Bob Rae

[Budget Implementation Act, 2008, June 4th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, if we were to treat employment insurance as real insurance, what would that mean? It would mean that the workers who have the highest rate of unemployment would have to pay the highest premiums and that the industries that have the highest rate of unemployment would have to pay the highest premiums. It would be a complete disaster for working families across the country.

I do not know why the New Democratic Party and indeed many of my friends in the labour movement continue to persist in this notion that somehow the answer for everything is to get back to the idea of employment insurance being real insurance. They are not serving the interests of working families when they do that, because they do not understand that the experience ratings that would apply would absolutely clobber working families.

Ironically, it is the New Democratic Party that has contributed to one of the most inane aspects of Bill C-50, which is the creation of this crown corporation. The NDP members got their wish and they will come to regret it.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2008, June 4th, 2008]

It is not called the constitution. It is a ludicrous proposition. If we had that idea, we never would have had unemployment insurance and then employment insurance. We never would have had health insurance and health care and a national health care program. We would have had none of these programs. We never would have had Central Mortgage and House. We never would have had any of the institutions that have made a real difference in the lives of families.

Yes, I believe there is a role for the federal government in terms of providing leadership. I believe there is a role for provinces and for municipalities. The key challenge in the future of our country is how to make sure these governments can work effectively together. If they are captured and ensnared by the philosophy or the ideology of the Conservative Party of Canada, the condition of all the people in the country will deteriorate for sure. That is why I am so strongly opposed to it.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2008, June 4th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, I will try to focus on one aspect of the comments of the member opposite, because it is a real difference of opinion.

I spent 15 years in the provincial jurisdiction. I know pretty well what a provincial jurisdiction is all about. The key challenges we face in our country are areas where both the federal government and the province have to learn how to cooperate and work together.

Is the question of urban transportation a municipal issue, a provincial issue or a federal issue? It is all three. It requires the cooperation of all three levels of government. There are no watertight compartments. There are no firewalls between municipalities, provinces and the federal government.

The key challenge of governance today in Canada, and this is a real difference that we have with the Conservative Party because it has this very narrow, locked-in view of what the responsibility of one level of government is and of another and never the twain shall meet, and that is a ludicrous—

[Budget Implementation Act, 2008, June 4th, 2008]

I have livened them up. They are awake. They are alive, even at ten to six in the afternoon.

In a very direct way for members opposite, they will never get anywhere by running down the neighbourhood. They will never get anywhere by running down the place where they live. They will never get anywhere by running down the people who work hard.

I am proud to say that all of Canada is a good place to invest. I am proud to say that every province is a good place to invest. I will always say that whether I am in opposition or whether I am in government. Canada is the best place to live. Canada is the best place to invest. Canada is the best place to bring up children. Canada is the best place to be. Every province can claim the same thing.

We will never succeed as Canadians if we have the attitude that somehow when we get into office it simply becomes a chance for us to make partisan hay each and every day. That is what we see in the House of Commons every day. It is a sad thing.

I read the farewell speeches of the former member of Ottawa Centre, Ed Broadbent, and my predecessor, Bill Graham, who was the member for Toronto Centre. Both of them commented at the end of their time that they could not believe the lack of civility in the House of Commons and the way, from their experience, it had gone down.

I do not want to wait until I leave to make those remarks. If somebody asked me what the big difference between what life was like in the old days when I was first here and today, I would say it is the absolutely barbaric way in which debate takes place in the House of Commons. It is not a reasonable exchange. Every time someone asks a question, all the Conservatives say is the equivalent of “Your granny wears army boots”. That is the thoughtful response we get from the government each and every day, each and every step of the way.

We on this side have a principled difference with the government. We do not agree with its vision. We do not agree with its direction. We do not agree with its policies. We have a principled division, but that does not require us each and every day to simply refuse to answer questions or refuse to deal with the nature of the House.

I was on television today with a member of the Conservative Party who said the reason the Prime Minister would not appear before a committee was because he knew it would be a circus. What is he saying about Parliament? Parliament is a place where we are supposed to do the public business. Our committees are supposed to be the place where we do the public business. It is a sad commentary that this is what has happened to the institution which we are supposed to revere.

I disagree strongly with the comments that were made by the Minister of Finance because they are harmful to my province and to my country. I believe he should stand up and correct the record. I believe he should say that he may have differences from time to time with other governments, but he should never say that this is a bad place to invest or a bad place to do business.

We need to have that capacity as a public place in Parliament where we recognize that each and every one of us has limits to what we can and should say about other places and other members.

When I see the government in action, I see a government that is consumed by a partisan interest. It is a government that, in a sense, is still an opposition party that has suddenly found itself in government.

The Conservatives do not think like a government. They do not act like a government. They act like a group of people who have temporarily taken over the government and who cannot resist taking partisan, nasty, brutal shots at everything that gets in their way, whether it is a provincial premier or a mayor they do not like, or a member of the opposition they do not like. Whatever it is, they throw the ball and their heads to see how they respond.

Some of us who have been around can handle it and we will deal with it. However, we will continue to deal with it in a way that speaks profoundly to the need for us to share the great values we have as Canadians, the great values we see going forward and the great need for us to have a federal government that has the capacity to serve the interests of the entire country.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2008, June 4th, 2008]

Judging from the heckling from the member for Cambridge, they were made in a way that is shared by members opposite.

When we look at the conditions being faced in our manufacturing sector—

[Budget Implementation Act, 2008, June 4th, 2008]

A colleague across the way says, “Because he is honest”, so it was not a mistake. I heard the heckle and I am picking up on the heckle and saying that is what the Conservatives actually believe. The member for Cambridge is only endorsing those comments.

Cambridge is a key element in the manufacturing sector of Ontario and he has associated himself now with this epistle from St. James to the Oshawans, saying that the last place to invest is the province of Ontario.

I want to indicate to the members of the House what would happen if this were said about virtually any other part of the country, if a prime minister or a first minister said that about the province of New Brunswick, or the province of Newfoundland, or the province of Quebec, or any other province.

If that had been said about the province of Quebec, if the Minister of Finance had said that Quebec was the last place he would invest, there would have been an open and not-so-quiet revolution in Quebec. It would not have been a quiet revolution, but a real revolution, because people would not have accepted that.

On behalf of the people of Canada who live in Ontario, we do not accept being singled out by the Minister of Finance for opprobrium and attack and we do not accept that we are somehow second class citizens. For the Liberal Party, our Canada includes Ontario and Ontarians, and that is what we believe. We believe in that economy.

With the increase in the value of the dollar having gone up 50% in the last three or four years, with the impact of higher oil prices and higher energy prices, of course competitiveness has been affected in the province of Ontario. Much of our exports and our manufacturing has had the benefit of a truly competitive economy and now we are in a more difficult position.

This is not the moment for meanspirited partisan attacks. This is not the moment for the Minister of Finance, because the government of Ontario happens to be a Liberal government, which defeated the government of which he was a member, to suddenly turn around and attack not only that government, but attack the people of the province and the business climate of the province and hold out to foreign investors the idea that Ontario is a place where business should not be done. It is shameful.

Let me remind the House once again of the words of the epistle of St. James to the Oshawans, “If I was an investor, the last place I would invest is the province of Ontario”. It is shameful.

I can assure members opposite that those words will not be forgotten. Those words will not be lost in the course of a parliamentary debate, because those words were spoken aloud by the Minister of Finance in a deliberate way.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2008, June 4th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, I did want a chance to participate in this debate and appreciate very much the chance to do so in the 10 minutes available to me. Given your position in the chair, perhaps you will understand that the theme of my remarks is based upon the words of the epistle of St. James to Oshawans. In that epistle, he said, “If I was an investor, the last place I would invest is in the province of Ontario”.

In commenting on this text, it seems to me it is very important for us to keep coming back to the Minister of Finance and reminding him of these words, reminding him how damaging they are and how damaging it is to have a Minister of Finance launching an invective and an attack on a single province, which happens to be the heart of our manufacturing sector in Canada.

I am very proud to associate myself with the remarks of my colleagues from Scarborough and my good friend, the member for Charlottetown. The vision of Canada and of the federal government, which has been expressed by the member for Charlottetown, is a vision I share entirely.

We need to have a federal government that is capable of exercising leadership. We need to have a federal government that is capable of providing Canadians with a sense of hope and with a sense of opportunity. Instead we find a federal government with a very narrow view of its jurisdiction, with a very restrictive view of, first, what any government can do and, second, in particular what the federal government can do. I want to make it very clear that I reject that vision of the country and I think the majority of Canadians also reject it and do not want to see it.

However, we come back to these words. Why would a Minister of Finance say such a thing? Why would a federal minister, from Oshawa, say to his own people, to his own constituents, that the last place he would do business as an investor is in the province of Ontario?

[Foreign Affairs, June 4th, 2008]

For all I know, Mr. Speaker, at that time, the minister who just responded was in high school, pulling the wings off butterflies. We have no idea what he was really doing.

The government is trying to hide behind a libel suit. The government is trying to hide behind a libel chill. The Prime Minister is hiding behind the minister who is now being prompted by all the ministers around him.

Why will the government not let the Prime Minister of the country appear before a parliamentary committee?

[Foreign Affairs, June 4th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, everyone knows what I was doing in the past. I suspect that when I was—

[Foreign Affairs, June 4th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, just a few short years ago, the Prime Minister said in a throne speech:

No aspect of responsible government is more fundamental than having the trust of citizens....It is time for accountability.

Those are the words of the government. I think those thoughts are shared by a great many Canadians.

If it is time for accountability, why would the government be preventing the Prime Minister and the former minister of foreign affairs from appearing before a parliamentary committee that its task is directly to deal with this question?