Mr. Speaker, it is important that we have a conversation about maritime workers in our country. The member opposite asked me about the $2 per hour. This was a flag of convenience ship, which means that the flag belongs to another country and is sitting in our waters. It is bringing products into our ports, staffed with people who are having their human rights violated. They were being paid $2 per hour on that one particular ship. There were reports of being paid less, to be honest, and in a lot of cases, they are not being paid at all.
How are Canadians, working in this field, supposed to compete? Aside from ensuring that the health and labour standards of these workers are being protected, how are Canadian workers supposed to compete with workers at that wage in our own waters? This is in Canada. They are transporting things across Canada.
This puts our maritime workers at an extreme disadvantage and I fought at committee to remove the pieces from Canada's Coasting Trade Act that were being changed. The maritime industry was not consulted on this and it will lose jobs.