Mr. Speaker, Bill C-262, an act to provide for the settlement of labour disputes affecting the export of grain is legislation which has been needed for many years in the often stormy climate affecting Canada's reliable supply of grain to the hungry world.
I am pleased to rise in the House today to support this private member's bill. Shortly after the newly elected 35th Parliament was opened early this year, the people of Canada were asking us to do something about the prolonged strike of nine locals of the International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union known as the ILWU and the accompanying lockout by British Columbia Maritime Employers' Association representing 70 different west coast companies.
By the time this matter came before us, the economic impact of this major disturbance in the workplace had spread to some 3,500 west coast grain handlers as well as approximately 200 employees of railroads while the cycle of rail car movement also suffered major disruption.
A great many prairie farmers whose grain was not yet being moved suffered major financial losses. Included were demurrage costs of some $10,000 per day for 26 ships in port plus the threat of even more demurrage for 38 ships due to arrive during that week and the next.
The disrupted labour contract had been the subject of prolonged negotiating sessions from July through December 1993, but rather than prompting a settlement the threat of strike erupted into job action at financial costs which were estimated as high as $300,000 per day for wheat alone.
However, perhaps the greatest loss was to the reputation of the Canadian Wheat Board and the port of Vancouver as being reliable suppliers of grain.
We should be aware that both our Canadian production of wheat and world demand for it are increasing. For example, according to figures supplied by the Canadian Grain Commission in its publication, "Grain Statistics Weekly", at the close of business January 9, 1994 farmers delivered 20,900 tonnes of durum wheat; 95,700 tonnes of other wheat; 10,200 tonnes of oats; 85,900 tonnes of barley; 71,100 tonnes of canola; 6,400
tonnes of flaxseed and over a tonne of rye for a total of 291,400 tonnes, all for export.
But the previous week the totals were nearly three times as high; 912,900 tonnes, the vast majority also headed for export. International demand for wheat, especially among customers living around the Pacific rim is growing.
According to a letter from the Canadian Wheat Board called "Grain Matters": "The Far East and Oceania, home to 3.2 billion consumers, could account for 40 per cent of the world wheat trade by the end of the century. Population and income growth, increased urbanization and the resulting dietary shift away from rice, are expected to lead to greater use of wheat based products. Canada could secure as much as 30 per cent of this market".
Such growth in both Canadian productivity of wheat and growth in Pacific rim demand for that wheat could be good news for farmers and for the Canadian economy as a whole. We must ask ourselves what happens in corporate board rooms around the Pacific rim when chief executive officers and boards of directors see shipments expected from Canada being delayed for two weeks or more due to a labour dispute?
Unlike a current TV commercial for coffee, those ships cannot simply be turned around en route. Instead they sit in port while we pay penalties called demurrage. According to figures supplied from both the department of agriculture and the department of human resources the Japanese cancelled some of their barley orders for April over the strike in January. Unfulfilled or seriously delayed orders cause serious damage to the willingness of our customers to buy from us, if they can possibly obtain sufficient grain for their needs in either Australia or the United States.
Nor was the grain handling disruption in January this year a one time occurrence. On the contrary. The need to settle grain handling disputes has been the most prominent issue requiring recent federal back-to-work legislation, starting with the West Coast Ports Operation Act, providing for the resumption and continuation of longshoring and grain handling operations, rushed through Parliament on August 31 and September 1, 1972 and even earlier on the St. Lawrence in 1966.
From then onward until earlier this year the list reads like a sad litany to mourn the failure of the labour negotiation process as regards this perishable commodity: in 1974, 1975, 1976, 1982, 1986, 1988, 1991 and again in 1994.
In part the blame must lie with the excessive taxes caused by a quarter century of excessively high peacetime federal government budgets. As proof of these excessive taxes, in British Columbia tax freedom day according to the Fraser Institute has advanced 49 days during that period of time until in 1994 the average B.C. worker must put in fully half a year's wages to pay his taxes before he can finally draw a full breath and start to work for himself and his family on the first day of July.
Seeing less and less of his pay cheque being left to spend on the necessities of life for himself and his family, at the same time as the prices of goods have been relentlessly driven upwards by the same causes, the average employee wants a bigger pay cheque when it comes time to negotiate a new contract.
Likewise, British Columbia employers continue to be saddled not only with the highest personal income taxes in Canada on the profits, but also as business people with high levels of taxes not related to profits, including business licences and insurance, plus premiums paid for things like unemployment insurance and workers' compensation.
These factors, influencing both sides of labour negotiations, make it harder and harder for all employers and all employees to readily reach new terms once an existing contract expires.
Given the size of our federal debt, now in excess of $530 billion, it is clear that high taxes are not going to go away in the near future. It must also be clear that we need a new method for settling disputes such as the one involving west coast grain handlers whose economic consequences are so widespread. Indeed many members of Parliament, including myself, have received representations from the elevator operators asking that some long term resolution of their dispute be legislated as it has become apparent that the present system simply does not work.
My fellow members of Parliament in the Reform Party caucus and I voted in favour of the government's back to work legislation last February with the understanding that a long term solution must be found so that the federal government need not continue to interfere on a case by case basis in the collective bargaining process.
It was therefore with a great sense of relief that I first read this private member's bill, C-262. It lays down a simple method of settling future disputes precisely along the lines employed in the government's back to work legislation earlier this year as embodied in Bill C-10 passed on February 8. The only difference I can see between the actual dispute settlement mechanisms outlined in private member's bill C-262 and the government's Bill C-10 is that C-262 asked an appointed arbitrator to make his recommendations within 60 days, but allows the arbitrator to appeal to the minister for a longer time if needed, whereas Bill C-10 starts with 90 days instead of 60.
Both of these bills use the last best offer method of dispute settlement whereby either the final offer of the union or the final offer of the employer's association must be accepted in its entirety for matters on which the two have not previously been able to agree. However, nothing in the legislation would prevent the two parties from negotiating peacefully together and possi-
bly never needing to use the new legislation at all. It would be in place if it were needed rather than requiring Parliament to once again rush to interfere if the two parties should again find themselves unable to sign a collective agreement and the shipment of grain again become jeopardized.
In view of the widespread and long term economic consequences of possible future disruptions in handling Canadian grain, I hope that all members of this House who joined together in support of government Bill C-10 will once again be able to join together to support Bill C-262.
