Scott Armstrong

[Air Canada, March 12th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, last week the Minister of Labour asked the CIRB to carefully examine whether a work stoppage at Air Canada would have a negative effect on the health and safety of Canadians.

This being the beginning of March break, over one million passengers, hard-working Canadians and their families, could be affected by a labour stoppage. Labour stability in the air transportation sector is critical for the Canadian economy, the economic recovery, and the confidence of the average Canadian traveller.

Could the Minister of Labour give this House an update on the status of labour negotiations with Air Canada?

[41st General Election, March 12th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, on April 30, 2011, the Liberal Party's national campaign held a secret training session for Liberal campaign workers to teach them how to use robocalls. Hours later, the phones in Guelph were ringing off the hook with a Liberal dirty trick. Someone was calling residents with an anonymous and misleading message from a fictional character named Laurie MacDonald. These were fake Liberal calls from a fake phone number from a fake Liberal volunteer using a fake name.

The member for Guelph has admitted that he paid for these illegal and unethical phone calls to fight the NDP surge. If these calls were simply an “oversight”, why did he wait until he was about to get caught to come forward? It just does not add up.

We know the opposition spent millions of dollars on hundreds of thousands of phone calls during the last election. How many other Canadian households did it target with this illegal campaign?

[National Defence, March 8th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, we are all saddened by the tragic death of Burton Winters. Recently, the Minister of National Defence requested that the Chief of Defence Staff conduct a review of Canada's search and rescue protocols in the wake of this tragedy.

As is normal practice for ground search and rescue events in Canada, civilian assets were requested by the province to assist in the search. In this case, the Canadian Forces was contacted 20 hours after the young man went missing.

Could the minister please inform us of the results of this review?

[41st General Election, March 5th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, last week, West Nova was mysteriously added to the list of alleged calls by Gord MacPherson, the campaign manager for Liberal candidate, Robert Thibault, who said that he had no memory of anyone complaining about calls during an election.

The media quoted Mr. Thibeault himself for remembering the incident. He said, “I had one person call saying that he got repeated calls at odd hours from a caller saying he represented the Liberal Party”.

There it is. The Liberals paid millions of dollars making hundreds of thousands of phone calls in these ridings and they now claim to have received these calls from the opposition.

The opposition's exaggerated allegations demean the millions of voters who cast their votes in the last election.

[Fisheries and Oceans, February 29th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, our fisheries remain one of the greatest economic engines of many of our coastal communities. However, the industry suffers from low wages and low capacity.

We need to make sure that the fishermen in my region continue to look for change and they look for solutions. Unlike the rhetoric we hear from many labour unions, we need to ensure that they have the opportunity for this change.

What we have heard recently from the FFAW in its negotiations with the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador is such rhetoric we need to ignore. Could the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans please inform the House on his activities to support--

[Foreign Affairs, February 17th, 2012]

Madam Speaker, the reports coming out of the Democratic Republic of the Congo are a cause for concern.

Since their last election last November, they have been trampling on the rights of their citizens. As we all know, the right to free assembly and the right to freedom of speech are basic democratic tenets in any stable democracy.

Can the Minister of Foreign Affairs please update this House on the happenings in the DRC in terms of democratic reform and respect for democratic principles and the rights of its citizens?

[Business of Supply, February 16th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, one of the things on which I think we can all agree is that the future for first nations has to improve. On our side we do not think that improvement necessarily depends on spending more money. We have already spent $1.5 billion in Canada on first nations education for 118,000 students.

There are some reserves across the country that are flourishing. The reason they are doing better and better is that they focus on education and economic development. There is one in my riding that continually supports its students. It invests in and sends the children to the public schools. Other first nations have schools on their reserves and are doing very well, but they put an emphasis and focus on working with the federal government, provincial government and municipal government together to provide the best education they can for their students. They use the economic development money to fund education.

Does the member see some benefit in working together with all levels of government to support the students?

[Business of Supply, February 16th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, as someone who has had a great deal of experience with first nations education on both coasts of Canada, I can tell members that our government has spent $1.5 billion on education over the last year for 118,000 first nation students. Therefore, I hope the member opposite will agree that the answer is not more money.

The answer is to make structural changes to remove the impediments to providing adequate education to first nations from coast to coast to coast. Money is not the answer. The answer is in working with our first nation partners to provide a structure that will remove those impediments so we can deliver the education those students need.

[Fred Dickson, February 10th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today with great sorrow in my heart to say goodbye to a good friend, Senator Fred Dickson, who passed away early yesterday morning.

[Member spoke in Scottish Gaelic as follows: ]

Cha bhithidh a leithid ami riamh.

[English]

His equal will not be among us again.

Fred was a key negotiator in the offshore agreement between Nova Scotia and the federal Government of Canada in the 1980s, an agreement which led to a huge success for the future of our province.

As a senator, he was dedicated to ensuring that future generations of Canadians could have a health care system that was strong and one they could count on.

His passion was for his family; his wife, Kay; his sons, Colin and Ian; his daughter, Kathryn; and his grandchildren.

Fred, my friend,

May the road rise up to meet you,

May the wind be always at your back.

May the sun shine warm upon your face,

and rains fall soft upon your fields.

And until we meet again,

May God hold you in the palm of His hand.

Goodbye my friend. God bless you, Fred.

[Copyright Modernization Act, February 10th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I will not stand here in the House of Commons and summarize the concerns of the opposition. I will talk about the concerns of the Canadian people, the people who actually need to use the Internet, the people who actually need to download information to do their jobs and the people who actually need to download information to pass a course in school.

The current regime we have regarding Internet protocols and copyright legislation is antiquated. Sections of the current bill that refer to education talk about flip charts and overhead projectors. This is so antiquated that it does not apply at all to modern education.

That is why the Canadian Alliance of Student Associations is in support of this bill. It states that “the government has demonstrated a commitment to...Canada’s education community”. It goes on to state that students across Canada are greatly encouraged. It goes on to state that “the federal government has a clear understanding of how this bill will impact Canada's students, educators and researchers”.

On time allocation, this is the same bill that was debated for many hours in the last Parliament and all sides of the House at that time voted to send it to committee. Since we supported it and sent it to committee the last time, why would anyone want to delay sending it to committee again? We have waited 15 years and that is long enough.