Charlie Angus

[Restoring Mail Delivery for Canadians Act, June 24th, 2011]

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, what happened was that my hon. colleague requested to hear the question. Because of the heckling and shouting from the Conservatives, she was not able to hear the question, so she said, “Can I hear the question?”

[Restoring Mail Delivery for Canadians Act, June 24th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I have been in the House for most of the last day and much of last night. I have heard from both sides and I hear one common element, which is the importance of getting the mail service back and the importance of ensuring that average Canadians, senior citizens and small businesses are not impacted. That should be our primary goal here.

To get through this, we can throw rocks at each other for days. I think the government understands that we are serious about fairness. However, we both have to look at the issue of compromise in order to put senior citizens and small businesses first.

I ask my hon. colleague, because of his experience, if he thinks that it would be fairly straightforward for the Prime Minister to take out the clause that forces wages down in the back to work legislation. Could he take that out, call on Canada Post to unlock the doors and send both parties to mediation and arbitration?

This could be settled immediately. I think it is incumbent upon us to show Canadians that in this 41st Parliament we could actually get something done for the good of the people of Canada.

[Restoring Mail Delivery for Canadians Act, June 24th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Your ruling this morning really set the tone for this debate. Some of the members might not have been there but we need to reflect on the role that we are playing in this as people are watching.

I would ask, Mr. Speaker, that you ask members to settle down. We need to have a civilized debate. I was very impressed with your ruling this morning.

[Restoring Mail Delivery for Canadians Act, June 24th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, we have made an offer to the government to settle this. I am not trying to freeze the Liberal Party out of this whatsoever. We are trying to act in good faith with the government. We have offered the amendments. We have offered not to go public with them. We want to see if the government will sit down and negotiate. That is how it is done.

We are serious about getting this situation settled. We know everybody wants their mail service back. This manufactured crisis by the Conservative Party has an impact on Canadians across the country. We think it is completely unacceptable that the government has held senior citizens hostage when the mail servers said that they would ensure that any cheques for seniors would be delivered. They made that offer. Once again, the Conservatives are not talking to the people on the lines. We have been talking to them. We know what their offers are. We know what the issues are. We are offering as the official opposition to make this happen. We just need to see that the government is actually willing to stop holding the Canadian public hostage.

[Restoring Mail Delivery for Canadians Act, June 24th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the minister's argument and it seemed to get rather convoluted. At one point he said that great stress has been caused to business. Yes, of course. That was caused by his government's decision to lock out the workers.

How much more direct do we have to be? Do we in the New Democratic Party want the workers back at work? We want them back now. This is why we have said let us just sit down and deal with these amendments, but the government does not want to do that.

Then the minister presented a circular Conservative argument saying that they, as in Captain Canada and the Conservative Party, represent Canada. They do not represent Canada. He accused the New Democratic Party of not representing Canada. Why do the Conservatives not do the right thing?

I say to the member that I do represent Canadians. I represent the people of Timmins—James Bay and I will be in this House for as long as it will take to ensure that people get a fair deal.

[Restoring Mail Delivery for Canadians Act, June 24th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I am honoured to rise in this House representing the people of Timmins—James Bay who, over the last century, have fought many of the key labour battles that have allowed us the standard of living we enjoy today and who are watching with great concern. I have received emails from people across the region who have been watching a concerted attack against a way of life that has been built in this country thanks to working people standing together.

What we need to do here today is to deconstruct the stage play that has been set up by the PMO and the Conservative Party. This is one of their careful little stage plays were the world is in black and white and there is good versus evil, and Captain Canada over on the Conservative benches is going to rise up and squash the union bosses and the socialists. We hear such language from the back benches of the Conservative Party.

How was this stage play created? There was an ongoing labour dispute with Canada Post and CUPW. Certainly in the Conservative mind, beating up on posties is probably an okay because they think there is a collective memory of a time of great labour conflict. They keeping saying that the sides have never been able to get together. In fact, look at the last time: It was in 1997 when we had to order them back to work. Then my wonderful daughter, Margaret Lola, was not even born and now she is in high school. So this is not an ongoing crisis; it is a breakdown of discussions. Then the government intervened and locked out Canada Post.

We have an unprecedented situation where, in a fragile economy, the government is working with Canada Post to shut down the mail service of the country. That has allowed them to stand up and to say that we have a crisis and that they have been forced to act. It is a manufactured crisis. It is an old tactic of the Conservatives. John Snobelen, the leader of the Mike Harris gang, used to speak about how one has to manufacture a crisis in order to shake things up.

They shut down the postal service across the country. Then the Conservatives have come into this House dressed as Captain Canada, vowing they are going to defend the interests of the senior citizens they have cut off, that they are going to defend the small businesses they have cut off. They create this as an us versus them battle.

It was interesting last night to listen to the Minister of Labour, because she kept trying to confuse the Canadian public that the Conservatives had to intervene because it was a strike. She said the word again and again. It is a misrepresentation, because it is a lockout.

She said the government was not taking sides. Of course, we know what side the government has been on.

When the leader of our party said that we could settle this, that we were speaking with the union and that we were willing to bring forward amendments to make this work, there was laugher and ridicule from the Conservative benches that we would have a phone line to the union workers of this country. Of course, we have a phone line to them because that is how one gets things done in the country. In the New Democratic Party, we believe one should talk and not demonize.

I find it astounding that the Minister of Labour would ridicule the idea of actually talking to the other side. That is what we have been doing. We have offered amendments and offered to work with this government. We have not heard anything back from them except vitriol.

The Minister of Labour defended this. Wearing her Captain Canada logo, the minister said that the Conservatives represented 33 million people. It is an absurd claim that the Conservatives make that they represent all Canadians versus only 40,000 union members. What does that attitude represent, but a narrow mentality that the big get to crush the small.

If we went by that theory, we could undermine all manner of things in this country. That is the Conservative mentality. That is the stage play they are creating, whereas New Democrats do not believe in pitting people against each other or using the politics of division.

Unfortunately, it is not all that surprising, because we need to see the author of this stage play. I would like to quote the voice of someone who is well-known in this House, who said:

In terms of the unemployed, of which we have over a million-and-a-half, don't feel particularly bad for many of these people.

Who was that? That was the Prime Minister of our country.

He said that when he decided he did not like federal politics. He had better things to do. He quit his job as a member of Parliament, which some people might not remember, and he went to work for the National Citizens Coalition. He thought they had a better agenda than could be achieved in the House of Commons.

I was looking at the platform the current Prime Minister ran on in 1997 with the National Citizens Coalition. One point was to start attacking the interest groups such as women's organizations and human rights organizations. We sure saw how the Conservatives put the boots to KAIROS. It goes right back to the original plan. Another one was to launch a media attack against unions. We could hear it from the backbenchers. They would go on about those big bad union bosses. That was there in 1997 when the Prime Minister was running the rabble at the National Citizens Coalition.

There are some other interesting things he ran on. These are the key reasons he left Parliament. One was to set up a lobby campaign to bring in right to work legislation in Alberta. The second was the privatization and elimination of the public service. The third and most crucial one which he ran on with some of his now elected buddies was a campaign to de-unionize the workforce.

When Conservatives say they are not picking sides, we know exactly what they are doing. This has been a manufactured stage play by the extreme right in this country and a Prime Minister who said that he did not care about the fate of the unemployed. He said that in 1997. We know that a leopard never changes its spots.

I would like to indicate how this demonization has occurred under the Conservative government.

I heard the member for Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound yesterday. The Conservatives are creating all these emails and saying that they are talking to the common people, madam and monsieur citizen. The member said his people back home say that if people starting in the workforce get $12 an hour and three days a week, they should be tickled pink.

I have talked to many people in my riding and across the country. I have never had senior citizens come up to me and say they are ticked pink that their adult son or daughter was getting $12 an hour with no pension and three days of work a week. They are lucky to have a job; that is the attitude. I have never heard that.

What I have heard is people asking about what has happened to our country. The pension and workforce that have been built up are being eroded. The workforce is being turned into a temp service. By intervening and creating this lockout, the government is creating a two-tiered workforce. It says that the new workers do not deserve pensions, that they deserve lower wages. My hon. colleague from Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound said they should be lucky to have a job.

I know what it is like to see communities fight to get basic wages. My grandmother told me that when she was a little girl she saw the first form of lockout and back to work legislation. It was called the army. My grandmother was a young girl when Winston Churchill sent in the army against the dockworkers of Dundee. She never forgot that.

Of course, they moved into the velvet over the brass knuckles. When my family came to Canada my grandmother was in the Hollinger mine strike that went on for six months. At that time the average life expectancy of a Timmins miner was 41 years because minders were dying of silicosis. At that time there was no eight-hour workday. They fought for the eight-hour workday. It was not given to anyone. This is something they built up.

I remember the stories of men like “Big” Jim McGuire of the Western Federation of Miners. He said that when a man gets injured in the mines, there should be compensation. The records show that the Conservatives at Queen's Park at the time laughed and ridiculed him. Their grandsons and granddaughters are here today laughing at us because we have said there is a fundamental principle here. If the Conservatives want to make this a stage play, well this is their play.

The New Democrats have said again and again that we want the locks off Canada Post. We want people back to work. We want a fair negotiated agreement. This takes good will. We have offered to work with the government. We have offered to help bring the union to the table if the government is willing to listen. However, it is not going to happen if the government ridicules the notion of actually talking to the union, if it tries to demonize them as union bosses, and if the members of the government believe that people making 12 bucks an hour for three days a week should be happy to have a job. That might be the Conservative ideology, but it is not ours.

The Conservatives say they will not take sides, but look at Nortel. Look at the Nortel workers who lost their jobs and their pensions. Look at the sick workers whose benefits were cut off and the government did nothing. Every other western nation that was involved in Nortel stood up for their workers. The government did nothing, but--

[Restoring Mail Delivery for Canadians Act, June 24th, 2011]

Sorry, Mr. Speaker. I was not allowed to finish because of the interruptions.

I would ask my hon. colleague to do the right thing and retract that rather low-class comment. If he wants to make derogatory comments, he can go out to the washroom or get on the bus. He can use many places to make derogatory comments, but this is the House of Commons. He needs to have a certain decorum in debate.

[Restoring Mail Delivery for Canadians Act, June 24th, 2011]

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, I think people would agree that was a really low-class statement that is not befitting of the kind of debate we have in the House. If the member wants to engage—

[Restoring Mail Delivery for Canadians Act, June 24th, 2011]

Madam Speaker, I am sure my hon. colleague is well meaning in his question. What concerns me is if we are going to have fair bargaining, and we are attempting to bargain with the government, then we would be undermining our ability to build trust with the government by asking our members to reveal what those negotiations are.

[Restoring Mail Delivery for Canadians Act, June 24th, 2011]

Madam Speaker, I would like to remind my colleagues in the House that it was a certain member who said, in Montreal in 1997, “In terms of the unemployed of which we have over 1.5 million, don't feel particularly bad for these people”. Who said that? It was our present Prime Minister who quit his job as a member of this House because he felt he would better serve at the National Citizens Coalition where he ran the campaign to deunionize Canadian workforces.

We see the Conservatives today pretending they have the interests of the workers in hand. We have the old crocodile who has dressed himself as Little Bo Peep, and he has his bonnet pulled down over his snout to try to hide his true intention. However, if we pull the bonnet back, we will see the same dismissive attitude and the same arrogance against common working people on these benches today that we heard in 1997.

I would like to ask my hon. colleague what she thinks about the Prime Minister's dismissive attitude towards working people.