House of Commons photoLost his last election, in 2015, with 38% of the vote.
Citizenship and Immigration April 23rd, 2010
Mr. Speaker, we certainly do understand that people are disappointed when their visa applications are denied. Our responsibility, however, is to ensure that all visitors meet the requirements to come to Canada, as set out in Canada's immigration law.
These applications are assessed on a case by case basis. Visa officers review the specific facts that are presented by the applicant in each case as well as in this one.
Citizenship and Immigration April 23rd, 2010
Mr. Speaker, I totally reject the premise of the question because it actually is not the case.
On January 16, we said immediately, first, that family class sponsorships would be put forward and, second , spouses or common-law partners with in-Canada class applications, protected persons with family members in Haiti, citizenship and citizenship certificates and in-Canada applications for work permits would be extended on a temporary basis.
We have done more. We have moved this forward. We have said that we would work with the provincial government in Quebec to do exactly what we are trying to do, and that is help Haiti.
Citizenship and Immigration April 23rd, 2010
Mr. Speaker, in actual fact, no government has moved quicker in terms of assisting Haiti with respect to the issues it is dealing with.
We said at the very beginning that we would expedite the 2,000 cases that we have on file and that we would make them a priority. We have made them a priority and we are now bringing families back together, just as we committed to do.
National Volunteer Week April 19th, 2010
Mr. Speaker, this week is National Volunteer Week, a time for us to recognize those within our communities who give of themselves to make our lives better.
In my constituency I would like to recognize Lorne and Helen Dueck for their work with the Ontario March of Dimes, Doug French for his work with the Child Advocacy Centre of Niagara and Dr. Julia Murray of Court Animal Hospital who has done extensive volunteer work to help lower the amount of stray cats in St. Catharines.
While volunteers have many faces and can play many roles, today I would like in particular to thank those Canadian seniors who volunteer. Whether they are raising funds, rallying behind important causes or providing much needed services to others, seniors in my constituency of St. Catharines play a key role. They are an inspiration to us all.
I hope everyone will join me this week in saying a sincere thanks to all our Canadian seniors who volunteer.
Madam Speaker, there is no government that has shown more flexibility in terms of working with a country that has had as vast a devastation as Haiti has.
Whether we talk about the issues that are on the table here today or whether we talk specifically about, for example, operation stork, which brought 203 adopted Haitian children to their Canadian families, we did that process, which would normally take up to a year, in very quick time. It would take up to a year to do what we did in three weeks.
We have processed over 2,200 applications for more than 3,300 people received after the earthquake, which are in various stages of being processed. By the end of June, we expect to have made a final decision on the vast majority of applications submitted before the earthquake.
We are working with Quebec to implement their special measures program, and we are working closely to reunite families as quickly as we possibly can.
Madam Speaker, since the earthquake in Haiti this past January, our government has acted swiftly to evacuate more than 4,600 Canadian citizens and permanent residents from Haiti.
To date. over 2,200 applications for more than 3,300 people received after the earthquake are in various stages of being processed. As well, more than 3,000 people have attended information sessions held in Quebec and organized by the CIC regional office to explain the special measures to the Haitian community and others.
Priority processing has taken place based on five specific categories: first, family class sponsorships; second, spouse or common law partner in Canada class applications; third, protected persons with family members in Haiti; fourth, citizenship and citizenship certificates; and fifth, in-Canada applications for work permit or to extend temporary resident status.
We are working to get people to Canada as quickly as we possibly can.
By the end of June 2010, we expect to have finalized the vast majority of the applications submitted before the earthquake. This means that CIC would be processing in six months what would normally take two years.
For all cases where we have received both a completed sponsorship and permanent resident application since the earthquake, we aim to make a preliminary decision within four weeks of receipt. If required, interviews will be held within eight weeks from the preliminary decision and. in most cases. a final decision will be made shortly thereafter. This is because it may take some additional time to conduct the medical and background screening for some of these applicants.
We will continue to apply our common sense principles to this tragic situation. Urgent cases involving vulnerable people will continue to receive priority processing by the embassy. For example, for completed sponsorship and permanent resident applications received by April 30, we expect to have held an interview and either have made or be about to make a final decision on most of the cases by the end of July 2010.
The highest processing priority remains on the closest family members and urgent and exceptional cases. We know the importance of reuniting people with their close family members. Other members of the family class and applicants who meet the requirements of the Quebec special measures are also being processed in a timely fashion.
Our expectation is that the vast majority of persons in our highest priority would be in receipt of the required decisions and documents to come forward to Canada by the end of July of this year.
Business of Supply March 23rd, 2010
Mr. Speaker, I credit the member for the work he is doing as chair of this association.
In fact, let me point out very clearly that the buy American policy, which definitely would have had an impact on this country, and did to some degree, was resolved based on the hard work of our relationship with the United States. We agreed, whether we were Liberals, Conservatives or New Democrats who sat on this committee, that our relationship had to be strong with the United States. This does nothing to make that any stronger.
Business of Supply March 23rd, 2010
Mr. Speaker, first, the member who moved the resolution was a premier of the province of Ontario for five years. I have been here for four years. I have never introduced a motion or a private member's bill in the House that indicated, in any way, shape or form, some reference to what he did to Ontario. He did a lot of bad things to Ontario for five years, but I never, when dealing with an issue in the House of Commons, try to use a previous government from either another province, or worse, from another country.
I do not understand why the member opposite asks a question. He reads this and says that we are not trying to partner with our brothers and sisters in the United States. This is not what it is doing. It is driving us further apart. We do not accept it. We will not support it.
Business of Supply March 23rd, 2010
Mr. Speaker, the answer is quite clear. We do agree.
The hon. member makes a point of stating what the Prime Minister said in terms of the last time this came on the table. He stands by his word. We stand by our word. In fact, he is making it a priority when the G8 and G20 meet here in our country, in Toronto and Muskoka. It is a priority for him and this government.
However, to turn this issue of trying to help mothers and children in poverty across the world into some political issue that the Liberals feel will drive some sort of message or try to divide the House in dealing with an issue that is completely non-partisan is unacceptable. This is why we do not support the motion.
Business of Supply March 23rd, 2010
Mr. Speaker, we will be voting against the motion before the House.
This motion is an extremely transparent attempt simply to reopen the abortion debate which we have clearly said we have no intention of getting into. By voting against this motion we are proving that we will not reopen the debate. In addition, the motion contains rash and extreme anti-American rhetoric that we simply cannot support as a matter of foreign policy.
I am rising today to speak to this motion and more specifically, to outline how important food security is in the context of maternal and child health. Before I get into the details, let us first look at the present landscape.
More than one billion people around the world have too little to eat or are malnourished, which is the result of a number of factors. These include population growth, volatile food prices, transportation and agriculture costs, as well as a struggling economy and reduced global investment in food and agricultural development.
While we are focusing on this, the Liberals are focusing on something else. Instead of supporting the Prime Minister in his efforts to make the lives of women and children in third world countries better, the Liberals only see an opportunity to cause controversy where there is none and slam our neighbours to the south which they should not be doing. For the Liberals, this statement is simply business as usual.
For the men, women and children who go to bed hungry every night, a lack of access to sufficient safe and nutritious food can have a devastating impact on their health and severely limits their ability to learn in school, to earn a living and otherwise to live well on the basic necessities of life.
This makes food insecurity a central obstacle to reducing poverty and in keeping mothers and children healthy at the most critical points of their lives, for mothers during pregnancy and in the years that immediately follow, and for children during their early years of life.
Within the global context, Canada is among the leading donor countries committed to countering food insecurity. In fact our government has made the issue a major focus of the Canadian International Development Agency whose very mission is to lead Canada's international effort to help people living in poverty and to do so in a way that is efficient, focused and accountable.
Since the 2008-09 food crisis, the number of people living without access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food jumped from 923 million to over one billion, one-sixth of our world's population. The majority of these individuals are farmers living in rural areas, and of course, women and children.
This is particularly significant for two reasons. One, worldwide approximately 500 million small-scale farmers cultivate food for more than two billion individuals. Two, women account for a large proportion of agricultural production in the developing world and are therefore important agents of economic development and food security. We cannot hope to reduce poverty if the very individuals who bring food to the world are incapable of even feeding themselves.
From national and regional perspectives, we know that governments must strengthen their ability to address food security. We know as well that in the global context, difficult economic forces continue to aggravate the stability of food systems. The same goes for volatile energy crises which make food more difficult to access given that its production, transportation and distribution rely heavily on energy markets, and likewise for the unpredictability of a changing climate, including changing intensity and frequency of rainfall which can negatively impact and influence the global food system.
As a government our imperative is to help the world's poorest and most disadvantaged to overcome these challenges and to make it less likely for them to be affected by food shortages and constraints to agricultural productivity.
To help navigate these waters, the Canadian International Development Agency has a food security strategy that clearly outlines three priorities: sustainable agricultural development, food aid and nutrition, and research and development.
Most poor people living in rural areas earn their income from agriculture. In fact, according to the 2008 World Development Report, agriculture programming is two to four times more effective in reducing poverty than investments in other sectors.
CIDA's plans for sustainable agricultural development therefore include doubling agriculture investments by supporting national and regional agriculture strategies which support the ongoing efforts of the World Bank and the International Fund for Agricultural Development and supporting agricultural research.
These measures will translate into progress on many fronts. More small rural farmers will increase agricultural production and CIDA's partner governments will develop stronger policies, make their institutions more accountable and design better processes to provide stable, local sources of nutritious food.
In terms of food aid and nutrition, it bears remembering that worldwide more deaths are attributable to hunger and malnutrition than HIV-AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined. Nutrition is therefore obviously essential to early childhood development and to building a healthy population for the long run, given that malnourishment leads to serious illness, blindness, mental disorders and death among the world's most vulnerable.
In terms of addressing the food needs of these high risk populations, emergency food aid, social safety nets and nutrition are examples of key interventions that contribute to addressing food insecurity. CIDA's work to improve access to sufficient quantities of nutritious food and enhance the quality and effectiveness of food aid programming will result in more lives saved and better overall health for all developing world citizens, including mothers and children.
The final priority in the food security strategy is research and development. As investments in agriculture research and development have declined over the last 30 years, so too has growth in global agriculture productivity. Based on present estimates the global food production must increase by 70% by 2050. Investments in agriculture research and development are essential if production is to keep pace with increasing demand.
As a significant donor to the Consolidated Group on International Agricultural Research and through contributions from Canadian academia, private sector and non-government organizations, Canada is putting its considerable experience in agricultural research and development to use on a global scale by sharing knowledge and resources with developing countries. In fact, our government also contributed $62 million to the Canadian International Food Security Research Fund. We put our money where our mouth is.
The purpose of this joint initiative between CIDA and the International Development Research Centre is to increase the contribution of Canadian organizations toward solving global challenges regarding food security through applied collaborative efforts and results-orientated research in partnership with developing country based partners.
The work CIDA is doing to facilitate research and development within the developing world will give farmers in partner countries better access to the new technologies and specialized expertise they need in order for their farming operations to keep pace with the growing demand for food and also to withstand the ongoing effects of the changing climate.
The triple challenges of meeting the food needs of tomorrow, of staving off hunger today while doing this sustainably illustrates the enormity of our task and the need for concerted and coordinated action. This is critically important as we keep working to reduce poverty.
While we are here to debate the important issue of women's and children's health, the Liberals continue their history of making inappropriate and disrespectful remarks about the United States and this statement in their motion is just more of the same.
Our government has made much progress in trying to undo some of the damage caused to our relationship with the U.S. by the party opposite when it was in government over the past few years, yet the Liberals continue to undermine and continue to try to damage that relationship.
We are going to ignore the Liberals' provocations and continue to make progress on food security for at risk populations in our world. There is no doubt that food security ties itself closely to our government's objectives on maternal and child health. Without it, we cannot hope to keep mothers and children healthy at the most critical points of their lives.