moved for leave to introduce Bill C-379, An Act to amend the Air Canada Public Participation Act.
Mr. Speaker, I thank my seconder, the member for Vancouver East. She supports this bill, as well. The bill calls for an operational and overhaul centre for Air Canada to be continued and maintained in Vancouver, British Columbia. So the member of Parliament for Vancouver East is standing up, as she always does, for people of the Lower Mainland of British Columbia.
When the Air Canada Public Participation Act was put into effect, it called for the corporation, Air Canada, to maintain operational and overhaul centres in the city of Winnipeg, the Montreal urban community and the city of Mississauga, but it did not include the city of Vancouver. As a result, the Lower Mainland has seen a hemorrhaging of jobs in the operational sector, in overhaul centres. A wide variety of jobs have been cut back. We believe Air Canada should be maintaining those jobs on the west coast of Canada. It should be maintaining those jobs in the Lower Mainland. It has an impact not just in the Richmond, Vancouver and Burnaby—New Westminster areas, but of course, right through the Lower Mainland. There are small businesses that depend on the dollars that are brought in through the provision of those jobs in operations and in overhaul.
For those reasons, the NDP is supporting this amendment to change the Air Canada Public Participation Act and to oblige Air Canada to maintain those facilities in the city of Vancouver and the Lower Mainland of British Columbia.
(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)