Steve Mahoney

[Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act, December 4th, 1997]

Oh, that is going to help.

[Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act, December 4th, 1997]

I do not expect the member to understand. I am really not talking to him. I am talking to the Speaker and to the Canadian people. They understand that some people might benefit from the simple black and white solution that everybody gets to invest in an RRSP fund for their retirement.

I think my colleague was right on. We are talking about who will benefit from a wide open RRSP fund and the elimination of the CPP. Is it the average working Canadian? Is it the working poor? Is it families and young people who need some leadership and some strong financial backing from government?

I think it will be big business. The oil barons out west may benefit from it, and God bless them. That is why we have a system for everyone to invest in their own retirement savings plan. There are rules that guide the investment.

What is the Royal Bank's profit up to today? It is $1.6 billion. That is absolutely unbelievable. Why is that? It is probably in large measure because of the amount of money Canadians have been putting into RRSPs and the banks. Whether it is through RoyFund, investment procedures or whatever, the banks are benefiting.

Reformers simply care more about the banks, the oil companies and rich Canadians than taking care of all Canadians in a universally funded system that will accrue to the benefit of our children and in spite of their rhetoric will accrue to the benefit of their children.

[Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act, December 4th, 1997]

Don't talk about disrespectful. We almost had one of the Reform Party fellows going into fisticuffs, climbing over a chair this morning. That is the mentality we see on that side of the House. They should be ashamed of themselves and embarrassed.

Canadians watch television and see the kind of behaviour we saw here this morning. A member actually had to be restrained physically from climbing over chairs to attack another member of Parliament. That is the mentality. That was the Reform Party. Canadians are fed up with that kind of nonsense. Canadians want leadership.

Several years ago another very important pension fund members opposite might be familiar with, the teachers' pension fund of the province of Ontario, was in some difficulty for very similar types of problem.

The contributions had been too low from both the teachers and the employer, the Government of Ontario. The investment procedures used by that pension fund were inadequate and unfair. Many of the roads, bridges, schools and other parts of the infrastructure in our province were paid for from that pension fund at interest rates as low as 3% when market interest rates were in the double digit area. It was a fund from which to borrow cheaply to build public infrastructure.

As a result we wound up with a pension fund the actuarial people said was in serious trouble. The Liberal government in office at the time decided we had to bite the bullet. We increased the contributions of teachers and we matched that with an increase to the employer, the Ontario government. We set up an independent body for investments and today the teachers' fund is one of the strongest financial vehicles in the entire country, perhaps in North America.

The teachers were not happy when we did that. They demonstrated. They came to Queen's Park. They were very unhappy. Today the fund owns the Toronto Maple Leafs, although there are days when I am not sure it would want to. The fund has substantial investments such as investments in newspapers. Teachers have a financially strong pension fund because the government of the day had the courage to make those changes.

I give that example because it relates. The CPP must change from being simply a pay as you go fund, which in a sense is exactly what the super RRSP fund would be. If one has the money to invest and has a job then under the Reform plan one would be able to invest in an RRSP. A lot of Canadians simply do not fall into that category.

This is not rocket science. If we split them out and tell people they will be given the option of opting out of the plan, obviously the financial integrity of the CPP will be jeopardized. We are not prepared to do that. Canadians have investment options for their retirement. They have options to invest in RRSPs. We believe there should be a publicly funded, solid, government backed Canadian pension plan for all Canadians and for future generations.

What do we do? We either increase the contributions, reduce the benefits or change the procedures. Frankly we are doing all of that in an effort to put the CPP in a sustainable format. Yes, there will be an increase.

[Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act, December 4th, 1997]

I am teasing the bears and they are apparently getting a little agitated. Since they stopped listening to Newt Gingrich they have had to go farther afield to get their marching orders. Where the policies come from is really quite telling.

I will be splitting my time with Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Veterans Affairs.

Reformers talk about the fact that there has been no consultation. The tactics that are used are interesting. My colleague from Mississauga South pointed out that a former speaker of the Reform Party said that only 270 people were consulted. The fact of the matter is the committee travelled across the country and received 270 deputations or presentations literally representing millions of Canadians.

They know that, but it is convenient to describe the Canadian Labour Congress as a person rather than to say that it is a group representing millions of people who have a lot at stake. It is a neat little way to twist the facts around to get out a message that is very misleading.

We did consult. As for ramming Bill C-2 through this place, as members opposite know we have consulted across the country. It has been debated in committee. Members opposite have spoken about it. It has been debated at second reading. It has been debated in committee of the whole and at third reading. I suppose the Chilean experience would simply see polarization of parliamentary democracy. We do not operate that way and members opposite know that we have to deal with reform to the CPP.

[Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act, December 4th, 1997]

I do not care if the member thinks it is funny. Is it not interesting that the Reform Party has to get its policies by watching ABC television reporting on the Chilean experience? We want a made in Canada solution. We do not need to go to the states.

[Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act, December 4th, 1997]

Madam Speaker, I rise to speak to an issue about which I heard a lot of nonsense this morning from members on the opposite side, particularly from the member from Chile. I found that rather interesting.

[Postal Services Continuation Act, 1997, December 2nd, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, I say exactly what I said in my speech. We attempted to conciliate and we attempted to mediate.

One thing the Reform Party misses is that the minute you go to a mediator you lose control of labour negotiations. Let us take a look at the facts. The results of mediation generally drive up costs in labour disputes. If that is the solution the Reform Party wants, it will mean driving up the costs of Canada Post.

We would rather see a negotiated settlement. Since we were unable to negotiate it we must take responsibility and get the mail moving in Canada.

[Postal Services Continuation Act, 1997, December 2nd, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, I am encouraged that I did not give encouragement to a member of the Bloc. One of the reasons I may not have given him or members of the NDP such encouragement was that they were obviously not listening.

I was not castigating post office workers. I was talking about the leadership of the union, the people who are challenging and saying that they will close airports, bridges and roads. What kind of a democracy do they think we live in?

The government is elected and has every right and every responsibility to deal with the issue. There is a lot more in terms of rights and being involved in a union than simply the right to strike. There is the right to organize. There are rules and regulations within federal and provincial labour boards. They have a right to be part of a union to better the working conditions for the men and women they work alongside. They do not have a right to break the law. Nobody has that right.

I also fully believe in my heart that the rank and file do not want this strike. The rank and file want to go back to work and get their paycheques so they can have a decent Christmas and build a good life for their families. We support the rank and file. We do not support the militancy of the leadership of that union.

[Postal Services Continuation Act, 1997, December 2nd, 1997]

We are not talking left wing. That is what the hon. gentleman does not understand. In labour negotiations we need fairness, we need a balance, we need to recognize that the rights of the workers should be protected. In this case the rights of the Canadian people must also be recognized.

We are seeing this increase in militancy. We see labour leaders saying they are going to defy this law. We see them saying they are going to block bridges, close airports and highways. I would say to those labour leaders that what they are saying is totally irresponsible.

It does no service to the fine tradition that exists in the labour movement in this country, a tradition which has involved the building blocks that have made our economy strong. No labour leader worth his salt has ever bankrupted the company in attempting to get a better contract for the worker. It is pretty fundamental and it makes no sense.

I call on the leaders in this labour dispute to calm their rhetoric and lead the men and women of the postal service back to work so we can have peace and harmony and labour relations in postal service.

There is some suggestion that we came upon this solution quickly and without a lot of thought. It could not be further from the truth. Last July the federal government involved federal conciliation officers in an attempt to resolve items of dispute. In October the federal government appointed a conciliation commissioner. The very word conciliation should send a message that says this government is trying to head off what we are facing today, that this government wants to conciliate between the members of the postal workers' union and the employer Canada Post to see if we can keep the mail going in this country.

The solution by the right wing extremists in this place and in this country would be to simply privatize things like Canada Post and CBC. We have a very unusual country, a country that needs the public service to deliver services to all Canadians with fairness and equity. We cannot simply leave that to the private sector. I have no difficulty, and in fact support very strongly, that certain competition be allowed whether it is in delivery of mail and we are seeing that. We see E-mail becoming a more important opportunity for people. We see couriers for businesses. Fundamentally, just like we need a strong CBC, we need a strong service to deliver the mail from sea to sea to sea. We do not need the simplistic black and white solutions we hear coming from members opposite.

We have attempted to conciliate this problem. The government appointed Mr. Marc Gravel who is a respected and neutral third party. He did his best but in the end he said that he could not find common ground, a solution. Even after that when the strike began the government appointed, I hope all members in this House would agree, a very distinguished Canadian, Mr. Warren Edmondson, on November 24. The government asked him to go the table to see if he could find some common ground. He was unable to do so. As a result, we wound up in a strike position.

What is the government to do? We have tried the conciliation process. We have tried to mediate this process with respected, talented Canadians being involved. The union leadership stands up, goes in a rant and leads everybody out on strike. I have talked to postal workers in my riding and they are saying, the men and women on the line, please legislate us back to work. It is Christmas time. They are worried about their families. They make a reasonably good living. Their wages start in the $17 an hour range and they go up from there to $17.41. They are not interested in being on the picket line at Christmas time unable to provide for their families.

It is not the rank and file we are seeing more and more in labour disputes who are leading the protest. It is the extreme comments from many of the union leaders. Yes, it is, I say to the members opposite.

I know a little of what I speak having been raised by a labour leader in this country. I was in Sudbury when the steel workers led a raid on Mine mill. At the time I was a 16 year old lad driving my dad up to Sudbury to lead the raid. I thought it was really neat. I thought we were hunting communists. That was the spin. We were going to Mine mill in Sudbury to get rid of all the commies. Do members know what we were hunting? We were hunting for more members. Do members know why? For dues. It was more money.

I can tell members right now that the union leadership in this dispute are talking about 4,000 jobs. Somebody do the math quick. At $50 a month in union dues, is that a lot of money or is that a lot of money? Money is power and power in this country in labour negotiations wins in the minds of the militant union leaders.

I would plead with the rank and file in this case to understand that just because the charities were used as examples and the small businesses, in fact it is the very men and women who union leaders would purport to protect who they are hurting by walking out and going on strike.

The big companies do not care. The big companies who those guys pretend they want to get at do not care because they have alternatives. They can use their own internal staff or couriers. They have alternatives. It is small business, charities and everyday men and women in this country who are being hurt. It is the obligation of this government to put an end to this particular strike.

I close by saying that I hope the rank and file will understand that we want to end this fairly and with a reasonable wage increase. We think this bill does that. We look forward to getting the mail going as quickly as possible in this country.

[Postal Services Continuation Act, 1997, December 2nd, 1997]

Madam Speaker, I would like to do something unusual in talking about this issue. I would like to actually talk about the bill that we are debating, to share some of the aspects of this bill and discuss why I think we are here.

Let me say right off the bat that the Reform Party did not invent what they refer to as final offer selection. They should not stand up here and try to lecture the government that they told us we should do that. Final offer selection is a process that has been around for some time. It allows for issues that are clear and definable to be put on the table by either side in a labour negotiation.

The difficulty with these negotiations is there are many issues that simply do not line up in a black and white manner. If we are simply talking about wage demands, then the labour union puts their contract offer on the table, the company puts theirs and the arbitrator selects one or the other. There is no in-between.

That is not the case when we are talking about defining postal routes, about defining methods of delivering the actual mail. Those are issues that require much more sophisticated negotiations.

I would agree, however, that final contract arbitration in matters that are clear and simple is an effective tool. It would require both parties to come to the table with their best, most reasonable offer which could often result in a settlement.

That is not the case here. In fact, Madam Speaker, ask yourself why are we here. Why are we seeing such a rise in the militancy of the labour movement? I would suggest that it is precisely because of the right wing agenda being promoted in this country by parties like the Reform Party or the Conservative Party, in particular in the province of Ontario.