Yvon Godin

[Jobs and Growth, 2012, October 30th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I will answer the member's question about taxes my way, with what I think. If people were not paying any taxes we would not have hospitals, schools or highways. We would not have any of that. Instead the government wants us to believe that it will give $100 to parents to take care of their children, but at the same time it will take back half of what it has given them at income tax time. That is the Conservative Party's way. It gives tax breaks at one end and then grabs money back at the other end.

Most of the jobs being created in our country right now are part-time jobs. Most young people between the ages of 15 and 24 are working part-time. Those are the kinds of jobs that have been created. Looking at the big number, people are working three jobs. That is what the Conservative government has done. How many of those young people who go to school and work hard and have university degrees are working part-time? That is what the Conservative government has done. Instead of creating steady jobs for those people, they are creating more part-time work. The Conservatives tell us that according to a study that was done they are creating jobs. They are actually the creators of people losing their jobs. Nineteen thousand people in the public service have lost their jobs. They were providing a service to Canadians.

That is not what Canada is all about, my friend.

[Jobs and Growth, 2012, October 30th, 2012]

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think that the questions, comments and what we think about the bill are on the agenda today. We can also talk about what is missing from a bill. We must never limit debate in the House of Commons to the content of a bill ; we must be able to talk about what is missing.

Once again, the government is trying to shut us up so that it does not look bad. What did it do? For example, through its bill it is requiring people to work until the age of 67. This direct attack on workers is unbelievable. The Minister of Finance and the Minister of Labour say that they are doing this to help people. That all this is being done in order to help people.

They want me to talk about Bill C-45. So I will talk about temporary foreign workers. Does it make sense for us to bring in temporary foreign workers who will be paid 15% less than Canadians? What does this mean? It means that employers will be able to keep temporary workers in their businesses. There is a reason why Canadians who go to work in Cap-Pelé are sent home after working 20 hours. Temporary workers can stay for 40 hours.

There is a reason that, in Caraquet, some workers are not called back to work in a fish plant. Temporary foreign workers have taken their place because the employer can pay them 15% less and make them work in a different way given the regulations in effect in New Brunswick. There are laws that are not obeyed in New Brunswick. If the poor foreign worker who wants to earn money disagrees with what his employer says, the employer calls Immigration Canada and says that the worker he got is not working out.

How can employers bring temporary foreign workers to their workplaces when the unemployment rate in Acadie—Bathurst is 20%? That is crazy.

Here is what the Conservatives are doing with this bill: they are opening the door to what I call “foreign worker slavery” and to the loss of jobs for local workers. Then they turn around and tell us that they want our people to work.

Here is what they really want: they want our people to go work out west, and they want foreign workers to do seasonal jobs, pay taxes and pay employment insurance premiums before being sent back to their country without receiving any benefits at all.

The government could do the same thing the Liberals did: take $57 billion contributed by workers and spend it however it wants. That is what the Conservatives are doing, but it is not the right thing to do. People need to wake up and realize that.

I am proud that I went to the demonstration in Campbellton this week. However, I was not proud to see the fear in people's eyes, nor was I proud of the way the government has treated workers.

I meant it when I asked what workers did to the Conservative Prime Minister to make him hate them so much. Because that is the truth: he hates workers. He is constantly making their lives more difficult.

[Jobs and Growth, 2012, October 30th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I do not mind responding if it does not take any of my time, because it is a point of order.

I will not lose time. Thank you.

Employment insurance is what I was talking about, if he was listening, on the other side. I said that what was missing in the bill were changes for the workers. That is relevant to the bill, because it is a money bill. Workers will be losing money. To me, it is relevant.

[Jobs and Growth, 2012, October 30th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, today, I am pleased to speak about Bill C-45. This is not the first time that the Conservative government has introduced this omnibus bill. The Conservatives introduced it in the spring and they are introducing it now. It is the second part of the budget. How many laws does this 400-page bill contain?

First, the bill prevents parliamentarians from representing their constituents. In my opinion, in a democratic country and a supposedly democratic Parliament, when election day comes and Canadians choose representatives in Ottawa, it is so that those representatives can do something. First, parliamentarians have the right to talk about a bill. Second, they have the right to examine it. Third, they have the right to vote on it.

I would say that this Conservative government is a reform government because that is really what it is. The Conservative Party used to be a progressive party but such is no longer the case. This majority government is introducing bills that are setting back democracy.

I do not understand how Conservative members can feel comfortable with this situation. Even the public is starting to stand up and say that it does not make sense that their elected representatives are no longer allowed to do anything because of the Conservative—or the reform—government. Democracy is suffering.

I do not have much time so I would like to give some examples right away. Ten minutes is not a lot of time. In fact, two minutes have already passed and I have only eight minutes left.

Let us look at employment insurance. This is an issue that is close to my heart, and I will explain why. In my riding, there are a lot of seasonal jobs. Seasonal workers do not exist. There are only seasonal jobs.

In July, there were five demonstrations in my area: one in the riding of Miramichi, three in the riding of Acadie—Bathurst and one in Madawaska—Restigouche, the riding of the Minister of State for the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency. This is the same minister who said that people should have to have a grade 12 education to be eligible for employment insurance benefits. He is also the one who told his constituents that there are still people out there today, in 2012, who would prefer to collect employment insurance benefits so that they can go hunting instead of going to work. What an insult to workers!

On the weekend, I participated in a demonstration that deeply touched me, and I will tell you why. More than 2,000 people participated in this demonstration. When Acadians and anglophones from New Brunswick marched on the J. C. Van Horne Bridge in Fredericton, they saw aboriginal peoples from Gaspé and francophones from Quebec marching towards them. It was called the meeting of the peoples. We told the Conservative government that it was not heading in the right direction with employment insurance reforms.

In this budget, the Conservatives could at least have changed some of the regulations. What they are doing is cruel. We talk about cruelty to animals. What they are doing to workers who have lost their seasonal jobs in the fisheries, forestry sector or tourism, is cruel.

Every week, those very people have to present themselves to employers and ask if there are any jobs. Women over 60 are calling me to say that they have to go into stores to ask about being hired, otherwise the government will cut their employment insurance benefits. They are being humiliated even though they have worked their entire lives in a fish processing plant, for example.

In my riding, no matter if the person lives in Caraquet, Shippagan, Lamèque, Miscou, Tracadie-Sheila, Inkerman, Saint-Simon, Maisonnette, Anse-Bleue, Grande-Anse, Saint-Isidore or Paquetville, there is simply no work.

The government boasts that it has created 820,000 jobs, but it does not talk about the jobs it has eliminated. For example, it eliminated jobs at the Canada Post call centre in Fredericton and replaced them with jobs that pay $12 an hour and no benefits. The government does not talk about that.

They humiliate people and scare them by making cuts to the employment insurance program. I get calls from employers who tell me that they have no jobs to offer. They have a small store with two employees. They get 50 to 300 people every week who come in asking for a job. They say that the government is hurting their businesses. These are not customers coming to buy from them; they are people looking for a job.

We see the way the government is acting. It is forcing people down home to go elsewhere to look for jobs. I understand what the Conservatives are saying. They are saying that if people are on EI, they are supposed to be looking for jobs.

However, they live in an area where unemployment is up to 20%, because the fish plant has closed down and tourism and forestry have closed down for the winter, because that is what we have at home. They are telling those workers to look for jobs three times a week, and if not, they will cut their employment insurance.

Store owners are calling our office saying that they do not have jobs, and when these people go to their establishments, they are hurting their enterprises. It is not that they do not like them, but they are not buying in their establishments. As a matter of fact, they are putting signs in their windows now, stating that they are not employing anybody. As matter of fact, some of them are saying that they are going to start charging $15 for each person who wants to have the owner fill in the form human resources wants. Some of them are saying that they are going to start charging $20 for the forms human resources wants them to sign.

Just imagine that. They have already lost their jobs. They are only getting 55% of their wages, and they have to travel around the Acadian peninsula looking for jobs that do not exist. Imagine the amount of money they are spending just on gas, and that is money they do not have. How can the government say that it has put that in place to help people find jobs where they did not know that a job existed?

I invite the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development to come down to the peninsula to Acadie—Bathurst, Miramichi or Madawaska—Restigouche any day to see if there are jobs. The jobs are not at home. In her bill she is saying that they have to look an hour away from home. Does she understand where they are living?

[Official Languages, October 24th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, Statistics Canada figures indicate that bilingualism is on the decline in Canada. The Conservatives are certainly not setting a good example when they appoint a unilingual anglophone auditor general or Supreme Court judge.

One solution would be to support the economic development of official language minority communities, rather than telling people to move to find a job elsewhere. The government also needs to support provincial governments, like the NDP government in Manitoba, which is building new francophone high schools.

Do the Conservatives realize that, by eliminating programs, they are only exacerbating the situation?

[Official Languages, October 24th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, if we need another example of how the government's plan for jobs is not working, simply look at how it is failing francophones across the country. Instead of helping French communities grow, the Conservatives are gutting the services that support the communities, like unemployment insurance. What is the result? Francophones move to other places where there are no French schools, hospitals or services to help them. Where is the plan to help our French communities?

[Official Languages, October 16th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, the programs are working, but the Commissioner is asking that they be put in place.

Does the government want examples of the setbacks? A year ago, the Minister of Industry announced the creation of a committee on the French language. Where is this committee? The government appointed a unilingual anglophone to the position of auditor general and is closing the only bilingual Canadian search and rescue centre, which is located in Quebec City. If that is the government's commitment to the official languages, I am not impressed.

If the minister is so concerned about official languages, why is he allowing his government to dismantle so many bilingual institutions one after the other?

[Official Languages, October 16th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, official languages are pretty far down the Conservative government's list of priorities.

In his most recent report, the Commissioner of Official Languages again pointed out problems at Air Canada, Parks Canada and Elections Canada.

The Official Languages Act has been around for 43 years. Both linguistic communities have had equal rights under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms for the past 30 years.

Why do the Conservatives accept these setbacks for Canada's official languages?

[Food Safety, October 3rd, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I do not think the Conservatives will answer that question because they are around and they will not get to that. The Conservatives keep getting up and talking about Bill S-11 in the Senate.

We are in 2012. Does the member really believe that we need a new law for the government to take the responsibility that it should have taken before? Does that mean that in our country we did not have the law to ensure the safety of Canadian men, women and children? Is that what the government is saying right now?

[Petitions, October 3rd, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to present a petition signed by 1,023 people from Acadie—Bathurst who are calling on the government and Parliament to oppose Bill C-38—which was already passed—and its provisions concerning the power to define “suitable employment,” the power to define “reasonable and customary efforts to obtain suitable employment” and the creation of a social security tribunal. These provisions will impoverish the entire economy of our country and punish seasonal and regional workers. These measures do not improve access to employment insurance or the matching of workers’ skills with job vacancies.