Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak today in opposition to this flawed bill.
In my riding of Nanaimo—Cowichan, forestry has been a long and proud tradition. We have a long history in forestry, the sawmills, the pulp and paper mills and the men and women who have worked in the forestry but we are seeing dislocation in my community that is impacting not only the workers and their families, but also their suppliers. It is impacting on municipal councils and cities to make long range plans and decisions that will support the vitality in our communities.
I want to remind the House why this is such a bad deal for Canadians and for British Columbians. Many of my colleagues, including the member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley, have spoken quite eloquently around the impacts, but I think some of these points deserve repeating.
Part of the reason that this is such a flawed agreement is that it is based on some falsehoods. Let us just call it what it is. It is based on the falsehood that the Canadian softwood lumber industries are subsidized. This falsehood has been exposed and rejected time after time by both the NAFTA and the U.S. commercial court rulings that have ruled in favour of the Canadian softwood lumber industry.
This agreement gives away $500 million in funds that are owed to the Canadian softwood industry. This is just a massive giveaway to the U.S. industry and to the U.S. government.
We often talk about accountability in this House and when we talk about accountability we expect good value for our dollar. I would question the fact that we are giving $450 million in funds to the Bush administration, funds that can be used at the discretion of Congress with no accountability attached to them. It seems to me to be a very strange way to talk about accountability.
I heard an echo in the background here talking about subsidy, and it does seem like a subsidy to activities that are detrimental to our industry here in Canada.
The other thing we talked about is the fact that this agreement can be cancelled unilaterally at any time. With that kind of uncertainty, how does that provide any stability to our softwood industry? We have seen this lack of stability played out over the last number of years as companies have been unable to invest in upgrading their equipment, as we have failed to invest in training and education for workers, as we have failed to provide that stability to our small communities.
This agreement also kills the credibility of the NAFTA dispute settlement mechanism. I have already mentioned the fact that we have had these rulings in our favour. This agreement goes outside of the NAFTA dispute settlement mechanism and goes ahead and talks about the fact that part of these illegally obtained $5.3 billion in duties are being sent back to the U.S. to fund further activity against Canadian softwood. It also does nothing for the thousands of workers who have lost their livelihood over the past five years. There is nothing in the softwood lumber agreement to deal with the major disruption that the U.S. abusive trade rules have caused to working families and their communities.
I talked earlier about my own riding. Whether we can directly attribute this to the softwood lumber industry or whether it is a secondary spinoff, we have seen mills close. The Youbou mill in my riding closed four years ago but I continue to hear from people who talk about the impact this has had on their livelihood and on their families. Some of those workers are still not employed on a regular basis four years later.
A little later I will talk about some other spinoffs that have happened that have put the continuing squeeze on this industry, and some of this is about actual deaths in the woods.
While the softwood lumber agreement supplies $450 million of Canadian money to the U.S. to help U.S. communities and workers, there is not one cent in this agreement for the transition for our own workers in our own communities. Many of the workers in our communities have already been displaced. Where is the funding for training and education that helps with the transition that is taking place daily in this industry? Where is the recognition of the value of the workers in our own communities who deserve to have some assistance with training and education as the industry changes? Some of these training and education dollars should go directly toward helping people gain the skills as the industry itself changes but some of these funds also need to be applied to help workers who need to transition out of the industry.
One of the other things, which is hopefully is an unanticipated consequence of the agreement, is that many people feel that this will discourage value added production and stimulate raw log exports. The deal fails to close a loophole that gives raw logs from private lands a competitive edge over logs processed here.
On Vancouver Island, in my riding, a significant proportion of the land is private land. The softwood lumber agreement fails to secure that those logs would be processed in British Columbia. People talked about a made in Canada solution. We do need a made in B.C. and made in Canada solution that considers our industry, our workers and our communities.
The member for Burnaby—New Westminster has consistently called for hearings that to take place from coast to coast to coast so communities, labour and industry have some input into crafting the agreement. I would strongly urge the House to support the fact that we want to see these hearings in communities across the country.
There is also a voice that has been absent in this agreement. I believe first nations were only mentioned once or twice in this entire lengthy document. First nations must be at the table and must be considered in the consultations around softwood. In British Columbia, in particular, we are engaged in treaty process, land claims and the management of resources. First nations must be at the table as equal partners in any discussions that go forward.
I want to talk a bit about statistics, and I know many in the House are thrilled with statistics. There is a need for an industrial strategy in Canada. According to the B.C. government, since 1999, British Columbia has lost 20% of our workforce alone. The workforce around direct forestry activity has declined from 31,000 to 21,000. This kind of massive dislocation in an industry calls for a national strategy. We as a country must determine whether we will commit to us being a processor, a hewer of logs, and we must have an industrial strategy that talks about the kind of reinvestment that keeps us competitive, both domestically and internationally.
According to the United Steelworkers, and it uses the government's own statistics on this, we can talk about the value that is lost both in our province and in our country. In 2001 logging produced revenues of $5.2 billion while solid lumber and pulp and paper mills produced revenues of $11.2 billion and $6.5 billion respectively. It is clear that the real value in our wood is when it is milled, not when it is shipped as raw logs. For every $1 million that forest companies invest, they create 3.9 direct jobs in their industry and 5.9 indirect jobs. In 2005, 3,300 direct jobs were forgone due to exports, which means $250 million in lost earnings.
If we just want to talk about economy, we need to talk about the fact that the more we do closer to home, the more it results in not only direct jobs in our community, but indirect jobs in terms of suppliers, transporters and all those other industries that support our forestry industry.
We talk about economics and industry, but let us talk about real life, on the ground, what happens to people in their families and their lives. Overall it feels like there has been increasing pressure on industry over this last several years and there has been little relief for them. The NDP has called for loan guarantees to help the industry over this tough time. We have called for an additional investment in training and education. The sad reality is there is increasing pressure on the industry. This agreement contributes to that overall pressure.
I talked about this being not just about dollars. I want to talk about last week's inquest into the death of Ted Gramlich in my hometown of Duncan. As a result of this inquiry, a number of health and safety issue have been exposed about the new regulations in the B.C. woods.
Responsibility for health and safety has been downloaded to individuals and contractors instead of the companies that buy the wood, creating huge gaps in the safety net. Last year 43 loggers lost their lives on the job. The Vancouver Island Loggers Safety Group continues to work to raise awareness among politicians and the private side as a whole.
My time is up, but I make a plea to the House to consider the impact, not only on the industry, but on communities and individual lives. This agreement will have a long ranging impact. I would urge us to think very carefully before members of the House support such a deeply flawed bill.