Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for recognizing that I had tried to explain the context in which the remarks were made in Winnipeg.
I do not know the rules on this, but let me explain with respect to Churchill. There is a marine review going on and Churchill will be addressed as well as the comments made by my hon. friend whom he mentioned in his speech.
With respect to jobs in Winnipeg, CN has just announced hundreds of jobs in Winnipeg. I was there a couple of weeks ago and that was confirmed, so there has been an effort to retain some jobs there.
I want to address specifically the question that was raised a couple of weeks ago. In the 1950s and 1960s, thousands of CN employees worked in my province and many times I heard about the challenges that employees faced when representing their union brothers in trying to improve salaries, working conditions and safety conditions.
Many of these men to whom I spoke and listened to were veterans of World War I and II, like Luc Roussel and Bill Dunn who I mentioned this afternoon. They were very proud of what they had achieved in their military service but they understood they had very limited educations which was through no fault of their own. They had fought for their country and then they fought for their rights as workers, faced by highly skilled lawyers, negotiators for powerful railroad interests.
I said in Winnipeg that all parties today have to recognize their responsibilities with respect to where railroads are and what is happening, whether it is government or management. I also said that under no circumstances would I point a finger at those achievements arrived at by men who in many instances had only grades 7, 8 or 9 education who worked very hard at protecting their rights and the interests of those who have succeeded them.
Everybody in that room in Winnipeg, with the exception of the three people who walked out, knew exactly what I meant. It was a compliment to people who had made an enormous effort in the face of very difficult odds to achieve rights that were theirs.
I want to take up my friend's suggestion and apologize to anyone who has been mislead by the way those remarks were interpreted. I apologize if anyone felt slighted by them because those achievements were remarkable in those days. Now I think it is time for us to move on and make sure that the railroaders of today have a future by making sure the conditions they work in and the railroads they work for can be viable.