Mr. Speaker, before I begin my follow-up on the perils of the temporary foreign worker provisions in the trans-Pacific partnership, I would like to take a moment to acknowledge the results of yesterday's election in Manitoba. I would like to pay tribute to the outgoing premier, Greg Selinger, and to the 16 years of good NDP government in Manitoba, and what that has meant for our province.
Outgoing Premier Selinger brought his experience as a social worker and social activist first to city council and then to the Manitoba legislature as minister of finance in the government in 1999, until he took over the leadership from Gary Doer. He led a government that was focused on investing in people and in the infrastructure of Manitoba at a time when governments across the world were embracing austerity and paying the price for those policies of austerity.
In Manitoba, we had great economic performance compared to other provinces. We were building social housing and child care spaces. Over those 16 years, that is one of the unsung achievements of the NDP publicly.
However, one of our biggest accomplishments there was the neighbourhoods alive program. It is a program that provides seed funding to community organizations. It is not a model of government coming in and telling communities what to do, but building community capacity so they can guide their own future. It is a model that has applications well outside the area of community development, and could be well applied within other government departments to ensure community people are in the driver seat when it comes to government investment,.
Again, I am proud of the record of the NDP government, and we will carry on fighting. We will give the new government a run for its money in 2020.
Part of the work we are here to do is to stand up for working people. We have heard the government itself say that there are serious problems with the temporary foreign worker program. The minister has committed to a review of that program and has said that it is one of her priorities to fix.
However, when we look at chapter 12 of the trans-Pacific partnership, we have language around temporary foreign workers that essentially will recreate and perpetuate the problems of the temporary foreign worker program. Therefore, on one hand we hear criticism of the TFW program, but on the other hand, we hear nothing but praise, frankly, from the government for the trans-Pacific partnership.
I would like to hear a commitment from the government today that the Liberals' study of the temporary foreign worker program will include within its scope a study of chapter 12 of the TPP to ensure that what they say they are fixing with the one hand, they are not taking away or putting back with the other hand.