Mr. Speaker, I am glad to rise in the House today to address the Speech from the Throne. Before I do, this is my first time speaking officially with a 10-minute speech in the House since the last election, so I would appreciate if my colleagues would give their thoughts and consideration to the people who volunteer, as we all do on our campaigns. Everyone here has a number of people to thank and be grateful for. I want to start with my campaign manager, David Parker, and all of the team. Shelley did an absolutely great job keeping me where I needed to be and on track, and that is not an easy thing to do in a marathon campaign. Jonathan did great work on Facebook. I thank everyone who did all the door knocking and canvassing in going door to door.
I have a brand new riding. At least half of the riding is new to me. I have been the member of Parliament for Wetaskiwin for the last 10 years, and now the riding consists of the north half of the city of Red Deer, the third largest city in Alberta. What an eye-opening experience for me to go door to door in a large urban area. As a country bumpkin who grew up on a farm north of Lacombe, even though I have always considered Red Deer the closest major city, the city where we would do our business, buy our groceries, and from time to time do all of our shopping, it certainly has changed since I frequented Red Deer a lot when I was a much younger man with my family.
Talking about family, I would also like to take this opportunity to thank my family: my wife Barbara and my kids, Eryk, Kasandra, and Krystian. I still remember their names after 10 years of being a member of Parliament. Being from western Canada, I spend about 14 hours a week just in transit to get here and get back, not to mention all the events a person has to do on the weekends and so on. I could not do what I do on behalf of the people I represent without their love, patience, and understanding. I can attest to all of those things in my duties as a member of Parliament. I certainly appreciate all that they do.
My riding has changed, but the issues that affect the folks in central Alberta have not changed. Whether one lives in Lacombe, Sylvan Lake, Ponoka, or the north end of Red Deer, all of these issues are the same. We all like to work hard and play hard, and of course we love the places we call home, wherever that happens to be in central Alberta.
I want to talk first and foremost about the absence of those issues that are most important to the folks in central Alberta that could have been or should have been in the Speech from the Throne. I will start by talking about agriculture. There was not one mention of agriculture.
I grew up on a farm. I was very lucky. I grew up in the same farmyard as my grandparents did, so I basically had two sets of parents. I had grandpa and grandma, who handed the farm off to my mom and dad. Of course, they are still on the farm right now. My sister is living there with her kids. That family farm and those generations continue to evolve. Agriculture is very important.
There was not one mention, not one signal of hope for the over 2.2 million Canadians that are either directly employed or work in the agricultural sector, whether they are farmers or producers on some 90,000 farms across Canada or whether they work in the value-added sector. They could be working in places like Canadian Premium Meats in Lacombe, which does custom slaughter of various animals, most notably cattle. It is the only EU certified slaughter facility in Canada at this time. It is able to export whatever the customer demands to any place in the United States or the European Union. It is doing an absolutely fantastic job. It is only held back by the fact that we do not have more robust trade and that we have not been able to ratify things like the Canada-Europe trade agreement.
These things are inhibitors to the bison ranchers who sell their bison products domestically in the central Alberta area. One can go anywhere in central Alberta and buy some of the best bison products one could ever want to eat. These products should be on store shelves not only around Canada but around North America and of course all through Europe. There was not a mention of the value that actually adds.
Whether it is regular products like beef or pork or whatever the case may be, these are all things we grow in great abundance. I have the largest number of dairy farmers in Alberta in my riding. There are over a hundred farms in my constituency. The chair and vice chair of Alberta Milk, who I call Albert and Heini, live just down the road. These are my friends. These are the people I have grown up with. These are people who work hard every day and deserve to have those kinds of mentions, at least about the products they grow and the services they provide and the value they add to our economy. There was nary a mention of it. It is very frustrating.
There was nothing about market access or diversification. There was nothing about product diversification or research and technology advancements in the agricultural sector to keep it a more viable sector than it already is. Where I live in central Alberta, the growing season is only a couple of months a year. If it was not for advancements in research and technology in the agricultural sector, we would not be as competitive.
We cannot turn our cattle out and raise them on grass 12 months of the year, like they can in Brazil and Argentina and other places around the world. We have to depend on these technologies to be competitive.
Before I go any further and start going on my rant and litany about the energy sector, I would like to remind the Speaker that I will be sharing my time with my colleague from Souris—Moose Mountain.
I am very frustrated on behalf of all the farmers, producers, and ranchers in central Alberta who I meet at the coffee shop in Ponoka, or wherever I happen to be, who tell me that they are very concerned about the ability. We have had some good years in the last several years, but we have had no signal from the current Liberal government at all about these things being a priority, and that causes a lot of concern among the people I represent.
Let me get to the energy sector. I will make this a bit personal, if you will indulge me, Mr. Speaker.
I have been very lucky to have the background I have. As I said, I grew up on a farm, so I have some common sense. I am a bit of a mechanic, a bit of a welder, a bit of an electrician, and a bit of a carpenter. The reality is that I know how to work. I think with my head and work with my hands, and that value is easily translated into energy sector work, which is why we find so many people in the energy sector in Alberta. If one walks into any place that does service rigs or drilling rigs and says, “I am a farm boy”, one does not even have to hand in a resumé. People are asked when they can start, because employers know what they are probably going to get. They are going to get someone with common sense, someone who knows how to get up early in the morning, go out and work hard, work all day, expect an honest return for that, and go back home. These are the things I was able to do.
I would work in the summer for parks. I enjoy the outdoors. I enjoyed that very much. However, in the winter, rather than going on employment insurance or whatever I could have done, I decided it did not make any sense for a farm boy to do that. I went out and worked in the service rigs. I worked for Trimat Well Servicing, for Roll'n Oilfield, and for Northstar doing directional drilling, because I had those kinds of skills.
I am not talking about just me. There are tens of thousands of people like me in central Alberta right now who are desperate, and not just because of the low commodity prices. We cannot blame all of this on low commodity prices. Yes, that is a factor. I understand that there are certain things that are beyond any government's particular control, but one does not take a situation that is bad and make it so much worse.
Right now Albertans in the energy sector are feeling the pinch. They might not have believed us years ago when we said that if they elect a provincial NDP premier and elect a federal Liberal government things are going to be bad for them. Do they not remember the 1980s? Do they not remember walking away from their homes? People in central Alberta right now who are working in the energy sector and have a 10% equity position in their houses are in big trouble. The keys are going to be coming onto the desks of the mortgage lenders in a matter of months if things are not turned around.
One does not solve this problem by leaving a vacuum in leadership to the point where mayors in little municipalities or big cities across this country are making decisions, or at least are pretending to make decisions, about things like pipelines, which should be uniting this country from coast to coast. This is absolutely atrocious. It is beyond comprehension that these kinds of conversations are even happening. Unless one gets around Canada on a bicycle, whittled with a bone knife, made out of wood, one is a hypocrite, because we use energy. If we took everything out of this room that is made with a petrochemical product, we would not even be able to record the information that is here.
Let us be realistic about what the petrochemical industry and energy industry actually does, and let us start having a serious conversation, because people's lives, their well-being, their welfare, and their ability to look after themselves are at stake here. A government's job is to let people who can take care of themselves take care of themselves and to use the vast tax base left over from that to look after those who cannot. That is the role of government, and that is where this Speech from the Throne failed epically.