Madam Speaker, I do want to get into a discussion on the bill sponsored by the member for Chambly. I would like to give a little history lesson first because people see the bill differently in different parts of Canada.
My constituency has 87 post offices. Approximately 12 of them are located in houses, in small rooms with separate entrances, providing a service to a small community. There is no question in my mind that if we were to make those facilities compliant with the bill I am afraid that would cause Canada Post to close these small centres.
I have never talked to any individuals who operate these small post offices who had ever indicated in any way that they wanted to do anything else but place a tender and operate out of a small room. There is no demand out there, as the hon. member from the government side has just said, to make changes to that. None whatsoever.
We still have contracts for those people who would carry the mail in these remote areas. When these contracts go out people bid on them and the lowest bid is not always accepted. The Bloc member said that somehow they are told that they would have to lower their bid in the bidding for Canada Post contracts. That is absolutely false. I know it as I have helped many of these people prepare their bids.
The conditions of the bid include the mileage, the route, the time and everything else. They know how long the contract will be and when the contract will come to an end. They can either reapply and re-tender it. The idea that was raised in this House that somehow the tenders are looked at first and then negotiated to take the lowest tender after the tender process is absolutely not true.
The hon. member who just spoke from the government side did raise an interesting point. He said that we get the mail in reasonable time. I would like his definition of reasonable. I used to get mail from Ottawa delivered to my home more quickly when the CPR carried it than at the present time, so let us not say it is reasonable.
I have great fears that if we were to take all of Canada Post and put it so that all employees, even for only a few hours a day, came under a contractual arrangement we would ruin service to the rural areas. I am sure that would happen. Instead of having a daily mail service, it would perhaps be cut down to two days a week.
While the idea of the bill may have some merit, speaking from rural area Saskatchewan and speaking on behalf of the smaller post offices, I am afraid we could not support the bill even though it was votable.
The people who render the service in rural Saskatchewan do a tremendous job. The poolrooms are no longer the social centres. The post offices in rural Saskatchewan are the social centres of the community. For that reason, to destroy the operation of the post offices that now exist, at least in my area, under different contractual operations, would be a blow to the communities.
For that reason of course I cannot support a change in the present arrangements that Canada Post has with the smaller areas.
In the larger areas, I am not disputing, in any way, CUPW's operation. I am not disputing the arrangements that it has for mail contracting. I am not disputing the arrangements that Canada Post has with airmail or having the trucks deliver to central points.
What I am disputing is the government, or Canada Post as a corporation, trying to put something in these smaller areas that simply will not work in rural Canada. I know it will not work because I live in rural Canada and smaller areas are not asking for it. I have lived in a rural area for years. We have 24 truck deliveries and about 80 post offices. No one has ever asked for a change in what we now enjoy.
For rural Saskatchewan, those places outside the city, and for smaller places from coast to coast to coast, all the bill would do, if it were a votable bill and it came into effect, is cause Canada Post to bring poorer service to rural Canada, including Saskatchewan. Therefore I cannot support the bill.