Francesco Sorbara

[Budget Implementation Act, 2018, No. 2, November 29th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for Louis-Hébert for his intervention and speech.

Through Bill C-86, we are making ongoing investments in the economy, in middle-class Canadians and in those working hard to join them. As well, the investments in our recent 2018 fall economic statement will help businesses and individuals in his wonderful riding of Louis-Hébert. Perhaps he could he expand on that.

[General Motors Plant Closure, November 26th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, we have a very integrated supply chain. When a vehicle is made in Canada, it will cross the border between Canada and the United States several times before it is finished. The tariffs are impacting both sides of the border. Just as much as they are impacting us, the tariffs are, unfortunately, impacting many American businesses. The decision that was made by General Motors had nothing to do with the tariffs that were put in place at all. We know that. In this morning's conference call with the GM CEO, we know that sides have to produce an explanation. The retaliatory tariffs or the initial tariffs had nothing to do with any of these types of decisions. A company bases its decision on a long-term plan of product cadence and product portfolio and this would not enter into that calculation at all.

[General Motors Plant Closure, November 26th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, when we became government, we had an auto innovation fund which we transformed so we could make direct investments to auto parts suppliers and the OEMs, and we have done that. The hon. member for Durham should know that. We have created literally tens of thousands of jobs, direct and indirect, with that plan. Second, just recently we introduced the accelerated capital cost allowance, which allows for the immediate expensing of investments. On the accelerated investment income, we have tripled the rate to invest and get returns, which will be another great thing for manufacturers.

The one salient point the hon. member for Durham misses is that these assembly plants are based on a product cadence, which is determined by each of the individual automotive manufacturers. It is up to each of the individual private companies to determine that. General Motors has made a strategic decision to determine that. If anything changes between now and next year, that will be wonderful, but we need to be realistic. I do not believe in the pie in the sky and I do not believe in being Pollyannaish. We need to deal with the situation at hand, support the workers, support their families and move forward. If there is a solution, great, but let us make sure these workers know a brighter future awaits them and that their government has their backs.

[General Motors Plant Closure, November 26th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, obviously it is a little melancholy to rise to speak about something that will impact a lot of families in a specific region of Canada, Oshawa, families who want to have better futures for their children, want to see a better day when they wake up and whose careers have been altered by today's announcement.

It goes without saying, and we have all commented tonight about how deeply saddened and concerned we are about General Motors' overnight announcement and this morning's confirmation that it would be shutting down a number of facilities in North America and one in Korea. The automotive parts sector and manufacturing industry is close to my heart.

In my riding last week, I spent a considerable amount of time with the CEO and president of Martinrea, Rob Wildeboer. We toured the oil field facility in my riding, which employs about 550 people in good, middle-class jobs. In talking to some of the folks who work there, I could just imagine, and in some ways just try to empathize with, what the folks in Oshawa are going through in finding out that their jobs will most likely not be there in a few months. It is devastating, and we always need to think about that.

Under the leadership of the Prime Minister, our government has been a big supporter of the automotive industry. Last year, he came to my riding and visited an auto parts facility owned by The Woodbridge Group. We spent some time there talking to some of the employees. We could see the diversity that Canada is about, and how the people there go to work with pride, much like the pride demonstrated day in, day out for the last 100 years by the folks who work at the Oshawa facility.

In the time I covered the auto sector, both at a credit rating agency and later at a bond desk, year in, year out the Oshawa facility was rated as one of the most efficient facilities and as producing one of the highest quality products. J.D. Power gives annual rankings, and the Oshawa facility would always come out on top. Unfortunately, we know some of those products were recently taken out of Oshawa, which is what we call “product cadence”, and production volumes over the years have declined. It was something I was very cognizant of.

However, my conversation last week with the CEO of Martinrea affirmed to me that there is a future for the automotive industry in Canada, and that our government is providing the right policies and regulatory environment and support. Rob praised our negotiating team for the recent USMCA. He worked very closely with our team, and he praised the minister of global affairs for the job the team had done. That was something I took back and was very proud of. I spent several hours with him and his team at Alfield, which supplies the General Motors facility in Ingersoll, Ontario. Actually, my wife and I drive a Chevrolet Equinox, and that is where that vehicle was made. I am proud to drive that very good quality vehicle.

as I said, our government has been unwavering in its support for the automotive industry since 2015. A number of my colleagues have commented on that today, and I would like to re-emphasize that our government has invested $389 million, leveraging $4.1 billion in investments, in the sector, leading to a total investment of $5.6 billion. Our strategy continues to do that.

What we must understand is that the automotive sector, much like a lot of industries these days, is transforming itself. We need to make sure we are focused on the importance of a policy of moving up the value-added production chain, whether it is electric or autonomous vehicles. Our government is there with investments in skills training. The GM facility in Markham is hiring literally hundreds of engineers.

Earlier today, I also had an opportunity speak on another matter, Bill C-86. I mentioned that Canadians are bold and tough people, who expect the same thing their government. They expect us to be bold, tough and decisive. One thing I know I have learned since I have been here is that our government will have the backs of these employees, that they can rest assured of that. We will have the backs of the automotive industry.

In the time I spent covering the auto sector, I had the opportunity to travel to BMW in Munich and to Würzburg, as well as to Volkswagen, and over to Asia and, obviously, to Detroit. They were the big three at the time, which has since changed because it used to be DaimlerChrysler, which is now FCA, and Ford and General Motors.

The industry has changed a lot. The 2008-09 crisis taught us that we need to work together. The provincial government worked alongside the federal government, two different parties, to save those jobs, to save the supply chain, which was the right decision.

If we fast forward to today, our government continues to ensure that key investments are made and that the regulatory environment is favourable for manufacturing here in Ontario and across Canada from coast to coast to coast.

Our government's strategy leverage is to have a broad array of policies intended to support innovation, enhance manufacturing competitiveness and secure investment through a comprehensive approach, including support for auto innovation programs such as the industrial research assistance program, tax incentives through the scientific research and experimental development tax credit and the ACCA allowance for manufacturing.

I would like to speak to that because we did introduce our 2018 fall economic statement last week. I am a pro-business MP from a riding that is very entrepreneurial, with a number of head offices located in it. Magna is located not too far away. Martinrea is about a kilometre from my constituency office. Some of the largest entrepreneurs in the county live and work and employ tens of thousands of Canadians not only in my riding, but also tens of thousands of Canadians across North America.

It was great to see our government put in an accelerated capital cost allowance, the annual incentive for investment.

One thing that we have committed to is skills training and making sure that every Canadian has a career and finds his or her fullest potential. We will do that with these employees in Oshawa. We will ensure that they have a brighter future for their families.

Transition is tough. I grew up in what was basically a one or two industry town in northern British Columbia. My father worked in a pulp mill. Just before he retired the pulp mill closed down, the company went bankrupt, and the pulp mill is no more. It was Redpath Industries.

I can empathize on a personal level with what some of the families are going through this evening and will go through in the following months. It is tough to go through transition, because there are a lot of questions that have to be answered and bills to be paid.

Our government will be there. We have a great Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development, and a Prime Minister who knows the sector. He recently visited FCA's facilities in Windsor. As I said, he came to my humble riding of Vaughan—Woodbridge and visited the wonderful people who work at the Woodbridge Group there, a plant that has been there since just before the Great Depression. The plant's history is phenomenal.

I have believed in the sector for a long time. I have covered it and met with many industry leaders, from CEOs down to treasurers. I can still remember the conversations about how great the industry was to operate in Canada, our highly skilled labour force, the quality of our supply chains, the tool and dye makers all over southwestern Ontario into central Toronto. We need to remember that.

We can look at other industries worldwide that have gone through similar transformations, whether the steel industry in Pittsburgh or industries in Cleveland, where tens of thousands of people were once employed. We have had to change and transform. This sector is to a certain extent like that.

We need to be at the forefront, and our government is at the forefront by investing in skills training, making investments and partnering in autonomous vehicles. We have had some success with Honda, Toyota, Ford, and other OEMs and General Motors, especially in Ingersoll and its other facility. We will continue to do that.

With respect to Oshawa, we will make sure that we have the employees back. We will make sure that we can do something. We will look at all options. These folks are skilled and talented. They have a future. We are doing the right things to ensure that manufacturing in Canada, especially highly value-added manufacturing, remains robust. That is what we are seeing.

I hear it everyday when I speak to stakeholders in my riding, whether it is Vision, Vision Products or Martinrea and Kisko. I could name about 20 or 30 of them that operate in my riding and that are doing very well and are proud to be Canadian and to continue to invest in Canada.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2018, No. 2, November 26th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for that very important question, because ensuring equal pay for equal work is a human rights issue, and our government is addressing it. We are not only addressing it with pay equity legislation contained in the BIA, but we are also addressing it using gender-based analysis when we do our budget. We are also addressing it when we improve EI benefits on parental sharing.

It is not just one measure; it is a number of measures. Currently the ratio is about 88.5¢ for every dollar. We need to close that gap and make sure that women in this country are paid the same, equal value for equal work. We are moving that way.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2018, No. 2, November 26th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan for his thoughts. He and I actually co-chair the Canada-Holy See Parliamentary Friendship Group. The big message from Pope Francis in a number of his speeches and homilies is for social justice. With that, social justice is helping the poor and helping refugees, helping those less fortunate. That is what is contained in our poverty reduction targets. That is what I would answer to my colleague.

The things we are doing with the national housing strategy, cutting taxes for nine million Canadians and setting targets are things that we need to do as a government. Again, Canadians expect an ambitious government. They are ambitious. We need to act in the same way. Our targets for poverty reduction are bold.

I am glad the member's daughter is a great drawer. I have two daughters and they draw a lot as well.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2018, No. 2, November 26th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, it is great to be here this morning to speak at the report stage of Bill C-86.

We heard the news this morning with respect to General Motors, and the workers and their families are in our thoughts. Our government will do everything we can to support them during this period.

Canadians are an ambitious lot and they expect the same from their government. They expect us to be ambitious. They expect us to be bold. They expect us to be trailblazers. In this globally competitive world in which we work, operate and compete, we know that Canadians can compete and succeed globally, which is what they are doing. We also know that our strong economic performance is not only about a strong economic record of performance; it is also about ensuring that all Canadians benefit from strong economic growth. Yes, our government has been bold on pursuing policies that will ensure a robust and strong future for our economy and our workers and help those middle-class Canadians working hard and those who wish to join the middle class and are working hard, but also to ensure that all Canadians benefit. That is what our government has been about since we were elected in October 2015.

In Bill C-86, our poverty reduction targets are one of the things that defines this government. First, we are aiming to reduce poverty levels to 20% below the 2015 level by 2020 and to 50% below the 2015 level by 2030. That is ambitious. We put out a policy paper on that, “Canada’s First Poverty Reduction Strategy: Opportunity For All”, which I looked at over the weekend. That paper is telling of what our government's values are and the values for Canadians and how we are going to lift up Canadians, but we are also going to ensure that those people who take risks are rewarded.

Corporations are enjoying after-tax profit levels that can be measured by margins at a very high level. They are doing well. Wage growth has rebounded from the previous government's era of policies that basically led to stagnation. Employees are doing well. Workers are doing well. That is what our government is about.

Since 2016, the Canada child benefit has provided an extra $25 billion to families in Canada over five years. The guaranteed income supplement provides $647 million or roughly $3 billion or $4 billion over a couple of years, helping 900,000 single seniors across Canada, our most vulnerable, and lifting hundreds of thousands of them out of poverty. The Canada workers benefit provides $3 billion over five years, lifting 70,000 Canadians out of poverty and helping two million Canadians from coast to coast to coast who are working hard. For someone earning approximately $15,000, that is an extra $500 a year. Those are our policies. That is our values statement on where our government is taking this country.

In 2017, we had 3% economic growth and this year it is around 2% and change. We are going the right way. Recently, the Governor of the Bank of Canada was at the finance committee, a committee which I have the pleasure of sitting on. He stated that our economy is chugging along nicely, benefiting from strong export growth and good business investment levels. We have seen that, and we should be proud of that.

Bill C-86 also introduces a number of measures that will benefit my kids in the future. There is pay equity legislation to ensure equal value for equal work. That would benefit women. My two daughters at home will know that the work they do will be rewarded the same as other work. That is very important and should be applauded. We have said that the ministry for women is a full ministry getting full resources. Again, we must reduce and remove structural barriers that women face in this country. We must also help other countries pursue those endeavours, because we know that for Canada and Canada's economy to truly succeed, all Canadians must be full participants. That includes under-represented groups and all Canadians.

I am proud of Bill C-86. There is a lot in it. There is a lot we went through during committee. There is a lot that will strengthen our foundational economy and move us forward. We will do it in a very measured, prudent way.

As many members know, and many of my colleagues have repeated a few times, I spent approximately 22 years in the global financial markets in New York City and Toronto. I was a credit rating analyst which basically means I looked up the ratings of corporations and sovereigns. Canada's AAA rating is thanks to former finance minister Paul Martin. It has been that since our government many years ago. We will maintain our fiscal anchor, our fiscal target and the targeted debt-to-GDP ratio is going to decline. It is going to hit about 28.5% in the 2023-24 period. Again, we are undertaking measures that will strengthen our economy, help the middle class, help those Canadians wishing to join the middle class. We will do it in a measured, prudent manner. That is what we see in many of the measures in Bill C-86.

One of the things that is emphasized by economists is this thing called the labour force participation rate. We see now in Canada looking at working age Canadians, 15-year-olds to 64-year-olds, we are at the highest rate of labour force participation in our history. Why is that? Yes, we have created 550,000 jobs in Canada, a majority of them full time and a majority of them in the private sector. I say “we” very humbly because it is risk-takers across the country, entrepreneurs, small business owners like the ones in my riding of Vaughan—Woodbridge, very successful people who invest their time and resources, who take risks and yes, hire and employ folks.

What has happened is the labour force participation rates have risen for all groups, including women and under-represented groups. That is what we need to succeed. That is what we are seeing. Bill C-86 contains those types of measures: pay equity legislation which is groundbreaking; a ministry for women; child-rearing drop-in positions; a new parental sharing benefit. It is said that the sincerest form of flattery is imitation, and those provisions are similar to the ones that are used in the province of Quebec. When two parents can share benefits, they get an extra couple of weeks. In Quebec, the labour force participation rate for women is much higher than in other parts of the country. With this, we will improve that. We have learned a measure from la belle province.

On the poverty reduction targets, I cannot emphasize this more than to say that we will be going from one in eight in poverty, about 12% of the population today, to about one in 10 in 2020, which is 10% and we have targeted one in 17, which is roughly 6%. Currently, we have lifted 650,000 Canadians out of poverty by the measures we have introduced in the last three years. That is something worth recognizing, but we need to recognize there is more work to be done.

I often like to say that we have done a lot for our economy. There are a lot of good things. We have created 550,000 jobs. We have attracted a lot of investment. LNG was approved in my home province of British Columbia. I say it is my home province because that is where I was born and raised. However, our work is not done until all Canadians can succeed, have a good job with benefits, good pay and provide for a brighter future for themselves, and most importantly, their families as many of us do here. That is what is important. That is the material in Bill C-86. It was those measures that I had the pleasure of debating at committee.

We have also done some other things that Canadians will benefit from. We have improved their protection when they visit a bank or financial institution. We have introduced measures to make sure that all organizations, all high net worth individuals, pay their fair share of taxes. We continue to do that. We have invested $1 billion into the CRA in the last two or three years to ensure that it has the resources and tools to go after those who are not paying their fair share.

In my riding of Vaughan—Woodbridge, I am blessed to have a number of entrepreneurs. They are going to benefit in January 2019. We have moved our small business tax rate from 11% down to 10% and now we are moving it down to 9%, a savings of $7,500 annually for small business owners that work tirelessly day in and day out.

Those are my humble thoughts today on Bill C-86 and I look forward to questions and comments.

[Business of Supply, November 19th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, frankly, looking at the future of my kids, my two daughters who are at home right now, their future looks great. It looks great not only because of our government's action, but because they are blessed to live in this country called Canada. We will find out measures in the fall economic update on Wednesday. I encourage the member to stay tuned. I encourage him to be here, take notes and be attentive to the great things happening in this country. As a government, we are listening, and we will always continue to listen to businesses and consumers. At the end of the day, we will always maintain that certainty for businesses and consumers and the confidence to invest in and grow our economy and create those middle-class jobs Canadians want to look forward to in their futures.

[Business of Supply, November 19th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, stay tuned for Wednesday, November 21, for the fall economic statement. Our government's fiscal position, and the importance of having a strong fiscal position, cannot be re-emphasized. A declining debt-to-GDP ratio, which we have emphasized, is something we need to look at, as well as balance that with key investments in our economy and in certain sectors. We have the supercluster program that we have announced. Again, we have rave reviews for businesses.

On the U.S. tax legislation that passed earlier, remember, it is running a trillion-dollar deficit. Now, I am not sure if the Conservatives want to start running those types of deficits, but we surely do not. We need to be prudent, we need to be measured and we need to undertake measures that address any sort of competitiveness issues. However, the fact remains Canadian businesses are confident and are investing. They are doing it in my riding and all ridings across this country. That is why they have created over 500,000 or 600,000 full-time jobs over the last three years. The results speak for themselves, but we will have to wait for Wednesday for specific measures in the fall economic update.

[Business of Supply, November 19th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, the previous government, frankly, refused to admit that there was an actual global financial recession going on and had to run very quickly to undertake a number of measures to combat it.

As I said, the Conservatives inherited a surplus from a Liberal government, which is not surprising. We are good stewards of Canada's fiscal situation, and we will continue to be. However, they squandered that. The Conservatives did not prepare right, and they did not make the right investments in infrastructure, in skills training and in the things that matter most to the residents of my riding of Vaughan—Woodbridge. They did not make those investments.

The Conservatives left us a very large deficit, an infrastructure deficit and a deficit in terms of investing in Canadians and their future. We are having to make up for that. We are making tough choices, the right choices, to maintain a strong fiscal position and to reduce our debt-to-GDP ratio. We are making the investments in Canada and in Canadians that they deserve and that will prepare us for the future.