Debates of June 23rd, 2011

Restoring Mail Delivery for Canadians Act

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Madam Speaker, I heard an implied question, and I heard a secondary question. I will answer the implied question first.

In my three businesses, if I had employees who went on rotating strikes against me, I would look in the mirror. I would assume responsibility for my mismanagement. I do not have those problems in my businesses. My businesses are run fairly, with fair benefits and fair pay for my employees. They appreciate that, and therefore they are loyal, so I do not have those problems.

Look in the mirror.

The answer to the second question is that yes, 33 million Canadians want to have their postal service restored. Everyone on my side of the aisle wants to see those services restored. We know that it is up to 167 members of the House on that side, although we know that it is really up to one or two or three. Allegedly it is up to 167 members who can unlock those post offices tomorrow if they decide to do that.

[Nycole Turmel, NDP, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

Madam Speaker, we talk a lot about the services of Canada Post. The opposition talks a lot about the lack of services or the economic impact of this strike or this lockout.

I want to know from my colleague from Thunder Bay—Superior North what happened in the past with the lack of service and the reduction of services by Canada Post? I want to know the impact on rural communities and his constituency of Canada Post's decisions?

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Madam Speaker, we have serious problems in Thunder Bay—Superior North in many of our rural areas. My riding is 100,000 square kilometres. There are 31 communities and nine first nations communities. The communities are not getting mail delivery every day. There has been a backlog due to cutbacks of staff and the use of part-time supplementary workers when needed. Small mom and pop operations that service the communities have been regularly closing, and they are being replaced by more affluent service centres, often operating out of one of our Shoppers Drug Marts at less convenient locations that are not close to those people.

It has been very clear for a long time that service is going down. It is time for the government to not only settle this labour dispute but to go about making the investments and making the commitments to make sure that rural delivery is enhanced and restored.

[Ryan Cleary, NDP, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

Madam Speaker, I heard the member opposite ask the hon. New Democrat member how he would feel about people not showing up for work. I would remind the member opposite that the post office workers did show up for work. They were actually locked out.

I have a question for the New Democrat member. Would you, as a small-business owner, cut the guts out of your employees' pension plan?

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Madam Speaker, as I said before, we have a growing problem in this country as we emulate the United States Republican model. We have growing gaps in income. We have a loss of the middle class. We have people who are the working poor.

I urge all members opposite to read The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better, by Wilkinson and Pickett, to read real hard science on why the Scandinavian countries are way ahead of us in terms of happy, healthy societies that benefit all people and have a reasonable balance between big business, small business, and workers.

[Isabelle Morin, NDP, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Madam Speaker, as all of my colleagues have said today, we are sitting in the House of Commons on Quebec's national holiday. I apologize to my constituents. This shows that the Conservatives care more about opposing the rights of workers than they do about respecting the national holiday of a nation of Canada. The Conservatives were the ones to accept the validity of the Quebec nation and now they are putting their anti-labour ideology ahead of respect for Quebeckers.

On June 3, 2011, the Canadian Union of Postal Workers began a series of rotating strikes that demonstrated the workers' willingness to exert pressure, while still remaining in good faith and keeping the mail service running. The union offered to end the strikes if Canada Post would agree to reinstate the old contract during negotiations. But Canada Post refused.

On June 15, Canada Post, with the Conservative government's approval, decided to lock out its employees, force them into a work stoppage and shut down the mail service in order to allow the government to intervene.

As my hon. colleague from Marc-Aurèle-Fortin was saying earlier, the government certainly must have approved the lockout. This allowed it to then introduce back-to-work legislation. Locking out the employees this way does not seem very fair to me in a collective bargaining situation. It shows the government's tendency to set restrictive parameters that prevent the parties from talking. Canada has laws to protect workers, but the Conservative Party seems to be telling the workers that it is going to take away their right to negotiate a collective agreement, impose conditions inferior to what Canada Post was offering and force arbitration. Will the arbitrator be neutral? We do not know. Will the arbitrator follow the government's lead and side with the employer?

Mail service continues to be essential to Canadians’ lives and to our economy. In my riding, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine and Dorval, people are angry because of this lockout, because their business depends on that service. But my constituents still realize that the dispute is much broader. They also realize that this is not a strike, it is a lockout. And they know that the dispute goes beyond what is happening at Canada Post; it is an unbelievable precedent.

The government is not just moving toward privatization, as several of my colleagues have pointed out. It wants to impose a climate of fear, to make workers who want to negotiate proper working conditions wary. The workers at Canada Post have been the victims of a huge machine that wants to violate the rights of workers everywhere in Canada. Before long, Canada will be doing what the state of Wisconsin did as recently as March 2011, when it passed a bill limiting the rights of public service unions and stripping government employees’ unions of nearly all their collective bargaining rights, with the exception of bargaining about wages. That is repression.

The letter carriers I have talked to in my riding say it is not even wages that upset them in this case. As my colleagues have pointed out, the pension plan is in danger, the “orphan clauses” are unacceptable, and management is imposing frustrating conditions in which employees are going to have to work. What upsets my constituents the most are the terms that affect occupational health and safety. I spoke with Michel St-Pierre, a letter carrier who has lived in my riding for several years. The postal workers are asking their employer for good working conditions in terms of safety, among other things.

At present, a letter carrier has to carry two bags, one on each side of the body, plus circulars. We all get millions of circulars in our mailboxes every day. So we can imagine the weight they have to carry. With the new special bill, they are being required to carry a third bag. Canada Post wants to force them to carry a bag in front that completely blocks their view of the ground. Well, that is intelligent. It is going to save money by making workers carry more bags, but workers’ compensation is going to have to pay out a lot of money because workers will be injured and file complaints. In a case involving backache, it is very difficult to prove to the compensation board that it is attributable to the job. Canada Post is going to lose a lot of money because of those injuries.

And that is not all. The union stood by its position that every postal worker must have access to the same pension plan and be entitled to the same benefits. Should we agree to Canada Post’s proposal to eliminate the option of early retirement for future employees, it will only be a matter of time before an attempt is made to tighten the eligibility criteria for early retirement for current employees. We remain optimistic about resolving the dispute, but there must be a show of goodwill on both sides.

The government has to stop interfering in the negotiations. Locking out employees and then forcing them back to work is certainly not a fair way of negotiating. I now have trouble believing that the two parties will be able to negotiate a fair contract.

For there to be a fair contract, the Conservatives need to put an end to their interventionist style of government and prevent a precedent from being set, which will be the case if this legislation passes.

It is true that the multinational courier companies regularly lobby to have Canada Post deregulated. These companies want the government to open up the letter mail market to competition so that they can increase their profits and market share.

Finally, some right-wing media outlets and economic institutes have called for the privatization and deregulation of Canada Post. However, almost everybody is opposed to this.

In 2008, the federal government commissioned a review of Canada Post Corporation and the report was published in 2009. This report is very clear. It appears that the public is no way favours the privatization or deregulation of Canada Post.

Furthermore, every major federal political party is officially opposed to privatizing the postal service, and most parties also reject deregulation.

I would also like to add that another one of my constituents contacted me this morning. She is a letter carrier and has been working for a very long time. She is currently having difficulty carrying all this weight. She told me that the new bags that are going to be imposed will mean that she will be required to carry more than 30 kilograms.

That is not all because, with that 30 kilograms, letter carriers currently have four hours to prepare their mail and four hours to deliver it. Now Canada Post wants to impose six continuous hours of delivery, six hours of walking the streets with three bags, plus flyers, to deliver the mail.

On top of that, with the new special legislation, they would be prohibited from collecting overtime. If my constituent finds it too heavy, if she has difficulty walking, if she has stairs to climb, if there is black ice in the winter and she has difficulty and takes half an hour longer, she cannot claim a half-hour of overtime. I think that is truly ridiculous.

We are asking the government to change this special legislation and let workers get back on the job so that small businesses can have their mail service. We need to let the parties discuss the collective agreement together so that these workers can determine what they need and they can ask for what they need for workplace health and safety, for the orphan clauses and for pensions and wages.

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health]

Madam Speaker, I have been listening to the NDP members' speeches, and it is so obvious, the lack of respect they have for small businesses and Canadians who are relying on the post office.

It is quite obvious to everybody who has followed this disagreement that these are two parties that have a history of not agreeing. As I said earlier, 1978, 1987, 1991, 1997--each of those times they required back-to-work legislation. That is what we are talking about here.

They have had since October to come up with an agreement. The minister has met with them numerous times. She has bent over backwards to try to come up with an agreement. This is an essential service for small businesses. They need the cheques to come in and they need the cheques to go out.

These two parties, not one side or the other but both of them, cannot come up with an agreement. Businesses are suffering. I am asking the members on the other side, how long will they allow that to occur?

[Isabelle Morin, NDP, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague from across the floor for his question.

It is certainly true that small businesses need postal services to resume as soon as possible. My husband has a retail business on eBay and everything has been shut down for two weeks because he cannot send any parcels. However, he understands that this is a lockout that the employer decided to impose on the employees. The employer locked the doors and prohibited them from delivering the mail.

In my riding, the employees even decided to continue the service. An elderly man wanted his pension cheque and could not get it because his street was under construction and letter carriers could not get to his house. He went to the Canada Post office and still has not been able to get his cheque.

We want the workers to be allowed to go back to work, but they must be allowed to discuss the conditions themselves with an impartial arbitrator who will listen to both sides.

[Ted Hsu, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Madam Speaker, the hon. member opposite spoke of two parties with a history of not agreeing, and it seems to me that what we need to do in this chamber is to move beyond disagreeing and make some progress. We have a problem because we have a bill that is unfair and a dangerous precedent and we have a firm opposition on this side. On the other hand, we have a majority on the other side. So how do we make progress?

I think the way we make progress is something that the leader of the opposition mentioned, which is to look at some amendments where we can meet in the middle somewhere. Unfortunately, we are standing here debating a hoist amendment, which is simply to get rid of the bill. It is not talking about where we can meet in the middle. I have great hopes, because I trust the leader of the opposition that maybe some helpful amendments will be raised.

Does the hon. member know when we will start talking about those amendments to help us make progress so we could make this unfair bill more just and make this dangerous precedent not that way?

[Isabelle Morin, NDP, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his question.

After our leader's speech yesterday, someone on the other side of the House asked him what the amendments were. We are talking about pensions. We are talking about wages that are lower in the proposed legislation than what the employer was offering. We are talking about orphan clauses. In fact, the amendments are simple. We have been talking about them for several hours and we will continue talking about them for the next few days. The rights of workers must be respected and some sort of common ground must be reached.

[The hon. member spoke in Cree.]

[Romeo Saganash, NDP, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise in this august chamber to speak on behalf of the people of Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou and on behalf of all Quebeckers on this national holiday. Of course, like all of us, I would have preferred for us to celebrate this day in our ridings with our constituents, but we have decided to take this time for workers today.

I want to talk about the speech we heard last evening by the leader of the opposition and the many proposals the leader had to offer in his speech. In my opinion, it was one of the best speeches I have heard in the House of Commons in a very long time. We should be grateful to him because it was truly an honour for those who were here to listen to the leader yesterday.

A number of points raised in his speech are essential and fundamental to this debate. A number of my colleagues have been raising a number of those points over the past several hours. I want to come back to one point in particular and that is the cavalier way in which this government is unilaterally imposing draconian conditions on the workers involved in this dispute. This creates a dangerous precedent. It seems that the hon. members across the way are having fun and like dangerous things. Just look at how they feel about chrysotile asbestos.

Tabling this type of draconian measure would create a dangerous precedent. It would very certainly open the door to other measures in other sectors in the future. In my riding, many people are increasingly wondering who will be the government's next victims and what this government will do next. Rest assured, what we are seeing right now is just the beginning.

Good labour relations require respect for workers' rights. That is a fundamental aspect of bargaining and labour relations. That is not the case when this government introduces draconian measures that violate their rights, as is happening with the bill before us. This bill is shameful, outrageous, unacceptable and unsustainable. There are so many negative adjectives I could use. It is unfair and even propagandist in some respects, since it is nothing but propaganda to keep calling this a strike. The Minister of Labour should know that this is not a strike; it is a lockout. Even my constituents are writing to me to ask me to remind the Minister of Labour that this is not a strike, that it is a lockout. It is rather shocking to see that the Minister of Labour was not distinguishing between the two yesterday. A young person who wrote to me even counted, as did we, that the minister said it three times in her reply.

I come from a culture of negotiations. I am a first nations man, from the Cree Nation, to be exact. I can provide examples of negotiations I have been making for the past 25 years on behalf of my people, such as the implementation of the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement. That was the first modern agreement signed in Canada between a government and aboriginal peoples. In this case, it was the first modern agreement signed by a provincial government. That had never happened before 1975. It was the first agreement signed by aboriginals that involved a province.

The difficulty in this case was getting the provisions of the agreement implemented. It took 30 years for an agreement to be reached.

I am proud to have taken part in the negotiation process in 2002 for the Paix des Braves, an agreement with the Government of Quebec. I also participated in the agreement to help establish a new relationship between the federal government and the Cree nation, which was settled in 2007 after a delay of several years. Furthermore, I am proud to speak about the new, recently signed framework agreement for the civic and public governance of James Bay. We may end up with a public government in the James Bay area, which is good news for everybody. This would spell an end to the exclusion of aboriginal peoples in the management of their natural resources.

I have given these examples because I know that relationships are at the core of any negotiation process, and that these relationships must be based on mutual respect and cooperation. Relations between management and workers must be harmonious, too. These relationships are the key to any negotiation. In my opinion, there are very serious implications to what is being currently proposed in this bill. These are not solutions; they are draconian measures being foisted upon the workers of this sector.

I also want to talk about the signals this government has sent out throughout this affair. It concerns and troubles me to see how negotiations will be run for years to come should there be further labour disputes. There needs to be a very close eye kept on this process. All Canadians, and indeed certainly every resident in my riding, are watching what is happening very closely. It will be an indication of the arrogant approach this government, this majority government, will take in the years to come.

The right to negotiate, which incidentally has been a fundamental right for a very long time in this country, has no place under this approach. This right is as fundamental as the right to go to court, which this government also disregards. This approach in no way promotes an environment of trust between management and workers, nor by any means a responsible culture of negotiation and compromise, which is fundamental to all labour relations.

We have been labeled ideologues a number of times this morning. The ideologues are on the other side of this House. We are fighting for social justice in Canada.

There is no shame in standing up for the rights and interests of aboriginals in this country. There is no shame in standing up for the rights and interests of women in this country. There is no shame in standing up for the rights and interests of immigrants in this country. There is no shame in standing up for the rights, interests and freedoms of people in this country. And there is certainly no shame in standing up for the rights and interests of seniors, let alone workers, in this country.

I have been involved in negotiations for the past 25 years and I intend to continue my involvement in this particular matter for as long as it takes, and throughout my term in office.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance]

Madam Speaker, I must say that this moment is a little sad for me. The hon. member who has just spoken talked about social justice and about the fact that the Aboriginals in the north cannot be forgotten.

The hon. member represents a constituency in the north of Quebec where elderly Aboriginals need things like eyeglasses or medications. They need the Nutrition North Canada program. Vital food is sent to our Aboriginals through the mail. But he says that he wants to support workers who earn between $21 and $37 per hour and who want to negotiate. He wants to represent them more than those who need the representation, the Aboriginals in the north.

I am asking him clearly if he is going to decide to support those who elected him, those in need in the north of his riding, the Aboriginals in the north.

[Romeo Saganash, NDP, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Madam Speaker, first of all, let me correct the references to the Aboriginals in the north. They are not our Aboriginals, they are peoples and nations.

Second, I would like to emphasize that the Aboriginal people whom she mentions so proudly are not naïve. They understand perfectly. The young Cree man whom I mentioned just now, the one who sent me an email and counted the times that the Minister of Labour used the word “strike” in her speech yesterday, he understood that the minister was spreading propaganda.

People understand perfectly that this is a lockout. All the Prime Minister has to do is call the head of Canada Post and get him to unlock the doors at Canada Post.

[Dany Morin, NDP, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Madam Speaker, the member just mentioned the CEO of Canada Post.

I am putting myself in the Conservatives' shoes. We are coming out of a recession, so everyone is tightening their belts. I understand that. The NDP stands in solidarity with everyone.

Should the CEO of Canada Post who, I believe, earns $497,000 a year, plus a 33% bonus, also have to tighten his belt to help resolve this dispute?

That question is for my NDP colleague, if he has an answer.

[Romeo Saganash, NDP, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Madam Speaker, I do not think that the CEO of Canada Post intends on doing what the member suggested. However, for the good of all the citizens who currently need postal services, I think it would be smart for him to put an end to the lockout.

The members on the other side seem to be fond of locks. We must unlock the doors of Canada Post. When the Prime Minister was not happy with how things were going here, he locked the doors of Parliament. When my leader, the leader of the official opposition, suggested meetings to find solutions together, what did the Prime Minister do? He suggested another lock.

[Ted Hsu, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Madam Speaker, we are currently debating the hoist amendment to this unfair and dangerous bill.

I would like to know whether there are any negotiations.

I know that In a few hours the amendment will be defeated by the majority over there, and I would like to know if there are negotiations going on for what is going to happen next and how we are going to make progress.

I am not aboriginal, but I know I share with aboriginals and other Canadians the feeling that we want to see progress. We have to make progress at some point. We cannot let this unjust, unfair and dangerous law--

[The Deputy Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

Order, please. The hon. member for Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou.

[Romeo Saganash, NDP, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Madam Speaker, we have raised a number of questions from this side of the House. I think we have a very good idea of the amendments being proposed to this unfair bill. It would be great if there were an opening, but there is not. Everything is locked up.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Madam Speaker, honourable members, brothers and sisters: lockout, lockout. It hurts to hear those words. I don't know whether the Speaker can see it from her Chair, but I have a bump here that dates back to the first lockout I took part in at Commonwealth Plywood some 30 years ago. The workers had been locked out, and the scabs were escorted in and out by police officers and private security services. Those security guards and police officers took billy clubs to the workers there and to the people who had come to support them. To my mind, a lockout is a violent measure. I see a member laughing over there, but that does not prevent it from being very violent. There is political violence in this kind of legislation.

For the Conservatives, when citizens demonstrate, it is often violent. Cutting jobs, imposing legislation, putting people out on the street, cutting $11 billion from public services: that is not violent for them. Making seniors wait in hospitals for 16 hours is not violent, no.

Lockout, lockout. This government loves locks; we should have suspected that. It also likes big fences around cities to protect them from dangerous and violent demonstrators. The summits of the powerful are protected from the legitimate demands of citizens.

This government really likes borders. It is putting a lot of money into border infrastructure, even in the backyard of the minister responsible for the Treasury Board. This government also likes prisons, lots of prisons with lots of locks.

To justify investing in prisons, the Prime Minister says there is a lot of unreported crime. Do workers who refuse to go back to work in response to a sorry piece of legislation commit that kind of unreported crime? Perhaps.

Touching their fences is another unreported crime that could help fill those prisons. That is dangerous. They arrested 1,200 individuals who dared to touch their fences; that is a major crime.

This government wants to lock the Canadian people into a system of logic, the logic of law and order. If things do not work the way it wants, it will put locks on our freedoms: the freedom to negotiate, the freedom to exercise pressure and eventually freedom of association perhaps. The only thing it will not put locks on is its privileges. No one puts a lock on the freedom to mine anywhere without the consent of the local communities. They have the right to operate a two-kilometre mine near a lake or near 62 rivers in the name of freedom of trade. They have the freedom to drill shale gas wells anywhere they want. They are free to dig a well in my backyard. No one is putting a lock on that kind of freedom.

They have the freedom to pollute the water, the air and the vast expanses of the Canadian Prairies with mining and oil residues. They have a firm grip on their freedoms. They have the freedom to exercise control to benefit the oil market, to raise prices. They have the freedom to concentrate communications businesses in order to send a message. We cannot put a lock on that. They concentrate businesses. They are good at that.

They have the freedom to speculate with the savings of small investors, without regulation or penalty. They gamble with our savings. They are free to do that.

They have the freedom to charge usurious interest rates of 20, 22, 23 per cent. There is nothing to it. Families are going into debt, young people in particular. They put them at the bottom of a well so they have to pay for 100 years. They have the freedom to avoid taxes.

We have nice little tax havens. We are free to go and put our money there. That is how we launder our money. It is fun. We make money. No one looks into that. Those are the freedoms they defend on the other side of the House. It is true. However, they do not respect the freedom of workers to organize, to negotiate. What about negotiating, exercising pressure or establishing a power relationship? No. We are talking about negotiations. All week long, I have heard the Minister of Labour say they negotiated for eight months. What kind of negotiations are we talking about? Negotiations designed to divide workers into two groups: one group for which they want to cut wages, undermine pensions and increase the retirement age. What are those false negotiations? False negotiations! You would think Canada Post Corporation was a bankrupt business asking its workers to make an effort to save the company. We know that workers, even unionized ones, often make those efforts. But we are talking about a business that makes a profit of about $281 million a year. It is not the case: Canada Post Corporation is not bankrupt.

To understand the offers made by Canada Post Corporation and, indirectly, the government, you have to understand that there is a political agenda behind this. The first item on that political agenda is to prove to everyone that the Conservatives will not make an issue of workers' rights. The second item is to prove that they are in power and that they are strong. It is true! One need only consider the ministers' condescending attitude in the past three weeks in their answers to the questions put to them. I am thinking of the Minister of Foreign Affairs, who systematically repeats the same sentence to us. The Minister of Industry does the same thing when it comes to asbestos. They are not answering questions; their patting themselves on the back; and they are not meeting the expectations of the members of this House, not at all, any more than those of the public who would like to have answers to certain questions such as: What was done with the $50 million? How is it that no one has any documents on the matter regarding the decision-making processes that led to those investments? Those documents have simply disappeared.

The fundamental objective of the Conservative government's political agenda is to scuttle public services, to carve up the government, to make cuts to public services and, lastly—the ultimate objective—to privatize and eliminate government, contracting everything out to the market. It would be good if there was no more government and everything was private. That is the Conservative credo. We know that. We should privatize the hospitals, prisons, public services, police, water, the land, our land. In the collective psychosis of privatization, why not privatize the government itself, the government of the people? Let it be replaced by a board of directors! That would be a lot easier.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Let us remove the government and establish a vast board of directors made up of businessmen who will decide what is good for the people. That is the vision, the collective psychosis of the Conservatives, the reform ideal.

If you are engaging in social “desolidarization”, you will need a lot of locks. You would better buy locks! You will also need a lot of prisons. You will have to put a lot of officers on the border. We will not let the speculators, the usurers, the predators of the common good destroy the social and political progress of the last 100 years without reacting. No, it is out of the question!

The NDP members will stand up with workers and Canadians to defend something that cannot be locked up, put between four walls, fenced in, put behind barbed wire, something that you cannot leave at the border, something we cannot lock up. This thing that we will always stand up to defend is our freedom, our freedom of speech, our freedom of association, our freedom of organization, our freedom to get organized to live in a fairer society, enriched by all its members.

[Harold Albrecht, Conservative, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is unfortunate that in this debate the NDP continues to ignore the origin of this work stoppage.

It is clear that the rotating strikes had a negative impact on the volume of mail that was being delivered. Everybody who has ever had a business knows that they cannot continue to pay 100% of the expenses when they only have 50% of the income. It was an obvious fact that the work stoppages had led to a decrease in the volume of the mail. Canada Post locked them out, of course.

I have an email here that I just received in the last half hour from a constituent who says, “I just wanted to drop you a quick note of support on the Canada Post issue. Our company relies heavily on Canada Post and we are losing customers daily”.

What about the companies that are going to shut down? They are losing business, laying off workers and firing them. When is the party across the way going to start standing up for the working families of Canada?

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Madam Speaker, I would like to respond, just like the Minister of Foreign Affairs, by saying that the Auditor General made recommendations and that we are going to follow them, and that 32 projects benefited from these investments, and so on.

If someone asks me another question, this is what I am going to say.

Honestly, and to answer my colleague's question, I would be remiss if I did not point out that it is June 24, Quebec's national holiday. So I invite all the members to sing along: “Si j'avais les ailes d'un ange, je partirais pour Québec! Si j'avais des lumières sur mon bike...”

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Madam Speaker, I listened closely to the member's speech and I noted, on a number of occasions, that he used the words “lock” and “locked” as part of his way of expressing what has happened with respect to Canada Post. He also used the word “union”.

Back in St. Catharines, I have a union with the people of the community that sent me here to represent them. I take that union with them very seriously. I also know that every mailbox in the city of St. Catharines and in this country has a lock on it. I have 120,000 people in my community who deserve to get their mail on a daily basis, for whatever important reason it is.

The member opposite was just elected, and there are 100,000 locks on the mailboxes in—

[The Deputy Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

Order, please. The hon. member for Rivière-du-Nord.