Johanne Deschamps

[Business of Supply, September 28th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, today I rise to speak to the Liberal party motion on the Conservative government cuts affecting Quebec women. These cuts are made with disregard for the role of women in our society and the importance of giving them equal opportunities.

Since coming to power, this Conservative government has refused to accept any responsibility for the social problems affecting our society. The Bloc Québécois is opposed to the cuts that the Conservatives are preparing to make at the expense of Quebec women. I would like to dedicate my comments today to all women who fight inequality, poverty, violence, isolation and prejudice against women. Women are directly affected by the $5 million, or 20%, reduction in the budget of the Status of Women Canada announced by the Minister of Finance on Monday.

How can such an attitude be justified? There is only one word that applies in this case: irresponsibility. This government, which no later than Monday was telling us about its billions in surpluses, has the nerve—at the same time—to cut what it has also the gall to call fat. The President of the Treasury Board took this affront so far as to say that his government has adopted a strategy for saving a billion dollars, this year and next year. Those savings will be made on the backs of the most vulnerable among us because of the women’s programs and services that are being eliminated.

In the riding of Laurentides—Labelle, the Réseau des femmes des Laurentides and the organization La Passe-R-Elle, two organizations dedicated to women’s welfare, will have their efforts stymied by the Conservative decisions. The way that organizations funded under the Women’s Program have been treated in recent months provides eloquent evidence of what the Conservatives think about the status of women. The fact is that the work done by these organizations helps dozens of women, every day, who have been victims of violence or intimidation. These organizations cannot believe the government's withdrawal undertaken by the Conservatives.

The reduction in funding for literacy programs means that Griffe d'alpha in Mont-Laurier will no longer be able to provide the French language integration courses that it offered free of charge to new immigrants in the region. This is going to make it more difficult for these newcomers to integrate.

Our society will have to rely even more on the generosity of volunteers to make up for the irresponsibility of this government.

But there is more. The government eliminated both the volunteer support program and the court challenges program that helps minority language groups exercise their rights in the courts.

After eight months in power, the Conservatives are finally showing their true face, and it is the face of a party that gets its ideas from the ideology of right-wing groups that could not care less about the problems and concerns of minorities and of the disadvantaged in our society. This kind of management has nothing to do with the values and priorities of Quebeckers.

Since January 23, Quebeckers have been having to deal with a government that does not keep its election promises. In fact, I would like to remind this minority government that in the recent federal election, the Prime Minister himself acknowledged, and I quote, “—that Canada has more to do to meet its international obligations to women's equality”.

He also committed himself to taking concrete and immediate measures to ensure that Canada fully upholds its commitments to women on the international scene.

In October 2004, after an agreement was reached among the parties in the House of Commons, and at the initiative of the Bloc Québécois, the first Standing Committee on the Status of Women, composed of representatives of the political parties in the House, was created. The attitude of the Conservative government is an affront and negates all the efforts at consultation that this committee has made since it was created.

One by one, groups have appeared before the committee to testify that they are worried about how less and less importance is being placed on women’s concerns in the government’s decisions. Many of them were of the opinion that government action to fund women’s rights groups is a priority, and suggested that underfunding would make it more difficult to promote women’s rights.

Some witnesses were also heard on the need to re-examine the allocation of funds.

One of the chief concerns is the assurance of core funding for front line agencies, such as support centres for victims of sexual assault and spousal violence, as well as women’s networks.

Other witnesses have also talked about the importance of encouraging the federal government, when it is preparing policies and budgets, to take into account the effects these will have on women, suggesting that the role of Status of Women Canada be strengthened.

What do the Conservatives really think about the status of women? Not very much, if we look at their electoral platform, where the word “woman” can be found only twice. This shows that the Conservatives are not interested in the specificity of women’s lives.

The Conservative government has cut away the fat. It has slashed the assistance allocated to programs and services for women.

Poverty is a major issue for women, who are overrepresented in this respect, particularly mothers in single-parent families, older women, immigrants and aboriginal women.

The expression “low income” does not appear once in the Conservative Party’s electoral platform. This is upsetting, when we know that one in six women in Canada is poor.

The birth of children, the breakup of a conjugal relationship and illness are all reasons that may cause women to end up with low incomes over a long period.

Four single-parent families out of five are headed by a woman. Meanwhile the wage gap between female and male graduates goes on widening. Female graduates make only 71% of the earnings of male graduates.

Pay equity, maternity benefits and parental leave are not part of the Conservative platform.

As for public housing, the Conservatives basically emphasize tax incentives for builders in the private sector. There is nothing to help women regarding public housing or for dealing with violence against women.

While they acknowledge that there is violence in the streets and that no woman should have to live in fear, the Conservatives do not have anything to say about the thousands of women who seek refuge in safe houses and transition houses as a result of conjugal violence. They do not recognize the merits of these services and do not propose any investment to support them. Cutting away the fat—that is how they propose to deal with women’s problems.

In conclusion, the government preferred to take the approach of REAL Women of Canada, that conservative group that asks for nothing other than the abolition of Status of Women Canada.

An article that appeared in The Canadian Press is particularly eloquent:

The minister responsible for the status of women is not ruling out the possibility that this file [Status of Women] will be put on the chopping block of Conservative cuts, but she maintains that her government will continue to fight against inequality and the obstacles facing Canadian women.

This may not be enough to ease the fears of certain women's groups, but her comments contradict the position of organizations, such as REAL Women of Canada, which maintain that women no longer need help from the government to achieve equality.

The Bloc Québécois is very concerned about the cuts announced regarding Status of Women Canada and the position of women in the Conservative ideology, which supports an approach contrary to the values of Quebeckers. This government is reactionary and misogynous.

The Bloc Québécois team will continue to rise and defend the rights of women, the principles defended by the Beijing conference,and equity. Quebec will always strive to achieve the freedom of action and financial resources it deserves, in order to achieve the full powers that will allow it to develop alongside all other nations.

[Canadian International Development Agency, September 25th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, today, the foreign affairs minister of Colombia is in Ottawa to meet with various ministers and agencies, including CIDA.

Will the Minister of Foreign Affairs take advantage of his meeting with his counterpart to pressure the Colombian government to honour the judgment by the Colombian constitutional court recognizing that CIDA-funded humanitarian groups are not terrorist groups?

[Employment Insurance Act, September 21st, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I will be brief.

I can tell my friend and colleague from the NDP that I share his feeling. I would go further on the subject of their hypocrisy and perhaps ask the Liberals who used to form the government: what they did with the surpluses accumulated in the employment insurance fund.

[Employment Insurance Act, September 21st, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the Liberal member for his question, which I did not really understand.

Was this about handicapped persons who could not qualify for the program or about the spring gap? I would like to give him an answer, but I do not understand his question.

In any case, I will add that if he so desires, he can introduce a bill including what he said. It is up to him. We would give it consideration. However, the content of Bill C-269 did not appear out of nowhere. The bill really reflects the concerns mentioned by the workers of Quebec and Canada.

[Employment Insurance Act, September 21st, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the Conservative member for his question. It is quite pertinent. I would also ask the Conservative members if they support Bill C-269.

Not only is this the reality in Quebec, but it is representative of the experience of workers throughout Canada.

My colleague, who sits on the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities, carried out consultations across the country. He heard from all groups and associations that advocate for and support workers, the unions and the Canadian Labour Congress. They all agree that the current Employment Insurance Act absolutely must be overhauled.

Whether Liberal or Conservative, we must concern ourselves with the fate of our workers in our ridings.

[Employment Insurance Act, September 21st, 2006]

moved that Bill C-269, An Act to amend the Employment Insurance Act (improvement of the employment insurance system) be read the second time and referred to a committee.

She said, Mr. Speaker, it is a great privilege for me to debate Bill C-269, a bill that I introduced in this House in May of this year.

The purpose of this bill is to improve the present employment insurance system, which the Conservative and Liberal governments have gradually distorted into a complex, unfair program that bears increasingly little resemblance to an insurance plan.

Enacting this bill will provide a lifeline for all workers in Quebec and Canada. That is why the government must have the political will to update the system before it does any more damage. It has ample resources to do this.

We should recall that, until 1990, the Canadian government contributed to the unemployment insurance fund. In 1990, however, Brian Mulroney's Conservative government destroyed that equilibrium by terminating the federal government’s contribution to the fund, leaving the entire funding of it to employers and workers. The withdrawal of federal funding created a major deficit in the fund at that time.

The government then tried to solve the problem by slashing the coverage that the system provided, cutting the benefits paid to unemployed workers and tightening the eligibility rules for workers. The effect of this was to reduce the number of people covered by the system by half between 1989 and 1997 and to create enormous surpluses in the fund. The federal government turned it into a slush fund that has accumulated over $48 billion dollars to date on the backs of workers and employers.

For more than 15 years, workers and employers have been the only contributors to the fund, and every year, the surpluses in the fund are swallowed up by a federal machine whose appetite knows no bounds.

In its present form, the employment insurance system is no longer a worker assistance program, it is a disguised tax, a tax picked from the pockets of the workers and employers of Quebec and Canada. The system was initially supposed to assist the workers who paid the premiums. It was an insurance policy, just like fire insurance, theft insurance, disability insurance.

The regions are suffering economically from plant closings and mass layoffs. Imagine what the effect on them will be when the employees who are laid off are also receiving no assistance from the system.

Add to that the millions of dollars in premiums paid by employers and employees. That is money Ottawa removes from the regions. We can understand the dire economic situation they are in at this time.

The government, be it Liberal or Conservative, manages the EI fund money as though it were its own. Do we need to remind that the surplus money comes from cuts made by the federal government?

Today, about 40% of people who lose their jobs manage to qualify for EI. That is 4 workers out of 10. The people the most affected by the federal government's reforms are the women, the young and the seasonal workers. Of course, they are the same persons who are the most dependent on the program because they occupy precarious and unstable jobs.

It is a shame. Older and seasonal workers, women and young workers who lose their jobs have contributed to the fund but will never receive one penny from it.

While workers get poorer because they do not have access to EI benefits, their families and their regions also get poorer. Depriving the unemployed workers of benefits for which they paid premiums during many years is also depriving the regions of Quebec and Canada of several million dollars.

In her November 2005 report, the Auditor General of Canada, Sheila Fraser, said there was an accumulated surplus of more that $48 billion. She also declared that the federal government had the obligation to respect the Employment Insurance Act and added that:

For the past six years, we have drawn Parliament's attention to our concerns about the government's compliance with the intent of the Employment Insurance Act, with respect to the setting of employment insurance premium rates and its impact on the size and growth of the accumulated surplus in the Employment Insurance Account. The accumulated surplus in the Account increased by an additional $2 billion in 2004–05 to reach $48 billion by the end of March 2005.

What is the government doing to respect this law and end the suffering afflicting thousands of workers in the regions?

Will the Conservatives care about redressing the injustice suffered at present by the workers, or will they also be tempted to help themselves to the fund as the Liberals did before them?

Will they put their American priorities ahead of their social responsibilities?

During the last election campaign, the Conservatives made a commitment to put in place an independent employment insurance program and to create an autonomous fund administered by employees and employers.

The House will recall that in the past the Conservatives agreed that any surpluses from the plan should be used to increase benefits and that the plan should be better adapted to the needs of Canadian workers.

They also supported the recommendations of the human resources committee whereby the plan would be reserved for the sole benefit of workers.

So, if they are consistent and true to their promises, they will support the Bloc Québécois’ bill, which everyone has been calling for for a long time.

Quebeckers and Canadians have the same expectations as far as the Liberals are concerned. If one day they hope to resume power, they should prove they are worthy of it and that they are listening to the people.

Perhaps the fact of finding themselves in the opposition will make them more attentive to the hardship faced by workers in their ridings.

With my colleague fromChambly—Borduas and the human resources and social development critic for the Bloc Québécois, I am visiting several regions in Quebec to hear, understand and better grasp the daily realities being experienced by those who have been hard hit by the present system.

I am talking obviously about the areas of Abitibi-Témiscamingue, Mauricie, Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean, Côte-Nord, Gaspésie-Îles-de-la-Madeleine, Bas-Saint-Laurent and Laurentides.

Some citizens from Mont-Laurier, in my riding, told me that, because they had to wait so long between the time they applied for benefits and the time they received their first cheque, they had to go to food banks or even sell some of their belongings in order to pay their regular expenses, such as rent, groceries and hydro bills.

A Côte-Nord agency said that from 70 to 75% of seasonal workers are women and that most of them have a hard time qualifying for benefits.

Seasonal workers, part-time workers, casual workers, on-call workers and contract workers are increasing in numbers, especially among young people and women.

All these categories of workers have increasing difficulty accumulating the hours needed to meet employment Insurance requirements.

Others told us about the fact that some voluntary departures are actually the result of employer harassment and that these people are not only psychologically shaken but face a loss of income as well.

In the Saguenay, all who spoke to us wanted the older workers assistance program back.

They said as well that in some parts of their region, it is impossible for people to accumulate more than 360 hours because of all the seasonal jobs in agriculture, forestry and tourism.

The system we had in the 1990s is no longer suited to today’s realities. That is why reforms are needed to help working people. It is time to give contributors what is due to them and stop looting the fund.

Contrary to what we might think, the statistics show that the unemployment rate has gone down since 1996, but in actual fact, it is the number of eligible claimants that has gone down.

The eligibility requirements are so strict that ever fewer workers qualify, and that translates inevitably into a reduction in the unemployment rate.

The rising number of independent and part-time workers also tends to falsify the results.

In my riding of Laurentides—Labelle, the economy is based largely on the forest industry, tourism and agri-food.

In the regional municipality of Antoine-Labelle alone, 62% of the people in the primary sector work fewer than 49 weeks a year, in comparison with 41% in Quebec as a whole.

The employee turnover rate is especially high, largely because the jobs are unstable and seasonal.

Another reality that must be factored in is the exodus of young people. Too often they must leave their home regions in order to pursue their education in large centres, and not many decide to return. The Bloc Québécois has always made employment insurance reform one of its priorities. Bill C-269 is intended to restore some fairness for workers in the way employment insurance benefits are delivered.

This bill aims in particular to:

reduce the qualifying period to a minimum of 360 hours regardless of the regional unemployment rate—this will eliminate the inequities between regions on the basis of their unemployment rates;

increase the benefit period from 45 to 50 weeks—in this way, we will be able to limit the effects of the gap or black hole, which currently leaves the unemployed suffering for sometimes as long as 10 weeks;

increase the rate of weekly benefits to 60% of insurable earnings rather than 55% as is currently the case—unstable jobs are generally the least well paid and these changes would provide claimants with a bare minimum;

eliminate the waiting period between the time when people lose their jobs and apply for benefits and the time when they receive their first cheques—workers should not be penalized for losing their jobs and their financial obligations continue, even if the money is late arriving;

eliminate the distinction between a new entrant and a re-entrant to the labour force—this practice is totally discriminatory, especially against young people and women whose work situation is typically less stable;

eliminate the presumption that persons related to each other do not deal with each other at arm’s length—it is not up to workers to prove their good faith when they lose their jobs, but it is up to the system to investigate if there is any doubt;

increase the maximum yearly insurable earnings from $39,000 to $41,500 and introduce an indexing formula—the current contribution formula is actually a regressive tax that affects low-income earners the most. It is worth noting that the maximum was once $43,000;

calculate benefits based on the 12 best weeks so as not to penalize seasonal workers who sometimes work small weeks; and finally,

extend program coverage to the growing number of self-employed workers in the labour market who have no coverage should they become unemployed.

In closing, I would like to remind the House that workers' and employer's groups, the Auditor General of Canada and the Bloc Québécois, and now even the UN, have criticized the federal government and its employment insurance program.

In an article that appeared in La Presse on May 23, it was reported that the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights

recommends that the State party reassess the Employment Insurance scheme with a view to providing greater access and improved benefit levels to all unemployed workers.

I feel I must emphasize the words "providing greater access", "improved benefit levels" and "all unemployed workers".

In closing, I would like to challenge the Conservative and Liberal members of this House to tell me in all sincerity that there is neither unemployment nor poverty in their ridings.

Can they truly say they do not believe there is any need for Canada to have an employment insurance program worthy of their fellow citizens, workers and employers?

[Development Assistance Accountability Act, September 19th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to take part in the debate on Bill C-293, an Act respecting the provision of development assistance abroad.

I have a deep interest in international development as the Bloc Québécois’ foreign affairs critic for Africa and Latin America.

I can assure the House that the Bloc Québécois takes very much to heart the effects of poverty and misery in the developing countries, especially the sub-Saharan countries.

We are lucky in the West to have been born in rich countries that have the resources to meet our basic needs, such as food, clothing and housing.

Quebec is often cited as a model on the international scene for its health, education and daycare systems, as well as its social safety net in general.

As we speak, a number of human tragedies are playing out in various parts of the world: armed conflicts, natural catastrophes, famines.

The Bloc Québécois has always supported increased international assistance that is fair and effective. Canada has the wherewithal to act and should do so. The Bloc supports Bill C-293 in principle. However, some aspects of it should be studied more extensively in parliamentary committee.

The bill proposes the establishment of a committee of experts in international assistance to be appointed by the minister responsible for this file.

I really wonder. Is it appropriate for members of the House of Commons to be on this committee?

Parliamentarians already have an opportunity to express their views and make their recommendations known in the House as well as in various committees.

Would it not be better for the members of this committee to be experts who are active in the field and can be found by the hundreds in different non-governmental organizations, religious organizations and the private sector that does business in these countries?

I have another question. Should the appointment of these specialists not be subsequent to a study of their candidacy by the members of Parliament and a vote in the House to approve the suggestions of the minister in charge?

If the minister has the ability to appoint the members of the committee, determine their remuneration, and dismiss them any time he likes, who in this House would really believe that these future committee members are impartial?

This is all the more true in view of the fact that some NGOs are very dependent on federal government funding for their work in the field and will feel obliged to keep quiet in order not to displease their funder.

Another question arises as well. Will the moneys allocated to the establishment of this committee be taken from the funds, already too paltry, that we have invested in international assistance?

Let us hope not, since Canada currently is not even able to meet its Millennium Goals commitment to invest 0.7% of its GDP in international assistance by 2015.

That is why this morning, my colleague from Longueuil—Pierre-Boucher, the Bloc Québécois critic on international assistance, tabled a motion to force the Government of Canada to respect its commitments on this matter.

The motion states:

That, in the opinion of the House, the government should improve Canada's contribution to international assistance through a commitment firstly to achieving the target of 0.7% of GDP by 2015 by increasing in a stable and predictable manner amounts for government development assistance, and, secondly by enshrining in law that the mandate and purpose of government development assistance is poverty reduction based on the principles of the United Nations Millennium Goals.

Last spring, the Auditor General of Canada criticized the way Canada spends its money on international assistance.

The purpose of Bill C-293 is to enhance transparency in the department, but nothing is proposed for improving the internal management of funding at CIDA.

Perhaps the panel of experts proposed here would not be necessary if CIDA resolved its internal management problems once and for all and if the Government of Canada finally adopted a concrete and effective plan of action for the distribution of its international assistance.

In my opinion, Bill C-293 raises another problem and that is the way it defines development assistance, limiting it to poverty reduction and sustainable development.

None of the other six targets put forward by the UN in its Millennium Goals has been emphasized in terms of Canada's action for eliminating poverty in world.

It is important to recall these goals, which are all necessary to put an end to poverty in developing countries.

First is the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger. We know that more than a billion human beings live on less than one dollar a day and that 800 million of these people do not have enough to eat and cannot function day to day. One quarter of all children under the age of five in developing countries are malnourished. This starvation has long-term consequences, making these children frail and vulnerable to sickness and disease.

Next is the achievement of universal primary education, because 115 million children of school age do not have the opportunity to attend primary school.

In addition, the promotion of gender equality in developing countries is more than necessary. Here are some examples: family violence; crimes of passion; trafficking of women; female circumcision; early and forced marriage; elimination of young girls through infanticide; violence related to dowry; acid throwing; and violence related to sexual exploitation. Such is the daily lot of millions of women in the world.

In terms of the infant mortality rate, the United Nations calculates that more than 11 million children die every year in the world. Those 11 million victims equal the entire population of Ontario.

Thirty thousand children die every day from causes directly related to poverty. The loss of those 30,000 children is the equivalent of the city of Alma disappearing on a Monday, and the city of Mirabel vanishing on Tuesday, and the population of Val-d'Or wiped out on Wednesday. In other words, there are far too many victims.

There is an enormous amount of work to be done in order to improve the health of mothers in poor countries. Mothers are generally the last line of protection for children of these countries in the face of poverty. The death of mothers during pregnancy, delivery or soon after the birth of a child leaves infants in a very fragile state in the face of extreme poverty or exploitation.

HIV-AIDS is also a fierce adversary to the advancement of women in Africa. More than 60% of the people infected are women and that has countless repercussions, in particular, reduced education of children, a decrease in per capita GDP, and more food crises, because women are at the heart of the agriculture industry in those countries.

I must also mention the struggle to eradicate such diseases as malaria, tuberculosis and HIV-AIDS, which is the main cause of early death in sub-Saharan Africa, and the fourth leading cause in the world.

As for promoting environmental sustainability, Canada is truly pathetic right now thanks to Conservative inaction. Canada's withdrawal from Kyoto reveals the Minister of the Environment's lack of awareness and vision. Two weeks ago, she decided not to act on Canada's commitment to poorer countries to help them reduce their greenhouse gases. This proves that this government does not care about our planet's and our children's future.

The last goal is to establish a global development partnership that includes all countries struggling against poverty. That way, all human beings, whether they are born in Quebec or in Rwanda, would be guaranteed the basics of life.

In conclusion, I would like to reiterate my support and my party's support for bill C-293. I hope that my colleague's motion will resonate with this government that, since it came to power, has been boasting about its transparency, accountability and integrity.

This is the same government that, as soon as it came to power, tore up the Kyoto protocol, turned its back on poor countries seeking to help stop global warming despite their many social problems, spent billions of dollars on arms, but failed to keep its word on the millennium development goals, turned its back on its commitment to correcting the fiscal imbalance with Quebec and reneged on its promise to establish a new program for older worker adjustment.

[Petitions, June 21st, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to table, in my own name and that of the hon. member for Vaudreuil-Soulanges, the petition “Lives on Hold” signed by nearly 4,000 people. This petition calls on the government to establish a process to facilitate the granting of permanent residence to persons who have been in Canada for more than three years and who are from countries on which Canada has imposed a moratorium on removals.

Following the events of World Refugee Day yesterday, it is high time that Canada boost its international image and act in a humane manner.

[Small Arms, June 19th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, the proliferation of small arms is another concern. In the past 10 years, 2 million children have died, 6 million have been disabled and 10 million have been left with psychological trauma because of conflicts involving small arms.

Forty-five countries are in favour of ratifying a treaty to limit the proliferation of these weapons. Canada still has not taken a stand. Does the Minister of Foreign Affairs plan to support such a treaty?

[Denise Julien, June 5th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I want to inform the House of the determined work done by a woman for many years in the forestry sector in Laurentides—Labelle and Quebec, Ms. Denise Julien.

For the last 12 years, she has run the Centre de services aux réseaux d'entreprises in Mont-Laurier. She helped found the Coopérative forestière des Hautes-Laurentides and was recently appointed to the committee to implement the Coulomb commission report. She also chairs the Comité socio-économique Forêt et ressources naturelles of the Conférence des élus des Laurentides.

Denise Julien has devoted many years of her life to the development of the forestry sector and was recently named engineer of the year by the Ordre des ingénieurs forestiers du Québec—and all that without ever having studied engineering.

Congratulations Ms. Julien. May our region continue to benefit from your knowledge.