Andrew Cash

[Petitions, October 8th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, the second petition pertains to the issue of precarious work in the GTA.

Right now, about 50% of all workers in Toronto cannot find a stable full-time job. This petition supports my private member's bill to institute a national urban worker strategy.

[Petitions, October 8th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I have two petitions to present to the House today.

In the first petition, the petitioners call on the government to intervene and stop the development of the Sarnia-Montreal Line 9 pipeline. They note that it goes through the most densely populated area of the country, that being Toronto. They also note that the energy transport company Enbridge has a poor record when it comes to pipeline safety.

[Military Contribution Against ISIL, October 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, first I have to take a step back and say that there is absolutely nothing consistent in the Liberal position on this conflict. The Liberals are making it up. They are saying, “What should we do? One day we're here. One day we're there.” However, we have been firm about our position. We do not support these military strikes.

With our amendments, we are trying to pull the government toward a more progressive, positive role in this conflict. The part of the amendment that the member is referring to calls upon the government to contribute to the fight against ISIL, including military support for the transportation of weapons for a period of up to three months, which is consistent with article 14 of the UN resolution, which talks about reinforcing the capacity of countries affected.

This is where we need to be clear. In the NDP we have consistently looked to international actions under the auspices of the UN. The UN had called for this in article 14, so we are responding to that call through the UN, which is what we always do.

[Military Contribution Against ISIL, October 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, the House has been seized with the issue of Syrian refugees. We cannot get a straight answer from the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration about why on earth it is taking Canada so long to settle 1,000 Syrian refugees.

There is a very simple answer to the question: the current government could redouble its efforts around refugee resettlement. That is one thing it had already committed to before it made this commitment. The reason that process has been so bogged down is the cuts made to the very people who process these applications. This is about priorities and it is also about efficiency.

If the government wants to take some direct measures to alleviate the misery, we can start by fulfilling the commitments we have already made and doing them promptly.

[Military Contribution Against ISIL, October 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, prior to question period I had been reading into the record some of the comments from people in my riding around the mission at hand, the decision by the government to send CF-18s and our Canadian troops to Iraq.

I just wanted to give the House, and read into the record, some of the examples of the concerns that are coming from Toronto, from my riding. Just in part, one constituent said, “We should be supporting refugee efforts. We should be offering humanitarian aid and support. Stop deploying our military and foreign affairs and bring our attention to the vast array of trouble right here at home: health care; housing; food supply and security; violence against women, particularly first nations women; destruction of science and muzzling of research communications; and a whole host of issues including climate change, rising tuition and minimum wage”.

This is not the only constituent who has raised the issue or made the links between the cost of this mission in dollar terms, what it costs to our international credibility, and what it costs in terms of what we can do domestically to be an example to the world of the kinds of democracy, peace, justice and fairness that we stand for.

It is often said, and it bears repeating today, that when we talk about programs that we think are important here in Canada, we always talk about how much they cost. We try to wring every penny of savings out of every program. What we have seen in Canadian society over time has been a squeezing of the middle class and the creation of a huge gap between the rich and the poor. We have seen otherwise middle-class families in cities such as Toronto spending close to a mortgage payment just to provide day care for their children. We have seniors living in poverty. We have a whole host of issues around youth unemployment. We have young people in Ontario graduating with up to $40,000 of debt. These are serious issues.

The reason I am bringing up these issues is that the Conservatives are constantly saying to us, “This will cost too much money to implement; we cannot implement this and we cannot implement that”. However, when we ask them for a dollar amount on this mission, they go silent. Suddenly, we cannot get answers. Suddenly, it is not proper. The Conservatives question our Canadianness in asking these very questions. These are questions that Canadians want answered.

We asked whether we offered air strikes or whether it was something that the U.S. government asked us. We got no answer. In fact, what the Conservatives try to do is belittle the question. It is not leadership on the global stage when we cannot get the kinds of answers that we need from the government.

We asked the Conservatives what the rules of engagement are and what the exit strategy is. These are important questions, especially given our recent history. The Afghanistan mission was supposed to be very limited. It was supposed to last only a few months and contain a very small number of Canadian men and women in uniform. We know what happened there. Gradually over time Canadians were asked to approve a more expanded mission and then at a certain point it was impossible to reel that in. This is part of our concern here today. Given the fact that the Conservatives are not answering questions, it only ratchets up the concern around mission creep and mission leap.

The Afghanistan mission produced around 40,000 veterans. We have battled with the current government ever since to hold its feet to the fire to properly take care of the brave men and women who went to Afghanistan and came back with a variety of needs that we are duty-bound to administer to.

We are not supporting the mission. We believe that Canada must have a real, robust international role, and that role is a humanitarian role. It is a significant role. It is one that the international community has looked historically to Canada to fill. It is one that the countries in the region have asked us to fulfill. That is the role that the NDP believes is the best course for Canada in this conflict.

[Citizenship and Immigration, October 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, the real question is this. Why does this minister consistently mislead Canadians about these numbers?

He knows that around 1,300 of the Syrian refugees were already here before the government made these commitments. He admitted this himself to The Globe and Mail in July: only 177 government-assisted and 108 privately sponsored refugees are here.

When will the minister stop playing games with numbers to hide his own failure? When will he act to speed up processing, including for privately-sponsored refugees?

[Citizenship and Immigration, October 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, last year the government committed to resettle 1,300 Syrian refugees by the end of 2014. In July, the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration said that Canada had only resettled 284, less than one-quarter of its total commitment. An internal report from Citizenship and Immigration reveals that Conservative cuts are preventing sponsorship applications from being processed.

When will the minister stop misleading Canadians about the numbers? What is he doing to get the other 1,000 Syrian refugees here in Canada?

[Military Contribution Against ISIL, October 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, as always it is an honour for me to rise in this place on behalf of the good people of Davenport in the great city of Toronto to debate the motion at hand, which is essentially the most important motion and the most important decision that Parliament is ever seized of, and that is to send Canadians to war.

The government would like us to believe that the only choices are its proposal, its motion, and inaction. However, I think there has been a healthy debate here today. What Canadians have heard is that it is not true. The response Canadians and Canada should make is far different than the response that the government is making and far different from the response the government wants Canadians to believe is the right way to go.

However, on some level what we perhaps also need to think about are the voices coming from our constituencies, what people are saying on the ground, and the concerns people are raising. I think I speak for many here.

I have received a steady stream of correspondence and concern. I thought it might be helpful to read a couple of the letters I have received into the record because it would help to frame this debate in a slightly different way. Oftentimes it is perceived that all we are doing is scoring partisan points in this place. In this particular instance, in this debate, I believe that is far from the case. It is a difference in values and of direction. I know that I stand here as part of a party, a caucus, that has a strong history of standing up for the cause of peace, for the cause of peace in Canada and globally. I am proud of that history. That is one of the reasons that I and no doubt my colleagues in the New Democratic Party are in this caucus.

I have a couple of letters I thought I would read into the record so that it is clear that our position is one that is not just part of our history but part of our job representing Canadians. Therefore, before we take a break to discuss these issues in a different kind of way during question period, I will read this into the record. It states, “As a Canadian citizen, I am one of the majority who oppose entering this conflict and want to maintain Canada's historic role as a peacekeeping nation. I believe strongly that Canada should not be entering the war in Iraq and sending 6 CF-18s and 600 personnel. This is a civil war and we have been asked for humanitarian aid, which we should supply”.

In other words, it is not that Canadians do not want to engage, it is how we engage. What the government is doing with the motion and this direction is pulling us out of our historical role and rules of engagement.

[Petitions, October 6th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of the constituents of Davenport with a very serious petition regarding the fact that up to 50% of workers in Toronto cannot find a full-time, permanent job. They are relegated to working multiple part-time jobs, freelance, self-employed, on contract, without any access to pension benefits or job security.

These petitioners want action from the federal government. They want the government to support a national urban workers strategy.

[Citizenship and Immigration, October 6th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, the minister has to stop making up his numbers and acknowledge his government's failure on the issue of Syrian refugees. After the government promised to bring in over 1,300 last year, an internal report from Citizenship and Immigration shows that only a few hundred have actually arrived in Canada. The Conservatives have cut staff and closed offices, thereby adding to the backlog.

Will the minister now keep his promise, live up to our international commitments, and bring these refugees to Canada now?