Madam Speaker, the first thing I would like to do is thank the Speaker for granting this emergency debate today. I sat through all of it tonight with sincere concern for the families in Oshawa and, in fact, the families around Durham region.
In general terms, the tone of the debate has been very, very strong with a strong level of concern. Some solutions have been proposed. That is the reason we are here tonight, to try to find solutions and to work not just with the government, but also with the community and labour, along with the employees and all those who are affected as a result of the very devastating news from Oshawa today.
I have been spending a lot of time, actually, in Oshawa over the last several years. My son plays for the Oshawa Generals. By the way, the Generals are named after General Motors. I go to the games as much as I can. I talk to a lot of people. People who recognize me because they have seen me on TV or CPAC or whatever come up to me and we talk politics. Just on Friday night, a gentleman came up to me at the Tribute Communities Centre arena. We talked about pensions and the need to protect pensions and how important that was to those employees at General Motors. We had a long conversation about it. This is a conversation that is happening over and over again in the Oshawa community.
I think of those people who I saw at the Friday night hockey game and those people who I am going to see this coming weekend at a couple of games in Oshawa. I will give them a hug if they need it. I am sure there are some of them who are up tonight watching this debate with great interest after the devastating day that they had today and are trying to find out what, if any, solutions the Government of Canada and this Parliament of Canada can come up with.
If we look back, a certain amount of prophecy happened back in May. Magna International's chief executive officer, Don Walker, was talking about overall competitiveness in the automotive industry. He was doing this at a shareholder relations meeting. He said:
[I]nitiatives such as Ontario’s cap and trade program, as well as rising electricity costs and new labour legislation are making it increasingly difficult to remain competitive against other jurisdictions that don’t face “all these burdens.” “I’m worried about what’s going on in Canada,” Walker told employees and shareholders gathered in Markham, Ont. on Thursday.
“I get very frustrated when I see the decisions being made that put undue administrative costs and inefficiencies on our plants, specifically here in Ontario, because we have to compete… We’re not going to get business if we’re forced to be uncompetitive.”
Walker was talking specifically about some of the initiatives in Ontario with respect to the Fair Workplaces, Better Jobs Act as an example of how the government is affecting business and competitiveness.
I think the same could be said of any of us who have been in Ontario over the course of the last 15 years. Those of us who represent Ontario know just how devastating some of the policies of the Wynne and McGuinty government have been to business. This announcement today is the culmination of not just those policies in Ontario, but I would also suggest the policies of the current federal Liberal government. The reason is simple. I have said many times in this House that those who are running Ontario into the ground are now running the Prime Minister's Office and, therefore, by extension, running Canada into the ground as well. Those failed policies in Ontario are not going to work here federally. It has been proven that they do not work. It is quite concerning in just three short years.
It is funny because I think back to the last election when I had debates and I was talking about this very issue. I would ask people why we would want to go down the same path federally as Ontario did. Why would we want that? We knew there was no difference between the Ontario Liberal Party and the federal Liberal Party.
Canada, in general, and the state of our economy and competitiveness have really taken a hit over the course of the last three years. There are several reasons for that, such as regulatory requirements, environmental requirements, tax requirements, when seemingly our biggest competitors are going in a completely opposite direction. When it comes to tax and regulatory regimes, Canada is going in the opposite direction, and we are imposing more regulation and taxes on businesses, which is creating more uncertainty, not just in the automotive sector but also in the energy sector. We have seen hundreds of billions of dollars that have left the energy industry. We have seen hundreds of thousands of jobs that have been lost. That uncertainty is cascading throughout the economy.
The other side will talk about the 500,000 jobs that have been created, or the 700,000 jobs. Nobody on the other side seems to get that number right. However, the reality is that there is doubt and uncertainty that exists within our country. Any time there is doubt, it limits investment. In fact, it restricts investment, because the one thing that businesses do not like is uncertainty and they will not make the investments they need to make in an uncertain economic business environment.
What is causing that uncertainty? Well, the Leader of the Opposition was in Barrie in August. We held a round table. We had some of the largest manufacturers. Napoleon was represented there, a large steel and aluminum manufacturing facility, and there were others as well. Every single one of them talked about the impact of steel and aluminum tariffs on our country, and not just what was imposed by the United States, but the retaliatory tariffs that we imposed on ourselves as causing a problem and creating this uncertainty.
I walked away from that meeting remembering what one of the largest employers in central Ontario said to me. He said, “The one thing the Liberal government needs to understand is that my money is portable. I can take it anywhere I want. I can take it to another country or another continent. I can set up shop there and hire people there. I choose to be here because these are my roots, but as long as this continues to go on, this doubt and uncertainty within the business environment, there is no reason for me to stay here when I could take my money somewhere else, and it is portable.”
That is a warning, just like the warning from the CEO of Magna that every Canadian should be heeding right now. We have been heading down a path over the course of the last three years that has put us in an uncompetitive environment in almost every sector of our economy. It is concerning, and it certainly came to light today with this announcement at GM.
We want to come up with solutions. We do not want to just complain about what is happening to this country, although what is happening within this country is very real. However, let us talk about competitiveness. The hon. member for Durham said it right when he started off this debate earlier this evening. We have to work together to find a way to retool this plant. We have some of the best skilled labour, some of the most innovative people in North America, arguably around the world. We could use that expertise to figure out how we can retool this plant. We have to look after these employees. It has been said many times tonight that it is through job training, benefits and pensions. It is just like the gentleman who approached me at the Tribute Communities Centre the other night said about protecting the pensions. That has to be critical for these employees.
I talked about tax competitiveness and aligning with the provinces a tax competitive regime so that when one end of government tries to give a credit or benefit, the other end is not trying to take it away. That has to be an option.
As well, for God's sake, we have to stop this carbon tax now. It is putting us in an incredibly uncompetitive position, and that is coming from every business sector in this country. We have to look at regulatory competitiveness and make sure that the carbon tax is not imposed on businesses, especially small and medium-sized enterprises.
The new NAFTA agreement, the USMCA, is causing uncertainty. There are the steel and aluminum tariffs. I mentioned the retaliatory tariffs. We have to eliminate those. That is what business is telling us they need in order to move away from this doubt and uncertainty.
I will conclude with this—