Nicole Demers

[Teaching Exellence, November 20th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, Collège Letendre in Laval is extremely fortunate to have an exceptional teacher on staff. Evelyne Lussier is one of the recipients of an award for teaching excellence.

Ms. Lussier has been teaching French at the secondary 5 level for only five years, but she has already made her mark in education. Her accomplishments and contributions have been remarkable. For instance, she created an elective course in communications and journalism, and put together the editorial team of the student newspaper, La Jazette, which won an award at the 2007 Québec Entrepreneurship Contest.

Her students won the Governor General of Canada Medal for obtaining the best overall average. She also volunteers at the Sainte-Justine UHC and at the not-for-profit restaurant Robin des Bois, and leads workshops she created herself for the parents of her students.

Along with her past and present students, my Bloc Québécois colleagues and I would like to congratulate Ms. Lussier on her many accomplishments.

[Election of a New Member in the Riding of Hochelaga, November 17th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to mention the resounding victory of my new colleague, Daniel Paillé, in the riding of Hochelaga, on Monday, November 9, 2009.

He won 51.2% of the vote, an absolute majority, and the voters of Hochelaga unequivocally chose the only candidate who is able to stand up for Quebec in Ottawa, the only candidate who can defend the interests of his nation, Daniel Paillé. The best the Conservatives could do was 4th place, with a paltry 10.1%.

I would also like to acknowledge the excellent showing of Nancy Gagnon in Montmagny—L'Islet —Kamouraska —Rivière-du-Loup. She put up a good fight throughout the campaign.

Lastly, I would like to thank all of the campaigners who helped out with these two political battles.

My colleagues and I would like to welcome Daniel Paillé to the Bloc Québécois caucus.

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, November 17th, 2009]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for the question.

Obviously, such acts of violence are committed in other countries as well. We are very aware of that. However, there is a common thread. Where mining companies are present, there are union problems and human rights violations. For example, in Romania, the rights of workers have not been respected. People who lived around the mines had to be moved. These people have ongoing health problems because mining companies have little respect for them.

My colleague is knowledgeable about all aspects of human rights. Yes, the Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms should apply and the Ligue des droits et libertés should be allowed to review this agreement and add anything that is missing. This agreement currently has very important gaps.

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, November 17th, 2009]

Madam Speaker, I agree with my colleague. I also do not understand why this government is in such a hurry to give in to the lobbyists' demands. But I am not surprised.

The Bloc Québécois members are not the only ones who are opposed to this free trade treaty. The opposition members are not the only ones who are opposed to this free trade treaty. Justice for Colombia is an organization based in England, not Colombia. It is based in England, where all the unionized workers support our cause. Nearly three million United Steelworkers of America support our cause. As far as I know, we are not the only ones who support this cause. We should not be so crazy, so naive.

What is the government waiting for to stop kowtowing constantly to Bay Street? What is it waiting for to stand up and refuse to aid and abet these mining companies, which will keep on committing abuses and will enable these killings to continue?

[Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, November 17th, 2009]

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for his fine exposé on the current situation in Colombia as well as in this House.

We have been discussing the pros and cons of Bill C-23 for several months now. On this side of the House, we think there are a lot more cons than pros. That is only to be expected.

As always, the Bloc Québécois is opposed to all injustice, not only in Quebec and Canada but everywhere in the world. This bill, unfortunately, would sanction a number of injustices.

When the government says that no crime victim or any one whose rights have been trampled, even here in Canada, should be ignored and tells us that it has a very busy law and order agenda, I think it is forgetting that there are places elsewhere in the world where people do not have the ability or even the possibility of defending themselves.

At present in Colombia, 30% of the people who in the government are being seriously investigated for corruption, collusion and all sorts of things and 60% of the rest are suspected of engaging in activities that are not exactly legitimate in view of their positions and responsibilities.

Every day in the House, members from one party or another rise to praise someone from their community or someone whom they know to remind us—because this person is deceased—of how important the person was to his or her family, children, colleagues at work and the people he or she met on a daily basis.

At times like those, I think it would be great for us to stop treating the victims in Colombia—the trade unionists and murder victims—as mere statistics despite what the Colombian government has to say and despite its efforts to minimize these crimes. We know of 109 murders between January 2007 and June 2008. I want to list a few of them and it would be good if my colleagues on the other side could start seeing them as human beings, as fathers and mothers of families and as people with responsibilities in society. These people are dead today because of their convictions and their work. I want to mention the following:

Maria Teresa Jesus Chicaiza Burbano, killed on January 15, 2007; Maria Theresa Silva Reyes, killed on March 28, 2007; Ana Silvia Melo Rodriguez, killed on May 19, 2007; Marleny Berrio de Rodriguez, killed on June 11, 2007; Leonidas Sylva Castro, killed on November 2, 2007; and Maria del Carmen Mesa Pasochoa, killed on February 8, 2008.

Other people who have been murdered include Maria Teresa Trujillo, killed on February 9, 2008; Carmen Cecilia Carvajal Ramirez, killed on March 4, 2008; Leonidas Gomes Rozo, killed on March 8, 2008; Victor Manuel Munoz, killed on March 12, 2008; Ignacio Andrade, killed on March 15, 2008; Manuel Antonio Jiminez, on March 15, 2008; Jose Fernando Quiroz, on March 16, 2008; Jose Gregorio Astros, on March 18, 2008; Julio Cesar Trochez, on March 22, 2008; Adolfo Gonzales Montes, on March 22, 2008; Luz Mariela Diaz Lopez, on April 1, 2008; Emerson Ivan Herrera, on April 1, 2008; Rafael Antonio Leal Medina, on April 4, 2008; Omar Ariza, on April 7, 2008; Jesus Heberto Caballero Ariza, on April 16, 2008; Marcello Vergara Sanchez, on June 5, 2008; and Vilma Carcamo Bianco, on May 9, 2009.

I could go on naming names for another 20 minutes. How many victims do there have to be in Colombia before this government wakes up and realizes that it is not a good idea to be negotiating a free trade agreement at this time with a country that has no more respect for human beings than this?

All of the persons I have named were unionists. All of them were working to improve the living conditions of people living in Colombia and trying to make a better life for themselves. But this government does not hear the names of the dead and murdered. It hears them only when it is in its interest to hear them, when it can spread propaganda, when it can use them.

This government should stop using the misfortune of others for its own advantage and start respecting people who work to earn a living.

At the moment, working people in Colombia are subjected on a daily basis to violence, murders and crimes. We cannot stand by and let this sort of thing go on. If we agree to this free trade agreement today, we are agreeing to the continuation of these murders of men, women and children.

I do not know if my colleagues are like me, but I believe that all of us have to look into our hearts, stop thinking about profit only—obviously, there is short-term profit involved here—and stop thinking that we can impose our law on the whole world. That is not the way it works, and that is not the way it will work in Colombia, where the government is corrupt virtually from top to bottom.

Do you think that the Colombian government will be suddenly cleansed of all its impurities because we sign a free trade agreement today with Colombia? One would have to be a little naive to think that.

Indeed, my colleague from Compton—Stanstead is right. You have to be a little naive or acting in very bad faith to believe such a thing. You have to be a little naive or acting in very bad faith to try to make this House vote in favour of a bill that has not been thought out and for which no serious consultation has been done. As my colleague from Shefford so aptly said, the only consultations that were done were not used to develop a free trade agreement that would stand up and take account of the rights and lives of the people in Colombia.

If we adopt this agreement, if we pass this bill, I will be ashamed as a Quebecker and a Canadian. I am ashamed that we would support such a bill. I am ashamed that we are trying every day, through the Justice minister, to introduce bills that will put crooks in prison using minimum sentences, with no consideration for judicial discretion. I am ashamed that we are trying to introduce bills that would throw a large part of the population, aboriginals primarily, into prison without any opportunity for rehabilitation. I am ashamed that we are permitting a corrupt government to keep on turning a blind eye to crime and the murder of its citizens who are doing everything they can to give the people living down there a better life.

I simply cannot believe this. I cannot believe that the members in the other opposition parties are turning a blind eye too. I do not believe it. If we stand up for the rights of the people we represent, we have to stand up, by virtue of our status as members of Parliament, for the rights of the people we represent everywhere in the world and for the rights of human beings.

The unionists have come to meet with us and let us know about these odious crimes committed against their sisters and brothers. We know perfectly well that they have not been heard by the government.

Is my time up, Madam Speaker? Very well then.

[Employment Insurance Act, November 3rd, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I agree with my hon. colleague that we should review the entire employment insurance program.

He has, however, left the door wide open for me to say that any party that becomes the ruling party in the House will act the same way as the others. We have already seen what these two parties have done. I do not think that, if it were in government, the New Democratic Party would act any differently from the Conservative Party or the Liberal Party.

[Employment Insurance Act, November 3rd, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague from Trois-Rivières.

She is absolutely right, as usual. If they had really wanted to meet the needs of all the workers who lose their jobs, they would have done things differently and would have agreed to abolish the waiting period. That is one of the most essential and fundamentals steps to really support workers who have lost their jobs. They would have made sure there was no need to make thousands of calculations. The most demanding aspect of this bill is the need to make so many calculations that almost nobody understands it. On top of having to struggle to maintain one's standard of living, one has to struggle to learn how to juggle figures to try to get five weeks or two weeks more, without knowing what will come of it in the end. Our jobs will not reappear, our plants will not reopen, our forestry companies will not resume operations.

That is what people are calling for, real measures that will ensure that people feel safe and stop being afraid. At present, they are afraid.

[Employment Insurance Act, November 3rd, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, they will not get this help now; second, the only real assistance that could be provided would be through a pilot project; finally, we have proposed much more concrete measures for accessibility to employment insurance.

POWA is the program that can best meet the needs of long-tenured workers who today are unemployed. They would not receive assistance for just one additional year, or six months, or five to ten weeks; the assistance would continue until they reached retirement age. That is what they truly need. Not half measures, false measures or smoke and mirrors, but real measures like the ones we have always asked for.

[Employment Insurance Act, November 3rd, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I think we should be careful when we talk about discrimination. As I said and as my hon. colleague surely knows, this bill does not meet the needs of most of the people he mentioned nor does it help those who work part time. The program is designed to target a specific, well-defined group of people in an attempt to get their vote. Those people live in Ontario. They do not live in Quebec or New Brunswick, they live in Ontario.

[Employment Insurance Act, November 3rd, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the hon. member for her question. As I was saying earlier, we are voting against this bill because it does not meet the needs of the people. It meets the needs of a specific target group that the government wants in its corner come election time. That is all.