Chris Charlton

[CANADA-COLOMBIA FREE TRADE AGREEMENT IMPLEMENTATION ACT, June 11th, 2010]

Complete disdain for Parliament.

[CANADA-COLOMBIA FREE TRADE AGREEMENT IMPLEMENTATION ACT, June 11th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, I know the member for Elmwood—Transcona could have used another 20 or 30 minutes to put his case fully. Just like all the rest of us in the New Democratic Party, he feels very strongly about this issue. The fact that the debate is coming to an end today is profoundly disappointing to all of us, especially since the end is coming as a result of a time allocation motion. We are not even allowed to fully debate this issue in the House. However, I will ask the member one brief question.

I was surprised that in my home town of Hamilton, some of the biggest proponents of putting an end to this Canada-Colombia free trade agreement were people affiliated with the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace. They saw a critical nexus between this issue and their advocacy for corporate social responsibility, particularly in the global south.

I want to commend some people for their work on that issue. Father Ted Slaman, in particular, was a prime mover of the petition campaign and card campaign that was launched in our community. People like Rita Dugas and Kathy Somers were instrumental as were students at Catholic high schools right across my riding. In particular, I single out St. Jean de Brébeuf high school. Students there care passionately. They believe this is an issue of fundamental human rights. It is an issue of corporate social responsibility.

Could the member address those concerns?

[Income Tax Act, June 11th, 2010]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-534, An Act to amend the Income Tax Act (in-home care of relative).

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House today to introduce legislation that was first brought to my attention by good friend, Judy Wasylycia-Leis, the former MP for Winnipeg North, who, along with her adviser, Chuck Brabazon, did all the heavy lifting to make the bill's tabling possible today.

I am proud to stand on their shoulders and sponsor this initiative through the legislative process because it will make a profoundly positive difference for the thousands of Canadians who are the primary caregivers for their spouses.

Let us look at the bill. My bill would bolster the family income of persons living with disabilities by extending the caregiver tax credit to the spouses of persons with disabilities. It is outrageous that spouses are excluded from a tax credit for which almost every conceivable relative of a person living with disabilities can apply, including a child, grandchild, brother, sister, niece, nephew, aunt, uncle, parent or grandparent. Not included is the one person who is most likely to provide care on an ongoing basis, the spouse. That is patently unfair and undervalues the caregiving that spouses provide every day of every week of every year.

A quarter of Canadians provide informal care to a family member or friend with a serious health problem every year. More than 75% of these caregivers are women. The Canadian Caregivers Association estimates that caregivers contribute $5 billion of unpaid labour per year to the health care system, which represents an enormous savings to federal and provincial governments.

Making spouses eligible for the caregiver amount is a small step forward. It will send a strong signal that the federal government recognizes the exceptional contribution that spouses make as caregivers and provide a new support for them to help a loved one who is in need of care to live with dignity and as much independence as possible.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Pensions, June 11th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, tax cuts do not help seniors in poverty. Those seniors are not paying taxes. Canadian workers and failing or bankrupt companies like Nortel and many others need action to protect their pensions. Just last year the underfunded pension plan for CHTV employees in Hamilton wound up with an $8 million shortfall, this, while the executives at CanWest were given $41 million to top up their underfunded pension plan before entering CCAA protection.

New Democrats have legislation before the House to protect employee pensions of companies in trouble. Will the government join us in passing our bill and protect Canadian workers by putting them--

[Pensions, June 11th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, a year ago, the House unanimously adopted an NDP motion calling for the government to allow Canadians to increase their CPP contributions. The government finally appears to have gotten the message, but what is missing from its plans is any effort to lift seniors out of poverty by increasing the guaranteed income supplement. The finance minister does not need the provinces to do that.

If the government is willing to throw more than $1 billion at the fake lake summit, then why will it not invest a mere $700 million to lift seniors out of poverty?

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, June 9th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, I did not quite realize how important it was to the member for Kings—Hants to put on the record that it was actually Chrétien's relationship with President Bush that started the free trade agreement, but I am certainly happy to confirm that. Yes, absolutely, we will set that record straight.

I am also sure that organizations like the steelworkers and the CLC will be delighted to know about the member's support for this free trade agreement.

There are a couple of other things. With respect to the letters he claims to have gotten from the Democrats and Republicans in support of this free trade agreement, I know there were also letters in opposition to the free trade agreement. While it may be right that the ILO is investigating the situation in Colombia right now, I am not sure that that investigation has come to a close.

I hope that clarifies things.

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, June 9th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, it is difficult to take that question seriously when he says that New Democrats do not represent rural Canada.

Has the member actually looked at a map of this country? I would encourage him to have this conversation with the member for Western Arctic. He should have a look at the map and see how much of Canada we actually represent. He should have a look at northern Ontario. All of those seats are NDP seats. Please, have another look at the map.

With respect to the member's question, we know that exports have actually gone down after we have signed free trade agreements so this agreement is not going to help the farmers in the member's riding. Moreover, if the member is so absolutely certain that this free trade deal has nothing but benefits on all of the points that I raised, then why is he so afraid of putting this deal to an independent assessment before it is ratified and implemented?

I would encourage the member to do that. The member should stand up and say that he is willing to do that if he is so certain he is making legitimate points in this House.

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, June 9th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, I have spoken in opposition to the Canada-Colombia free trade agreement on numerous occasions in the House. I am delighted that, through the incredible leadership of my NDP colleague, the member for Burnaby—New Westminster, we so far have been able to stop this bill from becoming law. Now the government is shutting down debate through a draconian time allocation motion because it knows it cannot win its bill on its merits.

While I still can, let me explain again why we feel so strongly about this ill-conceived trade deal. In fact, in the roughly 10 minutes that I have to participate in today's debate, I will give 10 reasons why the Canada-Colombia trade deal should be scrapped.

First, Colombia is still the most dangerous country in the world for unionized workers. More labour leaders are killed in Colombia every year than in the rest of the world combined. Trade unionists are terrorized to put a chill on union organizing. This keeps unions weak and wages miserably low. It benefits businesses' bottom line and keeps Colombia attractive for foreign investment.

Who is being targeted? The prime targets are activists who are trying to organize or join a union and bargain collectively or who are engaged in industrial disputes or in fighting privatization. They are teachers, prison guards, agricultural, food and health care workers and others from almost every sector. Who is killing these union organizers? Most of the murders are committed by paramilitary death squads. Paramilitaries are illegal armies that fund their operations through Colombia's illegal drug trade and illegal contributions from some companies like Chiquita Brands International. The paras have been classified as a terrorist organization by the Canadian government, along with other armed groups, such as the FARC leftist guerrillas.

The second reason is that Colombian labour law is simply not up to ILO snuff. A union-busting culture dominates Colombian society. Colombia's labour laws stifle unions and workers' rights. Recently, in order to show it is doing something positive, the Colombian government passed two labour code reforms, one on the right to strike and one on “associative labour cooperatives”, but even with recent changes, they still do not come close to International Labour Organization minimum standards.

Colombian workers face huge legal and bureaucratic obstacles to register a union and to bargain collectively. Some say it is easier to form an armed group than a trade union in Colombia. These anti-union laws, plus the violence and terror directed at unionized workers, have helped keep Colombia's rate of unionization at less than 5%. With its huge informal sector and high unemployment rate, which is officially over 11%, it means that only one in every 100 workers can negotiate a collective agreement, the lowest of any country in the western hemisphere.

Third, there seems to be impunity for the killers in Colombia. Not enough is being done to bring them to justice. Very few of the crimes against unionized workers and other civilians have been investigated. Even fewer of those responsible have been convicted. This is called impunity. The victims are often accused of being guerrilla sympathizers. Their murders are then not questioned. Ninety-seven per cent of the murders of union activists remain unsolved.

That brings me to the fourth reason. Simply put, no justice, no peace. The government insists that it has demobilized the paramilitaries so that they are no longer a threat. Under a program called the justice and peace law, paramilitary combatants were supposed to hand in their arms and admit to their crimes in exchange for reduced sentences, but thousands of the demobilized have simply walked away from the program and formed new, deadly groups, like the Black Eagles, who terrorize the poor and anyone who dares to dissent from Uribe's security plan. The Black Eagles even sent a nasty threat to the Canadian embassy in Bogota. This is a far cry from Colombian's demands for a process that exposes the truth of paramilitary crimes, delivers justice and ensures reparations to the victims.

Reason number five is the shocking government ties to paramilitaries. Today, 62 mafia-like ex-paramilitary drug trafficking criminal networks control economic activities and political institutions in 23 of Colombia's 31 provinces.

Violence and insecurity prevail in the countryside. Colombia's independent supreme court, one of the country's few bright spots these days, has launched a series of groundbreaking investigations into paramilitary presence in the Colombian congress. More than 60 congress members from Uribe's coalition, 20% of the congress, are being investigated for crimes like collaboration with paramilitaries, getting rich from drug trafficking and collusion in election fraud. Thirty of them have been indicted.

That leads to reason number six. The army and the government are implicated in crimes against humanity. In a suspicious move in August 2008, Uribe extradited 14 jailed paramilitary bosses to the United States on drug trafficking charges, a much lesser crime than their crimes against humanity. These criminals are now conveniently out of the way of supreme court investigations into their links with Uribe's and his officials' involvement in atrocities. The International Criminal Court of the Hague is looking into these events.

In November 2008, the world was outraged to learn that 27 high-ranking army officers were accused of a horrifying crime known as false positives. This involves the soldiers kidnapping and executing innocent civilians, dressing them as FARC guerrillas and claiming they were killed in combat. This practice developed in response to President Uribe's demands for results in fighting the FARC insurgents and offers of bonuses based on a body count. These revelations are just the tip of the iceberg in a series of charges of army involvement with executions, extortion, ties to drug traffickers and other crimes against humanity.

It is no wonder then, and this is the seventh reason, that diverse Colombian peoples are vehemently opposed to this trade deal. Colombia's unions have said no to the NAFTA model because it will cause more unemployment, poverty and hunger. Signing a free trade deal with Uribe will signal that state terrorism and killing trade unionists is okay.

Colombia's paramilitary opposition, the Alternative Democratic Pole, or PDA, opposes free trade because it will annex the economy to multinational corporations. For example, it will provide new land grabs for Canadian mining companies that get powerful new rights but not responsibilities. The Association of Indigenous Councils of Northern Cauca carried out a popular referendum in 2005 in which 98% said no to free trade. In October 2008, tens of thousands of people protested the free trade model, linking it to the death of mother earth.

This brings me to reason number eight. More trade and investment will hurt, not help, human rights. Independent human rights organizations, such as Human Rights Watch and others, warn that this deal could actually undermine the struggle for democracy in Colombia. Without international pressure, the Colombian government will have no incentive to make improvements in human rights.

The ninth reason for opposing this deal is that Canada's own parliamentary trade committee said that human rights must come first. In 2008, Parliament's Standing Committee on International Trade undertook an in-depth study called “Human Rights, the Environment and Free Trade with Colombia”. Committee members even went on an official mission to Bogota to hear first-hand what people thought. The international trade committee report said:

The Committee recommends that an independent, impartial, and comprehensive human rights impact assessment should be carried out by a competent body, which is subject to levels of independent scrutiny and validation; the recommendations of this assessment should be addressed before Canada considers signing, ratifying and implementing an agreement with Colombia.

Last, we come to reason number 10, specifically for my colleagues across the way, who first introduced this bill solely to support the international efforts of George Bush. Well, there is a new president south of the border and Barack Obama says yes to workers' rights. There is no way that this trade deal will pass south of the border anytime soon.

Let us do the right thing here in Canada, too. Let us put human rights before free trade and carry out an independent assessment of human rights violations in Colombia before ratifying and implementing this deal.

[Status of Women, June 9th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, I want to commend the Social Planning & Research Council of Hamilton for continuing its important work of tracking and reporting on the basic indicators for women's progress.

The council's most recent report confirms that women in Hamilton still earn significantly less than men. In fact, they only make 73% of men's total income.

However, the picture of poverty in our city is multi-faceted. Single women, visible minority women, newcomer women and aboriginal women have especially high rates of poverty, pointing to the fact that women's poverty is not equally distributed in our community.

Among women who work full time, 7% are earning wages so low that they are still poor. There are more than 4,000 working poor women in Hamilton, and the general poverty rate for women is 20%, significantly higher than the provincial average of 16%.

For senior women, the picture is especially bleak. Older women are more than twice as likely to be living in poverty as older men, and the poverty rate for single female seniors is much higher than for the general population of women 65 years of age and older.

It does not have to be this way. It is time to heed the advice from the UN, whose recent report showed that electing more gender-balanced legislatures leads to policies that improve women's lives. Clearly--

[Jobs and Economic Growth Act, June 8th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, as I said in my speech, I of course agree. The road down to privatization of Canada Post should never have been in the budget bill. Twice before we have seen this in the House as stand-alone bills. That was an appropriate way to present the matter to this House. Of course the opposition rallied. We made sure that those two bills did not pass, but that too is a part of democracy.

The member for Elmwood--Transcona is also right that basically, the Liberals sold out the workers at Canada Post. Last night we had an opportunity in this House to delete the sections of the budget bill that dealt with Canada Post. We had that opportunity. Unfortunately the Liberals voted with the government so the sections remain in the budget bill.

I find one thing absolutely incredible about that. I have been in this House listening to speeches about the budget at second reading. We have been at committee with the bill. We are now here at third reading. I have heard Liberal member after Liberal member get up and say, “We care passionately about protecting Canada Post. We are with you, CUPW. You can count on us”, and last night, when they had the opportunity to show which side they were on, what did they do? They voted with the government. They sold out the workers at Canada Post and they led us down the path of privatization of Canada Post.

It was an absolute disgrace and I was ashamed on their behalf last night in this House.