House of Commons photoWon his last election, in 2015, with 53% of the vote.
Points of Order November 19th, 2007
Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. During question period, the member for Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine quoted from a document dated last week in which the Prime Minister praises Mr. Mulroney. I would request that this document be tabled in the House.
Foreign Affairs November 16th, 2007
—and the Ukrainian community.
International Day for Tolerance November 16th, 2007
Mr. Speaker, today is the International Day for Tolerance. This day is an opportunity to promote tolerance, education, and an occasion for wider reflection and debate on local, national and international problems of intolerance. However, to tolerate our neighbours is but a first step. We need to respect our global diversities and in Canada to celebrate our nation's multicultural achievements.
Let us teach our children. As individuals, as parents, as members of Parliament, as Canadians, we are all capable of performing local acts of kindness and respect and to be international envoys of this message.
Let us embrace and celebrate our global diversities, our colours, our languages, our religions. International Day for Tolerance is a clarion call to all to take a moment to truly look inside ourselves and at each other through eyes of tolerance, respect and embrace, a time to take stock of where we are as humanity and the type of global village we can build in the 21st century.
Points of Order October 31st, 2007
Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The Holodomor was referenced during question period. The record will show that back in June, a private member's bill to commemorate this famine genocide was defeated by the Conservative members. They voted against this bill, including the House leader and whip of the Conservative Party.
Perfluorooctane Sulfonate Virtual Elimination Act October 24th, 2007
Mr. Speaker, not quite a year ago a number of our members of Parliament, in fact the Minister of the Environment, the Minister of Health and members from each of the parties were asked to take part in a study. They were tested to see what sort of dangerous chemicals there may be within their bodies.
A number of our colleagues from past sessions have been noted in the House when they have tragically succumbed to the terrible illness of cancer. Once these members had been tested, we waited to hear what sort of results would come forward. We found out that in fact there was a veritable cocktail of chemicals in the members' bodies.
That is why it is so encouraging and we should congratulate the member for Beaches—East York. She has zeroed in on one particular chemical. There were a number of chemicals found in the members' bodies, and from that we can extrapolate that these are chemicals most Canadians probably have within their bodies. However, she has zeroed in on one which is not that well known, PFOS.
The name itself does not appear to be all that insidious, but there was a time when DDT did not sound all that insidious either, or PCBs. Yet we do know that PFOS, in certain ways, has characteristics that are even more dangerous.
Let me read the full name, perfluorooctane sulfonate. Not only is it bioaccumulative, but it is also inherently toxic. We also know that it takes eight years to eliminate just half the amount of PFOS that we have in our bodies, if we were not to accumulate any more into our bodies during that eight year period. In fact, it has characteristics that are even more insidious and dangerous than DDT or PCBs.
As was mentioned by some of our other colleagues, we find PFOS everywhere, in upholstery, in carpets and in food packaging.
Let us just think. What sort of danger are we exposing Canadians, especially those most vulnerable? Children crawling on carpets, or adolescents, as they were unwrapping that hamburger at the local hamburger joint. They were potentially poisoning their systems because in the past PFOS was used in the wrappers that were used for hamburgers.
What are the consequences? Testing on animals has clearly demonstrated that PFOS causes breast cancer, liver cancer and thyroid cancer. In fact, it is quite dangerous and suppresses the immune system.
Polish Canadians October 22nd, 2007
Mr. Speaker, in the discourse of Canada's political history, the roles played by our first nations, and the French and the British components regularly overshadow the important roles played by Canadians of other origins.
In fact, for over a century we viewed our country as bicultural. It was not until Liberal Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau that for the first time we formally acknowledged that Canada was in fact a multicultural nation. For this reason, it is important and proper that we acknowledge and pay tribute to those communities that helped to build Canada's foundations.
To underscore this point, this year marks the 140th anniversary of the election of the first Polish Canadian, Alexandre Édouard Kierzkowski, to Canada's first House of Commons in 1867. Kierzkowski was a Polish officer who came to Canada in 1842. In the year of Canada's Confederation, he was elected the Liberal member of Parliament for Saint-Hyacinthe.
For 140 years Polish Canadians have contributed in building our great multicultural nation and, as such, they should be considered one of Canada's founding peoples.
Pilotage Act June 20th, 2007
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to participate in the debate on Bill C-64, an act to amend the Pilotage Act, a bill that was introduced yesterday in a mad rush by the government to try to convince Canadians that it is doing more than just producing taxpayer subsidized attack ads on its opponents and, of course, taxpayer subsidized logos for millionaire NASCAR race teams. With the government having run on the mantra of doing things differently, I guess Canadians are getting to see what doing things differently means for the Conservatives' 18 month old, tired, and not so new government.
Having said that, I note that Canada is blessed by three strikingly beautiful coasts and the St. Lawrence Great Lakes Seaway. We are a country blessed with a multitude of waterway systems that have played a defining role in the historic and economic development of our country.
Pilotage authorities have played a key role in ensuring a strong and safe marine transportation system. The four regional pilotage authorities, Atlantic, Laurentian, Great Lakes and Pacific, have played an important part in ensuring safe marine navigation in Canada.
Because pilotage authorities were created under the Pilotage Act, and each directed by a full time chairperson, they are crown corporations. Today the dynamics of Transport Canada are such that marine transportation, particularly marine transportation on the St. Lawrence Great Lakes trade corridor, is fiercely competitive with other transportation modes.
As pointed out in the submission of the Hamilton Port Authority during consultations in early March of this year, this competition has led to marine transportation losing a portion of its traditional cargo to rail and truck transportation. While this competition between transportation modes will like be a permanent feature, a doubling of trade in 10 years and a tripling in 15 years is likely to place significant pressures on the capacity of land-based modes, which most Canadians, particularly those in urban centres like the greater Toronto area, already recognize as a fact of life.
In this context, those involved in the transportation of cargo recognize that they have a choice of modes and will always seek the most effective mode for their particular needs. Those in the marine industry have done their best to respond to the challenges they face and have worked diligently to improve their overall competitiveness in today's climate.
For instance, the St. Lawrence Seaway Management Corporation, which is now managing the assets of the seaway, recently introduced an incentive tolls program in an effort to draw in new business. As well, Canada port authorities are more interdependent and responsive to the needs of their customers.
Additionally, stakeholders have worked diligently to better market the potential of marine transportation. Once again, in the case of the St. Lawrence Great Lakes Seaway system, it is estimated to operate only at 50% of its capacity. Many stakeholders have underscored that this underutilization is largely due to expenses.
Some marine stakeholders have stressed that they face significant hurdles in the form of regulatory challenges, which include but are not limited to a pilotage regime. By working together under the Hwy H2O marketing campaign to jointly promote the system, those in the marine industry have succeeded for a time in stopping the decline in tonnage and transits by attracting new business and new services onto the waterway.
The concern is, however, that this effort will not be sustainable, especially if the greater efficiencies passed back to customers are negated by excessive pilotage tariff increases. International vessel operators, commodity traders and other potential customers regularly cite pilotage as a disincentive. This is not just about cost. It is also about the reliability of service and the inability to predict with the required degree of accuracy what the pilotage cost, the bottom line, is going to be when contemplating a pro forma voyage estimate.
This is particularly challenging for the operators of the smaller multi-purpose type of vessels that potentially represent the future for the St. Lawrence Seaway and Great Lakes trade corridor. In fact, this sector has shown the greatest growth over the last two years.
It should be remembered that the Pilotage Act dates back to 1972 and governs the operation, maintenance and administration in the interests of safety and efficient pilotage service within one of the four regions. In short, pilotage authorities are in the business of mitigating risks to navigation and ensuring the protection of our marine environment.
Pilotage authorities can set fair and reasonable user charges that allow the authorities to sustain themselves financially. This means that pilotage authorities hire pilots either as employees or pilot corporations, and the act outlines how they are to negotiate service contracts with pilot corporations. Pilotage authorities are given broad powers in a number of areas of acquisition, as well as regulatory responsibilities.
When the consultations on the amendments to the Pilotage Act were held in early 2007, a number of important concerns remained. These concerns were underscored by the Shipping Federation of Canada, which stated that the consultation that took place focused exclusively on “the financial self-sufficiency of the pilotage authorities, rather than addressing the more pressing question of whether the Pilotage Act's overall objectives of providing a safe and sufficient pilotage service are actually being met”.
While Bill C-64 claims to give pilotage authorities flexibility in the matter of engaging pilots, its overall effect will be to permit authorities to no longer be restricted to locally trained and locally engaged pilots. Given the expertise and the knowledge base that locally trained and locally engaged pilots bring to the table, and given their role in ensuring a strong and safe marine transportation system, this aspect of the bill should give pause to all concerned.
Furthermore, not only are there issues of an acceptable level of navigation safety in the four regions, but the cost factors for shippers and insurers in the event of an accident have yet to be fully determined within the scope of this proposed legislation. It is not yet clear that pilotage technology has advanced to the extent that pilots on our nation's water systems have become expendable. The relatively few number of marine occurrences in the past year could very well be seriously jeopardized by this hastily drafted legislation.
Moreover, it appears that through this legislation pilots will be restricted to their job functions as pilots only. They in fact will not be permitted to serve as directors of their association and still hold their licence. Those associations also will have to operate without government assistance, having to meet all of their operating costs through sources that presumably come from fees only. This will also constitute an additional disincentive to serve on professional boards for pilots, who then only hold their licence if they restrict their activities to pilotage specifically.
The proposed amendments to the Pilotage Act would also have the effect of transferring additional investigative authority to the Department of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, giving it the freedom to operate without regard for transparency and openness. The Conservative government's mantra of transparency and openness appears to have been thrown out the window in this legislation.
The Minister of Transport would no longer be compelled to investigate upon receipt of notice of objection. The decision to do so would be at the minister's discretion. The minister may also appoint a person to investigate the proposed regulation. That investigation could be done internally and the investigator would then report back to the minister. However, the minister would not be bound to do anything other than receive a report.
The bottom line is that there is no accountability here. The Conservatives like to talk accountability, but as this legislation shows, talking and delivering are two very different things, and Canadians continue to be shortchanged by this secretive and controlling government.
I would like to once again quote from the stakeholders who unanimously disagreed with this legislation. They stated that it was their hope that the government will take into consideration the views of those intimately engaged in the marine industry before proceeding further.
Unless there is a further substantial review of these proposed changes to the Pilotage Act that can take into account the concerns of all stakeholders, and where safety concerns are not trumped by other concerns, we cannot support this bill as it currently stands.
Pilotage Act June 20th, 2007
Mr. Speaker, the member for the NDP previously raised the issue of union members and whether they were consulted. The parliamentary secretary said that they were consulted. It appears they may have been consulted, but the government did not listen to the advice.
Let me read a quote from Paul Devries, from the British Columbia Coast Pilots Ltd, who wrote that “Stakeholders on the west coast unanimously agreed the proposed [changes] are counterproductive”. Could the parliamentary secretary tell us whether or not the stakeholders agreed, especially the ones he referenced earlier?
Resignation of Member June 19th, 2007
Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order arising out of question period. The Minister of Public Safety during question period invited the official opposition to advise the government on his task force on the RCMP. Will the minister commit here and now to meet with the official opposition to discuss the membership of the task force and how its work can be made fully transparent with proper oversight and public reporting?
Royal Canadian Mounted Police June 19th, 2007
Mr. Speaker, David Brown indicted the culture of secrecy in the RCMP, but the truth is he could just as well have been talking about the Conservative Party.
Who is going to sit on this task force of so-called experts? How is a problem made by insiders going to be solved by insiders?
The minister said that there are fresh breezes blowing through the RCMP. It sounds like the minister is blowing smoke.
Why did the government invent a review panel with no transparency to fix an RCMP suffering from exactly the same disease?