Evidence of meeting #12 for Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was jobs.
A recording is available from Parliament.
President, Manitoba Federation of Labour
Who are we talking about being competitive with? I think WestJet is probably the biggest competitor, and my understanding is that they use StandardAero as one of their maintenance and service providers, and that has operations right here in Winnipeg. I think Canadian jobs and Canadian workers can be and are competitive.
I think the real question at work here is that we have an act that has a requirement to maintain good Canadian jobs, and is our government going to continue to enforce it?
Liberal
Vance Badawey Liberal Niagara Centre, ON
With respect to the centres of excellence that have been announced, I guess to some extent a bar has been placed with respect to what they'll be doing at these centres of excellence. Have you given any thought as to how to enhance that, how to raise the bar, with respect to the centres of excellence with the recommendations that are to be part of Bill C-10?
President, Manitoba Federation of Labour
I'd be all for raising the bar. I don't know much detail about the centre of excellence. I've heard mention of it. We've heard little bits and pieces, but the reality is we haven't seen that document. I appreciate the comments by our local minister earlier that it's not something that's public yet and needs some work. I believe it needs work and it needs some public understanding.
Should we raise the bar and provide good-quality services and jobs? Absolutely, and let's do everything we can to grow that.
Liberal
Vance Badawey Liberal Niagara Centre, ON
Thank you.
To Ms. Stefanson, do you agree that a centre of excellence would be beneficial for Manitoba?
Deputy Premier, Government of Manitoba
Absolutely. We think it would be very beneficial to our province. Again, we're in favour of the modernization of the act, the change in the geographic scope, but, as Mr. Rebeck said earlier, it gets down to those jobs and how that part of the act provides too much flexibility to pull jobs out of Manitoba at this stage. We need to make sure it's not changed, so that there's a net benefit to jobs to help grow our economy.
Liberal
Vance Badawey Liberal Niagara Centre, ON
With respect to net benefit or net gain, and taking into consideration that you just got into office, has the province discussed any opportunities with respect to incentives to actually compound some of the incentives the federal government may be offering?
Deputy Premier, Government of Manitoba
I think we're in the stages of having discussions with our federal counterparts to make sure we can do that. That's the real reason we're here before committee today: We've just gotten into office and we're trying to make sure we can work collaboratively with the federal government and ensure that there will be a net benefit for jobs here in the province of Manitoba.
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you to the two folks from Manitoba. It's been a long time since I lived there. I used to enjoy getting down to Rae and Jerry's. I guess it's still around, is it?
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
Great.
I wanted to talk about the state of the Manitoba industry, because when I lived there it was a source of pride that we had Bristol Aerospace, just like we have New Flyer there. The company I used to work for did a lot of business with them.
When Aveos went down, obviously there was a gap all of a sudden in the provision of services to Air Canada. It seemed that Air Canada did all of its business with Aveos or that all of Aveos' business came from Air Canada.
When Aveos went down—and Mr. Rebeck, maybe you'd have to have a bit more corporate memory here—were there opportunities opened up for the other Manitoba operations to go in and bid on Air Canada's work?
President, Manitoba Federation of Labour
It's a good question. I don't have that corporate memory and I'm not sure exactly what happened with all of that or how that work's been managed since. I do know there's clearly a gap so that we've been disappointed that expectations have not been lived up to. There may have been some other opportunities, but at what cost, when 400 jobs have been let go?
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
Some of the wording around the original agreement with Air Canada required them to operate and maintain maintenance facilities in Canada. As you know, that company went bankrupt, and they spun off Aveos. It occurs to me that at that moment, in fact, Air Canada was no longer living up to the law, because they didn't have that work being done in house any more, and this happened a long time ago. Is that not correct?
President, Manitoba Federation of Labour
That is correct.
It was before my time, but I do know that labour was a strong voice at that time as well, saying that they weren't living up to the commitment and calling on the federal government to help enforce those commitments. They didn't. They considered it enforcement by letting Aveos do that work. Workers did organize and unionize, and they were union jobs, but I don't think they were living up to it at that time either.
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
To your recollection, was there any movement by other private industry or by the union or by the Government of Manitoba when Aveos went down to step in and try to rescue the Winnipeg operation?
President, Manitoba Federation of Labour
Again, I don't have the details of that. I'm certain there were efforts to do it.
Organizations are adaptable and move to fill voids where they exist, but that doesn't take away from the core question. We have an act in place right now that gives an obligation for Air Canada to provide for good jobs in three different communities across this country—good Canadian jobs with Canadian skilled workers—and that has not been lived up to.
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
Madam Deputy Premier, I guess you're getting used to that title. It probably looks good on you.
Getting back to the question that one of my colleagues asked, if there is to be true collaboration and partnership between all levels of government to support Manitoba's aerospace industry, has your new government had at least some discussions about what it could do, either in league with Bill C-10 or outside of it, to also work with us to bolster Manitoba's competitiveness and the number of well-paying jobs that are located there?
Deputy Premier, Government of Manitoba
Thank you for the question and for your comments.
We have been in discussion with some of the local cabinet ministers to express our concern with respect to Bill C-10 and to express our interest in working collaboratively with the federal government to ensure that jobs are created here in the province of Manitoba in all sectors of the economy, including the aerospace sector. Those discussions have begun.
I think at this stage, for the purposes of today, we're concerned about the bill being moved forward too quickly, before the details are dealt with.
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
With regard to the discussions you may have had with the cabinet ministers who come from Manitoba and sit in the federal cabinet, have they been productive thus far? I know it's early days for you.
Deputy Premier, Government of Manitoba
I think they want to work with us on this file. I think it's a matter of time.
Today is the last day for presentations to committee, which is why I'm here today. I think there was an amendment by another MP from Manitoba that was brought forward to maybe extend this. From our perspective, this is really about Manitoba jobs and the future of our economic growth here in Manitoba.
Conservative
Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC
Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
This has been most instructive. Once again, may I congratulate Mr. Brian Pallister and all of his team for their fine victory in Manitoba's last provincial election. We are very happy to have you here again with us to be able to talk about it.
I will go back to Mr. Rebeck in a few moments, but for now I want to speak to you, Ms. Stefanson.
I would like you to tell us a bit about your program. What does the Manitoba government intend to do to convince the federal government not to move too quickly on Bill C-10? We also believe the Act to amend the Air Canada Public Participation Act needs to be modernized. We also think Air Canada has to become more competitive. However, there is no reason to rush things. The official opposition is in complete agreement with you on that.
What is your game plan to try to convince Mr. Garneau to delay the adoption of Bill C-10 to the fall?
Deputy Premier, Government of Manitoba
I want to thank the member very much for the question.
Moving forward, our plan is, and has been thus far, to work as closely as we can with the federal government to ensure that they understand our perspective, which is that we need to do everything we can to protect the jobs here in Manitoba. Moving this forward in this fashion, with some of the amendments.... Again, you are right. The modernization of the act, the expansion of the geographic scope—we have no problem with those things. However, when it comes specifically to jobs and the flexibility that it offers—a little too much flexibility—for Air Canada to be able to pull those jobs from Manitoba, we have a serious issue with that.
We want to ensure, in Manitoba, that in any sort of negotiation there is a net benefit for Manitobans. Moving forward, we want to develop a plan collaboratively with the federal government to ensure that there is a net benefit in the way of jobs that will help grow our economy here in Manitoba.
