Megan Leslie

[Business of Supply, February 2nd, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, the first thing I would say is that no other province has minimum processing requirements, so the starting point is a false one. We cannot ask that question, because minimum processing requirements do not exist anywhere else.

I have heard the member and others in the House on the Conservative side stand up and say that it is a lot of money and that we are asking for money all over the place. In that case, they should not make the deal if they cannot afford it. Do not make the deal and then break the deal and renege on it.

All we are asking for is transparency and accountability. If the federal government says that this is the way it is going to be, we expect it to really be that way. Do not make the deal if you cannot uphold it.

[Business of Supply, February 2nd, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question and I thank him for his excellent work in bringing this motion forward. The fact that we are having this debate today, taking control of the House and dedicating it to fairness to Newfoundland and Labrador, speaks volumes.

Some people might say that Newfoundland and Labrador is small. It has seven MPs. The Conservatives have done their political calculations and they have figured out that they do not need Newfoundland and Labrador in order to win the election. Some people are cynical in that way.

However, I do not think that this is the case. I think that the Prime Minister takes delight in stuff like this, in breaking promises. I really do. We have seen broken promises, whether they were about child care or the Atlantic accord, over and over again. It is the Conservatives' modus operandi. It is really just about breaking promises and wanting to feel like the big man on campus. It is a bully mentality, and it is unfair. We expect more from the government.

[Business of Supply, February 2nd, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, the member's question was about reneging on a deal. The Premier of Newfoundland and Labrador is saying it is very clear to him that we cannot trust this Prime Minister. That is what happens with the bait and switch we were talking about earlier: there can be no trust.

My colleague from Winnipeg North talked about how important it is that provinces and the federal government work together. He rightly brings up the first ministers meeting; I would bring up the Council of the Federation.

In 2010 premiers from every single province got together and had a news conference to announce that they wanted to engage in the bulk purchase of prescription drugs. With bulk purchasing they could save money, up to $1 billion a year. It was historic. They were all around the table.

What has happened on that issue? Nothing, because there is no leadership. Who is going to lead? Is it going to be Newfoundland or Ontario or Quebec? It should be the federal government, but the federal government is not there at the table. This is a perfect role that a federal government could and should play.

[The Environment, February 2nd, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, a federal report reveals huge gaps in the handling of oil sands bitumen spills. Nobody, not the National Energy Board, Environment Canada, or Fisheries and Oceans, knows how to deal with a bitumen spill properly. In the Arctic, the problem is even worse, yet the Conservatives continue to pretend that nothing is wrong.

The Prime Minister has gutted environmental laws and cut funding to that very research. When will they stop cutting the research that would help us to deal with these spills?

[The Environment, February 2nd, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, according to a secret report, the government knows very little about the toxic effects of the oil sands on our lakes and rivers. More research is needed on the effect oil has on the aquatic environment.

However, the Conservatives have made cuts to funding for research, they abandoned the experimental lakes and they cut funding for the Maurice Lamontagne Institute. Why are the Conservatives playing games with Canadians' safety and their environment?

[Business of Supply, February 2nd, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, before I launch into the substance of the motion, I would like to take a moment to talk about the sponsor of the motion, the member for St. John's South—Mount Pearl.

We met in 2010, before the last election. I was with the member for St. John's East, another strong and passionate advocate for Newfoundland and Labrador. We were in St. John's together attending round tables about different issues in the community. He was not yet the member for St. John's South—Mount Pearl, but he was there as a member of the community attending these round tables. I was really impressed by how engaged he was with the community and the issues it was facing and how committed he was to Newfoundlanders and Labradorians.

As we all know, he was elected in 2011. I have had the pleasure of serving in the NDP caucus with him since then. He has also been the chair of the Atlantic caucus for the NDP, so I have got to know him quite well here on the Hill and know him to be a strong voice for Newfoundlanders and Labradorians. I have had a chance to visit both Newfoundland and Labrador with this member and am still impressed with his work in community and the way he works alongside the member for St. John's East, the way the two of them work together, to bring these important issues from the community to this place, to the House of Commons, because that is the point.

There are 308 of us across this country and we are supposed to bring these issues that our communities are facing to the House of Commons for Parliament to work on, no matter how uncomfortable the issues are.

Today, I am standing and debating another example of this member's work. It is a great motion that stands up for Newfoundlanders and Labradorians. I am proud to debate it as a Nova Scotian, because we do pay attention to what goes on around Atlantic Canada. We have been following this issue quite closely, because Nova Scotians are quite familiar with the levels of betrayal by the federal government as well. We do have experience with that.

Newfoundland and Labrador was promised a $400 million fishery fund by our federal government. That is not chump change but a substantial amount of money for a transition, and now we see the Conservative government reneging on that deal, to the point where the Conservative Premier of Newfoundland and Labrador, Paul Davis, has said:

It really solidifies that you can't trust the federal government, you can't trust [the current Conservative] government.... We bargained in good faith. We believed we had an agreement in place, that we had a deal set.

Those are pretty strong words for a premier to come out and say against a government, against the federal government and against the Prime Minister. What is the solution? It is exactly in this motion. This is what the NDP is asking for: We want the federal government to live up to the commitments it has made, plain and simple. It is pretty simple, but pretty elegant, and I think only fair. We want the federal government to commit its share of the $400 million fisheries fund that would allow the development and renewal of the fishing industry in Newfoundland and Labrador. It is pretty straightforward.

In Atlantic Canada we do follow what is going on in different provinces. I read in the news in mid-January that Newfoundland and Labrador had suspended its support for CETA, the trade agreement, and all trade agreements currently being negotiated with the federal government. I wondered what these headlines meant. What was going on? I read the articles, and I saw that Newfoundland and Labrador's business minister, Darin King, had said:

The Federal Government's failure to honour the terms of this fund is jeopardizing CETA for all industries, economic sectors, and indeed all Canadian and European Union citizens.

There was another quote by him where he also talked about the failure to honour a deal. Those are strong words to say that a government is failing to honour a deal.

We go back to the premier's quote. He talked about how Newfoundland and Labrador had bargained in good faith with the federal government. Now we see that bargain is not being lived up to, that the federal government was not bargaining in good faith after all, because the terms of the agreement have been switched right before our very eyes.

The member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley talked about how, after the deal had been struck, the Conservative government started to crab walk. Perhaps that is a good metaphor for the issue of minimum processing requirements. Another one is the bait and switch, to say one thing and switch it out for something else. There are some good fisheries metaphors. Unfortunately, they are not very funny. It is not hard to believe that there has been a bait and switch or a crab walk because I find the Conservatives to be masters of the bait and switch.

There are other policies where we have seen this too. For example, they promised child care spaces. They ran on a platform where they would create child care spaces. How many have they created? They have created zero. It is not just the Conservatives. It is the Liberals too. They promised child care year after year they were in government. They had majorities, they had minorities, they had it all. How many child care spaces did they create? They did not live up to that promise either, did they?

Tom Walkom, a reporter for the Toronto Star, did a piece about child care, including the NDP's proposal for $15-a-day child care. The title of his article is “National child care—the promise that's never kept”. It is time for the government to start keeping its promises, like the promise of a cap and trade system to bring down our greenhouse gas emissions. Now Conservatives sit on the other side of the House and demonize a price on carbon. It is like this big, scary bogey monster that is under the bed, that is going to take everyone's money and eat their children, when it was actually part of their platform to have a cap and trade system.

They promised oil and gas regulations. New Democrats have been asking questions in the House about those, including where the regulations are. I have gotten answers from various ministers over the years that, “Hold your horses, we are trying to get it right. We are perfecting it.” Then this fall, the Prime Minister said it would be crazy to regulate the oil and gas sector. If that is not a crab walk or a bait and switch, I do not know what is.

Speaking of bait and switch, how about the change in the age of retirement from 65 to 67? I do not remember any discussion of that during the last election campaign. Usually if a party has a major policy announcement, it lays it out in a campaign document. It has a platform that it runs on and says to voters, “This is my offer to you and I ask you to accept that these are the things the party will do.” I do not remember that offer or the Conservatives saying, “And we're going to raise the age of retirement.” They did not campaign on that, and yet those years have been taken away.

As I said, people in Nova Scotia pay close attention to what is going on in Atlantic Canada. They share in each other's successes and in each other's struggles. This is just the latest struggle.

The member for St. John's South—Mount Pearl, who introduced this motion, set up a briefing for NDP members so we could better understand the issue, have our questions answered, and know exactly what was going on. He did a good job of spelling things out really clearly for us. I am proud to be able to stand here and say what the NDP is asking for.

We believe that a deal is a deal. We believe that the Conservatives made a promise to Newfoundland and Labrador and need to keep their word. New Democrats have been clear that we support signing a trade agreement with the European Union if it is a good deal for Canada. I do not know if that question has been answered yet. It is a huge document. I think there are 40 chapters to this trade deal. New Democrats are going over it and taking the time to get it right, but we know this one aspect, this broken deal with Newfoundland and Labrador, is unfair. It is not the deal that was struck. As the premier said, the province bargained in good faith and that is now being taken away.

We all know that the fishery supports good, middle-class jobs in Newfoundland and Labrador and that the government needs to protect those jobs and build a fishery of the future, not just leave it to chance. It is too important to be left to chance. Time and time again, the Liberals and Conservatives have gone to Newfoundland and Labrador, cap in hand, only to turn around and betray it once they got what they wanted from Newfoundland and Labrador. All Canadians deserve a government that respects ordinary Canadians. We deserve a government that will work with provinces to create jobs and get things done.

In the NDP briefing to try to understand this issue, it was unbelievable reading the headlines and thinking this was happening, but it really is. What went on is laid out.

We know the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador has a long-standing system of minimum processing requirements. This is specifically designed to protect its fish processing industry. This system requires that a portion of the fish landed in Newfoundland and Labrador must be processed in this province. This makes good sense. It is creating and protecting jobs, good middle-class jobs, at home. However, it is potentially under threat when we are looking at trade agreements. We have seen some of the unexpected consequences of NAFTA. We want to ensure that does not happen when it comes to CETA as well, the European Union agreement.

The deal was that the EU asked for Newfoundland to lift its minimum processing requirements, the fund about which I talked. The federal government came forward and said that it would set a 70/30 federal-provincial cost formula to help with the transition of these fisheries workers, that this was only fair. It was actually called a “transition fund”.

Now the government is reneging on that, saying that damages have to be shown, which is unfair. This is not the deal that was struck. That is not a transition; that is damages. There is a big difference between laying out the money for a just transition for workers to transition versus having damages and coming in after the fact. That is more like a court system.

As my time is up, I am eager to answer questions.

[Public Works and Government Services, January 28th, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, last week a federal panel ruled that for tax purposes the Halifax Citadel was worth $41.2 million. Well, that is $37 million more than what the Minister of Public Works and Government Services proposed, and get this: she also argued that the Citadel site itself was worth $10.

This whole situation is absurd. Halifax has been waiting for decades. The Conservatives have stalled and delayed and made incredible claims and started expensive court battles.

Will the Minister of Public Works and Government Services finally give up the games and pay Halifax a fair price, the price it deserves?

[Questions on the Order Paper, January 26th, 2015]

With respect to the Convention on the International Trade of Endangered Species (CITES) Conference of the Parties in March of 2013: (a) why has the government placed reservations on all species added to Appendix I or II of the Wild Animal and Plant Trade regulations from the meeting of the Conference of the Parties rather than adding them to Schedule I of Canada’s Wild Animal and Plant Trade Regulations; and (b) does the government intend to lift these reservations and fulfil its commitment to CITES and, if so, what is the timeline in which the government intends on lifting the reservations on all species given increased protection?

[The Economy, January 26th, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives remain in denial, but job losses are mounting and the inequality gap between the privileged few and the middle class keeps on growing.

It is time to make the economy work for all Canadians. Instead, the government is taking billions away from hard-working families and giving it away to the wealthy few who do not need it.

Will the Conservatives finally admit their backward economic policies are failing the middle class?

[The Economy, January 26th, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives can bury their heads in the sand, but they cannot hide from the fact that they have done such damage to our economy.

There have been 375,000 manufacturing jobs lost since 2006. There is a 13% youth unemployment rate. Family incomes are shrinking, and household debts have skyrocketed to 163% of disposable income.

Canadian families need help now, so why are the Conservatives making corporate giveaways a priority?