Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Trois-Rivières.
I first of all want to thank the electors of Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel for placing their trust in me for a third consecutive mandate.
It is my pleasure to take the floor regarding the Speech from the Throne. I will not dwell on the content of the document, but rather on some of its oversights and silences. As there are many of these, I will be unable to list them all in the 10 minutes allotted to me.
I will therefore focus on one of the most important oversights in the throne speech, which is all of the men and women who are suffering the adverse effects of globalization. Nothing is said on this subject. I am of course referring to the unemployed who have lost their jobs in different sectors and different communities. We are exposed to competition from the emerging markets. I am thinking of Brazil, China, India and Mexico, whose economies, with much lower costs because of an absence of respect for labour rights, permit them to compete with us.
In Quebec, as in the rest of Canada, men and women work in a variety of industries: textiles, furniture, wood processing, flooring, bicycles, iron and steel products and lumber. All those men and women had devoted their lives to those industries, and overnight they lost their jobs, for all sorts of reasons. It may be caused by the strong Canadian dollar, or by a country that does not respect environmental standards or respect human rights regarding child labour and women’s work, or a country that does not respect health and safety laws. This creates unfair competition, which may lead to our businesses shutting down.
In this Speech from the Throne there is no provision for the unemployed. Fortunately, the Bloc Québécois is here. Today, a subamendment was passed unanimously, to have the government recognize that an assistance program is needed for workers aged 50 and over who lose their jobs and who, for various reasons, are unable to find employment elsewhere. In many cases, they have devoted 20 to 25 years of their lives to the business. They are soon in need of an assistance program.
The citizens of Quebec can count on the Bloc Québécois. Even the rest of Canada can be proud that so many Bloc members have been elected to this House. This means that we will be able to represent those workers and to stand up for their interests. Without the Bloc, there would have been nothing in the Speech from the Throne, important though this is.
Employees who work in industries such as agriculture, forestry or tourism often have seasonal jobs. It is not the workers who are seasonal, it is the jobs they hold. Because no independent employment insurance fund is being created and the employment insurance rules are not being improved—fewer weeks worked in order to qualify for benefits—as the Bloc Québécois has been calling for for several years, men and women fall into those well-known seasonal gaps. They have no income because they have not worked long enough. Once again, this is not the workers’ fault, it is rather the fault of the type of industry they work in. They have not worked enough hours to draw employment insurance benefits.
The Bloc Québecois has always said in this House that there should be an independent fund managed by employees and employers. In this type of industry, the employer hopes that the employee can draw employment insurance before resuming work the following year. We want an independent fund. Since 1996, the government has no longer paid a penny into the employment insurance fund. That year, the Liberals stopped funding the account completely. So the Liberal government kept the money contributed by companies in the government’s coffers.
Today, the Conservative government is holding on to these surpluses, which enable them to make fine election promises. Unfortunately, no promises are being made to those who paid in the money. In the Speech from the Throne, there is nothing for the employees and employers who contributed their money to this fund. In the last fiscal year, the Conservative government benefited from $1.6 billion. This money was a surplus from the employment insurance fund, paid by workers.
This is $1.6 billion that the Conservative government will probably announce in the next budget. What we want is for part of this money to go towards helping workers, improving the system so that workers need to work fewer weeks and can avoid those dreaded gaps. We must create an assistance program for older workers, or POWA. That way, people who lose their jobs due to competition from the emerging economies could benefit from assistance until they retired as covered by provincial and federal government legislation.
That is what we want. The men and women who sit as Bloc Québecois members will be here to make the government understand that, in the next budget, help has to be provided for workers and the unemployed, through the surplus money they pay into federal government coffers.
There is nothing either, in the Speech from the Throne, concerning support for the aerospace industry. Quebec is responsible for over 50% of all production in the aerospace construction industry in Canada. Once again, the federal government has not provided any assistance for the aerospace industry.
I had the opportunity to attend an aviation industry convention in Le Bourget three years ago now. I can tell you there are many countries that would be proud to have an aviation industry like Canada's. Many countries would pay to have our aviation firms. Participation in such a convention makes it clear why countries approach Canadian and Quebec representatives to find out what programs we offer to help the industry.
Having an aviation industry is a matter of prestige. It is at the leading edge of technology. There is nothing in the throne speech, however, to help this flagship of the Quebec and Canadian economy.
The public and industry workers can count on the Bloc in Quebec and in Canada as well to defend the industry when the next budget is presented.
I will close by discussing agriculture. It is not a matter of forgetting, because the matter has been discussed, it is a matter of silence. The farming industry is facing a major income crisis. I am happy to discuss the matter. It is not that this crisis gives me pleasure. It in fact causes me deep distress. Nevertheless, I am especially pleased to debate this crisis in the House because my riding of Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel is 70% farmland. Some of my colleagues here are in similar situations, including the member for Laurentides—Labelle, the member for Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, the member for Compton—Stanstead and the member for Beauharnois—Salaberry. I could name a number of others, since the Bloc is represented in almost all rural areas of Quebec. It is to be found in all regions of Quebec. This is a good thing and what Quebeckers wanted.
Farmers put food on our tables. It is not for nothing that Quebeckers and Canadians think so highly of them now and currently rank them third on their value system. There are many reasons for this when we consider all the epidemics lately such as SARS, the mad cow crisis or the avian flu. The public is increasingly aware of the fact that farmers are responsible for the quality of the food that ends up on our tables. It is not for nothing that people think more highly of them.
Contrary to the opinion of Canadians and Quebeckers on farmers, Canada has cut its investment in the agricultural industry. This is catastrophic to farmers.
I have a few statistics, which do not come from the Bloc Québécois, but from the Canadian Federation of Agriculture. It states that farm subsidies in Europe and in the United States allow farmers to sell their products below cost. Here, we do not subsidize farming, but Europe and the United States currently do.
What happens as a result? The value of the products decreases. Our farmers sell their products for less and are therefore less competitive, since Europe and the United States, among others, subsidize the industry directly.
We can maintain the status quo and go before international forums to state that we no longer want the European countries and the United States to subsidize their exports. We can do that. The problem is that in the meantime, our industry is getting weaker and our farming incomes are decreasing. Obviously this makes us less competitive. We are losing jobs and businesses are closing. We will become less and less self-sufficient. We will be increasingly at the mercy of the other industries in the other countries, which will likely affect the health of Quebeckers and Canadians who will assume less responsibility and be more at the mercy of foreign producers.
Once again, I hope the government will address this problem and provide the necessary funding. Farmers are calling for $6 billion over three years. I hope the government will help them and resolve this crisis brought on by global markets. I hope the government will listen carefully—