Nathan Cullen

[Aboriginal Healing Foundation, March 30th, 2010]

This is a remarkable moment actually, Mr. Speaker, to hear the vitriolic words of my colleagues. I would ask my colleague to restrain himself--

[Aboriginal Healing Foundation, March 30th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, it is important not to mention when members have been absent from a debate that they apparently care so much about that they could not bother to show up to. I will make sure I do not do that again. I suppose the understanding that we have--

[Aboriginal Healing Foundation, March 30th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, the question was very direct. Apparently the Minister of Health is seizing the day and will take charge of this whole thing but she could not bother to be here for any of the multiple hours of the debate.

[Aboriginal Healing Foundation, March 30th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, keeping 12 out of 134 programs going is a concern to many of us on this side, simply because many of these centres are located in remote and sometimes hard to reach communities. The government has suggested that a 1-800 line is going to compensate for the loss of local counselling, which of course, anecdotally and intuitively, makes no sense whatsoever.

I am not sure if my hon. colleague would have the capacities to answer my question, but I am going to try anyway.

The government oftentimes suggests that it does a cost analysis of any program it either runs or cancels, to understand what the savings would be to Canadians or how it is going to benefit the country. I am wondering if he is aware of any assessment that has been done by his government, by Indian Affairs, Health Canada, the Prime Minister's Office, any department, to study what the cost impacts are going to be on communities when these programs are shut down.

One of the things we have heard, which is in the government's own report, and this is why this is important. The government itself knows that part of the success of the aboriginal healing program has kept people away from some of the more costly government programs such as prisons and addictions services.

Has his government done any assessment at all that he is aware of, assessing the costs to Canadian taxpayers, never mind the human costs but just the costs to Canadian taxpayers, by cutting this program? Is he aware of any such analysis?

[Aboriginal Healing Foundation, March 30th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, I suppose what we are hearing from the government tonight is that we should trust it because it has a replacement plan in place. It has not shown us the plan and there are no papers or descriptions to the aboriginal communities, to the 134 projects that are ending tomorrow and, more important, to all the people they are servicing, counselling and have built up a trust relationship with over these most incredibly sensitive topics.

We are talking about abuse at a very early age. We are talking about people dealing with addictions. We are talking about folks having a hard time in life that have built up a rapport with this organization, which, everybody agrees, works very well. The government's own report says that it works excellently. My hon. colleague has said that it is one of the best programs the government has ever run.

This foundation works well and is functional but instead the government tells us to trust it because it will let Health Canada do it. Health Canada does not do this kind of work, does not have this relationship and has no rapport with those aboriginal communities we are talking about. It will be doing it on an individual basis when we know from aboriginal communities across this country that while individual counselling is important, community-based and family-based counselling is one of the things that has made this aboriginal program so successful. Now it will undo that very tenet and tell us to trust it but it will not tell us the plan or show us the plan.

Does the member agree that it is possible to trust the government on this issue and how can aboriginal people—

[Aboriginal Healing Foundation, March 30th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague. I do not know him well. He seems like a nice fellow. I assume he understands, because he said he does, the impacts that residential schools had on aboriginal people and continue to have to this day.

I am speaking in part out of the frustration of the people I know who have been involved in the Aboriginal Healing Foundation's work in the northwestern area of British Columbia, who I represent. They have been involved in the six programs that are in existence that have now lost their funding and their capacity to do the community-based work that has been seen as so crucial. It smacks of a certain hypocrisy of the government and a tragic sense of cynicism to say that a report that was sitting on a minister's desk for months, a report that we now know says the Aboriginal Healing Foundation worked and worked well, was released the day after the budget. It was done by Indian Affairs itself, saying how wonderfully this community-based system worked, a family-based system, delivered by first nations for first nations and that it was helping the healing process. The cynicism to cut that program in the budget and then release a report the next day that says what a fantastic program this was smacks of a hypocrisy to the first nations communities that I represent and all across this country. The apology was meant to be followed up by action. That is what we asked the Prime Minister for when we all sat in this place and listened to the residential school apology.

First nations people, despite many generations of broken promises, took the chance and said they would give the Prime Minister the time, saying maybe he would follow up on this action and deliver and support aboriginal healing in this country.

Now we find out that all of these programs are being cut, programs that were working, and the government is saying that it is very interested in this healing process and wants to support it. The way the government can support it is to continue the funding.

To the last point about the so-called time of restraint, the government found $250,000 to send to an asbestos lobby in Quebec to promote asbestos exports to other countries, while ripping it out of the walls of this place. That is $250,000 that could be much better spent on aboriginal healing at a—

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, March 30th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, the amendment put forward by the Liberal member is more than an insult. It pretends to do something it knows it will not. It pretends to provide some sort of security with respect to human rights in Colombia, yet the amendment asks the Colombia government to do that. It proposes that the Colombian government review its own human rights record, decide whether it is good enough and then tell Canadians and Colombians about it.

I do not want to be cynical, but my suspicion is this. If the Colombian government continues to break human rights, continues to assassinate trade union leaders, it will not report on it. That is just a guess.

The fact that the Liberal member proposes this as some sort of fix or cure is an insult to everyone's intelligence in this place. Worse, it has the tragic consequence of continuing a practice that simply must not be allowed to continue.

It seems to me that in order to facilitate the things that Canada wishes, which is a better world for all, to raise all ships to better environmental standards, the first thing we should do is practise that type of integrity in this place. The amendment is a waste of time and paper. We should move to a real fair trade deal with Colombia and Canada. That would be true progress.

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, March 30th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for the tragic listing of numbers that mean so much. We can list so many hundreds and no prosecutions. We can list another so many hundreds and no prosecutions.

However, the implication is twofold, not only to the lives of those lost through persecution, sometimes at the hands of their own government, as in the case of Colombia, not only to their families that have lost those people who dared raise their voices, in many cases, to provide criticism to government, something that we try to honour every day in the House, and fought and died for, but it speaks to the effects of people in the future who seek to raise their voices, who seek to express concerns for their families or their communities for something that the government has done to them, for something that outside companies, which do not obey the laws and rules of the land, do to them.

If the people do not have their government on their side, how can we possibly sign a deal with such a government? How can we possibly sign a deal with false hope of any protection for those very families, communities and workers? It is abhorrent. We need to take a step back, look at this and make it better.

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, March 30th, 2010]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to say that it is a pleasure to join in this debate, but it seems an unfortunate circumstance that again we have to engage the government and its very loyal official opposition in respect to trade deals. The bill we are speaking to today, Bill C-2, was Bill C-23 in the previous Parliament before the government undemocratically shut down the House, thereby killing its own legislation. That is an ironic way to run government. For a government that claims to be in such a hurry to open up trade deals like this, the question is whether this trade deal meets the standard of morality and ethics that most Canadians hold.

Let us quickly go through aspects of the bill. There are two central concerns.

One is if we believe the press releases from the member for Kings—Hants, the bill was first negotiated on a dance floor over a couple of rum and Cokes in Colombia with a foreign trade minister. If this story is true, and we have to take it with a grain of salt when it comes to the member for Kings--Hants and how he enters into the media, this is a strange way for the government to have trade relations with a foreign government. An opposition member goes dancing with the other country's trade minister and at the end of the night they decide why not have a trade deal together but they will not put in any uncomfortable conditions as to how to treat the environment or how to deal with human rights complaints because that would be cumbersome for trade.

When we boil this down, the question before the House and before Canadians is, will the Government of Canada finally take the evolutionary step of moving from blanket carte blanche free trade deals to fair trade deals? Will it move to deals between this country and its democratically elected representatives and foreign nations that lift up both countries and in particular address aspects of trade, such as the environment, human rights and labour codes? Clearly in Bill C-2, formerly Bill C-23, there is little or no mention of these important concerns. These are concerns that everyday Canadians have.

A second aspect is the net benefit, the true benefit to Canada. All of us were elected to this place and came here seeking to make lives better for those whom we represent. We would want any trade deal put forward by the government to enhance the quality of life not just in the other country, but also in Canada. We have seen time and time again that when regulations and the values of this country are not placed in those trade deals, they go awry.

My riding in northwestern British Columbia has been an unfortunate victim of trade deals signed by previous Liberal and Conservative governments. We know all too well what happens when a trade deal is signed. So-called foreign investment comes in, but it is simply a foreign takeover. The jobs go away. The investment is not investment; it is simply a robbing of Canadians' greatest crown jewels, and corporate entities that used to provide jobs in this country now provide them somewhere else and the interests of Canadians are no longer represented.

For members who have not spent time in Latin America this can be difficult to understand. Democratically elected governments in places like Colombia, Peru or Ecuador will institute what are called paramilitary death squads or groups that go out and simply take care of any opposition to the sitting government. This is an abhorrent practice which unfortunately is all too common in some of the countries in the south; not all and not all the time, but it exists. To ignore the existence of such practices is either naive or outright ignorant. Particularly with the Uribe government in Colombia it is well documented, and all members in this place should be concerned, that it is a government that presents itself to the world as diplomatic and democratic, yet at home treats trade union officials and groups that dare to raise dissent to the sitting government with the utmost of severe and punishing violence.

The proposals the New Democrats have put forward in order to encourage this Parliament along, in order to entice the government toward fair trade, have been rather precise and simple. A review of human rights abuses in the trading country, in the partner that we seek to sign this agreement with, should be done independently by a group not associated with the said government.

We are saying that if this trade deal were to go ahead, there should be an independent commission to look at the complaints raised against Colombia, identify them and report to both elected houses. That commission would tell us what happened in the last year, the allegations, the ones it thinks are true, and the concerns that we should be raising.

The suggestion that we have an independent human rights council, which already exists by the way, able to report to both houses of each country, seems to us to be a most reasonable suggestion, a push toward something that all Canadians would agree with. We want trade to enhance the quality of life of our trading partners. We do not want our trade to facilitate the opposite effect.

This addresses an ideology within some members of the House that trade automatically equals democratic improvement, that anywhere there has been a notion of a free trade agreement or a new, enhanced trading practice, a sweeping wave, the invisible hand of the market will step in and lift up the voices of the independents in that country, allowing people independent thought and expression in the political sphere.

Some of the strongest trading partnerships we have are with countries like China, Saudi Arabia, and the list goes on. We have been trading with Saudi Arabia for 70 or 80 years. Has there been the democratic improvement that is always promised with these trade negotiations? Has the plight of women in Saudi Arabia improved because we continue to buy its oil and services?

It is not implicit. There is nothing implicit in trade that says democratic reforms will come to that place, that human rights conditions will improve. There is nothing in trading with another country that says that as soon as we start to trade with them, things will automatically get better with respect to the environment, labour laws, and the basic reforms of social democracy.

There is nothing in this agreement that enables that either. That is the concern New Democrats have put forward to the government. We have pleaded with the government and the Liberals at committee and in the House. We are not standing against the notion of trade with Colombia, but if we are going to trade with Colombia, we should do it in such a way that Canadians will be proud. We should do it in such a way that will enhance the lives of the Colombians who will be affected by our trade relationship.

Is that unreasonable? No. Yet time and time again we run into this brick wall of ideology that says to trade at all costs with no conditions. We see what the practices lead to. Undemocratic countries around the world that we have traded with for generations have not improved any of these things. Why? Because we do not ask for it. We have never asked to evolve our trade practices. We have never said let us seek to define and understand what fair trade would be like, so at the end of the day we would see those improvements. That seems reasonable to us.

I mentioned Skeena--Bulkley Valley earlier because the place that I represent has seen two distinct so-called instances of foreign investment, which the government somewhat rightly will laud whenever it has an increase in foreign investment numbers, money coming into the country, theoretically investing in Canada, to make our economy stronger.

Skeena Cellulose Inc., a multi-tiered forestry firm in northwestern British Columbia with some 3,500 employees, went through a bankruptcy. The foreign protection laws were erased by a previous Conservative government. A Chinese firm owned wholly by the Chinese government, not a subsidiary, not a subcontractor, with no record and no compunction whatsoever, came in and shut down the mill. It made promises to the people of Prince Rupert where the main mill had been situated and six years later nothing has been done. It has not opened a thing, and the 3,500 workers have had to find other work.

Rio Tinto Alcan, formerly Alcan, formerly a crown gem in Canada's industrial sector, was taken over by a firm from outside, again with no conditions from the government. In Kitimat, one of the communities where Alcan used to operate but now it is Rio Tinto, a promise of a future mill expansion has not come and it is killing the community. This is a story that unfortunately exists across this country.

All we are asking for is a reasonable trade policy. All we are asking for is a fair trade policy from the government, one that we can all stand behind and support, one that Colombians will congratulate us for, one that will truly lift up the lives of all those concerned, not one as has been presented by the government with false promises and no hope for renewal.

[Business of Supply, March 15th, 2010]

Madam Speaker, I am sure that my hon. colleague's excitement will also be brought to bear on the notion that the New Democrats put forward today and her party for some reason rejected.

If we were able to stop the attacks that she mentioned in her speech, and I would hope that my Conservative colleagues would express, at least privately, some regret at calling one of the Liberal members anti-Semitic. He is a gentleman who has spent much of his time working for the cause of the Jewish people in Canada, if not most of his life.

The Conservative Party used a ten percenter to accuse this member of anti-Semitism. I hope that there is regret on that side for this, as I hope there is regret from the Liberal Party for the accusations about Canadians not being able to be proud. I would suggest that this tool has been abused and misused by most, if not all, parties in this place.

The recommendation the New Democrats have made is that, while it is important to communicate with Canadians about important issues, there ought to be a limit on attacks against individual members in this place, duly elected by their constituents, or their parties or leaders.

Can we not find a way to communicate with Canadians without bashing one another and bringing the debate to a lower level every time? My hon. colleague from Mississauga began his question and comments today with that very thought. We are bringing the debate down in this country. Would she not see the proposal that the NDP has put forward as a reasonable one?