Chris Charlton

[Budget Implementation Act, 2007, June 11th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I was delighted to hear what the member for Winnipeg North had to say about the plight of seniors. She is absolutely right that this budget did absolutely nothing for the people who built our country.

She pointed out how quick the government is to try to recover money from seniors. If we look at today's Ottawa Sun, the headline is about the government trying to get money back from pensioners. The article states in part:

The federal government is working to recover more than $7 million in public pension overpayments....

The department has appointed a special team to manually review the...files in an effort to recover all the cash.

We have raised in the House over and over again that seniors were shortchanged between 2001 and 2006 as a result of a miscalculation in the consumer price index. Seniors are owed, by our estimates, about $1 billion and by the government's own estimates, perhaps as high as $3 billion.

I wonder if through the hearings in the finance committee, the member got any sense at all about when it is the government is going to stand up for seniors, do right by them and make sure that they are reimbursed the money owed to them.

[Petitions, June 11th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I am starting to get embarrassed by having to rise yet again to table three more petitions on the urgent need for this House to pass my bill, Bill C-390, which would allow tradespeople and indentured apprentices to deduct travel and accommodation expenses from their taxable incomes so they can secure and maintain employment at construction sites that are more than 80 kilometres from their homes.

At a time when communities like Hamilton have lost over 11,000 jobs in the manufacturing sector, it is essential that the government take concrete action to assist workers in securing decent-paying jobs.

It makes no sense for tradespeople to be out of work in one area of the country while another region suffers from temporary skilled labour shortages simply because the cost of travelling is too high.

Hundreds of workers from Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, Alberta and British Columbia have signed these petitions. All they are asking for from their government is a little bit of fairness. Surely they deserve that much.

[Petitions, June 11th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to table another two petitions today that arise out of my national campaign to fight for fairness for ordinary Canadians, in particular for seniors who were shortchanged by their government as a result of an error in calculating the rate of inflation. The government has acknowledged the mistake made by Statistics Canada but is refusing to take any remedial action.

The petitioners call upon Parliament to take full responsibility for this error which negatively impacted their incomes from 2001 to 2006 and to take the required steps to repay every Canadian who has been shortchanged by a government program because of the miscalculation of the CPI.

It is a privilege to table these petitions on their behalf.

[Manufacturing Industry, June 11th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, in question period I recently challenged the government to act on real solutions to stem the flood of job losses in the manufacturing sector; 11,000 in Hamilton alone and over one-quarter million nationwide.

The minister's answer was, in essence, that he was “taking care of business”. That line has not made workers happy since Bachman-Turner Overdrive took that song to the top of the charts in 1974.

Working families deserve more than song and dance from their government. It is time for government to be at the table when companies like Stelco in Hamilton contemplate mergers, partnerships, acquisitions or sales.

The government needs to ensure that no action is taken on the backs of workers and retirees. It is time to stand up for working families, demand that collective agreements be respected, ensure that all pension and benefit obligations for active and retired workers are honoured and ensure that jobs will be protected.

Workers need those decent paying jobs to sustain their families, small businesses need them to stay afloat and our city needs them for the tax base that supports community centres, hospitals and schools.

During the election, the Prime Minister promised he would stand up for Canada. The time to deliver is now.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2007, June 11th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I will be very brief because I am so surprised that I am actually in agreement with something that one of the government cabinet ministers would say that I really do not quite know what to do. I am in agreement that the Liberal record is not actually anything to crow about.

In particular, I want to take the member back to Bill C-55. I have spoken in the House about how the manufacturing sector in my community is being decimated and I will talk about that again later when I get my own turn to speak. Members will recall that we hoped that at a minimum the Liberal government would address wage and pension protections in cases where companies went bankrupt.

The member will want to speak about the Liberal government's record some more, but the Liberals introduced Bill C-55. The bill did not do enough on pensions but at least the Liberals started to move forward on wage protection. That bill passed through the House. It passed through the Senate. It received royal assent, but when push came to shove, that bill was never proclaimed. Once again the Liberal government let down workers right across the country.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2007, June 11th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I was really impressed by the breadth of my colleague's knowledge about the impact of this budget on his home province of British Columbia and on his own riding.

My home riding is Hamilton Mountain in Ontario. Our province has been absolutely decimated by the loss of manufacturing sector jobs. In my home town alone, 11,000 of those jobs have been lost.

When people look to this budget and to the government, they want real help. What they had hoped for, at a minimum, was some real investment in employment insurance and some real access to retraining so they could get jobs in new fields because the manufacturing sector is being decimated in part because of the trade policies that were started under former Conservative prime minister, Brian Mulroney, but the same environment exists now for trade and for the economy in this country today.

I know the member does not have the same manufacturing base that I have in my riding but I would think that issues like EI and retraining would be equally important to the forestry sector. He has been an eloquent spokesperson against the softwood sellout that was so readily supported by other parties in the House but which has devastated many workers and their families in my colleague's province.

I just wonder whether my colleague could comment on whether he is getting the same groundswell of outcry because the government failed to do anything for working families in this country.

[Petitions, June 6th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I am also pleased to table another petition today calling on this House to adopt the NDP's Bill C-394, the once in a lifetime bill. This petition was circulated by the Philippino community in my home town of Hamilton.

All of the petitioners agree that family reunification must be a key component of a fair immigration policy. The current family class rules, as we all well know, are too restrictive and mean that many close relatives are not eligible to come to Canada.

The petitioners are asking Parliament to ensure, by passing Bill C-394, that Canadian citizens and landed immigrants are given the once in a lifetime opportunity to sponsor a family member from outside the current family class as it is currently defined in the Immigration Refugee Protection Act, so that they may be reunited with loved ones from around the world.

It has been my privilege to work with the Philippino community in Hamilton to bring this petition forward on their behalf today.

[Petitions, June 6th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I have two petitions to table in the House today. The first petition is on behalf of over 100 members of the Polish community in Hamilton and all of their friends.

Poland is a free, democratic and proud country within the European Union. As a member of the EU, Poland uses all of the same secure passport identification that other EU countries use, including biometric passport technology. In light of those circumstances, it is bizarre that people coming to Canada from Poland still need a visitor's visa.

Why do we not lift the visitor visa requirements, so that we can increase family visitation, tourism, cultural exchanges and trade missions? That is exactly what the petitioners are asking from the Parliament of Canada. I am delighted to promote their call for action by tabling this petition on their behalf today.

[Concession Street Business Improvement Association, June 4th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, in my riding there is an eclectic group of 120 shops and services located on the top of the Niagara Escarpment above the centre of Hamilton. Together, they are the Concession Street Business Improvement Association, the oldest business community on the Mountain.

At its physical centre are the Henderson Hospital and the Juravinski Cancer Centre, whose amazing health care professionals, staff and volunteers make a profound contribution to the quality of life in our city.

However, at the heart of the street are the small business owners and their employees who have created a strong commercial district with a very special touch that gives it a small town feel and makes it a place where neighbours meet.

One cannot live on the Mountain and not know about Streetfest and Cornfest. This year marks Concession Street's 100th anniversary and, thanks to the BIA and the Hamilton Mountain Heritage Society, the centennial was marked with a historically based theatrical production by Ronald MacDonald.

I had the privilege of seeing the play and loved it. Based on a book by Robert Williamson, we took a trip down memory lane that connected our past to the present and reconfirmed our commitment to build Concession Street for generations yet to come.

I thank the board, members of the BIA and all the family and friends of the Concession Street community for creating this memorable centenary celebration. Everyone knows that small businesses are the engine of our economy but on the Mountain they define our very sense of community.

[Manufacturing Industry, May 29th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, that answer is cold comfort to the men who have to go home to their families tonight and tell them that dad has lost his job.

Thousands of unemployed workers are facing uncertain futures. It is time to put these working families first. Will the minister begin by telling the workers of Hamilton Specialty Bar today that they will have adequate EI benefits and retraining? Will he tell them that bankruptcy laws will be changed so that wages and pensions are protected? Will he tell them that he will not accept the decline of decent paying jobs as simply being inevitable? Will he at least tell them that?