Excerpt from National Assembly transcript September 23, 2003

Le Président (M. Ouimet): Alors, nous allons reprendre les travaux de la commission parlementaire. Je vous rappelle que le mandat de la commission est de poursuivre les auditions publiques dans le cadre de la consultation générale à l'égard du projet de loi n° 9, Loi concernant la consultation des citoyens sur la réorganisation territoriale de certaines municipalités.

Hampstead Municipal
and Recreational Association

Et je vois que les représentants du Hampstead Municipal and Recreational Association sont avec nous. Alors, M. Steinberg, je vous demanderais de bien vouloir présenter les gens qui vous accompagnent.

M. Steinberg (William): Thank you for inviting us to present our brief. I'm William Steinberg, president of the Hampstead Municipal and Recreational Association. On my left is Gary Shapiro, our vice-president, and on my right is Doris Steinberg, who is also on our executive board.

Le Président (M. Ouimet): So you have a period of 15 minutes for your presentation, and then we will have exchanges with the parliamentarians.

M. Steinberg (William): O.K. I want to explain why I'm addressing you in English. I have a profound hearing loss which, even with powerful hearing aids, makes it very difficult to hear in English and virtually impossible in any other language. I thank you for your indulgence.

This committee is faced with a choice between two opposing views of how Bill 9 should be modified. On one side you have megamayors who have betrayed the people who elected them. Just as the former PQ Government did, they have confused legality with democracy. These mayors want absurd conditions placed on the public's right to choose their local government or they want the whole process put off for at least two years so it will be far more costly to undo the mergers. For these people, the wishes of 80%, 90% or even 99% of their citizens mean nothing. Their proposals would be laughable if the issue of basic democratic rights were not so serious.

On the other side are ordinary people who have seen the towns in which they've chosen to live ripped away from them in spite of their overwhelming opposition to the forced mergers. For most people the largest investment they will ever make is in their homes. They think long and hard before choosing a community in which to live. To have that choice nullified in such an undemocratic and brutal fashion is unspeakably cruel.

The Québec Liberal Party and the honorable Jean Charest, while the Official Opposition, spoke passionately about this outrage. You are to be commended for keeping your election promises to restore democracy with Bill 9. However, Bill 9 has some flaws, which prevent it from being a full and proper expression of your goals: namely, to allow the citizens of each former town to decide whether or not they wish to have their town back as it was prior to the forced merger.

With regards to the prereferendum registers, it is important to realize that based on the current timetable they will likely be opened in the middle of winter when many of our residents are away on vacation and other elderly citizens find it difficult to go out due to bad weather. Consequently a 10% threshold to trigger a referendum is, in reality, a requirement to get 20% to 30% of the available residents to come out. This is clearly unfair. We suggest that the threshold be set at 2.5% or a maximum of 5% as is the case for virtually all other municipal referenda.

Further, the registers should be located in the former municipality, open for 10 days so that at least one weekend is included, and open from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. A final suggestion is that notice of the dates, times and locations of the registers be placed in every resident's mailbox at least 10 days prior to the registration period. These are perfectly reasonable suggestions and would assure that the will of the people is expressed.

At these hearings the issue of requiring a 50% turnout to make the referendum results valid was raised. This is outrageous. Requiring a minimum voter participation rate gives a veto to those in favor of the megacities. It means that people too lazy or apathetic to vote will be counted as being against demergers. Dead people who are still on the electoral list, people who have moved, people on vacation, people too sick to come out and vote, all will be counted as being against demerging. Is this fair? A 50% participation rate requirement is identical to requiring 50% to sign the register on a single day instead of over five or 10 days. Is this fair?

Having any type of participation rate requirement will have the perverse effect of reducing the voter turnout since not voting will be the best strategy for those opposed to demergers. If they suspect that they will lose the vote, as the polls indicate will happen in most of the merged cities, then the best strategy will be to stay home.

If a 50% participation rate requirement had been in effect for the 1995 sovereignty referendum, the turnout would have dropped from 94% to 47% as the people in favor of keeping Canada and Québec would have stayed home. Would that have been fair?

Already the process is biased against those who wish to demerge. First we need to get a sufficient number of people to sign a register. Then there are studies that will be influenced by the people in power, the megamayors. Finally, there will be a referendum where one side will use our tax dollars to fight against what we want, namely, to get our cities back. And now the suggestion of an unheard of minimum participation rate requirement is raised.

•(16 h 10)•

However, if this committee truly believes that a 50% participation rate is necessary for referenda involving significant changes then, on the same day that you pass Bill 9, pass a law about future sovereignty referenda requiring the same 50% participation rate. Surely taking Québec out of Canada is a far more significant change than taking Hampstead out of Montréal.

In your deliberations on how to improve Bill 9, you must consider both ethical and pragmatic issues. Ethically, you are bound to keep your preelection promises. On the practical side, no one wants to see a Swiss cheese Montréal. We are certain that Hampstead, Montréal West, Baie-d'Urfé, Westmount, Pointe-Claire and several other former municipalities will meet even a high requirement because we are very well organized and the anger against the forced mergers remains extremely high. However, some of our neighboring towns are less organized, even though the sentiment for demerger is just as high. Recent polls show that over 80% of the cities on the island of Montréal would demerge if a referendum were held today. The citizens in these towns will be mad as hell if they are denied the right to have a referendum because of an unfairly difficult standard. This will lead to social unrest and the Swiss cheese Montréal that we all want to avoid.

Bill 9 is about more than just the process leading to demerger. It also addresses how powers and tax revenues will be shared between the reconstituted municipalities and the central city. Our opponents say that defusion equals confusion or as Robert Libman, the former Mayor of Côte-Saint-Luc and, in the distant past, a fierce critic of the forced mergers, says: «It will be a black hole.» The mantra of Mayor Tremblay and Mr. Libman is that: «You won't get your cities back the way they used to be». This is an enormous exaggeration since demerged towns will be a lot closer to what we used to have than what we now have in mega Montréal or even under Mayor Tremblay's so-called decentralization plan. Nevertheless, Bill 9 does not completely fulfill the election promises to give us back our towns with the same powers as they used to have.

A couple of weeks ago, I spoke to the head of Public Works in the Hampstead sector of our borough about those Defusion equals Confusion stickers which have appeared on municipal vehicles. He told me that it is a cat and mouse game. They remove the stickers and the unionized employees put them back on. He told me that when Hampstead had 15 Public Works employees, they were easy to control, but now with over 7000 in the union it is impossible. The lime green fire trucks are another example of the new, much more powerful unions doing whatever they please, even if it reduces safety and security in our communities. We could list numerous examples of how our community is worse off since being merged into Montréal.

Bill 9 lists several services which will be administered by the central city but which will be billed to the demerged towns. Some of these clearly are better handled locally. In particular, when we ran the fire department, there were no lime green fire trucks and no fire hoses full of holes. As for garbage collection and recycling, we should be the ones to determine the frequency of collections and what, if any, rules about putting out the garbage should apply, not some distant central city bureaucrats. It is equally absurd to have local municipal courts run by a central city when the courts will rule on local bylaws.

As to the other services, they could be administered by the central city, but the charges must be based on the demerged towns' usage of those services. If a fair cost cannot be negotiated, the towns must have the right to opt out and control locally any services that they wish. Failing that, Bill 9 should mandate binding arbitration based on the true cost to deliver the services. If Bill 9 does not incorporate one of these two proposals, then we will have taxation without representation, as many political commentators have already noted.

Finally, there is the issue of equalization payments. If the intention is to redistribute the wealth, then that is best left to the income tax system, which is fairer than using property taxes that penalize house rich but income poor seniors. However, if the intention is to have towns in the Greater Montréal region help with the costs of central Montréal, because these towns derive benefits from their proximity to Montréal, then the payments must apply to all municipalities in the region, including those on the North and South Shores. After all, many South Shore towns are closer to downtown Montréal than many West Island municipalities.

The present formula in Bill 9 only applies to towns on the island of Montréal and it is based on house evaluations. This is terribly unfair. A fair formula would apply to all Montréal region municipalities and be based on distance to downtown Montréal. For example, Hampstead is closer than most other towns. We would be happy to pay more as long as property valuations are not in the formula and as long as towns on the North and South Shores share the burden.

Before the last election, the Québec Liberal Party made a solemn promise to restore democracy and fairness to the electorate. We believed you and voted for you. Don't make a mockery of that promise by putting so many obstacles in our path that the will of the people cannot be expressed. We thank you for your kind attention and we welcome your questions.

Le Président (M. Ouimet): Merci, M. Steinberg, thank you very much for your presentation. Je vais maintenant céder la parole au ministre. Je ne sais pas, je veux juste régler une question d'intendance, est-ce que madame va agir à titre de traductrice ou d'interprète pour vous, M. Steinberg?

Une voix:...

Le Président (M. Ouimet): Oui? Très bien. Alors, M. le ministre, s'il y avait des problèmes de communication, faites-moi signe. M. le ministre.

M. Fournier: Merci, M. le Président. M. Steinberg, madame, monsieur, merci d'être avec nous pour venir nous donner votre point de vue. De mon côté, je vais profiter de la séance à laquelle nous participons pour vous donner aussi mon point de vue et quelques informations qui, me semble-t-il, sont pertinentes non seulement au débat d'aujourd'hui, mais au débat qui s'ouvre jusqu'à la prochaine consultation.

Premier élément qu'il est important de noter, you want to have your city back as it was. That is what you say. I think it's important for me to tell you what was the engagement that we have taken. At the same time, maybe we could refer to the group that preceded you, that recalled us the words used by Mr. Charest during the debate or during the campaign.

Ces mots, qui forment le cadre de notre projet de loi, je dirais qu'il y en a deux: consultation, agglomération. Et, autour de ces deux mots, vous retrouvez le projet de loi. Et il y aura une consultation, et il y aura des services d'agglomération, il y aura une fiscalité d'agglomération. Et, comme il a été dit avant le vote, il n'y aura pas de retour en arrière au statu quo ante. Il y aura une nouvelle situation.

En aucun temps on peut prétendre que l'engagement signifiait de retourner en arrière, tel que c'était avant. C'est une possibilité pour les citoyens de choisir leur organisation politique dans un cadre qui va toujours respecter le fait ? ici, on le prend pour Montréal, on peut regarder ailleurs, mais pour Montréal ? le fait qu'il y a là une agglomération que nous voulons forte et qui sera forte, d'autant plus forte qu'elle bénéficiera de l'appui démocratique de ses citoyens grâce à une consultation. Ça me semble important de vous dire que le jour du vote, si vote il y a, chez vous ou ailleurs, ce ne sera pas ? ce ne sera pas ? pour retourner dans l'état préexistant.

Le projet de loi n° 9 est assez clair sur les services d'agglomération. Grâce à de nombreux témoignages, il sera encore plus clair lorsqu'il aura fait l'objet de débats à l'Assemblée nationale, parce que ce que nous cherchons, c'est qu'il soit suffisamment précis pour que nous puissions donner toute l'information en termes de coûts, notamment, que cela représente d'être à l'intérieur de la nouvelle ville ou d'être sorti de la nouvelle ville. Donc, si on veut être logiques et justes avec notre idée et engagement de consultation, nous croyons qu'il doit s'accompagner d'un échange d'information le plus grand. Et je pense que c'est mon devoir de vous dire aujourd'hui que je ne partage pas votre point de vue à l'effet que l'engagement était un retour en arrière dans l'état préexistant.

Ceci étant dit, vous nous avez parlé des registres, on en a entendu parler tantôt. La loi, en ce moment, prévoit pour une municipalité comme la vôtre un taux de participation de 10 % au registre «for one day». That's the law. On arrive avec un projet de loi qui parle de cinq jours. Dites-moi en quoi il y a là un bris à une ouverture pour une consultation.

• (16 h 20) •

M. Steinberg (William): O.K. If I understand, why should the registers be open for five to 10 days when other registers have been open for only one day? Well, in Hampstead, registers were open for a week and registers required just 2.5% of the citizens to sign. So there may be some others that required... that were open for only one day but they certainly didn't require 10% to sign. As far as I know, the vast majority of registers that are open in municipalities have a requirement of only 2.5%, at the most 5%.

Now, if you are going to go with 10%, then obviously the registers have to be open for a longer time. How long? It depends on a number of factors. How many registers will there be? How accessible will they be? Will they be in the former municipalities or in some more central location? Will they be open for 12 hours a day or only a few hours a day? You have to take everything into consideration in determining what is fair. We've highlighted... I mean, the worst thing is the 10%. If you go down from 10% to 21/2 or 5%, then perhaps it does not have to be open for 10 days, maybe five days is enough. But a single day looks like you're stacking the deck, and you don't want to look like you're stacking the deck.

M. Fournier: I'm sorry but I don't want you to think that we are against consultation, but to some extent you are saying things that are maybe not true. In the law, the actual law that applied to you, the number that you... or the percentage that you should have is 10% for one day. That's the law. If we apply the law as it is today in the Bill 9, it will be 10% for one day. If you're more than 20 000 in a city, if there's more than 20 000 persons, it's 2.5%, but that is not your case. And the only thing that we are saying here is it's around 10% for your situation and it's one day. So that's the question. I'm just telling you that... We want to be clear here. I don't want you to go back and say that we tried to close the door to consultation. I think that we are opening a door so that people can sign and, after that, there will be a referendum, if they sign, if they are enough.

L'autre point qui m'étonne et sur lequel je voudrais avoir des précisions, l'autre groupe qui vous a précédés a aussi abordé cette question-là, celle des études d'impact. Et je comprends de votre mémoire qu'au niveau des études d'impact vous ne souhaitez pas que le gouvernement intervienne. En fait, j'ai même compris que vous ne souhaitez pas d'étude d'impact parce que, selon vous, elle serait contredite. Dans tout débat politique, il y a toujours au minimum deux côtés et parfois beaucoup plus. Cela ne devrait pas, me semble-t-il, nous empêcher d'essayer de donner le plus d'information possible. Donc, je cherche à comprendre quel est le sens de votre position sur le désir qu'il n'y ait pas d'étude d'impact ou à tout le moins que le gouvernement n'y soit pas partie.

Le Président (M. Ouimet): M. Shapiro.

M. Shapiro (Gary): Thank you. I guess there is a reason why we are sitting on different sides of the table. We're trying to get back what we had. What was taken away from us was taken away from us undemocratically, without impact studies. The city of Montréal was not able to function with the resources that they had, so they needed additional revenues from the suburbs. Bigger is not better. We are put in the position where we have to defend our democratic rights but, in reality, our rights were taken away from us.

The town of Hampstead held a referendum themselves. I believe the voters' participation was approximately 50%, and we had 98.5% against forced mergers. So where is democracy in that case?

That is what we hear: to get back to where we were, to the best of the ability. We understand we won't be able to get back to 100%. But right now we have next to no control over our services, over our recreation, and we would like to get back to what we had, to the best extent possible.

Le Président (M. Ouimet): Merci.

M. Steinberg (William): Also, with respect to... Do we want the Government to conduct impact studies? Yes, we... Well, there are two possibilities as we've mentioned in our brief, not in the presentation but in the brief. You could do impact studies, and we wouldn't have a terrible problem with that, as long as they are unbiased. But that's tricky. People are going to say: It's biased one way, it's biased the other way. As it is, there are studies that have already been done. Lawrence Poitras held a study that showed that demergers will not be very costly, that taxes will go down for both the core city and the newly reconstituted municipalities, services would be better all around, and so on. You can do more studies, if they're not biased, we have no objection to that. On the other hand, it's undoubtedly true that both sides on the referendum issue are going to do their own studies. So whether it's necessary for the Government to undertake that expense, well, we don't really have a strong opinion, as far as that goes.

Le Président (M. Ouimet): Très bien. Merci. Nous allons maintenant aller du côté de l'opposition. Mme la députée de Bourget.

Mme Lemieux: Merci, M. le Président. M. Steinberg, madame, M. Shapiro. M. Shapiro, tout à l'heure, il y a quelques minutes, vous avez dit, et je voudrais bien vous comprendre, vous avez dit: L'ancienne ville de Montréal n'avait pas tous les moyens, toutes les ressources, tous les outils pour assumer ses responsabilités. C'est ce que je comprends? C'est votre propos?

Le Président (M. Ouimet): Oui, M. Shapiro.

M. Shapiro (Gary): Well, if I understand correctly, the city of Montréal, I will not go so far as to say that they were bankrupt, but they were having trouble managing a big city. If you can't run a fair-sized city like it was, how would you expect to run even a bigger city? I am not a believer in bigger is better. I do not believe that our society will be better because we have Wal-Mart's taking away the corner store. You've taken away the identity of the town of Hampstead, you've taken away the will of the aspiring politician who would get involved on a town council, on a school committee and work his way up and maybe one day be so lucky to be an MNA. Right now, you've cut off so many of these different towns that the upward mobility for any aspiring politician doesn't exist.

M. Steinberg (William): Even our currently elected borough councilors, who seem to be either sitting on the fence or in favor of the megacities, have told me that it's impossible. The bureaucracy is running the town. Whereas when we had our small towns, be they Côte-Saint-Luc, or Hampstead, or Montréal West, the politicians made the decisions and ran things, now, in the megacity, what I'm being told, the bureaucracy runs everything, and the politicians have very little control.

I know the argument for the megacities was: you have economies of scales. But I also know that there are studies that show the ideal size for a town is about 50 000 people. Beyond that, instead of getting economies of scale, what you get is you lose all your volunteers because the city is too big, there's no sense of community and, as a result, the work that those unpaid volunteers did now is paid for... now requires costly unionized employees.

You certainly lose your ability to call up your town councillor. In Hampstead, I could call up any of the seven representatives anytime I wanted and get them that evening. In Montréal, now that we have three representatives instead of 21 for our three towns, obviously, they're ridiculously overworked, and that's what they tell me themselves.

• (16 h 30) •

Bigger simply means more inefficiencies, more bureaucracy and more distance from the people.

Le Président (M. Ouimet): Merci.

Mme Lemieux: Est-ce que... Donc, je comprends que vous avez d'énormes doutes sur l'idée d'une très grande ville. Est-ce que ça veut dire que vous seriez prêts, au nom d'une plus grande efficacité de Montréal, à séparer Montréal en deux ou trois territoires?

Le Président (M. Ouimet): M. Shapiro.

M. Shapiro (Gary): Yes. If I may, I don't think that is the question. What we want is we want our towns back, and, I believe, with consultation, anything is possible. You might be 100% right, maybe three sectors would be great or maybe it'd be four or six. The point is: not by doing it through forced mergers, by doing it through consultation.

Le Président (M. Ouimet): Mme la députée.

Mme Lemieux: Oui, merci. Vous seriez confortables à l'idée d'une consultation qui mènerait à deux ou trois, vous dites, peut-être même ça peut être un scénario de six villes, mais, par exemple, un scénario qui ferait en sorte qu'il y aurait des concentrations linguistiques? Vous croyez que ce serait profitable pour Montréal?

Le Président (M. Ouimet): M. Shapiro.

M. Shapiro (Gary): If she can just repeat the last part of the question, please.

Mme Lemieux: Est-ce que vous croyez que... Par exemple, supposons qu'il y avait une consultation sur un modèle quelconque pour organiser Montréal. Si les gens signifient qu'ils voudraient avoir une ville basée, entre autres, sur une concentration linguistique, où il y a plus de francophones, où il y a plus d'allophones, où il y a plus d'anglophones, pensez-vous que c'est une bonne chose pour Montréal?

Le Président (M. Ouimet): M. Steinberg, après, M. Shapiro.

M. Shapiro (Gary): If I may? First of all, this consultation that you're referring to should have taken place before the forced mergers. Consultations should always take place prior to.

In terms of your specific question, I think that is definitely inappropriate as a question. I don't think that any free country should be divided upon linguistic territories, and I firmly believe in a bilingual province, in a bilingual country and a bilingual city.

In some cases, municipalities are concerned about losing their bilingual status. No one is looking for unilingual English status. We would just like to maintain bilingual status whether you have 40% individuals, anglophones, or you have 75%. I'm a firm believer in bilingualism, and I don't think anything should be forced on individuals.

And, to answer your question: Definitely not... not be linguistic divides within the city. We are working together in a city, in a province. Just because we live in the town of Hampstead and we've chosen to live in the town of Hampstead doesn't mean that we're not proud of the city of Montréal. We're all very proud of the city of Montréal. We want the city of Montréal to succeed, and we all do pay a large portion of our taxes to the city of Montréal.

Le Président (M. Ouimet): Mr Steinberg, do you want to add on that?

M. Steinberg (William): No, it's O.K. Gary handled that point.

Le Président (M. Ouimet): O.K. Très bien. Mme la députée de Bourget.

Mme Lemieux: Bien, peut-être une dernière question. Vous représentez The Hampstead Municipal and Recreational Association. Pouvez-vous nous parler un peu de cette Association. Qu'est-ce qu'il s'y passe? Comment ça s'organise? Est-ce que vous avez des membres? Avez-vous des services? Enfin, comment ça fonctionne.

M. Steinberg (William): We chose that name only because we wanted to take a former association that existed and restart it with a dual goal. On one hand, our primary mission is to get our town back and that's stated in our by-laws. But, secondly, since we did not know whether or not the Liberals would get elected and whether this process would be put in place, we wanted to ensure that the quality of life that we had in Hampstead could be maintained to the best of our ability, even within a borough where we're just one part of a borough, which, in turn, is part of Montréal. Obviously, not the ideal situation, but we had a twofold mission because we had no way of knowing who was going to win the next election.

Mme Lemieux: Ça va pour moi, pour l'instant.

Le Président (M. Ouimet): Merci, Mme la députée. M. le ministre.

M. Fournier: Je pense que c'est M. Shapiro qui parlait de ça tantôt: s'il y avait eu une consultation avant de faire les fusions forcées. Imaginons qu'on retourne dans le temps. Le gouvernement précédent envisage de faire un regroupement de toutes les villes de l'île de Montréal et fait une consultation sur l'ensemble de l'île de Montréal. Est-ce que vous auriez exigé qu'il y ait des règles spéciales de consultation, d'expression de la démocratie, considérant que vous n'êtes pas la majorité à Hampstead sur l'île de Montréal? Donc, la volonté des autres aurait pu vous être imposée s'il y avait eu une consultation comme celle-là. Est-ce que vous auriez exigé... pour qu'il y ait une légitimité à la démarche d'un tel référendum à la grandeur de l'île, auriez-vous exigé des règles particulières de consultation?

M. Shapiro (Gary): Consultation obviously provides an opportunity for all sides to be heard and all points of view to be heard. If we all weren't living in a selfish society, everybody would want what's good for them, but, at some point in time, you do have to look at the bigger picture. I am quite sure that Hampstead would not have stood alone in their disagreement with a merger, whether or not it be forced, whether it was a recommended merger, and Hampstead would have stood with, I'm sure, dozens of other municipalities to make their positions known.

If other municipalities were not in agreement, that'd be one thing. But, as you know, from polls and so forth, most of the municipalities were against a forced merger. Maybe with proper consultation and maybe if it was done a little bit more sugar-and- honey, maybe you could have convinced some people that the merger was better.

M. Fournier: Si je peux juste répéter ma question. L'hypothèse que je soumets, c'est qu'il y a eu un référendum à la grandeur de l'île, et la ville, l'ancienne ville de Montréal, étant majoritaire en termes de population, aurait donc pu, si ça avait été la volonté très, très large des citoyens de l'ancienne ville de Montréal, choisir et influencer pour qu'il n'y ait qu'une ville sur toute l'île de Montréal même si Hampstead et d'autres avaient décidé, chacun dans leur secteur respectif, de ne pas voter dans ce sens-là.

Ce que je cherche à... Ce que je veux vous demander, c'est une hypothèse. Je veux que nous discutions ensemble sur les règles de consultation. Dans le cas où on consulte toute l'île de Montréal ou Montréal elle-même, le secteur Montréal, appelons-le comme ça, est majoritaire et peut donc, par sa volonté, imposer des choses aux autres. Et je vous demande: dans ce cas-là, doit-on avoir des règles particulières de consultation lorsque, dans une telle consultation, un groupe impose sa volonté aux autres?

M. Shapiro (Gary): The only thing I do not understand from your hypothesis is why should the city of Montréal ? the former city of Montréal ? have any vote or right in terms of deciding whether or not we should lose our rights as towns.

If you consulted with all the former municipalities and towns, there might be some logic there. And, if the vote was taken in that regard with the ? I think there are ? 27 former municipalities, it might make sense. But the city of Montréal should not have a vote as to whether or not I should have... lose my rights and they should take our money and tax dollars.

M. Fournier: Je... je...

Le Président (M. Ouimet): Malheureusement, M. le ministre, l'enveloppe de temps est tout à fait épuisée.

M. Fournier: Dommage.

Le Président (M. Ouimet): No more time, Mr. Steinberg. But... Nous allons aller du côté de l'opposition. Mme la députée de Bourget, il reste 6 min 30 s. Mme la députée de Rosemont, pardon.

Mme Dionne-Marsolais: Merci, M. le Président. Je vais continuer dans le sens de la question du ministre, parce que je pense qu'elle est intéressante.

Il y a eu une élection à Montréal et il y a eu un maire qui a été élu. Est-ce que vous reconnaissez la légitimité du maire de Montréal, aujourd'hui?

O.K. What I'm saying is there has been an election in Montréal. There was a mayor who was elected. Do you recognize that he's the legitimate mayor for Montréal?

Le Président (M. Ouimet): M. Steinberg.

M. Steinberg (William): Well, we recognize that, legally, he is the mayor of Montréal. Do I have any respect for someone who said one thing when he was running for office and does totally another thing later? I mean, Mayor Tremblay said very clearly, and it's in his platform, well-documented, that he would in no way stand in the way of a demerger process if the Liberal Government... if the Liberals got into power. And, then, in the middle of the election campaign, he comes out and he says: Give up your election promises, it's no good. Now, to me, that's a betrayal. So, of course, I recognize him as the mayor of Montréal. But that's as far as it goes.

• (16 h 40) •

Mme Dionne-Marsolais: You seem to have very little faith in any elected official and even in the process that we are currently participating in. You state in your opening remarks that you applaud the Government for honoring its promise to allow merged municipalities to regain municipal status where the citizens desire it.

You heard the Minister, as we did. He said the status quo was not on his agenda. What's your reaction to that? What if you don't get your city back as you had it before? Aside from the fact that you do not have trust in anybody that, I don't know, doesn't share your view, what happens?

Le Président (M. Ouimet): M. Steinberg ou Shapiro? M. Shapiro.

M. Shapiro (Gary): Just to answer, I... twice, you've stated that we have no respect for elected officials. I have no idea where you got that.

Mme Dionne-Marsolais: Well...

M. Shapiro (Gary): Nowhere was that stated. We're here, we appreciate the fact that we are here, and I do not understand where you're deriving that statement.

Mme Dionne-Marsolais: Let me correct. Your comments in... page 2 for instance, you say: «The actions of Montréal Mayor Tremblay, who promised not to block any process to allow former municipalities to demerge and then publicly urged the [...] Liberal Party to abandon its election promises show that the good faith of our current municipal political leaders can not be assumed.» Let's talk about good faith, then, instead of talking about trust.

My point is: You heard the Minister say that the «statu quo»... the status quo is not on his agenda. So, what's your reaction to that decision? What's your reaction? We are here. You have a commitment from the... from people in a political campaign that said ? at least, that's what you quote ? «that they would allow merged municipalities to regain municipal status where the citizens desire it». And, now, we're working on a bill that tries to establish a means to dialogue. Do you have a plan b? Do you have an alternative or do you just want your city back?

Le Président (M. Ouimet): Mr. Shapiro... Mr. Steinberg.

M. Steinberg (William): O.K. First of all, you have to distinguish between respect for politicians who keep their promises and those who don't. We have the greatest respect for Jean Charest. He has been criticized recently for keeping his election promises. This is the most absurd thing I've ever heard of. I have never heard a politician criticized for keeping his promises. But that is what Mr. Charest has been criticized for. I have the greatest respect for him because he is keeping his promises. But, no, I have no respect for politicians who say one thing to get elected and another after they get into power.

Now, you say we don't have any faith in this process. That's not true. We have a lot of faith in this process. We are simply highlighting the potential pitfalls of some of the things that are in Bill 9 as tabled. We think there are some ways in which it can and should be improved. But we certainly have no problem with the overall theme of Bill 9, namely consulting the citizens, letting us sign registers, having impact studies, letting us vote in a referendum and, then, abiding by the results of that referendum. We have no problem with that. We have problems with some specifics.

M. Shapiro (Gary): If I may...

M. Steinberg (William): Oh! And, as for the cities never being the same, that we'll never go back to the status quo, well, of course, we'll never go back to the status quo, unless all the merged municipalities demerge. If all of them demerge, it's quite possible to go back to the status quo. But we can't assume that that's going to happen. Now, based on the polls, some will remain merged, some will demerge. So, we can't have exactly the same structures, the same MUC as we used to have. There have to be some differences. But there's absolutely no reason why Hampstead can't go back to being almost identical to what we used to have. And I don't think anyone has said anything differently on that side.

Le Président (M. Ouimet): In less than 15 seconds, Mr. Shapiro.

M. Shapiro (Gary): If I may, I appreciate the fact that consultation is in the works. I think the issue that we cannot forget is: timeliness is very important. Because the longer we stay the way we are now, the more risk we have of having difficulty in undoing it. I'd much rather have everyone demerge and have a consultation, whether it takes six months or six years, and do it properly and not do it to the detriment of all the municipalities.

Le Président (M. Ouimet): Très bien. Alors, M. Steinberg, M. Shapiro, je vous remercie. Thank you for your participation. Thank you, Mrs. Steinberg, for acting as a translator for the purposes of this commission. Thank you very much.