Daniel Blaikie

[Instruction to Committee on Bill C-2, April 18th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, tomorrow it will be six months since the new government was elected. The most recent bill introduced was Bill C-14.

A handful of the bills that are before Parliament are quite routine. They have to do with the estimates. There are around three of those 14 bills that are straight-up repeals of the previous government's laws. Two of those bills are mandated by the Supreme Court, which is why we are dealing with them. In fact, the only non-routine bill that has come from the government of its own volition is a bill to betray Air Canada workers. That is the only original legislative initiative we have seen from the government, and I will have more to say on that shortly.

I wonder, given the extreme paucity of the legislative agenda so far, is there any good reason at all that we would not be given the time to consider these two things separately? It is not like there is anything else getting in the way.

[Air Canada Public Participation Act, April 18th, 2016]

Madam Speaker, part of the issue around Bill C-10 is really about the nature of a deal and the worth of a deal.

In 1989, when Air Canada was privatized, there was a deal made with Canadians that we would continue to enjoy the benefits of having a major aerospace company that was Canadian, which meant doing the work in Canada. We have heard a lot from the government about how deals cannot be broken, how the deal is sacrosanct, and asking what the word of the Government of Canada would be worth if we went back on a deal. Well, what kind of responsible conviction is it that allows the government to break a deal with Canadian workers while not being willing to say no to a country with a terrible human rights record and selling that country arms? What kind of responsible conviction is that?

[Air Canada Public Participation Act, April 18th, 2016]

Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for joining me in noticing the way the western Canadian aerospace industry has been left out of the discussion. We should be taking a more comprehensive approach and trying to develop an aerospace strategy for the country that involves all of its regions, rather than engaging in these kinds of one-off deals.

Part of the narrative that we are hearing from the government side has to do with this happy coincidence of Air Canada just happening to make an order for Bombardier jets and provincial governments just happening to drop their lawsuits. Is the time not propice, which I think was the French word used earlier by the parliamentary secretary, to bring these changes forward?

I do not know if it is sunny ways sort of occluding the government's view of how negotiations actually happen or if there is something more cynical at work. However, could the member comment on how a changing government and a government that is willing to gut the Air Canada Public Participation Act changes the bargaining position of provincial governments that, heretofore, had a case to make in court and no longer do? Of course, they are willing to sign up for a centre of excellence, because it is the best they can get in a context where the federal government is selling them out.

[Air Canada Public Participation Act, April 18th, 2016]

Madam Speaker, I detect a contradiction between the Liberal members' two arguments.

On the one hand, they say these changes will create more jobs for Canadians because we will have centres of excellence in Winnipeg and Montreal, but they are forgetting that there are no guarantees these jobs will exist from one year to the next.

On the other hand, they say that the industry has changed a lot since 1989 and that Air Canada needs to be flexible and competitive. They are talking about opportunities available to other companies and having work done in other countries. That is the competitive advantage we are talking about here. We do not need to change the law to have the centre of excellence jobs. For Air Canada to enjoy the benefits of flexibility, jobs have to be exported out of Canada.

Will the government at least admit that this bill will result in quite a few jobs leaving Canada?

[Air Canada Public Participation Act, April 18th, 2016]

Madam Speaker, I think it is worth noting, in fairness to the hon. member who just asked a very good question, that there was not an answer to that.

It is odd to have the Liberals on the one hand wanting to invoke what is going on with Bombardier and the C Series order in their speeches. When they are asked a pretty obvious question, which is if we are talking about Bombardier and Air Canada in the same breath, it would be nice to hear the government just say so. I think it makes a lot of sense to be asking if there is a connection between the two. It seems obvious that there is.

In her remarks, the hon. member often talked about flexibility, about the need to compete. When we talk about the virtues of this deal in terms of jobs, centres of excellence, how wonderful it is that we will be building these centres of excellence, and how well suited the areas are in which Air Canada will build those centres of excellence or do the work it will be doing competitively, what is missed is that nothing in the act as it stands prevents those centres of excellence from being established. Therefore, why is it we have to give up legal guarantees for good jobs, different kinds of jobs, in order to get these other jobs, if these areas are so well suited to the kind of work that will be done?

I would mention, because we are giving up jobs with a legal guarantee, what legal protections are there for the jobs at the centres of excellence?

[The Budget, April 14th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, today the government brought forward legislation that has to do with medically assisted dying. One of the things I noticed when it presented the budget was that even though we knew this type of legislation was going to be coming to the House, because there is a court-ordered deadline, there was no money in the budget for palliative care.

Regardless of what side of the issue members in the House ultimately end up falling on, there is some agreement across party lines that the new legislation, whatever form it takes, has to be accompanied by a meaningful strategy for palliative care across Canada.

There was not so much as a dime to even hire an analyst, or even seed money to start creating a strategy for how to roll out better palliative care across Canada. I wonder what the member's thoughts are on that and if he would be willing to advocate to his own government to get that money in as soon as possible, instead of having to wait for next year's budget.

[Air Canada, April 14th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, after years of pretending to be champions for Air Canada workers, the Liberals tabled legislation that gives Air Canada free rein to ship the good-paying jobs of 2,600 workers and their families right out of Canada.

The Prime Minister once stood alongside protesting maintenance workers. He was chatting about solidarity and probably throwing in the odd Kumbaya for good measure, but where is that solidarity when it could actually do something for workers?

Will the Prime Minister stand up, apologize for his cynicism, and withdraw Bill C-10?

[Federal Public Sector Labour Relations Act, March 22nd, 2016]

Madam Speaker, to the extent that I believe that once Bill C-4 passes we will have a better certification regime in Canada, it is a happy coincidence that the two bills are moving in tandem through the House of Commons. That means that when RCMP members are ready to organize, if they choose to do so, they will have a better certification regime under which to do it.

My colleague in the NDP spoke earlier about some of the issues that come up when workplaces are on the cusp of forming unions and the intimidation that workers can be subjected to. I do not think anyone is naive in this place. We do not live in a perfect world. Intimidation can sometimes occur on both sides, but many methods of intimidation may be available to an unscrupulous union, or to the employer as well. There are far more tools available to the employer than are available to anyone else doing the organizing, which is why the card check system is important. The employer can put the jobs, lives, and families of workers on the line, if they decide they want to be represented in the workplace. It is not just plucking a few examples, as one member suggested earlier. It is far more the case that we can provide thousands of examples where this has happened.

I am pleased that RCMP members will have the opportunity to organize under a better regime, that is if they do not organize beforehand under the old regime.

[Federal Public Sector Labour Relations Act, March 22nd, 2016]

Madam Speaker, I thank the member for the question because it cuts to the essence of what I am trying to get at. Collective bargaining can be an important tool to address persistent issues within an organization or workplace. When the government says it is looking at those issues and will get around to them, that they are separate, I think there is already a mistake in conceiving how we might deal with these issues. There would be virtue in submitting some of those issues in collective bargaining and seeing what the employees and employers within the workplace can figure out.

Part of the persistent problem, perhaps historically within the RCMP, which we certainly hear about from some members, has been that members of the RCMP cannot get their voices heard, that management is always in charge, that the system is not working, that management develops another system and there may be meaningful consultation or there may not. There will be differences of opinion about that. However, what certainly has been true is that management has had the ability to come up with new systems for decades within the RCMP, and certain problems persist.

What would be genuinely new, a novel approach, is to allow employees in at the ground level to address some of the issues at the bargaining table, with the knowledge and expertise they have because they are living it. They could see if they, working with the employer, could come up with solutions that management has not been able to come up with on its own.

I am glad that the government is concerned about those issues, and I am glad it is going to pay some attention to them. What I am upset about is that it is foreclosing on what would be a genuinely new way of dealing with the issues when the old ways clearly have not worked.

With my last few seconds, and for the information of members who may want to know, I want to recognize that my wife is visiting the nation's capital today.

[Federal Public Sector Labour Relations Act, March 22nd, 2016]

Madam Speaker, I certainly acknowledge that RCMP members are going to have more of a say around certain aspects of their employment by virtue of the bill. The thanks goes to the Supreme Court on that, not the new government. To the extent that the bill responds minimally to the Supreme Court decision and tries to protect certain exclusions from bargaining, I would say it is a missed opportunity.

There is perhaps a persistent misunderstanding of my point in the response from the parliamentary secretary. It is not that government would have needed to conduct all of these studies and then include the responses in a bill. Part of the virtue of opening some of these things up to collective bargaining is that the resolution to these issues could actually happen away from the government table, between RCMP members and RCMP management. Government need not be involved, to the extent that adequate solutions are being found at the bargaining table. These exclusions foreclose on that possibility.

There is the idea that these are issues, the solutions for which we need to look at later, motivating the government's position. What it misses is that the bill forecloses on one good option, which is to let RCMP members at the table address some of these issues. I think that is unfortunate. It would be a good way to deal with some of those issues, or potentially be a good way.

To the extent that it is not, the provisions around binding arbitration and having the arbitrator consider the unique role of the RCMP as the national police force, a phrase we are hearing a lot, would protect the interests of the RCMP. What I am trying to say is the government is already making a limited decision by closing the door on one option by advancing the bill and not addressing these exclusions.