Finance committee  Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee. I'm delighted to have the opportunity to address you again. For those of you who aren't too familiar with our industry, we move 90% of all consumer products and foodstuffs in Canada and about two-thirds of Canada's

Finance committee  The Government of Canada, over the last 10 to 12 years, has taken the position that it would have to be a broad-based measure. The United States has taken a different approach. They've looked at different segments of the working population and decided where it makes sense to have

Finance committee  I don't have any inside information on why it was cancelled. All I would say is that this program was working. We are aware of the fact that the new government is developing a new “clean air act”—or that's the name it's been tagged with—and we think this program is one that deser

Finance committee  I remain eternally optimistic.

Finance committee  Well, an eternity, perhaps. Indeed, if the environment is a key and important issue to this country, both in terms of GHG and in terms of air quality, then I think what we're proposing makes a heck of a lot of sense. The kinds of incentives we're talking about here are not enor

Finance committee  I think what you're referring to is just the latest in a long and ever-expanding list of so-called security measures. The most recent one is--not even a proposed rule--an interim rule that was published a couple of weeks ago by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, whereby starting

Finance committee  Bio-terrorism is the term they're using. Agriculture Minister Strahl met last week with his counterpart, and the indication we received was that the preliminary meeting was positive and that they are at least prepared to look at alternatives. So again, as I said to you earlier, I

Finance committee  No, I don't. There are no other similar programs in the transportation sector, and that's what I'm involved in. How that compares to allowing people to get rid of microwaves quicker and that sort of thing, I can't say. However, I think it's clear that transportation is a major

Finance committee  I think we can do better.

Human Resources committee  Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and members of the committee. My name is David Bradley. I'm CEO of the Canadian Trucking Alliance. We represent in excess of 4,500 trucking companies across Canada. It is our view that Bill C-257 is unnecessary, and if you'll bear with me, I'd

Human Resources committee  That would be difficult to do, I grant you that. That's why we say we don't think it's been resorted to very often in our industry.

Human Resources committee  No, not enough to fill all of the seats, absolutely not—depending on the size of the company, of course.

Human Resources committee  Yes, we have a long-term structural shortage.

Human Resources committee  I think that's what we tried to say in our submission as well, that we have a relatively stable labour relations climate in our industry. We said that we don't see the necessity for Bill C-257. We don't know what it would bring to the table to give whatever balance is supposedly

Human Resources committee  They would have no options. It's difficult to find replacement workers, as was said earlier. However, you can, depending on the marketplace right now—