John McCallum

[Employment, April 29th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Employment and Social Development has been a party to the increase in temporary foreign workers for some years.

When the CEO of McDonald's said that the minister gets it, he knew that the minister saw nothing wrong with McDonald's practices.

When caught in the act, the minister changed his mind and is now criticizing employers for their practices, which he himself encouraged.

Will he finally admit his mistakes?

[Vaisakhi, April 10th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, next week, Sikh, Hindu, and Buddhist Canadians across our country will celebrate Vaisakhi.

Vaisakhi has different meanings for the different faiths that celebrate the festival. For many, it is a harvest festival, a time to be thankful for the bountiful harvest. Beyond the traditional harvest thanksgiving, Vaisakhi has a special meaning for many Sikhs. In 1699, Guru Gobind Singh laid down the foundation of the Khalsa Panth.

As members may recall, my riding of Markham—Unionville is the most multicultural riding in Canada. I have always enjoyed celebrating Vaisakhi with my constituents, and I look forward to this year's celebrations.

On behalf of the Liberal caucus, I wish everyone from coast to coast to coast who is celebrating a very happy Vaisakhi.

[Member spoke in Punjabi]

[Economic Action Plan 2014 Act, No. 1, April 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, given what the member just said, perhaps the NDP members have changed their minds and now agree with the Liberals' policy. If so, I congratulate them because we have said pretty much the same thing he just said. We are not opposed to the program in general, but we are not okay with letting foreign workers come here to take Canadians' jobs. That is what I just said and what he just said.

At the same time, in the agricultural sector, as I said—though he may not agree—I know there is a need for these foreign workers, and in some cases, we would like these temporary workers to become permanent workers in Canada and eventually Canadian citizens.

[Economic Action Plan 2014 Act, No. 1, April 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, with respect to the second question, the answer is not at all, and that is not at all what I said.

The minister can use all the vitriol and negative language he wishes, but he really misses the point. It is not so much that I am the one who is devoid of facts or knowledge; it is him, by virtue of some of the things he just said.

The point is not the point he makes. The point is that under a Liberal government, as I said in my speech, we had approximately 150,000 people. Contrary to the NDP, which wants no temporary foreign workers, we are conscious of the need for them in agriculture and other high-skill areas. We have nothing against the program in principle.

What we do object to is the irresponsible doubling of the number of such people, more than doubling, by the Conservatives, under the leadership of the minister, and bringing in people wildly inappropriately and causing scandals in a number of well-known companies. Now they have cooked their own stew, and he is doing his best to extricate himself. If he had accepted the motion I proposed—

[Economic Action Plan 2014 Act, No. 1, April 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak to this bill. Clearly, as you know, the Liberals will vote against it.

I will start with the temporary foreign worker program. Three hours after question period, I moved a motion in the House that, unfortunately, did not receive unanimous consent. However, that motion reflects our point of view on this program.

What I tried to do in this motion, which did not receive unanimous consent, was to propose that the section of the budget implementation bill having to do with fines being imposed on those who break the laws regarding temporary foreign workers be removed from this bill and passed immediately through all stages of the process, thereby becoming effective immediately. This would provide another tool in the kit for the government, which is seeking to punish, so to speak, employers who are breaking the rules on temporary foreign workers.

The government did not like that. I guess it does not like the principle of breaking up its huge omnibus bill, no matter how much sense that might make. However, this would have given the government the tools right away to deal with this problem. This illustrates the more general point that while we in the Liberal Party agree that the temporary foreign worker program should exist, we also believe that the government has been incredibly irresponsible in allowing the number of temporary foreign workers to more than double, from approximately 150,000 or 160,000 people when the Liberals were in government, to well over 300,000 today.

As we know from examples involving my former employer, the Royal Bank, and also a mine in British Columbia, there have certainly been abuses of this program. Now the government has created its own mess and is trying to fix it. Liberals believe that many thousands of jobs that have been occupied by temporary foreign workers should have gone to Canadians in need of work. That is becoming more evident. It was evident from the public response to the situation involving McDonald's in Victoria.

We think the Conservatives should never have gotten into this in the first place. However, now that they have a mess to clean up, we think they should have accepted our motion so they could have imposed fines right away, rather than waiting weeks and weeks until this massive budget implementation bill finally passes through both Houses and becomes law.

According to what I have heard, the NDP wants to abolish the temporary foreign worker program, which would be really stupid if that were true. That shows that the New Democrats' attitude and economic policy are devoid of any common sense.

Experience has shown that in some sectors, including agriculture, this has been a useful and vital program for decades. There is absolutely no question that we want to keep this program. However, under the Conservatives, the numbers have shot up irresponsibly. Therefore, we want to put limits on the program, not abolish it.

The danger of this program is that it risks taking us away from Canada's long-held immigration system, where people come in with their families, become citizens, have children, vote in elections, and have grandchildren. That is how most of us, if not all of us, came to this country. By having massive numbers of temporary foreign workers, who are not in many cases qualified to be here but are taking other Canadians' jobs, we are gravitating toward a Europe-style, a Switzerland-style guest worker system, where people come in for a couple of years and then are shipped out again. That is not and never has been the Canadian way, but I fear that is the way the government is taking us.

I would like to spend the rest of my limited time on two other immigration-related issues.

The first issue is the immigration investor program. I believe there are approximately 20,000 applicants to the program who would be unceremoniously dumped by this bill. Yes, they would get their fees back, but in many cases they have been waiting many years to come into this country on the basis of this program. All of a sudden they are cut off at the knees and have absolutely no possibility of coming to Canada under the terms of that program. It is perhaps coincidental, but it is a fact that a very high proportion of these people happen to be from China. Naturally, they are not at all happy about this development.

I would be the first to acknowledge that the program, which I believe was brought forward in the Mulroney years, was imperfect. It had deficiencies and things that should have been fixed. Instead of $800,000, which the people get back, maybe it should be $8 million. Maybe there should be a requirement for real job creation. Maybe this, maybe that. We do not have the resources of the government to design a precise program.

My point is that rather than cutting these people off at the knees and throwing them out the window, the government should first develop an improved version of the program and give those who were already applicants in the old program the option of transferring to the new program. That would be fair. That would be better for Canada, because those people are likely to make a major contribution to the country, especially if the requirements imposed on them are more onerous and more favourable to this country.

Therefore, rather than proposing a little pilot program, which the Conservatives do not define and for which we have no idea of when, if ever, will happen, the government should have done its homework first and reformed the existing program, giving the applicants to the old program the opportunity to apply to the new program. That would be the way to move our system forward in an efficient and effective manner, primarily for the sake of Canada but also for the sake of those who waited many years and spent many dollars to apply to come to this country.

Finally, I will speak to another provision in the bill. This provision would extend to 20 years, rather than 10 years, the time that has to elapse before a newcomer is eligible for GIS.

The poorest seniors will now have to wait 20 years instead of 10 in order to be eligible for this benefit.

This is a subset of a more general issue. The government has decided that instead of sponsors being required to look after their parents for 10 years, they will have to look after them for an extended period of 20 years. In today's volatile economy, it seems to me that this is an unreasonable imposition. One does not know over a period of 20 years whether one will lose one's job or whether other unfortunate things might happen.

The bottom line is that in imposing these changes, the government is rationing the number of parents and grandparents to be allowed into the country according to the income and wealth of those who are applying. I think it is a very restrictive approach and I do not think it reflects the long, positive Canadian traditions in the area of immigration.

[20th Anniversary of the Rwandan Genocide, April 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to seek unanimous consent from the House for the following motion, that, notwithstanding any Standing Order or usual practice of the House, clauses 299 to 302 related to the temporary foreign worker program be removed from Bill C-31, an act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on February 11, 2014 and other measures, and do compose Bill C-33, an act to implement administrative monetary penalties for the temporary foreign worker program; that Bill-33 be deemed read a first time and be printed, deemed read a second time and referred to a committee of the whole, deemed reported back without amendment, deemed concurred in at report stage, and deemed read a third time and passed; that Bill C-31 retain the status on the order paper that it had prior to the adoption of the order; that Bill C-31 be reprinted as amended; and that the law clerk and the parliamentary counsel be authorized to make any technical changes or corrections as may be necessary to give effect to this motion.

[Citizenship and Immigration, April 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, for once I congratulate the minister for his acceptance of clear non-Orwellian Liberal logic. Well done. However, he is not off the hook on refugees.

From Jack Pickersgill and the Hungarian refugees, in the 1950s, to Paul Martin, all Canadian governments have accepted thousands of refugees when the circumstances have demanded it. The same is true for other countries today with thousands of Syrian refugees.

Why is it that one month ago the minister said that Canada had accepted a grand total of 10 refugees? For once, will he tell us how many of the 1,300 sponsored refugees are here?

[Citizenship and Immigration, April 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, for a few days now, I have been asking all the witnesses at the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration about the language testing for sponsoring spouses. All the witnesses agree that the language tests will do nothing to help protect women from violence.

Can the minister therefore now confirm that he will not impose any criteria based on language, income or, education for the sponsorship of spouses?

[Citizenship and Immigration, April 3rd, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, Progressive Conservative John Diefenbaker would be absolutely ashamed of the disgusting performance on refugees by a successor government. Absolutely ashamed.

Last week, the minister caved to Liberal pressure on his Orwellian plan to subject spouses to language testing before they come to Canada, but the government was also considering education and income tests for spouses.

Will the minister do another U-turn and confirm that he will not impose tests for languages or income or education on spouses who come to this country?

[Citizenship and Immigration, April 3rd, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, Canada has a proud legacy when it comes to welcoming refugees, such as the 36,000 Hungarian refugees who came to Canada in Diefenbaker's time.

This minister is lagging far behind in his commitment to welcome 1,300 Syrian refugees. Sweden has already taken in 17,000 refugees and Germany has taken in 10,000. Meanwhile, the minister has admitted that fewer than 10 refugees—not 10,000—have arrived in Canada.

What would Diefenbaker say about this minister's pathetic performance?