Mr. Chair, before I get started, I just want to respond to a comment by my colleague from New Brunswick, who talked about the impact on forestry workers and communities. He talked about his family connection to the forestry sector. I also have a family connection. My great-grandfather and my great-grandmother lived in Ocean Falls, where my great-grandfather was a papermaker. My grandmother and my late grandfather also were there, and my mom was there. When Ocean Falls went from a thriving community of 3,500 people to the 70 people it is today, as it collapsed, we saw intergenerational families disperse, and we saw the impact that had, not just on community but on families, and the cost of that. We have to do everything we can to ensure that it does not happen in communities like Port Alberni and the community where my colleague lives, and we need to work collectively.
Today I am honoured to bring the voices of workers, of people in the forestry sector, communities and first nations in the riding of Courtenay—Alberni, who are here lobbying for the federal government to take this issue seriously. We know the softwood lumber industry is a $23.3-billion industry that generates around 200,000 direct jobs, but it also is responsible for 182,000 indirect jobs for Canadian workers and supports livelihoods in over 300 communities across this country.
We need to take an “all hands on deck” approach. We need to rethink how we are looking at the forestry sector. As my colleague from Saanich—Gulf Islands said, it is an opportunity also for us to start maximizing the use of our fibre. As we tackle the housing crisis, we can use mass timber and modular construction supported by Canadian softwood lumber, which also can help cut build times in half for affordable housing and reduce emissions associated with homebuilding by up to 60%, but we need to treat this like an emergency, as we did during the COVID pandemic. The government is not moving at that pace.
In addition, obviously we need to retool, but supporting biomass utilization and including it as a source of clean energy also makes both economic and environmental sense. It supports billions of dollars in economic activity while comprising only one part of an all-out, necessary, hands-on-deck approach to reducing the prevalence and spread of wildfires.
With respect to this take-note debate, as we know, it is critical timing, because the softwood lumber industry is in crisis. Since 2017, tariffs have drained nearly $10 million from Canada's forestry sector, and the B.C. softwood lumber industry is facing tariffs of up to 45%. Trump's tariffs on softwood lumber are higher than those currently in place on Vladimir Putin's Russia.
It is not just tariffs; softwood lumber is also on the front lines of the climate crisis. Wildfire damage has cost Canadians over $1 billion annually, and this figure will only increase over time. Without urgent action, the massive emissions wildfires produce will trap us in a devastating cycle of environmental and economic degradation.
In August, the Prime Minister announced $1.2 billion in new funding to support the forestry sector, which is far less than for the other sectors. Worse, that money has not gone out to producers. They have not been able to access the promised relief, and they are still waiting for that money to come through. Further to that, only $50 million of that money, 4%, is earmarked for worker supports. I have said it before in the House, and I will say it again: That is not a plan; that is an insult. What is worse is that many owner-operators and contractors remain excluded from those worker supports, despite how crucial the softwood lumber industry is to our economy.
The Prime Minister continues to be in the U.S. talking about other sectors and not talking about forestry. Right now, we can look at the news, and the headline is about bailing out the steel industry. Well, I can assure members that it will not be the same as what he is offering the forestry sector. We know that, and we are going to continue to act in support of productive ideas, but we are also going to be propositional, as we were with the biomass tax credit, which will hopefully generate and unlock around $6 billion in investment.
We all also need to make sure that team Canada and the U.S. are working collectively, together with major strategic interests, as we have with energy, critical minerals and continental supply chains, hydroelectric energy, softwood lumber and Arctic co-operation. We need a more comprehensive, high-level negotiating framework, similar to what the EU has achieved, which could provide the leverage needed to resolve softwood and other long-standing issues. We need a team Canada approach. We need the government to act with urgency.