Mr. Speaker, it is great to rise today to debate the opposition day motion in relation a really important subject, the Canadian auto industry.
I will be sharing my time this afternoon with the hon. member for Mississauga—Lakeshore.
As I was saying, I think it is important that we have this conversation. I welcome it, and the government certainly welcomes it, because we have been deeply focused on what comes next and how we can support the workers, industry and communities that are impacted by the auto sector.
I know a lot of the debate in the chamber today will be about communities in Ontario, southwestern Ontario in particular, and perhaps communities in Quebec, but the auto industry touches all elements of our country. I think about my own communities in Kings—Hants, where Michelin manufactures component parts of vehicles. I believe it employs close to 3,500 workers in Nova Scotia. The supply chain for the auto sector exists all across this country, but it, of course, is heavily concentrated in Ontario and Quebec.
I am going to start by highlighting a few things. I was surprised that the opposition took this amount of time to give, to call them compelling would be too generous but, some thoughts on the auto industry. I will point to elements that I think are not bad public policy, and elements that I think are so unrealistic they are not worth the paper they are written on. It is surprising that it took the Conservatives this long to be able to get to this point. It has been noted in debate, and it was noted in question period, that the Conservatives seemingly did not do much engagement with unionized labour in this country about their vision and how their plan would connect and support workers, or not support workers.
We heard the Minister of Industry during question period talk about how there is deep concern within Unifor and some of the major unionized workforce in the country that the Conservative plan would actually inadvertently impact and hurt workers in what is already a difficult and delicate time. The government is working to be able to address that.
I thought one of the most compelling things the Minister of Industry said in question period was that there is nothing in the opposition day motion, or the proposed plan, about the auto parts sector. Assembly is important and that matters, but as the minister highlighted, Linamar, Magna and Martin are three major auto parts producers in the country. There is no mention in the Conservative strategy about what we are doing to support that element of the supply chain, which also has extremely important jobs.
I do want to take a moment, and if Canadians at home have not necessarily heard from the government already on this, they deserve to hear exactly what the five pillars are, which the government launched well over a month ago now. The government has actually put in place a Canadian auto strategy, recognizing the moment that we are in, recognizing that we have to both protect Canadian jobs and protect and incentivize the industrial build-out. Those would certainly be some areas of principle in which I think we could find agreement with the opposition.
I want to start by saying that the first pillar is exactly that. It is to boost domestic manufacturing. That is somewhat tied to the strategic response fund. It is $3 billion to incentivize and draw investment into the country. There is a number of tax incentives. Also, what the Conservatives have not mentioned today in debate is the remission order. The way in which the government is using the remission order for companies that are continuing to produce in Canada, signalling future investment and continuing the cross-border collaboration that has existed for quite some time, is that the remission order is functioning, in some way, on the principles of what they are talking about vis-à-vis the 1965 auto pact, which not enough people in this debate today have highlighted.
The auto pact was built in an environment where there was no foreign importation of vehicles whatsoever. It was a true closed-loop system. That no longer exists. There are 500,000 foreign-produced vehicles imported into Canada every single year. We can close our eyes and pretend it is 1965. It feels like it was a golden era. We should continue to make the case, and we should continue to work through CUSMA and our North American trading partners, to continue to promote an auto industry that has been mutually beneficial for communities in all three countries, frankly, Canada, Mexico and the United States.
Therefore, yes, in that way we agree, but the idea that we are going to have a tit-for-tat auto policy is probably even against the provisions of the existing trade agreement we are in.
It is a great idea in principle to remove the GST on Canadian-built vehicles. However, we are going to have something to answer for vis-a-vis the conversation right now with the United States around that: about whether this could be seen as reciprocity in terms of some of the measures the U.S. has put in place and whether it could actually exacerbate the problem as we try to make a case to the U.S. administration that the tariffs it has unjustly imposed on the Canadian industry are counterintuitive not only to the benefit of American communities but also to Canadian communities and to the close integration we have enjoyed. There is no level of nuance from the opposition benches about whether removing that GST would even be compliant.
The government of course has said we should boost domestic manufacturing and focus on reworking environmental policy, while at the same time putting incentives to encourage the uptake of plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles.
The hon. member who spoke before me talked about keeping the auto industry in his communities. I know how important that is, but he must recognize that globally right now, EV sales are doubling year over year. There is a massive uptake in countries like Norway, a Scandinavian country with a similar climate to Canada's. Almost 99% of new vehicles are EVs. The global industry is going in this direction, and we have a decision to make about whether or not we are going to get serious about trying to meet that need.
I represent a rural constituency. For my constituents, battery electric vehicles are probably quite unrealistic for many of them in the short term. Plug-in hybrids are a much more reasonable pathway. They make sense because they can lower gas bills. In an environment where we are seeing the fallout from the war in the Middle East right now, that is important. Obviously they have some environmental benefit as well, and they are also convenient for consumers.
This is the direction in which we are going. The government is walking a line through its remission order to say to companies selling and importing cars into Canada that if they choose to import a higher volume than their historical average, they are going to face the remission penalty and the countertariffs that Canada has put in place on the United States.
That is functioning as an incentive to continue production and enhance production where companies are selling brands of vehicles that are doing well in this country. In that North American context, there are principles within the quasi-Conservative plan that are already being met by the remission order, principles that the government has laid out. I have heard nothing from the opposition benches to at least acknowledge that point.
I think it is also interesting that we heard the last member talk about spy cars. The geopolitics of the world are such right now that when I was in the United Kingdom recently, I saw Chinese EVs on the road. When I was in Europe, what did I see? I saw Chinese EVs on the road. I was just in the Caribbean with my wife, and the EVs are there. I guess the hon. member is making the assertion that our allied countries within NATO and within the G7, like London and Europe, are letting spy cars drive around their communities. Is that the assertion the Conservative Party makes?