Mr. Speaker, I was listening to the debate throughout the day and I kept hearing about finding a balanced approach with management on one side and labour unions on the other because it is the Canadian way. I heard this from the Minister of Labour, other members of the government and some Alliance members. I must tell those people that they are wrong. This is one of those times when a decision must be made about what is right. When it comes to strikebreaking legislation, to the use of scabs in the workplace, that is wrong and we must outlaw it.
I had a personal experience this past summer on a picket line in Chatham, Ontario, which will live with me for the rest of my life. In the course of that strike a truck was trying to move through the crowd and some of the picketing workers were being forced through to so-called security firm people, who in fact were professional strikebreakers. They were a bunch of goons. I had dealt with the same group of people earlier in January in Windsor. As the truck was going through it was forcing the workers to move toward a yellow line that had been painted on the ground and they were not supposed to cross over that yellow line.
As they were being forced toward that yellow line they were hit, kicked and punched by the strikebreakers, and an incident developed. One man was kicked in the chest, and when he went down he was kicked in the head by one of the strikebreakers. His wife, who went to his aid, was kicked in the chest by one of the macho strikebreakers. The real sadness of this was what happened the week following as a result of the tension on the picket line. One of my constituents was almost killed by one of the strikebreakers when he was doing nothing more than picketing there.
The government must realize that what we saw in the Chatham and Windsor areas this past year can happen anyplace in this country. All of the evidence has been heard today, particularly from my colleagues in the Bloc, about this type of legislation prohibiting that kind of conduct. It will reduce lost work days and increase the potential for peace in those kinds of relationships.
I feel very strongly that this legislation is required. It is no longer a question of consensus building or what has to be done right. If the government does not realize that, it will have the same kind of problems as we had in Windsor and Chatham this past year.