Madam Speaker, I am privileged to be speaking right after my colleague from Skeena—Bulkley Valley, and I greatly appreciate his input to this extremely important issue.
We are standing at a crossroads right now. We have to decide what kind of country we want to be. Do we want to control our destiny, or do we want other people to do it for us? Will we chart our own course or will we be a source of materials and a branch plant for other countries and global corporate entities like BHP Billiton?
New Democrats welcome yesterday's developments and congratulate the government for putting the brakes on what looked a few weeks ago like a slam dunk for the Australian resource giant.
We recognize that it is a step in the right direction for this government and hope it uses the time it has created to reflect on the way that Canadians are waking up to the fire sale that is Canada.
We might say they are waking up on the wrong side of the bed, for the government's decision on BHP is largely a response to buy time and try to minimize political damage in Saskatchewan. I want to take this moment to thank Saskatchewan NDP provincial leader Lingenfelter for all the hard work that he and his caucus has done on raising this issue and pushing it to the forefront as well. We know that we could not rely on the 13 MPs in Saskatchewan. Normally we would call that a baker's dozen, but that is far from a baker's dozen.
People are getting angry in Canada. We have not been getting a fair shake when it comes to the trend of more and more foreign ownership of what we consider to be ours. In northern Ontario we have seen this all too clearly. We saw Essar buy Algoma Steel. We saw Vale buy Inco. Xstrata took on Falconbridge. We are under siege in northern Ontario, and it is our best assets that are going first.
In my constituency, lodge owners and outfitters came to me about a disastrous low water level in the Mississagi River and Tunnel Lake. Who runs those dams? It is a Brazilian multinational. Brascan bought the dams, but it is called Brookfield Asset Management now. The company was originally founded as a builder and operator of electricity infrastructure in Brazil. The company's earlier name of Brascan reflected this history: Brazil plus Canada. It has assets of $94 billion and operates in North and South America, as well as in Europe.
This is but one example of the abuses that can take place when foreign owners take over from Canadian ones. Obviously, despite the significance of this situation to the people who rely on fishing or who enjoy it, it seems minor in comparison to the hostile takeover that, we hope, will be avoided in Saskatchewan.
It may be tempting to blindly strike out at others during this debate. We saw that yesterday when the Prime Minister said that he could not remember a single instance when the NDP has agreed with foreign investment in Canada. We know that that is not true. Instead of claiming that we have a hidden agenda in order to badmouth our policies, it is time the government dealt with certain aspects of foreign ownership.
Canadians have nothing to gain from silly slogans and political manoeuvres that serve to avoid debate. We all want a prosperous economy. We want good jobs in our communities and low unemployment. No one wants to pay more than their fair share of taxes. We all agree on that.
What we tend to disagree on most of the time is the solution. For some time now, the NDP has been denouncing the fact that foreigners can have free access to our markets without providing appropriate guarantees. Frankly, that limits our options.
We have nothing against trade and investment; we are simply questioning the lack of control they are subject to. Not requiring guarantees to protect our country's and our communities' interests would mean trusting blindly in the market.
No economic theory can replace the inevitable need for exceptions in the name of the general good. Things such as health care, defence and social programs, for example, have unique needs and challenges.
We watched the events that took place in Sudbury. Vale flexed its muscles and ground the workers down in the year-long battle. My husband was one of those. The outcome has changed the culture there forever.
Now, new hires cannot look forward with any certainty to a reasonable or secure pension. These are people who saw the generation before them look forward to their future. They could buy camps and take trips. They were secure in the future they were building with their hard work, work that was the engine of the community and the spirit of it, too. It was like that for years, but not for the kid who gets hired on next.
It is like that all across Canada. So many communities are hurting. Budgets are tight and they are getting tighter. All kinds of costs are going up at the same time. We are in an economic squeeze play and it is getting harder for Canadians to accept.
In terms of excessive CEO salaries and bonuses, let me just talk for a minute about those. Let us look at the January report of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. It says that Canadians have been hit hard by a worldwide economic recession, but not Canada's 100 highest paid CEOs.
It goes on to show how the total average compensation for Canada's 100 highest paid CEOs was $7,300,884 in 2008. Compare that to the total average Canadian income of $42,305.
By a little after 1 p.m. on the first working day of the year, these CEOs had pocketed what takes Canadians earning an average income an entire year to make.
People such as J. M. Lipton, of Nova Chemicals Corp., took home $19.7 million; or Hunter Harrison, of CN Rail, who took home $13.4 million. That is something that will not sit well with the people of Hornepayne, who are struggling as that community lost the Northstar Centre, thanks in part to CN and the way the Liberals privatized it with no regard to the consequences.
It looks as though my colleague who used to sit in this House, Bill Blaikie, was right when he fought so hard against a deal that made no sense to the real stakeholders, the people of Canada.
We could even look at Patrick Daniel from Enbridge, who took home $6.5 million. For people struggling to make a living in places such as Wharncliffe, Webbwood, Smooth Rock Falls, Moonbeam, Iron Bridge, Dean Lake, South Baymouth, Manitouwadge or White River, this is a little hard to swallow. That is what I meant as I spoke about excessive CEO salaries and bonuses.
I can go on. The “Big Six” banks earned $5.1 billion in the third quarter of 2010. Profits for 2010 now exceed $15 billion with one full quarter to go, well ahead of last year's performance at this time.
There is more, and I will talk about that in a little bit.
For someone watching a neighbour not be able to sell his house because the market is so bad after a plant or a mill closure, that is pretty hard to accept.
If we make it clear that a goal of the Investment Canada Act is to encourage foreign investment that will bring in new capital, create good jobs, transfer new technology to Canada, increase Canadian-based research, contribute to sustainable economic development, and really improve the lives of Canadian workers and their communities, then we can say that we have an act that truly takes care of Canada and Canadians first. That is the type of act we need.