Bill C-14 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Canada Post Corporation Act

This enactment amends the Canada Post Corporation Act to modify the exclusive privilege of the Canada Post Corporation so as to permit letter exporters to collect letters in Canada for transmittal and delivery outside Canada.

Canada Post

[Patrick Brown, Conservative, Barrie, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in addition, I have a petition from 134 constituents in regard to Bill C-14 and their concerns with regard to the deregulation of Canada Post.

Canada Post Corporation Act

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I have to say from the outset that we oppose the principle of Bill C-14.

As we know, this bill seeks to deprive the Canada Post Corporation of its exclusive privilege with respect to letters intended for delivery outside of Canada.

We are surprised that an advisory committee was recently set up, in April 2008, to review this issue. The committee is going to table its report in December 2008. Therefore, this bill seems premature at this point.

Why was that committee established? Why is the government introducing this legislation? As the member for Abbotsford wondered, why is the government implementing both measures at the same time?

It seems incredible that the government would decide to set up an advisory committee, but would not take the time to listen to it. The government has decided to draft its own legislation, because its ideology is well established and its principles are very clear: it only thinks about the private sector; the rest is no good.

Incidentally, I was surprised to hear the member for Abbotsford say, somewhat naively, that we would lose 10,000 jobs in one fell swoop. At no time did he think or say that, among these 10,000 jobless people, perhaps 9,000 would go to Canada Post. And why not, if there is a need? If 10,000 people are working in remailing companies, it means that a need exists.

It is certainly possible that some of the offices in communities close to the United States would move there. This does not mean though—and the advisory committee will enlighten us on this—that when the mail leaves the United States, Canada Post will agree to deliver mail posted in Hong Kong, for example, at a quarter of the cost of posting it here. It certainly would not bother Hong Kong to put stamps on it because all they do is put it back in the boxes and away it goes. When it only costs a quarter of the price, they laugh their heads off. When the mail arrives here, though, Canadian Post Corporation has to deliver it without getting anything in return.

These consultations should also make it possible to assess the situation of Canadian mail that is turned over to a foreign postal system, that is to say, how it will be delivered. These are things that the advisory committee will surely study, although the government does not want to wait for it.

We are convinced that if Canada Post were to lose the exclusive privilege it currently enjoys, its revenues would be endangered because, contrary to what was just said, remailing would grow exponentially. Even little things within Canada would be affected, and this would have dire consequences. It is unrealistic to think there would not be any repercussions because mail delivery would be re-organized in rural areas. There would certainly be a second-class delivery system because revenues would decline.

Earlier, someone mentioned that Canada Post has been making fabulous amounts of money. It should be said, though, that this is a very recent development. We feel that this is a very ill-advised bill at a time when Canada Post is starting to make money, and deservedly so. We should remember that the money it makes produces a dividend that goes directly to the government. The government does not put this money in the bank or in its pockets but redistributes it to Canadians in general through the services it provides.

Rather than having a dividend flow back to the government to the benefit of all, some people want one or two or three individuals to make money and pocket it. That is the difference between the private sector and the public sector.

The post office is currently a public service. We fail to see why private enterprise should make money and redistribute it outside Canada instead of our government redistributing it inside Canada to meet the needs of Canadians and investing it in various services. The surpluses that Canada Post generates could be used for this purpose. We would not want to see too many surpluses. What is most important to us is high quality mail delivery in Canada.

I represent a rural riding and I see the extent to which the quality of services provided in rural communities is being threatened. Small post offices are being closed. In my own municipality, the post office has not closed yet. Why? I have been told that there were some rather important people in the riding, for which I am glad, who are able to get Canada Post to bend. Post offices were the traditional, cultural gathering place for people to meet, to pick up their mail and to have a chat. It is too bad they are being closed. It is not the Internet that is doing this. It is the desire to make as much profit as possible and keep fewer and fewer post offices open. Today, delivery to rural mailboxes is threatened because of safety. We agree that some roadside mailboxes were not safe for letter carriers. We agree on that. But to say that two thirds of the boxes in Quebec will be eliminated is going a bit too far.

There is something that has not been grasped here. One imagines that they want to save money like this so they can make a company even more profitable for private enterprise when it gets privatized. A little earlier, there was talk about Atomic Energy of Canada. The intention is to privatize everything. They want to privatize the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. All of this because of the dogmatic principle that it is more profitable, which is totally false. They are forgetting that the money that goes to the government gets redistributed to everyone and not merely to two or three people.

In 1981, the federal government gave the new postal authority the autonomy it needed to adopt business objectives that would allow its services to be self-funding. That is why I said a moment ago that Canada Post has not always been profitable. It has only been profitable for a few years. If it is profitable now, why are they so bent on eliminating so many rural mailboxes? It seems that it is precisely to cut back letter carriers’ delivery times, so that mail can be consolidated in a few locations.

A moment ago I was going to say that this hurts private enterprise. A rural mailbox is not used only by Canada Post, it is also used for commercial delivery of leaflets, advertising and local newspapers. Those people will no longer have anywhere to leave that kind of mail, which is often very bulky, if there are no more mailboxes. Someone will tell me that they need only send it through Canada Post and that way it will end up in the community mailboxes, the green boxes. Well no, because often the postage for that much mail, the kind of volume that the weekend advertising flyers or daily newspapers represent, would cost so much that people would not be able to pay for it.

On the other side of the House they were talking about job losses. Taking away rural mailboxes is going to result in jobs being lost.

What about older people who can not get out any further than the end of the road to pick up their mail? I have some of those people in my riding. They get out once a week when their son or daughter or a neighbour takes them to do their errands. As a result of this system, they get their mail once a week. That is really inhuman and unthinkable.

Why did someone think of putting the mail into boxes mounted on posts in front of people’s homes? Because, in the country, people are far from each other and because it was a good system. Often, a mail box could be moved a few metres—at the most, 30, 40 or 50 metres—and the box would no longer be a danger, since it would not be on the edge of the road. Or, the mailbox could be put on the other side of the road.

I made the rounds with some people from Canada Post who told me that if the box were on the other side, people would have to cross the street. However, they prefer to force them into automobiles to drive to a community mailbox, in a place that is often just as dangerous, in order to collect their mail. We see very clearly that their arguments are convoluted and give no assurance that they will provide the same quality of service as they did previously. It is all to ensure that Canada Post makes the most money possible so that they can sell this crown corporation at the highest price.

At present, despite all of Canada Post’s profits, this corporation quite properly still provides the equivalent of $60 million in free postal service to Parliament and the military. Often, it is the only way for members to keep in touch with their fellow citizens. Many of our voters do not buy a newspaper or watch the news on television, but when we mail them a pamphlet, they read it. This service is open to everyone in the House. That $60 million per year is money very well spent. If it were privatized, that might be something we would lose.

It goes all over the country. It is an extraordinary service. There are also services for the blind and other services that deliver to the far north at the same price. That is something very important in our country: to be able to provide the same quality of service to everybody at the same price. Just because someone lives far out in the country does not mean that it should be different. People are useful in the country. If you are a farmer, you should be able to correspond with all the other people and receive things from other people at the same price.

In my view, the purpose of this bill is to prepare for privatization, not to protect jobs in Canada. Those jobs would be saved in any event. Canada Post would open new buildings and get them back that way.

A few years ago, Canada Post initiated legal proceedings against several remailers. Earlier, someone said there were never any problems. Not so, the dispute has been going on for years. Between the proceedings and the appeals, the issue was brought before several courts. We know how long this all takes. In every instance, the courts upheld Canada Post's interpretation of the act, under which it has an exclusive privilege.

This exclusive privilege ought to be maintained, and the committee that was put in place must be allowed to review the issue and report back to us. Should we ever happen upon an appropriate middle course in the legislation, we will take it. Currently, I believe that Bill C-14 is really far from meeting our expectations regarding a universal postal service for all Canadians.

In fact, the Ontario court ruled in 2004 that section 14 of the Canada Post Corporation Act gives the corporation the exclusive privilege of collecting mail. It was first determined in 2002, then confirmed in 2004, and again in 2005, not to mention that the court of appeal for Ontario upheld the interpretation of the Canadian legislation. Proceedings have been underway for several years, seven or eight years maybe. Over a 20-year period, it is fair to say that there have been proceedings underway half of the time. We have heard that there had never been any problems in 20 years. Sorry, but there have been problems for the past eight years.

This is an attempt to deregulate the market, but the Conservatives would like us to believe that this is not deregulation.

What is their conception of deregulation, if they claim that this is not deregulation? When something is rigid, when it is dismantled and when everyone can get their hands in the cookie jar, we think it is because deregulation has just occurred. The government lets those hands get in the cookie jar. Until then, that was not allowed. This is what deregulation is about. At least, it seems to me that this is what it is. Otherwise, I did not understand how people get their hands on the cookies.

The Bloc Québécois feels that before restricting or eliminating the exclusive privilege of Canada Post, the government should conduct a public and rather exhaustive review of the issue, and not simply decide whether we are in favour or opposed to private business, as we hear in this House. We must also assess the impact on the requirement to provide a universal and affordable public service. That is the whole issue.

If we privatize and sell Canada Post, postal rates will no longer be controlled by the government. They will be controlled by private enterprise, and we know what the consequences of that have been in other areas. Private businesses apply various rates and keep increasing them. They obviously do not deliver mail in the far north, or in small remote communities, for the same rate.

Canada Post is making money. With operating profits amounting to $300 million, as someone said earlier, the corporation pays income tax as well as a dividend. This is a money-making operation for Canada. Of course, companies would also pay income tax, but we all know that people would not have a hard time avoiding it.

We have to assess how a legislative change like this one would directly or indirectly affect the financial viability of the Canada Post Corporation and its ability to keep providing a universal, affordable service. Universal because it is everywhere and affordable because it is provided at a reasonable cost. It is not at all clear that this would be the case if things change.

The Canada Post Corporation must also devise a plan to ensure the survival of its rural service. There is a reason the corporation is trying to get rid of roadside mailboxes and has closed almost all small post offices. In response to an inquiry by the minister responsible, the Canada Post Corporation said that such an operation costs between $475 million and $640 million over more than five years.

The corporation needs money to carry out these transformations. It is not news to anyone here that the corporation is moving toward full automation for mail sorting, and when that happens, major changes will take place. These changes are already in the works, and we believe that the government needs to take control of the changes that are about to happen, not leave it up to private enterprise.

I would like to propose an amendment to the motion for second reading of Bill C-14. I move, seconded by the member for Richmond—Arthabaska:

That the motion be amended by deleting all the words after the word “That” and substituting the following:

Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Canada Post Corporation Act, be not now read a second time, but that it be read a second time this day six months hence.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague does have it right. This is about protecting 10,000 Canadian jobs in Vancouver, in Toronto, which is where he is from, and in Montreal. Our Conservative government is standing up for those jobs. Unfortunately, we have NDP members saying no, that those jobs are not important. Shame on them.

We want to ensure that we have representatives across the country standing up for Canadians and speaking out when their jobs are at risk. Senator Fortier is speaking out for Montrealers. MPs across the country recognize that Bill C-14 is absolutely critical to ensure that we protect those Canadian jobs. Make no mistake, it is very clear that if Bill C-14 does not pass and Canada Post Corporation shuts down the remailers, these 10,000 jobs will not be kept in Canada; they will go elsewhere.

[Joe Volpe, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Mr. Speaker, mine is more of an observation and comment rather than a question, although I welcome the hon. member's reflection on what I will say.

I have been struck by some of the comments that have to do with concern for rural Canada. Over the course of the last couple of months, the issues related to delivery of mail to rural Canada has really centred around the relationship between Canada Post and CUPW. There have been differences of opinion about when and how CUPW will deliver that mail. It has put some demands forward to Canada Post that it would not recommend its members deliver mail in rural communities where the issue of safety, by its own definition rather than by others, would cause it to say no, it would not deliver. The bill does not address that at all. The bill has nothing to do with rural communities. From what I can see, it has everything to do with a business that has been in operation for some 20 years in three major cities and not anywhere else.

The positions of my colleagues from the other parties are every bit as legitimate as anyone else's, but why would they think a corporation, which has net profits of 5% of its gross revenues, should shut down 10,000 other jobs generated by other businesses in order to improve its efficiency? The corporation has gross revenues of $7.3 billion. It is one of the largest corporations in the entire country in terms of revenues. It can boast that it has net profits of $320 million, roughly 5%. Why would anyone support its shutting down operations that provide 10,000 jobs for people who are not part of Canada Post?

Why anyone would say the corporation is right to shut down 10,000 jobs and deprive 10,000 families of a livelihood so it can have a chance of perhaps getting their revenues? Are we talking about social justice, labour justice, or exclusively about business and administrative practices? That is why I support Bill C-14. It has everything to do with supporting 10,000 families in the continuance of their livelihood. One does not have to be a member of the NDP, or Conservative, or Liberal, or Bloc, or independent to believe that is social justice.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the short answer is, yes, we will continue to sit and it will do its work. The key issue is to ensure the status quo, the 10,000 jobs we presently have in Canada, remains intact and the families that rely on those jobs continue to live knowing they will be employed.

My concern is, as the strategic review plays out, that Canada Post moves forward and shuts down the remailers. There is the immediate consequence to 10,000 jobs in Canada. I am sure the member, who comes from Quebec and would obviously be worried about jobs in Montreal that would be lost if in fact we did not pass Bill C-14, would be concerned. He has to be concerned. That is his job, to stand up for the people of Quebec and ensure their jobs are protected.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, first, I assume the member listened to my speech. I believe I confirmed on three occasions that this was not about deregulation. Nor is it about privatizing Canada Post. I want to lay her fears to rest. This is not about deregulation.

Second, she talked about tinkering with universal service. For well over two decades, the universal mail service in Canada, the exclusive privilege, has been restricted to domestic mail, in other words, mail collected within Canada and delivered within Canada. The suggestion that we have somehow had universal mail delivery in the area of international, outbound mail is wrong. It is simply wrong.

Why is she not standing up for the people in Montreal who depend on the remailing industry for their livelihoods, for their jobs? What will she say to the families that will now have individuals and members who are without jobs, if in fact she does not support Bill C-14?

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I was very pleased to actually hear the Liberals support Bill C-14. There is very little we agree on in the House but from time to time we sing from the same page. Unfortunately, the NDP still is not getting that this is all about saving Canadian jobs.

This is not a complicated bill. Actually, it contains one simple clause. For most Canadians, it will have no significance that they know of but to the thousands of Canadians whose jobs will be lost if we do not pass this bill, it is critical to their livelihoods and their families.

What is remailing? Let me explain for those who do not understand what that industry is all about.

As we know, there are people in Canada who mail letter mail to each other. It is mail that is sent within Canada, collected within Canada and delivered within Canada. That mail is delivered by Canada Post and Canada Post has what is called exclusive privilege, which is simply another name for a monopoly. Canadians accept that. Our government accepts that. I believe all the parties in the House accept the fact that there is exclusive privilege for mail that is collected, distributed and delivered in Canada.

However, there is also other mail that is sent from Canada around the world. What businesses find is that the cost of that mailing can in some cases be very expensive. If a business is sending out thousands and thousands of pieces of letter mail a year, those costs can add up. They can affect one's competitiveness in a fiercely competitive international market.

Remailers are companies that will collect and bundle letter mail in Canada, take it to another jurisdiction, in most cases the United States, and mail it from there because the costs of mailing are significantly less. That is good for our economy because anything that allows Canadian businesses to compete better with the world markets is good. It is good for our economy and for families across this country, although the NDP just cannot understand that.

The change is very simple. The bill states, “does not apply to letters intended for delivery to an addressee outside Canada”. In other words, the exclusive privilege will not relate to letter mail that is collected in Canada but mailed from outside of Canada.

For 20 years this was not an issue. The industry, Canada Post, the unions, the remailers all accepted the fact that the Canada Post Corporation Act actually only provided exclusive privilege for letter mail that was collected and mailed within Canada to Canadians.

What happened along the way? The remailers started building their businesses. They starting investing a lot of money. They started creating jobs in Canada to provide a service to Canadian businesses. For 20 years there was no opposition to this. I am trying to figure out what happened.

Here is what I think happened. Canada Post obviously employs bright, young lawyers who are supposed to protect their interests, and that is fair. I am guessing that one day one of these bright, young lawyers checked the clause in the Canada Post Corporation Act, both in English and French, and, lo and behold, they found there was an inconsistency between the two clauses. The English clause did not say exactly what the French one said. It was an “aha” moment for the lawyer. He felt that he might have them and took the remailers to court.

The remailers were told that under the French version of the act they did not a right to exist and that the people working for them should not be employed in a remailing industry. The case was taken all through the courts until it ended up in the Supreme Court of Canada. The Supreme Court of Canada had to basically choose one or the other of the two interpretations, the English one or the French one. In the end, the Supreme Court of Canada decided, in its wisdom, that it was the French that should prevail.

That ruling came as a shock to the remailing industry and to our government. It came as a shock to most of the members of the House because we were at risk of losing an industry that employs some 10,000 people in Canada and an industry that is worth at least $100 million a year. Overnight this was going to be shut down.

I do not think that is fair. It is not the Canadian way and, quite frankly, it is not why I was elected as a member of Parliament. It is my job to stand up for Canadians, to defend Canadian jobs and to ensure we are fair with the Canadian people.

Our clause simply restates what everyone has accepted as the status quo for well over two decades. It says that remailers will continue to have the right to conduct their businesses, to take business mail within Canada, bundle it together and send it elsewhere in the world from another jurisdiction.

One might think that along the way Canada Post had been asserting its right to exclusive privilege over the remailing industry but that is not so. Back in 1988, Canada Post actually issued a magazine called Manager Magazine. In the April-May 1988 edition there was an article written by a lady by the name of Barbara Leimsner. In an article that she entitled, “Reaching for a Higher Plateau”, she said:

Outbound mail is not protected by exclusive privilege which leaves this lucrative business open to a new threat--aggressive competition from international remail companies.

That is Canada Post acknowledging that it was facing stiff competition and that it was taking on the remailers in the market legitimately. That was back in 1988.

Let us move on to 2005. A newsletter was issued by, I believe, Canada Post and, ironically, the newsletter is called , “Upfront”. It is actually in the form of a letter by the president and CEO of Canada Post no less, and is entitled, “Moving beyond our history”. The chief executive of Canada Post said:

Today, the notion of exclusive privilege is a thing of the past....We must all understand that today our customers have many opportunities to take their business elsewhere.

When she refers to taking business elsewhere, what else could she mean but that Canadian businesses have the ability to take their mail to a remailing company and have it mailed around the world from another jurisdiction.

Even as recently as 2005, Canada Post accepted the fact that exclusive privilege, this monopoly, only applied to domestic mail, mail that was collected within Canada and delivered within Canada. The CEO acknowledged in the article that exclusive privilege did not extend to the remailers.

Today, however, we have the court case that we must deal with. It says that there was an ambiguity in the law, that there was an anomaly between the English and French versions and that somehow we must reconcile those so they will choose the French version which has the impact of actually shutting down a major industry in Canada, eliminating some 10,000 jobs and $100 million worth of business a year.

The member for Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine referred to the fact that Canada Post actually owned a slice of the remailing industry for some four years. Is that not an irony? The very corporation that says remailers should not exist, actually invested in a remailing company some years ago and presumably made some money at it.

I do not know if the Bloc is supporting the legislation, but the other suggestion being made by my NDP colleagues is that somehow the profits that the remailers make today, and that Canada Post would like to now make its own, is critical to continuing a rural mail delivery service across Canada.

That is absolutely not true. In fact, we heard the profit quoted earlier. Last year, Canada Post earned some $320 million in profit. It is not losing money. The suggestion that somehow the bill would cause Canada Post to lose money is absolute nonsense. It does not own that business now, and it has not for some 20 years. This is a business that was legitimately carried on by the remailers. For over two decades, they depended on what everyone understood the state of the law to be, which was the English version of the Canada Post Corporation Act. Now that has changed because the courts picked up on this anomaly and decided against the remailers.

We want to correct that situation. We want to send a message to Canadians, especially those who rely on the remailing industry for their livelihoods, that we will stand behind them.

I want to give credit to the Liberals in the House. They recognized that. They got it. They understood there would be an injustice foisted upon these workers and industries, which had been acting in good faith for such a long time.

A suggestion has also been made that this is somehow a step toward deregulating postal service in Canada and privatizing Canada Post. Nothing could be further from the truth. We have made it very clear, as a Conservative government, that we will not take steps to privatize Canada Post. We believe Canada Post is performing a very useful service in Canada.

We have ordered that a strategic review of Canada Post be undertaken to ensure Canadians receive full value from Canada Post, to ensure Canada Post continues to pursue the objectives and purposes for which it was created and to ensure the postal corporation remains vibrant within Canada.

The suggestion that now putting the heavy hand of the law on the remailers would somehow enhance Canada Post prospects or enhance the prospects of businesses across Canada, which would like to keep their costs down, is ludicrous.

I come from an area of the country where individual enterprise is valued very highly. The remailers that have invested for some 20 years in this industry have done so in good faith. They took risks. They built their companies. They hired employees. They continued to grow. They provided a valuable service to thousands of other businesses across the country. To suggest that shutting those businesses down and getting rid of those jobs is somehow serving Canadians is absolutely wrong.

If I could just summarize, in point form, what the bill would not do and then what it would do, I hope Canadians will understand why Bill C-14 is important to them.

As I have already mentioned, it is critically important to those who rely on the remail industry for their livelihoods, but it is also critical for Canada's ongoing economic prosperity because we depend on remaining competitive. Canada lags behind many of the other industrialized countries in productivity.

How do we improve on that? One way is to ensure that Canadian businesses can reduce their costs and compete in a fiercely competitive world.

What would the bill not do? It would not result in a loss of revenue for Canada Post because Canada Post never had these revenues in the last 20 years.

This is not about a loss of jobs. I do not believe the NDP is even suggesting that it is a loss of jobs in the industry. What we are doing is protecting jobs. What those members would like to see happen is that those jobs go elsewhere. In fact, members may not know this but a number of the remailer companies have shut down their business in Canada and have gone elsewhere. Do members now where those jobs went? They did not stay in Canada. They left the country. Therefore, why would we want to risk that happening to the 10,000 remaining jobs we have in Canada? It is not about a loss of jobs; it is reaffirming the status quo of the last 20 years.

Is this about deregulation? Absolutely not. We have made that clear. My colleague across the floor has made that clear. This is not an attack on Canada Post. We continue to support exclusive privilege to Canada Post and its critical role in allowing Canadians to communicate with one another.

This is about protecting jobs, protecting our industry, our remailers, ensuring that we protect the trust that Canadians have, especially Canadian businessmen, when they see government and Canada Post moving forward in reliance on a certain law, that we will not flip-flop down the road. Finally, this is about maintaining Canada's competitiveness in the global economy.

Is Canada Post an important federal institution? Absolutely. It has a presence throughout our country. Does it need the remail industry to survive? Absolutely not. The profits last year of $320 million speak for themselves. There is more than enough money for Canada Post to do a good job in ensuring that Canadians have good rural mail delivery. Canada Post will continue to collect and transmit mail within Canada, and it is entitled to compete with the remailers in sending mail outside of Canada.

This is about protecting jobs. It is about standing up for Canadians. I appreciate the opportunity to defend this industry today with Bill C-14.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

I will begin with the last question first.

I read the letter from the Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Liberal Party of Canada that was addressed to Deborah Bourque, the president of CUPW. In it, our leader makes very clear the Liberal policy. The Liberal parliamentary caucus and the Liberal Party are opposed to privatization and deregulation of Canada Post. It is clear. No, we do not support it. N-O.

In terms of the second question the member asked, about the representation that approximately 10,000 Canadian jobs are dependent on the passage of Bill C-14, I believe the member is correct in that figure. I believe that is the approximate number of jobs. These jobs are located principally in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver. That is why I made the point that I did. When certain elements attempt to fearmonger and say that should the international remailers be given the legislative authority to continue to compete on that little slice of Canada Post business it will somehow put into jeopardy rural mail delivery, it is simply not true. It is not.

Shame on anyone who attempts to make that argument. If it is CUPW, shame on CUPW. I am a strong unionist, but it is not because one is a unionist that one is without error and that one's argument is always right. And it is certainly not because one belongs to the NDP that one is always right. I would say it is more that one is usually wrong.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise in this House today to support Bill C-14, an Act to amend the Canada Post Corporation Act, on second reading. This bill recognizes the reality that international remailing companies have been operating in Canada for several decades.

Why should we punish these small businesses that play an important role in our economy? As I will try to show this afternoon, it would be preferable to examine the bill in committee than to defeat it, as some members of the House would like to do, without hearing from experts and those who will be affected.

This bill seeks to address an existing weakness in the Canada Post Corporation Act. A difference in the wording of the English and French versions of the provisions of the Canada Post Corporation Act dealing with the exclusive privilege of the corporation has allowed other companies to deliver mail to people in other countries.

Acting on this difference in wording, the Canadian International Mail Association has been able to collect and distribute letters weighing up to 500 grams addressed to foreign recipients for 20 years—I repeat, for 20 years. Recently, Canada Post decided to exercise the exclusive privilege giving it a monopoly over mail to foreign addresses.

International remailers have been in operation for more than 20 years. They operative almost exclusively in three large metropolitan areas—Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver. The revenue of these international remailers here in Canada is estimated at about $50 million per year, which is less than 0.8% of Canada Post’s annual revenue. There is no competition in other areas. They do not compete for distribution of mail in small rural communities where Canada Post may be an important employer, if not the most important. Nobody competes with Canada Post for the role of the standard bearer of our presence in Canada, a contact point between government and citizens all across the country.

This sector has prospered for more than 20 years. Obviously, its success is not so great as to significantly affect Canada Post’s revenue. Last year, Canada Post generated total revenue of $7.3 billion. While the postal delivery sector was stable, remailing companies did not take in much more than $50 million. One can see that they do not represent a Trojan horse for Canada Post, despite what the corporation and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers may say. I am a former member of that union. In fact, I was a shop steward.

As my hon. colleague, the member for Eglinton—Lawrence, put it so eloquently in his speech in this House on this very bill on November 20, 2007, and I quote:

As members of the House of Commons, our first obligation is to ensure that no legislation goes through the House that damages the potential available to any Canadian and, concomitant with that, the obligation to nurture an environment that gives Canadians that same opportunity.

Indeed, members of the Liberal opposition and I have been aware of the potential impact killing this legitimate business, killing this legitimate competition, and its impact on Canadians. We have been working hard to remedy the situation.

I would like to give a little history of what Liberals have been working on, on this issue. On March 22, 2007, the member for Etobicoke Centre wrote the Minister of Transport as the then Liberal critic for crown corporations. He insisted in his letter that the government make the necessary legislative changes to continue to allow these firms to operate. If I may just read the actual letter:

Dear Minister: I am writing to you about the ongoing concerns of members of the Canadian International Mail Association who face difficult challenges due to pressure being applied by Canada Post Corporation to eliminate competition in the international mail market in Canada.

It is my understanding that the government supports the maintenance of the competitiveness of the international mail delivery market and has indicated its intention to make the necessary legislative changes to enable these firms to continue to operate.

I note that during question period on October 26, 2006, you stated that:

And my colleague is referring to the Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities:

“many members from all sides of the House have indicated support on this issue. Indeed, the new government supports small businesses and competitive economic conditions needed to ensure their survival. This is why the government will be coming forward in a few weeks with substantive steps to deal with the issues regarding international re-mailers”.

Then my colleague from Etobicoke Centre goes on in his letter to say:

Please be assured that should you introduce this important legislation, there would be significant support from the opposition members.

Respectfully,

Member for Etobicoke Centre

Critic for Crown Corporations

That is not all. On October 17, 2007, the Leader of the Opposition affirmed this support in a letter to the president of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers, Ms. Deborah Bourque. He explained that while Liberals supported international remailers, we do not support the deregulation of Canada Post. I would like to read that letter dated April 17, 2007:

Dear Ms. Bourque: On behalf of the Liberal Party of Canada and our Liberal Caucus, I am pleased to have this opportunity to respond to your letters and clarify our position in regard to international re-mailers and the deregulation and privatization of Canada Post. I regret the delay of this response.

As you can appreciate, this complex matter has stirred much debate in the past few years from all affected parties. After careful consideration and study of the issue it is our intent to support the continued operations of international re-mailers within Canada.

Although I understand your concern in regard to this issue, it is important to note that international re-mailers have been operating in Canada for several decades now. The Liberal Party does not believe that hurting these small business owners would be in the best interests of Canadians.

That said, it is also important to note that the Liberal Party does not support the deregulation and privatization of Canada Post.

As your correspondence and related material will also be of interest to...the Liberal Critic for Crown Corporations, I have taken the liberty of forwarding a copy of our exchange for his consideration. I am certain that he will be happy to provide a more detailed response to your concerns.

In the meantime, I hope the above helps to clarify our position on the issue. Thank you for taking the time to write, and please accept my warmest regards.

Leader of the Official Opposition

Leader of the Liberal Party of Canada

As early as March and then in April 2007, official spokesmen on behalf of the Liberal parliamentary caucus and the leader of the official opposition and Leader of the Liberal Party of Canada made it very clear that Liberals would support and do support maintaining the right of international remailers, and that we do not support any move to privatize or to deregulate Canada Post. I hope that no one in the House will try to mix both issues, because they are separate issues.

Let me go on and continue to provide a little of the history.

So, on May 9, 2007, the hon. member for Eglinton—Lawrence, as Liberal critic for transport, infrastructure and communities, brought forward at the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities a motion which I think would settle the issue between Canada Post and the remailing companies. After several hours of discussion, my hon. colleague's motion was passed, as amended, by a vote of eight to three.

On May 18, the motion put forward by the hon. member for Eglinton—Lawrence, on which other Liberal members of the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities had worked, was introduced in the House of Commons as part of the fifth report of the committee. The report stated, and I quote:

That the Committee recommend that Government issue a directive to the Canada Post Corporation pursuant to the Minister of Transport's authority under Section 22 of the Canada Post Corporation Act and in accordance with the Financial Administration Act, stating that:

i) The Corporation shall, at its option, either discontinue, withdraw or consent to a judicial stay of proceedings in respect of allegations or judicial findings that entities have or continue to violate the exclusive privilege in Section 14 of the Canada Post Corporation Act with respect to letters intended for delivery outside of Canada and, where an injunction has been issued with respect to letters intended for delivery outside of Canada, the Corporation shall consent to an application brought to dissolve such an injunction, until the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities has the opportunity of reviewing the matter and formulating recommendations to the Government and Canada Post.

ii) The Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities conduct this review of section 14 of the Canada Post Corporation Act by end of 2007.

The government drew inspiration from this fifth report of the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities for its Bill C-14, introduced on October 19, 2007. That is the bill we are debating today.

I also heard from people working in this sector in my own riding. On October 24, five days before the minister actually tabled government Bill C-14, I wrote to the Minister of Transport requesting that he take such action on this important issue. I would like to read my letter into the record. It states

Dear Minister...

I recently met with a representative from Spring Global Mail, an international mail delivery service company, which has an office in my constituency. The representative from Spring informed me about the deep concern he had for the international mail service industry in Canada. As of November 2004, Canada Post was granted a permanent court injunction to enforce its monopoly powers over this sector, thereby making this industry slowly disappear.

This simply is not right as it would dissolve a growing Canadian market that not only includes international mail delivery companies but small and medium sized businesses, as well as some of Canada's largest corporations in printing and financial field[s]. It would be a shame to lose a twenty year old sector of our country's economy to unequal economic practices.

I support equal economic opportunity for all Canadian businesses and would completely disagree with Canada Post having full jurisdiction over this sector. Fixing this injustice is simply the right thing to do. I would support legislation that would revitalize this industry and reverse the court injunction so as to stop the bleeding.

I signed it “Sincerely”, with my name, as member of Parliament for Notre-Dame--de-Grace--Lachine, with a certified copy to Mr. Stephane Forget of Spring Global Mail.

I think this makes it quite clear that the issue of international remail delivery has been something that Liberals have been active on, as I am sure other members sitting in the House have been, and which I believe needs to go to committee.

As I said, there are people in my riding who have been working in this sector and who have been working legitimately in this field for over 20 years. Should Canada Post and CUPW succeed in their efforts at painting this as an issue that impacts rural mail delivery and succeed in having the bill killed before it truly can be examined, it will not help the honest Canadians in my riding and in other ridings in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver, the centres where these companies are located. These centres are not located in rural ridings. They are not even located here in Ottawa. They are located in three main urban centres: Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver.

I am assuming, but I could be wrong, that the NDP may be supportive of Bill C-14. I hope it is supportive, but it would not surprise me if the NDP is not. Should Canada Post and CUPW and the NDP succeed in killing this bill, they will also be killing the jobs of many hard-working Canadians. To attempt to claim that this has anything to do with rural mail delivery is simply false.

I worked for Canada Post. I was a shop steward for Canada Post. I am a defender of rural mail delivery. I can tell members that Canada Post's efforts in its study on rural mailboxes, for so-called health and security reasons, are going to endanger rural mail delivery much more than international remailers will ever do.

I would say that anyone, including CUPW, the NDP and Canada Post, that attempts to link this to the protection of rural mail delivery or to privatization or deregulation is simply not stating the facts and is trying to fearmonger. This has absolutely nothing to do with any of those three issues.

I would beg colleagues in the House not to attempt to make that linkage, because it is a tenuous one at best and that is putting the best spin that I can on it. It is simply not true.

I will end there and say that I urge members in the House to support Bill C-14 being referred to a committee and also to protect our honest, hard-working Canadians in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver who depend on those companies for their jobs.

The House resumed from November 20, 2007 consideration of the motion that Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Canada Post Corporation Act, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Business of the House

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform]

Mr. Speaker, our week devoted to action on the environment and health of Canadians is proving to be a success. We just passed Bill C-33 at report stage with the support of two of the other three parties. This is our bill requiring that by 2010 5% of gasoline and by 2012 2% of diesel fuel and home heating oil be comprised of renewable fuels. It represents an important part of our plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20% by 2020. Debate of this bill at third reading will now be able to commence tomorrow.

We have also started to debate two bills to improve the safety of food, consumer products and medical products in Canada.

On Monday we debated Bill C-52, to create the Canada Consumer Product Safety Act and yesterday we debated Bill C-51, to modernize the Food and Drugs Act.

We also introduced Bill C-54, to promote safety and security with respect to human pathogens and toxins. We will continue to debate these bills today and tomorrow.

During these uncertain economic times to the south, our government has led the way on the economy by taking decisive and early action over the past six months to pay down debt, reduce taxes to stimulate the economy and create jobs, and provide targeted support to key industries. In keeping with our strong leadership on the economy, next week will be maintaining a competitive economy week.

We plan to debate the following bills intended to enhance the competitiveness of certain sectors of the Canadian economy: our Bill C-23, at third reading stage, to amend the Canada Marine Act; our Bill C-5, at report stage, on liability in case of a nuclear incident; and our Bill C-14, at second reading stage, to amend the Canada Post Corporation Act.

We will also debate at second reading Bill C-32, which modernizes the Fisheries Act, Bill C-43, which amends the Customs Act, and Bill C-39, which amends the Canada Grain Act. We will also begin to debate Bill C-46. This is our bill to free western barley producers from the Canadian Wheat Board monopoly by giving them the freedom to market their own products. We will debate at third reading our bill to amend the Aeronautics Act, Bill C-7.

My friend, the member for Wascana, the Liberal House leader, said that government business and the doing of business in the House of Commons appeared to end on Tuesday. That is because next Wednesday and Thursday will be opposition days, and I would like to allot them as such at this time.

In terms of the question he raised with regard to Bill C-293, which is a private member's bill, I understand it is scheduled to come before the House in early May. At that time the House will have an opportunity to deal with the matter.

In terms of estimates and witnesses appearing before committee of the whole, the government does have to designate those to occur before May 31. Late last night I finally received notice of which two departments were identified and we will soon be advising the House of the dates that will be scheduled for consideration of those matters in committee of the whole.

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Mr. Goyette, if we don't ask you any questions, it's probably because we agree with your demands.

However, I'd like to know whether you are familiar with Bill C-14, which was tabled in the House and which amends the Canada Post Corporation Act.

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform]

Mr. Speaker, this week's theme is getting the job done on justice and tax cuts. I am proud to say that our government got the job done on justice yesterday. The tackling violent crime act passed the House at third reading and the bill is now over at the Senate.

The government expects the Liberal dominated Senate to respect the will of this democratically elected House of Commons and quickly pass the bill, certainly before Christmas so Canadians can enter the new year safer and more secure in their neighbourhoods.

Today we will continue to get the job done on tax cuts by debating the budget implementation bill, which grants tax relief to all Canadians, especially by reducing the GST to 5%.

Next week will be economic certainty and prosperity week. Hopefully the budget bill will pass second reading this week so next week will begin with the Standing Committee on Finance considering it. The budget bill is an important part of our plan to provide economic certainty and prosperity for all Canadians.

The government hopes that the committee, once it receives the bill, will quickly review it and report it back to this House so it may proceed through the legislative process and receive royal assent before January 1, 2008. Canadians do not want to lose the reduction in the GST if parliamentarians fail to pass it into law before Christmas.

In this chamber next week we will continue to provide economic certainty and prosperity.

We will debate Bill C-23, to amend the Canada Marine Act, and Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Canada Post Corporation Act.

Both bills will help create jobs and a dynamic Canadian economy.

We will also debate Bill C-30, establishing an independent tribunal to which superior court judges will be appointed, to help resolve specific first nations claims.

This will deliver greater economic certainty for first nations and all Canadians.

We will also debate Bill C-29, which modernizes how loans are made to political parties, candidates and associations and how those loans are treated under the Canada Elections Act. This will create greater certainty by closing a loophole in our current campaign financing rules.

If time permits, we will debate our bill to strengthen the Youth Criminal Justice Act, Bill C-25.

Finally, in response to the question from the opposition House leader, Thursday, December 6 will be an allotted day provided that we have achieved early passage of the budget implementation bill and associated tax reductions.

Canada Post Corporation Act

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to join in the debate today.

The NDP believes that prior to even getting to the point of whether we agree with the bill or not, there ought to be a follow through on the commitment to do a review of the entire mandate of Canada Post. Then we would have a better idea of how this fits into what we collectively expect from Canada Post going forward.

It is a shame that is not happening. I suppose it is possible there is a good reason why it is not happening. The government may not like the way it looks in the context of a mandate that has just been reviewed, but I will leave that where it is. We will continue to push for this mandate and we will continue to oppose the bill.

I cannot seem to find anything on what Canada Post has to say about Bill C-14. I can only hope Canada Post is not being gagged. I hope very soon, either at the end of today or tomorrow at the latest, we will get some idea of what one of the largest crown corporations in our nation has to say about a bill, a bill that goes directly to the heart of its ability to raise revenue and meet the mandate given to it by Parliament.

Let us remember, as we go through this whole discussion, that Canada Post, in addition to the services outlined in the legislation, has also been mandated to raise revenue on a self-sufficient basis. In other words, Canada Post cannot come back to Parliament and ask for money. It has a good enough service and product that it should be able to raise enough money through revenue to pay for all the costs.

Let us remember that we have one of the lowest universal letter rates in all the industrialized world. Canada is the second largest country, land mass wise, in the world. That is a pretty good achievement. For all the kicks that everybody likes to take at Canada Post from time to time, for whatever reason, at the end of the day that is a pretty good accomplishment. Canada Post is raising revenue without running a deficit. It is not coming here and asking for money.

The absolute key to Canada Post being able to provide a service that is recognized around the world and serves the needs of Canadians at a cost that they can afford is the whole notion of the exclusive privilege. It either has an exclusive privilege or it does not. The government wants to have it both ways. It does, but maybe not everywhere: Conservative government, public service, money to be made.

At this point, the NDP and the Conservatives start walking down a different road. Our sense is the reason the government is doing this is part ideology. The Conservatives do not like public services. If there is a dime to be made, one of their buddies ought to make it.

The notion of what is best for the public interest does not appear on a balance sheet. It does appear in a crown corporation, but it does not in private enterprise and nobody suggests it should. The Conservatives want this business because there is money to be made. That is the only reason, and from all accounts, there will be more and more money to be made each year.

We have a situation where some private enterprises have started to do work that is exclusively the mandate of a crown corporation. Whatever happened to the law and order party in our country? Under other circumstances, if people broke the law, flagrantly no less, and went ahead and started conducting business that was the rightful business of somebody else, the Conservatives would be holding them to account. They would go after them because they broke the law according to the Conservatives. They would be considered a law-breaker of the whole nine yards.

What do we see in this case? The Conservatives are going to change the law because there is lots of money to be made so law-breakers are now complying with the law. That is a pretty good trick if someone can get them to do that.

Let us take a look at some of the meat in the legislation. I agree with my Bloc colleague that one cannot believe for a minute that just because it is a small bill, and it really is, it somehow will not have a major impact. This is a smooth process. They are not allowed to do something by law. They go ahead and start to do it. The people who have the exclusive right to do what they are doing call them on it and they keep doing it.

From what I understand, Canada Post spent a few years working with the Universal Postal Union trying to come up with a way to square the circle in terms of what that organization represented and the law, which gives the exclusive right and privilege to Canada Post. It did not work.

Therefore, Canada Post said that it would go to court to make it very clear that the work done by the private companies encroached on business that was the lawful mandate of Canada Post. Canada Post won. These corporations, I guess because they care so much about public service and the delivery of mail, appealed it. They lost again.

It is interesting what the judges said in this case. Justice MacFarland, who wrote on behalf of a three judge panel that ruled unanimously, said:

The purpose of the statutory privilege can only be to enable CP to fulfill its statutory mandate or realize its objects. It is meant to be self-sustaining financially while at the same time providing similar standards of service throughout our vast country. Profits are realized in densely populated areas which subsidize the services provided in the more sparsely populated areas.

This is not a new challenge that we face as a country. Because of our values, we believe Canadians, no matter where they live in the country, should be able to find, with reasonable closeness, a reasonable facsimile to the services they would enjoy anywhere else in Canada.

Do we achieve that wholly? No, we do not. We can ask anybody. Ask my friend from Sault Ste. Marie whether the health services are the same in Sault Ste. Marie as they are in Toronto. Notwithstanding the difficulties in Toronto, they are that much greater in Sault Ste. Marie. Why? Because it has a smaller population and it is spread out so far.

I have not even begun to talk about the territories and the extremities of the country. It is a massive country. We believe that things like health care, transportation services, environmental protection and other government services should, as much as possible, be the same, or at least as close as one can reasonably get, never backing away from pushing to get there.

Quite frankly, we do not have to go all that far even in my own province. There are a lot of rural areas just outside Hamilton. If we based our profit margin, as a postal service, on the amount of business that came out those small areas, they would not get any. They would be an afterthought, but that is not the case right now.

For the same price, we can mail a letter or a package from anywhere in Canada to anywhere in Canada at a reasonable rate. Why? Because the exclusive privilege allows the post office to take profit from parts of its service, which allows it to offset the cost to provide, as close as it can, the same service in rural areas as we get in downtown Toronto. Again, in the second largest country in the world, that is not an easy feat.

What is proposed in the legislation will water down the ability of Canada Post to do that. Some might say that it is not doing the work at all right now. As I understand it, that is not factually correct. Some of the work is being done by Canada Post. Some of it is being done by people who should not be doing it. It is unlawful.

We are running a surplus right now. Overall, not in manufacturing but in many other areas of the economy, things are not going too badly. Profits are being made.

But what about tomorrow? What about next year? What about in five years, in ten years? Once we begin down the slippery slope of eating away at exclusive privilege we undermine the ability of Canada Post to provide the world class service that it does.

It is that simple. That is why we ought to be reviewing the mandate. If we do not want it to do that, then let us stop kidding ourselves and build a whole different kind of post office.

This is not really about whether we believe in privatized services, whether we believe in the private sector or the public sector and which one should be bigger, more important, first dibs on it. Really that is not the issue. It is a side issue. Really what is in front of us is the issue of how we want to handle postal services in Canada. If we want to continue them along the same vein that we have started, then we need to make sure Canada Post has the means to do it. It is that simple.

I certainly do not know of any commercial entity that wants to take over rural postal services only, or other aspects of delivering anything in Canada that is difficult, not to mention our weather. No. There is big money in it and that is why big money was prepared to hire high-priced lawyers to go to court to try to get it ripped open. When that did not work, they looked up at the sky, counted all their lucky stars and said, “We have a Conservative government in power. Let's just get the law changed”, and here we are with Bill C-14.

It takes just a handful of lines:

1. Section 15 of the Canada Post Corporation Act is amended by adding the following after subsection (2):

(3) The exclusive privilege referred to in subsection 14(1) does not apply to letters intended for delivery to an addressee outside Canada.

It might as well say that where Canada Post has a chance to make a decent buck, we are going to privatize it, because that is what is going on.

I know the Conservatives are going to jump up and flail their arms and say, “This is not privatization. No, no. This is its sibling deregulation”. It is the same thing.

Make no mistake, if this bill passes today and we keep a like-minded government in power--and I cannot say anything about the official opposition; I have heard two speakers and they both took each side of the issue, which is pretty traditional so far, so it is hard to say whether this could only happen with the Conservatives. The Liberals are close enough that they may get what they want from either one.

The fact is if they win this, why would they not be back for more? Why not sit back in the boardroom and say, “Okay. Here is how this works. Let's find out other profitable areas of Canada Post and start doing it. When Canada Post gets upset, we will not even have to take it to court this time. We'll just go straight to the government and the government will stand up and say, 'Why are you doing this to these poor small businesses?'”

By the way, a lot of these poor small businesses have a huge global reach. This is big money. It reminds me a bit of WSIB, workers compensation in Ontario, where the private insurance companies are still standing outside the borders of the province drooling at the prospect of getting their mitts on all that money.

If this works, why not identify something else, go through the whole process again and eventually water it down to the point where we are in this place one day where there is an attack on the fact that Canada Post is running a deficit. Then they will go looking for scapegoats. And then what? My good friend from Ottawa Centre asked, “Then what?” That is exactly the right question. If Canada Post starts running a deficit, either this place starts to give it money that we have not had to do before because that profit is now not in the pockets of Canadians through the public service, it is in private pockets.

I hear one of the members heckling and asking “Is that bad?” I would say it is bad when either the cost of stamps and postal services goes up, taxes are increased to provide the subsidy or cut the service. Those are the options. I would say to you, Mr. Speaker, with regard to what the hon. member said, that yes, it is bad.

Maybe if I were lying on a nice deck chair on a great big yacht somewhere being taken care of by those who got all that money, I might feel differently. But as somebody who cares about postal service in Canada and is here to fight for the rights of ordinary Canadians, this is the structure that works.

The government did not even have the guts to say that it was going to change the mandate. No, it takes away the financial means to achieve the mandate. It is deceitful in some ways, if that term is allowed to stand, and it seems that it might be.

There is a sham being perpetrated here. We hear the argument that we are picking on people and why would we do this when it is already being done and all this stuff that suggests it is not a big deal and not to get all upset, that this is just the Bloc and the NDP fighting for those working people again or public services. At least some of the Liberals are saying that. I am waiting to get clarification of exactly where they are, so I will not comment. It does not really matter anyway, because they do not vote. They are just a debating society.

I want to read something in support of this notion about the slippery slope. Either we leave the exclusive privilege in place in its entirety or we say, no, revamp the mandate and build something completely different. It is one or the other. I agree with my Bloc colleague when he said that this is a vote up or down; there is no mitigating, no amendments, we either believe in this or we do not.

This is what was said in a report 11 years ago, the last time there was a Canada Post mandate review: “Removal of the exclusive privilege would be tantamount, in effect, to tossing Canada's postal system up into the air, allowing it to smash into a random assortment of pieces, and hoping that those pieces would somehow rearrange themselves into a coherent whole that was better or at least as good as the current system”.

At that time Canada Post did not seem to have as much difficulty finding its voice and it said that for as long as it is the public policy of Canada to provide universal letter service at uniform rates, it will be necessary to maintain the limited exclusive privilege for letters.

That is what this is about. This is about legitimizing and legalizing something that is currently outside the law. It is no different from Microsoft, or Disney, or any other big player. Canada Post is protecting its revenue stream, its market.

Why on earth would we tinker with a system that for the most part serves Canadians well and does not cost Canadian taxpayers anything beyond the money it costs them to buy the service at the postal station? Why would we mess with that? Why would we tinker with it? There is only one reason and this is my opinion. I am saying this in here, and this is pure speculation, but it is my right to say it and I am going to. It looks an awful lot to me like these private entities could not win in the courts, so they did the lobbying routine, lobbied the government and now the government is prepared to do their bidding to legalize tomorrow what is today illegal.

I will be interested to hear better arguments, particularly from my friend over in the corner who has his laptop and I am sure that all the information is being fed from central command about what his questions to me are going to be and how he is going to attack those wild-eyed New Democrats again. I await that moment, but what I await more than anything is the remote possibility that they might come up with an argument that actually holds.

Do not give us this stuff that we do not care about those private sector jobs. Of course we do.

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Transport]

Mr. Speaker, this is a government committed to helping Canadian businesses compete internationally.

In Canada we have businesses involved in what is called remailing. Remailing is a business that most hon. members are probably not aware of. Indeed, remailers collect mail destined for international locations from large, commercial mailers. The remailer, or consolidator, then ships the mail outside of Canada to another country, a country with cheaper postal rates, ideally, a country that has been designated as a developing country by the Universal Postal Union.

The Universal Postal Union is an agency of the United Nations. It has been in existence since the late 1800s. Today, it has close to 200 members and deals with postal issues. It does not get involved in domestic postal matters. Its role is to act as a primary forum for cooperation among postal sector players. It actually sets the rules for international mail exchanges and makes recommendations to its members, “To stimulate growth in postal volumes and to improve the quality of service for customers”.

It was the Universal Postal Union that established a single postal territory for the exchange of international mail, which obviously is very necessary. This means that when we are mailing a letter out of the country, we can buy an international stamp to put on that letter.

Canada Post would keep the revenue from that stamp, but it would be a different postal administration delivering that letter. It is that other postal administration that is incurring the bulk of the cost for the delivery of the letter.

Therefore, under the Universal Postal Union system of international exchange of mail, Canada Post would need to compensate the country of delivery. This compensation is called a terminal due.

The Universal Postal Union has classified its member countries as industrialized or developed versus those that are developing. Obviously different countries fit into different categories. This classification affects the rate of terminal due a country is eligible to receive from another country for mail it has received and the rate it is obliged to pay another country for mail that it sent out.

It is a complicated issue, but remailers do not have to pay terminal dues and are therefore able to offer lower rates than Canada Post. The Universal Postal Union also allows remailing. There are other countries that allow remailing. However, Canada does not.

A few years ago Canada Post took a large number of remailers to court. The courts have rightly ruled, in reading the exclusive privilege of Canada Post, that remailing is an infringement upon Canada Post's exclusive jurisdiction. This exclusive privilege was granted to Canada Post through its legislation. This is legislation that was passed in the House of Commons over 20 years ago when the Canada Post Corporation Act was first enacted.

Since the exclusive privilege is set out in the act, the only way to adjust this exclusive privilege is to amend the act. It is only Parliament that can change provisions of the act, and only after public debate and discussion will that change be made.

The government is pleased to have introduced Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Canada Post Corporation Act, and the purpose of this bill is to remove all outgoing international mail from Canada Post's exclusive privilege. This would actually enable remailers to operate in Canada without infringing on Canada Post's exclusive privilege. They would no longer be breaking Canadian law. They would no longer be at risk of a legal challenge.

Although the bill is proposing something broader than just remail, its net effect on Canada Post is not expected to be any different. Indeed, the business model of remailers is to collect large volumes of mail from commercial companies. It is not interested in collecting mail from you, Mr. Speaker, nor I.

They offer Canadian businesses lower postal rates. This actually reduces the cost of those companies. This reduces the cost of their goods or services to Canadians, to consumers, which is ultimately a good thing for Canadians. This results in lower costs to the ultimate consumer of the goods or service.

In fact, there used to be many federal government departments and agencies that used the services of remailers for their mail going overseas. They had shopped around to find the lowest rates so that they could make effective use of taxpayers money.

The proposed legislation is not intended to allow the mail to come back into Canada and that is very clearly a difference that should be re-explained. The addressee of the letter is to be in a foreign country. We are not touching domestic mail. The addressee is to be outside of Canada. Remailers that attempt to send mail back into Canada will still be in contravention of the exclusive privilege of Canada Post after amended.

We are not proposing to let other postal sector players put stamps on their mail while it is in Canada. Some other countries also allow an Extraterritorial Office of Exchange, which is defined by the Universal Postal Union as:

--an office or facility, operated by or in connection with a postal operator, outside its national territory, on the territory of another country. These are offices established by postal operators for commercial purposes to draw business in markets outside their own national territory.

If a stamp is put on a letter while in Canada, it should have a Canada Post approved stamp. If Canada is to allow these ETOE's, or the Extraterritorial Offices of Exchange, there should be a licensing regime associated with it. We are not going there with this proposal. We are not allowing other countries to operate postal outposts in Canada. We want to help Canadian businesses compete internationally and we are attempting to do that with this legislation.

The government has studied the issue. Canada Post has told us that it estimates it is currently foregoing revenues in the amount of $50 million to $80 million a year. This is an estimate based on what it has seen as a trend in its revenue stream since new rules were put in place by the Universal Postal Union in 2001. Canada Post does not know for sure how much business it has been losing to remailers operating illegally in Canada.

On the other hand, the industry itself has made claims of it being millions of dollars to hundreds of millions of dollars. Because the courts have ruled remailing as unlawful, we cannot get data or information from the industry members that can be validated. These are small businesses often, and some large businesses, and usually located in places such as Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal.

Both estimates from Canada Post and from the industry itself are significant. They are also not very close. Some of the difference can be accounted for given that they are based on different premises and, of course, different expectations.

The Canada Post estimate represents the impact on Canada Post itself and is not a measure of the industry. The industry estimate is more of an estimate of economic impact as it includes supporting businesses such as envelope manufacturers and print shops throughout the country, as I mentioned.

Should this legislation get enacted, Canada Post estimates losing another $45 million to $50 million a year, so there are financial implications. Its employees will worry that this is a first step toward privatization. Let us be clear. This government will not privatize Canada Post and there are no plans to do so.

Canada Post is a very large institution. It is one of the largest employers in Canada. It has one of the largest retail networks in Canada. It provides services to Canadians from coast to coast to coast. Some would argue that it is indeed a Canadian icon.

I would argue that in rural communities in my constituency there is no federal institution that is more important to my constituents than Canada Post. That is why this government is taking positive action for Canadians.

There are many issues and challenges facing this corporation. It would be easy to get sidetracked on any number of these issues. We just need to ask the previous members of the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities. They had some discussions on remailers, as my friend across the way will confirm.

The members tabled motions and amendments to those motions. At the end, they reported back that they wanted time to study the issue. This government has decided that it has done enough studying. The government has decided it is time to take action and positive action will be taken.

The bill itself is targeted to this specific issue. We do not want to get sidetracked in our goal to address this issue. Indeed, we also do not want changes to Canada Post to be widespread. This government is not interested in destroying Canada Post or privatizing it. We are not opening up our domestic mail services.

This is not the first step in the privatization of Canada Post. I have said that three times. I can assure the House that we are sincere on that.

We are enhancing competition in the outbound international mail business to benefit Canadians, to benefit small businesses across this country, and we are going to continue to support Canadian businesses.