Madam Speaker, indeed I come from the riding of Longueuil, the nicest one in Quebec. Located along the St. Lawrence River, it reflects the history of French Canadians, the history of Quebec. There are some very old houses. I myself own a house built in 1854. It was bought by the Oblate Fathers when they first came to Canada. They settled on Saint-Charles street, in Longueuil. As you know, the Oblate Fathers were missionaries and discoverers. They promoted Quebec's development and we are very proud of that.
As regards Bill C-11, the Liberal government is once again helping itself. It creates a new department, it changes the name of the department so as to give itself more power, much more power as was explained by the Bloc Quebecois members who spoke before me. It seeks to provide the minister with the authority to get involved with the private sector, with the provinces, or some of them, for the purpose of creating a system that will be detrimental to the Quebec employment department.
In Quebec, a manpower development agency was set up a few years ago. This structure reflects the unanimous will of all Quebecers, whether they are from business or labour, and whether they belong to either one the two main parties, namely the Parti Quebecois and the Quebec Liberal Party. There is a definite consensus. All Quebecers agree that the province must have its own way of dealing with the unemployed or with welfare recipients, who had the misfortune of losing their job. There are some who had the misfortune of losing their employment because of the federal government's way of managing.
We know that the federal government, through its policies of concentrating all the powers here in Ottawa, wants to show Quebecers that it is the big leader of this country. It wants to show that, without the federal government, it would be impossible to survive in Quebec. All the measures it has taken have had the effect of bringing about inflation in some cases; after having caused inflation, it increased interest rates, which generated recessions between 1970 and 1980.
Between 1984 and 1986, we experienced the same problem when inflation and recession were brought about. So, the real cause of the social problems we have in Quebec is particularly related to the inappropriate actions taken by the federal government. Today, the minister wants to give himself powers to manage the unemployment insurance program better. But the government is the cause of unemployment.
I want to point out that we cannot have much confidence in this Liberal government. Only three weeks ago, I asked questions of the secretary of state for finance, who was saying that he wanted to set up an unemployment insurance fund, adding that he wanted to use the moneys collected from both employees and employers, some $5 billion a year, to collect even more and then give it back under the new way of managing the unemployment insurance program.
He was saying that this fund could be used to reduce Canada's debt, and that he also wanted to set up a fund to accumulate money for lean years to come. Let me remind him that these are lean years.
If the government wants to build up a reserve during the lean years, how much more money will it collect when prosperity returns? Apparently, it will collect $5 billion during a lean year like this one. How much will it collect when times are good? Will it be $10 billion, or $15 billion? Where will all that money go? In the consolidated revenue fund, to reduce the Canadian debt.
The poor are being squeezed, and the small businesses too. We know that the maximum insured income has been reduced. The higher the salary, the lower the relative contribution will be. Quebec has many have small businesses, and our salaries are lower. That means that small businesses will pay more. In a way, workers and employers will have to pay a new tax to reduce the federal deficit.
It is a strange way to put government finance back in order. They squeeze money out of workers and small businesses in Quebec to reduce the federal deficit. As you can see, we do not trust this way of doing things. This bill gives more powers to the minister, so you will understand why we are apprehensive, and why we worry so much about the future.
My colleagues have already mentioned that Quebec wants to have complete jurisdiction over manpower training. That has been said so many times in the past. There reasons why Quebec wants this. Quebec is a distinct society, whether you like it or not. It is a fact of life.
It is a reality. English Canada has to understand once and for all that Quebec is a distinct society.
We are a distinct society, not necessarily because of our French language. The fact that we speak French is patently obvious, of course. Quebecers speak French and quite a high percentage of French speaking Quebecers do not speak English. For instance, the minister could ask a Quebec worker who just lost his job to take a job in Toronto or in Vancouver. That is what is called manpower mobility.
Any worker who loses his or her job could be asked to move to Vancouver for example or Toronto to get a job. However, a French speaking Quebecer who does not speak English could refuse to take a job in Toronto or in Vancouver, but then he would stand to lose his UI benefits, because a French speaking Quebecer can be forced to
move to an area where he, in principle, cannot work, and where he is not at all interested to go. It is too big a change to ask of him.
Because Quebec is a distinct society, we cannot make the same rules for Quebecers as for the rest of Canadians. This is one of the reasons we believe Quebec should be responsible for unemployment insurance and for manpower training. Everybody agrees with that in Quebec.
Quebec is not a distinct society just because of its language. Quebec is not a distinct society just because of its folklore. Our folk dances are not the only difference. We dance the typical square dances of the Scotch and the Irish. If ours is a distinct society, it is not only because of folklore. We have a distinct culture.
In particular, we are distinct because of our financial institutions. Quebec's financial institutions are distinct, as is again obvious when we deal with amendments concerning financial institutions. This is of the utmost importance.
The Mouvement Desjardins alone, for example, has assets of more than $80 billion. This is quite significant. Why did Quebecers have to put in place their own financial institutions? Because English Canada would not give loans to good French speaking Quebecers who needed money. No loans were given. In Quebec, loans were only for English speaking individuals and for their businesses.
So we had to set up our own financial institutions with Quebec charters and rules. But there is not only the Mouvement Desjardins.
Quebec chartered mutual insurance companies were created specifically to answer Quebec's needs. There is also the Quebec Deposit and Investment Fund which manages more than $50 billion. The money is used to develop our economy, give loans to Quebec businesses and to create partnerships with certain companies. This is what distinct society is all about. It means that we created our own financial institutions, our own corporations and all that.
Now, you will understand that we do not intend to lose what we duly earned by the sweat of our brow. How could we accept that the federal government should decide how we are to be trained, and what rules are to be established even without our consent?
Just look at what the government did our fusion project in Varennes. It decided unilaterally that the federal government's priority was not nuclear fusion.
It acted unilaterally. It did not talk to Quebec, to other investors, and Hydro-Quebec is one of them. It decided unilaterally to pull out of this research.
The great federal master decided on his own to suddenly withdraw or change the rules without taking into account the efforts that we made in Quebec to develop ourselves. We have created many things. In spite of all our efforts, if we succeed in having an unemployment rate no higher than 10 or 12 per cent, we are considered to be top players, extraordinary people. The federal government has never helped us much in terms of economic development, we have had to do it all by ourselves with a lot of hard work.
Do you think we can have confidence in the federal government for our development? When we think that in R&D in 1989, and I have had the opportunity to do a study of this, federal contracts to Quebec using our tax money for R&D-which is somewhat linked to training, because businesses need to develop, as people need to be trained, it is all connected-research and development contracts or assistance from the government, to businesses or educational institutions were $1.2 billion less than to Ontario.
I do not recall all the figures exactly, since it is quite some time since I did the research, but I do remember clearly that the shortfall for Quebec in R&D contracts from the federal government was $1.2 billion. So, if you wonder why there is more unemployment in Quebec than in Ontario, there is the reason.
In the industry committee this morning I asked the people from Statistics Canada who were there testifying what the distribution of Statistics Canada staff was. They said the distribution was good, and relatively representative of the population, but when I asked for details, they told me that there were 4,600 employees at Statistics Canada, and some 3,500 of those were in Ottawa. Now, as far as I know, Ottawa is in Ontario, so when you look at the $346 million spent by Statistics Canada, and think of the relationship between the total of 4,600 employees and the 3,600 Ontario employees, you will see that the repercussions for Ontario are markedly greater, and that is where the difference lies.
The purpose of all that is to say that we cannot count on the federal government to help us develop. We really have no confidence in them. As the saying goes, once burned twice shy, and let me tell you that we have absolutely no confidence in the federal government to look after manpower training, to look after our jobless.
They say unemployment is running at only 10 per cent, 11 per cent in Quebec. Unemployment is still much too high in Quebec compared with the United States, where it is at about 5 per cent. The worst of it is that there are somewhat fewer unemployed than there should be because those who have run out of unemployment insurance are now on welfare.
Welfare in Quebec is very high. Why? Because people are getting less unemployment insurance, because they are working less. Why is there more unemployment in Quebec? For the reasons I mentioned earlier. Because the federal government has never taken Quebec seriously, and we have always had to work a lot harder to achieve economic growth.
That is what the distinct society is all about. Quebec will never agree to let the federal government manage its affairs, unless major changes are made.
On that point I conclude and I thank you very much, Madam Speaker.