Debates of Oct. 17th, 2006

Softwood Lumber Products Export Charge Act, 2006

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I do not know what makes those members tick. They are definitely are not compassionate about the workers in the lumber industry. They do not care whether or not those lumber companies are successful. The only thing they care about is ensuring that money flows into the hands of lawyers so they can carry on ongoing litigation. We want to put this dispute behind us. We want to ensure that our industry is prosperous well into the future.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

Before we resume debate, the hon. member for Burnaby--Douglas is rising on a point of order.

Citizenship Act--Bill C-14

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to respond to the point of order raised on Friday, October 6 by the parliamentary secretary, regarding Bill C-14. I appreciate the opportunity to respond to the concerns raised by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration in the House on Friday October 6 regarding the admissibility of an amendment to Bill C-14 that was passed when the bill was under consideration in the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration.

As the mover of that amendment at the standing committee, I appreciate the opportunity to respond to the point of order. As we know, the amendment in question adds a new subsection to clause 2 of Bill C-14, which reads:

Any decision of the Minister under this section may be appealed to the Immigration Appeal Division of the Immigration and Refugee Board.

I would first point out that this amendment was found by the chair of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration to be in order, and it was discussed and debated by the committee and approved by a majority of members of the committee in that context.

I would like to emphasize that the parliamentary secretary made his arguments before the committee at that time.

As well, there was a vote at the committee, after hearing the arguments made by the parliamentary secretary and after hearing from other members, upholding the chair's ruling that the amendment was in order. The committee voted to sustain the chair's ruling.

I appreciate that the committee's actions do not preclude an approach to the Speaker and the House on this issue, but I want it to be clear for the Speaker that these issues were considered by the committee. I know that the Speaker has repeatedly found that in most cases committees know best when dealing with the matters before them, so I thought the fact that this amendment was debated and found in order by the committee is important.

I submit that the amendment does not go beyond the scope of the bill as passed by the House at second reading. Bill C-14 and the amendment in question are amendments to section 5 of the Citizenship Act. Section 5 deals with the question of grants of citizenship and sets out the minister's obligation with regard to the granting of citizenship. It also grants discretionary powers to the minister to waive requirements of the act in certain cases.

Bill C-14 amends this section of the act by adding a new section 5.1 that addresses the citizenship of children adopted by Canadians overseas, granting them citizenship upon application at the time of the finalization of adoption. This removes the discriminatory effects of the current law, which requires adopted children to apply for permanent resident status and then meet the residency requirements before subsequently applying for Canadian citizenship, but grants children born to Canadians overseas immediate Canadian citizenship without such an application.

Section 5 currently establishes criteria for obtaining Canadian citizenship, as well as noting situations where the minister may exercise discretion. Bill C-14 proposes a new section 5.1, which adds new criteria when dealing with children adopted overseas by Canadians. The amendment proposed by the standing committee to Bill C-14, rather than stepping outside the scope of the bill passed at second reading, merely adds a further consideration to the decision making powers of the minister as outlined in sections 5 and 5.1 by allowing an appeal of the minister's decision. I submit that this is in keeping with the principle of the bill as passed at second reading.

With regard to the parliamentary secretary's contention that this amendment provides new powers and a new mandate to the Immigration and Refugee Board beyond what is provided in the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, I would submit that denial of citizenship to an adopted child is a de facto denial of an immigration visa and permanent resident status to that child and, as such, the Immigration and Refugee Board is exactly the body that exercises judgment and rules on such cases.

The board is the body that understands the issues related to the validity of adoptions of children by Canadians overseas by currently ruling on appeals of the denial of permanent resident status to children adopted overseas. I would maintain that the issues investigated and criteria applied currently to rule on an appeal of permanent resident status to a child adopted by a Canadian overseas will be the same issues and criteria used to rule on an appeal of the denial of citizenship to such a child should Bill C-14 and the amendment be passed into law by Parliament.

This does not, therefore, add new powers or a new mandate to the Immigration and Refugee Board beyond those already mandated and exercised. The final result of decisions appealed will change as a result of a decision, given that under Bill C-14, should this amendment carry, an adopted child will become a Canadian citizen instead of a permanent resident, but the decision making process of the appeal is essentially the same.

In this respect, no new powers or mandate are conferred by the amendment, and no royal recommendation would be necessary since no new activities are being contemplated or undertaken. No new public funds should be required in these circumstances and therefore I would argue that it does not impinge on the financial initiative of the Crown.

Mr. Speaker, this amendment was presented and its procedural admissibility was approved by the committee. In your ruling on the form and content of report stage amendments, made on March 21, 2001, you implored members to use every possible opportunity at committee to make amendments and therefore save report stage for the purpose it was intended.

Mr. Speaker, you stated:

--I would strongly urge all members and all parties to avail themselves fully of the opportunity to propose amendments during committee stage so that the report stage can return to the purpose for which it was created, namely for the House to consider the committee report and the work the committee has done, and to do such further work as it deems necessary to complete detailed consideration of the bill.

This is exactly what I have been trying to do. The amendment supports both the scope and spirit of the bill, and I contend it achieves the overriding goal the government has stated that the bill is supposed to achieve.

With regard to the contention that this amendment is incomplete, I submit that requirements as to its operation can be delineated in regulations developed to implement the act, and therefore the amendment meets all the tests of completeness. Surely the government is not asking that this House consider that legislation is incomplete unless all regulations are published before report stage. That would fly against all past practices of this place.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, for hearing my response to the point of order raised by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration. I would urge you to allow this important amendment to stand and be considered by the House.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

Is the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform rising on the same point of order?

Language Used by Members

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a separate point of order. Unless there is other conversation on the first point of order, I would like to raise a point of order arising from question period. I believe that I heard the hon. member for Don Valley West refer to members of the government, ministers of the government, as strangers to the truth. I would suggest that there was a theme coming out of question period today, because I heard not only the member for Don Valley West but also the member for Wascana use the same quote: that members of this House were strangers to the truth.

I suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, that the decorum in this House would improve dramatically if members would address issues rather than addressing items that could be construed as personal attacks. Therefore, I would hope that you would take a look at today's blues. I would ask for a ruling on the words of the member for Don Valley West and would invite you, Mr. Speaker, to address the broader issue of personal, undignified and unjustified attacks on members in the House.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

I thank the hon. parliamentary secretary for his intervention on this matter. The words that he mentioned were used several times during question period. Off the top of my head I do not consider them ones that were unreasonable, but I will certainly look at the authorities on this matter and come back to the House in due course with some comments that I hope the hon. parliamentary secretary will find of assistance.

Oral Questions

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, very briefly, I do have a point of order that I would like to raise. During question period, the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, in answering a question from the member for Winnipeg South Centre, made reference, accidentally, I suppose, to the member for Winnipeg Centre not being in favour of matrimonial property rights for aboriginal women.

I would like the record corrected. I believe the Minister of Indian Affairs misspoke and meant to say the member for Winnipeg South Centre, not Winnipeg Centre.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

I hope that matter will take care of itself in the blues. I am sure it will be noted in due course.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-24, An Act to impose a charge on the export of certain softwood lumber products to the United States and a charge on refunds of certain duty deposits paid to the United States, to authorize certain payments, to amend the Export and Import Permits Act and to amend other Acts as a consequence, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Softwood Lumber Products Export Charge Act, 2006

[Brenda Chamberlain, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is amazing how a change in seating arrangements can change one's mind. The government cannot be the same party that just one short year ago sat on this side of the House decrying the notion of settling for anything less than a complete and outright vindication for Canada.

I wish to quote for members from page 19 of the Conservative platform:

A Conservative government will:

--Demand that the U.S. government play by the rules on softwood lumber. The U.S. must abide by the NAFTA ruling on softwood lumber, repeal the Byrd Amendment, and return the more than $5 billion in illegal softwood lumber tariffs to Canadian producers.

That is some pretty tough talk, which I think most in the House and most Canadians across this country could get behind. As a matter of fact, my party and I campaigned on roughly the same position, stating that:

The recent string of NAFTA decisions in Canada's favour continue[s] to be valid and must be respected--the United States remains legally obligated to revoke the tariffs and refund, with interest, all duties collected, totalling more than $5 billion. A Liberal government will continue to wage a vigorous legal and political fight with the United States government and industry and will continue to consult with the provinces and Canadian industry on the best way to achieve a final and lasting solution.

So here we are in the House to debate legislation which breaks the government's election promise, legislation which settles for a loss instead of a win, and legislation which brings in a politically expedient quick fix at the cost of the future of an industry and a way of life in Canada.

Need I remind the government that Canada's legal position prior to the introduction of the Conservative government was supported by numerous decisions by international trade tribunals and by the courts in both Canada and the United States, and yet the government has settled for less, and a great deal less.

Further, I think this complete surrender to the United States government on this file only sets up this government--and more importantly, future governments--for hardship and failure on any number of issues in the future. I guess Washington knows that in future disputes with Canada the new government may not have the will or the stomach to stand up for Canada and fight when it is right to fight.

This outright abandonment of Canada's position that our softwood industry is not subsidized shreds any notion that the dispute resolution provisions of NAFTA can work. It will only reinforce the will of certain U.S. legislators and bureaucrats that they can flaunt international rules any time they want and anywhere they want on any trade agreement.

This deal is a bad deal for Canada. The criticisms have been articulated here in the House and across this country. It leaves $1 billion belonging to Canadian companies in the hands of Americans, $500 million of which is at the disposal of the U.S. lumber industry to use to fund legal attacks against us, against Canadians. They will use money from the Canadian softwood industry to attack that very industry.

This deal creates an export tax that at current price levels is actually higher than current duties and will create an unfair and unprecedented tax regime which will impose crippling export duties on softwood. It limits the government's ability to help the softwood industry, and it undercuts our rules-based trading relationship with the United States. Let me say again that this is a bad deal. If the members opposite say this is the best deal they could get, then I say they were not trying hard enough.

My mother always said that we can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, but I want to give credit to the Standing Committee on International Trade. Committee members took a bad agreement and tried very hard to make it better. Some of the committee's recommendations included: advocating more time to conclude a final agreement that would meet the softwood industry's expectations; making sure to obtain an effective mechanism to resolve any disputes that may arise over the interpretation of that agreement; and upholding Canada's legal victories. I will say that again: upholding Canada's legal victories.

We have won a number of legal cases on this issue. It seems to me that when we have won such a number of cases, legally and morally, it is up to both of us to collect upon and enforce this decision. When we do not, we weaken the very reason we would go into arbitration.

When awards are won and parties do not have to live up to the terms, future decisions are threatened and undermined. In this case, this could have far-reaching effects on various other aspects, not only in this industry but also in many other areas of government.

With this agreement, we are letting down our workers in the softwood lumber industry. Further, many other industries face similar trade problems. Therefore, through admitting defeat on this issue, we would be letting down many Canadians from coast to coast. Is this truly what the new government intended to do?

From having served for over 13 years in this House, I know my colleagues from every party are trying, to the very best of their abilities, to do the best jobs they can for Canadians. I truly I believe that. However, to not acknowledge the weakness of not enforcing awards is doing very serious damage. That is why it is so very important that we push the new government to try to get international trade rules upheld, acknowledged, accepted and enforced.

The committee's recommendations did not stop there. The fact is that the committee's report also advocated a flexible ceiling under option B. It also advocated flexibility for those under option A. The aim was to ensure that the industry was not excessively penalized for sudden and temporary increases in exports to the United States. The Standing Committee on International Trade also recommended that every measure be taken to ensure that Canadian companies, with interest, would have their due share of countervailing and anti-dumping duties within 90 days of the conclusion of this agreement. These are only a few of the strong recommendations that the Standing Committee on International Trade made.

In the past election, the Conservative Party talked a lot about how important committees were. Conservatives talked about the fact that if they were elected, they would listen to the committees because they believed that the committees represented all parties, many points of view, and most of all, balance.

It is hard for me to understand, when the committee has come out with such very strong recommendations from an extremely rigorous examination of this issue, that the government essentially chooses to completely ignore that report. I am sorry for that. I, too, believe that balance is important in our decision making. We must be willing to weigh the pros and cons of every situation and we know, as parliamentarians, that our final solutions will not please everyone. They rarely, if ever, do, but we as parliamentarians must strive for that balance. We must hear all points of view and we must not tune them out, as the Conservatives are doing at this point.

I would ask the government to revisit that committee report and re-look at some of the committee's recommendations, which were put forth in good faith. I believe Canadians are looking for a government, no matter which party forms it, to give balance, to listen and, at the end of that process, to make the best possible decision for Canada and all Canadians. People want no less of the government. People are tired of the bickering, and I cannot say that enough. Every time I go into the riding, I hear how people are tired of parliamentarians bickering. They want us to work together for the best solution.

This is an important file. We have worked on it for a long time together, perhaps some would say too long, undoubtedly. However, to sell out is not the proper way to go about this. When there are areas that have been hard fought and have been legally won, we should not abandon those victories.

It is, indeed, a great challenge to try to not only protect this industry but to help ensure it flourishes. The softwood industry is an important part of Canada's economy, particularly in many rural parts of the country. We need to keep this industry strong to help both our national economy and the local economies of the communities where this industry is based.

The industry offers Canadians good jobs, jobs that we need. We must do everything that we can to support it and the Canadians making their living from it. Please, do not sell us out.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I doubt the member's mother was the one who coined the phrase “You can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear” as she will also doubt that it was my mother who said, “You'll know which hill you should die on, but, remember, you're still dead”.

I would suggest that the sow's ear would have been a continuation of what we have undergone for the last several years with respect to no resolution of any kind. We may have won decisions at NAFTA, but we were also losing decisions at the WTO on the same issue.

As much as we all would like the perfect solution, does it not make sense that we should listen to every province and the vast majority of the industry, which has said this as a good a solution as we can possibly get and that we should simply get on with business and allow the forestry industry to start prospering again?

[Brenda Chamberlain, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Mr. Speaker, first, my mother, and I loved her very dearly, had a lot of sayings. However, I did not say she coined that phrase. I did say she said it and she said a lot more. She often repeated these sayings to me when I was very little. People say to me that I repeat these a lot. That is because I loved my mother a great deal. Therefore, I ask the hon. member's forgiveness.

The issue is this it is not a good deal. We are forgoing legal positions that we have won legal restitution, and that is serious for us.

I am sure members have seen the Globe and Mail today. I do not like what it says. It says “The softwood sellout agreement”. It goes on to say that the new government has said it would forgo $1 billion of the total duties owed and agreed to a new border charge as high as 22.5%. The Conservatives are not speaking about this, and that is quite serious. The Canadian people need to know that this is the kind of a deal to which the Conservatives are agreeing.

The hon. member has said that provinces are wanting this or are saying that they may want it. At the moment, there is some truth that. Some of the industry is saying that, but some are quietly saying they are very nervous about these new charges and the fact that the legal situation appears still to be very murky.

To have quiet agreement that industries will choke down it for short term gain for long term pain is very serious.

I know the new Conservative government wants to try to do a good job. I know this file was important for the Conservatives to hold up as kind of mantra and say, “Look it, we did this. We solved this”. To solve it incorrectly, to solve it on the backs of an industry, which in a short time will go down because of this deal, is not the right thing. This is why it is so important that we try to get this deal better.

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

Mr. Speaker, one concern is this. If the Conservative government goes through with its promise of the so-called softwood agreement, in my view, what will be the next thing it will capitulate to the United States after winning legal battles. It is softwood one time. What will it be the next time?

The member is absolutely correct in saying that the U.S. Court of International Trade has stated that Canada is entitled to every penny of that money. Why does she think the Conservative government would allow American companies to keep $1 billion of its own money? What does she think is next in the trade battles when American companies do not like to go to courts? Will they use heavy-handed tactics and convince the government that this is the way it will go, and to take it or leave it?

Would she comment on that?

[Brenda Chamberlain, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Mr. Speaker, that is also one of my main concerns, so I share the hon. member's concern on this. If this, what next? Where next do we go on our knees? Where is the protection?

The Globe and Mail today also spoke on the issue and said that we finally had the U.S. in one of its very own courts, it was losing and we quit. We have to ask why do we abandon when we are winning in legal courts?

[Gerald Keddy, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margaret's, NS]

Mr. Speaker, before I start in on debate, I would like to make a point. I realize a lot of people had questions for the last member and therefore you could not recognize everyone. It is always a difficult job in this place. However, I wanted to ask the hon. member a question, and I think I can answer it myself, about the number of sawmills she had in her riding. I have 15, and every one of them supports this agreement. I believe the answer to my question would be a big zero.

When we talk about the industry, we should have some knowledge about the industry. Members in this place discuss the bill as if they have some knowledge about the softwood lumber industry. In reality, it is simply political posturing, and I really begin to lose patience with it. As Speaker of the House, you have lots of patience, and we certainly try to follow your example, but it is difficult sometimes.

There has been a lot of politics and posturing around the bill, but let us take some of those positions that members in this place have brought forward. Let us take the position that we will continue for litigation. We have had 24 years of litigation, and 24 years is a long time with no end in sight. We will litigate, but as long as the Byrd amendment is in place in the United States, we will continue to have litigation. Therefore, it is important to have some clarity and certainty on this issue. Bill C-24 brings that to the softwood lumber industry.

I spent a good portion of my life working in the lumber industry as a logger. My family members are still loggers. My grandfather owned the local sawmill. I can assure the House that It is a tough life, but it is a good life as long as we have some certainty that we can sell our product.

The Liberals great failure was not reaching an agreement, which is the reason they are not supporting this. For the life of me, I still do not understand our Atlantic Canadian members who are all say they will not support the agreement. The agreement is the future for the sawmill industry and the softwood lumber industry in Atlantic Canada. The agreement allows us certainty for our exemptions, which have been hard fought for outside this place.

The previous international trade minister, under the former Liberal government, put Atlantic Canada's exemptions for countervail and for anti-dumping on the bargaining table to try to get an agreement prior to the last election. The Liberals would have given up Atlantic Canada's hard fought for exemptions. The Liberals did not get those exemptions for the industry. Industry got them by proving to our American counterparts that our industry was on the same basis as theirs. Seventy-two per cent of all the land in Nova Scotia is privately owned. Our mills are exempt from countervail because of that. We do not subsidize the industry. It works on a free market basis, the same basis on which the American industry works.

The great thing about Bill C-24 is that it allows flexibility, it allows for change and it allows for regional differences.

If we allow the bill to pass, I fully expect all my NDP colleagues from Atlantic Canada and all my Liberal Party colleagues from Atlantic Canada to support it because it is a good bill for Atlantic Canada and it is a good bill for the rest of Canada. It recognizes regional differences. It recognizes an industry, to be perfectly frank, which was in a state of collapse because of the mismanagement of this file by the Liberal government.

What does the agreement do? It is good for Canada. It is good for the United States. It eliminates the punitive American duties. It returns more than $4.4 billion to producers. It provides stability for the industry. It spells an end to the costly litigation and the long-running dispute between Canada and the United States.

Bill C-24 is a good bill. The return of the $4.4 billion alone will benefit communities, workers, truckers, and the whole sawmill industry from coast to coast in this country. Our deposit refund mechanism has been developed with Export Development Canada and will allow Canadian companies to receive their share of deposits practically immediately, within four to eight weeks after entry into force of this agreement.

Rather than attack the Minister of International Trade, my opposition colleagues should applaud the minister. He more than anyone else worked to bring this agreement to fruition. He went through the tough slogging. As a former industry person he was able to talk on an equal level with his American counterparts. He knew what was required at the bargaining table. He worked for a just end for the softwood lumber industry right across Canada. He did not do that by pitting British Columbia against Nova Scotia. He did not do that by pitting Ontario against Quebec. He did it by bringing in an agreement that has flexibility and recognizes regional differences. Somehow our counterparts in the opposition cannot seem to wrap their heads around that.

I can tell the House what would happen if we did not have this agreement. We would continue with litigation. The American industry is protectionist. No one is questioning that. We know it, and that is not going to change. We had to get the best agreement we could get. We had to get an agreement that would give surety to the industry and move forward from that point. If not, we would be stuck in litigation forever, and companies and sawmills, loggers and individuals, and communities and families would face devastation across this country.

There are 600 communities that depend upon the softwood lumber industry to survive. I can guarantee that many of those communities would not survive this crisis without this agreement. If the NDP do not want to go along with it, fine. If the Liberals do not want to go along with it, fine. But clearer heads will prevail and this agreement will allow those communities and those families to survive.

The termination clause in the agreement is something else that has been misrepresented in this place. With respect to the criticisms regarding the termination clause, let me note that termination clauses are standard features of international trade agreements. The discussion here is as if this is the only agreement with a termination clause. Under international law, without a specific termination clause, agreements may be terminated at any time with 12 months' notice. This has a minimum of 18 months' notice with a year added on to the end of it. That is two and a half years.

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate being able to speak on this subject today. I fully expect all my opposition colleagues to support this great agreement for Canada.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to my colleague from the Conservative Party making his speech. I would like, however, to repeat the position of the Bloc Québécois, which supports this agreement but in a context where the Quebec industry had told us that they were on their last legs and that they had to support the agreement because, in the last analysis, they had no choice.

Since 2002, we have had Liberal governments and now a Conservative government who did not support the companies who were dealing with the softwood lumber problem.

The Bloc Québécois, as everyone knows, asked for loan guarantees from the Liberals. During the election campaign, the Conservative Party told us it was going to offer loan guarantees but it did not do that. We called for flexibility in employment insurance to help the workers who were affected by the softwood lumber problem, but there was no flexibility, either from the Liberals or the Conservative Party. We called for support for processing activities in order to provide new opportunities for the Quebec forest sector but no measures were introduced.

I hope that this House will listen to these remarks. I believe this is a bad agreement but we have no other choice than to sign it, because the industry is on its last legs. However, this Parliament should learn a lesson, including the Liberals whom we kept after for months and months to come to the help of these companies and to support them even in terms of legal costs. To date, the legal costs for companies in the forest industry exceed $350 million. They have received no assistance from the government.

I believe this should be a lesson for the Liberal Party, the Conservatives, and for all members. If we do not support our companies in this kind of dispute, we will wind up with an agreement like this one, which is unsatisfactory for all the companies and all the workers, but in the end we have no choice but to support it.

I would like to hear the member’s comments about my remarks.

[Gerald Keddy, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margaret's, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I understand that my colleague from the Bloc has a real concern for the industry and certainly the sawmill industry in the province of Quebec. As for the rest of Canada, this is a good deal for Quebec. As a matter of fact, there is enough flexibility built into the agreement that it allows for free trade in lumber, the same as we have in Atlantic Canada, for 32 mills in Quebec. Those border mills will all have free trade in lumber. Furthermore, it allows for enough flexibility in the deal that other provinces can adopt Atlantic Canadian and border mill standards throughout Canada and have free trade in softwood lumber.

The great danger, which has been a danger from the very beginning of discussions with the Americans and the very basis for our exemption in Atlantic Canada, in subsidizing the industry is that those subsidies will then be seen as countervailable and we are back into another trade war and another round of talks. That will go on forever. We will never get away from it.

I understand the concern. It is certainly something we talked about and we were willing to do as a government. However, the best agreement and the best thing we could do for industry was to bring surety, bring this agreement to fruition. That is what the Minister of International Trade has been able to do and that is the lifeblood of the industry and the future for the country.

It is a good agreement and I appreciate the member's support for it.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am glad that the member has raised the question of the Atlantic exemption.

I must say that I was very surprised when I was participating in the debate on this bill in the House at the end of the September to see another Conservative member from Atlantic Canada rise and say that the government had to amend its own bill because the language around the Atlantic exemption did not actually use the word “exemption”, that it was not strong enough, and the bill was so bad that the government was going to have to bring in an amendment to its own bill to include the actual word “exemption” when it came to the situation of the industry in Atlantic Canada.

I know the Atlantic exemption has support in every corner of the House, but how does the member respond to the fact that the bill is so bad in the way that it has been presented to the House that not even something where there was universal agreement could get worded properly in this piece of legislation?

[Gerald Keddy, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margaret's, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I will try to be brief, but I am always amazed at the rhetoric from my NDP colleagues. They take something and manage to twist it into another vein altogether that does not resemble at all the point brought forward by the hon. member for Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley. The point was that everyone was here trying to be an expert on this piece of legislation, but all the opposition parties had not read the bill or they would have picked up the same thing that my colleague from Cumberland--Colchester--Musquodoboit Valley picked up.

I am not a lawyer but the intent is there for the exemption. Whether the language is exact, the intent is there.

The issue is that this bill should be embraced by the member from British Columbia because it is a great deal for British Columbia. If they really get their act together out there, they can follow Atlantic Canada's example and have free trade in softwood lumber. It can be done. We have proven it.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is both a pleasure and a distress to enter into this debate. Talking of rhetoric, we take no lectures or lessons from other sectors of the industry. British Columbia has a proud forestry tradition. My particular riding takes no lessons or lectures from anyone in the House when it comes to the pain and suffering that has gone on in the forestry sector over the last number of years.

We have watched families in distress. We watched the previous government not show up to the table with the loan guarantees. I know it is difficult for members to listen and to actually participate in the debate but they need to understand that when a government starts to spin on the dance of rhetoric and starts to talk about how other parties are playing politics all of a sudden, it is a good indication that the facts no longer support its cause.

The response about the exemption to Atlantic Canada, that the intention was there but that the language was not, is absolutely dumbfounding to me and to many Canadians, both in Atlantic Canada and across the country. How could such an important concept as the exemption that was parroted and chirped across the country for Atlantic Canada not make it into the bill and have to be pointed out by other members in the House as opposed to the drafters of the bill, the government itself?

Skeena—Bulkley Valley, in the northwest corner of British Columbia, which is 300,000 square kilometres and is the absolute heart and soul of the softwood industry in the country, understands the deal well. Just recently I was on a tour throughout the western part of my riding, some 900 kilometres on the road. We held open houses and discussions and allowed people to come in and comment. There was no bias on my part. We just simply sat and listened to what people in our communities had to say about the deal.

From across the political spectrum in my region, people who vote all different ways came with absolute disappointment and dismay at the inherent basic flaws communicated in this so-called agreement which, more and more, is a sellout. I wonder if the government has any excuses or reasons for the 3,000 people who just lost their jobs in Quebec and Ontario and the families that they support.

The government just seemed so desperate in its need for victory. However, in April , on the very day the Prime Minister so proudly announced the deal, the Americans were filing more lawsuits against us. The government needed a victory so badly that it left $500 million in the hands of the American coalition, which has been hurting our communities for so long, to continue to fight us. Somehow the government has twisted itself into believing that it is a good idea, that it is a good idea to get smashed over the head year in and year out.

At the very end, last Friday the Court of International Trade found again for Canada, which is the final place for this decision to go, and Canadians need to know that. There is nowhere else to go for the coalition. However, the government has taken that victory away, has handed the Americans half a million bucks to beat us up some more later and has signed a deal that offers no certainty whatsoever.

I know members from the Conservative benches care for their communities, especially those members who have softwood industries in their ridings. I call upon them to stand in their place today and defend the principles of the bill because they need to be accountable. We have heard so much talk about accountability from the Conservative benches but when we come to a deal like this politics trumps common sense. Why would we leave a half a billion dollars behind for an industry that is dedicated to fighting against any notion of free trade?

The climate for investment in Canada has been destroyed by this deal. Why would an operator who operates on both sides of our borders have any notion of putting money into a mill in Canada when all they need to do is take their money back, place it into a U.S. mill and avoid a self-imposed tariff altogether? I have yet to hear an answer from the government.

I have spoken to the mill managers and the people on the line and they do not get it. They do not understand why the provincial government in Victoria, British Columbia is so keen on raising the export of raw logs thereby raising the export of British Columbian jobs to other places. When I am in my riding I see the trucks drive right past the mills that have shut down and dump the logs in the water, boom them up and send them south.

For heaven's sake, this so-called deal says to a producer, says to a manufacturer, “Do not invest in Canada. It is much smarter to invest in the United States or just about anywhere else, because if you invest in Canada and you value add to any of the wood that Canadians produce, you will be hit with a tariff of up to 24% on your cost of production”.

I wish there were someone in the government who could simply answer that basic sense of economic disequilibrium that has been created by the government's one action, the tendency, the nature and the drive for industry to no longer invest in our country at a time when we have lost over 10,000 jobs in this sector. It is not as if we have any more blood to give. We have already given at work and at home. There is no space left in the industry other than its complete collapse.

The true and deep concern I have in this debate is that for the government to secure some sort of improved relations with our American neighbours, which we all want to see, for that so-called victory it has signed a deal that allows Washington to interfere with provincial regulations on how we cut our own wood. This House of Commons does not have that right constitutionally but somehow we have just cut a deal that allows Washington to comment on our own forestry practices at the provincial level.

Many communities have been through so much, with thousands of jobs lost. I would invite members in this place to take a tour through my community and visit those places that have in excess of 90% unemployment. I wonder if anyone in this place can conceive of that in their hometowns, to go back home next week and find 80%, 85%, 90% of the people willing to work in their communities gone, simply unable to work. Imagine the social devastation, never mind the economics, we know that: schools closing down and hospitals no longer able to operate at a time when industries needed the support.

The Conservatives were with us for a moment when we pleaded for loan guarantees for the industry but the previous government was unable to deliver. The Court of International Trade, the last place for the scoundrels who perpetuated this fraud upon Canadians and Canadian communities were heard, the court sided with Canada. Canada has sent our lawyers down to plead on behalf of the American cause. We are asking the court not to settle this case, to not award the entire $5.4 billion to Canada because we have this incredible deal that gives us foreign change, and which, by the way, perpetuates trade wars into the future.

It is not only remarkable that $500 million will end up in the coffers of the U.S. coalition's war chest to fight again, but it sends a disturbing signal to other industries that try to compete with Canada. What we are saying is that the Americans were right. They must have been right because why else would we leave money behind? We must subsidize our industry.

Conservative members have stood in this place and made the argument that no, there is no softwood subsidy and we are not operating a subsidized system. However, by capitulating to them we are saying that they are right. If the Americans were able to end up with this much of the Canadian industries' money, we must be subsidizing. This opens up the floodgates to other industries that cannot compete.

I only wish we could have some form of free trade. The lie has finally been put to that concept of free trade in this country. We only need to look at the way the Americans have handled themselves and the way that Canada has now decided to place itself in such an incredible position as to harm Canadian industry and communities by simply admitting, through this deal, that we must have a subsidized industry, and by putting in jeopardy all the other industries in Canada that now must try to compete with the Americans who we know are protectionists. We have seen it. The Conservatives just said so, and it is true. They will subsidize and they will protect. They will try to offer unfair competition to our industries, particularly in an industry like softwood where we know the Americans cannot compete.

Canadian mills are the most efficient in the world. I have those mills in my riding. I have visited those mills and we have talked to the foremen and the people running the shop. They know that they are running the best. All they want is a fair playing field and an opportunity to compete but instead they will be hit with a 24% duty on their wood. We are going to self-impose a duty when we have said that we are not subsidizing and that we are operating a fair game.

The problems with this deal go on and on. A lot of Conservative members would like to ignore the fact that there is an actual cap on the amount of wood that can be produced. However, it is not done by company but by region. We have also assisted some of the larger companies that have the capacity to invest more money against some of the smaller ones because as soon as the cap is reached it hits everybody in that region. It does not hit the individual company that may have flooded a market. It hits everybody. Suddenly the cap goes up. The tipping point on this, the point where the tariffs start to be imposed, the price of a board foot of lumber has been below the trigger point for months.

This is an opportunity for the government to finally stand up and admit some of the absolute flaws in this agreement. We each need to stand up and represent our communities, which is what we were sent here to do. We were sent here to represent the people who work every day or who are trying to get back to work. We need to get the job done and get a better deal because this deal sells our communities and our future down the river.

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I have had the opportunity to visit the member's riding. As a former British Columbian and Yukoner, I have gone through Skeena—Bulkley Valley on many occasions, and he is absolutely correct. Not only is it one of the most beautiful areas in Canada but it has some of the hardest working people in those mills and in forestry and, I may say, in many ways in a very environmentally sustainable way because they know the future relies on their jobs in those mills.

It is sad to see a number of businesses in small towns like Fraser Lake, Burns Lake, et cetera, closing down or reducing the number of employment opportunities which has caused people to go elsewhere. He now knows exactly what we on the east coast have been going through with our fisheries. He also knows what the farmers are going through now on the prairies.

I have been here for nine and a half years now and I have seen and heard of countless numbers of farm families shutting their farms down and the large corporate companies taking over. I have seen many fishing communities, like the one in Canso, Nova Scotia, literally shut down and thousands of people having to move away from their homes.

In the last week alone 3,000 jobs have been lost in the lumber industry under the watch of Liberal and Conservative governments. It is a pattern. It does not matter which industry it is, farming, fishing or forestry, which I call the three f's that built this country, they are being decimated by the government.

What scared me the most today was when I heard the Minister of Natural Resources, who himself is from British Columbia, say very clearly, “We need this deal so we can restructure the industry”. That makes me very nervous. My colleague is right when he says that whole logs are being sent out of British Columbia into the United States to be brought back as a finished product that we buy. It is like the world's largest gypsum mine that is just outside of my riding. Every ounce of gypsum is sent to the United States and we buy it back as Gyproc.

Am I the only one who thinks this is crazy and that we need to turn this around? I would like my colleague to elaborate a bit more on that.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the consolidation of industries, and the consolidation in particular of this industry, has been staggering. We have watched mill upon mill get bought up. It almost seems like in the last five years, in this particular plight of industry as more and more tariffs were slapped onto Canadian companies, more and more of those sawmills were either shut down or bought outright. When they are bought, it is not as if business continues as usual. Anybody who has been at the bottom end of a consolidation knows what that means. It means job losses. It means losses to entire communities.

If anyone in the Conservative benches would actually like to stand and debate some of these issues about what is going on in northwestern British Columbia, I would urge them to do so, but the interest seems to have been lost. The air is out of the balloon.

The Conservatives just want this thing to coast through and not actually address the concerns of mill owners I just talked to this past week. They said, “What's the point?” They have been struggling to get their mills up and running and were finally able to do it after some months. Then they looked on the horizon and they saw more dark clouds mounting. The clouds were a self-imposed tariff on their industry. Why? Because George Bush needed a deal and the Prime Minister wanted it so bad he could not wait.

He could not wait after this many years to look at the decision by the Court of International Trade. The court said, “It's all yours Canada. You were right. These communities were right to survive and thrive on the industry that they had built”.

Instead, the Prime Minister and the Minister of International Trade needed something so desperately that selling out a few hundred communities, selling out families, was not so bad because in their equation maybe that was worth it in the long run.

As parliamentarians, as people who are elected, we have to go back and look those people in the eye. We cannot have what happened to the Atlantic fishery. All those parliamentarians over the years turned a blind eye to what we knew was happening while the federal government shirked its responsibilities. The cries that came out from those communities that needed a sustainable industry fell on deaf ears. Now, we are watching a repetition of this in the softwood industry. It is an absolute disgrace.

We try our best to look through the legislation, to read this deal, which I have done, and which I hope and pray that the Conservatives at least have done in their blind support for this thing. I cannot find one scintilla of enthusiasm for investing and reinvigorating our softwood industry.

Instead, we have a $12 million cut to a beetle fund that would help mitigate what was going on with the pine beetle outbreak in British Columbia. That was the answer: sell them out down the river one day and pull back funding to help communities transition the next. That is hardly supportive of rural Canada. We are going to have to switch governments as soon as possible.

Message from the Senate

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

I have the honour to inform the House that a message has been received from the Senate informing this House that the Senate has passed the following public bill, to which the concurrence of the House is desired: Bill S-211, an act to amend the Criminal Code (lottery schemes).

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-24, An Act to impose a charge on the export of certain softwood lumber products to the United States and a charge on refunds of certain duty deposits paid to the United States, to authorize certain payments, to amend the Export and Import Permits Act and to amend other Acts as a consequence, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Softwood Lumber Products Export Charge Act, 2006

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate this opportunity to again speak on the softwood lumber products export charge act. I did have the opportunity to address the House earlier in the debate, but needless to say there is a lot more that can be said about this bad deal.

When I ended my speech last month, I gave the final word to the Prime Minister and I would like to start there this time. I want to quote the Prime Minister who said in this House on October 25, 2005:

Most recently, the NAFTA extraordinary challenges panel ruled that there was no basis for these duties, but the United States has so far refused to accept the outcome and has asked Canada to negotiate a further settlement. Let me repeat what I have said before, and let me be as clear as I can. This is not a time for negotiation. It is a time for compliance.

Those were the words of the current Prime Minister here in this House almost a year ago. It seemed like he was making an argument for the United States to comply with the court decisions that were made in the softwood lumber dispute. He was making that argument very clearly.

Sadly, it seems he has reversed his position completely now. It seems he was actually calling for us to fall in line with the desires of the American industry, the American government and the American protectionists. It is a very sad turnabout and a very dramatic one. It is a capitulation to those interests that have been working so hard to destroy the Canadian industry and with it Canadian communities and Canadian jobs.

It is so ironic that the Prime Minister's reversal comes at a time when a just and fair victory for Canada was in sight. It has been said many times that this agreement and this legislation actually snatches defeat from the jaws of victory. That is exactly what is happening here.

Unfortunately, the victory that Canada was on the verge of has been lost because of this proposal and this legislation. That is why it is a bad deal for Canada, a bad deal for British Columbia, and certainly a bad deal for my home riding of Burnaby—Douglas.

The ironies continue. It was just last Friday afternoon that another court case was decided in Canada's favour. That case before the U.S. Court of International Trade, CIT, found in Canada's favour. That court said that every last penny of the $5.3 billion of illegally imposed duties on softwood lumber exports over the years had to be returned to Canada. That money was taken from Canadian companies, Canadian communities and Canadian workers. That court said every last cent had to be returned. This was just last Friday where there was yet another victory in the courts.

Indeed, we were running out of court opportunities. We were getting down to the wire on every last one of them. Incredibly, it was Canada's Ambassador to the United States, Michael Wilson, when he was before committee this summer who said the opportunities for court action on this were coming to an end. We were absolutely on the verge of a wholesale victory on this issue in the courts. Unfortunately, that has all been thrown by the wayside by this agreement and this legislation.

I want to come back to the speech I had hoped to deliver the first time around and some of the points that I did not have time to talk about.

If this is such a great deal for Canada and for the Canadian industry, I have to wonder why page after page of this bill is devoted to punitive measures to punish Canadian businesses that do not comply or do not agree with this legislation. If this was such a great deal for Canada and for Canadian businesses and communities, why has such emphasis been placed on punitive measures in the legislation?

I was surprised to hear in this House last month a Conservative member from Atlantic Canada say that the government would have to pursue an amendment to its own legislation because the wording of the maintenance of the Maritime lumber exemption was not strong enough or clear enough, and did not actually use the word “exemption”.

It is hard to believe that on a part of this whole controversy where there is absolute agreement in every corner of this House around the need to maintain the Atlantic Canada exemption, that the government could not even get the wording right in this legislation on that aspect of the bill. It could not even get it right when everyone agrees how important that is. It could not get it right when its representatives from Atlantic Canada were so involved to maintain this exemption.

I think that is another example of how bad this bill really is. If there is a point where there is no controversy, where there is a clear agreement and where the language has been accepted for some time, why that language could not even make it into this legislation is beyond me. If the government cannot do it on that front, what is happening on the other clauses that are more controversial and more complicated?

Another important flaw in this legislation is that it does nothing to address the serious issue of the export of raw logs. One observer of the forest industry in British Columbia, and someone who has carefully poured over the agreement and the 82 page appendices to the agreement, notes that this legislation goes out of its way to be specific about what is covered, about what aspects of the softwood lumber industry are covered. In fact, he says it is dizzying in its specificity. He also says:

Taxes will apply to “coniferous wood, sawn or chipped lengthwise, sliced or peeled, whether or not planed, sanded or finger-jointed, of a thickness exceeding six millimetres”. In similar minutiae, wood siding, flooring and fencing are discussed.

That is all very well, but not once in this agreement and in this legislation does the word “log” appear. We know that the export of raw logs is a serious issue facing the industry. It is certainly a serious issue for the industry in British Columbia.

To fail to close a loophole around the export of raw logs from private lands is a huge failure. It gives raw logs from private lands a competitive edge over logs processed, for instance, in British Columbia.

This will discourage value added production and jobs in B.C. and will stimulate more raw log exports to the United States where workers will process them. It robs Canada and Canadian workers of opportunities and jobs. Jim Sinclair, the president of the B.C. Federation of Labour, has pointed out that:

More than 3,300 jobs in the forest sector were lost to log exports in 2005 alone and an estimated 27 mills closed at a cost of 13,000 jobs between 1997 and 2004.

This is work that should have remained in Canada, with Canadian workers and in Canadian communities. It is an absolute travesty that this has been allowed to happen. It is further unbelievable that this opportunity to deal with this issue has slipped through our fingers and another reason why this is a bad deal.

When we add those jobs lost to raw log exports, as the president of the B.C. Federation of Labour pointed out, when we look at the fact that 3,000 jobs have been lost in the last week in the forest industry alone, we come to realize just how bad this legislation and this deal truly is.

Bill C-24 also subjects any change in provincial forest policy to approval by the United States. It is incredible that we would give up our sovereignty in that way.

I think that Steve Hunt, the United Steelworkers Western Canadian director, said something that is very instructive with regard to this. He said:

This deal doesn't need tweaking, it needs a complete rewrite. The proposed Agreement was part of a “sell-out strategy”. If this is what talks between [the President and the Prime Minister] have achieved, then we'd prefer continued litigation, rather than a Softwood Lumber Agreement that might only last a few years and gives up provincial sovereignty over forest policy.

I think it is very clear that this is a bad deal. It is a bad deal for Canada, for British Columbia and for Burnaby. What will happen with that $1 billion in illegally collected tariffs, which we will not get back because we will forfeit to the United States? It will go directly to the lumber industry to mount the next campaign against our industry. It is incredible that we should even be discussing the bill at this point in the House.