Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak on behalf of the Bloc Québécois about the resolution that is before us today. Naturally, it is impossible to be against motherhood and apple pie, and the Bloc Québécois will obviously support the motion as written.
The motion is essentially about security, and I think that is important. Like our American colleagues, the Bloc Québécois and I have long understood the importance of security. Moreover, nearly 12 years ago, I began what is called a triangle of excellence involving Vermont, New York state and the riding of Saint-Jean. These states are my riding's closest neighbours, and I knew we had common interests. One of those important interests is border security.
In fact, I remember that it was often the main topic of discussion 12 years ago. My American colleagues, like us, said that it was important because the largest gateway between Quebec and the United States is at Saint-Bernard-de-Lacolle. The Americans are so convinced of its importance that they invested $100 million in what is called a port of excellence in Champlain. They demolished the buildings and infrastructure at their land entry point and built new ones at a cost of $100 million. Security is extremely important to them.
We also work regularly with the Americans on various issues. For example, we are currently working on the 400th anniversary of the arrival of Champlain, who gave his name to Lake Champlain on the American side. Border security is therefore important to us.
I also have a lot to do with the Border Security Agency, the part of the Department of Homeland Security that is in charge of border security. We meet with them on a regular basis. In addition, I recently instructed my office to proceed with an update, because I have not been there for a year or two and I want to go back.
We are also talking to our contacts at U.S. customs about how to ensure the uninterrupted flow of traffic so as not to create delays at the border. We also want to prevent illegal travellers from crossing the border, and I think that the Americans want that too.
That being said, we have to send the right signals and talk to the right people. The Conservative government says that it is concerned about security, but its actions do not support that. It is cutting out things that the Americans consider important.
What are we supposed to say to a U.S. member of Congress who asks us whether we have closed certain RCMP detachments over the years? Well, seven or eight RCMP detachments near the border have indeed been closed, and promises to reopen them have not been kept.
How are we supposed to explain to the Americans that the government supports restricting Canada Border Services Agency activities along the border? How do we justify eliminating procedures and operating practices that enabled the organization to move agents from one border crossing to another during busy times or heavy arrivals, and pay them overtime? That is not happening anymore.
As a result, trucks are going to get stuck in long line-ups even if border access points are separated. Trucks getting stuck five or six kilometres away does not help the industry. Trucking companies often complain about this.
We also have to make the Americans aware that we have secure lanes. I gather that the minister is having trouble getting that message across to the U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security. I can understand that because I just gave two examples of how the agency is causing traffic jams at the border and security problems by refusing to move border services agents from one crossing to another during really busy times.
We are sending a contradictory message. The Conservatives have failed to raise awareness among Americans. I point to the fact that, during the debate on WHTI, the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative, which will soon require the use of passports at borders, it was the Bloc Québécois and I who led a delegation to Washington to convince our American friends to not go ahead with it. The only thing that happened was that implementation was delayed by one year. This initiative will go into effect on June 1.
There are other issues such as the enhanced driver's licence that contains a chip. It will be less expensive. This enhanced driver's licence will make border crossings by land easier. However, it cannot be used for air travel. Effective June 1, new rules will come into effect for land, water or air travel. Everyone is required to have a passport or, for land travel, the enhanced driver's licence I spoke about.
The signals sent by the Conservative government do not square with their philosophy, which is centred on security. There is not just the issue of the WHTI, but also that of protectionism.
At present, the winds of protectionism seem to be blowing very strongly in the United States. Two weeks ago, when the minister was in the U.S., I led a delegation of members to Washington to defend Quebec's and Canada's interests by asking them to not be overly protectionist. That is what we did.
How did the Conservative Party react? The member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles objected to what we had done. He told us that we had no business being there. He asked us what we had done and who we had seen. Everything is on the Bloc Québécois website: the names of the nine congressmen and two senators we met with and the topics we discussed, including security at customs. We will not be lectured by the member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles and the Conservative Party, who are wondering what we did in Washington. It seems to me that all the members of this House have four points in the year to go to Washington. We have to go to Washington. The Americans are our number one economic partners. We have to try to resolve our differences together. That is what we did. We do not agree that we had no business being there. We need to go there. The Conservatives may be asleep at the switch and not doing their job, but they cannot prevent others from doing their job. We are glad we went to Washington. I think it is our duty to go.
We cannot understand why the secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security would say such a thing when the minister had just met with her. The next time we go to Washington, we should perhaps ask to meet with her. Maybe things would go better if ordinary members met with her and explained how things really are.
When I say that the government is sending mixed messages, I am talking about the cuts to the agency and to overtime. That is going to cause delays at the border crossings. There is also the whole issue of the special team at Lacolle, where there is a giant scanner that was used to scan trucks one by one. The Conservative government decided to dismantle the team.
What message will that send? On the American side, that is what I was talking about earlier; the $100 million port of excellence they have created has all that equipment. I know, because I saw it. Now, as I said earlier, I want to bring them up to date. What shall I say when the border agency security representative asks me why we are disbanding our team that works with the giant scanner? How are we going to respond? Those are different messages.
There are patrols on the Richelieu River, in my own riding. That area is a virtual sieve for drug traffickers and potentially illegal immigrants. We have just put an end to that. There was a border crossing right on the river, and we are told that it is finished. What other message does that send? What messages are we sending to our American colleagues? This government is trying to convince us that security is extremely important.
As a final point, our party is doing its best to make up for this government's shortcomings.
We are extremely disappointed in what is happening. We were right there less than two weeks ago. We met with nine members of Congress and two senators. We talked about that, and we even talked about American protectionism. We have some important allies in the American Congress and we must meet with them. A woman like Louise Slaughter from New York is very important to us. She joined us in our fight regarding the passport requirement at customs. She fully understood that it is important for the states that border Canada to remain as flexible and as open as possible.
Naturally, the Americans will say that they cannot take one approach with Canada and a different one with Mexico. It must be a joint policy. However, this should not stop us from trying to convince them that their northern border is quite different from their southern border. It is natural for them to have a lot more problems with their southern border than their northern border, since Canada has always been their ally. Canada has always made an effort to harmonize and be in tune with American policies.
Now we are hearing the opposite from the Conservative government. They seem to want nothing to do with security. When the time comes to do important things, such as ensure that we have competent border agents and border patrols and that traffic jams do not interfere with the Canada-U.S. economy, the Conservatives are nowhere to be found. That is inexplicable. We have to take charge of this issue.
If the Conservatives do not agree, I invite my opposition colleagues to go there and say so. I think that, at this time, we cannot count on the Conservatives, who say one thing but do another. That is basic. We cannot convince our American friends that we can do the job when we are doing the opposite of that. We are closing RCMP detachments. The border patrol is very slow off the mark. Overtime has been abolished, which will lead to serious bottlenecks at the Canada-U.S. border and the closure of the scanner and its team.
The Americans are going to think that the border is indeed porous, not to mention the fact that there are a lot of roads we do not monitor. The Americans now feel that they have to put cement blocks on their side of 107 roads going from Canada to the Unites States because we do not control those points. The U.S. does monitor its side of those entry points, sparing no expense. They have helicopters, patrols, vehicles and cameras. They are even talking about using UAVs—drones—to patrol their side of the border. We do not do any of that. We are still amateurs.
The government makes all kinds of lovely promises, but then it does not keep them or do anything about them, which does not do us any favours in Washington. We know that because we meet with them regularly and we talk about these things. The opposition's role is to put pressure on the government to do something to ensure that the Americans feel safe when it comes to our border. We want them to believe that their ally to the north is in control of its borders. We do not want any more situations like the Secretary of Homeland Security saying that terrorists came through Canada to perpetrate the September 11, 2001, attacks.
The first time I heard that, it was my friend, New York state senator Hilary Clinton, who said it. At a dinner in Plattsburgh in the context of the triangle of excellence, I was very keen to meet with her to tell her that she could not say that, that that is not what happened, and that the border in question was theirs. To make a long story short, I never heard Ms. Clinton say that again.
How is that a few years later, we are still hearing such things? Not only do we hear them, but we learned that the Canadian Minister of Public Safety met with her a week before she made that outrageous remark. This has proven very costly, financially speaking, since the entire diplomatic corps has had to mobilize to try to dispel this myth, as well as in terms of their perspective, that is, how the Americans see Canadians and Quebeckers. They see us as people who do not look after our border. If we do not look after it, they will look after it for us, and they are talking tougher, which is not good for our economy.
What we want—and this is what I was saying when I began speaking—is for goods and traffic to flow freely at border crossings. We want people to be able to cross all borders, whether in Lacolle or elsewhere. However, we want the Americans to know that if people try to cross the border illegally, we are capable of stopping them. That is what they want to hear, and that is not what is really happening.
Of course, that is the thrust of our colleague's proposal. It is important and that is why the Bloc Québécois will support this motion in the House.