Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot.
I am happy to speak about the throne speech today as my party's critic on the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology. I would like to talk mainly about the situation in the forestry industry. In this throne speech, the Conservative government completely ignores the crisis the forestry industry is going through.
In the throne speech, the government only briefly mentions the challenges facing an industry that has existed for more than a century in Quebec, perhaps because the crisis does not affect Alberta's interests. In Quebec, the whole economy is being affected by the problems in the forestry industry. Entire regions are suffering because of job losses, unemployment and plant closures.
In my riding, Trois-Rivières, the Kruger paper mill had to close temporarily, laying off 1,000 workers. Many plants north of La Tuque, in Saint-Michel-des-Saints and elsewhere have also been affected. These plants cannot count on the federal government to address the problem, which requires a reorganization of the regional economy.
One of the non-negotiable demands the Bloc Québécois made as a condition of its support for the throne speech was that the federal government introduce tax measures to support the regions of Quebec affected by the forestry crisis.
This means that the federal government will have to fix some of the mistakes it has made. We all remember its refusal to help the forest industry throughout the entire softwood lumber dispute and the major effects this had that are still being felt today. An economic upswing in many parts of Quebec has long been hampered by Ottawa’s refusal to act. The Bloc Québécois demands an end to this Conservative ideology of laissez-faire. The Conservative government must realize the urgency of the situation, act responsibly, and take the necessary action to turn the situation around.
The Bloc Québécois has insisted on a clear mention in the Speech from the Throne of fiscal measures to help the regions affected by the crisis in the forest industry. However, there are no specific measures in this speech to help workers, companies and regions affected by this crisis. Although the government says it is very concerned, the Prime Minister has not provided any solutions or taken any steps to help the industry recover, not to mention any programs to help workers.
The government even has the crust to boast about what it has done to support the industry and the people working in it. There is no truth to any of it. The only thing the government has done is cut the community assistance programs and leave the workers who lost their jobs at the mercy of the crisis. The only promise in this speech is that the government will continue doing nothing to offset the effects of the crisis in the forest industry.
We in the Bloc have proposed a number of measures. One of them, for example, is to bring back the fund to diversify forest economies that was eliminated by the Conservatives, although the management of this fund would be turned over to local stakeholders. The Minister of the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Regions of Quebec did away with this fund on the excuse that it was not being used properly.
Instead of relaxing Ottawa’s inappropriate and bureaucratic criteria, decentralizing the program, and making the regions responsible for managing it in accordance with their own needs, the minister simply eliminated the program, thereby depriving the regions that needed it most in order to diversify their economies. Like a lot of federal programs, this fund was more suited to meeting Ottawa’s objectives than the real needs of the regions affected by the crisis.
For these reasons, the Bloc Québécois wants the fund brought back, although the management of it should be turned over to local stakeholders. It is local people, as we have always said, who know what is needed. They are best placed to determine who needs this fund, why they need it, and how to get the regions out of the economic quagmire in which they find themselves.
The second measure would set up a loan and loan-guarantee program to help finance investment in production equipment. There is nothing about this in the Speech from the Throne. The federal government has done nothing to help the industry caught up in the softwood lumber crisis.
The Bloc Québécois has been constantly asking the government for many years—