Mr. Speaker, I was provoked into speaking on this group of amendments by the thought that someone wanted to eliminate the position of minister of labour.
I want to speak to the tremendous qualifications of the individual who presently holds the position. I am sure all Canadians will be impressed.
I have to ask myself why one would want to remove the position of the minister responsible for the working people? Why would we not want to have a minister of labour? Let us look at the issue.
This amendment, if passed, would eliminate the representation of the working people of Canada from the cabinet table. Think of the impact of that. This is a proposal from the Reform Party, the party that says it is grassrooty, that it comes from the salt of the earth and represents ordinary, working Canadians. It depends on what day we speak to those members. They pretend to represent a variety of things. At least on occasion they pretend to be the party of the average person.
What are those members proposing to the House today? What are they asking Parliament to do? They are asking to eliminate the position of the minister responsible for working people, the person who sits at the cabinet table to represent them. I hope all workers in the next election campaign get copies of this amendment and distribute it widely.
Whether a person is unionized or otherwise, the principle is the same. They are trying to eliminate that representation from the cabinet table. Whether working for a railway under federal jurisdiction, an airport, a TV station, a radio station, a crown corporation in any position, the Government of Canada or the wheat pool, the member from Kenora will know that all these people are covered by acts of Parliament as opposed to provincial legislatures. The Minister of Labour is the representative of all these people at the cabinet table.
I know the hon. member spoke cannot speak again on her amendments, but perhaps others in her caucus who have assisted with the drafting of these amendments can enlighten the House on why it is appropriate and desirable to abolish the position of minister of labour, the representative of the working person at the cabinet table. I have some difficulty with that.
They also want to remove the provision whereby cabinet could decide to have a deputy minister of labour. That is optional. It is not compulsory. It is an option the government has. They want to restrict or remove that option in addition to abolishing the position of the minister.
I do not know how long the Reform Party had to think about all this. I suspect it was probably done on the back of an envelope with not much thought. I say this respectfully. I ask all hon. members in the House why they would want to eliminate the position of the minister of labour, to deprive the working people of Canada of a voice at the cabinet table.
I wonder if workers from all over the country who voted when byelections were held a few days ago knew that the Reform Party wanted to remove their representative from the cabinet table. And when they do become aware of this fact-and they will certainly find out when they hear about the amendments being debated today-I wonder if those few who were tempted to vote for the Reform Party will still be inclined to do so, knowing that their representative would no longer sit at the cabinet table. Imagine making the member for Saint-Léonard-not the person but the position-disappear; the Reform Party would want to see the Minister of Labour dropped from cabinet and not be replaced.
Workers would not be represented by anyone. Zero representation, that is what the Reform Party wants. Does that make any sense like the member says? It is appalling.
Let us take a minute and look at the extremely good and well qualified individual that presently holds the position, the hon. member for Saint-Léonard.
Until recently the member for Saint-Léonard was Secretary of State for Parliamentary Affairs. He has very extensive experience. He studied at the Sir George Williams campus of Concordia University and had a career in accounting. He is a chartered accountant. He also had a very elegant and interesting political career. He was a school trustee and was president of a very large school board. He was elected as member of Parliament in 1984, re-elected in 1988 and also in 1993. And now, they would want that person removed from the cabinet table. As I said before, it is not the member himself they want to get rid of, but his presence in cabinet.
I can hear some hon. members heckling from the other side and I am almost tempted to answer myself this proposition of the Reform Party to make the hon. member from Saint-Léonard disappear from the cabinet table. No, it is not done, and it will not be done, fortunately, because workers in Canada, when they hear later today or early tomorrow, that Reform members want to do away with the position of Minister of Labour will call Reform members to order.
When Reform members board their plane to go home this afternoon, tomorrow or whenever, I am sure that airline employees will greet them a little less warmly, knowing that they want to do away with their representative in cabinet.
This is what the Reform Party wants to do and it is a shame. I tell you it is a shame. From one end of the country to the other, people will rebel against this suggestion, especially since Canadians hold the member responsible for this portfolio, the hon. member for Saint-Léonard, in such high regard, as he is very qualified and elegant. They would like to remove this great speaker in the House of Commons, this great defender of workers, from cabinet. Can you imagine that. It is a shame and Canadians will never accept that we do away with their representative in cabinet, especially someone with the qualities of the hon. member for Saint-Léonard.