Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with my colleague from Edmonton—Sherwood Park.
It is a pleasure for me to rise and speak to this Bloc motion that is before the House. The motion reads:
That, in the opinion of the House, due to the increasing number of factory closures associated with globalization, the government should establish a strategy to help older workers who lose their jobs, a strategy that should include income support measures.
I am the former Conservative critic for international trade and now for emerging markets. I have gone around the world and have seen the impact of globalization, not only on Canada but across the world as economies open up. It creates a change in the economy. As we develop new opportunities for Canada, at the same time we will lose some ground. This is not only a unique feature to Canada but to every country due to globalization.
Canada is a trading nation. Close to over 42% of our GDP is tied to international trade. International trade becomes a critically important part of Canada's prosperity.
As many of my colleagues and people who have come before our committee have said, globalization has been extremely beneficial and has given unprecedented prosperity around the world, Nevertheless, it has some drawbacks. We lose workers and some factories close down. This is the case here.
When those factories close down, it becomes natural to retrain the younger workforce. We have many retraining programs in order to send these individuals back into the workforce. At the end of the day, it is beneficial for Canada to have more people at work.
Naturally, it is with those older workers, and that includes myself now, where we see a need and training becomes difficult. It is not because they do not want to be trained. Other factors come into play that make it difficult for them to be retrained. It is natural that we as a country should ensure that we support these workers. They have been out in the workforce and they have helped to build this country. When these unfortunate circumstances do take place, it does not mean that we close our eyes and walk away.
My party will be supporting the motion before us, as will other parties. We recognize the importance of having people in the workforce, irrespective of age.
As recently as this week, Ontario removed the retirement age of 65. We recognize that we need the expertise that is out there. We need older workers. Our economy is growing and we have a shortage of skilled labour as well.
We need these people to come back into the workforce as quickly as possible. This is a way to help them and ensure that they are employed. It is our responsibility to ensure that Canadians get the first choice in jobs. We want to help them in whatever capacity we can. This motion talks about bringing these people back into the workforce. It is a timely motion that I do not think anybody in their right mind would not support. It is a pleasure for us to support the motion.
Many people have talked about factory closures. The riding beside me has suffered textile closures due to globalization. On many occasions my colleague representing that riding has stood in the House and spoken about the plight of workers in his riding because of this globalization issue. We recognize that factory closures do take place and there is a need for us to address this issue. This issue of factory closures and globalization is being addressed all over the world.
Can the globalization march be stopped? No, it cannot be stopped. It is something that has brought a tremendous amount of prosperity to all.
As I have mentioned, we are a trading nation and we need these kinds of agreements to ensure that we have outside market access. We are a country of only 30 million people with a huge amount of resources. Who will we sell these resources to? It will not be to ourselves. We need to trade.
I and my party support the principles of the WTO because we need a rules based system where larger economies do not nudge us out because we do not have deep pockets, as does our neighbour to the south or the European Union. Naturally, from all aspects my party has supported the concept of the WTO and globalization because we believe that in the final analysis globalization is beneficial to Canada.
As I and many colleagues have stated before, we have pinpointed some negative aspects of that but, nevertheless, it impacts Canadians. It is a pleasure for me to support the motion to recognize that older people who may lose their jobs require support from us.