Mike Lake

[Automotive Industry, March 5th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, obviously when Canadians lose their jobs, Canadian families are affected, and our thoughts are with them.

I do want to just point out that yesterday the hon. member and I sat on a committee and listened to various witnesses talk about the most critical thing, the crucial importance of passing the budget to get the secured credit facility in place, the $12 billion to get the receivables insurance. We heard the parts manufacturers talk about the receivables insurance being so important.

I would remind the hon. member that he actually voted against that budget. Not only did he vote against the budget, but his party delayed it at every opportunity.

[Business of Supply, March 5th, 2009]

Madam Speaker, I have a really quick question. I want to make sure that I heard what I thought I heard. I think I heard the member say that the government is meant to be like a concerned parent looking after its children.

I would like to clarify whether the hon. member was referring to all Canadians as children. I just want to make sure that I actually heard what I thought I heard.

[Points of Order, February 27th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday the member for Bourassa sank to a new low with his question regarding the Minister of Industry's chief of staff.

If we wanted to go down the same road, we could point to the fact that there is a staffer in the office of the Leader of the Opposition who is currently on secondment from Hill and Knowlton.

The accusations from the member for Bourassa are unfounded and not based on any facts, but we have come to expect that from the member, who continues to throw mud against the wall hoping that something will eventually stick.

This has no place in the House. He must take responsibility for his actions. We would like to see him retract his statements and immediately send an apology to the minister's office addressed to his chief of staff.

[Education, February 27th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, our government has increased funding for scholarships at the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada by 50%, or $75 million. More scholarships are available to more graduate students from all areas of study.

Stakeholders asked us to make more scholarships available to business students, and we have done that. Canada graduate scholarships will continue to fund social sciences and humanities studies and also support business and finance research.

[Committees of the House, February 26th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, there have been consultations among the parties and I believe you will find consent for the following motion. I move:

That the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology create a subcommittee whose membership will be composed of five (5) members, with two (2) from the Conservative Party, one (1) from the Liberal Party, one (1) from the Bloc Québécois, and one (1) from the New Democratic Party, and that the Chair be from the Conservative Party; that the sub-committee have all the powers and authority of the Standing Committee, to undertake a study of the crisis faced by certain industrial sectors in Canada such as aerospace, energy, forestry, high-tech, and manufacturing, with the understanding that any legislation referred to the full committee take precedence over the work of the sub-committee, that the sub-committee not meet at the same time as the full committee, that the sub-committee report its findings and recommendations to the main committee, and that the main committee present the report to the House within ten sitting days.

[Business of Supply, February 26th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to serve on the industry committee with the hon. member. As a new member, it is always a challenging thing to come into the House.

I would especially note that she is in a unique circumstance in that for the first time in history, an opposition leader allowed a free vote on the budget, and she took the opportunity to vote against the budget, as did her Newfoundland colleagues. With that free vote, 90% of her Liberal colleagues took the opportunity to support the government in the important steps.

In terms of the steps we are taking, our budget contains a long list of initiatives to stimulate the economy and make sure Canadians are working. We have doubled the amount of money in the gas tax and made it permanent. For this year it will be doubled. It is now permanent, something municipalities find very important.

My encouragement right now would be to ensure that we get the budget implementation bill back to the House, that we vote on it and that we all support it. Hopefully this time around the hon. member will rethink her position with the free vote and actually support the budget in an attempt to get the money flowing to the communities she talked about.

[Business of Supply, February 26th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I would point out that the slowdown affects sectors and industries across the country. It is a big issue. Obviously it is a global situation that affects countries around the globe and within Canada, there will be effects across the country.

Many of the steps we have taken are specific to industries. There is the community adjustment fund. There are modifications we have made to EI, for example, that makes it easier for people to get the support they need. We have the targeted initiative for older workers that the members from the Bloc have been talking about.

In terms of infrastructure, we have a $4 billion stimulus fund to help the provinces, territories and municipalities all across the country get projects started as soon as possible to put out of work Canadians to work as soon as we can.

There is $2 billion to accelerate construction of colleges and universities, which will have a short-term benefit in terms of the jobs that will create, but a long-term benefit in terms of the ability to train Canadians to be global leaders for the future.

There is $1 billion to create the new green infrastructure fund. There is $500 million to support the construction of new community recreation facilities and upgrade existing facilities, again, putting Canadians to work.

It is such a long list, it might take a little bit longer to go through it.

[Business of Supply, February 26th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House today to speak to this motion.

As many of my hon. colleagues may recall, in November 2007 this Conservative government made the largest single commitment to Canadian public infrastructure in over half a century when we launched the building Canada plan. This is the largest investment in infrastructure since the second world war. Since then we have moved quickly to implement this plan, working together with our counterparts in the provinces, territories and municipalities.

We have signed framework agreements with all provinces and territories. We have taken action to develop our gateways, borders and trade corridors. We have made the gas tax transfer, which provides municipalities with stable and predictable funding, permanent. We have delivered significant public transit initiatives. We have flowed money to provinces and territories so project work can begin quickly. We have committed more money to infrastructure projects across the country than any other government in Canadian history.

All of these actions will help provide a solid foundation for our country to weather the economic storm we are facing. Building Canada money is already at work in communities across the country. It is being used for more than 4,700 projects with many more on the way. These projects are not only creating jobs and stimulating local economies in the short term, but they will also have many lasting benefits. For example, we are investing millions of dollars in the expansion of the Manitoba Red River floodway and flood protection measures in British Columbia. This investment will help protect hundreds of thousands of people and billions of dollars in property from the possible ravages of flood waters.

We are helping fund the expansion of the Spadina subway and GO Transit in the greater Toronto area, new buses in Montreal, and the SkyTrain in B.C. These initiatives will encourage more people to use public transit, which is good for the economy and the environment. It will help create a better quality of life for our families and our communities.

Our government is also investing in projects that will result in cleaner water for Canadians to drink, use and enjoy. We are helping to pay for the cleanup of the Saint John harbour in New Brunswick, upgrading storm sewers in Nova Scotia, and developing better water treatment plants in Nunavut.

Every day millions of Canadians and Canadian goods take to the roads, highways and airports, all activities which support our economy. Our government is investing heavily in making those roads, highways and airports safer and better. By facilitating the movement of people and goods, we are encouraging tourism, trade and commerce, all of which have enormous benefits for our country.

Our building Canada plan will help important projects, such as the Trans-Labrador Highway, the Montague Street bridge in P.E.I., the Kicking Horse Canyon highway in B.C., and many more.

We are also investing in infrastructure that makes Canadians proud to live, work and play in their communities. Sports, tourism and cultural infrastructure across this country are getting a much needed boost from our government.

Calgary will see a redeveloped Stampede Park. The Quartier des spectacles in Montreal and Evraz Place in Regina are being revitalized. Right in our backyard, Ottawa will soon be home to a magnificent world-class convention centre that will attract business and other groups from around the globe, opening the doors to enormous economic opportunity.

In 2011, Halifax will welcome the world for the Canada Winter Games. Our government is proud to support this event by helping fund the Halifax Mainland Common Centre, which will be a primary venue for this event and a world-class facility for training high performance and competitive athletes.

By investing in community recreational infrastructure, our government is committed to building healthy communities so that families, friends and neighbours can come together.

All of these infrastructure projects are only possible through the co-operation of all levels of government. As Canada's Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities has said repeatedly, together all three levels of government can go three times further and three times faster. Ontario's Minister of Finance has said, “Today, the federal government has come to the table and has made the much-needed infrastructure investments Ontario has been calling for”.

No one level of government alone can accomplish what we need to get done. Our government has stepped up to the plate with $33 billion in infrastructure funding under building Canada, plus another $12 billion in new funding announced in the most recent budget.

We will speed up the flow of these funds to the provinces, territories and municipalities. We will cut the red tape, so provinces and territories can put shovels in the ground quickly to create jobs. Together we will build the infrastructure that will allow Canadians and the economy to thrive now and in the future.

We will continue to work with the provinces, territories and municipalities to invest wisely, quickly and efficiently to address the needs of Canadians today, tomorrow and into the future. This is our plan.

I want to read a couple of articles. We have talked at different times in the House about the leadership the Prime Minister has shown on the international stage and comments from different organizations that have commended us for our world leadership. Around the globe we are the envy of other countries when it comes to the way that we not only acted prior to the slowdown but how we have worked during this time to ensure that Canada will come out sooner and stronger from this economic slowdown than other countries.

It is interesting to note, for example, an article from the Daily Telegraph in the U.K., that came out during the G8 meetings this past summer. The article significantly lamented the lack of leadership among the other G8 countries as we headed into the economic slowdown, but it singled out one world leader for specific recognition and excepted him from the comments it made regarding the leadership, saying that our Prime Minister had shown specific positive leadership. Here is a direct quote:

Of all the leaders, only [our Prime Minister]...is able to point to a popular and successful record in office. Some will regard it as alarming that, in current times, world leadership should rest with Canada. But the Canadian Tories are a model of how to behave during a downturn.

At the end of the article it says:

If the rest of the world had comported itself with similar modesty and prudence, we might not be in this mess.

I am not going to quote from the article, but there was a recent article in The Guardian in the U.K. that viewers can check that commented a little bit on the Liberal leader and there is a stark contrast between the two comments.

I am now going to turn to an article that appeared in Newsweek recently on February 16, talking about Canada under the headline “Worthwhile Canadian Initiative”. This is a direct quote:

Guess which country, alone in the industrialized world, has not faced a single bank failure, calls for bailouts or government intervention in the financial or mortgage sectors. Yup, it's Canada. In 2008, the World Economic Forum ranked Canada's banking system the healthiest in the world. America's ranked 40th, Britain's 44th.

The article went on to say:

Canada has done more than survive this financial crisis. The country is positively thriving in it. Canadian banks are well capitalized and poised to take advantage of opportunities that American and European banks cannot seize.

In closing, the article went on to say:

If President Obama is looking for smart government, there is much he, and all of us, could learn from our...neighbor to the north.

Wise words there from Newsweek.. On the international stage, Canada is regarded as a world leader because of the steps we have taken, not just during this global slowdown but as the hon. member who spoke just before me mentioned, well in advance. Right from the time that we formed the government in 2006, we have been taking steps to make Canada stronger. In the long-term those steps have served us very well up to this point and helped us to enter the slowdown later, have ensured that the slowdown here will be felt less than in other countries, and will ensure that moving forward we will come out of this slowdown sooner and stronger than other countries.

With that I will end my comments and I look forward to questions from opposition members.

[Air Canada, February 13th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I would point out that I have already answered the aerospace question, but I will talk a little bit about the budget.

We are coming up on some really important votes to do with the budget, a budget that will help provide support for Canadians who are out of work due to the global economic slowdown. It will help Canadians get re-trained and get back into new jobs, those Canadians who can do so, as soon as possible.

Because of the steps that we have taken, Canada is in a position that is the envy of the rest of the world as we head into this slowdown. I would encourage all members in the House to pass this budget as soon as possible.

[Air Canada, February 13th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, the Canadian aerospace industry is not unlike other industries and will feel the effects of the global economic crisis. In 2007 we announced $900 million for the industry through SADI and $153 million invested to date.

Through the IRB policy and the Canada first procurement strategy, contracts are going to Canadian firms. Today the Prime Minister will be making an announcement in Montreal that I encourage all members to watch.