John Cannis

[Provincial Choice Tax Framework Act, December 8th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I am glad the Minister of Transport did not get up. He gets enough time during question period; it is our time now.

Nevertheless, the member for Kitchener Centre placed it one way, and I would like to place it a different way. The member for Burnaby—New Westminster said that Manitoba, for example, rejected it.

I know he believes in democracy, and democratically, the question is not up to us. The Conservative government of the day has made a proposal to these two provinces, British Columbia and Ontario. It is up to those two provinces to accept or decline. Who is he, or I, or anybody else to decide? I say to the member, who believes in democracy, let those provinces make up their own minds. They will either pay the consequences or reap the benefits. Let them make that decision.

[Provincial Choice Tax Framework Act, December 8th, 2009]

It is that New Democratic Party that is oppressing democracy. It is literally telling the provinces of British Columbia and Ontario that they cannot democratically choose how they wish to be governed. That is shameful on behalf of the NDP.

[Provincial Choice Tax Framework Act, December 8th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I just want to make a brief comment on what was said by the member for Timmins—James Bay about democracy. That is what it is all about. It is democracy.

[Disposition of an act to amend the Excise Tax Act, December 7th, 2009]

Madam Speaker, the hon. member talked about how the Liberals are running away from this. I am not going to speak on behalf of the new Conservative government but I will speak on behalf of my Liberal team.

I want to make it clear that we are not running away from anything. What I and my colleagues are simply saying is that the democratically elected, majority government of the province of Ontario has decided, rightly or wrongly, good or bad, to implement this harmonization tax. Who am I to stop what the democratically elected, majority government of Ontario wants? It wants this policy and the federal Conservative government is accommodating it. That is the simple answer I give to my constituents.

Let the people judge accordingly at the polls. I believe in democracy and I know that member does as well. Does he not believe that we should just leave it as such and let the provinces make their own decisions?

[British Home Children, December 7th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I want to begin by congratulating the member for his motion. All of us in the House were very moved by the comments he made, especially about his ancestors.

For a person who thrives on history, I not only want to tell him that he can look forward to my support but I think we should take it a step further. We should not declare 2010 the year of British home child but perhaps collectively we can talk to our provincial members, who are responsible for the education curriculum, to ensure they teach this part of our Canadian history.

Would he perhaps consider that collectively we should make this effort to tell our provincial counterparts that this is part of our country and history, and that they should put it in the curriculum? Would he consider doing that?

[Business of Supply, December 1st, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I had the privilege of chairing the Standing Committee on National Defence. The parliamentary secretary and I served together on the committee. He will attest that the committee functioned as a family. We put the interests of the mission first and then our men and women in uniform. I know he feels the same way as I do and so does the minister.

We asked tough questions. All the honourable gentlemen the minister mentioned came before the committee and a committee of the whole in this chamber. We asked tough questions. That is our role as parliamentarians.

I have had several calls from my constituents asking, “Are you guys really against the military?” Why does the member think that every time we ask these tough questions we are getting rebuttals? I say this respectfully, but tactics have changed. We are supposedly against our men and women in uniform and against the military which is really not the case. I am sending that message across.

[Committees of the House, November 18th, 2009]

Madam Speaker, I listened very carefully to what the hon. member from the Conservative Party said. I was intrigued when he talked about how his government is supporting and wants to support small and medium-sized enterprises.

We certainly believe in that on the Liberal side. In 1993 we identified that it was the engine that would drive our economy. The employers told us then that if we lowered EI premiums, or taxes they called them, they would reinvest. We did that, and there was about fourteen point something billion dollars over the years.

I want to ask the hon. member a very simple question. Does he believe in what the Prime Minister said when he was a member of the Reform Party, that a tax like EI on jobs is a killer of jobs; it destroys jobs? If indeed he believes in what the current Prime Minister said, then a member of Parliament from Alberta from the Reform Party, then why, I ask him, is the government raising EI and taxing jobs out of Canada to the tune of $15.5 billion? Will he tell the Prime Minister to take that out of the budget?

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, November 17th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, that is precisely why I used the example of Turkey as an applicant for membership to the European community. There is nothing wrong with doing a study, but we cannot afford to wait until the study is completed. We must move in parallel to whatever efforts are being undertaken.

That is why I deliberately used the example of Turkey as an applicant. There are violations that are taking place. I mentioned the Cyprus issue as one example. I do not want to mention any more, but the European community is not saying that it is not accepting Turkey's application or that it is not allowing Turkey to go through the process for membership to the European community because Cyprus is still under an illegal occupation. It is saying that it is moving along and also moving toward resolving the issue.

The same thing is being done with Skopje, in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, who wish to gain membership but are being shown the prerequisites. I agree with Skopje. However, we must not stop the progress and wait for the outcome of the study.

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, November 17th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I was really moved when the hon. member talked about giving Colombia a chance. That is really what this is all about. People say that we do not agree. I think that when it comes to common sense, we Liberals at least find room to agree.

There have been many times when we have voted for legislation that has been brought forward by the government of today because we think that it is good legislation or that it makes a lot of sense. We are supporting this bill because it makes sense. We want to give, not necessarily a country, but a people the chance to get jobs, put food on the table and improve themselves.

When a nation is working, it does not engage in crime. I think we all know that when unemployment is down, crime is also down. If we are going to help put the people of Colombia to work, then we are also helping them reduce crime. If we put them to work, we are going to work toward eliminating the labour abuses and human rights violations that we have talked about.

We can only achieve that by being there. The sooner we are there, the sooner we are going to resolve this issue.

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, November 17th, 2009]

What I am saying is that we do not turn away from these opportunities which are our business people out there. Our business community is encouraging us.

There have been undertakings in Colombia to address the problems that exist: human rights violations, labour abuses, et cetera. The paramilitary has been brought up.

Frank Pearl, a highly recognized individual, was appointed some years ago by the Colombian government to help people reintegrate into society. There are tremendous amounts of money being invested so people can come out of the jungles, reunite and reconnect with their families, re-engage and retrain in order for them to become productive members of society. However, all this does not happen overnight. It cannot happen overnight. It is impossible for it to happen overnight, but it is one step at a time.

I have personally seen that the government of Colombia is very serious about taking on these challenges. What we as Canadians are saying to Colombia is yes, we are going to sign a free trade agreement, the same as we signed with Mexico, the United States, Costa Rica, Israel, et cetera.

I do not have the document with me, but I would be more than pleased to table the information I have available confirming what I just said in terms of the types of agreements we have signed with these other countries. The Canada-Colombia agreement is patterned the same way and uses the same types of parameters.

We have not lessened the conditions we are asking for as a country or the government is asking for today. I have personally expressed my support for it. If anything, we are becoming more stringent because when we signed an agreement years ago, let us say, with Mexico, between then and now we have learned, improved and fine tuned. We are always looking to better ourselves.

In response to some of the comments that were made earlier with respect to what the Liberal member said, referring to me, I can only encourage other colleagues to think of it this way as we hope to get this over and done with as soon as possible. There are several things.

The longer we delay, our country is going to lose out. We delayed in signing CAFTA, the Central America Free Trade Agreement. When the United States signed on, it was ratified by one vote. Canada lost out. Canadian jobs lost out. The Americans are looking at this agreement as well.

Earlier today representatives from the Pork Producers Association were in committee and they said the same thing, “Don't delay, it's going to cost us. Don't Delay”. They were talking about how Korea, for example, had signed a free trade agreement and we were going to lose business. Our pork products are not going to be able to compete. Who is going to lose? Canadian jobs are going to be lost.

The end result is that people will be going on employment insurance, something the New Democratic Party was promoting two weeks ago when we were talking about improving EI benefits. Canadians do not want EI. Canadians want to work. They want to get up Monday to Friday to go to work and know that they can spend the weekends with their families and be proud of bringing home their bread and butter. That is what Canadians want to do.

What is it that we have to do as government representatives? We have to create a platform or the conditions, if I may say, whereby our nation, business people, farmers and manufacturers have the ability to flourish and prosper, and as they prosper, jobs and wealth are created. The big deficit we now have, thanks to the new Conservative Party, will hopefully be eliminated. That is why I am supporting this free trade agreement, to generate revenue and bring down the $56 billion deficit.

I am in full support of it and I am asking the Bloc Québécois and the New Democratic Party to look at it from that point of view. If we stay away, we are not really helping the people we want to help. By going there, we will show Colombia how we do it in Canada. We will insist that certain things are undertaken to ensure that we are headed in the proper direction.