Jim Maloway

[Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act, May 11th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-501, which was introduced by my colleague. He has analyzed the problem correctly and I think that he is introducing the remedy that is required for the moment.

It is amazing to me that we have found ourselves in this place, given what we and our parents have gone through since the Great Depression of 1929 and on. Our parents went through the Great Depression and came out of it. It took perhaps 30 years for the stock market to recover. By that time, anyone who held stocks was likely to find that the companies they held the stocks in were never to come back.

One would have thought, given the situation out of that recession, that people would have thought ahead and come to the conclusion that we had to work out an insurance scheme for the retirement plans themselves. It only makes sense. If we look at historical records, we will find that companies rarely last for huge amounts of time. We have situations where consumer tastes change. We have obsolescence in companies. Just plain bad management of companies leads companies to fall into tough times.

Workers and their representatives had an undying trust that they would somehow put their money into a pension plan and be able to have the benefits last until the end of their lives. This trust came at a time when there was a lot of optimism on the part of the workers. I also think that when young workers start, they rarely question the pension plan. Whether they are in unions or not, I think most people will agree that it is only when people get to be middle age that they really start to take a deep interest and question what their pension plans are all about and whether the money is going to be there.

Previous speakers have indicated already that we have a patchwork quilt of pension benefits across the country. I believe that only 33% of people have taken advantage of the RRSP program. Only another rather small percentage of people actually have a company pension. Of those, some have the defined benefit plans. Those have peaked and they are not increasing in numbers at all. If anything, they are decreasing over time. Those are the best plans, the Cadillac plans, that came around in the 1950s and 1960s. Those are more or less at an end in terms of their expansion.

Now we are seeing the defined contribution plan taking over. That type of plan is not as good as the defined benefit plans were. Through all of this, I fail to see why successive governments and workers' organizations themselves were not calling for an insurance plan for pension plans as early as the 1960s, knowing what we know can happen and does happen over time to the economy. I can point out other industries that have formed their own compensation plans or insurance plans.

All we have to do is look at the P and C, property and casualty, insurance companies. In 1987, I believe, after several bankruptcies of small P and C companies in Canada, the industry realized that this was bad for business to have a house insurance company go bankrupt and leave people stuck without having the claims paid and the premiums not returned. I could mention some names of some companies, but I will not do that now. It was a long process and at the end of it the companies decided this was a big enough risk that they got together with the governments, or vice versa, and they formed a pool. The P and C companies now have a pool so that if someone's house insurance company goes bankrupt and goes out of business, this pool steps in and there is an orderly wind-down of the company and the policies. As a matter of fact, it is so painless that the public does not even notice it is happening.

The same is true of the life insurance industry. It has a similar type of pooling structure. We have had travel acts in Ontario, in Quebec and in B.C. now for a number of years. Consumers in those provinces know, when they buy airline tickets, that if their agency or tour operator goes bankrupt, like Conquest Vacations did last February, that they are protected. There are provinces like my own, Manitoba, that do not have their own travel fund. They are not protected at all, but the consumers in Ontario, Quebec and B.C. are.

I was at a Canada-U.S. conference in New Orleans on the weekend. We were given a briefing on the oil spill on Sunday morning. They talked about the potential for the worst-case scenario and there is a fund set up for a limited liability of $100 million for oil spills, and the companies pay into this fund. Of course, if there is a case of an oil spill that exceeds the amount, or if the liability is determined that the company was negligent, of course it could be unlimited liability.

Potentially a company like BP, very healthy only a few weeks ago, might end up in a bankruptcy situation in the future. All the shareholders who thought things were going fine two weeks ago would lose their money, and the workers at BP would be in a similar situation to some of the workers we are looking at here, such as those from Nortel.

These are not isolated examples. They happen in the economy all the time, so the question is: Why can we not look forward and take precautions when we know it is going to happen? We are going to have workers who have paid into pension plans for many years and through no fault of their own are going to have a deficiency in what they can draw.

Bear in mind that the workers are not running the companies. It is the management that is running the companies. It is management that is making the bad business decisions that get companies occasionally into trouble. Then we have a situation when the company is going into bankruptcy, when the management ends up looking after itself. It was mentioned by the previous speaker that Canwest is an example. Management took $41 million to take care of itself.

The public gets outraged when it sees that happen. I know the member for Winnipeg Centre is listening right now and I can just see a speech starting to develop over this issue, because people see this happening. They see that management takes care of itself and the workers are the ones who are left holding the bag.

It is time we passed this bill and moved the workers to the front of the line.

[Petitions, May 11th, 2010]

Madam Speaker, the second petition was also signed by dozens of Canadians.

The petitioners are calling upon the Canadian government to match funds personally donated by the citizens of Canada for the victims of the Chilean earthquake. Members will know and we will soon find out next week, I believe, that the earthquake caused massive damage in southern Chile and the communities in Canada are organizing raising funds for Chilean earthquake relief. There is another social coming up in Winnipeg, I believe, on May 22.

The question that people are asking every day is: When will the Prime Minister give the same treatment to the Chilean earthquake victims as he did for the victims of the Haitian earthquake and match funds personally donated by Canadians to help the victims of the Chilean earthquake?

[Petitions, May 11th, 2010]

Madam Speaker, I have two petitions to present today.

The first petition was signed by dozens of Manitobans calling for equal employment insurance benefits for adoptive parents. Under the current EI program, adoptive parents have 35 weeks of paid leave, followed by a further 15 weeks of unpaid leave. The biological mother is given both the first 35 weeks and the latter 15 weeks as paid leave.

We all know that adoptions are very expensive, lengthy and stressful to the adoptive parents and their families. Recent studies have shown that an additional 15 weeks of paid leave would help parents to support their adopted children and help them through a very difficult period in their life.

The petitioners call upon the Government of Canada to support Bill C-413 tabled by the MP for Burnaby—New Westminster, which would amend the Employment Insurance Act and the Canada Labour Code to ensure that an adoptive parent is entitled to the same number of weeks of paid leave as a biological mother of a newborn child.

[Fairness at the Pumps Act, May 10th, 2010]

Madam Speaker, I think the member would agree with me that increasing the penalties is a positive element in the bill, but that the real flaw in the bill going forward is basically the privatization of the inspection services.

I mentioned before that for many years Manitoba had a government run inspection service for vehicle safety. Vehicle owners would get a letter in the mail on a random basis. They would be called in for a safety inspection and a government inspector would fill out a safety report on their car and the people would go to a garage of their choice to get the repairs done.

Around 11 or 12 years ago the Conservative government in Manitoba, under the guise of consumer protection that basically was under pressure from the motor dealers association, decided to make the vehicle inspections mandatory when new cars were purchased.

There were no more government random inspections. They were mandatory inspections. They had to be done by local garages. Guess what? The price of used cars went up considerably when this took effect. There was rampant abuse of the program because the same garages that were inspecting the cars were also the garages where the cars were being fixed.

Therefore, there was incentive to find a lot of things wrong with these cars. As a matter of fact, we had the CBC go into different garages basically on a ghost car basis to find these abuses. It found lots of them. It went back another year to the same garages and found the abuses had not gone away.

Does the member agree with me that the penalties are not the big flaw in the bill? We agree with the increased penalties. However, the fact is that the government is going to basically privatize the inspections. Small businesses in northern Ontario are going to have to shop around to find an inspector to inspect their pumps, when a random inspection done by a government inspector is the way to handle this by hiring a few government inspectors. Perhaps that is the way to go.

[Fairness at the Pumps Act, May 10th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, the member talked, as other members have, about the big picture and the big problem. We have known for a number of years that we need to deal with amendments to the Competition Act because over 125 studies have been done, which prove that the Competition Act is what needs to be changed to ensure more competition.

Would the member take the lead and introduce whatever motion, amendment or bill that would cause that to happen? We have a minority government. We could get together with the member for Pickering—Scarborough East, who is an expert in this area. He recognized the problem many years ago. I have certainly been aware of the problem for a long time. We have three caucuses of a similar mind. Why can we not get together, drive this issue and force the government to deal with the real problem rather than simply nipping around the edges?

[Fairness at the Pumps Act, May 10th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, for many years Manitoba had a random system of inspecting vehicles. It was a case where the government inspectors would send out letters over a period of years. One never knew when one would get the letter but over a 10-year period the car would be called in for inspection. People trusted the system because it was a motor vehicle branch person who inspected the car. If it needed repairs, the owner was ordered to a garage to get them done.

About 12 years ago the Conservative government, under the guise of helping the consumer and under lobbying from the motor dealer association, turned the whole affair over to the private sector garages. Basically, it was a licence to print money. The price of used cars went up substantially when the legislation took effect. Garages were proven to be overcharging people because there was a conflict of interest.

We cannot have garages certifying cars when they are in the repair business as well.

Does the member think it is a reasonable idea that people would trust a government inspector, inspecting on a random basis, far more so than one where people had to shop for an inspector who also might have some other conflicts?

[Fairness at the Pumps Act, May 10th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, I wish to thank the member for his presentation on Bill C-14 today. I certainly have supported his work over the last number of years on this particular issue, but in terms of this particular bill itself, it seems to me that increasing the penalties is something that is long overdue and should help in the situation. I think the member would more than likely agree with that.

Given that we are bringing in this bill to save basically $20 million, are we looking at the other side, which is the cost to the businesses?

The only time a Conservative government ever brings in consumer legislation is if there is an offset to business, and the offset to business here is that it is going to allow private people to get into the inspection business. It is going to let the inspection services be determined by market forces. That means that these little retailers, in some cases in the rural areas and up north, are going to have to shop around for an inspector, maybe at a cost of hundreds of dollars, to come and inspect their pumps.

It seems to me that with the random system we have right now, inspection by the government, there is no conflict of interest there and that is the system to have. Maybe we should be doubling the number of government inspectors and keeping the inspections on a random basis so that the retailer does not know when the inspector is going to show up.

This proposal says that they have to find their own inspector and that they are going to know when the inspector is going to show up to do the inspections.

[Fairness at the Pumps Act, May 10th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, I take exception to the member's attack on my Liberal friend from Pickering—Scarborough East. If the Conservative member had been around for the last number of years he would know that the member took on his own government consistently over many years on this very issue and others. The member has always said that the problem with high gas prices is that the Competition Act needs changing.

One hundred and twenty-five studies have been done by various governments over the last few years and they have all come to the same conclusion, that no price fixing is going on, when we know there is. The definition in the Competition Act needs to be changed and if it were changed we would see actual convictions. The member knows that.

The member is fair in attacking the Liberal Party but I would ask him to be very careful about that one particular member who has done a very admirable job on this issue and others over the years.

Would the member consider--

[Petitions, May 10th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, the second petition is signed by Canadians calling on the Canadian government to match funds personally donated by Canadian citizens for the victims of the Chilean earthquake. On February 27, 2010, an 8.8 magnitude earthquake occurred in southern Chile. The Chilean-Canadian community has been mobilized. It has had many social events. As a matter of fact, there is one coming up on May 22, I believe.

The question is: When will the Prime Minister give the same treatment to the Chilean earthquake victims as he did to the victims of the Haitian earthquake and match funds personally donated by Canadians to help the victims of the Chilean earthquake?

[Petitions, May 10th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, I have two petitions to present today.

The first petition is signed by dozens of Manitobans and calls for equal employment insurance benefits for adoptive parents.

Canadians realize that adoption is important in a compassionate and just society. They realize that the current EI program provides adoptive parents with 35 weeks of paid leave, followed by a further 15 weeks of unpaid leave. A biological mother is given both the first 35 weeks and the latter 15 weeks as paid leave. We know that adoptions are expensive, lengthy and stressful for the adoptive parents and their families. Recent studies have shown the additional 15 weeks of paid leave would help parents to support their adopted children and help them through a very difficult period.

The petitioners call on the Government of Canada to support Bill C-413, tabled by the MP for Burnaby—New Westminster, which would amend the Employment Insurance Act and the Canada Labour Code to ensure that an adoptive parent is entitled to the same number of weeks of paid leave as a biological mother of a newborn child.