Mr. Speaker, we have the same problem in New Brunswick. The pulp and paper company in New Brunswick allowed a front line company to come in and it is running the place. The community has nothing to say on it any more. Right now they are on strike.
The government not only allowed the wood to go out of the community but it allowed it to go out of New Brunswick because it supports big corporations and corporations can do anything they want.
It was a shame when the mill in Nackawic went into bankruptcy and the workers lost their pension plan. What did the government do to help them? It has done sweet nothing so far. This is a shame.
What the motion would do is create a program to help those people who are aging. It is the same with Brunswick Mines when it closes five years from now. We will have people 50 years old and unemployed.
I was an underground worker and I am sure if I had continued to work there until I was 50 years old and then lost my job, I would not have been able to find another job. I would have been searching but I probably would never have found a job. Most of the jobs available today are in the high tech industry and using computers. Our youth today learn computers at the age of two, but not the workers who come out of a mine, such as the ones in Timmins or in New Brunswick.
When the Minister of Natural Resources visited my region he told the woodcutters to take their power saws and hang them on the wall because it was over, that the company no longer wanted power saws in the bush. They told New Brunswickers how they should work. They put people out of their jobs and put them on welfare. This is not taking responsibility for the community.
The only way to take responsibility for the community is to look after the community and to talk with the people and find solutions. It is not just by running away with the company and saying that if it does something to the big company it will close its door. Well, let it close the door and go home because we do not need it.
We need a company that accepts responsibility. We could do it through people and through co-ops where we could look at ways to keep our resources and create jobs instead of taking the job, sending it somewhere else and not taking responsibility.
I say shame on the Liberal government of Ontario if it does not look after the workers. When an election comes, oh boy, it certainly wants the votes of these working men and women.