Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak on behalf of my Bloc Québécois colleagues on this important motion introduced by the Liberal Party. This motion could be called a non-confidence motion. Its wording is relatively clear since it says that the House has lost confidence in the government.
We Bloc Québécois members agree with Liberal members that this Conservative government can no longer have our confidence, especially the confidence of Quebeckers from all regions of Quebec, whom we proudly represent here. I will have the opportunity to explain why this government does not deserve our confidence.
Quebec's motto is, Je me souviens, I remember. Sometimes, we may seem to forget things, but Quebeckers clearly remember that exactly one year ago, all of us here were actively campaigning. Indeed, the election was held on October 14, 2008. At that time during the campaign, but also after the election, what was the government doing? It was denying the existence of any economic crisis. This Conservative government was telling us that there would be no deficit. Obviously, it misled us. What are we to do when a government misleads the House and the public? We must state that we no longer have confidence in that government.
Even though we, the Bloc Québécois members, support the Liberal motion, we feel that we have in front of us and beside us two parties with the same vision, two different parties but with the same outlook, two parties, one Liberal and one Conservative, that deliberately ignore the needs of Quebec and its citizens.
As the former Quebec lieutenant—the member for Bourassa—confirmed this week, the Liberal Party is controlled from Toronto. The Bloc Québécois has been saying for a long time that the Liberal Party is controlled by the Bay Street establishment. However, whenever we would say so, the Liberals would accuse us of engaging in doom and gloom and witch-hunting. Yet, the Quebec lieutenant who just resigned confirmed it.
The Liberal Party is controlled out of Toronto, but the Conservative Party is controlled from Calgary, because the decisions affecting that party are made in Calgary.
It can safely be said that in both cases these two parties, which have the same outlook, ignore the interests of Quebeckers. The Bloc Québécois is the only party that fights for the interests of Quebeckers and of Quebec's regions. That is why, since 1993, Quebec voters have always given a majority of seats to the Bloc Québécois. That is also why each Bloc member works very hard to be present in his or her riding, to be present here in Ottawa, and to listen to people's needs.
The Conservative government is totally out of touch. I am going to provide a few examples.
Consider the sectors of the economy that are in trouble. In Quebec, the manufacturing sector has been hard hit by the current crisis. Yesterday we had the announcements by Pratt & Whitney in the riding of my colleague from Longueuil—Pierre-Boucher. The forestry industry has been affected in all regions of Quebec, and even the Montreal region, because there are paper companies that have their head offices in Montreal. There have been cuts in the forestry industry in Montreal. In the regions, we have a genuine disaster.
In my riding, the sawmills owned by Kruger have closed down. There were three sawmills, two in my riding and one in the riding of my colleague from Manicouagan. The main employer in the municipality of Longue-Rive in the Haute-Côte-Nord region, the Jacques Beaulieu sawmill owned by Kruger, has closed down, taking jobs away from 100 people. Those people are experiencing an economic disaster.
Quite recently, on September 17, AbitibiBowater announced that it was eliminating 120 positions at the Clermont plant and also 340 positions in my riding at the Beaupré plant on the Côte-de-Beaupré. And the Saint-Hilarion sawmill, which depends directly on those two pulp and paper plants, is threatened with closure too.
Therefore, it is clear that for the people affected by this crisis, and given the government’s inaction, we cannot continue to have confidence in the Conservatives.
We could also recall that in the last Conservative government budget alone the modest sum of $170 million over two years was allocated to the forestry industry and the manufacturing industry across Canada. At the same time, the auto industry in Ontario was given $10 billion. That may be why our colleagues in the NDP who represent ridings in the Windsor, Ontario, region are a little lukewarm about our effort to stand up against the inequitable treatment of the forestry industries in Quebec and the auto industry in Ontario.
Another group that has been hit hard and directly by the recession is workers who have suffered job losses. These workers have no choice but to resort to employment insurance. The only action plan presented to the government by one of the opposition parties was proposed by the Bloc Québécois. We presented our first action plan in November 2008, and in February 2009 we attached an addendum to include other elements. The only party that has made the effort of presenting concrete proposals to help families, industries, regions and individuals is the Bloc Québécois.
That is why one of the things we called for in that action plan was for the waiting period to be eliminated. When you are unfortunate enough to find yourself without a job, the credit card bills, the mortgage payments and other everyday expenses, electricity bills, heating bills, whatever, keep coming in. Desjardins is not going to propose that you start paying your mortgage again when you feel like it just because you have lost your job. That is not how it works. That is why we called for the waiting period to be eliminated, to ensure that money continues to be injected into the economy, that people who are waiting for the situation to improve, who are waiting for someone to find another job, can continue to have an income.
I am almost out of time, but I would have also liked to talk about the situation of seniors. Sadly, again, the only party taking up the cause of seniors is the Bloc Québécois. Today, again, there was a question about the guaranteed income supplement, asked by my colleague from Châteauguay—Saint-Constant. Seniors are also experiencing income losses and are having more and more trouble making ends meet.
Some seniors have even reached the point of wondering whether they should eat or buy prescription drugs. That is unbelievable, and it is totally unacceptable. That is why the Conservatives no longer have our confidence.