Mr. Speaker, let me congratulate you on your appointment to your new job. We actually did not think this was going to happen until we occupied the other side of the House. I am sure that you bring expertise and fairness to the position. I look forward to a long tenure with you.
While I am congratulating and thanking people, I would certainly like to thank the people of the grand old constituency of Wetaskiwin for returning me to the House of Commons for the second time. This is a real endorsement of our party's policies, our leader and our platform. If I may be so bold, it is probably an endorsement of myself as the candidate.
That did not come about strictly by accident. It came about as a result of a lot of hard work. I would like to thank those people who spent so much time, effort and shoe leather getting me elected. They did an exemplary job and I would like to recognize them here in the House.
When I was going around in my constituency during the election campaign, I talked to a lot of people in the coffee shops, on the doorsteps and on the farms throughout the constituency. Their concern was that they felt they had more government than they could afford, that the debt was certainly a huge problem, that it was a millstone around Canadians' necks. They told me that they would like a fresh start. Coincidentally, that is exactly on what we campaigned.
Therefore, it is incumbent on us to do our utmost to give Canadians a fresh start and to ease the tax burden. As the labour critic for the Reform Party, I noticed that the throne speech was sadly lacking in the area of labour.
Being a farmer, labour as it relates to me most directly is in the shipment of grain to port. Of course, a lot of other products have to go to port. We discover that these shipments can be interrupted either through work stoppage, that is a strike or a lockout.
I was most disappointed that the government did not take an opportunity to put into the throne speech some sort of final offer selection dispute settlement mechanism. I think this is of utmost importance. The loss of markets that we suffer each time there is a work disruption is an immeasurable commodity. Although we can measure certain amounts of lost markets, we cannot measure the entire impact on the economy.
Mr. Speaker, if it is not too late I wish to inform the House that I will be sharing my time with the member for Calgary West.
What about the amendments to the Canada Labour Code? We expect them to be tabled in the House very soon. Those amendments would be an excellent opportunity to see a final offer selection arbitration settlement mechanism take place.
This mechanism would affect about 700,000 federal workers, people who do not necessarily work for the federal government but who come under the jurisdiction of the federal labour code. That represents about 10 percent of the Canadian workforce. These people are mostly involved in the movement of goods, services or capital. They are people who work in the airline industry, the banking industry, the railroads and the post office.
We think it is of utmost importance that we have a mechanism to settle these disputes and yet we are not getting any kind of co-operation from the federal government. The federal government will use final offer selection arbitration once they have legislated either a locked out group or a struck group back to work. If it is good enough to use after these people are legislated back to work, then why not make it available to the parties before the work stoppage starts?
How would that work? The parties involved would agree on who their arbitrator was. They would present to the arbitrator the matters that were agreed on, the matters that are outstanding and their final position on those outstanding items. The arbitrator then would choose all of one position or all of the other position, no compromise position.
To me, this is a tool that can be equally used by labour or by management. If it is used to its ultimate, as I have said in this House many times before, it will not to be used at all. Both parties know that they have to bargain in a most earnest situation. They have to arrive at the best possible bottom line. There would be no fudging, no hedging, just the bottom line. If they do not, then an arbitrator can be imposed on them.
Some people have said this takes away the right to strike and disrupts and interferes with the bargaining process. Quite the contrary. Groups that are either locked out or on strike will have their bargaining process far more compromised through back to work legislation than they ever would with final offer selection arbitration.
I was most disappointed that we did not hear any mention of this during the Speech from the Throne. It is high time we adopted this. As I mentioned, Bill C-66 as it was known in the last Parliament, died in the Senate. Therefore I expect that the minister will reintroduce it in the House in the coming weeks. I am going to push very strongly to see that there are some changes made along the lines of final offer selection arbitration.
Canada is in a global marketplace. We have to establish our reputation as a reliable supplier of goods. Not only do we have to supply the best possible commodities, which we do, there is no problem with that, but we have to supply them on a regular, consistent and reliable basis. If we do not, our customers are certainly going to be looking elsewhere. It is like being in the supermarket business, if it is not on the shelf, it is pretty difficult to sell.
I am looking forward to seeing the bill come back to the House for debate, which I am sure will be any day now, at which time we will be addressing it and making all sorts of improvements to it, not the least of which is final offer selection arbitration.