kind of an agreement. In the meantime, $3.5 million were spent on a program that did not exist. It was a ghost program. Has the member heard from his constituents about this colossal waste of taxpayer money on a program that did not exist? Hon. John McCallum : Mr. Speaker, my colleague is certainly right about what he calls the boys and girls in short pants. There is a risk of telling them their spending is ineffective.

What I mean is that they should spend less, but they might take the opposite point of view that if it does not work at $750 million, maybe they need to spend a few billion more of taxpayer money to try to make it do the trick. I am aware of it, although I have not heard from constituents about the case he raises. There are many cases where the government advertises before a program is legal, before it passes the House, before it has spoken to its provincial counterparts. It advertises programs that have not yet been passed into law.

My colleague raises a very good point, but it is just the tip of the iceberg on so many things the Conservatives do. They make huge budget announcements, not in the House. The list goes on and on of the inappropriate behaviour to which they subject themselves. However, the main point today is to get this rule passed so the kind of abuse my colleague has talked about will not happen in the future. Ms. Yvonne Jones (Labrador, Lib.) : Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague from Markham—Unionville for his comments on the bill and for sharing his time with me today.

Obviously he has tremendous insight into what the actions of the government have been when it comes to using taxpayers' money to produce partisan ads in this country. There has been some discussion about whether these ads the Conservative government has taken out in prime time, such as during Super Bowl games and hockey games, work or do not work. In my opinion, a lot of that is irrelevant. The real relevance is that the Conservatives are using taxpayers' money. Should it be permitted to use that money to produce ads that could be seen as partisan by promoting the message of a political party.

I think that is the fundamental piece we need to look at. We also need to look at whether the information in these ads is even correct. We have seen many ads the Conservative government has put out saying that people can access this program or apply under that program knowing that the programs do not even exist. A small asterisk under the ad says “if passed or if approved by Parliament”. Imagine a government taking millions of dollars of taxpayers' money, to the tune of $750 million, to produce ads when some of the ads are advertising programs that are not yet available.

We do not know if they are going to be available. Talk about wasting money. That is what a real waste of taxpayers' money is. Third, not only is the information incorrect, not only is there the partisanship of the ads, but the ads are being used at a time when there are so many other needs in the country. Every single day Canadians are reaching out to the government for better programs and services, for better use of taxpayers' dollars, and for better investments in their communities.

All the while, the government is investing in partisan ads to promote its message at the same time it is cutting other services for Canadians. That is shameful. I am pleased to speak today to the motion and to support it, because our motion calls for the creation of a third-party review process that would vet these ads before they are approved to ensure that they are appropriate, proportional, and a prudent investment of taxpayers' money. For example, do the programs really exist that are going to be advertised to Canadians?

We know that in 2013, Advertising Standards Canada sent a letter to the assistant deputy minister of employment and skills development at the time and indicated that the Conservatives had breached the Canadian Code of Advertising Standards, because they were airing commercials that urged Canadians to apply for the Canada job grant. At that time, the grant did not exist. There were no provinces that had agreed to the potential program. Why was the government advertising for a program that provinces had not signed onto and that was not available to Canadians? In my opinion, it should never have been permitted.

We saw a similar thing take place in Ontario some years ago. Others today have spoken about the Government Advertising Act, which was passed by the McGuinty government in 2004 in Ontario to ensure that these things did not happen. It is evident that we need to be doing something similar in the Parliament of Canada.

(1340) I know that my colleague, the member for Ottawa South , has a bill that is at second reading right now that looks to establish that kind of policy in legislation. I would encourage members to support that as well, because it is necessary. It is necessary to control misleading ads that are going out to the Canadian public and to control the partisanship of ads, because no political party, no matter which one is in government, should be using taxpayers' money for political advertising. That is certainly how this was interpreted when the Conservative government put out those ads.

Let me speak to the other side of it in terms of how a government makes decisions on where money should be invested. We have all seen the ads during the NHL playoff hockey games. I am proud to say that ads by the Liberal Party are paid for by the Liberal Party. They are not paid for by the taxpayers of Canada, the source of revenue for the Government of Canada. No, they are not, unlike the Conservative ads during those games, which have been paid for by taxpayers. I will provide an example. This past year, we have seen the Conservatives spend $130 million to $140 million on advertising campaigns.

We have seen them spend up to $100,000 for one ad during a hockey game. They have spent $750 million on those ads over the last number of years, yet they have cut things like, in my riding, the Institute for Environmental Monitoring and Research, one of the most important groups and institutes in the riding. It did studies on everything for the last number of decades, collecting data in Labrador and looking at all kinds of research on ducks, eagles, moose, caribou, water fowl, rivers, environmental contaminants, all kinds of transatlantic flights, and the impact of 5 Wing Goose Bay on aboriginal culture.

It was one group that looked at vital concerns about the environment in Labrador, and guess what? Shutters were put on their doors in March. It cost a few hundred thousand dollars to operate one of the most important northern institutes that looked at environmental issues, including climate change and the impact on our ecosystems, and the government closed the door on it. It could have paid for it with two ads during a hockey game. That is how sad that is. We have heard the argument from Newfoundland and Labrador about the $400 million it did not receive as part of the CETA deal.

It says it was a commitment, an agreement between two governments, but when the time came to ante up the money, the Government of Canada said no, it was not paying the money to Newfoundland and Labrador. However, it had no issue putting $750 million into ad campaigns. These are the kinds of decisions governments make, and I believe that governments that make decisions to cut programs and services to Canadians and to use the money to promote their own messages and political interests is wrong. They should be ashamed of continuing to do it.

In fact, those ads should probably be assessed, and where partisanship is determined, they should be paying back the money, in my opinion, to the people of the country. That is exactly what they should be doing. They should not get away with these kinds of initiatives. I do not care who is in power; they should not get away with those kinds of initiatives.

As one member of Parliament, I find it very frustrating to lobby for small amounts of money to keep important services in my riding, to keep delivering important services to Canadians, and to not have the fiscal ability to do it because the government in power says that advertising for programs that do not exist is more important than actually providing services to Canadians. That is wrong, and it should be ashamed of itself.

(1345) Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Winnipeg North, Lib.) : Mr. Speaker, I would ask my colleague to recognize that things change in time. Government and NDP members who say that this is the way it has been done in the past make me reflect on the issue of proactive disclosure. When the leader of the Liberal Party indicated that we needed to change things, the Liberal caucus led to changes on proactive disclosure, and both the Conservatives and NDP finally came on board. What we are talking about today is that we need to have a third party in place, because it is in the best interest of taxpayers.

Through that third party, we would be able to distinguish the line, and when something crossed that line, the political party, and not the taxpayer, would foot the bill. As long as it stayed on the fair side of that line, it would be okay to use public tax dollars. The member might want to add some comment on that.

(1350) Ms. Yvonne Jones : Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague, the member for Winnipeg North , for that question. As members know, he is a great debater in the House of Commons. I am sure that this is one piece of legislation he will be very happy to stand and support when we come to the vote. The member is exactly right. It has been the Liberals who have led the way on proactive disclosure in the House of Commons. We were the first party to report all of our budgets, all of our spending, and to provide the details to the public. We are the party that encouraged others in the House of Commons to do the same.

However, we cannot leave the disclosure of taxpayers' money as one small, isolated portion of spending. Disclosure has to be overall, which is why I do not see any problem whatsoever in advertising by the Government of Canada being scrutinized for fairness, prudence, and public interest. When it meets those targets, it is fine, but when it does not, it is an abuse of the government's power. [ Translation ] Mrs. Anne-Marie Day (Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, Quebec's motto is “Je me souviens”, or I remember. We remember the sponsorship scandal. We cannot forget it.

Today's motion moved by the third party seeks, among other things, to make things more transparent. We are not against greater transparency. The current government has spent $750 million on advertising. Does the hon. member think that this motion will rub out the stain on the Liberal Party caused by the sponsorship scandal? [ English ] Ms. Yvonne Jones : Mr. Speaker, I can tell members what it would not do. It would not clear up the waste of public money we have seen by the NDP in recent months. That is very clear.

The purpose of the motion today is to ensure that advertising, no matter what party is in power, is done fairly, without partisanship, and is in the best interest of taxpayers. This is what the motion is asking the House of Commons to vote on. I do not think there is any member in this House who does not want to tell their constituents that the money we spend, the money we are responsible for on behalf of the Government of Canada, is going to be used in their best interest and that it will not be wasted on promoting our own party or on promoting programs that do not yet exist.

The Deputy Speaker : Resuming debate, the hon. member for Yellowhead. I would advise the member that he will have about five and a half minutes before we break for statements. Mr. Jim Eglinski (Yellowhead, CPC) : Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise in the House today to speak in opposition to the motion on government advertising. Mr. Speaker, your hon. predecessors have indicated in prior rulings that the government should be careful that its communication products, particularly its advertisements, do not convey the message that proposed legislation has been passed or will be passed in its current form.

I can assure members that our government has been very vigilant in ensuring that communications materials indicate that new initiatives still before Parliament are proposed or subject to parliamentary approval. There are government policies in place regarding the nature of the advertising the government can undertake. The communications policy is one such policy. It is an extremely robust policy that provides direction to ensure that Canadians receive “timely, accurate...objective and complete information” about the government's “policies, programs, services and initiatives”.

The policy states that in “the Canadian system of parliamentary democracy and responsible government, the government has the duty to explain its policies and decisions, and to inform the public of its priorities for the country.” The policy also helps to ensure the government departments and agencies are “visible, accessible and accountable to the public they serve” and that their communication activities “safeguard Canadians' trust and confidence in the integrity and impartiality of the Public Service of Canada”. The policy has clear standards of accountability.

Its goal “is to ensure that communications are well-coordinated, effectively managed“ and, most notably, “responsive to the diverse information needs” of Canadians. The policy sets out 10 interconnected and interdependent policy commitments based on Canadian and public service values, statutes and regulations. It has 30 policy requirements. It also sets out roles and responsibilities for each institution involved in implementing the policy. Its procedures provide specific directions for advertising, publishing and public opinion research.

I want to take a moment to clarify what the communications policy says with regard to advertising. It clearly states that departments and agencies “may place advertisements...to inform Canadians about their rights or responsibilities, about government policies, programs, services or initiatives, or about dangers or risks to public health, safety or the environment”. It also states that departments and agencies must “ensure advertising campaigns...are aligned with government priorities...themes and messages”. There seems to be a lot of misconception around how government advertising is planned and executed.

Allow me to describe how the process works, fo