Madam Speaker, we are debating an important issue today, one which my party has concerns about. Back to work legislation, particularly in regard to the Public Service Alliance of Canada and the current strike, is an issue we take most seriously, especially considering that mechanisms are in place whereby the government could have resolved the matter.
My understanding is that the difficulties have been under negotiation for some two years. The fact that no resolution has come forward is almost an indictment of the government and its lack of effort to bring this matter to some kind of closure.
I am particularly concerned about my part of the country because one of the fundamental issues in this strike is the regional rates of pay. The government has refused to acknowledge and negotiate that. Regional rates of pay means that people who are doing exactly the same work are paid less in one part of the country than people in another part of the country. Not surprisingly a bulk of those people who are paid less reside in Atlantic Canada, one part of the country that can least afford low wages.
I will address that particular issue because it affects my region. It affects other regions. It is interesting to note, and the hon. member for Winnipeg Centre raised this yesterday, that in the back to work legislation there is some reference to those particular regional rates of pay. The government is suggesting that it will reduce the number of regions from 10 to 7. It is talking about combining Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia, and I suppose we will have Nova-Saskatchewan. It is another way of saying that people in western Canada and eastern Canada will receive less pay than people in other parts of the country. And the government wonders why there is western and eastern alienation.
How long has this been going on? I believe regional rates of pay were imposed in 1922. There have been some changes since 1922.