Pat Martin

[The Québécois, November 27th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I have no problem with most of the remarks of my colleague, the Minister of Labour.

Would he join with me and urge all members of Parliament to at least acknowledge and recognize what has been asked of us by the Assembly of First Nations? It has asked us to make it abundantly clear in our remarks and comments today that nothing about this motion, recognizing the Québécois forming a nation, in any way derogates from or undermines the long-standing recognition of the unique status of first nations in the Constitution of Canada and within the Canadian framework.

Would he add that to his comments, that this recognition does not diminish the status of first nations within Canada?

[Canada Elections Act, November 27th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, nobody should be able to buy an election in this country or a politician for that matter. Our election finance laws were designed to get big money out of politics. Well, big money is still buying influence in Canadian politics through the loophole that allows huge so-called loans to politicians and their organizations.

When is a loan not a loan? Well, if it never has to be paid back it is not a loan, it is a donation. Even if it is paid back, it is still “who you know” politics. If one candidate can borrow millions and the other candidate can only borrow peanuts, it is easy to see the one with the rich sponsors will have an unfair advantage.

These massive Liberal leadership loans are tantamount to donations. They undermine the principles of equal opportunity and our election laws and they should not be allowed. If the Conservative government were sincere about getting big money out of politics, it would plug this last remaining loophole so that nobody could buy an election in this country ever again.

[The Québécois, November 27th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, very briefly, I thank my colleague from Winnipeg North for raising the issue of the first nations, brought to us over the weekend.

In the context of the debate, there has to be some kind of non-derogation recognition that what we do today will not derogate from or diminish in any way the status of first nations within the context of the Constitution or the debate.

Could the hon. member reinforce for us today how the first nations are recognized with this status within Canada and we, in this party at least, will not have anything to do with anything that derogates from that?

[The Québécois, November 27th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I do not disagree with most of the minister's remarks; in fact, I find I can associate myself with them to a large degree. I would like to ask him, though, about one issue that has come to our attention in recent days.

Technical difficulties make it impossible to amend the motion. However, given that the first Europeans to come to North America made contact with what they reported to be nations of indigenous people, would he agree if it were possible to amend this motion that we could and should in the context of this debate and the vote also recognize first nations aboriginal people in the same vein as we recognize the Québécois form a nation in this country?

[SOFTWOOD LUMBER PRODUCTS EXPORT CHARGE ACT, 2006, November 22nd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, my question for my colleague, the member for Burnaby—New Westminster, concerns one of the details he mentioned in his speech. I have heard him raise it a number of times.

I do not think Canadians fully understand the dangerous precedent that is set when we are about to pass an agreement that forfeits Canadian sovereignty. For us to make any significant policy changes about the forestry industry, we have to ask permission from Washington.

How does that make the member feel? Could the member explain to Canadians, if it is possible, how in God's name the Conservative government could think this is a good idea?

[SOFTWOOD LUMBER PRODUCTS EXPORT CHARGE ACT, 2006, November 22nd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I was paying close attention to my colleague's speech and one of the most compelling remarks she made was what she itemized as number six. I believe it talks about Canada as a sovereign nation signed on to this unprecedented clause in the bill that would require provinces to first vet any significant changes in their forest industry policy with the Washington, D.C. In other words, it is unprecedented that we would need to ask Washington if it were okay to change something like stumpage fees or our cutting levels.

What does the hon. member think of the significance of this dangerous precedent being set, surrendering our sovereignty and the Bloc supporting it?

[SOFTWOOD LUMBER PRODUCTS EXPORT CHARGE ACT, 2006, November 22nd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, that is a very thoughtful remark. If I could go back to my opening comments, it seems that the new Conservative government is hell bent and determined to shred any competitive advantage that we may enjoy over the U.S. in any industry sector where that may occur.

Whether the Conservatives are just yielding to pressure from the U.S. or whether they have ruled that we should harmonize in some way, why would we voluntarily give up our advantages such as those in the resource sector, where we are blessed with abundant natural resources? Why would we sign a deal that would actually encourage the export of raw logs and discourage the value-adding of that lumber before it gets shipped across the border? It is inexplicable.

To put it in simple terms, when we strip down this agreement into a couple of pages of what it actually does, Canadians will be horrified. They deserve--

[SOFTWOOD LUMBER PRODUCTS EXPORT CHARGE ACT, 2006, November 22nd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, it is troubling and worrisome that we have done such a terrible job of representing Canadian interests in the process of these negotiations.

I come from a trade union background. I have negotiated a lot of collective agreements. One thing I can tell members without any hesitation is that we are not going to get much of a package if we announce ahead of time that we give up.

That is virtually what our Minister of Industry did. Before the negotiations were even over, he announced that this was the best deal we were going to get. The Conservatives' bargaining strategy was to be on their knees, which is not a bargaining strategy at all. It is not coming from a position of strength; it is coming from a position of weakness.

I do not know who we sent down there to bargain on our behalf. I think the people who negotiated the free trade agreement should be dragged into the streets and shot, frankly, and as for the people who negotiated this agreement, it borders on economic treason to sell the economic interests of Canada down the river for God knows what other secondary objective they may be trying to achieve.

What I can tell members is that the one thing has been ignored in all this hype about how thankful we should be that the Conservatives get along so well with the Americans is this reality: Canada tossed away a significant victory that was won not just before the North American Free Trade Agreement panels but before the U.S. Court of International Trade. On April 7, the U.S. Court of International Trade ruled that the duties on softwood lumber were illegal. Within days of that very time, we were rolling over and accepting a deal that left $1.3 billion on the table.

My colleague from Trinity—Spadina was itemizing what that $1 billion we left behind could buy in terms of other necessary social spending. At a period of time when the Conservative government was nickel-and-diming all these important programs across the country, it was cavalierly leaving $1 billion on the bargaining table in the United States. It does boggle the mind as to how they can be so cavalier and frivolous with massive amounts of money and so miserly, to the point of almost being cruel, with $100,000 here and there that would keep an important program going in one of our communities.

[SOFTWOOD LUMBER PRODUCTS EXPORT CHARGE ACT, 2006, November 22nd, 2006]

Traditional sovereignists, as my colleague from Skeena says.

I am just stating this clearly for the folks at home who may be watching. I am not sure that Canadians fully understand the impact of this hastily thrown together sellout of Canadian sovereignty. It is not only the dollar figure; perhaps this clause I have mentioned is even more damaging than the $1.3 billion we left on the table.

For the record, this is the second time that a Conservative government has snatched defeat out of the jaws of victory on a lumber file. For the historical record, I remind my colleagues in the House that in 1986 the GATT, the World Trade Organization's predecessor, issued a preliminary finding on the legality of U.S. lumber duties against Canada.

Brian Mulroney's government at the time, hell bent on negotiating a free trade agreement with the U.S., abruptly aborted the challenge that we were winning. The preliminary finding was issued in our favour, and even though we were winning and would have perhaps put this whole issue to bed at that early stage of this longstanding challenge, he aborted it, so the findings were never officially published.

It does not take a suspicious mind to assume that Mr. Mulroney did not want the ruling to become part of the permanent record. He did not want to offend the Americans in any way at that fragile stage of his newly crafted free trade agreement. I can only say that I cannot condemn enough that kind of sellout of Canadian sovereignty and well-being.

Let me make a comparison that I wanted to draw in my opening remarks. There is a connection to be made. The Conservative government is doing the Americans' dirty work for them, not only on this big trade irritant that was the softwood lumber issue, but also on the Canadian Wheat Board, which has offended Americans for years. The Americans do not like this collective action on the part of Canadian farmers.

The Americans filed 11 separate trade challenges against the Canadian Wheat Board and lost every single one of them, but now the Conservative government has promised to do what the Americans could not do by any legal challenges. The government has served notice that it intends to do away with the Canadian Wheat Board in spite of all the empirical evidence that the Canadian Wheat Board serves the interests of Canadian farmers well and is an important prairie institution.

I will take members back in history again. We should take note of the fact that there was a dual market voluntary wheat board at one time. It failed in one of the most catastrophic bankruptcies that Canada had known to that time. It failed in 1935 in a spectacular bankruptcy.

We know that the dual desk cannot work for one simple reason, that is, if the initial offering price is higher than the market price, the Wheat Board will get all kinds of grain delivered to it and will have to sell the grain at a loss, and if the initial offering price is lower than the outside market, the Wheat Board will not get any deliveries. Then, boom, the board will be out of business in one or two years.

We know that it will be the death rattle of the Canadian Wheat Board to do away with single desk marketing, yet the government seems to be on a mad crusade to do the bidding of the Americans, to do their dirty work and do away with this great prairie institution.

Those of us on the NDP benches shake our heads and wonder why--

[SOFTWOOD LUMBER PRODUCTS EXPORT CHARGE ACT, 2006, November 22nd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I will be happy to pick up where I left off yesterday in debating the Group No. 1 amendments to Bill C-24. At the time, I was reminding Canadians everywhere who have not been following the softwood lumber issue perhaps as carefully as those of us who have been seized with the issue, that it seems the government is moving at almost warp speed to shred any competitive advantage that Canada may enjoy over the United States in the case of lumber and, as I will develop further, in the case of wheat.

Just days before Ottawa bludgeoned Canada's lumber industry into this deeply flawed softwood lumber agreement, the Vancouver Sun published the details of a leaked letter from the Bush administration to the U.S. lumber lobby. This is not a conspiracy theory. This was accurately reported in the Vancouver Sun and its veracity has never been challenged. In the letter, the American administration, the Bush administration, confirmed that its objective was to hobble the Canadian industry for seven years. It is no longer paranoid to assume that this was their goal. This was a stated fact.

Nor does it end there. The most shocking thing has been pointed out in great detail and with great courage and strength, I might add, by my colleague from Burnaby—New Westminster, who has been perhaps the sole champion on behalf of the Canadian public on this issue through committee stage and still is now as this plods through the House of Commons. Perhaps the most horrifying statistic that my colleague from Burnaby—New Westminster pointed out is that fully $450 million of the $1.3 billion that we left on the table in illegal duties, which the Americans will get to keep, will re-grease the re-election wheels for the protectionist Republicans.

Canada's timber industry will thus be forced to subsidize the ongoing illicit attack on itself, all with the explicit consent of the Canadian government. Let us imagine it. We are fueling the administration by the $450 million in this fund to continue these attacks, and not only on our lumber industry, because the Americans will have won that battle. Who knows what other industry sectors they will be targeting next? I will talk about the Wheat Board in a moment, and my colleague from Hamilton raised the issue of the steel industry, which is of course very concerned.

There is even more. The softwood deal is trade that is managed of, by and for the American lumber lobby. A supposedly sovereign nation, Canada, has signed on to an unprecedented clause in this agreement, a clause that requires provinces to first vet any changes in their own forestry policy with Washington. I say that with some emphasis, because I myself was shocked. I have not been following this softwood lumber agreement as carefully as have some of my colleagues, such as my colleagues from Skeena and Vancouver Island North, where the lumber industry is key and integral to the very viability of their economic regions.

I was dumbfounded, but what confused me even more is that my colleagues from the Bloc Québécois who are in support of the softwood lumber deal are the enablers that are allowing the Conservatives to ram this deal down our throats. On the issue of sovereignty alone, one would think that my colleagues from the Bloc would have blown the whistle on the bill and refused to participate in it to any degree. They, of all people, should acknowledge what an insult to the sovereignty of Canada it is to have to go cap in hand to Washington to make any substantive changes to the way we administer our own forestry industry.