David McGuinty

[Veterans Hiring Act, May 16th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I really appreciated my colleague's comments, particularly with respect to the rent problem. I have Canadians Forces Base Uplands in my riding, and I have heard from many families who are struggling under the weight of the rental problems that continue to go on and on.

However, I want to raise another important point. The government is taking a tepid but important step toward helping our veterans find meaningful employment. However, overseen by the President of the Treasury Board and the Minister of Foreign Affairs, who is regional minister for the national capital region, we have seen 30,000 to 50,000 jobs slashed—so many jobs slashed, in fact, that the outgoing Parliamentary Budget Officer was never given the information and was never able to expose for Canadians and veterans where all those cuts were taking place and what front-line services were being affected.

We are trying to reconcile that over here. On the one hand, the government says it wants to do something meaningful for our veterans, but on the other hand, surreptitiously and in the dark, it is slashing thousands of jobs. Just today another 100 to 300 jobs are being lost at Canada Post. It is an interesting question.

Finally, can the hon. member help us understand how it is possible that the government is going to take these very small steps involving very small funds when it spends $42 million a year on obscene economic action plan advertising in the middle of hockey playoffs?

[Employment, May 16th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, will we have true facts and true data from the party that killed the long form census?

Liberals have been calling for temporary foreign worker reforms for over a year. In fact, our leader has put forward five specific changes needed to fix the program.

Let me ask a really simple question. Will the minister commit now to disclosing the use of the temporary foreign workers program by region and by occupation?

[Employment, May 16th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, everyone from Don Drummond to the Auditor General to thousands of public servants agree that the government is not collecting the necessary information to determine the real needs of the labour market. Without reliable data, the government is simply making up policy on the fly. Then, when the Conservatives' bad policy inevitably leads to bad outcomes, they have another knee-jerk policy reaction.

There is no dispute that Conservatives prefer ideology over data, but would they not agree that it is time to give evidence-based policy-making a try?

[Employment, May 16th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, two years ago, the Conservatives said that paying temporary foreign workers up to 15% less than Canadians would help our economy. Last year, they said paying temporary foreign workers the same amount as Canadians would help our economy. Today, they are saying that requiring employers to pay higher wages to temporary foreign workers will help our economy.

When will the minister stop improvising and making decisions blindly ?

[Business of Supply, May 15th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I have a very important question for my colleague. I appreciate his comments, but I want to ask him about a pattern of conduct in the government with respect to crown corporations of this kind.

Five or six years ago, I began raising the spectre of the privatization of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, and the government scoffed. That was before it sold it off at fire-sale prices to SNC-Lavalin, and now it is privatizing the management of our isotope production facility in Chalk River.

A second crown corporation in play now is Canada Post. It has been seriously weakened. A plan was put out by the PMO and rubber-stamped by Canada Post. Third is VIA Rail, which was cut by 15% last year.

My question for the member is very simple. We appear to be on the slippery slope to the privatization of a number of crown corporations. Can he help us understand what his perspective is in this regard? I ask because my constituents in Ottawa South are furious about these cuts.

[Questions on the Order Paper, May 14th, 2014]

With regard to contracts under $10,000 granted by the National Capital Commission since January 1, 2013: what are the (a) vendors' names; (b) contracts' reference numbers; (c) dates of the contracts; (d) descriptions of the services provided; (e) delivery dates; (f) original contracts' values; and (g) final contracts' values if different from the original contracts' values?

[Questions on the Order Paper, May 14th, 2014]

With regard to contracts under $10,000 granted by Transport Canada since January 1, 2013: what are the (a) vendors' names; (b) contracts' reference numbers; (c) dates of the contracts; (d) descriptions of the services provided; (e) delivery dates; (f) original contracts' values; and (g) final contracts' values if different from the original contracts' values?

[Fair Elections Act, May 13th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague if he could help Canadians interpret what is going on with the government's approach to the bill, because weaving its way through the debate in terms of the tone and character from the government is what I think most Canadians would describe now as just simply meanness. I think it perhaps culminated or peaked when the minister responsible for this bill made specious and spurious allegations at the Senate, the other place, in committee, when he alleged that the head of Elections Canada was opposed to the bill because he was personally looking for more power and for more money.

For Canadians who are watching this, it is the tone of meanness that is, I think, now getting them very worried indeed about the bill. We have seen the pattern of conduct in other areas manifested by the government: other firings and pushing out of senior officers of Parliament, Linda Keen of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, and the former parliamentary budget officer; a recent attack on the Supreme Court of Canada chief justice; an attack on Sheila Fraser, the former auditor general of Canada; an attack last week on VIA Rail's outgoing president; and of course this ridiculous and unacceptable attack on Mr. Mayrand as head of Elections Canada.

Could he help us understand what it is at play here? What is it that motivates this regime to personalize its attacks when there are dissenting voices that speak truth to power?

[Fair Elections Act, May 13th, 2014]

That's not the answer and that's not the question.

[Fair Elections Act, May 13th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I have a very direct and specific question for the member.

Why does this bill not provide the Commissioner of Canada Elections with the power already held by the Commissioner of Competition under section 11 of the Competition Act; that is, the power to ask a judge to compel witnesses to testify in cases of electoral fraud? Why does this bill not contain the power already held by several provincial chief electoral officers or commissioners in New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, Alberta and Yukon? Internationally, other electoral management bodies have this very same power, such as Australia and the United States.

Without bobbing and weaving, without making up facts or inventing crises, can the member explain to his constituents of Richmond Hill why this is the only order of government in Canada right now that is preventing this power from going forward?