Sheila Malcolmson

[Holidays Act, December 5th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, to honour veterans, fallen soldiers, and peacekeepers who stood up for Canada, we gather on Remembrance Day to honour the service of the men and women who put their lives on the line for our country.

Nanaimo—Ladysmith's Legions, No. 256 Mt. Benson, and No. 10 Harewood, in Nanaimo; No. 257 Lantzville; No. 171 Ladysmith; the Gabriola Island Veterans Association; and Cedar Valley Memorial Gardens, all held powerful services to recognize Remembrance Day in Nanaimo—Ladysmith. I am grateful for their work. They are keeping veterans' stories alive, and we are grateful to them.

Veterans need parliamentarians to do our part to recognize and support those who have sacrificed for our country. There is clearly a debt owed, there is money in the till, and sincere and vital promises have been made. Every year, 3,000 veterans pass away, so let us get on with it and act to show that we truly support veterans.

There are eight things that parliamentarians can do to live up to that responsibility. Last year, this House unanimously passed a motion brought forward by my colleague, the member of Parliament for Port Moody—Coquitlam, recognizing Canada's covenant of moral, social, legal, and financial obligations to veterans.

Here are the eight ways that we could act on that unanimous commitment of this House:

One, instead of spending thousands of dollars fighting veterans in court, the Liberal government should halt the court proceedings against wounded veterans and spend that money instead to bring back veterans' pensions.

Second, because one in six vets experiences mental health or alcohol-related disorders, or have in this past year, and because half who have served in Afghanistan have suffered PTSD, depression, and anxiety, I call upon this Parliament to prioritize and support the mental health of military service men and women, veterans, first responders, retired and volunteer first responders, and their families.

Third, to make real change for vets and their families, we can defeat paternalistic legislation that blocks pension benefits for two groups: one, spouses of veterans, RCMP members, judges, and public sector workers who choose to marry after the age of 60; and, second, retired and disabled Canadian Forces and RCMP veterans.

The fix for this bill and the mental health one referred to previously are Bills C-260, C-261, and Motion No. 61, all from the member of Parliament for London—Fanshawe and the New Democrat critic for Veterans Affairs.

Fourth, to our shame, homelessness rates in Canada are shocking, with estimates that there might be as many as 1,300 veterans living on Canada's streets. Canada's national housing strategy must take action on veteran homelessness.

Fifth, the government should act on detox treatments for veterans exposed to chemical defoliants like Agent Orange. Medical treatment can cut dioxin levels such that veterans can return to work. It will not repair the damage, but it can help people function.

Six, we should relax the regulations on access to veterans hospitals, and ensure that veterans from World War II and the Korean War are able to access these beds when they require long-term care.

Seven, and I am very glad to say that this has already been done, the government will start covering the cost of medically prescribed cannabis extract products for police and military veterans being treated for PTSD. This was the subject of a petition that I sponsored, and I am very glad that the government listened to the many Canadians who supported this change.

Eighth, we can pass this bill to make Remembrance Day a holiday. Earlier versions of this bill to make Remembrance Day a holiday across the country were introduced by former New Democrat MPs Dan Harris, Chris Charlton, Nelson Riis, and veterans' advocate Peter Stoffer.

In my home province of British Columbia, November 11 is already a holiday. As a result, we see families coming together to recognize and celebrate Remembrance Day. When families remember together, they are able to teach their children about the sacrifices that the men and women who have fought and continue to fight for Canada have made.

For example, Ladysmith's Legion hosts an afternoon ceremony in the community of Cedar, at the Cedar Valley Memorial Gardens, where there are cadets, Guides, Scouts, and and Beavers. It is lovely to see, and a great example of what happens when families honour and celebrate together.

Last month, on Remembrance Day, we recommitted to standing up for veterans and their families, so that every veteran has the care that our country owes them. Bureaucratic delays and disingenuous platitudes cannot define Canada's response to veterans, and just 2.5 of 23 Liberal promises have been fully implemented. Let us use our power as leaders and voters and support real change for veterans and their families.

On Remembrance Day and all days, we never forget; we forever honour.

[Fisheries Act, December 2nd, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, we have today in this Parliament a historic opportunity to act on the key recommendations of the Cohen Commission to protect wild salmon and the wild salmon economy and to innovate and take action on coastal job creation.

The importance of wild Pacific salmon cannot be overstated. They are the foundation of indigenous culture in British Columbia. They are the foundation of our coastal ecology, and they established British Columbia's settlement pattern.

Salmon support a $102-million west coast commercial fishery employing 1,400 people. They support a $326-million west coast recreational fishery employing 8,400 people. They fuel a $783-million west coast wilderness tourism industry employing 26,000 full time, and roughly 40,000 in total. Yet wild salmon are at risk globally. Due to climate change and the increased prevalence of salmon farms along migratory routes, salmon populations on the west coast are at serious risk.

Worldwide, since 1975, oceans have absorbed 90% of the excess heat from global climate change. Worldwide, fisheries, as a result, could lose $10 billion of their annual revenue because of climate change.

Since salmon farms proliferated on our coast in the nineties, Fraser sockeye populations have crashed. In 2009, the salmon run on the Fraser River saw only 1.4 million fish, a drastic low in spawning returns from typical levels, which are usually 20 million to 30 million. Sockeye salmon at our latitude are threatened with extinction by 2050, and potentially all species of salmon are threatened with extinction by 2100, if we do not act. This would affect everything, moving up the food chain, including resident killer whales.

Writes Diana Hardacker from the riding I represent, “I teach students at the Nanaimo River Fish Hatchery about the important irreplaceable role that Pacific Salmon play in the health of our ecosystem, and our health. Any threat to that, namely disease from Atlantic salmon, is unacceptable.”

I agree. Open-net fish farms are a further threat to Pacific wild salmon. They are located in key migratory areas for wild salmon, and there is evidence that they are harming wild salmon. Feces and waste feed damage the ecosystem near fish farms. They promote the spread of disease and allow sea lice to flourish.

Imagine being a wee salmon minnow running the gauntlet of net-pen fish farms on the migratory route. They emerge bristling with sea lice. Salmon have enough to contend with between ocean, river, lake, and four years out in the ocean without this impossible burden of sea lice. If and when viruses spread to wild salmon, which are already under threat from sea lice, the results could be even more catastrophic.

I salute the work of Alexandra Morton. She is a heroine on our coast for standing up for wild salmon and ringing the alarm on science and the threat from salmon farms.

We need to transition to closed containment. West coast salmon, wild salmon, are under threat from sea lice, pollutants, and diseases coming from open-net fish farms. We have see this happen already. Norway, Chile, Scotland, and now B.C. have all had problems with their wild salmon fishery as a result of the contamination from open-pen fish farms. We cannot afford the declining wild salmon population, and we cannot afford the aquaculture collapse.

I heard about this from Julie Smith, who wrote to me, “As someone who was a commercial fisher for over 25 years and now has lost my job because of the decline of fish returns, this is something I feel very strongly about. Please support this, it is important.”

I urge the government to do the right thing and transition this industry to safe closed containment technology.

New Democrats called for a judicial inquiry into the sockeye collapse of the Fraser salmon run, and then we championed the implementation of the recommendations resulting from the Cohen Commission. The new Liberal government has promised full implementation of Cohen's recommendations, yet 18 of its 20 deadlines have passed already without any action.

Cohen said that the Government of Canada should remove from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans' mandate the promotion of salmon farming as an industry and farmed salmon as a product.

Never was the need more clear to remove that conflict of interest than when we heard the DFO parliamentary secretary in debate last month proclaim the spotless record of the aquaculture industry. It is just not fair.

We heard strong words from Cohen on the precautionary principle and the possible link between open-net salmon farming and the decline in wild salmon.

We are arguing in the bill today that closed containment salmon farms are the solution for the west coast. They would create jobs while protecting wild salmon. We already have 70 licensed closed containment fin farms in British Columbia already, so the technology is proven. They would keep the farm environment on the farm, and the wild environment wild. They would protect wild salmon from parasites like sea lice. On-land fish farms can better control the water temperature and water quality, maximizing the efficiency of growth, which is good for the salmon farming business.

It is time to innovate. The rate of change in this industry is tremendous and Norway and Denmark are already generating very good results. This is proven technology and we are already making great strides across Canada in closed containment Atlantic salmon production with Sustainable Blue in Nova Scotia and Kuterra leading the way in B.C.

With many of my colleagues from three different parties in the House, we had the chance to visit Kuterra. It has been in operation since 2013 and is fully owned by the 'Namgis First Nation on northern Vancouver Island. It is designed to produce 450 tonnes per year of antibiotic and hormone-free, non-GMO Atlantic salmon. All the water is recycled and cleaned every hour and 99% of that water is reused. The solid waste, which in traditional fish farms is dumped into the ocean, is filtered, captured, and composted in Kuterra's on-land farm. The ammonia in the water is converted to nitrate and can be used for aquaponics.

I cannot say enough how inspiring it was to go to this facility to see local people innovating, working together, creating local jobs, using local feed, and generating those on-the-ground results that can really inspire further success.

We have heard again and again from the proponents at Kuterra what a tremendous advantage British Columbia has. We already have fish farms, technicians, processing plants, everything to give us an advantage now over the United States. Yet the Danish company Langsand Laks is starting a 30,000 tonne on-land closed containment Atlantic salmon farm in Florida. Canada could get ahead of this sustainable, hi-tech wave by innovating now to protect wild salmon.

My colleague, the member of Parliament for Port Moody—Coquitlam, has such a strong record of standing up for wild salmon. He has flown across Georgia Strait, across the Salish Sea, and down the Fraser River. He has been a fantastic proponent and advocate, along with NGOs like the Georgia Strait Alliance. His bill before us today would strengthen the Fisheries Act by requiring west coast salmon farms to move from open-net harmful pens to safe closed containment systems within five years.

It would require the Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard to plan the transition of the salmon farming industry on the west coast to closed containment in a way that moves those jobs that support the local economy. It is a win-win for the environment and local employment.

While 150 first nation bands oppose open-net salmon farms, there is tremendous support for this on-land salmon farm bill. The Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs, the First Nations Fisheries Alliance, the Canadian Wildlife Federation, the B.C. Wildlife Federation, and hundreds of others are in support. Moreover, almost 1,200 of my constituents have written to me to say that they want to see Parliament support the bill.

I will end with a plea to Parliament to recognize the sacred duty we have, the responsibility we have, to make things right for both the wild economy and local jobs. We can support a just transition to on-land closed containment salmon farms in B.C., proving that Canada can innovate, create jobs, protect wild salmon, and protect B.C.'s coastal economy.

[Indigenous Affairs, December 2nd, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, it is pretty clear the Liberals only want consensus when it suits them. The Prime Minister did not seek consensus before approving the Kinder Morgan pipeline.

Snuneymuxw first nation in my riding of Nanaimo—Ladysmith feels betrayed. Former Chief Kwul'a'sul'tun said, “this project puts at risk our way of life.” He also said the decision was “premised on a denial of aboriginal peoples rights and voice”.

Why has the Prime Minister betrayed first nations and our coast? Where is their need for consensus now?

[The Environment, November 30th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the government's announcement that it intends to act on abandoned vessels, which would prevent oil spills, if we get ahead of them, and prevent them from sinking.

We are still looking for the detail that was expressed by coastal communities in the consultation this summer, and has been expressed by local governments for 15 years. We still have no detail in the plan.

The announcement did not say how the federal government was going to fix the mishmash of responsibility in our current laws. My private member's bill, Bill C-219, would do that by making the Coast Guard the first stop. We need to resource the Coast Guard well to do that.

We need to have new money and a broader mandate for the Coast Guard. We heard this summer about preventative action before the vessels become a hazard. We are looking for a turn-in program, a bring in a boat program, to make it easier for owners to do the right thing. We are looking for support around vessel salvage and fibreglass—

[The Environment, November 30th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, the last time I discussed abandoned vessel response, which is an oil spill prevention mechanism, we were on the verge of having a new federal announcement. Now the oceans strategy has been announced with great fanfare and a bit of a leap of hope in the hearts of coastal people. However, some weeks later, we still have seen no content and are no more confident from the details that have been released so far.

Therefore, I would like to talk, through you, Mr. Speaker, with the representative for the environment and transport on this file.

We recently heard the Prime Minister say, “As a community, we need to protect our magnificent oceans”. Of course, in solidarity with a great number of coastal communities, I, as the member for Parliament for Nanaimo—Ladysmith, am dismayed that the Prime Minister did not heed the call of the Union of B.C. Municipalities and multiple coastal first nations that all opposed the Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion with its attendant seven-fold increase in oil tanker traffic through one of the most sensitive regions of our country. It is a region that a Transport Canada's report has described as one of two with the highest probability of a high-impact oil spill. It is already one of the busiest areas for vessel traffic, without counting the increased tanker traffic from once a week to once every day through our very sensitive and very busy waters.

There are a couple of parts of that oceans response plan that I would like to take apart. One is on the oil spill response side. We have had multiple coastal people weigh in on this. Jess Housty, a Heiltsuk Nation council member in Bella Bella, B.C., said:

It's clear that even the best available technology and most qualified personnel can't effectively contain or mitigate a spill.... I shudder to think of the risk we'll face if we see an increase in shipping due the new or expanded pipelines.

I have another quote, this time from Mike Lowry of the Western Canada Marine Response Corporation, the industry-funded oil spill response team, which is a very good group. He says: “100 per cent recovery is never possible”.

One of the most frequently cited statistics, contained in a 2013 report for the federal government on oil spill readiness, is that even with optimal conditions only between 5% to 15% of the oil spilled is ever recovered using booms and skimmers.

I can attest to this. When I was elected to local government, my role was to be part of an incident command around re-certification for Western Canada Marine Response Corporation, which Transport Canada carries out. We did a simulated oil spill of 10,000 tonnes. This was simulated and not actually in the ocean. With 300 personnel on hand and all the best practices of oil spill response, after three days, 35 kilometres of shoreline were oiled and only 15% of the oil had been recovered. This is parallelled by the terrible situation with the Nathan E. Stewart, from which tens of thousands of litres of diesel oil spilled. It took 20 hours for the Coast Guard to get there. Multiple times over 20 days booms broke up and oil spilled in rough waters, and we expect rough waters when there is a marine spill.

I understand that our premier is confident in the oil spill regulations, but we have not seen any details whatsoever, and because this government is committed to oceans and to transparency, I hope that—

[Canada Pension Plan, November 29th, 2016]

Madam Speaker, my observation is that, during the 10 years that the Conservative Party was in power, income disparity grew and the pension gap really rose, so there were a couple of mechanisms that the Conservatives brought forward: the tax-free savings account, and the pooled retirement pension plans.

I would be interested to know the member's observations on how successful those were, because what I have heard is that they were mostly taken up by middle- and high-income people and not the low-income Canadians we are trying to protect.

[Canada Pension Plan, November 29th, 2016]

Madam Speaker, there were a lot of places where the difference in the New Democrat platform and the Liberal platform were unrecognizable. We were certainly pulling in the same direction. We had hope for our constructive proposals for amendment. Our initial belief was that the Liberals must have left these pieces out in error. We have tried to be as constructive as we can. We want the Liberals to fix these losses. If they did, it would certainly be better for women of the future.

[Canada Pension Plan, November 29th, 2016]

Madam Speaker, I did not hear the details of my colleague's proposal, but we absolutely have an epidemic of poverty among elderly women in our country. There are a number of ways to get at that, and I have named some of them in my speech. Certainly, advocacy organizations, whether around basic annual income, and a little more money in the pockets of seniors would address food insecurity and help with the cost of prescription drugs.

We would like to see the government take leadership on a multitude of fronts. If we make elderly women better off, then we would save money in health care and all kinds of places. It is the right thing to do.

[Canada Pension Plan, November 29th, 2016]

Madam Speaker, I, along with the New Democrats, intend to support the bill. It is important for the country. We have pushed for it much longer than the Liberals have.

My whole presentation is around us trying to work together to correct a flawed bill. We cannot believe that the government intends to leave out disabled workers and stay-at-home mothers in the future. This is why it is extremely discouraging not to talk this through and amend the bill now. Why would the government, when it has taken all this time, want to put forward a flawed bill?

The Liberals should be showing leadership with the provinces and territories. I certainly did not see any media that suggested our provincial and territorial leaders did not want to extend these benefits to stay-at-home mothers and the disabled. Again, the government has shut down debate, so we cannot discuss it.

I will quote the parliamentary secretary in 2015 on time allocation. He said:

The government, by once again relying on a time allocation motion to get its agenda passed, speaks of incompetence. It speaks of a genuine lack of respect for parliamentary procedure and ultimately for Canadians.

I agree with him.

[Canada Pension Plan, November 29th, 2016]

Madam Speaker, I rise today to speak somewhat in support of Bill C-26, though New Democrats have some serious concerns and amendments that we would like to once again raise. It is unfortunate that this debate is happening within the framework of the government once again invoking time allocation, which is shutting down debate. New Democrats have identified a serious error in this legislation. We wish the Liberals had acted on our suggestions to amend and that we had more time to discuss why they are reluctant. However, I will start with the positive.

Bill C-26 incorporates the recent agreement reached with the provinces to enhance Canada pension plan benefits. It is a very important step in improving retirement security for young Canadians and we congratulate everybody, especially our friends in the labour movement who worked very long and hard to lay the groundwork for this agreement. This is a success.

When fully implemented, the new CPP expansion would replace 33% of pre-retirement income. That is up from the current 25%. This action is needed. Retirement security is reaching crisis levels. Many Canadians do not have adequate financial security to maintain their lifestyles upon retirement, and this is particularly fuelled by the erosion of workplace pension plans, to the point that six in 10 working Canadians have no workplace pensions.

New Democrats have fought consistently for increases to the CPP, old age security, and the guaranteed income supplement. This bill would benefit a whole new generation of workers entering the workforce, but more is needed. This bill does little to alleviate the retirement income crisis of those now approaching retirement and the full effect of the changes would not be felt for 49 years.

Much more needs to be done right now to help lift seniors out of poverty and to help them live with the dignity they deserve. There are high housing costs, high drug costs, the clawback of the guaranteed income supplement, and the indexing of pensions. New Democrats want the Liberal government to keep its promise to introduce a new seniors price index, to make sure that old age security and the guaranteed income supplement keep up with rising costs and, in particular, to recognize that single elderly women are particularly living in poverty in this country, which is shameful.

Here is the big mistake in this bill. Bill C-26 does not contain the child-rearing dropout provisions that exist in the current CPP, so that parents, mostly women, are not penalized for time taken out of the workforce to raise children. The Liberal bill also fails to replicate a similar existing dropout provision for people who receive CPP disability benefits.

This is how the CPP already works in this regard. The benefits that people receive are based on an average of earnings from the time people are 18 until they retire. To accommodate periods where people may have low or zero incomes, the plan now allows for the lowest eight years of earnings to be dropped from the calculation, and that exemption is referred to as a dropout. That rule applies to everyone. Everyone who now qualifies for that will continue to. They should be assured that nothing will change for people already in this category.

Right now, on top of this basic exemption, there are two other specific dropouts. One is for disability, so that people receiving disability benefits are allowed to drop up to eight years out of their calculations. The other dropout is for child rearing, where people can drop up to eight years, while they were bringing up their children and their income was reduced or zero, from the calculations of their benefits. However, in the new plan that we are debating today, these dropouts would simply apply to the calculation related to base benefits, not to the calculations of the additional or enhanced benefits.

The original dropout provision for child rearing was introduced with much fanfare in 1977 by the government of Pierre Trudeau. The Liberal government of the day included this line in its 1977 throne speech:

You will be asked to consider amendments to the Canada Pension Plan which would further recognize the value of the contribution made to the family and society by both marriage partners, in the event that one remains at home to raise children while their partner works outside the home....

My friend, Iris Taylor, from Nanaimo described this. She said, “My sister Diane Wiebe along with her husband Art, raised three wonderful, hard-working, well-educated taxpayers. Diane was a stay-at-home mom until the youngest left home. Neither parents had jobs with pensions, so when they retired they solely lived on savings, CPP, and OAS. In fact, both worked part-time to cover living expenses until their passing at 70 years. My sister was always appreciative of CPP factoring in her years at home with children into her CPP pension payment.”

The effect of losing this could be significant, especially for women who are overwhelmingly the ones who applied for the child rearing dropout and presently receive a much lower average CPP benefit. The NDP ask was that the government restore it for the new CPP enhancements and that it do it now. We have debated every day in the House, asking the government if it would work with us to get this fixed. My colleague from Hamilton Mountain basically laid out all the groundwork at committee. All the Liberals needed to do was pick it up and run with it, but they chose not to.

In the House, we invited the government to amend its own bill. At committee, the New Democrats moved two motions to include the dropout provisions for women and those living with disabilities. However, the Liberals were not reasonable in looking at our amendments and ruled them out of order. When we tried to make a motion to have the committee recommend to the House that the provisions be put into the bill, the Liberals moved to adjourn debate. They kind of cut and run. It was very strange.

In case the Liberals might try to cite cost as a factor in their decision to omit the dropout provisions from the new enhanced benefits, our very preliminary calculations show that the cost would be very low. Using available information, it looks like the dropouts might cost each employee and each employer 0.2% of a worker's average salary. That is a very cheap price to pay to provide such an important and significant benefit.

On the other hand, looking at the calculations on Service Canada's website, the failure to fix this program could cost parents significantly. A mother who spent six years raising children would get between $800 to $1,200 less each year than she would otherwise.

Again, we have time allocation on the bill so we are not able to debate this fully. Again, this is inconsistent with previous Liberal positions. Here is what the Minister of Transport was quoted in Hansard in 2012 as saying:

Slowly but surely, Canadians are beginning...to question what the government meant when it promised...to be open, transparent and, most of all, accountable. I believe Canadians are beginning to feel that there is a contradiction between what has been promised and what is actually being done by the government.

This is déjà vu. That was the Liberals talking about the Conservatives, but now this is just how the Liberals are acting. It is very disappointing.

Hammering home again how important this program has been for Canadian women, June Ross from Nanaimo wrote to me and said, “The credit for my child rearing years was seven years. That credit helped my pension to increase. ln my view, the child rearing credit should have also been applicable to the old age pension as well. The woman who did not work outside the home and therefore was eligible for only the old age pension is punished yet again. As you are no doubt aware...we women have lesser pensions than our male counterparts because our work outside the home had very little value placed on it. Our hourly wages were very low...therefore, our pensions are much lower”.

Again, the Prime Minister likes to call himself a feminist, but when we point out that the Liberals' legislation is penalizing young women workers who would qualify for this in the future, they suddenly have nothing to say. The Liberal government should immediately agree to our proposal and live up to its feminist rhetoric. It should amend the bill so future generations of stay-at-home mothers and the disabled are not penalized. Please do the right thing, amend your bill and I will vote in support of it.