Malcolm Allen

[Business of Supply, October 25th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join in the debate. I will be sharing my time with the member for Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert.

This is a critical issue for farmers. I do not think we should make any mistake or have any illusions about this. Clearly, we are talking about the future of the farm family in western Canada. It is within our power to make a decision on their behalf as to the direction in which they ultimately go forward, whether it is under the single desk, as is presently the case, or under a market deregulation, as my friends on the other side have constantly talked about.

The one group that we seem to be missing in the middle of all this is the group that will be directly affected. Some of our colleagues will be directly affected because they are farmers on the Prairies and they grow grain. They will understand that impact as far as how they want to decide to move forward or to move in a different direction without the Wheat Board.

However, for all those folks who are farmers on the Prairies and who are not here, they deserve that we take the time to listen to them because, ultimately, it is their livelihoods and their farms that we are talking about. We are not doing it necessarily in a vacuum.

I know some friends and colleagues on the other side have farmers in their communities and in their ridings who are saying what direction they want us to go in. However, on the flip side of that coin, there are also farmers within their own ridings who are saying that they do not want to go in that direction.

How does one balance the competing interests between those farmers who are legitimately saying, and there is no question that they are, that they do not want to be a member of the Wheat Board any more?

I have heard the minister and others say it, and some have voted with their air sprayers, their air seeders. However, one can debate whether they decided to get out of wheat and go to canola or go to another crop based on the Wheat Board or based on the fact that, regardless, it was an open market and there might have been more money in canola anyway. It is not really a false argument. It just does not overlap and take into consideration everything that happens.

There is no doubt that the rotation of crops, new crops, how folks decide to do things and how they make the decision on the ground is their right. However, ultimately, why do we not engage them? Some will say that May 2 was our engagement process. The government has been fond of asking myself and my colleagues on a number of occasions what the member for Welland has in common with prairie wheat farmers, or what a member from Vancouver or a member from another large city has in common.

I would suggest to my friends on the other side that members from Calgary, Edmonton or any other major city would have a similar interest, like I, with Canadian wheat farmers. It is no different. Whether folks selected one particular party over another in a particular area was not specific to that question necessarily, as to how people voted because there were more than farmers voting.

It is a little spurious and a bit of a reach to suggest that the Conservatives have a mandate based on one question, on a large platform that talked about many things, that engaged all kinds of folks beyond just farmers but yet we can take the opportunity to ask them. What I would suggest to my friends is that we figure out what question we want to ask them. I have heard from the other side that they want a third option. We need to debate the question that we put to farmers in western Canada who are directly affected and ask them what they want.

In Ontario, my friend from Essex said that there is market freedom in Ontario because farmers decided that. He said that it was not a move by the federal government because it had no jurisdiction. The minister pointed out earlier that the federal government had no jurisdiction over Ontario farmers. The province did but it was the farmers who chose. The province did not tell them what they had to do in that jurisdiction. It allowed Ontario farmers to make a choice. They made a choice and went forward with that choice. It was their right to do so.

We on this side of the House are not standing in the way of western farmers. In fact, it is the opposite. We are standing with them in saying that the government should allow them to make the choice. Surely we all understand that it is the farmers' right to have the choice because at the end of the day it has a direct impact on them.

My colleague for Saskatoon—Humboldt talked earlier about his farming family, his great-grandfather, grandfather, father and uncles who have farmed. He gave us that nuanced piece in order for us to understand what it is like. There is no question that there are grievances. Folks did go to jail and people did feel they were treated unfairly, which should never have happened to them. However, now that we know all of those things, there are ways to ensure we fix it and part of our responsibility is to find a way to do that.

We can only use the plebiscite because the government refuses to actually put a question to farmers. The plebiscite is not quite the only tool but it is one of the tools we have. We can see that 62% of farmers want to keep the single desk. We have a smaller group that did not vote, and we are assuming that it did not want to. However, if we assume that is the case, then we have a majority of folks saying one thing and a minority saying the other. How do we engage the majority of folks? We simply apply what the minority wants against the majority situation and say that it is democracy. It is strange that I do not remember learning that in political science class but maybe that is how it is supposed to work in the government's perspective. However, I always assumed that when we looked at a vote, we took democracy in hand and took the majority vote, but that is yet to be seen.

When we look at this democratic process, the amazing thing is that the Conservatives are using words like “tyranny” and “oppression”. Tyranny happened in Libya until we saw the end of Gadhafi. Tyranny and oppression happens in Iran. To suggest that there is something tyrannical or oppressive about the Canadian Wheat Board in the same sentence seems to be a bit of a dichotomy in how we use the language. “Unfair” may be a reasonable word to use about the Canadian Wheat Board for those who do not believe in the single desk. However, to escalate the language to “tyrannical” or “the tyranny of the Canadian Wheat Board”, my goodness, one would think, if that were the case, that people were actually being removed from their land, such as what happened in the Ukraine under Stalin. That is not happening.

What is happening is that folks are asking to be given a choice. We see folks on the Prairies who are clearly upset with the direction of the government. They are making their voices heard and are asking for the opportunity to vote. On this side of the House, we are saying that if the government conducts the vote, we will abide by the farmers' wishes. What could be more democratic than that?

Many of my friends on the other side came here at one point with the old Reform Party and actually used to say things like, “I'll ask my constituents”. In fact, they even went so far as to suggest that maybe the constituents should have a recall provision because that is democratic. I do not know what happened to their roots but they clearly lost them along the way in becoming Conservatives. They do not want to go back and talk to their constituents, the folks who are directly affected, the farmers who produce wheat on the Prairies of this country, and ask them directly what they want and then respect their wishes. On this side, we would do that.

We reach out to members on the other side and ask them to join us in the quest of finding out what farmers want so that we can respect their wishes one way or the other. It does not need to be what we are asking for. Indeed, it could be that the Conservatives are right, but let us find out. If they are right, then we will stop, but perhaps they are not. If that is the case, then they should respect the wishes of farmers, just as we would if they are right. That is how the democratic process works and that is what we fight for. It is why we ask the brave men and women of this country to go overseas, as the government has pointed out to us on numerous occasions, to help them protect themselves and eventually garner democracy.

I implore the government to simply allow western farmers to have that voice and allow them to vote on their future because it is their future.

[Business of Supply, October 25th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the member for Saskatoon—Humboldt for allowing us to share some of his experiences with farm life. It is important to share that in this House for those who have not had the opportunity to have farm life.

I know that Saskatoon is indeed a city, and a substantial one. Since I actually represent a rural piece of southern Ontario with a lot of small communities, I understand that.

When we talk about marketing freedom, the other side talks in glowing terms about the upside. Perhaps the member could explain to us in real terms, because he has those experiences, that the market does not always go up. Every market, regardless of what it is for or whatever commodity it happens to be, goes up and goes down.

Perhaps the member could enlighten us on what he sees as the potential of the shortfalls we could see, similar to what happened in Australia. We see that premiums for Australian wheat growers under the Australian Wheat Board diminished from almost $99 to less than $27 below the American price per ton. They have actually taken a hit in an open market. They have not always gone forward in an open market.

It is said that markets are self-correcting, so there is not always an upward trajectory; there is indeed a downward portion. Perhaps the member could enlighten us on that aspect.

[Business of Supply, October 25th, 2011]

Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Industry for mentioning Welland on more than one occasion in the House. It is always a great joy when other members recognize my riding without my having to do it myself.

Let me be clear about why I would second it or not and why folks in Ontario are or are not in support of the Wheat Board. What I said in the House yesterday and what I am saying today is that in Ontario, as the minister has pointed out, there was a difference in 2003 because farmers chose that. It was not an act of government; the farmers chose it in Ontario. All we in the NDP are asking for is that western farmers make the choice.

I absolutely agree that there is a divergent viewpoint among farmers themselves, not just among members in the House. Certain prairie farmers want to do it one way, and other farmers want to continue the single desk. The simple question to the minister is: Why not allow them to have a choice? Why do we not debate the question we should ask and make it a fair question? I understand it may not be this or that; there may be another option. We should make it a fair question and let the farmers decide.

Ultimately, an election is not necessarily about farmers deciding, especially, as was pointed out by some members, if they live in downtown Toronto. Do people who live in downtown Edmonton really know about prairie farmers any more than downtown Torontonians do? It begs the question on that.

I would ask the minister to respond as to why we do not give farmers the choice to decide for themselves.

[Marketing Freedom for Grain Farmers Act, October 24th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I can only speak to what I believe is the decision not to allow farmer appointed or farmer elected board members.

The government has said that it will allow a voluntary Canadian wheat board. One would think that if it wants it to be voluntary and it believes that it is okay if folks want to join it, at the very least they should be allowed to decide if they want to vote for the folks who want a voluntarily association. One would think that is what the government would want.

One hates to have these thoughts that five folks who are appointed might just want to get rid of it, and that it might be made in such a way that is so draconian that those who actually want to voluntarily be part of it will be driven away by the folks who make decisions in their best interest.

That is why we have democracy. That is why we elect folks. The other side talks about how many of its members were elected and the fact that it has a majority government. True fact. The members could point to the fact that the reason that happened is because folks voted for them. True fact.

If that is the case, why not extend it to those particular farmers, if indeed the government wants a voluntary association, and simply say that at the very least it will give people the right to vote for the folks to represent them on a voluntary association called the Canadian Wheat Board?

Then again, if the government really wants to do that, it should have a plebiscite vote and find out if Canadian farmers really want to keep the Canadian Wheat Board.

[Marketing Freedom for Grain Farmers Act, October 24th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I am not sure I would agree with the hon. member's comment at the front end.

Nonetheless, as to the question not being the way we wanted it when it was asked at the plebiscite, 62% of western farmers said they wanted to keep the Wheat Board. If that was not a good question or a fair question, let us craft one and ask them.

I agree with my friend who says that coming from Alberta he understands the Wheat Board and wheat farmers. To say that just because we come from Ontario we do not understand wheat farmers or we have not learned to understand what it is about them, I do not think is necessarily a fair comment.

The bottom line is that if we ask farmers a fair question and the decision is to not have a wheat board, so be it. However, if the response is that the farmers want to keep it, then so be it also.

[Marketing Freedom for Grain Farmers Act, October 24th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank all my colleagues for their, at times, very impassioned speeches about the Canadian Wheat Board. There is no question that on both sides of the House there is a real delineation of thought as to what it is we believe that farmers want.

It is ironic that there are farmers among us on both sides of the House who have different viewpoints on it. That is fair from the perspective of having different viewpoints, but what I find amazing about this whole debate is the government's insistence that somehow the market is the direct benefit to all farmers at all times.

It reminds me of my younger days when I was first married and my wife and I decided to seek out a financial planner and talk about raising some money to buy a home and do all the things that young couples do. I interviewed a financial planner who talked to me about the market. I thought it was wonderful that he was telling me exactly how it works, except what he kept repeating was not to worry and that things always get better. What I am hearing the government tell farmers about wheat, durum and barley is not to worry, it will always gets better and they will get better prices.

I have heard all about the risks that farmers take and they do. As the critic for agriculture, I understand the risks that farmers take when they put seed in the ground, buy equipment and decide on the rotation for the year. They make all of those decisions and then have to face the vagaries of the weather, whether it be the floods in southern Saskatchewan or southern Manitoba this year or frost.

Conservatives on this side never talk about the downside of the market. My friends on the other side constantly want to teach us about the markets, which is nice, but they should at least be honest and say that markets go up, yes indeed, and markets go down, absolutely. Folks who bought RRSPs in 2008 got a bit of recovery after that, but ask them how they are doing in 2011.

When people throw themselves to the markets, they do not have ultimate control. They are not the markets, they are just players. Depending on size, they are either big players or not so big. If they are not so big, they do not have the same clout as big players, which means that ultimately the big players make more than the smaller players or takes advantage of them.

My friends on the other side talk about value-added and this new pasta plant that is going to open in the Prairies, which is a wonderful thing. They insist that means that primary producers, the farmers, in the west would get a better price if they go on the open market. We have seen a stock circular put out by a particular company. If we happen to go through it, one line says its expectation of making additional profit is by paying lower prices for primary products.

It reminds us of what happens when value is added. The value gets added in and the price gets taken at the other side, which is not the farmer but the consumer. The middle guy, who is the producer-processor, is not the farmer. The farmer is at the other end of that chain actually putting things in at the beginning where the first price comes. When the processor or producing-manufacturing group in the centre who has the power cannot get more money from the consumer end and wants to increase profits, because that is what the company's stockholders want, they squeeze it out in costs.

My friends on the other side constantly let us know how knowledgeable they are on these things. All business owners know that they wring out costs if they can and they wring it out at the bottom, at the front end, the farmer. When farmers do not have the ability to go somewhere else, they are told they can go where they want.

I wonder how that will look in five years when they do not get the producer cars that they rely on any more or the track time they need to get to the coast, port or wherever it happens to be they cannot get any more because there is a new potash mine and all of a sudden CN or CP is saying the mine pays more and the farmers can wait.

My friends on the other side have talked about pulses. There is no question that pulse farms have done very well. One of the biggest complaints from the group around the pulse organization is that the biggest impediment in their ability to pay farmers well is getting their crop to market. Which market? Not in this country. They literally take it 5,000, 8,000, 10,000 kilometres across the globe to a market in either India or Southeast Asia. The largest single impediment to getting their crop there on time or losing the market, because they can, is the railway.

They are paying costs because ships are lying at anchor in the Port of Vancouver waiting for their product to get there and they are being held up because CN decided to send something else that made it more money. When grain farmers end up in that queue, and they will, they cannot move their product to market and the premium that is suggested by this market free enterprise government will be lost because they cannot get it there on time. The pulse groups are saying today that they will lose the market, not the premium, but the market, period, if they cannot move their crop.

It begs the question, if indeed we have such difficulty on both sides of the House on whether we should do this or that, we have really come to an impasse. We think we are right and members opposite think they are right. Why do we not just ask the folks who actually do it? Why do we not just ask the farmer?

It has been said here many times that there are 8 out of 10 elected board members. The government changed the requirements on how to elect them. An individual had to grow so much wheat. They had to do it in consecutive years, otherwise they did not get a ballot.

I heard earlier from some colleagues who said the widow of a farmer got a ballot for her husband, and that is unfortunate. I would not like my mum to get a ballot for my dad who is deceased either, but that happens from time to time.

We have folks on election lists in this country who are no longer with us. Lists sometimes are not that good. In this House we know lists are not always that good because we have our own lists of constituents. How many times have we sent things to constituents to have it returned to us because they do not live there or they are deceased?

However, if we were to hold a legitimate, government-held vote of the producers, agreed upon by the board, and asked them what they want, I think this House would be satisfied. On this side of the House we would be satisfied. If the producers told us what they want, we would say it is fair. Nothing more, nothing less. It is fair.

Now we are asking the folks we represent what they would like to do. Would they like this open market as has been described by members on the other side, market freedom, or would they want to continue down the road they have with the Wheat Board. If we asked them that question, and we could debate how we form the question, but if we asked them an honest, fair question from both sides, not a one-sided question, and let them decide, this House could then go about its business because they had made a decision.

Anecdotal stories are being told from one side or the other. My colleagues from Alberta say that in Alberta, this is what producers are saying. People call me from Alberta, and I am not from Alberta, who say they want to keep the Wheat Board. There is no question that there are some folks who want to keep it and there are some folks who do not. There is no question about that. Why do we not simply let them have the final say on all of this.

We should decide on the question we should put to them after debate, let them decide for themselves and accept their wishes, based on the fact that it is their ability and their democratic right to make a final decision on their lives. It is not necessarily mine. I do not farm wheat, and a lot of us do not, but at least farmers would be making a decision for themselves, not having it imposed on them by either side of the House, regardless of how the vote goes.

[Keeping Canada's Economy and Jobs Growing Act, October 5th, 2011]

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for his enlightenment about the bridge and its application.

I would like to do a little arithmetic because it seems that our friends on the other side need help with that. They do not like statistics but sometimes they help enlighten the debate, so I am going to quote some statistics.

In July 2007 approximately 16,848,300 Canadians had jobs. In 2011 that number is 17,344,200--

[Keeping Canada's Economy and Jobs Growing Act, October 5th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, let me thank the hon. member for Parkdale—High Park for her impassioned speech and laying out for this House what really needs to get done when it comes time to help those who are really vulnerable in our communities.

I remind this House that Henniges Automotive, which used to be General Tire & Rubber Company, then became GDX, just closed in my riding of Welland on Saturday and threw the last 300 workers out of work. There were over 1,500 workers there at one point, not that long ago. Now they are all gone.

However, one of the things that has happened in our region that is of a positive note is the introduction of inter-regional transit; in other words, municipalities in the Niagara region will now have transit for the first time in a very long time. In fact, we would have to go back to my mother-in-law's day, rest her soul, which was many years ago, when they actually had a train system that went between communities.

I would ask my hon. colleague what she thinks the government should be doing when it comes to transit in this country, which seems to be always at the tail end of things, whether it be downtown Toronto and now my region of Niagara, where we are finally going to have an inter-regional transit, where people in Port Colborne, which has one of the highest rates of unemployment in the province, who are seeking employment need to get to my good friend the Minister of Justice's Niagara Falls riding to get a job, but who do not have a way to get there because they cannot afford a car now. Finally, they might have regional transit.

I would ask my hon. colleague to comment on what we need to do for transit.

[Employment, October 4th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservative government likes to tell Canadians that corporate tax cuts help create jobs.

The fact is that no strings attached corporate tax giveaways to profitable corporations are not the solution to Canada's growing unemployment.

We have just witnessed the latest plant closure in Welland. This past Saturday, over 300 workers worked their final shift at Henniges Automotive. Henniges, just like John Deere three years ago, gladly took the millions of dollars in corporate tax breaks that the government gave them, invested the money in Mexico and laid off Canadian workers. It is shameful.

The Conservatives are out of touch with workers, as witnessed by the comments of a Henniges employee who said, referring to politicians, “They need to take off their rose-coloured glasses and see the real world as it is”.

Canadian workers are clearly frustrated by the inaction of the Conservative government. It is time to stand up for working Canadians who ask for no more than a decent paying job to raise their families and build their communities. It is not too much to ask for. We need to get that job done on behalf of Canadian workers.

[Questions Passed as Orders for Returns, September 19th, 2011]

With respect to the Investment Canada Act and foreign corporate takeovers of Canadian companies: (a) on an annual and monthly basis from January 1, 1993 to December 31, 2010, how many takeovers were (i) approved, (ii) rejected; (b) for each takeover, what was the aggregate value of acquisition (i) federally, on an annual and monthly basis, (ii) by province, on an annual and monthly basis; (c) distributed federally, on an annual and monthly basis, and by province, on an annual and monthly basis, what are the takeovers, further distributed by the industry sectors (i) resources, (ii) manufacturing, (iii) wholesale and retail trades, (iv) business and service industries, (v) other; (d) in which year since January 1, 1993, did the most foreign takeovers of Canadian companies occur; (e) what is the current position of the government on foreign takeovers; (f) has the Investment Canada Act mandate changed since it was created and, if so, when and how, specifying the details of all amendments to the mandate; (g) in regard to takeovers approved between January 1, 1993 and December 31, 2010, what are the number of jobs affected by these takeovers as submitted by the investors as part of the application for review; (h) how many times has the Competition Policy Review Panel met on an annual and monthly basis, and broken down federally and by province, since its creation; (i) what changes to the Investment Canada Act has the Competition Policy Review Panel recommended; and (j) what other actions have been taken by the government to review the Competition Act and Investment Canada Act?