Mr. Speaker, it is a privilege to stand in the House and speak on behalf of working people across Canada.
Over the last few hours I have had to listen to debate where I have heard members from across the aisle saying that they are taking this action for Canadians. I want us to stop and reflect on that for a second. Working people in Canada are Canadians, except for the temporary foreign workers who come in right now. It is very hard to sit on this side of the House sometimes and listen to the diatribes that have occurred when people talk about Canadians in such a way that working-class people, whether they are professionals or they work in the service industry, it does not matter where they work as long as they are an employee working for someone else, are almost discounted by my colleagues across the way. If a worker should happen to have the audacity to belong to a union and, therefore, believe in collective bargaining, suddenly he or she is a bigger pariah.
I will take us back to the 19th century for a few seconds when the union movement came into existence. It came into existence because of the abuse of young children and workers by employers. Employers had all the power. People were dying on the job and terrible abuses were happening. Out of that industrial revolution, a kind of a balance emerged. It was the birth of the union movement where workers could get together as a collective and deal with their employer on a little more of a balanced playing field.
However, under the current government, the balanced playing field that has existed on and off for well over a century is being tipped in favour of the employer. I will explain why.
I have yet to see the government table legislation to help the workers in bargaining units, whether it was Air Canada, Canada Post or the Air Canada machinists and pilots. Air Canada pilots were legislated back even before they went out on strike. Now we have the CP teamsters. In every case, an employer is trying to take money out of the pockets of the workers and to dismantle their pensions. I know the government is very fond of attacking pensions, after all, it wants all Canadians to work until they are 67, whether they are able to or not. It has attacked the pensions itself. Therefore, why would I be surprised that the same group sides with employers who want to attack pensions?
Here we have an employer, CP, that makes substantial profits every year, millions and millions of dollars. Despite that, what is it asking their workers to do? It wants them to take a huge cut in their pensions. Do we not actually believe that people have earned these pensions and that they need to live a life of dignity? Should we not be bringing up every Canadian so that they have a pension and they can live a life of dignity? Instead, we have employers who are attacking workers' wages and pensions at the same time as they are making huge profits. I say that is such a shame.
Why would an employer like CP think there is any reason to negotiate? Even during the break week the minister made an announcement saying that when Parliament opens she planned to pass legislation. Can members guess what that does to bargaining? It brings it to a halt, especially on the part of employers who have no interest in negotiating because they have their friends holding a majority in this Parliament and they know they will get exactly what they want, which is another attack on working people.
I find it incredulous that people could sit in this room and say that the minister saying last week that she would be taking action did not have a chilling effect on negotiations. I think we need to accept that and the minister needs to take responsibility for prolonging the negotiations.
On this side of the House, we believe in full, free collective bargaining. I am getting so tired of my colleagues across the aisle talking about a free economy, the marketplace, letting things just go out and letting wages drop because, after all, they just facilitated bringing in, in a fast-tracked process, more foreign temporary workers who, they are saying, employers can pay 15% less. This is an abuse of those who come to work in this country. I believe that if they are good enough to work here they are also good enough to live here. Not only is it an abuse of those workers, but those kinds of policies actually lower the wages for other Canadians. Canadians are already struggling to make ends meet and now, with government intervention here and the changes to how we bring in people from overseas, especially the temporary foreign workers program, we are attacking Canadians from being able to make a liveable wage and to have decent security into their retirement years.
I am so proud of this collection of NDP members of Parliament who stand up for working people who are Canadians. We raise issues that are fundamental to a democracy, conventions that are recognized by the United Nations through the ILO and are recognized in our Charter of Rights and Freedoms. When we stand up to defend full, free collective bargaining rights, I am tired of hearing comments like, “the NDP are not friends of western Canada.”
I come from western Canada. I am from British Columbia and I am the best friend it has, along with the NDP, right now. It is this party that is speaking out for British Columbians and for building a stronger economy that benefits all and does not lead to our resources being shipped out of this country along with the jobs. We have experienced that in B.C. We watch truckloads of logs leave, the logs get manufactured into two-by-fours and then they come back. How much environmental sense does that make? How much economic sense does that make when good-paying jobs are taken out of Canada and moved overseas?
The argument that the NDP members are not friends of western Canada is just meant to detract from the real debate in this House, which is whether the Conservatives believe in free collective bargaining, and, obviously, by their actions, they do not.
I want the Conservatives to show me where they have intervened in a dispute and told employers that they were being unreasonable, that they should get back to the table and that it is not right for them to take away the salaries and pensions from employees. The Conservatives do not come out with statements like that. Instead they say that it is all being done to somehow save Canadians.
Right across the country, hundreds and thousands of workers are finding out how they are being saved. Their pensions are under attack and their wages are going down. The unemployment rate is high. As the they are looking at all of this, they do not see much of a salvation in this. What they see is a government that is going out of its way to take punitive action against employees and putting a chill over the whole bargaining process.
This is not right. This is not good for Canada. It is earning us a bad name both internally and internationally. It certainly is not good for our future generation.
We are looking at attracting more people to come to Canada, and we keep hearing from the minister that we are going to need more immigrants, but they are going to look at this and choose other locations.