Debates of June 3rd, 2014

A motion to adjourn the House under Standing Order 38 deemed to have been moved.

Canada Post

[Anne-Marie Day, NDP, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Mr. Speaker, during question period on April 4, I asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Transport about the Conservatives' position with regard to the revitalization of Canada Post, their support for job cuts, the decision to end home delivery and their support for a rate increase.

By supporting these cuts, the Conservatives are aiming to cut an essential service to Canadians and hoping for the corporation's ultimate demise.

The New Democratic Party has the interests of Canadians at heart and is determined to make our postal service more accessible, more affordable and more profitable. Our priority is people.

Canada Post is not facing a crisis, as the member suggested that day during question period. In fact, the crown corporation has been raking in profits every year since the mid-90s, with the exception of 2011, when two things happened, as we all remember thanks to our filibuster: the much talked-about lockout imposed by Canada Post and the pay equity settlement.

High-profile people and Conservatives argue that the crisis has been brought on by declining mail volumes. In fact, mail volumes are growing. Parcel delivery service is very profitable in a market economy. Service providers make good money.

Canada Post's decision to eliminate home mail delivery and install community mailboxes will affect close to 5 million homes. Community mailboxes are not safe and will not be easily accessible for people.

A report by ICI Radio-Canada noted that close to 5,000 criminal incidents, such as vandalism, fires and thefts, targeted mailboxes between 2008 and 2013.

In addition, Canada Post alone will determine the location of the mailboxes, without informing the community. The Conservative government supports these decisions, which will cause serious problems for people with reduced mobility and seniors.

As well, it is completely unjustifiable to increase rates when services are being reduced. Single stamps will now cost $1 each.

Other countries, such as Switzerland, New Zealand, Italy and France, have maintained the profitability of their postal services through the provision of banking services. Canada Post did a study on banking services, which showed that financial services would be a winning strategy and would bring money into the coffers of the crown corporation. The public would have a stable public postal service as well as improved access to banking services.

The study report draws conclusions similar to the recommendations by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers. Nevertheless, Canada Post put an end to the study and hid the report before announcing its action plan.

By reducing its services and eliminating 6,000 to 8,000 jobs, the Conservative government and the management of Canada Post hope that the crown corporation will again be able to make hundreds of millions of dollars in profit, which will be paid as dividends to the government or as bonuses to Canada Post managers. Let us kill jobs and hand out bonuses. Is this a desirable vision for the future? Does the postal service not belong to the public? The priority should be service to Canadians.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Transport]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for her intervention again in this particular matter.

There is a fundamental proposition that is being asked of the government in the House on this matter, which is do we trust the member—whose colleague, the member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, has said on the record that there is “no crisis at Canada Post currently”, a sentiment shared by Liberals on the record in the House as well—or do we trust the econometrics of a credible independent third party think tank in our country that applied an econometric model in forecasting, and not only analyzing, what Canada Post's current dire situation is?

There were a billion fewer individual stamped, addressed letters delivered in 2012 than in 2006, but that trend of e-substitution has not bottomed out yet. In fact, it is forecast to continue on into the future. Canada Post is posting annual deficits approaching $1 billion only six years from now in a rapidly declining financial position. Does the government support Canada Post acting now? Yes. Canada Post is an independent arm's-length crown corporation, managed by a board of directors and a CEO, and is responsible for its own day-to-day operations. Do we support them acting? Yes, absolutely, we do.

Canada Post chose a five-point plan. The member has articulated the particular points that are part of that five-point plan. It has done so in consultation with Canadians. It continues to engage communities in the rollout and implementation of that particular plan. We support that something had to be done and done now.

I know the member opposite and her party like to posit the idea of postal banking somehow turning the post offices into branches for banking. However, not one think tank in the country yet, the Canadian Centre For Policy Alternatives, or anyone else, has suggested how such a bank would be capitalized, what it would take, and how a crown corporation that is in a failing economic condition right now and rapidly declining, would somehow be able to convert itself into a postal bank. Why, for that matter, adopt the branch bank model that is currently already eroding and is likely to continue? Within nine years, more than half of banking consumers will be young millennials. They are already abandoning that particular model of going to visit their branch.

None of the ideas of the opposition make any amount of sense. We will continue to support Canada Post taking urgent action and doing it right now, so that we can actually have a Canada Post that delivers mail.

[Anne-Marie Day, NDP, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am sure that the member's TV does not have rabbit ears anymore and that he has probably switched to an ultra-modern flat-screen TV. It remains a TV, nonetheless. As life changes, we adapt to new technologies.

The postal service is profitable and brings in millions of dollars for Canadians. That money is paid to the government as dividends then redistributed in many ways. A number of solutions exist. Canada Post could, for example, increase its deliveries of small and medium-sized parcels, offer banking services and advertise.

We are asking the Conservative Party to sit down with Canada Post representatives, the unions and members of the public to explore potential solutions. When I took part in the “I'm walking with my letter carrier” rally, I met hundreds of people who told me, among other things, that they wanted to keep these services. Two-thirds of Canadians want to keep postal services. That is something the Conservative government should think long and hard about.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will not admit that I do have a TV that has rabbit ears.

Apart from that, Canada Post is facing an urgent situation, and it is facing it now. If we look at Canada Post's five-point plan, we see it is not suggesting somehow that it is cutting back on the profitable parts of its business. It is in fact quite the opposite. It is actually pursuing additional parcel services. It knows that is profitable.

However, what is profitable, but is losing money because the volumes are not there, is individual stamped letter mail. That business continues to decline. It is not just in Canada. This is part of a global transformation. This has happened in Europe, where the response has been to privatize the mail service and open up complete competition. It has slashed its workforce 26% to 40%. A stamp in the European Union is about 1.4 euros.

Those are the ways that other countries are choosing to deal with that particular thing. Canada Post has not. We can compare its five-point action plan to anyone else's, but we support that it had to take urgent action.

Veterans

[Annick Papillon, NDP, Québec, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased today to rise in the House and to close all these debates at a rather late hour and to speak to a subject that I am passionate about. It is an important issue. I am talking about veterans. These people sacrificed themselves for us. They gave everything. They went to where no one wanted to go. They served our country to the best of their ability. They truly gave everything.

On March 7, I asked a very clear question in the House. I asked the following:

Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives claim that cuts to Veterans Affairs Canada will not affect the quality of services provided.

Everyone knows that it is not possible to do more with less. Doing more with less is not possible.

On page 11, the Report on Plans and Priorities states that: ...there is a risk that quality service delivery could be affected due to VAC's increasing reliance on partners and service providers in the federal, provincial and municipal governments as well as private sector. Why is the minister making decisions that are bad for our veterans?

Why are they trying to balance the budget in times of so-called austerity? Whey are they trying to save money at the expense of those who served our country, at the expense of veterans?

Even during times of austerity, the United States and Great Britain did not make as many cuts as this Conservative government has made to Veterans Affairs. The current government does not understand what needs to be done for our veterans. However, every year the ombudsman's report is very clear. The report says that we need to invest in front-line services for our veterans. The Conservatives seem to toss each report on a shelf, as they do with any report, and ignore what it says until something very bad happens.

If you look at the news, you can see that our veterans are facing far too much hardship. However, here, in the House, is where decisions are made. Where will we send our veterans? What will we do for them? Even if we make these decisions for them, we cannot later take them back and give them all the services they need, such as appropriate health care specialists or physical and psychological health care.

The NDP is flabbergasted that this government is doing absolutely nothing for our veterans. The needs and expectations are there. We hope that this government will take action.

Could my colleague opposite tell us that the Conservatives will change course and will finally invest, because we have invested in veterans, and that makes complete sense in light of the sacrifice they made.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Transport]

Mr. Speaker, I welcome the intervention by the member opposite.

Let me first start by affirming, of course, that not only the Minister of Veterans Affairs but the parliamentary secretary and members of this government from the Prime Minister on down have nothing but the utmost respect for our veterans. We are obviously concerned and are always looking for ways to improve the level of service while delivering value for taxpayers, who support them as well.

Additionally, the premise of the member's question is absolutely false. What the public accounts will show over time is that this government, since coming to government and implementing the new veterans charter, has invested nearly $5 billion in new investments. That is a year-by-year appropriation of somewhere in the neighbourhood of $3.5 billion, 90% of which goes to front-line programs, services, and benefits for our veterans.

On the part that is for administration and overhead, if we go back and look at the decision to merge eight local or regional district offices into the Service Canada network, we see it was to capitalize on using the Service Canada network and its overhead by phasing out or moving into these offices that were underutilized.

I will use the example of Windsor, since that is in my area. We had a 10,000-square-foot building and six unionized workers with their wages plus benefits managing 23 files, with low foot traffic. Instead, we now have the Service Canada office one kilometre away with a VAC client service agent and the other Service Canada network employees who are trained to a standard to deliver that service.

More than that, we are now reaching more communities with information, such as Belle River, Amherstburg, Leamington, and Chatham-Kent. Veterans in those communities used to have to drive into Windsor to get basic services. They can now do that in all of the communities I listed. We are moving our service points closer and into more communities where veterans themselves actually live, saving them a ride.

Let me clear what the VAC offices are. They are administrative points of service. They are not medical clinics. They do not deliver support for PTSD. They are not stress injury clinics, which were created by this government two years ago to deliver that important support. These were places where one could come to pick up and drop off one's paperwork. Veterans can now do that in more communities than they did before. We did this by delivering greater value for taxpayers and enhancing the level of service. We stand by that commitment to our veterans.

[Annick Papillon, NDP, Québec, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the difference between the Conservatives and the New Democrats is very simple. The Conservatives are interested in numbers, while we are interested in human lives. We are talking about people who have made sacrifices and need services. We are well aware that health care services have fallen off considerably even as the mission in Afghanistan has created a lot of needs. Nobody can deny that.

When the Minister of Veterans Affairs turns his back on a woman like Jenifer Migneault, who had questions for him, when they tell our veterans to dial 1-800-whatever and make them wait on hold for hours because their needs cannot be addressed right away, it does not seem to me that this government is making much of an effort. I do not think that it has followed through on its decisions. It deserves my criticism

Closing offices all over the country is also a service cut. My colleague opposite cannot deny that; it is a fact. The Conservatives are just not there for our veterans. That is an undeniable fact.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am not sure the member was listening. We have more points of service for veterans than we did before.

Presumably, the member wants veterans to have to drive from Leamington to Windsor to drop off their paperwork. They do not have to do that anymore. They can go to a Service Canada office and get Veterans Affairs services there in Leamington. They can do it in Belle River and in Amherstburg.

That is more places, not fewer places, and they are in communities where more veterans live. Communities that never had service before or access to VAC programs are getting them now.

By the way, there is a difference in approach. Every time the investments come down, whether it is in the new stress injury clinics that we created two years ago, in the JPSUs, in increasing more points of service, or in the nearly $5 billion in new money this government has put into veteran services, their benefits, and their programs, that party opposite votes against it. The members speak loudly with their votes; they do not support in this place the investments that our veterans actually need.

[The Deputy Speaker, NDP, Joe Comartin]

The motion to adjourn the House is now deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly, this House stands adjourned until later today at 2 p.m., pursuant to Standing Order 24(1).

(The House adjourned at 12:18 a.m.)