Jean-Yves Roy

[Government Programs, October 4th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, we see now why the minister was in a rush to squeeze out his regional managers by taking away all their decision-making powers when he took over the department.

Is that not the real reason? The minister squeezed everyone out to make it easier to impose his own values and those of his party, in other words, to choose the events that suit him, period.

[Government Programs, October 4th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, let me just go back to the Black & Blue Festival, whose grant was cut. The Minister of the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Regions of Quebec claims that the grant was cut because this event is successfully established. That is just a pretext and not the real reason.

How can the minister claim that the Black & Blue Festival is successfully established and that is why he decided to cut its grant when the Just for Laughs Festival received $805,000 and the Festival International de Jazz de Montréal received $890,000? It is pretty hard to say that these are not successfully established events.

[Employment Insurance, October 3rd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, we are running out of time. The deadline is October 7, which is in four days. The minister must act now.

Does the government realize that the workers in those areas affected by the softwood lumber crisis are the same workers who are seriously penalized by the delays related to the economic boundaries reorganization and the delay in extending transitional measures?

[Regional Development, September 26th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the Minister of Labour and Minister of the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Regions of Quebec announced an $85 million plan for the regions. It is clear, however, that there is no new money in that announcement.

How can the minister justify that he has nothing to announce, when during the last election campaign he promised a Marshall plan for the regions? Where is his Marshall plan?

[John Horman, June 19th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I was saddened to hear of the passing of Mr. John Horman, who was born in Matane and helped found the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League.He was also the league manager and statistician from 1969 to 1975.

Mr. Horman was the discipline prefect, vice-president and even interim president in 1983. He also helped found the Canadian Hockey League, which heads up the three major junior leagues. John Horman was inducted into the Quebec Amateur Hockey Hall of Fame and the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League Hall of Fame, which honours him by naming its executive of the year trophy after him.

I offer my sincerest condolences to Mr. Horman’s family and the fans of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League, who are mourning his loss. A great hockey man has passed away, but his fame and teachings will live on.

[Public Health Agency of Canada Act, June 13th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, what I just heard strikes me as a bit simplistic, both what the parliamentary secretary had to say as well as the hon. member who just spoke.

I will just give the example of the World Health Organization. It does not give orders to anyone, not to any country in the world. Does it give orders to the United States or to the Canadian or Quebec health agencies? No, it does not give any orders.

They say they want to establish a Canadian health agency because the provinces are incapable of getting along or incapable of doing their job or because sicknesses know no boundaries. It is very simplistic to say these kinds of things.

We should also not forget that the health agency will have a $665-million budget. Of this amount, about $165 million will be spent over two years on other federal public health initiatives. What are these other initiatives? Will these initiatives not just duplicate services that are already provided in other provinces?

Quebec has a fine health care system. The problem it has, as in the other provinces, is the chronic under-funding from which it has suffered since 1993, the reduction in federal funding, which fell from 50¢ to 14¢ on the dollar. This is what we need to realize.

The provincial health care systems, including the one in Quebec, are very effective now and have developed over the years. However, they have been under-funded, probably on purpose by the previous government. It did this so that some day, since the provinces and health systems were starved out, it could barge in claiming that the systems were not very effective. It is obviously impossible to be effective when there is no money.

I would like the hon. member to reply to these questions.

[Fisheries and Oceans, June 7th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, the proposed new system runs completely counter to the recommendations made by an independent, impartial expert mandated by the department to assess various options for revamping this program.

Is the minister prepared to announce publicly that he will abandon the integrity of the observer system simply to save a few dollars?

[Fisheries and Oceans, June 7th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, under the Department of Fisheries and Oceans' at-sea observer program, fishing boats in Canadian waters are required to take on board an observer who monitors catch quotas and regulatory compliance. The industry pays two thirds of the salary of these observers, and the department pays one third. Now, the industry could pay the full salary, and fishers will have the right to choose the observer.

Does the minister realize that with this reform, the observer could be in conflict of interest because he will be not only fully paid by the fisher he must monitor, but also hired by that person?

[Committees of the House, June 5th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Acadie—Bathurst for his remarks. He is well aware of the problem, because he too lives in a maritime region.

The government is telling us that it supports reinvestment in infrastructure and infrastructure repair. The problem is that it is offering nothing concrete. There was nothing concrete in the budget that was tabled. The government is even preparing to cut $20 million a year from the existing program. That is what the government is doing.

I would like to ask my colleague a question. He mentioned the corporations that manage the harbours, which belong to the government. If memory serves, there are 689 harbours, 569 of which are managed by corporations. We did a study, and these corporations told us that they received no government support. The corporations are run by 5,000 volunteers, with no support. These people are so burnt out that the corporations are falling apart and it is virtually impossible to replace people who leave.

I would like to know whether my colleague is seeing the same thing in his riding.

[Committees of the House, June 5th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague. I would like to tell him that in other developed countries, even when the government has divested itself of ports, it keeps on investing in them.

I will give a concrete example. Take the community of Mont-Louis, which has a population of 1,500. The port could be transferred to the community, but in 10 or 15 years, if the port needs $3 million or $4 million in repairs, do you think that 1,500 people will be able to pay for them? That is the problem with the port divestiture program.

The federal government must continue supporting communities and investing in ports, as governments of other countries do, even if the ports are managed by corporations or have been transferred.