Joyce Murray

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, September 29th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to join this debate on the Canada-Colombia free trade agreement, Bill C-23.

I spent three months on the international trade committee on first becoming a member of Parliament and so I have a great interest in this particular agreement. I have also had the opportunity to travel to Colombia and meet with a number of representatives and individuals during the course of that trip.

I would like to first make the point that this has been a very complex decision because Colombia has such tremendous challenges that have been so capably outlined by a number of the members. However, I believe we really need to think about the question that we are trying to answer in this debate. Therefore, that is what I will be aiming my remarks at and what I believe is the key question here.

Before going to Colombia, the trade committee spent two months in hearings in Canada and heard from a great number of witnesses both for and against the idea of a free trade agreement with Colombia. Of course, we had very serious concerns among the committee members after hearing from the witnesses: the human rights issues, the lawlessness in regions, displaced persons, the drug trade, vigilante groups, unexplained deaths, a very troubled country.

We had concerns about environmental issues and that was one of the key things that I addressed as a member of the committee. It was the weak compliance mechanisms of the Colombian government, the absence of a strong enforcement mechanism for investigating complaints in the environmental side agreement.

Given those concerns, when I went to Colombia to hear firsthand from the Colombian people, I certainly was not clear that this was the right step for Canada to take.

I understand that the Liberal Party has rightfully always been for free trade agreements in principle and so am I, but this was a challenging situation. Colombia was not a huge trade partner for Canada and there were certainly serious concerns.

Having heard a number of the members talk about the very difficult situation there, I do want to point out that independent voices are verifying the great progress that has been made in Colombia. Here is a statement from the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights.

It states:

I first want to commend the Government for the significant improvement in the overall security situation in the country since 2002. Respect for the right to life and the exercise of fundamental freedoms for Colombian citizens have improved. I further want to commend the Government for designing policies and strategies for the protection of human rights defenders...I find it remarkable that the Government and the civil society, given the current polarization, have reached a number of agreements through the roundtables for guarantees of protection of human rights defenders.

I personally ran into a young person in Vancouver recently who had returned from a vacation travelling in Colombia, knew nothing about my involvement with the free trade agreement, and made the comment that it was a great trip and it felt so much safer both for people in the country and for visitors to be in Colombia. Therefore, the situation is improving.

However, that is not the key question. It is not whether the situation is improving. The key question is not whether this agreement will solve all of Colombia's problems. The question is not whether it is a perfect free trade agreement, whether Colombia is a problem-free country, and the question is not whether President Uribe is a paragon politician.

The question really should be: On balance, is this a benefit to Canadians and to the people of Colombia? Overwhelmingly, when I ask that question, is this a benefit to the people of Colombia, the answer was yes.

In Colombia, we had three full days as a committee meeting with the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the ILO, international labour representatives, Canadian companies of course and environmental groups. I met with displaced families in one of the neighbourhoods in Colombia. I met with the women who had their farms and homes taken from them and asked them the same question I asked every group I met with. We met with indigenous people, with the president of the country, members and ministers of the Colombian government, human rights groups and labour groups, a great variety, and the question that I asked each of the people I spoke with during my trip to Colombia was, “Will you be better off or worse off with increased trade with Canada through this free trade agreement?” Overwhelmingly, the response was that they believed they would be better off.

That is not to imply that conditions there are perfect. It is not to imply that there were not many pieces of advice as to how the situation could be improved and what the Canadian government and Canadian people could do to help with that. There were many requests for how a free trade agreement might be structured or may be worded, but at the end of each conversation when I would ask, “If you had the choice to have a free trade agreement with Canada or not have a free trade agreement, which is preferable?”. The answer was very consistent, with the exception of the public sector unions.

Everyone I spoke to agreed that a free trade agreement with Canada would be beneficial to their situation. It would help the enforcement by the government of human rights and environmental issues by providing more dollars to the economy. It would help put jobs in the legal economy and help to displace that vacuum that was drawing young people into the drug trade. The free trade agreement would help reduce displacement by having the presence of Canadian companies in remote areas that were currently lawless and were perhaps without police forces and without judiciary to even follow up on crime.

The free trade agreement would help fund prevention measures, training for the army, help for the displaced, the things that government was improving and spending money on, but needed a budget to do.

I was told that the free trade agreement would help with the standard of corporate social responsibility because that is a strong focus of Canadian firms in Colombia and they are providing leadership on that level. It would help build infrastructure, afford the roads and the access into the remote areas. It would help to reduce control by the narco-economy. A free trade agreement would actually help with environmental compliance by having this rules-based trade and the scrutiny that would follow.

One main argument that has been made is that even the United States will not go into Colombia. I have a quote from President Obama very recently in which he acknowledged that he has instructed his ambassador, the United States trade representative, “to begin working closely with President Uribe's team on how we can proceed on a free trade agreement”. I am quoting President Obama. He continues:

There are obvious difficulties involved in the process and there remains work to do, but I'm confident that ultimately we can strike a deal that is good for the people of Colombia and good for the people of the United States. I commended President Uribe on the progress that has been made in human rights in Colombia--

The point there is that for the president of the United States the key thing is not, as I have mentioned previously, is Colombia perfect? Of course, it is not. And it is not, are there problems? Are there deep concerns? Are there tragedies happening in Colombia? That is not the question. The question is: Would free trade be good for the people of Colombia and good for the people of the United States? My question was similar: Would it be good for Colombia and good for the people of Canada? And overwhelmingly, the answer I got, right across the spectrum of witnesses, was yes, it will be good for us here in Colombia.

[Employment Insurance Act, September 28th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, it has been interesting listening to the member turn herself into a pretzel to justify voting for the Conservative government at this point.

How can the member and her party have confidence in the government given that this proposal was not tabled earlier? The appropriate time for tabling it was during the summer with the EI task force. Not only that, the government members deliberately falsified the projections for the Liberal proposal, which was very similar to what the NDP was calling for. Not only did the government not take its commitment to that task force seriously, it deliberately falsified and misled Canadians on the implications of the proposals that were supported by that member's party. How can she have confidence in the government on EI given that history?

[Employment Insurance Act, September 28th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments by the member opposite in terms of the compassion that members of Parliament feel towards those who have lost their jobs and whose families are impacted. I certainly share that view.

It was an interesting, contextual and philosophical set of comments. The word that really struck me, though, was when the member used the word “timely”. If anything, this proposed bill is completely untimely. We have a government that in its update last November claimed that Canada would be in surplus for this year and future years. That was pretty untimely. It was already a country in deficit. The untimely budget in January proposed a $32 billion deficit, which soon after has skyrocketed to $55 billion.

The thing that is completely mystifying in terms of the government's performance is that it did absolutely nothing to table this measure during the summer, when there was a Liberal-Conservative EI working group to make exactly the improvements to EI that the member claims this bill is about. Instead, the—

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, September 14th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciated the thoughtful remarks of the member who just spoke, unlike the member for Cariboo—Prince George whose ideological tirade appeared to have absolutely no concern for humanitarian or environmental issues in Colombia whatsoever, and also unlike the comments from the member for Burnaby—New Westminster who either has forgotten or is completely misrepresenting the testimony that I was present for during the visit of the international trade committee in the spring of 2008.

I will note that many of the witnesses were personally brought forward by the NDP and that member. We saw and heard from hundreds of people. With the exception of a very small handful of people, those witnesses acknowledged the serious shortcomings in Colombia regarding human rights, the environment, and security, yet confirmed their belief that this imperfect free trade agreement would be a benefit compared with no free trade agreement.

My question for the member would be, is the issue whether this is a perfect free trade agreement or not, and I agree with her that it is not, or that having this free trade agreement would be beneficial to the lives of Colombians compared with having no free trade agreement?

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, September 14th, 2009]

Madam Speaker, having been a member of the trade committee and having taken a great deal of interest in this free trade agreement previously, I have appreciated hearing the commentary of the various members. Environmental issues were the primary area of discussion and question that I brought forward, including the CEC and the side agreements environmentally.

Has the member been listening to the people of Colombia? I was part of a delegation that went to Colombia with the trade committee. We met for extensive hours for many days with labour, social justice, the United Nations, environmental groups and individuals, indigenous communities, refugees as well as business and government representatives. I can assure the member that out of all of those meetings every time I posed the question of whether it would be better or worse for the people of Colombia to have a free trade agreement with Canada, with the exception of one meeting with one set of people, every other group said, “We would be better off with a free trade agreement”. That includes the environmental groups.

Therefore, what would the member say to the environmental groups that were very clear with us that they believed the scrutiny, profile and investment that came with a free trade agreement would be better for them and their concerns and their constituents than not having that agreement?

[Questions Passed as Orders for Returns, September 14th, 2009]

With respect to crime prevention programs in the province of British Columbia: (a) what crime prevention programs does the government fund, and what are the dates that they were created, (i) what is the budget of each program, (ii) how many spaces do they provide, (iii) who is the responsible authority for overseeing and managing these programs; (b) what crime prevention programs has the government cut funding for during the fiscal years 2004 to present and, in what amounts; (c) with respect to Budget 2009, what has been budgeted for each crime prevention program in British Columbia, (i) how many spaces will be provided, (ii) who is the responsible authority for overseeing and managing these programs; and (d) what crime prevention programs has the government cancelled during the fiscal years 2004 to present, (i) what was the cost of each program, (ii) how many spaces did they provide, (iii) who was the responsible authority for overseeing and managing these programs?

[Questions Passed as Orders for Returns, September 14th, 2009]

With respect to Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (organized crime and protection of justice system participants) and Bill C-15, An Act to amend the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts: (a) does the government have an assessment of the increase in incarceration (both numbers and duration) that will result from the enactment of these Bills and, if so, what is it; (b) does the government have an assessment of the number of new provincial jail cells in British Columbia that will have to be constructed to house an increased prison population resulting from these Bills and, if so, what is it; (c) does the government have an assessment of the number of new federal prison cells that will have to be constructed to house an increased prison population resulting from these Bills and, if so, what is it; (d) does the government have an estimate on the cost to build the increased provincial and federal prison capacity to house the predicted increase in incarcerated Canadians; and (e) what are the estimated annual operating cost for the estimated increase in prisoner capacity?

[Questions Passed as Orders for Returns, September 14th, 2009]

With respect to the University of British Columbia (UBC), for the fiscal years 2004 to present (and including Budget 2009): (a) which government departments, agencies, crown corporations and granting councils distributed research funding to UBC; (b) in what amounts were these funds distributed; and (c) for what projects or programs were these funds distributed?

[Questions Passed as Orders for Returns, September 14th, 2009]

With respect to the Jericho Lands in Vancouver, British Columbia: (a) what are all of the documents outlining the government’s plans for the Jericho Lands; (b) which department or agency is in charge of the transition from military use to other use; (c) what is the timeline for the relocation of the regimental headquarters; (d) where are the family housing units currently located on the premises planned to be relocated and by when; (e) which department or agency will take custody when the Jericho Lands are vacated; (f) what dates and locations, if at all, did consultations take place with the public and Musqueam bands regarding the planned change in land use; (g) what is the process by which the government will divest itself of the Jericho Lands; and (h) have any commitments been made to sell, lease or transfer all or part of the Jericho Lands to any other organizations and, if so, to whom?

[Petitions, June 18th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to present a petition signed by concerned British Columbians calling on the government of China to release Falun gong practitioners from detention and end their persecution.