moved:
That this House acknowledge that the Canadian economy is facing unprecedented risk and uncertainty; recognize that many regions and industries across Canada have already suffered significant job losses in recent years; urge all levels of government to work together to build a balanced 21st century Canadian economy; and insist that Canada's Prime Minister meet with his counterparts in Halifax this November at the National Economic Summit being held by the Council of the Federation.
Mr. Speaker, thank you for reading the motion we are debating here today. As the official opposition, we feel it is important to remind the House that the central theme of our campaign during the last election can be summed up in two words: working together.
The major recession of 2008 taught us that it is crucial that we begin working with our partners, such as Europe and the United States, but of course within the context of the Canadian federation, that is, in co-operation with the provinces and territories.
So, imagine our surprise yesterday to hear the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons mock the idea of meeting with the provinces and territories to discuss the economy.
Immediately after the general election of October 14, 2008, I looked at the list of measures mentioned and I highlighted them in yellow. I would like to offer the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons this important tool so he can use it to highlight the appropriate parts of our platform the next time he wants to read it.
What did the Conservative Prime Minister have to say following that general election? He had a six step program. Four of those steps were to hold meetings. Let us read them together. Step number two was about discussing the global financial crisis and strengthening the Canada-European Union economic partnership at Friday's Canada-European Union summit. We would be meeting with the European Union. Number three was about summoning us to meet that fall and tabling an economic and fiscal update before the end of November. Number four was about participating in the G20 finance ministers meeting November 8 and 9 and calling for a further G7 finance ministers meeting to build on progress. The final one was about convening a first ministers meeting on the economy to discuss with the premiers and territorial leaders a joint approach to the global financial crisis.
He is obviously in no way a stranger to the idea of working together. In fact, there was a time when our Prime Minister found that so important that four of his six proposals involved working together.
What has happened since then? He now has a majority in the House. The Conservatives have such little need for others that they do not even convene the cabinet. When was the last time there was public notice of a cabinet meeting?
They get together in small groups and then inform the ministers about decisions that were made regarding their portfolios. That is his way of doing business.
Let us look at some of the bare economic facts that we think militate in favour of holding and attending that meeting in Halifax with the provinces and territories.
One would be the trade deficit. Right now the current account trade deficit in Canada is $50 billion. That is goods, services, investments and cash transfers. That is a record high. That is the number given to us by the Toronto Dominion Bank.
Another would be unemployment. This is worth noting, because we always hear the expression “net new jobs”. Here is the real number: there are 319,000 more people unemployed today than prior to the 2008 recession.
Let us consider manufacturing job losses. I was in southwestern Ontario on a jobs tour last week. I spent four days meeting with municipal officials, meeting with unemployment groups, meeting with chambers of commerce. Let us look at the manufacturing job losses in the last 10 years. In November 2002, there were 2.33 million manufacturing jobs in Canada. In August 2012, there were 1.80 million manufacturing jobs. Some 530,000 manufacturing jobs were lost in the last 10 years.
Under this government, it is worth noting that despite the rebound since the 2008 recession we are still at a net loss of 316,000 manufacturing jobs, almost exactly the number of additional people unemployed today over 2008.
We now have the highest household debt in Canadian history. Over the past 10 years, household debt in Canada has risen by 135%, while disposal income and nominal gross domestic product have risen by 54%. The average Canadian now has a record high debt load equal to 154% of his or her disposable income.
Finally, productivity is another key indicator. Under this Prime Minister, labour productivity has grown by an average of 0.5% per year. These are the worst six years of productivity growth since Statistics Canada began tracking the statistic in 1961. That is the Conservatives' record. That is what they are hiding from when they start making stuff up about our policies and our positions. That is why they do not dare go and meet the provincial premiers and those responsible for the territories. It is because they have nothing to put on the table except this lamentable record. That is what they have done to the Canadian economy.
Canadians used to be able to count on a decent job with good benefits and a pension they could rely on, but those jobs are disappearing fast. More often than not, they are being replaced by part-time precarious work in the service sector.
When Canadians look at the statistics and the facts coming out of Ottawa, they see that we have lost 500,000 good jobs in the manufacturing sector. Those jobs came with pension plans, but have been replaced with precarious jobs in the service sector without pension plans.
This is another debt the government is bequeathing to future generations, a social debt because future generations will have to look after retirees who do not have enough money to live with dignity.
In a country as rich as Canada, it is scandalous to have so many seniors living below the poverty line. The NDP is focused on working to ensure that no Canadian senior lives below the poverty line.
The trade deficit is $50 billion, and household debt is higher than it has ever been. Yet the government is giving the richest corporations tax cuts to the tune of $50 billion. Clearly, the Conservatives have their own priorities. These tax cuts are not for ordinary people. They are for the rich, particularly those with preferred access to the Conservative trough. We live in a time of unprecedented risk, and as I said yesterday, we are entering a period of extremely dangerous turbulence.
We are not making the most of our experience, our credibility and our expertise. But we are running a very large country, and we know how to work with regions that are in difficulty. We also have an equalization formula, and we know how to work under those circumstances.
When the serious crisis began in Europe, Canada could have offered to be at the table to give advice and assistance, and to share its experience.
No one, especially not me, ever spoke about cutting a cheque, but that is how the Conservatives like to twist reality: as soon as they were asked why they were not working with the Europeans, they said that the Europeans wanted a cheque for billions of dollars to maintain their extravagant lifestyle. Baloney! What we want is a Canada that is respected on the world stage.
Some of the challenges we are facing are, of course, driven by global forces, but the truth is our fate and our future is still very much in our hands. The greatest challenge we face today is not a failure of ability, it is a failure of leadership.
There are basic principles in public administration. This generation knows that we have to take environmental, economic and social factors into account every time we make a decision.
Basic sustainable development principles such as internalization of costs, polluter pay and user pay need to be applied. But really, the Conservatives could not care less.
It is extraordinary to watch the Conservatives go. Usually, coming especially from a law and order government, one would expect that if a company had practices that did not correspond to and conform to the law, the government would change the practices and order them changed to correspond to the law. What did the government do? It changed the law to make it correspond to the practices. That is what it is doing by gutting environmental legislation and leaving the largest ecological debt in the backpacks of future generations. The cleanup is going to be enormous, the cost insurmountable. That is the Conservatives' legacy to future generations.
Failure to enforce and apply existing Canadian environmental legislation has as a result that we are bringing in an artificially high number of U.S. dollars. That is contributing to keep the Canadian dollar artificially high. Everyone, whether it is the OECD, the Coulombe report prepared for Industry Canada, or Mark Carney, admits it is the high Canadian dollar that is the principal cause of at least 50% of the manufacturing job losses, and the Conservatives are not doing anything about it.
Slowly but surely, the Conservatives are dismantling the balanced economy that we built up in Canada since the Second World War. The difference between us is we know that governments played a role in establishing that balanced economy. The Conservatives refuse to acknowledge that. They believe that there is a pristine market that arbitrates all of these things on its own.
We know and understand that in a country as large as ours with a population of only 34 million, we have been able to hold ourselves together because government has always played an active role. That is what the Conservatives are trying to dismantle. That is why we are here to stand up and say they have to change their ways. They have to start talking with their partners across Canada and come to results that favour the Canadian economy for the future instead of dismantling it the way they are doing it.
After 50 years of constant economic growth in Canada, how is it possible that the government is now telling Canadians that we can no longer afford the types of programs that have always identified us? We can no longer afford old age security, employment insurance, and health care.
With such economic growth in Canada, how is it possible that the government has suddenly discovered that we can no longer afford old age security and employment insurance programs, and universal and free health care? Because they are draining the government's economic capacity. It is not surprising that we cannot afford these programs when the government gives away $50 billion in corporate tax cuts. Thus, the government has created the problem, which it proposes to remedy by cutting services. That is absurd and shows a lack of vision. That is another reason they are refusing to meet with the provincial premiers.
Young people are already paying the price.
Young people in Canada are being told by the government that they have no choice, that they have to accept less. If this continues we will be the first generation in Canadian history to leave less to our children than what we ourselves received from our parents. We find that totally inadmissible.
We believe that economic stability is dependent upon the ability to work together. The business world, of course, and also the workforce and government must work together to build a strong and balanced economy for the 21st century. That is our vision.
We can build an economy that creates wealth and prosperity for generations to come. Sadly, working together has not been the government's strong suit. Rather than invest in our workforce, the Conservatives trample on the collective bargaining rights of our workers. Rather than making the investments in infrastructure, research, and education that will allow businesses to thrive, they hand out billions in corporate tax breaks to well-connected industries.
I urge people to go to southwestern Ontario. When we think of people losing their jobs in a closed factory, we think first and foremost of the families and the effect that has on them. I urge people to meet with members of the chamber of commerce, meet with people at city hall. They will tell us that the plant is no longer part of their tax base. The city no longer has the money to take care of its basic infrastructure. It is a vicious circle that is being installed now, a vicious spiral downward for many of those municipalities.
That is where the government can and should be playing a role, but it would have to be at the table with the province to find those solutions. That is why it is so unacceptable that it is absent from these discussions. It prefers to finger wag and lecture. That is its only approach.
Canadians have the drive, talent, and ingenuity to compete with anyone in the world. However, prosperity does not happen overnight and it does not happen by accident. The challenge we face is not the failure of ability, it is the failure of leadership. We all recognize that government cannot do everything. Of course, a strong and vibrant private sector is always going to be the backbone of a vital, thriving economy, but there is also a commonsense role that everyone understands for government in shaping our economic future. The economy we have today took decades to build, decades of investment by business and government on behalf of all Canadians, and investments in education. The only way to create wealth is to create knowledge.
Our infrastructure is falling apart. Municipalities have the responsibility for 40% of infrastructure spending and 8% of the tax base in Canada. It is not going to happen. There is a deficit of over $100 billion in infrastructure. That is something else that the federal government can and should be playing an active role in if it is willing to talk with the provinces and territories.
Of course, investments in energy have also laid the groundwork for our economy to thrive in the last century. I was very proud in the last election to stand up, and I was only the Quebec politician to do so, in favour of loan guarantees for Newfoundland and Labrador to develop green renewable hydroelectric energy on the Lower Churchill. That is the type of vision we could have in Canada. Can everyone imagine the partnering opportunities? The places in Canada with the most consistent wind currents are often the latitudes with the largest concentrations of first nations. We see tragedies like Attawapiskat and the failure of the federal government to fulfill its responsibilities. Instead, it attacked, finger wagged again and blamed the victims.
Look at the opportunities we are missing to put in place a green renewable energy infrastructure across Canada and partner with first nations. That would be a vision for the future and the Conservatives do not believe in any of that. With the right leadership and the right choices, our economy could reach greater heights in the years to come.
But that will only happen on one condition: we must work together. The government must stop going on the attack, reprimanding, lecturing, believing that once a decision is made there is no other pertinent information that can be brought to bear on the issue or produce a positive outcome.
I am pleased to re-read today's motion.
That this House acknowledge that the Canadian economy is facing unprecedented risk and uncertainty; recognize that many regions and industries across Canada have already suffered significant job losses in recent years; urge all levels of government to work together to build a balanced, 21st century Canadian economy; and insist that Canada's Prime Minister meet with his counterparts in Halifax this November at the National Economic Summit being held by the Council of the Federation.
