Craig Scott

[Petitions, April 24th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to echo the petitions presented by my colleagues from Hamilton Mountain and Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing.

There is solidarity from the Toronto region with respect to the lowering of levels in the Great Lakes. Ontarian petitioners, including from Toronto, request that various ministers, Natural Resources, Environment, Fisheries and Oceans and Transport, work together to try to reverse the ongoing loss of water in the Great Lakes Basin, most especially in Lake Huron but throughout the Great Lakes.

[Combating Terrorism Act, April 22nd, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I would also like to add to the compliments that have been expressed. The hon. member almost always gives an extremely well thought out and carefully constructed speech, and I have to appreciate that.

However, I do have one concern. At a minimum, from the perspective of the Liberal Party being ostensibly concerned with charter rights, there is a bit of a contradiction. The recognizance with conditions provision was admitted by the government in committee to be something that can be applied to people who are in no way suspected of terrorist activity or potential terrorist activity. We tried to amend that, and the government said it wanted it to be that broad.

This has never been tested in the courts, so we cannot say that it might pass scrutiny, as is the case with investigative hearings. Therefore, I would like to know why the Liberal Party and my hon. colleague feel so certain that rights are not at issue with respect to the operation of that clause.

[Combating Terrorism Act, April 22nd, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to point out that the hon. member has stood several times today in debate to point out that the investigative hearings provisions under the old law were ruled by the Supreme Court of Canada not to violate the charter, but it is important to say that what this ignores is that Parliament has an independent duty to make its own judgment on whether human rights need more protection than the courts require. Courts always show some deference to Parliament, and their rulings, frankly, are floors and not ceilings for Parliament. That is why the NDP is still very concerned with these provisions.

The question that the hon. member keeps putting ignores that the recognizance with conditions provisions have never been validated by the courts. These provisions allow people to be jailed without trial for 12 months if they fail to conform to conditions, no legal aid is available if they are hauled in for a recognizance with conditions hearing, and, as I pointed out earlier and as my colleague from York South—Weston commented, perfectly innocent people can be subject to recognizance with conditions, people who have nothing to do with and are not even suspected of terrorist activity.

What I would like to know is whether the Liberal Party of Canada understands this feature of the bill and whether it supports this feature of the bill.

[Combating Terrorism Act, April 22nd, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for having spent a fair bit of time on an area that had NDP members leaving the committee after clause by clause quite shocked. We had attempted to propose an amendment that would make clear that anybody who was not suspected of being involved in or potentially involved in terrorist activity could not be subject to the recognizance with conditions regime. We wanted to make that clear, because we thought that the provision had been drafted badly. It turns out that is what the government wanted.

The parliamentary secretary said the following, which I am wondering if my colleague could comment on. She stated:

The recognizance with conditions in its present form would provide the potential for a recognizance with conditions to be imposed...[on a] person who would be subject to the recognizance with conditions [who] is not necessarily the person carrying out a terrorist activity. The proposed amendment [from the NDP] would seek to restrict the application of this measure....

Because that is inconsistent with the policy intent underpinning the provision, we are opposed to it.

I wanted to put on record what my colleague has been saying because many in the House might have thought this was a fanciful example of Uncle Albert. Maybe it is a stretch to think that anybody in Canada would do to Uncle Albert what my colleague suggested, but the possibility of that or other scenarios is very much what the government affirmed in committee.

I would like to know what my colleague thinks about that.

[Democratic Reform, April 18th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, we have gone from “in due course” to “in the near future” to “we will take the time to get it right”. The fact is, Conservatives have dragged their heels on giving Elections Canada the tools it needs to combat election fraud, just as their lawyer ran interference for months to prevent interviews of Conservatives by Elections Canada investigators.

On Tuesday the democratic reform minister said he would introduce legislation “on Thursday”. Today is Thursday, so could the minister please tell Canadians which Thursday he was talking about?

[Privilege, April 17th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to reinforce the points that were just made.

It has been reinforced many times that the normal procedure for a government bill, once placed on notice, is that the bill be kept confidential until introduced in Parliament. If what we heard is true, for a few select parliamentarians to be able to view the content of government bills prior to the rest of their colleagues in the House damages the integrity, the dignity and the authority of the House of Commons.

I do believe that there is a prima facie case of contempt of the House and breach of privileges, my privilege as the member for Toronto—Danforth, as well as the breach of privileges of all my colleagues in this House who have yet to see the contents of the aforementioned bill.

The reports that appeared earlier this afternoon, at 1:07 p.m. precisely, in an article by Steven Chase of The Globe and Mail, do suggest that certain members of the Conservative caucus had access to the content of this new bill, which is currently on the notice paper, prior to the rest of the members of this House.

Given the seriousness of the matter of prematurely disclosing the content of a bill, it is my duty as a member of Parliament to bring this question to the attention of the Chair and to this House at the earliest opportunity.

In that article, Steven Chase said that sources say Tory MPs, in the closed door meeting, “raised concerns” about how some sections of the bill were drafted and suggested rewrites.

The bill being mentioned, I should emphasize, if that is not clear, is the one that has been put on the notice paper yesterday by a minister of cabinet, the Minister of State for Democratic Reform, entitled “An act to enact the Canada political financing act and to amend the Canada Elections Act and other acts”.

The Globe article, by advancing that some MPs have expressed concerns about specific sections of the bill, clearly implies that those Conservative MPs have had access to a copy of the bill that is still on the notice paper and has yet to be introduced for first reading in this House. We will definitely need clarification on whether or not they have seen the text of the bill.

The question of the premature disclosure of a bill has been raised multiple times before this House. For instance, on March 14, 2001, the member for Provencher at the time, who is now the Minister of Public Safety, rose on a question of privilege regarding a briefing the Department of Justice held for members of the media where there was discussion regarding a bill not yet introduced in the House, Bill C-15 of the 37th Parliament, while denying access of the same information to all members of Parliament.

Speaker Milliken at the time ruled that this constituted a prima facie case of contempt. He said the following:

In preparing legislation, the government may wish to hold extensive consultations and such consultations may be held entirely at the government's discretion. However, with respect to material to be placed before parliament, the House must take precedence. Once a bill has been placed on notice, whether it has been presented in a different form to a different session of parliament has no bearing and the bill is considered a new matter. The convention of the confidentiality of bills on notice is necessary, not only so that members themselves may be well informed, but also because of the pre-eminent rule which the House plays and must play in the legislative affairs of the nation.

These were in the Debates of March 19, 2001.

In a similar case raised on October 2001, the member for West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast at the time rose on a question of privilege regarding Bill C-36 in the 37th Parliament, arguing that before the tabling of the bill the National Post newspaper had reported its content and indicated it had been briefed by officials from the Department of Justice.

On October 15, Speaker Milliken ruled there was a prima facie case of privilege, noting the matter was similar to the one I just discussed from March 2001.

In October 2009, the member for Joliette raised a question of privilege regarding Bill C-52, and again this question of privilege was validated by the Speaker.

Finally, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons rose on a question of privilege, in 2010, concerning the premature disclosure of a private member's bill, arguing that the member for St. Paul's had been given notice of a bill and then posted a copy of the draft on her website before it was read a first time in the House.

The matter was dropped when the member apologized, but the Speaker did remind members:

It is indisputable that it is a well-established practice and accepted convention that this House has the right of first access to the text of bills that it will consider.

Therefore, there is abundant precedent that establishes that a bill, once placed on notice, must be kept confidential until introduced in Parliament.

For a few selected parliamentarians to have been able to view the content of the bill in question today prior to the rest of their colleagues is unacceptable and seriously damages the integrity, dignity and authority of the House of Commons. I believe that this matter should not be taken lightly and should be referred to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs for a complete study.

I would add that it is all the more serious that the interventions within the Conservative caucus resulted in it being decided that the bill would not be tabled on the day the minister said it would be. That means that they have had an earlier vantage point on the bill than we have had. Under the minister's announced scheme, we would be debating this next Wednesday in the House. If he had not been convinced to pull it back, the members of the Conservative caucus would have seen it a week in advance of any attempt by our caucus to discuss the same bill. It is not just the fact that this was looked at today and withdrawn; it is the fact that had nothing occurred and the bill had gone forward, the Conservative caucus would have had a week's advantage.

[Business of Supply, April 16th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I would only say that the member's question was framed in such a way that basically does not need to be answered. It speaks for itself.

[Business of Supply, April 16th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I can only speak for myself. I am not aware of any particular NDP policy on the agricultural workers. I am completely in favour of that where there is a need. I am completely in favour of workers being treated humanely and virtually, as the form of the member's question might suggest, as members of the family on many of these farms. That is not at all where the problem lies.

I would add, though, that I very much believe these workers should have the right to be unionized and to bargain collectively. I am very disappointed that the Supreme Court of Canada upheld the Ontario government's refusal to do so in a recent case last year. I would very much be in favour of these agricultural workers and what jobs and Canada can do for them and their families, but they should be here with a full set of rights.

[Business of Supply, April 16th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, frankly, I am afraid I cannot answer the second question well, because I do not know what situations the hon. member is aware of. As a general premise, the fact that most employers are good employers and try to be good employers is probably a good place to start.

The fact is that we do not really know the way the system is being organized. The potential for abuse by employers to do what they might not otherwise do is there to a much greater extent than it should be. My colleague from Markham—Unionville just made a very similar point.

I would like to think that what the member has said is true and that it is by far the norm that there is no abuse. However, we very much need to double-check that in light of what we now know about the ways in which the system can be abused.

On labour mobility, and who can be against labour mobility, the fundamental component has to be worker choice and not coercion. The whole system is being built far too much around a lack of choice built in to the mobility policy.

[Business of Supply, April 16th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to say at the beginning that I will be sharing my time with my colleague, the hon. member for Saint-Lambert.

I should also say that I fully intend to support the resolution, its emphasis on abuses of the temporary foreign worker program, and abuse that amounts to threats to the well-being of Canadian workers and the Canadian economy. I can well support the premise along the lines of what some of my colleagues have already been arguing.

Frankly, I would like to speak about another form of abuse, the abuse of temporary foreign workers themselves and how that fits into the overall scheme of the concerns in the motion. The fact of the matter is that evidence is now suggesting that the temporary foreign worker program has been and is being used in a way that is bringing in temporary foreign workers to situations that place them in very vulnerable workplace environments. It is not being used in the way that was originally envisaged. It is not being used in a way that, for example, would be bringing in highly skilled workers where perhaps the abuse potential in their workplaces might be less than in other areas.

The Alberta Federation of Labour did some research for the period of April to December 2012 on labour market opinions. Out of 4,800 labour market opinions issued in that period, 2,400, fully half, 50% were for low skilled jobs. The extra abuse potential, with the problem of how the temporary foreign worker system is now working, is I hope obvious with that statistic.

The mere fact that the Royal Bank of Canada tried what it tried, and was given permission by the government to do what it tried, shows how the system can be used to gut existing jobs. Why would that be? That would be because existing jobs probably are staffed by people whose benefits and workplace conditions are somehow or other getting in the way of the corporate project. There is no other reason to think that RBC would be getting rid of 35 people, who already had the same jobs that they were going to be hired for, if it did not think it would get some benefits at the level of workplace conditions, salaries, etc.

I want to focus on proper compliance and enforcement issues, including the importance of working with the provinces to ensure that temporary foreign workers are not subjected to abuse in the workplace and also more broadly. On that point I will speak about the issue of deportation as well.

I am very privileged to be able to report that at the recent NDP convention this past weekend in Montreal, youth members of the Toronto—Danforth Riding Association proposed to the New Democratic Party to add a clause to the policy book on precisely the kind of issue that is raised by the motion today.

It was tabled, debated on the floor, and passed. It was introduced by a youth member of the NDP. It said, “Be it resolved that the following clause be added” to the NDP policy book to already eight clauses on temporary foreign workers. It read, “working with foreign embassies of sending countries to ensure temporary foreign workers coming to Canada are informed of their rights”, a concrete measure. Then, “working with the provinces to institute a licensing system for foreign recruiters (as is done in Manitoba)”. And “a registration system for employers of temporary foreign workers”. Finally it said, “providing access to federal hearings for temporary foreign workers who face deportation”.

This is now NDP policy, having been virtually unanimously, if not unanimously, voted by over 2,000 delegates at the NDP convention on Sunday.

Allow me with the same pride, as the MP for Toronto—Danforth and for the NDP youth, to refer to the introductory remarks made by Andre Fast on behalf of the riding association when introducing the motion. He wanted the 2,000 or so delegates to consider the following considerations. He told them that “many temporary foreign workers coming to Canada simply face exploitation of various forms. They are sometimes cheated by unscrupulous recruiters who make big promises they then do not deliver on. When the migrant workers get here, they are often, not always—there are many good employers, of course—they often face inadequate housing, inadequate training, and poor wages.”

He said, “Some migrant workers are often exposed to some of the most dangerous working conditions in Canada.” Frankly, the way this system works, in some cases that may be the reason they are being brought in. If they are injured on the job or if they complain about working conditions, it often results in their deportation. This suggests to me that quite often that very fact is the reason many temporary foreign workers refrain from complaining about their job conditions.

He said, “United Food and Commercial Workers, UFCW, has been doing tremendous work over the years to help these workers and our economy, but the government itself needs to do more to protect them.” Putting measures in place to ensure recruiters and employers of temporary workers can be held accountable will help protect them, such as the measures suggested and that are now part of the NDP policy. No worker should be injured on the job and then, as my colleague for Timmins—James Bay remarked, simply disposed of. This is why we also need “federal hearings for temporary foreign workers who face deportation”.

As New Democrats, we stood up on Sunday for the most vulnerable members of our society in adopting this resolution, and I have to say that I am very proud of the NDP youth who put forward this resolution at the convention. They seemed to understand the nature of this particular challenge far better than the Conservative government, which has been promising a review for some time. Not only have the Conservatives failed to keep that promise, they also are now continuing the abusive system that we have seen come to light in the last few weeks.

Manitoba has been governed for four successive terms by an NDP government. In April 2009, it introduced a system that is being used as the model in the motion just passed at the NDP convention. Manitoba's Worker Recruitment and Protection Act now has provisions and regulations that do a number of very important things which are needed across the country. This is why we need to have collaboration with the federal government in the nature of this temporary foreign worker program.

The first thing is that foreign worker recruitment agencies have to be registered and licensed by the province in order to do that recruitment. Second, they are prohibited from charging fees for the recruitment to the foreign workers themselves. Third, employers must register with the province, and that is not just the recruiters but the employers. Once they are registered, they can then work with the province to receive direct assistance benefiting from the province's network of international partnerships to source appropriate foreign workers in the right context. Finally, employers and recruitment agencies have to have detailed records about the place of employment, workers' duties, wages, and up-to-date contact information.

At the time that this was adopted, the president of the United Food and Commercial Workers, Wayne Hanley, said the following:

By keeping a registry of where these workers are, who recruited them and what they were promised when they were hired, you finally have a jurisdiction with the political will and regulations to penalize and weed out employers and recruiters who abuse foreign workers.

What is going on in Manitoba is a model of collaboration and co-operation between government, labour, and business, and we very much believe that the government side of this must be expanded. We need federal co-operation with the provinces to make sure this kind of scheme is rolled out across the country and for the kinds of contacts with foreign governments and embassies to make sure that workers come knowing that they do have rights and the ways in which they can go about seeking to enforce them.

Finally, I would like to end by saying that what we are seeing in the last few weeks coming to light again, and it was not as if it was not known more generally, is part of a bigger picture. This is not just about temporary foreign workers or that particular slice of our economy, but also about the organization of the entire economy and a particular ideology and set of attitudes that lie behind the way the Conservative government thinks about economics.

We are looking at a kind of “migrantization” of the economy. If we look at the unemployment insurance system and all of the recent so-called reforms, they are basically intended to create a more atomized society of workers who are forced to move further and further afield to find jobs of at least the same wage that they had before. They have to actually leave their region or go within an hour of where they used to work to receive any benefits. The way in which workers are being forced to think of themselves as completely mobile units to move around the country—be damned, so to speak, with respect to the effects on community and family—is part of the same picture.

I believe this motion deserves support. Its references to the abuse of the system and of Canadian workers are well-founded, but the abuse of temporary foreign workers themselves has to be built into our understanding of why we are voting for the motion.