Debates of Feb. 2nd, 2009

Canada-EFTA Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act

[Serge Cardin, Bloc, Sherbrooke, QC]

Mr. Speaker, we strongly support those two aspects, but we do have some concerns about them. In terms of the pharmaceutical industry, Quebec will come out on top, and so, by extension, will the federal government because it makes us pay taxes and never gives anything back. Quebec can also benefit tremendously from nickel and aluminum. But there are still two other issues: agricultural supply management and a proper development policy for the shipbuilding industry.

Because of these two concerns, we believe that, for once, the government really must act. I am talking about the party in power. We did try when the Liberals were in power, but we are trying again with the Conservatives in the hope that they will eventually see that they have to do something about this.

The Conservative government does have one talent: ambiguity. In the context of supply management, while contradictory statements have been made, we need to be sure that the Conservative government will defend supply management at the WTO and that it will bring forward a real policy for the shipbuilding industry.

My question is for my colleague: even though we lost confidence in the government last fall, is it possible to believe that they will make a specific commitment to supply management and a moral—and practical—commitment to development in the months to come?

[André Bellavance, Bloc, Richmond—Arthabaska, QC]

Mr. Speaker, if the government abandons the supply management system in the DOHA round negotiations, which have presently broken off but will undoubtedly resume at the WTO, all free trade agreements that we may enter into could become problematic at a given point. It is obvious that if the government does not stand up to the World Trade Organization with respect to bilateral agreements with certain countries—where there is talk of playing with tariffs on milk or other products—then, we will be finished. That is where we must wage the battle.

As I said earlier, how can we have confidence in this government when one minister after another said Canada would not be the only country not to sign an agreement at the WTO? Members can read the testimony of the ministers who told us that in committee. This means that regardless of what is in the agreement about agriculture, Canada will sign. Obviously, this government will then have the dubious distinction of having not only threatened the supply management system, but killed it.

I would remind this House that no less than 40% of Quebec's agricultural economy depends on supply management. Of course, in other provinces that also have the supply management system, such as Ontario, Manitoba and New Brunswick, producers are very concerned about what is happening.

The current Minister of International Trade said he wanted to meet with the Director General of the WTO, Pascal Lamy, to reopen the discussions that were interrupted last July in Geneva. This is disturbing, because the wording that was put before the countries threatened the supply management system.

I know that this week the dairy producers of Canada and Quebec will visit all of the members. I am sure that they will teach everyone something. I ask that all of the members in the House listen to them closely because if we are not vigilant on this subject, we risk putting people out on the street. They will be here this week. They will talk to us and it would be worth listening.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, this trade agreement reminds me of the old adage that if one does not pay attention to history, one is bound to repeat it. It seems that in this case we may be repeating a mistake that was made not that long ago and many miles away. It reminds me of what happened in the dry docks in the U.K., which faced similar unfair competition. Hundreds of those dry dock workers came to work in the dry docks in this country which at that time were flourishing. Indeed, this country recruited those workers in the hundreds because of their skills and the value they could bring to our country's dry docks.

I remember that all too well. I was a youngster at the time and my father was one of those workers who came to this country as a dry dock worker. He was a shipwright by trade. Those who know the marine industry know the types of skills that entails. He brought his family here and obviously we stayed.

We left the U.K. because the dry dock in Clydeside where he had a job, while it had been there for over a century was going and is now gone. In fact the remaining piece on the Clydeside is a crane. On that crane is a large plaque commemorating the lives and the work of those shipyard workers who built those ships. It would be a shame if this country were to build that last crane and place a plaque on it in memory of all those shipyard workers in this country who have gone before and there would be no more again.

That is why it is so important as we consider this bill that we look at the parts that affect the shipbuilding industry and those highly skilled and valued marine workers who work in the shipyards day in and day out. They provide services to us. They build coast guard vessels, and hopefully soon will build Department of National Defence ships, provided that the government decides to do it here.

Quite often the United States is held in esteem by many nations throughout the world as being a country to look up to, a country to emulate, and a country that has great ideas. I agree with that. In fact the U.S. had a great idea called the Jones act. That act talks about U.S. ships that will be built with U.S. money, that will be built by U.S. workers in U.S. shipyards. It seems like a great idea, especially when using taxpayers' dollars.

All too often Canadians think that we do not spend their hard-earned taxpayers' dollars as wisely as we could. I guarantee that if we spent those hard-earned dollars that Canadians entrust to us on building ships, they would thank us. They would say that it was a wise investment, a good choice, an excellent idea.

We are entering into a trade agreement with countries like Norway. Norway has developed a strategy, and good for it. Norway should do what it has done over the last 20 years. Norway's shipyards are flourishing, efficient and well stocked with skilled workers.

During that same period of time we ignored our shipyards. We let them decline to the point that today one-third of the shipyards in this country operate at one-third capacity. That is a shame.

My riding of Welland encompasses more than the city of Welland. It encompasses Port Colborne. Almost half the Welland canal runs through my riding. The history of shipbuilding along that canal goes back to the 1800s. We want to see a flourishing shipyard industry in this country where marine workers are proud to build ships that fly Canadian flags.

What we are looking for is a policy that asks, what is wrong with Canadian workers? Why do we not want to invest in those Canadian workers? Why do we not want Canadian workers to build Canadian ships?

It amazes me, as someone who is new to this House, that every now and again it seems that we forget why we are here. Canadians sent us here to advance what they wanted to have advanced for them. If we went to a dry dock today, and I have not been to one in a while, during the election campaign, but I would be more than happy to go back, I believe those marine workers would say that they want us to spend that money on Canadian yards, on Canadian workers, building Canadian ships here, not in Norway. I think we would find, regardless of which political party we belong to, that those workers indeed would say that.

The simple matter is that that investment multiplies itself through an economy. If we had decided to tender that defence ship rather than saying it was going to cost us a few pennies more, we could have had that investment go in as part of a stimulus package that would actually help those dry dock workers and those communities flourish. Unfortunately, that has not happened.

My father first got hired in a place called Collingwood. Many members many not remember that Collingwood actually had a shipyard. We used to be able to look down its main street and we could see this great big ship at the end of the street. It looked like it was parked on the street, but indeed there was a dry dock there.

Across this land there were many places where there were dry docks. Unfortunately, too many of them have closed. It seems to me that what we ought to do is make sure that not one more yard closes in this country, and one of the ways to do that is to ensure that we invest and make sure that we actually put those workers back to work, building a fleet of ships that not only would they be proud of but this country would be proud of, and that would emulate the best in the world.

I have absolutely no doubt that we would build anything but the best. Our workers are the most highly skilled, and given a level playing field, can be the most competitive and efficient in the world. What they need is an opportunity. With this particular bill, those workers are not going to be given that opportunity.

It is amazing the folks that actually talk about getting an opportunity. Some inside the Shipbuilders Association would say, “Perhaps we ought to just let it go”, but that is a defeatist attitude. That is not the attitude of Canadian workers. Canadian workers do not have a defeatist attitude. In fact, Canadian workers are very optimistic. All we need to do is have some faith in those workers and put some investment in those workers, and indeed we would be building some of the finest ships, if not the finest ships, the world has ever seen. One of our friends in the association said:

--we're very good friends with them, and we don't mind doing that, but now we feel that they're putting the boots to us. Not only do they want us to buy their equipment, they want to build the ships in Norway, put their own equipment on them, and then send them to Canada. I think the government has to think a long time before it does that.

Why would he say that? There is more to a ship than just simply building a hull. There is all manner of instrumentation and high technology. Depending upon where it goes, if it goes into the oil fields, in the offshore, it becomes a very intricate piece of equipment that requires a great deal of technology. That type of technology is extremely important to this economy. We do not want to have that type of technology leave this country, since it is our offshore that these ships will be working in. I am sure our offshore workers on those drilling platforms would really want to see a Canadian ship, built by Canadians and flying a Canadian flag, heading out toward them as they work that platform.

What it also would do is make sure that we protect those jobs. When we talk about the Jones act, it has been in place since 1920. That is a long time. It will soon have its centennial anniversary of 100 years. Yet, it has never been repealed. It has never really ever been challenged, not under NAFTA, not under WTO. It just exists. Everyone acknowledges it. Everyone accepts it. Yet, when it comes time to protect Canadian workers, we cannot find the courage to have an exception for our workers, but we are quite happy to turn a blind eye, nudge, nudge, wink, wink and say it is “Only America, it is okay, let it be”.

It seems to me that we ought to have the same legislation here. We could call it whatever we want, Jones 2 if we like, but at least we ought to have an equal playing field. We would like to see a structured financial facility, an accelerated capital cost allowance for the industry, and an effective buy Canada policy for all government procurements.

When one looks at this sense of procurement, what does it really mean? It means spending hard earned taxpayers' dollars that we collect in Canada. The net beneficiary of course of collecting that money and spending it here would ultimately be the Canadian taxpayer who actually paid it in the first place. Some might say, “That might cost us a bit more”. Indeed, it might. Perhaps it will cost us $1.05 when we might have been able to buy it for $1.

However, it seems to me if we spent that $1.05 on a Canadian worker, that Canadian worker has to repatriate some of his money back in the form of taxes and that $1.05 that it cost indeed might only cost 85¢ by the time the 20¢ is paid back in taxes. Ultimately, we are 15¢ ahead on the $1. It seems like a bargain. Then again, I am not an economist.

I am just the member for the riding of Welland who remembers as a child all those boats being built and all those workers being employed. Now he sees the service facilities in his riding working at less than half capacity and in some cases shut down for periods of time, and has not seen a new ship built in those yards in a great number of years and would ultimately like to see that.

As my colleague from Nova Scotia said earlier, there is about $22 billion that needs to be put into infrastructure in the marine industry. It seems to me there is not a yard across the country that would not be busy if indeed we did that.

Unfortunately, we are not doing that. We are letting these yards dry up as if it does not matter, as if someone else will do it for us, and indeed they will. But when we no longer have the capacity to do it and someone else does, we are at the mercy of them and what they wish to charge us when we need those ships to go to those drilling platforms, to assist those workers, to resupply them, and to do all the necessary things that those rigs will need.

It would be a shame if indeed what we thought would be an effective trade deal turned out to be an expensive one for Canadians because we ended up not keeping a shipyard business.

Shipyards go back a long way and a lot further back than just the story I recounted as a youngster coming to this country with my parents. Shipyard building for a marine nation such as ours goes back hundreds of years. In fact, it was marine nations that actually were able to send ships here in the first place that ended up meeting the first nations of this country all those hundreds of years ago. It seems to me that what happened at that point was those marine nations understood the type of infrastructure that was here when it came to lumber and indeed created the marine industry that has lasted all those generations.

We need to continue to build on that. Andrew McArthur from the Shipbuilding Association of Canada and Irving Shipbuilding said:

So our position from day one has been that shipbuilding should be carved out from the trade agreement. We butted our heads against a brick wall for quite a number of years on that and we were told there is no carve-out. If the Americans, under the Jones Act, can carve out shipbuilding from NAFTA and other free trade agreements, as I believe the Americans are doing today with Korea, or have done, why can Canada not do the same?

It seems to me that is an extremely relevant question. Why can Canada not do that? We have the power in the House to do that. Even for someone who has been here for such a short period of time, I think it is day 16, but it seems to me that is what we are empowered to do. We actually have, as Mr. McArthur said, the power to do that. What a novel thought, that we would actually enact, take that sense of urgency that marine and other workers across this country are giving to us and say we have to act on behalf of them. The Americans did. Why would we choose not to? If it is good enough for American workers all those years ago in 1920, surely to goodness in 2009 it is good enough for Canadians. So I would ask the government to look at carving it out.

As my colleague said earlier, this is not a bad total trade agreement. There is just a piece on shipbuilding that does not fit what Canadian workers need to have. We want to carve the shipbuilding piece out. Let us do what other nations have done. They have ultimately, over the years, done similar things and there is no reason why we cannot do the same.

Since the power is in our hands, proverbially as they say, that is the thing I have learned in the House, then why not utilize it? Why not indeed act upon it? That would be a novel thought for the House to protect Canadian workers at a time when they are most vulnerable, at a time where we can actually do something for them. They would say to us that we made the right choice, a great decision, and indeed had an effect on their lives, not only theirs from a personal perspective, but their families, their communities and ultimately this country. That would be a magical moment for a new person in the House like me, to actually say, when I leave this place, that we made a difference in the lives of Canadians. This is our opportunity.

It would be a shame for us to let that opportunity pass because ultimately we will be held to account for those opportunities that we let pass. I do not necessarily mean in elections. Ultimately, we have to look at what we have done as a lifetime of work for our fellow citizens, our communities and our country. That is the test we hold ourselves to when we make a difference, not whether to get re-elected, but whether we made a difference for Canadians. This is an ample opportunity to make that difference.

I would ask the government and my colleagues on the opposition benches to take a hard look at this piece of legislation and take the opportunity to act on behalf of Canadian workers, just like the Americans did with the Jones act, and exempt this piece on shipbuilding, so that it defends shipbuilding workers in Canada and allows them to get back on equal footing.

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

Mr. Speaker, I do not normally get involved in these debates, but I can only take the NDP's dire prediction of the shipyards for only so long. I want to lay out what is really happening.

In Canada we have shipyards in the Atlantic region, in Quebec, Ontario and B.C. All of these shipyards at this moment are doing good in their commercial business. For example, the Lévis yard, which was going to go out of business a few years ago, was bought by the Norwegians. It is producing the various rigs for oil and gas. All the other yards are operating.

I want to clarify what the government policy is with respect to ships and shipbuilding. With respect to government contracts, the DND or the Coast Guard are compelled to start with Canadian shipyards and deal with them. They are—

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

You cancelled them.

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

Mr. Speaker, if the member would let me finish, he can then answer.

On the order books right now are four submarines will be upgraded, 12 frigates will be upgraded, 6 to 8 Arctic vessels will be built, 3 support ships will be built and 98 Coast Guard vessels will be built. They have not been cancelled. The first round of bids on the support ships were not acceptable, so they are going to try again—

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

They were cancelled.

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

You obviously do not understand government or how the process works.

We have so much work for our Canadian shipyards that they will be busy for more than a decade.

We have to look at the cost, the capability and the schedule. If a shipyard cannot build something, or none of our shipyards can build a specific vessel, then we will have to go offshore. For anything offshore, we are committed to 100% industrial benefits in Canada. If somebody in a foreign country receives one of these contracts, the company would have to invest the equivalent of $1 for every $1 we spend—

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Order, please. I am afraid I am going to have to cut off the hon. government whip to allow time for the member to respond.

I did hear some use of the first person and some people talking when the whip was speaking. If we could just reserve questions and comments to when the chair recognizes members that would be helpful.

I will allow the hon. member for Welland an opportunity to respond.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the government cancelled a lot of the programs. The government might reinstate them at some point, but right now they are not there. I looked at the budget and the amount of money that was allocated to build two new defence ships. The government cancelled the program because it said that it was too expensive. The government decided not to build them, so at this point they are not being built.

Even the Canadian Shipbuilding Association says that it is a shadow of its former self. The shipyards left in the St. Catharines area are not robust. In fact, just a year ago the port Welland dry dock had nobody in it because there were no boats to build and no repairs to make—

[Chuck Strahl, Conservative, Chilliwack—Fraser Canyon, BC]

And what about now?

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Perhaps there might be if the money flows, Mr. Speaker, but then again the government has to ensure it does not cancel this one. Ultimately, we need to build up those abilities again.

The hon. member mentioned that we had to build these things overseas because we did not have the ability anymore. The reason we do not have the ability is because you let it slide away. You allowed those skills to erode. You did not give those workers the ability to work. You need to take some of your training money and reinvest in those workers and those yards—

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

I know the hon. member is new to this place, but I will remind him that we do not direct comments directly at ministers and use the first person, but through the chair.

The hon. member for Burlington.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I was in my office listening to the presentations from my friends from the New Democrats. I welcome the member for Welland. To give them a little sense of my understanding, in the last two years I have done a study in the port of Halifax, Quebec City, Toronto, Hamilton and St. Catharines. I have been on the seaway. I have been on the Welland Canal. I have been to the port of Vancouver and I have been at the port of Prince Rupert.

This free trade deal is about a 25% duty that will be phased out over a 15-year period, not overnight. Nothing changes in the first three years and then it is a gradual removal over 15 years. If one looks at how much money the Canadian shipbuilders have invested in Norway over the last number of years, it is $16 million. It is like an oil change. One tanker is worth $130 million.

There has not been a tanker built in Canada for the Great Lakes system since 1985. Those skills have gone over there. However, we have a robust shipping business in our country. Our shippers need product that is more environmentally sensitive to be able to move product from A to B. It is a good deal for Canada and it is a good deal for us to have these free trade agreements with different parts of the country.

The members like to talk, and I hear it all the time, about a combined ACCA, or accelerated capital cost allowance, and a combined SFS to make it more economical for a shipper to buy a foreign ship. When I was in Quebec City, the biggest ship owner in Canada was there, and it had put out for purchasing. It could not get anybody to buy. It is paying the 25%, which cannot be financed. What difference does that make in terms of actual cost to a $130 million vehicle?

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there is no question that ships move things, and I guess vehicles do as well. Twenty-five percent of $130 million is somewhere akin to about $35 million, give or take $100,000.

We have seen trade treaties and tariff things eliminated before. The argument is always that it is over an extended period of time. The shipbuilders' association and the marine workers are saying that they understand it is over a period of time. They are asking for a re-training program and the opportunity to do what the Norwegians did for the same 20 years that we did not do, which is an industrial policy that talks about marine workers in the shipyards.

If the government were to do that and give them the same opportunities that Norway gave its yards, we probably might accept that trade-off. However, it seems to me that this is not what it is proposing. We are going to eliminate the duty and tariffs, and it will go. It reminds me of the auto pact. It did the same thing there. Ask me how the Big Three are doing today.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives are waking up. They are starting to realize they have lost this debate because, unfortunately, they made the tragic error of throwing together a bill around this bad EFTA agreement without thinking of the impacts on shipbuilding. Now that it is being thrown back at them, they are starting to awaken to the fact that Canadians are not going to tolerate a government selling out again, like it did with the softwood sellout, another major industrial sector.

The Conservatives have said that the NDP is making comments about this EFTA agreement. I started to quote the many comments we heard from shipbuilders and marine workers themselves, all of them condemning the EFTA agreement and the lack of a carve-out. Why is there not a carve-out—

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Order, please. There are 20 seconds left for the hon. member for Welland.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the bottom line is we need a carve-out and all it takes is courage on behalf of parliamentarians to simply say that we will carve it out.

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak to the bill before the House, Bill C-2, on the European Free Trade Association trade agreement. It is important to understand what we are talking about. There are only a few countries involved: Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland. There is also an agreement on agriculture between Canada and the Republic of Iceland and various agreements related to the Norway and the Swiss federation on agriculture as well. They are part of the bill.

This party believes in trade. We believe in fair trade. I know a lot of members across the way would like to guffaw about that. They seem to think that free trade is a thing we do by taking off our warm coats and exposing ourselves to the cold for reasons of fashion. It is fashionable to talk about free trade and trading with other countries.

Our party believes in fair trade. We have a lot of examples of that. The Auto Pact is one of them, where there is a fair trade agreement between Canada and the United States dealing with trade and very important commodities at serious risk today. However, the government has a very one-sided view on trade, and that is knock down the barriers and we will have free trade. However, when it chooses to do it, it seems to choose to do it with people who have already put their own industry in a position where they are anxious to enter into a free trade agreement with Canada because Canada is not willing to protect its own industries.

We have heard various speeches this afternoon. I was particularly impressed by the speech by the member for Sackville—Eastern Shore, who has been on the shipbuilding file ever since he entered the House of Commons. I have worked with him over the years on this file, as well as with other members of the shipbuilding industry, in particular, the Marine Workers Union. The Government of Newfoundland and Labrador was very interested in this, as well. Newfoundland and Labrador has a great interest in shipbuilding. The Marystown shipyard, with the Cowhead facility, has been active in building up its capacity and ability to actively participate in shipbuilding ventures. We have been following this file tremendously.

In fact, if the government of the day and the previous governments listened to the member for Sackville—Eastern Shore for the last I think 11 years, we would have a shipbuilding industry that would be able to compete on a level playing field with Norway and we would not be probably in this position opposing this aspect of the bill. We would have had what Norway has had for the last 10 or 15 years. It used to be called an industrial policy on shipbuilding.

I know industrial policy is a very unfashionable word among the think tanks of the right, industrial policy as opposed to this whole notion of “let the free enterprise system do everything”. It is some ideological mantra that has got us where we are today in the world with the collapse of the international financial markets and the stock market as a result of this blind ideology of deregulation, free trade and lack of concern over the ways in which governments can and should regulate industry, protect their national interests and ensure that the kinds of things that should be happening are happening.

We are a coastal nation, as has been mentioned before today. We have the longest coastline in the world, the Arctic, the Pacific and the Atlantic, areas where we have a national interest, whether it be on the east coast with respect to protection of our fisheries and coastal protection in general, environmental protection in the Arctic, which is very important, and in the Pacific as well. Yet we have a situation where we do not really have a shipbuilding industry policy.

I listened to the minister of state, the chief government whip. I am glad to hear that all these shipbuilding projects are, I think he said, on the books.

The books were presented to the House of Commons the other day. I did not see all these projects. I did not see the joint supply ships back on the books. I did not see the Arctic icebreakers that we need and which the government said it has to have in order to ensure our Arctic sovereignty. I did not see them on the books in the budget.

Here is a budget that is supposed to provide economic stimulus to the industrial workers of Canada. If the contract for the joint supply ships alone had gone to the Marystown facility, it would have provided about 20 years of long-term stable work, the construction phase for about eight or ten years and a longer term maintenance project for the joint supply ships, which is something that Canada needs. We all know we need it. The government knows we need it, but what did it do? A couple of days before the election was called it shut down that project. It shut down that bid.

Why did the Conservatives do that? They said the price was too high. The price was too high because the project was initially costed back in 2002. The government never made any allowances for the increase in costs of procurement and materials, labour and everything else in between. Of course, when the price eventually came in, it was over what was anticipated in terms of the budget.

There is something wrong with a government that is not prepared to recognize that if we do not move fast on projects, the costs will obviously go up and we still have to decide whether or not we need these facilities and ships.

I listened carefully to the budget and I did not hear very much about shipbuilding, but I have to say that I was very pleasantly surprised when I looked in the budget documents, the big thick book that we got with the budget. Lo and behold on page 172 of the budget there is actually a section called “Shipbuilding”.

I was very enthused because I thought that the joint supply ships would be put back, the Arctic icebreakers would be built and we would see a serious attempt by the government to recognize the needs of the shipbuilding industry in Canada. What did I find? There is a recognition of the importance of the industry with 150 establishments, 30 shipyards across the country, recognizing, contrary to what the minister of state has said, that everybody is thriving. The budget itself recognizes that in recent years the industry has experienced decline in demand which has been exacerbated by the economic downturn. The Minister of Finance must need to hear from the government whip, who would inform him that everybody is thriving and everybody is busy. However, that is not the case.

The government's response is to have a shipbuilding program, so called, that involves $175 million to build something in excess of 90, what it calls, vessels. Someone talked about conveyances or vehicles a few minutes ago, but the government calls them vessels. What are these vessels? Sixty new small craft and 30 environmental response barges. The last time I looked, a barge was not exactly a ship. It goes in the water and it floats, but I do not see it as the kind of thing we would regard as a major undertaking in the shipbuilding industry. Obviously it is very necessary, do not get me wrong, and I was delighted to see the term “shipbuilding” being used.

I was delighted to see the recognition of the importance of shipbuilding, but I was very disappointed to see that what was involved here was new small craft. It does not say how small they are. Thirty barges, five lifeboats and there were three inshore science vessels. Those are important. One is home ported in Mont-Joli, Quebec, one in Shippagan, New Brunswick and one in Saint Andrews, New Brunswick, so there are two in New Brunswick and one in Quebec. Again, we do not know how big they are. We do not know whether they play the same kind of role as the very important scientific vessels that have been operating off the east coast for the last number of years.

We see vessel extensions as part of the project. The Cape Roger, whose home port is St. John's, is one that will be given a major repair.

There is something called vessel refits. There are 35 vessels scheduled for refit. These vessels are not large craft. There are 60 small craft, 30 barges, 5 lifeboats, and 3 inshore vessels. There are 98 vessels being built along with a number of major refits totalling $175 million. As the minister of state would know, when dealing with the building of ships, that is not a lot of money, $175 million for 98 vessels, not counting the ship repairs and the major refits that are involved. That money is spread out very thinly across the country.

What we did needed to see was a recognition that a national shipbuilding program was going to be part of an ongoing effort by the government to ensure that we have a shipbuilding industry that is able to compete. It is one thing to talk about how this is going to take place over 15 years and is gradually going to go down, but what are we going to be doing in the meantime?

If the Liberal government back in the 1990s, and the Conservative government, both the current one and previous one, had listened to what the member for Sackville—Eastern Shore was saying throughout the years, we would have a shipbuilding policy and we would not be complaining about the problems of engaging in competition with Norway. This really should be taken out of the trade agreement, the same way it was taken out of the free trade agreement with the Americans.

Countries protect their interests when they are dealing with trade deals. That is why, for example, the Americans refused to repeal the Jones act. The Jones act has been around since 1920. It is a piece of legislation that protects American shipbuilding under the guise of defence. The Jones act says that with respect to commercial travel, one cannot travel between two ports in the United States without having a ship that has been built in America, is manned by Americans, is owned by Americans and operates within America. It cannot be done, unless it is on that kind of ship. Canada has no such policy. America refuses to get rid of that policy. We do not have an equivalent policy in Canada.

It appears that we have no desire to develop a shipbuilding policy that is going to protect our workers and our industry before we are forced to run head to head with the Norwegians. The shipbuilding industry has asked to have this excluded from the agreement with good reason. The industry knows what Norway has done to build and support and protect its shipbuilding industry for the last 15 years. If there was a commitment, if we had an industrial plan laid out, a long-term commitment of government funds, it might be a different story, but we have not seen that.

There is an opportunity at this time when governments are being given permission by all the economists, the public and other nations of the world to engage in economic stimulus. The conditions are most favourable for the kind of investment we are talking about, and the response from the government is $175 million to deal with 98 smallish--and I do not want to put them down totally--but smallish projects for the Canadian coast guard.

No doubt these vessels are needed. No doubt their refits are needed. We have seen inadequacies in our coast guard. In fact we have seen situations where the coast guard was so inadequately financed that the ships were staying in port. The ships were not going out because there was not enough in the budget to pay the diesel fuel to move the ships around, to protect our coastal waters, to protect our environment, to inspect the fisheries. They were staying in port because the government was not giving them enough fuel. That is the state of the support for our coast guard.

We see some change. At least the coast guard will be given some vessels that it needs, but it is not being given the support for the important role it should be undertaking in protecting our waters for environmental reasons, in protecting our Arctic sovereignty, in ensuring that fisheries patrols are carried out efficiently and effectively. These are the kinds of things that should be part of a modern, industrial, coastal nation such as Canada and they are absent here.

There is another aspect of this agreement which I will only touch on briefly because other members have talked about it. It goes back to the whole notion of fair trade. Why is it that Canada does not protect to the degree required the supply management system? It is an important way that we secure our food supply. Food security in an uncertain world is becoming more and more important. It is going to become even more important as we see the ravages of climate change on food production in other parts of the world, as well as in Canada.

We have to recognize that part of our responsibilities as a government and as a people is to ensure that food supply is available when we need it, that production is here, and that the people who are engaged in the production have an opportunity to make a reasonable living. They play an important role in ensuring that our economy is safe from the kind of vicissitudes that can occur when trading goes awry or when food supplies go awry and we do not have the kind of supply that we have built up through a totally free trade system coming from other nations.

Supply management is part of that. It is a building block for a fair trade system and should be protected better than it is in this particular agreement.

Supply management plays an important role in ensuring that production occurs across our country. Some of our colleagues from Quebec have spoken about the importance of the dairy industry to that province and I agree. In Newfoundland and Labrador, for example, by securing part of the quota for industrial milk, it has been able to build its post-production with commercial milk, yogourt and other dairy products. These are value-added products from industrial milk quotas protected by the supply management system, a necessary kick-start to an industry that would have great difficulty growing on its own, especially with the cheap products coming in from outside the region, because they have had an opportunity to build up an industry over a longer period of time.

These are the two main problems that we have with the agreement. Why is it that there cannot be a carve out of the shipbuilding industry? It should be taken out. In the absence of a rather robust and long-term commitment for shipbuilding and industrial policies in this country, our shipbuilding industry will be put at risk. This is something that we do not want to happen.

Those are my remarks. I would be pleased to respond to any questions or comments from members on this matter.

[Chuck Strahl, Conservative, Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development and Federal Interlocutor for Métis and Non-Status Indians]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to comment on what the member had to say.

It is interesting to preface the remarks that the NDP members really are free traders at heart, but they just cannot support this free trade agreement. Of course they could not support the Canada-Israel free trade agreement. They voted against the Canada-Costa Rica free trade agreement. They promised to vote against the Colombian free trade agreement, the Peru free trade agreement, and any other free trade agreement that would come before this House, but other than that, they are fully in favour of free trade. That is very interesting.

When it comes to supply management, I was in Geneva, I was in Davos representing supply management and agriculture during those discussions. We are the government that brought in compositional standards for the dairy industry. On behalf of my government, I received the first and only standing ovation ever given to a minister, because we actually moved ahead on all that. We actually believed in all that. We actually supported all that. That is why we made sure in this agreement that supply managed industries are protected. They are protected. The member should read the agreement.

There are a couple of other things. One is that when it comes to a domestic shipbuilding industry, the hon. minister has already made mention of how the work that is lined up in the shipbuilding industry in Canada is not only for this year but it stretches out for the next 10 years. There is a lot of good work with lots of well-paying jobs all across the country, wherever there are shipbuilding facilities. That is good news. That is because of the actions this government has taken on a procurement basis to make sure that that happened. There may have been empty work yards a year ago, but it is not happening now. It is not only good news now, but it stretches off into the future.

Regarding the NDP's solution to shipbuilding, members could go to B.C. and see that just offshore there is $450 million tied up in an NDP fiasco called the fast ferries. Anytime we want to witness how the NDP shipbuilding strategy works, there are empty vessels parked on shore at taxpayers' expense that have never turned a wheel. That is the trouble with economic illiteracy and it is abounding in the NDP in this debate today.

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I want to congratulate the member on his standing ovation in Switzerland for his support for supply management in this country. I have not seen him getting many standing ovations on this side of the House on the actions of his government with respect to the Wheat Board either.

If the minister is actively supporting supply management and prepared to defend that in international agreements and in all international efforts, I want to thank him for that. I think that is what the government has to do and has to do vigorously.

As to his comments about the NDP being free traders at heart but simply do not support free trade agreements, what I said was that we believe in fair trade. Fair trade has elements of free trade, but it has elements of ensuring that we do not go into a free trade agreement and expose ourselves to the elements that other countries have built up through subsidies and through long-term industrial policies in their countries and then come knocking at our door and say, “We'd like to have a free trade agreement, remove barriers so we can come in and penetrate an industry that you haven't done a very good job of protecting”.

That is what we are saying here, that it is an industry where Canada has failed to have a proper policy. I guess the government's budget is a good example of that. There is reference made to shipbuilding and the importance of shipbuilding in the decline, but then where is the response? The response is to say, as the government whip said, “We've got all this work on our books but we're not going to do it. We're not going to do it in this budget”. We have an economic stimulus budget that is being bragged about as the greatest level of stimulation to be put into the economy in decades, but what is there for shipbuilding?

Out of the $64 billion deficit that the government plans to run in the next two years there is $175 million allocated for shipbuilding. That is not enough.

[John Rafferty, NDP, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I certainly appreciate the member's comments and certainly the minister's comments just before that. I invite him to come to Thunder Bay to see our shipbuilding facilities where not one ship is being built at this moment and not one ship was built last year. I invite him to come and I will personally show him around. The government mentioned that extending tariffs for some vessels for up to 15 years was an important part of EFTA. Without any other measures, is this not simply a stay of execution for the shipbuilding industry?

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

Mr. Speaker, surely, this is all it is doing. It is saying this is okay because it is stretched out over 15 years. Somehow or other the industry is supposed to respond to this on its own while we are competing with an industry that has been built up, supported, developed, subsidized, and nurtured by a government such as Norway, a country with one-third of the population of Canada but that has done a very good job of managing its internal resources, looking after its people, and making sure that when it develops an industry it is an industry that can compete in the world.

We have for example Norse Hydro which is participating in the offshore of Newfoundland and Labrador to a greater extent, through Statoil Hydro which is participating in the offshore of Newfoundland and Labrador with 12% of one project and 18% of another. They are active players in our offshore as a government agency. Norway has done this kind of work in ensuring that it is an international player in shipbuilding, in aquaculture, in salmon marketing, and all sorts of industries that it nurtured and developed. Shipbuilding is one of them.

We have to do the same if we hope to compete. Just sort of staging a withdrawal or staging out tariffs is essentially a staged withdrawal from being a competitive player, if one does not do the work on the ground to make it happen.

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

Mr. Speaker, I want to explain budgeting very quickly. Starting in 2006, and through 2007 and 2008 our government committed billions and billions into the shipyards. They may not show up in this budget, all these billions, but they have been committed by the government. Therefore, all those DND projects are there. The money is there and it will be spent. It just does not show up in this budget. The member has to go back and do the research.

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the explanation of the government whip, but we have had the same experience with the infrastructure funds where there are billions of dollars on the books but they are not being spent, so what good does it actually do? I thank him for his comments, but we will be looking actively for that money being spent.

I see the $175 million in this budget for the 98 vessels on a cash basis, and perhaps the member can explain to me whether I am right in assuming that a cash basis means that if we do not spend it in this budget year, then it is not on the books, that it is gone and it will not be spent. I think I am right in saying that, but if the member is right when he says that other projects are on the books, then we look forward to his government making an announcement as to when the joint supply ships will be constructed, and when that tender will go out again so we can see some action on it.