Larry Miller

[Transport, June 2nd, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, some 13% of licensed drivers in Canada are between 16 and 24 years old. This group accounts for about 22% of fatalities and serious injuries of drivers in Canada. No parent would feel comfortable with these statistics. We all just want our kids to be safe.

Can the Minister of Transport please update this House on what is being done to address this serious issue?

[Thomas James Mitchell, May 12th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, in light of the recent National Day of Honour to commemorate those who served in Afghanistan, I rise in the House today to pay tribute to Corporal Robert Thomas James Mitchell of Owen Sound and to recognize his parents, Bob and Carol.

While serving our country in Afghanistan, Corporal Mitchell was unfortunately killed by an insurgent attack on October 3, 2006, at the age of 32. Corporal Mitchell was a beloved husband and father of three children.

I had the honour of meeting with Bob and Carol as they came to attend the National Day of Honour in Ottawa. The support that Bob and Carol give to other military families is immense. Carol still attends the graduation ceremonies at Land Force Central Area Training Centre Meaford to speak to graduating soldiers, while also providing support to other families that have lost loved ones in Afghanistan.

I give my condolences to the friends and family of Corporal Mitchell and commend Bob and Carol on their great contribution to our country. Bob, Carol and the rest of the Mitchell family truly remind us that “Those who wait also serve”.

[Business of Supply, May 7th, 2014]

Mr. Chair, I would certainly like to wish the minister the best of greetings on a special day and thank her for being here tonight.

In December last year, Canada Post Corporation released a comprehensive five-point action plan entitled “Ready for the Future”. It was designed to realign how it delivers and prices postal services to meet Canadians' emerging and future needs while substantially reducing costs to the taxpayer.

This is a watershed moment for Canada's national postal service. Letter mail volumes have been declining since 2006, when Canada Post delivered 1.2 billion more letters than it did in 2013. That is a big number. The corporation estimates that for every 1% drop in mail volume, it loses $30 million in revenue. This is placing a huge strain on Canada Post's finances, as witnessed by losses of $129 million, before tax, in the postal segment alone in the third quarter of fiscal year 2013. It is quite clear that the services, as currently provided by Canada Post, are no longer sustainable.

Canada Post must now manage its business as a viable commercial enterprise that competes effectively in every product line. Even its traditional direct marketing business is facing digital rivals that use mobile and smart technologies, and the parcel business operates in a highly competitive environment.

The corporation is well aware that to build on recent successes, it must attract customers in an increasingly complex economic environment. The parcel business, unlike letter mail, is highly competitive, and parcel volumes have been rising worldwide. Postal services in many countries have been aggressively using their extensive sorting and delivery infrastructure to expand in this sector. Globalization has more parcels coming into Canada to be processed to the same high standards, and the highly competitive parcel delivery market means that service providers must modify operations in order to win and retain customers with the quality and reliability of their service. In the business of the customer parcel delivery market, that means providing fast, reliable, and convenient delivery, excellent tracking options, and reasonable prices.

The growth in the parcel industry has also intensified local and global competition. FedEx and UPS, for example, have increased their competitive positions in Canada. Customer patterns have also shifted from premium to less urgent products that cost less. The increased competitive landscape has put increased pressure on Canada Post to manage costs, improve product offerings, and provide a superior customer experience.

With approximately 40% of parcel deliveries to Canada originating internationally, Canada Post has negotiated bilateral agreements, notably with the United States and China, to increase its share of this inbound traffic. The corporation has also made extensive investments in new facilities, including a 700,000 square foot plant at Vancouver International Airport. It has increased real-time tracking through portable scanners for employees and has added to its capacity for motorized delivery to handle growing package volumes.

Canada Post also offered on-demand parcel pickup for small businesses in 2011 and 2012. It provided enhanced web services for online retailers, including seamless management of returns.

I wish to emphasize that the government is committed to ensuring transparency in how Canada Post provides quality postal service to all Canadians, rural and urban, individuals and businesses, in a secure and financially self-sustaining manner. That is why the government established the Canadian postal service charter in 2009, which set out its expectations regarding Canada Post service standards and related activities in providing postal services that meet the needs of Canadians.

An important aspect of the postal service charter is its commitment to universal service that ensures that Canadians in both urban and rural areas can send and receive letter mail and parcels within Canada and between Canada and elsewhere. As part of Canada Post's continued commitment to parcel delivery, parcel services to Canadians living in rural and northern communities not currently serviced by competing parcel delivery companies will have significantly wider access to, and the ability to return products from, Canada and around the world.This is crucial for the many rural and northern communities not currently served by private sector courier companies.

Canada Post's five-point action plan embraces the principle of reform without seeking any change to the Canadian Postal Service Charter. This plan is about giving Canadians the postal service they need in the emerging digital economy. Canada Post is quite aware of the changing face of the postal industry and has been preparing for a future with less mail and more parcels for a number of years.

The corporation has implemented measures to expand its parcel volume both through its postal operations and through its Purolator courier service. For example, changes to internal operations first begun in 2010 have made for a more efficient flow of parcels through the network to the customer. Canada Post has launched an aggressive plan to invest in replacing its aging processing infrastructure and delivery processes with more modern and cost-effective approaches driven by technology. The sorting equipment in place today is much faster and more accurate. From a delivery perspective, it has meant a massive shift toward motorization.

Canada Post will continue to leverage these investments. Doing so will further reduce the cost of processing the mail and will allow the company to better serve the growing parcel market and provide the services Canadians will need in the future.

In many urban areas, Canada Post has moved away from letter carriers delivering mail by foot to carriers who leave their depot every morning with a fuel-efficient van containing the mail and parcels for delivery on their route. Putting mail and parcels in one truck for delivery provides a better end-customer experience, especially in the parcel business, at a much lower cost to the corporation. These improvements will allow Canada Post to compete more effectively in the fast-paced and technology-driven global parcel market. All kinds of parcels are now flowing through Canada Post sorting plants, including items that depend on fast and accurate delivery, from health care products and gourmet food to live bees and baby chicks.

Canada Post realizes that the parcel business is highly competitive and it does not have the exclusive privilege to deliver parcels, as it does for letters. Therefore, the corporation has focused on providing a superior customer experience, recognizing the attachment Canadians have to their parcels. Canada Post has indicated a desire to expand en-route pickups and launch a comprehensive returns solution that will benefit e-commerce merchants and shoppers by improving inventory management, returns processes, and automatic billing.

An important component of Canada Post's proposed strategy is its intention to build upon its current strength in parcel delivery, which has demonstrated growth over the past few years thanks in large measure to the fast-growing market of online shoppers.

It is clear that Canadians have become enthusiastic online consumers. Statistics Canada reported in October 2012 that the value of orders placed online by Canadians reached $18.9 billion in 2012, up 24% from 2010 when the survey was last conducted. That is 24% in two years. More than half of Internet users, 56%, ordered goods or services online in 2012. Perhaps even more encouraging, most Internet shoppers, 82%, had placed an order from a company in Canada.

Canada Post's parcels line of business currently offers a range of domestic and international delivery services and is the largest player in the Canadian parcel market, with more than 50% market share. The corporation sees an unprecedented opportunity for additional growth linked to e-commerce as online business activity increases. Customers for parcel services include businesses, consumers of all sizes, governments, international postal administrations, and other delivery companies.

According to a recent report by the Conference Board of Canada, residential and small business customers indicated that their demand for parcel service will continue to rise with the spread of e-commerce.

Parcels are the fastest-growing line of service in the core Canada Post business. The corporation reports that overall growth in parcel volumes experienced a record-breaking holiday season, which runs between November 11 and January 4. Canada Post delivered 30 million parcels during this period, which was five million more than the holiday season last year. The corporation delivered more than one million parcels in a day, on 10 different days. Weekend delivery was also very successful. Canada Post employees delivered a total of 1.1 million parcels over the six weekends of the holiday season, with the highest number of deliveries occurring on the December 21–22 weekend. That is 317,000 deliveries.

The main reason behind this growth is that parcels are the one postal product that has seen growth driven by the digital revolution. Canada Post advises that its top-25 retail customers are making major e-commerce gains. January parcel volumes from these retailers shot up 35% compared to January of last year. This dramatic increase follows a highly successful holiday season in which year-over-year parcel volumes from this top-performing group grew by 50%.

It is very obvious that things and times change. They have certainly changed at Canada Post, and it has tried to adapt.

I have a question for the minister. The opposition is refusing to see that Canada Post is facing a new digital reality. Can the minister please explain why the status quo was not a possible solution to Canada Post's financial situation?

[Petitions, April 28th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I have a petition from a number of my constituents. It is a petition to ensure that Canadians have a fair electoral system.

[Firearms Registry, April 28th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, Canadians want tough-on-crime measures that are effective, efficient, and make good common sense. They do not want half-baked schemes dreamed up by big government Liberals that do nothing to keep Canadians safe.

That is why we ended the wasteful and ineffective long gun registry. It did nothing to prevent a single crime. Here is proof. Since 2009, gun crime in Canada has decreased by more than 25%, despite the dire predictions of Liberal elite politicians like former Ontario attorney general Michael Bryant, who implied that hunters and farmers were responsible for all domestic violence.

We all know that in reality gun crimes are committed by bad guys and criminals who acquire guns illegally. A good guy with a gun is a law-abiding hunter, a sports shooter, or a farmer. It is about time that the leaders of the NDP and the Liberals quit their long-enduring harassment of these law-abiding Canadians.

I, for one, am a member of this group. We are not part of the problem; we are part of the solution.

[Economic Action Plan 2014 Act, No. 1, April 8th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague across the way for her question, for her kind comments on my private member's bill that went through the House unanimously, and for her support on that.

We ran on a commitment to do a lot of things. If she were fair and would express honestly, she would agree with my next comment. At the end of the day, it would not matter what we had in our budget, the folks across the way would be more than likely to vote against it. That is what opposition does, which is unfortunate in this place, but it is the way it is.

The things we have in the bill are very important to Canadians and our economy, and I fully support them.

[Economic Action Plan 2014 Act, No. 1, April 8th, 2014]

First, Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for his questions and for pointing out the amount of dollars committed to health care in the term of this government, and the future commitment to make sure that is there.

With regard to the lack of dollars spent on health care in this country, some might argue that it is never enough. However, the commitment to keeping it, increasing it by $10 billion over the next 10 years in the increase alone, is something we have to keep doing. There are always better ways of doing things, and we should always be open to that.

I come from an area where a lot of the young people go away to university. I know that with some of the programs and supports that government has given them, they are very appreciative, and we will keep doing that.

[Economic Action Plan 2014 Act, No. 1, April 8th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House today to speak to Bill C-31, the budget implementation act.

This bill will enact various measures that were outlined in the budget that was presented to the House last month. I am very happy that the government is moving forward expeditiously to put these measures in place to benefit all Canadians.

Today I will outline why I feel as though this bill will benefit residents in my riding of Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, and indeed Canadians from coast to coast.

Before I begin, I want to take some time to congratulate the former minister of finance, a good friend of mine, the member for Whitby—Oshawa, on a job very well done. He was first elected to the House of Commons in 2006, after spending several years with the Ontario provincial government.

He has tirelessly represented the people of Whitby—Oshawa in his work here in Ottawa. The accolades that he has received internationally, and his recognition as the greatest finance minister in the world, truly demonstrate that he was certainly one of the greatest finance ministers that our country has ever had.

I wish him all the best in his retirement, and, again, commend him on a job well done.

Further to this, I would congratulate the member for Eglinton—Lawrence on his recent appointment as Minister of Finance and wish him all the best as he carries out his duties in this position. I am certain that he will carry out sound economic policies for Canadians in the years to come.

Before getting into the specific measures contained within Bill C-31, I would like to respond to some of the opposition criticism that the bill has received. Bill C-31 has been widely criticized by some of my colleagues across the way as being an omnibus bill. It is often presented that the bill has a wide range of initiatives and will implement new measures in many different areas and many different sectors.

What I think is being misunderstood here is that the problems that are facing our economy are not simple and contained to a specific sector or field. There are a wide range of issues that we are presented with, and we therefore need a comprehensive plan to tackle these issues. That is why Bill C-31 will implement a wide sweeping plan that will ensure increased growth and continue our leading economic prosperity from the recession.

One of these measures that I am very pleased to see implemented is the new building Canada plan. I was pleased to see that recently the government announced that this fund was open for business and municipalities could begin their applications to secure funds for the upcoming construction season. A $53-billion plan for provincial, territorial, and municipal infrastructure will provide stable funding for a 10-year period, the longest in Canadian history.

I, and many of my colleagues on both sides of the House, have spent some time in municipal politics, and I believe we all understand the importance of stable infrastructure funding. This will ensure that municipalities have the funding they need to carry out projects that will help them to better provide important services to Canadians.

In my riding, the new building Canada plan has received substantial interest. Many municipalities are looking forward to taking advantage of this record level of funding for local projects.

In discussing the upcoming construction season, I think it is important to discuss the importance of government funding in relation to creating summer employment. I am sure that when communities are able to secure funding through the new building Canada plan, many jobs will be created in many different fields.

Our government has always supported job creation and training. This budget continues this record.

Through the Canada job grant, Canadians will get the skills they need to get in-demand jobs. An investment of $40 million, for up to 3,000 internships in high-demand fields, and $15 million, for up to 1,000 internships in small and medium sized businesses, will support further job creation.

Furthermore, pilot projects to expand the use of innovative approaches to training apprentices and the creation of the Canada apprenticeship loan will support training and employment through apprenticeships. The Canada apprenticeship loan will help apprentices registered in Red Seal trades to complete their training by providing access to over $100 million in interest-free loans each year.

Therefore, I think it is very safe to say that this budget supports job creation and training and implements measures to address skills shortages and unemployment.

Continuing on with our commitment to improving Canadian infrastructure, this budget contains measures that would specifically address the needs of rural areas. I was very pleased to see that $305 million would be invested to extend and enhance broadband service for up to an additional 280,000 Canadians. In today's high-tech world, with reliance on services provided through the Internet, broadband service is very much needed in rural areas.

This is certainly a welcome announcement in my riding. On a personal basis, the area where I live is one without high speed Internet because of the topography. Hopefully, this initiative would allow companies to address spots like this and others, not just in my riding but across the country.

This budget would also support a strong and stable health care system. This year is significant in that the health accord would shift to the Canada health transfer, which would increase funding from $30.3 billion to $40 billion over the next 10 years.

Further to this, the budget would expand health-related tax relief by removing the GST and HST on more health care products and services to better reflect the health care needs of Canadians. Canadians are proud of their health care system, and this budget would continue to improve this already proven successful system.

My riding of Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound is surrounded by the Great Lakes on three sides. The recreational fishing industry is a vital source of economic activity and tourism for several communities. This budget would make a significant amount of funding available that would support growth in these communities through the recreational fishing industry.

It should be noted that the recreational fishing industry provides about $8 billion in economic activity in this country and has become extremely important to many people in my riding.

The first way in which this budget would improve the recreational fishing industry is through support for small craft harbours. The budget would invest an additional $40 million to ensure that harbour facilities meet the needs of local fishermen.

Furthermore, I was very pleased to see that the recreational fisheries conservation partnerships program was extended, through a $15-million investment. That program was originally put in place about a year ago. There was a lot of effort from a number of MPs from this side of the House. In particular, the member for Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, in Manitoba, put a lot of work into that. It is something that is very important to his riding, my riding, and many other ridings in the country.

Several groups in my riding have already received funding through this program, and the projects they intend to carry out will go a long way in establishing a secure recreational fishery. I am looking forward to seeing other sportsmen's associations and groups receiving funding through this program to support local fisheries. These people are true stewards of the environment, and they are committed to a healthy ecosystem. This funding would go a long way to creating a healthy environment and a strong recreational fishery.

In relation to getting out and enjoying nature, I was also very pleased to see that a $10-million investment would be made to improve and expand snowmobile and recreational trails. These trail systems provide a great deal of economic activity and are a great way for Canadians to see the countryside. The Ontario Federation of Snowmobile Clubs, the National Trails Coalition, and other groups do a tremendous amount of work to maintain a very successful recreational trail system in Canada.

I can tell the House that with this program and the winter and we have had this year, we saw snowmobilers in my area coming in, renting motel rooms, and buying gas and meals. The tourism effect was great, and it went right into April this year.

With that, I am going to leave it, and I look forward to any questions.

[Public Safety, April 2nd, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, our Conservative government has always stood up for law-abiding hunters, farmers, and sport shooters. Let us look at our record. We eliminated the useless Liberal gun show regulations. We have not allowed the UN firearms marking regulations to come into force. We brought common sense to the Explosives Act regulations. Finally, let us not forget that we ended the wasteful and ineffective long-gun registry.

There is more to do. The Minister of Public Safety committed to bringing forward measures to tackle the RCMP's arbitrary ability to reclassify and confiscate private property of law-abiding Canadians.

However, it appears not all parties share this approach. The member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca said:

This is an example of exactly what we said when the gun registry was being eliminated: that it would create obstacles to the police in doing the work they need to do to protect public safety.

This is another clear example that the NDP leader would bring back the long gun registry, should he get the chance. That is why Canadian gun owners know that the Conservative Party will stand up for their rights.

[Petitions, March 24th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I stand in the House today to present a petition from a number of my constituents. This petition asks that the Government of Canada ensure that all Canadians have a fair electoral system.