Maybe these are some of the approaches we can go into. However, we know the risk is always there if management and labour in a dispute know that government will step in and settle that dispute by legislation. Then they will not negotiate in good faith.
Looking ahead, the solutions are not always that obvious to us. If they were, we would have found them a long time ago. No one in the House believes that strikes and lockouts are the solution. But I do believe that if we keep stressing that we are now in this together, it is not a question of adversaries and stakeholders fighting it out. We are all in the same boat. If we are
fighting one another, we are drilling a hole in the bottom of our own boat. This has to be the attitude we bring to our future as management, as labour, as citizens and as government.
With this approach we are going to be able to overcome a lot of the animosities of the past. In doing this, we will have to ensure that we do not allow the injustices to creep in which gave rise during the twenties and the dirty thirties to organized labour that had to strike. We are going to have to make sure that we do not have the rapacious management of the twenties and the thirties that was capable of dictating not only wages and hours, but conditions that were unsanitary, unhealthy and such things. That is not what we are asking for. We are enlightened.
We know that a happy workforce is a productive workforce, is a competitive workforce. We know that a management team that works with labour and shares their problems, that brings them to the table, that opens the books to them, that says: "We have a big problem, how do we fix it together," is the type of enlightened management that avoids problems and brings about the new routes to productivity being employed by many of our competitors around the globe.
Let us not rejoice tonight in the fact that we have had to legislate an end to this work stoppage. Let us recognize that what has happened is a failure for every one of us. It is a failure for everyone in this House who did not use his or her collective strength and ability to say to labour and management, is there not a better way. It is a failure based on the way we have done things in the past. We have done them better recently, but it is only 10 years ago that we had the worst record for lost days because of work stoppages, strikes and lockouts.
Let us say we have done what we have had to do. It was necessary in the public good. Let us say, can we not use this as an occasion to find a better way for the future.
Recognizing the role played by workers, unions, companies, and Canadians in general, we must recognize that the measures taken today are not remarkable and that their sole purpose is to protect exports, harbours, and farmers, and to provide essential services. But, from now on, let us recognize that we must find more efficient and more realistic alternatives to ensure peace on the labour front, and co-operation between unions and management, in order for Canada to become stronger, more competitive and more prosperous.