Thank you.
I'm the vice-president of the Windsor and District Labour Council. I'm also a part of an organization in Windsor-Essex called Making Waves Windsor Essex. Some of our focus has been to really have a conversation about what's happening in terms of the undermining of our jobs, our democracy, and our public services, and in terms of our health, our relationships with one another, and even what the future looks like for future generations and how we move forward.
Long before any discussion at all about postal banking, I can say that I was active in my community in fighting against predatory lenders in terms of what that meant for the most marginalized people in our community, what that meant for people who were on social services and had to go to a predatory lender just to cash their cheque. It cost them $30 just to cash their cheque. We were actively involved in that, so I think this is a really neat and innovative thing that needs to be looked at.
In relation to that, I have a bit of history too. I was a city councillor for seven years. From that perspective, I can speak to a couple of interesting points that I think you would like to hear. I also come out of Unifor. My father was the president of the former CAW. On your comments around labour, I'd like to share some innovative ways in terms of how you can overcome some of the impasse that I heard you mention earlier.
If I had more time, I'd like to share with this committee two of the best success stories in our community. They come from the innovative thinking of different stakeholders that you would never expect to come together in a non-divisive way in order to think about how we can work together and collaborate better.
I'd like to tell you about two of those stories. One is in manufacturing, and one relates to a benefits company. We're working on another innovative project in our community that starts to address many complex questions and allows many stakeholders to see the benefits of collaboration.
One point I want to make is that Canada Post is a success story. If Canada Post disappeared today, imagine what the consequences would be for the Canadian population and for all of the spinoff benefits that I'm sure you're going to hear about through the various presentations when you go throughout the country. I won't speak to that today.
When I think of how governments today are trying to create jobs in communities, here's an excellent example. Just here in Windsor and Essex County, at a time when we're bleeding jobs, Canada Post provides 500 jobs in our community. They are well-paid jobs with spinoffs for our community that even go beyond the public service.
On the whole question about public and private, I always find it interesting in our country that suggesting that the public sector start going into new business is like trampling on business, but somehow business can always put forward lobbyists, think tanks, and everything on why they should be delivering public services.
I'm curious about this. When you talk about innovation, everyone says that we need change. Sure, we need change, but that change can't always be tilted in one direction in terms of who benefits and who doesn't. In this country, we all see the growing gaps in political and economic inequality. The question is, how does that conversation start to tilt back to where we can actually use government to think about how it can benefit the widest interests of citizens? Why is it that when we have profitable entities, things that have a success story, they're under attack?
I want to comment quickly on democracy, and again, I will say congratulations and thank you for hosting this event. I want to share this with you. Today when I walked in I saw my neighbour from across the street who's going to be speaking to you later on disability issues. I love coming in and listening to Gary's comments. I don't even know who else is going to be in today, but it would have been ideal for the people who made presentations today to have more time from our community perspective to put forward recommendations whereby we can learn from one another.
We all come from these little narrow perspectives that you hear from. I guess if we were going to have true meaningful engagement, what we would have is our community having the opportunity to put forward some suggestions that come from all of us on things that we agreed on and that actually tackled some of the very difficult questions. Today, we're hearing this divisiveness on all sides, whether it's management, whether it's political, or whether it's union. We need to start thinking of new ways that communities can advance ideas.
Before I leave here today, I'm going to ask you to please consider if somebody can facilitate a conversation where our community can come together—the people who presented here today—to actually have a conversation, and then I would invite you back to Windsor. I can assure you, before you submit your final report, that we can certainly submit some ideas and come up with some things that we have consensus on that I hope would make a difference.
Lastly, when I heard someone say earlier that it's not performing, that Canada Post has some challenges, I say, to what standard are we setting that opinion on?
Again, I look forward to answering some questions and giving some examples on how collaboration can put forward truly meaningful results for the public, for our country, and our future.