Bill C-6 (Historical)

Restoring Mail Delivery for Canadians Act

An Act to provide for the resumption and continuation of postal services

This enactment provides for the resumption and continuation of postal services and imposes a final offer selection process to resolve matters remaining in dispute between the parties.

Restoring Mail Delivery for Canadians Act

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, of course that question is very apropos, because as I said in my speech, this is all about making sure that the government's coffers are enriched on the backs of workers.

Canada Post has been paying dividends and income tax to the government. The more Canada Post can save, the richer the coffers of the government. It is completely outrageous that we are paying down the biggest deficit in Canadian history, which was accumulated by the Conservative government right across from us, and Canada Post workers are being asked to pay down that deficit. It is completely outrageous.

I agree with the member. The Minister for Management needs to take responsibility for her actions. I would encourage her to come back, become the Minister of Labour, and actually help negotiate a settlement to the labour dispute.

[Denis Coderre, Liberal, Bourassa, QC]

Mr. Speaker, you have observed that this is June 25. You have observed that as a Quebecker, I am proud: I have not apologized like the NDP members who showed disrespect for Quebeckers and French Canadians by sitting in the House of Commons on June 24. I thought the celebrations for this June 24 were extraordinary. Mostly, I spent a lot of time listening to my constituents. That is one of the reasons I am proud today that I voted as I did, to move to second reading, and if there are amendments, to get to them.

One thing is certain: first, people want workers to have rights and want those rights to be respected. In Quebec, people want a negotiated agreement to be possible. What they do not want, for example, is for us to be dogmatic and filibuster for hours and hours when we know very well that the longer we wait, the more harm is going to be done to the postal workers and the public. Today, many in the public are sick of this. That is why there has to be some balance. When the Conservative government is dogmatic and the NDP is dogmatic, everyone loses. That is why the House should sit in committee of the whole post-haste so that amendments can be moved and solutions to the problem found.

I am noticing a lot of talking. We are in a parliament here. Everyone is standing up and talking. I would like to have a bit of order so we can hear. Or maybe you do not understand my French when I speak; that is probably what it is.

Mr. Speaker, hon. members are talking when I am talking. Is it okay? You are asking for decorum. I would ask you to please make them shut up so we can talk.

[The Acting Speaker, Barry Devolin]

Order.

The chair would agree with the member for Bourassa. There is a dull roar in the place. I would ask all hon. members to give the hon. member for Bourassa all of the respect he deserves.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Denis Coderre, Liberal, Bourassa, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I do think it is unfortunate that you understood me better in English than in French. I am going to have to say nicer things in English next time.

One thing is certain: this is a bad bill. The Conservatives keep talking about a strike. It is not a strike, it is a lockout. Clearly the other side of the House does not respect the rights of workers, it does not accept that there is a right of association, and it does not want a negotiated agreement. A rotating strike is strictly a pressure tactic. It is the management of Canada Post that decided to cut mail delivery back from five days to three and then ordered the lockout. Then, as if by coincidence, the Minister of Labour wanted to impose legislation.

The Liberal government had to enact a back-to-work bill in the past, but at that time it was enacted after a general strike that had lasted two weeks. It was an essential service at the time. It must be understood that 14 years ago there was no Internet as there is today and there was no email and no ability to make payments electronically. The situation had therefore caused a huge number of problems, both for small and medium-sized businesses and for seniors, who wanted to get their mail. Today it is less serious, but a solution will still have to be found.

Certainly we hope to have a settlement and an agreement between management and the employees and we want workers' rights to be respected, but we also have to protect the public. The government has a majority. I understand that like us, the opposition is rising and presenting its views, but too much systematic obstruction is as bad as not enough. I will say to everyone who supports this opposition that when we stretch the elastic too far, it snaps back and hits us in the face. People are going to be thinking this is not right. That is the difference between dogmatism and pragmatism.

From the outset, we have said that if amendments were made to this bill, we could perhaps work to find a solution. It is unthinkable to tie the hands of an arbitrator, to require the arbitrator, as the bill specifies, to take either the side of the employer or the side of the workers. If that is the way in which we are going to proceed, we may well ask ourselves what arbitration is. Is it just choosing one side over the other?

Of course, we know full well how arbitrators work. They must be given every ability to work with both parties to reach a compromise. Arbitrators represent neither the union nor the employer. That is why we cannot pass legislation that will tie an arbitrator's hands. That is unacceptable.

It is true that salary provisions were included in the bill in the past. But in the current negotiations between the employer and the workers, Canada Post had proposed a salary scale. Why does this bill propose lesser amounts? If the minister is already on the side of management, why did she include in the bill amounts less than Canada Post had proposed?

For all these reasons, we are voting against this bill. But we look forward to the House resolving into committee of the whole in order for us to discuss whether it is possible to come to an agreement.

We are voting against the six-month hoist because the lockout continues. There is no agreement between the employer and the union, yet we are telling the workers that we are going to wait another six months. What are we going to tell Canadians for all that time? This is why we have to find a compromise, and this is why the Liberal Party is the pragmatic party. We are practical people, and we feel that we must find a better way than to hold up Parliament.

The hon. member for Acadie—Bathurst is waving at me. I suppose he is pleased to see me. So I will wave back. Of course, we can work to protect the interests of workers, but a filibuster just wastes time. We have just spent 35 hours on second reading. If we want to spend another 35, we can and they are going to, but they are in no way serving the workers or serving Canadians. That is why we have to find solutions together. As their slogan says, “Travaillons ensemble”. Let us work together.

Let us find a way together, during the committee of the whole, to see if there is a capacity for some amendments.

Of course I do not have a lot of trust in the government, for obvious reasons. However, I trust in people, and I believe that people deserve a service.

At the same time I want to ensure that people realize the workers are also Canadians. When I asked a question to the minister, she said she prefers to protect 33 million people rather than 45,000 workers. These 45,000 workers are Canadians, so I do not know why we have two tiers. Was she saying there are two kinds of citizens?

We must find a pragmatic solution, but night after night of filibustering is not the way to find a solution.

People are saying that there was an election. There is a majority government. We can urge, we can stall, but if we truly want to work together, we must get together in committee of the whole to propose amendments.

People were mad about this filibuster because June 24 is Quebec's national holiday. People were asking why Parliament avoided sitting on a Friday because of the NDP and Conservative Party conventions, but Quebec's national holiday was not important. Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day for French Canadians is not important. We can sit that day.

We must be responsible. We can exert pressure and discuss at length, but there must be an outcome. At the end of the day, we need to serve the public. We can find a compromise, a balanced solution. I hope that we will be able to discuss possible amendments.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have a question for my colleague, the member for Bourassa. This is the same question that his colleague from Scarborough—Agincourt asked in the House. I also asked the NDP the same thing. I think it is very important that we get an answer.

In this place we talk a lot. That's all we do in this place. It's important to match our talk with action.

We never got an answer about this very important question. The NDP talks a lot about the rights of workers, but as I understand it their own local 232 still doesn't have a collective bargaining agreement. This has been years in the making. As a result, many new hires in the OLO and other parts of the New Democratic caucus are being made as management in order to avoid the seniority that comes with being part of a local.

My question to the member is when will the NDP put in place a collective bargaining agreement for some staff and “walk the walk” as they “talk the talk”?

[Denis Coderre, Liberal, Bourassa, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the NDP will have to live with its own contradictions and will resolve its problems. What I am interested in today, at 12:45 in the morning, is not showing hyper-partisanship, but finding a solution so that we can first respect the collective constitutional rights recognized by the Supreme Court. And then Ms. Mailloux in my riding can receive her mail. I told Ms. Mailloux that it was a lockout that made no sense, but that I was going to make sure that she got her mail. We can walk and chew gum at the same time. At some point, we must realize that too much is just as bad as not enough.

I would like us to stop with the gobbledygook and set aside partisanship so that we can find a solution. We can stretch things out. The members just have to say the same thing all the time. They have been repeating the same thing for 36 hours. We know the arguments. They are always saying the same thing. It sounds good. The members from Quebec all apologized because they were unable to take part in Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day, but they are still making the same arguments.

Can we move on? Let us bring forward amendments, and we will work hard. We want to work so that there is service, but we want the workers to be respected as well.

[Christine Moore, NDP, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague, the member for Bourassa, how he can play petty politics by saying that it is the NDP's fault we were unable to attend Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day festivities. Our leader moved a motion so that we could take a break for Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day and return to our families. The Bloc Québécois also moved a motion on that. But both times, the Conservative government refused to let us go.

[Denis Coderre, Liberal, Bourassa, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Abitibi—Témiscamingue must also know that before there are motions, there is Twitter. Some journalists have been tweeting everything we have been saying from the beginning. I said the same thing.

It is a collective problem. The Bloc started things off and moved the first motion. I believe the hon. member for Bas-Richelieu—Nicolet—Bécancour moved the motion. That is not petty politics; that is a fact. I heard a former nurse say that she has had to work on June 24 in the past and I commend her. We need to be consistent, as politicians and as members of Parliament. A resolution was passed in the House to recognize Quebec as a nation. So, if we can suspend for a political convention—which I understand, for we have all done it—we can also respect Quebeckers, French Canadians, as a nation. So members felt that we should not sit on Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day, Quebec's national holiday. Both sides are to blame.

[Ève Péclet, NDP, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Mr. Speaker, today is actually June 25, but I will not apologize for not being in my riding to celebrate Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day. However, I would like to wish all Quebeckers a wonderful national holiday. I am with them in spirit. I am so proud to be a Quebecker. Let us celebrate our culture and our beautiful language.

Now, to get back to the subject, namely, Bill C-6. I heard the speeches given by my hon. colleagues across the floor. I heard them say repeatedly that the complete shutdown of postal services is hurting the Canadian economy and SMEs and that this must absolutely be resolved. I understand that, because it is completely legitimate.

However, they forgot to mention one important detail in their speeches. The employees of Canada Post never called a general strike. They did not want to stop delivering the mail. Instead, they decided to stage rotating strikes, so that Canadians would still receive their mail. It was the employer, Canada Post, that decided to impose a lockout and shut down mail delivery.

It is even more shocking to see this government try to then blame the workers and the NDP to justify its policy. The employees want to return to work and we know that Canada Post never would have imposed a lockout without the approval of the government and the Minister of Labour, who is currently not here.

The shutdown of mail delivery is affecting the economy. The government has to end the lockout. I am truly shocked to see the government so readily blame every party except his own.

Yesterday, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Agriculture said that millions of Canadians and small and medium-sized businesses were suffering because of the lockout and that the voters elected the Conservatives, who now have to represent the voters' interests. Are they forgetting that the Canada Post workers also voted for us? Are they forgetting that the workers' families and friends are counting on us? They too voted for us. Are they forgetting that their children are also counting on us? Those Canadians also have the right to have their interests represented in the House of Commons.

We are not talking about a right that is part of some act or regulation. We are talking about a right that is enshrined in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It is a fundamental human right that is the key to balancing the power relationship between the employees and the employer, which already has a position of strength over its employees.

Why is the government so bent on denigrating the workers and bolstering that position? This disrupts the balance of the whole structure in the workplace. A society without labour rights, without collective bargaining, is not a free and democratic society. Talk to the many political prisoners and prisoners of conscience in countries condemned by Amnesty International because those countries do not respect these fundamental rights.

Thousands of activists have been imprisoned after devoting their lives to defending labour rights and fighting for the workers in their country. I have a good example. Mansour Ossanlou, president of the bus workers' union in Tehran, spent his whole life standing up for workers' rights. He is now in jail in his country, being tortured.

I know that the hon. members opposite will say that we are not in Iran here. I would tell them that indeed, in Canada, workers have the right to negotiate for better working conditions. They have the right to negotiate for better wages and stable pensions to avoid spending their retirement in poverty.

How dare the government talk about freedom and democracy when it now wants to use its majority—which represents only 40% of Canadians—to force workers to return to work for wages reduced by $875 over four years and pensions that are less stable, with less vacation, less sick leave and fewer benefits? How dare the government use the economic recovery to justify these major cuts?

How can people living in uncertainty and with lower wages contribute to Canada's economic recovery? That makes no sense.

The young people of my generation are getting a terrible message. They are being told that they will not have good wages, good pensions, good benefits or good working conditions, and above all, that they will not have the right to negotiate for better conditions.

Canada Post, as a crown corporation, is well aware that it is not in its interest to negotiate with the employees because the government will take its side. The government will legislate in its favour. That is exactly why today, negotiations have come to a standstill. That is also why we are here today, since the employees have no other choice. We are their only way out in terms of defending their rights. In this situation, the government is not acting in good faith by offering less than what Canada Post had offered its own employees.

Canada Post employees are still mobilized in my riding. Despite the rain the day before yesterday, there were about 30 employees picketing in front of the Saint-Jean-Baptiste Boulevard post office in Pointe-aux-Trembles. The vast majority of motorists taking that route showed their support by honking their horns or waving. Contrary to what the government is trying to make Canadians believe, the majority of people understand the reasons that pushed the Canada Post employees to go on a rotating strike, however they do not understand why this government locked the workers out.

A large number of constituents in my riding work in factories, small workshops and the construction sector. They are unionized workers who understand the importance of having good, safe working conditions. They sympathize therefore with the Canada Post mail carriers and employees whose mail preparation procedure will be modified.

The Canada Post Corporation has already started to change the mail assembly procedure. Some mail carriers in Laval now have to prepare their mail while they walk. The mail carriers will now be required to wear two mail pouches, one on each side of their body. Regardless of the rain, wind, hail, or snow, mail carriers tread the sidewalks with loads of tens of pounds, sometimes loads of up to 30 pounds. How will they be able to regain their balance in a wet staircase or on an icy sidewalk if they are carrying mail pouches hanging from each side of their body?

The number of on the job accidents will increase and these accidents will become more serious. Furthermore, the government wants to cut mail carriers’ benefits and salaries. What will be the impact of this measure in areas with a lot of exterior staircases, as is the case in Tétreaultville, located in the western part of my riding?

“The worst negotiated agreement is better than the best imposed agreement,” according to a popular adage among collective labour contract negotiators.

In keeping with their right-wing ideas, the Conservatives want to punish workers who believe in labour relations laws and collective bargaining, and have resorted to entirely legal and legitimate job action in the form of rotating strikes. This government argues that the scale it wants to impose is the same as for federal government public servants. In addition to making a mockery of working conditions, the government has given an arbitrator—who will be intervening in relation to a particular issue—a mandate with no real flexibility. Given the constraints placed upon the arbitrator, his decision is almost predictable.

A responsible government only uses special back-to-work legislation as a last resort. This government from the new right wants things its way and is willing to scare government workers in the process. The special legislation will set a precedent in the history of labour relations despite there being no general strike, just a government-imposed lockout.

For the residents of Pointe-de-l'Île, Quebec and Canada, democracy is not simply about voting in general elections; it is something they experience daily, in the workplace. Unionized workers have the right to bargain and to organize, but also the right to engage in job action.

I was disgusted today to hear my government colleagues say that we have no respect for Canadians and SMEs, and that we do not care about Canada’s best interests. I will not allow this government to blame us for its undemocratic practices, driven by the economic interests of companies and employers. I will not allow this government to try and tell Canadians that the NDP is not there for them. We are here not only for the workers at Canada Post, but for all Canadians.

We are here for them, for their families and their children.

[Gary Goodyear, Conservative, Minister of State (Science and Technology) (Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario)]

Mr. Speaker, I have two comments—

[The Acting Speaker, Barry Devolin]

Order. The hon. member for Burnaby—New Westminster on a point of order.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, for some time now, the Conservatives have been acting very poorly in the House. I urge you as Speaker to control the Conservative members who are lacking respect in this Parliament.

[The Acting Speaker, Barry Devolin]

That is not a point of order. I would agree that there has been a lot more noise in the last few minutes, but I have been monitoring the debate in this place.

The hon. Minister of State for Science and Technology and for the Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario.

[Gary Goodyear, Conservative, Cambridge, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to make two comments on the member's speech.

One, she mentioned motorists honking at the strike initiative. She assumed the honking was in favour of the strikers. I suspect it was more likely small business owners going to work, simply honking at the strikers and saying, “Get the hell out of the way; I want to go to work”.

The other thing is that I have emails from postal workers who tell me they were not allowed to vote by their union. They are disappointed with that and are demanding that the union allow them to vote on what they thought was a very good deal.

I would like to know from the member: How undemocratic is that?