France Bonsant

[Employment Insurance, March 18th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, for some time now, relatives of victims of crime have been asking for the right to collect EI benefits during their recovery. Compared to the Conservatives' bill, the Bloc Québécois bill is more generous and further ahead in the legislative process. Moreover, the Bloc bill is supported by the association founded by Senator Boisvenu.

If the government really cares about helping the families of victims of crime, why is it refusing to get behind the Bloc Québécois bill?

[La Tribune Newspaper, March 16th, 2010]

Madam Speaker, La Tribune, which was founded by Jacob Nicol in 1910, is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year. That is 100 years of quality articles, faithfully covering the news in the Eastern Townships and Centre-du-Québec region.

To celebrate this occasion, management of the newspaper organized a major event at the Université de Sherbrooke cultural centre with 1,300 invited guests. I would like to congratulate Maurice Cloutier, editor, Louise Boisvert, president and editor, all of the journalists who were named ambassadors of the Mérite estrien, as well as everyone who helped make this evening a historic event.

The secret of La Tribune is that it has always operated with the same passion. The journalists and employees care about developing the community and about the well-being of the people who live there.

Happy anniversary to La Tribune. I wish it continued success.

[Business of Supply, March 16th, 2010]

Madam Speaker, I have been here since 10:00 this morning, and I keep hearing the same old thing.

I will repeat something else. First, affordable housing is for people who do not have money. In addition, the federal government never gave the $3 billion to our seniors. I am talking about the guaranteed income supplement. They have selective memory.

The Bloc Québécois proposed an end to tax avoidance, but the government prefers to turn a blind eye to help banks. Tax avoidance is all over.

In this budget, there is absolutely nothing for women. In regards to court challenges to help women defend themselves, there was a recent debate with a union representing women, and now the union will be penalized $50,000 per day if it goes to court to fight for equality.

Of the 12 committees on status of women, 10 have been shut down. The government would have us believe that Quebec is benefiting here. That would surprise me.

It is rather difficult for some people here to defend the Quebec nation. When the Conservatives talk about defending a united Canada, I would say that it is a Canada united against the Quebec nation.

[Business of Supply, March 16th, 2010]

Madam Speaker, to begin with, I would like to say that I will be sharing my time with my colleague from Richmond—Arthabaska.

It is with great disappointment for Quebec that I address this House today. After the reading of the Speech from the Throne and the budget, I am not surprised to see that this government has, once again, abandoned the Quebec nation. Once again, we must face the facts: federalism does not benefit Quebec.

The Reform Conservatives do not even bother anymore to try to meet Quebec's demands. Quebeckers are, once again, well aware of the fact that freedom and independence are the only solutions and that Quebec does not belong in a federation that does just ignores it.

Ten minutes is a very short time to list all the measures that cannot be found in the budget. There is nothing for the most vulnerable classes of society. There is nothing for the transfer of amounts to which Quebec is fully entitled. There is nothing either for the environment, women, culture, nor for the forestry and aerospace industries in Quebec.

The main characteristics of this budget are the gifts, the nice surprises and the goodies for western oil companies and Ontario's automobile industry. In other words, we are trying to rob Quebec to pay Ontario and western Canada. It is as though the federal government had organized a big party only for Ontario and a few western provinces. Quebec, in particular, is simply tossed aside.

As you know, British Columbia has received 1.6 billion dollars to harmonize its sales tax with the GST. As for Ontario, it has received 4.3 billion dollars, almost three times as much.

At the other end, neither the Speech from the Throne nor the budget mention any compensation for harmonizing Quebec's sales tax with the GST and this has been the case since 1997. Along with the Government of Quebec, the Bloc Québécois has been demanding for a while that the federal government give Quebec the 2.2 billion dollars that are rightfully his. In fact, 2.2 billion dollars is slightly above the amount offered to British Columbia, but half as high as that offered to Ontario. Another gift for Ontario and western Canada; and nothing at all for Quebec.

A few weeks before the recession, the Minister of Finance et the Prime Minister were highly optimistic when they said that Canada would not experience an economic crisis. However, reality has quickly caught up with them and they were forced to face the facts.

The forestry sector in Quebec has been particularly affected by this crisis. In my constituency of Compton—Stanstead alone, a number of sawmills have gone out of business. Among other mills, I might mention Labranche and Paul Vallée. These two major employers in St-Isidore-de-Clifton have had to close their doors. The economy of that small town has been significantly affected.

For several years, the Bloc Québécois has constantly proposed appropriate and specific measures to assist the forestry industry. In May 2009, for example, we were proud to put forward a series of concrete proposals that the federal government could easily have embraced. I could specifically mention the creation of a credit facility for the forest industry, a one-stop shop that would have provided loans and loan guarantees to companies in the sector. I could also mention the bill granting tax credits to young graduates settling in a resource region. But naturally, these measures were dismissed out of hand by these Conservative Reformers who prefer to put industries in a pecking order where only those who can offer them the most political capital are treated with generosity.

I would remind the House, for instance, that the Ontario automotive industry received $9.7 billion during the economic crisis. The oil industry in Alberta was granted major tax cuts with no conditions whatsoever. By comparison, the Quebec forestry industry received peanuts, only $170 million. That is about 60 times less than Ontario received for its automobile companies. Sixty times less, it is absurd. It means 11,329 people laid off in Quebec. Is this what open federalism is all about?

As deputy critic, I feel compelled to point out the budget's shortcomings in agriculture and agri-food.

In 2007, that industry generated $18.9 billion in added value for Quebec, a total of 6% of Quebec's GDP. That same year, almost 175,000 jobs were created as the result of agricultural production and the processing of agricultural products.

In the regions of Quebec, agriculture is a vital part of the economy. Abandoning it would be a disaster for our rural areas. For the umpteenth time, the government is showing that it does not care.

The Canadian Federation of Agriculture declared that it was “disappointed at the lack of new money and initiatives announced for the agri-food sector in the federal budget“. According to the Union des producteurs agricoles, the real needs of producers across Canada are in the order of $1 billion annually, yet a mere $500 million over five years are allocated to the sector. That boils down to $100 million instead of $1 billion a year. With the exception of this timid, miserly initiative and a sprinkling of photo-ops here and there, agriculture once again is the victim of the Conservatives' draconian measures. But, of course, the Ontario automotive industry and big oil, they do just fine.

The list is impressive and I could keep going for hours. We need only think of the billions of dollars associated with the changes to the equalization formula and the transfer payments that were unilaterally cut in the past. We can also think about the more than $400 million that has still not been refunded to Hydro-Québec by the federal government after the ice storm disaster in 1998.

And I am not talking about the needs of seniors, who are once again completely shut out by the Reform Conservatives. In addition to announcing a review of the pension system in the spring, they are simply ignoring the need to improve employment insurance and the guaranteed income supplement, in spite of the fact that there has been a unanimous motion of the National Assembly calling for this. Once again, these fine Reform Conservatives are turning a blind eye to a measure on which there is consensus in Quebec. This government obviously prefers to preserve the banks and tax havens rather than respond to the crying needs of seniors. The same is true for the homeless and social housing. The Prime Minister prefers to act as if those problems did not exist; his conscience is clearer that way.

The Conservative government is still refusing to pay Quebeckers the money that is owing to them. There is nothing in the Speech from the Throne or the budget that persuades us otherwise.

The evidence is unequivocal. In a recent survey, a large majority of Quebeckers said they were dissatisfied with the last federal budget. This is hardly surprising. In fact, there is only one thing in the budget for Quebec: business as usual.

In the same survey, two thirds of Quebeckers said that prorogation was unjustified. Imagine, to bring forth this budget, the economic bright lights in the government had to close down Parliament for two months, two months during which the Conservative reformers promised anyone who would listen that they would be coming back with new ideas, with a plan, with concrete actions to benefit the people of Quebec. The people who are still hoping for something from this government were disappointed to learn that there was nothing.

To conclude, I cannot help but think about victims of crime and their families. These Conservative reformers keep hammering at the message that they care about victims. In fact, they are too busy trying to fill our prisons with underage children to think about supporting the families of victims.

All the Conservatives have for victims is $6.6 million over two years. That is $3.3 million that Quebeckers and the residents of the provinces of Canada will have to fight over every year.

The government also says that it wants to facilitate access to special benefits for workers who have lost a family member. They are already entitled to those benefits. So again, there is nothing new, and nothing concrete. There are only false promises and old stuff.

The budget and the throne speech very definitely confirm that the Quebec nation will always be the loser as long as it is part of the Canadian federation. Only sovereignty for Quebec can get us out of this stagnation. I therefore invite everyone in this House to vote for the Bloc Québécois motion.

[Business of Supply, March 16th, 2010]

Madam Speaker, I would like to know what my learned colleague thinks. There is absolutely nothing for women in this budget. I think Canadian women were only mentioned once. The Conservatives chose not to reinstate the court challenges program. They closed 10 of the 12 Status of Women Canada offices.

I would like to hear what my colleague has to say about that.

[Petitions, March 16th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, my second petition today calls on the government to maintain the moratorium on rural post office closures. These signatures reflect the concern of citizens from Ayer's Cliff and Sainte-Catherine-de-Hatley, two municipalities located in my riding, about the phasing out of public services in rural areas.

Their frustration is justified and understandable, because postal services are basic services that ensure the survival of our small towns. These 400 signatures are in addition to those already submitted by my Bloc Québécois colleagues. The government needs to pay attention now.

[Petitions, March 16th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, once again, I am presenting a petition in this House that calls for the passage of my Bill C-343, which helps victims of crime and their families by reducing the qualifying period for employment insurance and allowing the families of victims to take time off work and keep their job for an indeterminate period of time.

These 170 signatures, in addition to all the others, show that citizens are concerned about the plight of victims' families and that they want the government to act as quickly as possible.

[Interparliamentary Delegations, March 16th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 34(1), I have the honour to present to the House, in both official languages, the report of the Canadian delegation of the Canadian Group of the Inter-Parliamentary Union, respecting its participation at the Parliamentary Panel within the Framework of the WTO Public Forum 2009 and the 19th Session of the Steering Committee of the Parliamentary Conference on the World Trade Organization (WTO), held in Geneva, Switzerland, on September 30 and October 1, 2009.

Pursuant to Standing Order 34(1), I also have the honour to present to the House, in both official languages, the report of the Canadian delegation of the Canadian Group of the Inter-Parliamentary Union, respecting its participation at the Parliamentary Meeting on the Occasion of the 53rd Session of the Commission on the Status of Women, entitled “The Role of Parliaments in Promoting Equal Sharing of Responsibilities between Women and Men”, held in New York, United States, on March 4, 2009.

[Business of Supply, March 15th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her position.

In our ridings, we have all received ten percenters from the Reformers, as I still like to call them. Although no longer called Reformers, the Conservatives have the same Reform mentality. Only the colour of their tie has changed.

People in my riding have written to tell me that they are shocked by this waste of money. Furthermore, they reply to these ten percenters, incurring further costs not included in the $10 million.

I would like to hear what my colleague, as a representative of the Bloc Québécois, has to say about the abuse of ten percenters.

[Petitions, March 9th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, I am tabling in this House a petition that calls for the adoption of my bill, Bill C-343, which would allow victims of crime and their families to receive their fair share of employment insurance. This petition was signed by more than 800 people in my riding and from across Quebec.

These signatures show that citizens are concerned about the plight of victims' families and that they want the government to act as quickly as possible.