Debates of Oct. 9th, 2009

Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Madam Speaker, I was using bank mergers as an example. If my colleague had followed my speech from the start, he would have learned something, because it is a good example of what can result from investing at all costs. If the Canadian banks had merged, which is what the Conservatives and the Liberal Party wanted, we would have witnessed a debacle just as catastrophic as what happened in the United States.

Bill C-23 is supposedly a free trade agreement. In fact, it is quite simply an investment agreement. That is what is dangerous. The government wants to enable private companies that specialize in mining development to invest more in Colombia without having to respect human rights or protect the environment. This is terrible, because it shows that this Conservative government is willing to do anything, as it proves daily. It gives tax credits for oil sands development, the dirtiest industry on the planet. It is not the Bloc Québécois that says that. The Economist and other newspapers around the world judge these things and find that the oil sands are the worst polluter in the world. Once again, the Conservative government has subsidized the oil companies to the tune of millions, hundreds of millions and billions of dollars since it came to power.

This is a concern because with Bill C-23, this free trade agreement, which is an investment agreement, will allow private Canadian companies to invest in the mining sector without having to respect human rights, working conditions or environmental standards. This will be a disaster.

Earlier my colleague from the north shore gave examples of what mining companies have done in the past in his region. He might get a chance to ask me the same questions. If we do not restrict private companies, whether they are in mining development or banking, all they will want to do is make money at all costs. That is why I maintain that banking and mining companies are all the same. Oil companies respect absolutely nothing. They want to make profits at all costs and pay dividends every three months to their shareholders and bonuses to company CEOs. That is what happened in the banking system. They wanted so badly for things to go well in the banking system that they even paid CEOs to give speeches in chambers of commerce. Every banker in the world was fleeced. Fortunately at the time there were parliamentarians like those from the Bloc Québécois who prevented Canadian banks from merging. We saved their life.

Today, once again, I am pleased that the members of the Bloc Québécois are here to prevent such bills from being adopted. My Conservative colleagues can laugh but they know the power that the opposition can command when it decides that a bill will not pass. They know it.

Today, they tried to prevent us from speaking about Bill C-23. However this Parliament has rules to prevent Conservative governments from using every means to stifle public debate and democracy. Conservatives stand in the way of democracy. They prove it every day.

Quebeckers decided, in their wisdom, to send worthy representatives to defend their values and their interests. Quebeckers do not see their interests and values reflected in a free trade agreement that is nothing but an investment agreement. It is not a true free trade agreement. It is an agreement that allows companies to make investments, and I will say it once more—it cannot be said enough times—without respecting human rights and the rights of individuals. I will not go over all the examples of what has happened in Colombia to unionists who have been assassinated and so forth. My colleagues have already talked about this.

Allowing our corporations to do business with a country that does not respect human rights, the rights of individuals and the rights of workers may serve the private interests of certain Canadian corporations but is not of benefit to Quebeckers.

Once again, we will act as the conscience of Canadian companies. We cannot leave it up to capitalists to respect human and environmental rights. We can forget that. The oil sands are an excellent example, in terms of pollution and from an environmental standpoint. We cannot leave it up to those companies to respect the environment. All they care about is their profit margin. When one is also supported by a Conservative government that is willing to use public money to pollute, this adds up to the oil sands. This always makes me chuckle, because oil is a non-renewable energy source.

We are happy to have hydroelectricity in Quebec, which we paid for ourselves, without a penny from the federal government. Not one cent of the federal government's money went towards creating Quebec's hydroelectric system. Quebeckers paid for it. We will be able to meet the Kyoto targets, which the federal government will never be able to do. It continues to be the laughing stock of the planet, which it will prove once again in Copenhagen in a few months' time.

Fortunately, Quebeckers have the members of the Bloc Québécois to defend their values and interests.

[Dick Harris, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

Madam Speaker, it is very difficult to listen to this member and all the nonsense he has been spewing out for the last 10 minutes. Members of the Bloc have been here for 16 years and they have never deviated from the thought: big private company, bad; small company, good. They do not get it that big companies create jobs for hundreds of thousands of people in this country.

Let us talk about the oil sands in Alberta. Under the Liberal government no money went to the oil sands companies to help them develop new technology for cleaning up the environment, not one cent--

[The Acting Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

Order, I recognize the member for Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor on a point of order.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Madam Speaker, in the spirit of what the government House leader brought up before, I must ask the Conservative member, what does this have to do with the trade deal?

[The Acting Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

Again, I would invite all hon. members to come back to the subject at hand which is the free trade agreement.

The hon. member for Cariboo—Prince George.

[Dick Harris, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am simply responding to what the Bloc member was saying when he talked about the big oil sands developers that were taking government money and still polluting. He does not get it. The reason the tax credits went to these firms was to help them get technology to clean up the environment. He will not admit that.

What is wrong with Canadian companies going abroad and teaching those companies about environmental rights, about workers' rights, and helping those countries, which may be lacking in those areas, to develop the standards that Canada has? I ask the member that.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Madam Speaker, the simple good reason is that there is nothing in the agreement brought before the House that promotes respect for environmental laws. Once again, I am not the one saying this. The international press has described the oil sands as the biggest polluter on the planet. That is a fact.

If the Conservative government wants to invest money to pollute, that is its prerogative, but that is not what Quebeckers want. As I said earlier, we developed our hydroelectric power with our own money, with no help from Ottawa. That is why one day, Quebec will be capable, as a country, of getting by without any federal money.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, unlike the Conservative members opposite, I rather enjoyed the member's presentation. When he was talking about the role of the big banks here, he was in fact going to be relating that to the free trade agreement with Colombia and how a free trade agreement would also facilitate the takeover of Colombian businesses and so on by these banks.

If it were not for the opposition in the House stopping the merger of those banks, we would have had bank mergers, and we would have been in a huge mess come the recent recession. So, in fact, the opposition inadvertently saved the government from being in the same mess that the United States government is in. They should be thanking the member opposite--

[The Acting Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

Order. The hon. member for Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Madam Speaker, I have to be honest with my colleague. His party, the New Democratic Party, did not want bank mergers. That means they have a conscience. Quebeckers are proud to serve as the conscience of the Americas. I encourage NDP representatives to continue acting according to their conscience and stop supporting a Conservative government that is one of the worst polluters on the planet.

[The Acting Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

The hon. member for Manicouagan has time for a very brief question.

[Gérard Asselin, Bloc, Manicouagan, QC]

Madam Speaker, the companies that the member for Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel referred to are not just making money, they are harming the health of their own workers and that of people living in the regions in which they operate. The activities of companies looking for uranium on the north shore, mainly around Sept-Îles, are detrimental to their employees and people living on the north shore.

[The Acting Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

The member for Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel has 30 seconds.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the member for Manicouagan, who provides us with regular updates on what mining companies have left behind in the region along the north shore. Things would be even worse if the member for Manicouagan did not work so hard to bring these polluters into line. I would like to thank him for his work.

He is the eyes and ears of the people, and he is working to bring mining companies on the north shore into line. However, other people will have to be responsible for whipping them into shape in Colombia. We will not always be able to be there, and that is why we have to vote against this bill.

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

Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise on behalf of the party, contrary to this particular aspect of what the Conservative government is doing. I consider the Conservative government to be so desperate to sign a trade deal with literally anybody, that it seeks one with Colombia. It wants to be like the big boys out there and say that it can play too.

I first want to put on the record that the NDP is not against trade deals. However, we would like to see deals that are fair trade deals, not trade deals that upset the environment and the workers' rights. Everyone knows that Colombia has one of the worst workers' rights records in the world. Everyone knows that a unionist in Colombia does not have a very long shelf life, as they say. The reality is that the paramilitary, with the backing of the government and others, has supported basically the riddance of some union members and other people on the left who wish to speak up for social rights, justice and the environment.

What does the government do? It seeks out friendships and trade deals with countries of this nature on the premise that we might be able to improve things and may be able to improve their situation. How has that worked for thousands upon thousands of workers in Mexico right now? Do members remember when NAFTA came along? All tides were going to rise up and the workers of Mexico were going to have the same quality and standard of life that we have in Canada.

That has not happened, and do members know why? The control is lost to governments and is turned to multinational corporations. That is what these deals are all about.

The fact is we, in the NDP, and others, and I assume the Bloc as well, are opposed to these deals because they completely ignore the human rights element and environmental aspects in Colombia. All they do is make these particular profits and motivations for trade paramount and everything else secondary. It is lust like the free trade deal and NAFTA. When we asked about labour rights and about environmental rights, what happened? They were put in a side deal, to be talked about later.

We in the NDP have been asking over and over if the government is serious about human rights and environmental rights in Colombia. Those rights should have been put into the main body of the text. The first things that should have been negotiated were human rights, workers' rights and the environmental rights and then we talk about the economy of scale and the opportunity for companies to trade back and forth and make a profit, which they should be able to do. However, we cannot separate them and put one in a side deal.

It is funny that we never hear about the economic aspects of these big resource companies being put in a side deal. They are always in the main body of the text and workers and the environment are always on the side, to be talked about later. That is not fair and it is certainly not right.

What we have said very clearly about any trade deal is that if the premise of the trade deal is to create an economy for both sides to lift up workers and their communities, then must be equal on both sides. It cannot just be a one-way street, which is what is happening here.

We know the committee on international trade was dealing with this but the government circumvents the work of the committee and goes ahead anyway. Why would the government ask a committee made up of all parliamentarians to study this particular aspect and then go ahead and proceed with it anyway? The government is circumventing its own members of Parliament. As Garth Turner once said, “The sheeples won't say anything. They're afraid that their committee chairs or something else may be taken away from them”.

The reality is that if a committee has been tasked to look into an agreement or into a particular legislation, the government should never be signing on until that work is done, a report is tabled in the House and a thorough review and analysis has done by all parliamentarians, instead of the government just riding roughshod ahead superceding Parliament's wishes in this particular regard.

I cannot say this enough. If our children looked to this Parliament, they would see a massive debt and deficit that we are leaving for them. We are leaving them an environment that, by all standards, is worsening on a daily basis. Now we have no idea if our children will have the security of long term employment that we ourselves had. This is the legacy we are leaving our children.

What does the present government do and what did the previous government do? They both rushed out to make these trade deals thinking that if we just keep trading with countries like Colombia everything will be better. That is simply not true.

For those of us who have toured Mexico, we know that a lot of people in Mexico are not better off by NAFTA. There is no question that some communities have done better, but most Mexican workers are not that much better off than they were before. We were promised that the workers in Mexico would have similar rights to our workers in Canada, but when the trade deal was signed, thousands of Canadians lost their jobs and a lot of businesses left Canada to go elsewhere.

We are still in debt and have a massive deficit, and what does the government do? It searches out countries like Colombia with a terrible human rights record and bad environmental standards and we want to trade with that country. For the life of me, I do not understand why the--

[The Acting Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

The hon. member for Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel on a point of order.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank the NDP member for allowing me to interrupt him.

At noon today, the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons put forward a motion pursuant to Standing Order 56.l that would prevent any new amendments to Bill C-23.

In my view, moving this type of motion pursuant to Standing Order 56.1 is out of order for the following reasons.

Standing Order 56.1 has to do with any routine motion for which unanimous consent has been denied. Standing Order 56.1(b) defines a routine motion. It may be required, and I quote:

—for the observance of the proprieties of the House, the maintenance of its authority, the management of its business, the arrangement of its proceedings, the establishing of the powers of its committees, the correctness of its records or the fixing of its sitting days or the times of its meeting or adjournment.

I do not think that a motion to prevent an amendment or subamendment to a motion for second reading of a bill can be classified as a routine motion based on the definition in Standing Order 56.1(b). I believe that it is a motion to limit debate much as moving the previous question would, and, I should add, Marleau and Montpetit consider the previous question to be a motion to limit debate.

I would like to bring to your attention a ruling you made on September 18, 2001, in which you stated:

The expanded use of Standing Order 56.1 since 1997 causes the Chair serious concern. The government is provided with a range of options under Standing Orders 57 and 78 for the purpose of limiting debate. Standing Order 56.1 should be used for motions of a routine nature, such as arranging the business of the House.

I am certainly willing to recognize that the government is being innovative with the wording of its motion, but the fact is that this motion is basically designed to limit debate. In that sense, I believe it should be ruled out of order, since it was introduced pursuant to Standing Order 56.1.

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Madam Speaker, I would like to support the argument and the point of order put forward by my colleague from the Bloc.

I was just reading the ruling that came from the Speaker on Tuesday, September 18, 2001, and I would agree that what the government did today by preventing further amendments was really a motion to limit debate.

It has been clear in rulings from the Speaker that there is a lot of concern now about the expanded use of Standing Order 56.1. The member is entirely correct about the Standing Order being about routine motions, whereas what took place today was clearly an attempt by the government to limit debate, which is not appropriate under this Standing Order.

The government has other Standing Orders that it could use, such as Standing Order 71. There are other measures that it could use. For the government to try to ram this through at the last minute by using Standing Order 56.1, definitely limits the debate of members.

Madam Speaker, I would hope that you would examine this very carefully. A creeping, sort of incremental change is taking place where the government is continually relying on this particular Standing Order to expand the horizon of what it wants to do. It is really an inappropriate use of this particular Standing Order.

I hope the Speaker will uphold the earlier decision that was made in 2001 to make the confines and the appropriate use of this Standing Order clear. It clearly was not intended to be used to prevent further debate by members, which is what is actually happening right now because it was allowed.

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Minister of State and Chief Government Whip]

Madam Speaker, it is our contention that we are following the rules of the House. Standing Order 56.1 has been used a number of times in the House, most recent, in the softwood lumber debate. We believe we are using it accordingly.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

I would like to read again, for the benefit of the chief government whip and yours, madam Speaker, the part of Standing Order 56.1 which states that such a motion may be used for the following purposes:

—the observance of the proprieties of the House, the maintenance of its authority, the management of its business, the arrangement of its proceedings, the establishing of the powers of its committees, the correctness of its records or the fixing of its sitting days or the times of its meeting or adjournment.

There is no mention of motions to limit debate. The purpose of the motion introduced by the government today under Standing Order 56.1 was to limit debate. In that regard, I think that the Speaker's ruling of September 18 was clear. The government could have used other means besides Standing Order 56.1.

I would therefore encourage you to consider our point of order.

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

Madam Speaker, as I said before, I believe our position will be upheld. We believe we are following the rules.

What I suspect is the two opposition parties do not have any more speakers and they are trying to fill the time until 1:30 so they can get out of here.

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

Madam Speaker, with great respect to the member from the Conservative side, I was right in the middle of a speech. If truth were an island, you would be uninhabited right now. Try a little honesty in the House next time. I—

[The Acting Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

I would ask the hon. member to address his comments to the chair.

I thank the hon. members for their contribution to this point of order. All their arguments will be taken into consideration and a decision will be brought back in due course. This is indeed a very serious matter.

I thank the hon. member for Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel and the other members for submitting arguments for and against. We will take these arguments into consideration.

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Sackville--Eastern Shore.

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

Madam Speaker, I want to reconfirm that the Canada-Colombia free trade deal was signed on November 21, 2008, right smack in the middle of the international trade committee dealing with this effort. I have to ask the government this. Why would it have the committee undertake a study of this deal and, while doing its work and before the reports can be tabled, sign the deal anyway?

What about the Conservative members on that committee? Are they pawns in a game? They should do whatever they are told and not worry about things. “Pretend you are wasting all this taxpayer money on studies, witnesses and reviews, don't worry we're not going to listen to anything you say anyway because we're going ahead and signing it”.

This is the problem with the Conservative government. It promised us accountability and transparency. What did we get? An incredible number of Conservative bag people, Tory hacks and political contributions. This is its accountability review. “If you donate to the Conservative Party, you too can be a judge in Canada”. This is the type of system we want to tell the Colombians about, that they should follow our lead, that corruption begins at the highest places, even in our Canadian democracy?

Getting back to the free trade deal, we firmly believe these deals should be based on fairness, equality, the rights of workers, the rights of people and, most important, the environmental standards for both countries. If these deals were predicated upon those items, then we would probably be very supportive. However, we get backhanded deals, we get told all kinds of wonderful things by the government, “Don't worry, be happy”. Bobby McFerrin sang that song years ago and won a Grammy for it, but the Conservatives would never win a Grammy for that, I can assure everyone.

They Conservatives are deliberately misleading the House and Canadians when they make these deals without fair and proper observation by the committees and a thorough analysis and debate by the House. This is why we are here.

I remember when the Conservatives were on this side of House, they stood on their chairs like banshees and screamed and yelled every time the Liberals tried to pull something like this. It is quite amazing to know that the Liberals are very supportive of this. They are in the pockets of the Conservatives on this deal.

At the end of the day, only time will tell if these trade deals are successful. I can guarantee one thing. We have seen other deals that Canada has made in other areas of the world and the workers are still no better off. The environment is getting worse and the debts and deficits of those countries are rising.

Where is the proof that these deals actually succeed in the long term and who do they benefit? Who are the main beneficiaries of these deals? Who is pushing the government so hard to get these deals signed so fast with a country like Colombia?

As my hon. colleague from Prince George said earlier, is it not our responsibility to help them, to work with them, to assist them with worker stability and the environment? Absolutely, but we do not need a trade deal to do that. We can send a lot of people there to assist them in moving forward in a more democratic manner. This is why this deal should not be ratified.

The bill should be killed. I am glad to see the Bloc Québécois and the NDP siding on this very important issue.

[Gerald Keddy, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of International Trade]

Madam Speaker, I sit on the trade committee along with a number of colleagues. This debate has been dragged out in the trade committee for an enormous period of time. We visited Colombia. There have been over 30 hours of debate in the House on this issue.

Quite frankly, there is a side agreement in this free trade agreement on the environment. There is a side agreement on human rights. This is some of the best legislation that we have ever put forth in a free trade agreement with another nation.

My question for the member is very simple. Name a free trade agreement that provides jobs and opportunities for Canadian workers that the NDP has ever supported? This is an ideological argument. This has nothing to do with reality.