Rob Oliphant

[Employment Insurance, March 31st, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, since October the number of unemployed Canadians has risen by 295,000. According to the OECD, it will continue to rise.

A young mother in my riding took on an internship to get Canadian experience. Her employer has just cut the program, leaving her on the street. She has 724 hours, but because she lives in Ontario, she does not qualify for EI.

What plans does the government have to bring EI into the 21st century?

[Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, March 26th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the member's understanding of this complex issue and his reluctance to take on the simplistic answers that I am hearing from the other side.

Of course we on this side of the House are supporting issues that would make our communities safer. However, he is stressing the fact that these are real people who are concerned and that these are complex issues that start with families, communities, health care, education, social services and the kinds of things the Conservative government has failed to see.

I wonder whether or not the particular costs of the corrections system are something that are of concern to the member, looking at the inadequate services for mental health for inmates, for corrections and for helping people who one day will get out of jail.

[Foreign Credentials, February 11th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, new Canadians in Toronto are particularly hard hit by this recession. On Friday, I am meeting with Mr. Alamgir Hossain, a Canadian citizen who emigrated from Bangladesh. He is a professional engineer who lost his job when his company downsized in December.

What specific plans does the government have to help new Canadians like Mr. Hossain find a job, pay his rent, and keep his two young children fed while waiting for a Conservative stimulus?

[Sultans of Science Exhibit, February 9th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to draw attention today to an incredible exhibit that opened at the Ontario Science Centre in Don Valley West this past week.

Sultans of Science celebrates 1,000 years of scientific creativity, imagination and scholarship coming from the Islamic world. It specifically explores the tremendous contributions made by Muslim scholars in the field of mathematics, science, health, aviation, translation and architecture during the so-called Dark Ages.

While the rest of the world was sleeping, the Islamic world was inventing. This international touring exhibit traces the roots of modern science and technology from Baghdad to Cordova, from Morocco to Constantinople. Its interactive displays invite us to learn more about Islamic contributions to our world.

Even more importantly, however, this exhibit invites us to a deeper, more appreciative relationship with the Muslim world and its contribution to humanity, helping to break down the walls of Islamophobia. I commend it to all members of this House.

[Situation in Sri Lanka, February 4th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, it is a privilege and an honour to be here tonight. I come with a heavy heart. I am very aware of the gallery being filled tonight. I am aware that people have come here with hopes and dreams, with pain and with challenges, and I am very pleased to see them.

I am also very keenly aware there are members from my riding of Don Valley West. I thank them for their fierce patience and their persistence and the honour that they have brought to this place today.

They have brought their stories with them as well, stories of brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles, cousins, relatives who have become displaced, become lost or have been killed. They are asking for us, as parliamentarians in Canada, to do the right thing, to tell their stories again and again so they may be heard so the world may change.

This conflict has gone on for over three decades and over 70,000 people, mostly Tamils, have been killed. And so we take this time in remembrance of them and also with the commitment to do something different about life.

As Canadians, we pride ourselves on standing for justice in the world. We pride ourselves on speaking when others stay silent. Most of all, we pride ourselves for fighting for the ability to right the wrongs that we see in the worldwide community.

We have a noble tradition, as the member for Etobicoke North said, in our world to bring about peace and to talk about peace. That reputation is sorely at risk if the Conservative government fails to stand up for our sisters and brothers half a globe away.

The Canadian government has an obligation to the global community, to the Tamil citizens, to all citizens of Sri Lanka and to Tamils living in Canada. They number over 200,000 and they have the right to speak up and be heard in our country, as they fully participate as Canadian citizens here.

While it is thousands of kilometres away from where we gather tonight, a genocide is occurring and the global community must take action. Most important, our Conservative government, which has been silent far too long, has to take further steps than even those announced today.

Up until today, there have been no calls for mediation, no calls for humanitarian assistance and, most important, no calls for a cease fire or a way out of this conflict. Every day the toll of this conflict is rising and its effect on future generations is flying out of control. Tens of thousands are dead, towns and villages have been destroyed, hundreds of thousands of people have been made homeless in this long conflict. Despite these ongoing tragedies, the crisis remains largely invisible to the western world. The press gallery is not full tonight. We will have an ongoing responsibility to take this message to the world and we on this side of the House are committed to doing that, not only tonight, not only yesterday but tomorrow and the day after and the day after.

All sides of this conflict have used violence and have experienced suffering. I will never condone the use of child soldiers or suicide bombings and I know that both forces have used these instruments. It is inexcusable, and we do not support them nor condone them. However, this growing crisis has disproportionately affected the minority Tamil population in the northern and northeastern parts of the island. Constant shelling of civilian areas, disappearance of community leaders, journalists killed and lost, long-term detentions without trials, incidents of torture and the increased deprivation of the country to the government's hindrance of food aid, water and medicine delivery happen day after day.

Our Canadian government has announced $3 million in aid and it is simply not enough. Nor is there any possibility that we can have a guarantee that it will be delivered. The agencies listed by the ministers tonight simply are not in the area. They are not, as the ministers say, on the ground. They are not able to deliver the aid.

The government needs to call for a UN envoy to be a witness for peace, a witness for justice and a witness for ongoing settlement to the solution. It is a half measure at best that the government has done. We are glad that it is acting. It needs to act further. We on this side of the House will have a concerted effort, we will stand with our friends, we will continually remind them of our responsibility and we will continue to keep them in our prayers.

[Situation in Sri Lanka, February 4th, 2009]

Madam Speaker, I thank the minister for her actions today, for announcing humanitarian aid and for other calls for a ceasefire from the government. In that same spirit of co-operation, as an individual member of Parliament, I want to work with her on this.

I do have a concern about the aid that has been announced and our ability to actually get it flowing through to the Tamil people in the areas, particularly those areas that have been controlled by the LTTE. Last summer, it was very clear when the United Nations refugee agency, the UNHCR, acknowledged that the supplies were low and aid was not flowing because the Sri Lankan government would not allow it to flow. Subsequently, it took aid workers out of the area, saying it was no longer safe for them. Those agencies have not been there for a number of months.

I am worried about how Canada can help get them into the area with safety and how we can get the money that the government has announced today, and more, flowing.

[Petitions, February 4th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to present a petition today from residents of Don Valley West, expressing concern about current hostilities in Sri Lanka.

The petitioners call upon the Government of Canada to put pressure on the government of Sri Lanka to provide the Tamil population with food, shelter, medicine and other fundamental necessities. They also call upon the government to call upon the United Nations and other international relief agencies to enter the area to provide witness to what is going on. In addition, they call upon the government to call for an immediate ceasefire and to take immediate steps to call for the UN to provide an observer to monitor human rights abuses.

[The Budget, February 3rd, 2009]

Those are that member's words, Mr. Speaker. I would say that my job as the member of Parliament for Don Valley West is watching where the government spends this money, how it creates jobs and what gets done. The hon. member will see me at Union Station, downtown Toronto, making sure that commuters have a way to get on the train safely and to get into and out of the city safely. I will be watching for those projects. I will be watching for the money to flow. We are putting the government on probation. We are watching. We will see what happens.

[The Budget, February 3rd, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, it is totally interesting to be on this side of the House. This is not a Liberal budget. In every way the budget shines as not being a Liberal budget, so of course we are critical of it. Once we had read it, once we had a look at it, once we examined it, we saw both its flaws and also areas where the government had learned something, unlike the New Democrats, who refused to even read it before they decided to vote against it. This is part of parliamentary democracy, part of making this country work. I pledged to my constituents that when I came here, I would find a way to make this work. We are trying to make this work. We will hold the government accountable. We will hold it responsible.

[The Budget, February 3rd, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I think the member, in referring to that economist in his statement, was thinking of the Prime Minister .

Absolutely, the answer is yes. Employment insurance was never meant to be a static plan for all regions, for all times, for all places and for all people. It is meant to be a plan that is flexible and that moves and changes as the times change. Absolutely I believe that employment insurance is a valid and very important instrument to be used to spur on economic development.

We have to keep money flowing. We know that when people are unemployed they are often one cheque away from paying the rent, from feeding their family, from getting the work done that needs to get done. That money is not socked away. That is not money that is stuffed into a mattress. It is money that is spent. Absolutely, that money should be increased.