Madam Speaker, there are two people I would like to recognize tonight before I get into my remarks. The first is the Speaker who agreed when he received the letter from the hon. member for Selkirk-Interlake that indeed there was an emergency, a crisis in Canada today. He had sense enough to recognize that this was an important issue. I congratulate him for allowing the emergency debate to take place tonight.
The other person whom I would like to recognize is the parliamentary secretary who is sitting here on behalf of the President of the Treasury Board and who is listening to the debate. I hope he listens very carefully to some of the things that have been said and that will be said in the next few minutes.
I do not have all the answers but I do have a couple of basic fundamental principles that I have found to be true wherever I go. As a businessman this gentleman knows only too well that what I will say is exactly what he has practised and what has made him a successful business person. I challenge him to apply the same criteria that made his business succeed to what the government is supposed to be doing in terms of its labour relations and in terms of the management of the economy and the finances of the country.
I will focus my remarks on two concepts. The first one is leadership. The second one is management. I propose to the Liberal government that at the present time the incidence before us that has given rise to this debate is merely a symptom of a lack of leadership in the government. It is an example. It is symptomatic of a lack of management or the application of management principles and the understanding of the operation of those principles.
I will move into those two areas to try to show clearly how the government is lacking vision. The number one characteristic of good vision a leader must have is a vision about where we are going as a nation, where we are going as a corporation, where we are going as a business, what will benefit this business, what will make it profitable, what will make us succeed as a corporation in the environment within which we have decided to set up business, what will serve our customers well, what will give us the satisfaction, and what will give us a profitable organization. For that a leader needs a goal and a vision and a clear articulation of that vision and of that goal.
Where is the vision in terms of reviewing the issue today? There is none. If there was one he would know that labour-management principles must be exercised. We should have smooth and co-operative labour-management relations. Do we have them? No.
We had a post office strike two years ago. It still has not been resolved. The Minister of Labour has extended the deadlines for the arbitrator again and again. I wonder if the hon. parliamentary secretary will go to the Minister of Labour and ask him to extend the deadline once again. March 31 is the deadline for the arbitrator. Will it be extended once more?
It is not only vision that is lacking. A leader is also a decision maker. He knows how to make decisions and does so. We have had decisions made by the Prime Minister. We have had a canoe museum built. We have had all kinds of interesting diversionary tactics to focus attention on everything except the solution of the things that we demand.
When will we come to the point where we recognize that we need to attack a problem, look at the alternatives, examine the implication of those alternatives, choose one, act and go down that road? Have we seen that? No. We are lacking on two counts: no vision and no decision making apparatus.
Let us examine how crises have been resolved? There was back to work legislation in the most recent strike at Canada Post. Has it resolved the crisis? The people are back at work, but what has the result been? It has stymied the negotiations with other unions that Canada Post is engaged with. It has brought about the situation that is existing in Vancouver right now. It is affecting all other negotiations. My hon. colleague from Calgary just indicated that it is affecting national revenue and the refunds that people are supposed to get.
These are all little crises. They are not of the proportion of the one with the grain handlers, but they show that the government is incapable of dealing effectively with its labour-management problems.