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Results: 1 - 60 of 131
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-06-15 14:55 [p.15068]
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Numbers do not lie, Mr. Speaker. The manufacturing performance is dismal, particularly with the dollar at 81¢, and it is part of a wider trend.
The trade deficit has soared to historic highs: in January, $1.8 billion; in February, $2 billion; in March, an all-time slump, $3.9 billion; in April, another $3 billion. That is a total deficit so far this year of more than $10 billion.
Without reciting talking points, could the government explain how it will turn those terrible numbers around?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-06-10 14:45 [p.14873]
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Mr. Speaker, the formal trade deal between Europe and Ukraine goes into force at the beginning of 2016, but the EU actually understands Ukraine's pivotal role and has therefore pre-emptively and unilaterally lifted tariffs for Ukrainian companies.
In contrast, despite much rhetoric about Ukraine, Canada has held back, awaiting the completion of inevitably time-consuming, formal, bilateral trade talks.
Why does the Prime Minister not do as much for Ukraine on trade right now as Angela Merkel has already done?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-06-08 14:38 [p.14697]
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Mr. Speaker, despite celebratory announcements in October and December of 2013, and then again in August and September of 2014, the CETA deal is still not done. Last September's premature party alone cost hard-working Canadian taxpayers nearly half a million dollars.
The government cynically boasts about the number of deals it has signed, but the grim reality is record high trade deficits of $3 billion and $3.9 billion in March and April. When will the government finally scrap its tired talking points and tell us when CETA will be finished?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-06-03 14:58 [p.14533]
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Mr. Speaker, the OECD has cut its 2015 GDP forecast for Canada to a dismal 1.5%. By way of excuse, the minister today claimed, “We are doing better than most developed countries”. That is simply not true. The OECD puts us behind Australia, Germany, Ireland, Israel, the Netherlands, South Korea, Sweden, the U.K., the U.S. and yes, even Spain.
This is no global problem, as the government likes to pretend to excuse its shoddy management. This is a made-in-Canada runway to recession.
When will the finance—
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-06-01 14:38 [p.14398]
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Mr. Speaker, Friday's GDP numbers showed a 0.6% drop over the first quarter of 2015, a performance rightly described as “terrible” by a Bay Street economist.
The Governor of the Bank of Canada's previous remark about an “atrocious” start to the year has sadly been borne out. Most troubling was the 0.2% decline in March, a month which was supposed to show an economic rebound.
When will the Conservatives quit parroting their talking points, face this grim reality, and admit they have no effective plan for jobs and growth?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-05-27 14:18 [p.14216]
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Mr. Speaker, in my riding of Toronto Centre, rail safety is an issue of immense community concern. The government has proposed changes to the current rail safety system, but they do not go nearly far enough.
A new proposed speed limit remains higher than self-imposed limits set by CN and CP in urban areas. The timeline to replace and upgrade aging DOT-111 tank cars would leave unsafe cars on the tracks for far too long.
The Conservatives' piecemeal approach to rail safety is frustrating our communities and putting them at risk. In my riding, two rail lines used for transporting crude oil run through residential areas. Residents and community organizations are worried and want better safety rules, but Transport Canada's Rail Safety Directorate lacks staff, funding and training.
We must do much more to improve rail safety in our communities.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-05-25 14:38 [p.14060]
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Mr. Speaker, the government's performance on trade continues to fall far short of its rhetoric. The most recent example is a breakdown in bilateral negotiations with Japan. Talks have been stalled for months, with Canadian officials citing Japan's focus on the trans-Pacific partnership as their excuse for the slowdown. However, Japan has continued bilateral negotiations with other countries, so this excuse rings hollow.
Will the Conservatives redouble efforts to schedule a round of negotiations with Japan before we fall behind our foreign competitors, as we did with South Korea, costing Canada billions of dollars and thousands of middle-class jobs?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-05-25 14:39 [p.14060]
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Mr. Speaker, a $3-billion trade deficit in March, a historic record, suggests the trade agenda is not working. This is not the first time the government has touted an imminent deal without showing any results. As CETA winds its way through EU institutions, it is facing mounting criticism from European officials. There is growing talk that portions of the text may even need to be changed to assuage these concerns, even though Canadians have been told that this is a done deal and have had hundreds of thousands of their dollars already spent to celebrate it.
Will the minister finally forego his smoke-and-mirrors act and tell us when CETA, which we have already celebrated, will finally be ratified?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-05-06 15:02 [p.13538]
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Mr. Speaker, speaking of shameless photo ops, despite hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on ceremonies and announcements, the CETA deal has stalled.
Conservative rhetoric on trade just does not match the results. There was a $3 billion trade deficit in March, a historic record. Our share of western export to Asia has been cut in half, and we are at risk of being kicked out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
The government prefers talking points over market access, photo ops over real export opportunities for Canadian businesses and Canadian workers. When will the Conservatives take some real action on trade?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives like to brag about the number of trade deals they have done, but in March they presided over the largest trade deficit of $3 billion in Canada's history. That makes, for the first quarter, a trade deficit of $7 billion.
This weakness is especially worrying, given Statistic Canada's recent report that businesses intend to cut R and D spending by 2.6% this year, a worrying indicator for the future. The numbers do not lie.
When will the government stop hiding behind absolutely ludicrous talking points on the TFSA and admit that its economic policies are failing Canadians?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-04-27 14:38 [p.13052]
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Mr. Speaker, Michael Kinsley defined a gaffe as the moment when a politician accidentally tells the truth. That is what happened when our usually invisible Minister of Finance said that the high cost of doubling the TFSA limit will be a problem for the Prime Minister's granddaughter. His remark revealed the Conservative government's profoundly cynical and short-term approach to economic policy, and its utter lack of a long-term vision for Canada.
Why are the Conservatives building up billions of dollars of debt for all of our grandchildren with this $10,000 tax break for the already wealthy, and where is their plan for long-term growth and jobs?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-04-27 14:40 [p.13052]
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Mr. Speaker, I am proud to say that we are worried about long-term solvency for the Government of Canada, and we are worried about jobs and growth now.
According to Carleton University economist Jennifer Robson, the Conservative income splitting plan “will only reach, at most, 12.9% of all Canadian households and a maximum of one third of families with children”.
Two-thirds of families with children will not save even one dollar from these so-called family tax cuts. When will the Conservatives start giving help to those who need it rather than to those who do not?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-04-22 14:45 [p.12862]
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Mr. Speaker, “multipliers for infrastructure spending...are...high. In contrast, a reduction in personal income taxes has a considerably lower multiplier...”. Those are not my words. That is the sound economic argument laid out by Jim Flaherty in his 2009 budget.
Could the current minister explain why he is ignoring this wise advice and handing out tax breaks to the rich instead of investing seriously in infrastructure and the economic growth middle-class Canadians so urgently need?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-03-31 15:52 [p.12623]
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Mr. Speaker, I will share my time with the member for Mississauga—Brampton South.
The Liberals share Canadians' concern about rail safety in Canada. After the Lac-Mégantic tragedy, the government promised to take steps to ensure the safety and integrity of Canada's rail network. However, in the past two months, there have been three major derailments in Ontario alone. In March, one of those trains, which was transporting dangerous goods, burned for a whole weekend.
In my riding, Toronto Centre, two rail lines used to transport crude oil go through residential neighbourhoods. Residents and community organizations, such as Safe Rail Communities, are worried and want the government to introduce safety measures and regulations to protect them from potential dangers. However, Transport Canada's rail safety directorate lacks staff, funding and training.
Transport Canada has a lot of catching up to do, but its budget was cut by $202 million, or 11%, in the main estimates. These cuts followed a scathing report by the Auditor General, who pointed out that the government had conducted just 26% of the required audits and did not audit VIA Rail, even though the company transports 4 million passengers a year. The report also revealed that the government does not have enough inspectors and system auditors to audit critical safety functions. When the Liberal critic questioned the minister in committee in March 2015, the minister said that a single additional inspector had been hired, which brings the total number of inspectors to 117.
This latest bill is yet another example of the Conservatives' piecemeal approach to rail safety. The Transportation Safety Board said in February that the Conservatives' new rail standards do not go far enough, and the recent accidents support that assertion. The TSB clearly stated that the older, least safe tank cars should be removed from the rails immediately. The government's timeline for removing these cars is unrealistic, and the Conservatives know it.
Railways united Canada, and many of us still live close to those same railways that helped build our country. The government has a duty to ensure that Canadians who travel on these railways and who live close to them are safe, and it also has a duty to keep the employees of rail carriers safe.
I represent Toronto Centre, which is a riding where rail safety is an issue of intense community concern. Last fall, my colleagues the member for Trinity—Spadina, the member for St. Paul's, and I held a town hall. We held it on a cold autumn night. It was a Friday, and 200 people showed up to discuss this issue. For me, that was a real measure of how strongly the community feels about this issue.
This is not some remote technical question for my constituents, for the people I have the privilege of representing in this House. This is something that people are concerned about every day, that people worry in a very real, very present way affects the safety of their families, the safety of their children.
We are planning to hold another town hall meeting in April, in a few weeks, simply because there was such intense community concern about this issue. I cannot underscore too much for this House how central this issue is, and what priority we must accord it.
Something that we hear every day, and that we heard again today in question period, is one of the threads that runs through the government's philosophy, and that is a point of view which for me feels like warmed over 1990s U.S. Republicanism. It is a “starve the beast” philosophy, a philosophy that says the central responsibility of government is to cut taxes so that government services can be cut. That really is the central ideological idea of the government.
I personally, as a Liberal, strongly disagree with that philosophy and that point of view. I do not think it makes sense for our economy, and it does not make sense for our society.
I hope that in this House, regardless of the party to which we belong, this is one area where we can all agree that government plays an essential role. Government cannot be underfunded. Regulators must be given the authority they need. We cannot count on industry to regulate itself in this crucial matter of rail safety which touches on the personal safety of so many Canadian families.
My concern is that Transport Canada's rail safety division is understaffed, underfunded and undertrained. It is a division which has been a victim of the revolving door of Conservative ministers, with five ministers in nine years.
I would be remiss if I did not point out that another essential aspect of the rail safety issue to which one of the hon. members opposite has just alluded is the fact that we are seeing far more oil being transported by rail than in the past. That is a big part of the reason that rail safety has jumped so high up the agenda of the people whom I represent in Toronto Centre.
People know, even though the level of information given in a timely manner about what is being transported is low, and people appreciate that vastly increased amounts of crude oil are being shipped along our railway lines. That has increased both the perception and the reality of the potential danger that this poses.
I must say that reality did not happen by accident. The reality that so much oil is being transported by rail at great cost and posing a great potential public safety hazard is the fault of the Conservative government which has failed to get the pipelines built that Canada's natural resource producers need to get our resources to market.
That failure is partly a failure of a relationship with aboriginal people. It is partly a failure of relationships with the provinces. It is partly a failure of relationships with local communities. It is, above all, a failure of diplomacy and building an effective productive relationship with the United States, our most important neighbour, our most important trading partner.
This is a failure that is of tremendous concern to the people I represent in Toronto Centre, because they feel, quite rightly, that it has put their communities in greater danger. What is really astonishing to me is that it is a failure which, above all, has caused problems for the Canadian economy as a whole.
In closing, we do see some modest improvements in this bill, but we feel that it does not go far enough. What we would like to see above all is a comprehensive, effective strategy for transporting Canada's natural resources and getting them to market.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-03-31 16:03 [p.12624]
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Mr. Speaker, that is absolutely right. There are a couple of issues here. As my hon. colleague has pointed out and as I mentioned in my remarks, the revolving door of ministers has not helped this situation. Equally though, we have seen a real erosion of expertise in the division responsible for rail safety.
In Canada, we are very lucky to have some excellent, dedicated, devoted public servants who have tremendous experience and cultural experience in their institutions. One of the tragic legacies of the Conservative government is the hollowing out of those institutions.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-03-31 16:05 [p.12625]
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Mr. Speaker, the member is absolutely right. Part of the answer here is better regulation, more regulators, and regulators who have the experience and authority to enforce the rules.
However, there is another part of the problem, which I have been hearing about from concerned people in my community. They are people who either have a past history of being involved in this industry, or in many cases, people who simply describe themselves as concerned mothers who have educated themselves about this issue and have become involved because they are worried about the safety of their kids. What they report to me is a tremendous decline in the infrastructure of the railways themselves.
One of the reasons that we will be putting forward a very ambitious infrastructure program is precisely to repair and rebuild these railways, which have been the backbone of Canada.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-03-31 16:06 [p.12625]
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Mr. Speaker, that is a very good point from my colleague. One of the things that has been a real issue is the perception that I hear from our American counterparts that Canada is dragging its feet when it comes to rail safety. That, to me, as a Canadian legislator, is a real matter of concern.
We should not rely on the Americans to pass rules to keep our people safe. We should do it ourselves.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-03-25 14:42 [p.12298]
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Mr. Speaker, over the past week, both the OECD and TD have sharply cut their economic outlook for Canada. TD's new forecast for 2015 has Canada losing $22 billion from our economy compared to the bank's projections from just three months ago. TD warns unemployment will rise, wage growth will stall and household debt will mount.
When will the Minister of Finance stop playing hide and seek with the House and personally tell us what his plan is to reverse this painful economic decline?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-03-24 14:36 [p.12246]
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Mr. Speaker, a new Conference Board report has exposed our country's shrinking trade presence in Asia. Between 1993 and 2013, Canada's share of exports to Asia dropped by half, falling from the 15th largest exporter in the region to the 23rd. There is a direct link between a strong export sector and good jobs, but we are losing ground in the largest market in the world.
When will the government finally table a budget with a plan to reverse Canada's trade decline and bring better paying jobs to Canadians?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-03-11 14:10 [p.11976]
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Mr. Speaker, Nadiya Savchenko, a Ukrainian pilot, Iraqi war veteran, and member of the Ukrainian parliament, has been held as a prisoner of war in Russia since June 24, 2014.
Last summer, Nadiya was kidnapped by Russian armed and Russian-led forces and illegally transferred to Russia. There she was detained and questioned by Russian intelligence about the deaths of two Russian journalists during a mortar attack, but cellphone records confirm that she was already in Russian custody before the journalists were killed. Nonetheless, Russian courts have continued to push the Kremlin's falsehood that she crossed the border voluntarily and have refused appeals for bail or house arrest.
This past Sunday, on International Women's Day, supporters in Toronto, across Canada, and around the world came together to fast in solidarity with Nadiya's 83-day hunger strike and to call for her immediate release.
Canada and the House should join their American and European allies and pass a resolution demanding Nadiya's immediate return to Ukraine.
[Member spoke in Ukrainian as follows:]
Slava Ukraini. Slava heroini.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-03-11 15:06 [p.11986]
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Mr. Speaker, those were nice words from the trade minister, but in January Canada posted a walloping $2.5 billion trade deficit, the second-highest in our history. Our dismal trade performance is especially worrying given the weakness of the dollar, usually a boon to exporters, and the economic rebound in the United States, our largest foreign market. The government is very good at throwing $100,000 parties to announce unfinished trade deals, but it is ignoring this worrying erosion of our exporting muscle.
When will the government finally table a budget with a plan to reverse this worrying decline?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-03-10 14:40 [p.11929]
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Mr. Speaker, the IMF has issued a warning about the inflated Canadian housing market, cautioning that home prices have jumped more than 60% over the past 15 years. Canadian families with a personal debt burden that the IMF warns is among the highest in the OECD are at risk of $100,000 losses they can ill afford. The IMF says that Canada needs better data, something the Conservative government is bizarrely opposed to, and more coordinated financial oversight.
When will the government quit electioneering and fearmongering and table a budget that addresses Canada's cooling economy and overheated housing market?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-03-10 16:00 [p.11941]
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Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for York West.
I am pleased to have the opportunity to join this important debate. Over the past 30 years, the Canadian economy has doubled in size. However, median household income has only increased by 15%. A report released last week by the CIBC shows that this trend has only gotten worse since the 2008-09 recession. I would like to quote a few passages from the report.
“The Bank of Canada continues to warn us that the headline unemployment rate is not as rosy as perceived and, in fact, according to the Bank's new and improved measure of labour market activity, labour slack is still significant,” says Benjamin Tal, deputy chief economist and author of CIBC's employment quality index.
He continues:
In many ways, the Bank has a point. Our measure of employment quality is now at a record low—suggesting that the composition of employment is sub-optimal. But a closer examination of the trajectories of our index's sub-components suggests that the Bank's prescribed remedy of low and lower interest rates might not cure what ails the labour market.
“While full-time paid-employment jobs are on average of higher quality than part-time and self-employment jobs, not all full-time paid-employment jobs were created equal,” says Mr. Tal. “The number of low-paying full-time jobs has risen faster than the number of mid-paying jobs, which in turn, has risen faster than the number of high-paying jobs.
“Over the year ending January 2015, the job creation gap between low and high-paying jobs has widened with the number of low-paying full-time paid positions rising twice as fast as the number of high-paying jobs. Those trajectories are largely behind the softening in our measure of employment quality over the past two decades.”
Faced with stagnating incomes, an increasing cost of living and mounting debt, middle-class Canadian families are struggling to make ends meet. Today, there are 159,000 fewer jobs for young people than before the recession. The Conservatives' action plan consists of income splitting and a $2 billion tax break that will mostly benefit the richest of Canadians while 85% of Canadian households will not see a cent.
The Liberal Party would invest those funds in areas that would really benefit the middle class, such as community infrastructure, post-secondary education and professional training, as well as research and innovation.
The Liberals feel that this country needs a new economic plan and, with each passing day, that feeling grows stronger. The economy of our largest trading partner, the United States, is on fire, but Canadian exports have dropped by almost 3%.
The Prime Minister wants to talk about anything but the economy. His priority is to give a $2 billion tax break to the richest members of our society, and he is more interested in fearmongering than in proposing economic solutions.
As we have heard from the CIBC, from a recent study by York University, from the IMF, whose concerns about the overheated Canadian housing market we cited earlier today in question period, there are some deep structural problems in the Canadian economy right now, particularly when it comes to the hollowing out of the middle class. We are becoming a low-wage, part-time economy for more and more Canadians.
The York University study I just mentioned has found that over the past 10 years there has been a 50% increase in the percentage of jobs in Ontario, which are part of this low-wage, part-time economy from 22% to 33% of jobs.
According to the OECD, in that organization of the world's leading economies, Canada has the third highest percentage of low-paying jobs as part of the composition of our employment.
The Bank of Canada is worried. In the monetary policy report for January, the bank said, “the proportion of involuntary part-time workers continues to be elevated”. As the CIBC has said, we are becoming a nation of part-timers.
As the Liberal Party has been arguing, what we need is an economic plan for the middle class to shore up Canada's hollowed-out middle class. We need a plan. A lot of what is going on is because of some of the new forces at work in the 21st century. A lot of what is happening is because of globalization, technological change, the rise of the sharing economy, or what some people are calling the “Uberization” of jobs, the “Taskrabbitization” of jobs.
However, the government can do something about it. The government is obligated to do something about that to adjust, to adapt our social and political institutions so that the Canadian middle class, rather than being the victim of globalization and the technology revolution, can actually thrive in these circumstances.
What we are seeing, I am very sad to say, from the government is the opposite. We are seeing that rather than trying to soften these forces, the government is leaning into them, particularly with its income splitting policy. Instead, what we would like to see from the government is an economic plan for growth, particularly growth of middle-class jobs.
Infrastructure is a big part of the solution. Those infrastructure jobs cannot be “Uberized” and they cannot be exported outside the country. Infrastructure investment has another great advantage. Big infrastructure programs help the economy to run hot. In those circumstances, the middle class has much more bargaining power, and we can see a reversal of these very terrible trends we have been discussing today.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-03-10 16:11 [p.11942]
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Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for her question. I also want to apologize because I will answer in English. I am not ready to answer in French, but I will try to do so eventually.
I strongly believe that we are facing a couple of related economic problems right now. One is this hollowing out of the middle class, which we have been discussing at great length today, and to which I do think there are government solutions. There are actions that the government can take to improve the situation. On the contrary, there are actions governments can take, like the income splitting policy of the current government, which will actually make the situation worse.
A related problem, I believe, is the problem that some economists are calling “secular stagnation”. The economies of the western industrialized countries are not rebounding from the financial crisis, from the recession, with the sort of strength that a lot of people expected. We seem to be stuck in this low-growth economic space. We see it particularly in Europe with some interest rates now negative, which is shocking.
Therefore, I strongly agree with the direction of the hon. member's question. I think now is a time when we need government action to focus on economic stimulus, and that is why I concluded by talking about infrastructure investment, which I think can have a powerful impact on both economic growth and middle-class jobs.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-03-10 16:13 [p.11942]
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Mr. Speaker, I think the member points to a real problem. The reality is that technology and advances in technology started off by allowing us to have just-in-time manufacturing where we did not need to keep great inventories of goods. We could get the goods to the factories just at the moment they needed them.
What has more recently been happening is that we have discovered that those same technologies have allowed employers to treat employees as a just-in-time input into the economic process. As my hon. colleague has pointed out, this has devastating effects on human lives. It means that people are unable to plan their family budgets. It means that people who have children, as I do, have a hard time organizing child care. Imagine if we knew we were going to work 40 hours a week but had no idea when those 40 hours would be.
I absolutely think it needs to be a priority for government policy to find ways to make sure that people have reliable incomes and reliable hours. I think this is something we can do in collaboration with employers.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-02-23 14:55 [p.11529]
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Mr. Speaker, Igor Sechin and Vladimir Yakunin are two close friends of Russian President Vladimir Putin. While both have been sanctioned by the United States, they are not on Canada's list. The media have described Canada's sanctions against Rosneft, Mr. Sechin's company, as “relaxed”. The government's hypocritical talking points about the number of people Canada has sanctioned ring hollow with our allies and with Canadians. This is about quality, not just quantity.
When will the government match its actions to its rhetoric and sanction Sechin and Yakunin?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-02-18 14:59 [p.11355]
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Mr. Speaker, in an email to the Conservatives about his plans to strip Muslim women of their right to wear the niqab at citizenship ceremonies, the immigration minister got the basic facts wrong. In a cynical political ploy, the government, he said, will appeal a court decision “allowing people to wear the hijab while taking the oath”. Surely the minister, of all people, ought to know the difference between a niqab and a hijab.
As the Conservatives seek to restrict the rights of Muslim women, can they not at least pay them the courtesy of getting the facts right?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-02-17 14:39 [p.11301]
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Mr. Speaker, a recent Conference Board study shows that Canada's younger generations are earning less and receiving fewer pension benefits than their parents. It states, “young Canadians may have a lower lifetime earning potential than any generation before”.
There is no more dire indictment of a country's economic performance than the prospect that our future may be poorer than our past.
Stale and misleading talking points, like the ones we have heard already today, will not deliver prosperity for this generation. When will the government finally table a budget with a real plan for jobs and growth?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-02-04 14:48 [p.10695]
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Mr. Speaker, that is simply not true. Everyone in business knows that we live in the age of big data. That is why Canada's leading economists and the CFIB are united in calling for the return of the long form census. As Roger Martin of the University of Toronto said, in direct contradiction of what we just heard, “It is just disinformation to say the current survey works”.
Will the government finally reverse its anti-science, anti-business, and antediluvian policy and return the long form census as my colleague's bill calls for?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-02-02 13:01 [p.10897]
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Mr. Speaker, thank you for giving me the opportunity to join this important debate.
Newfoundland and Labrador's support for CETA hinged to a significant degree on the Government of Canada's promise to help the industry adjust to the recent removal of minimum processing requirements. That promise should have been kept. CETA will eliminate trade barriers and boost free trade between Canada and the European Union. It will also create opportunities for the middle class.
The Liberal Party of Canada supports free trade because it will open markets to Canadian goods and services, grow export-oriented businesses, create jobs and provide choice and lower prices to Canadian consumers.
Unfortunately, the Conservatives negotiated this agreement without holding a proper public debate. As a result, the government did not adequately address concerns about sectors that could suffer because of CETA, particularly the sector that employs fish plant workers in Newfoundland and Labrador. The removal of minimum processing requirements is definitely a huge concern for the people of Newfoundland and Labrador. The province's support hinged to a significant degree on the federal government's promise to help the industry adjust to this new reality. That promise should be kept.
I would also like to quote my colleague, the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville, who talked about this matter last week:
However esoteric federal-provincial relationships might appear to many Canadians, all Canadians want their leaders, especially their Prime Minister, to be trustworthy.
This is very important. I would like to thank my colleagues, especially the francophone members, for listening to my bad French, and I hope it was understandable.
Now I will continue in English. I thank my francophone colleagues for tolerating my efforts. It is important for us to try, as practice will make perfect.
As my colleague has already suggested in her line of questioning, what is at stake here are some very fundamental issues that go right to the heart of the terrible way the government is conducting itself. I would like to focus on two in particular, and they are the fact that so often, and not just when it comes to trade but it comes to economic policy in general and foreign policy, the government talks big but does not deliver. The government's rhetoric is not matched by execution. One way to put it is that it is obverse of the usual advice, that one should speak softly and carry a big stick. Today's Government of Canada speaks loudly and carries a small stick, particularly when it comes to executing it.
This CETA deal is a perfect example of that. I have lost count of the number of official announcements we have had of this deal being concluded. I have lost count of the amount of taxpayer money that has been spent to celebrate the conclusion of this deal and yet the deal, manifestly, is not there.
What is more, with each passing week, some new real obstacle, some new hurdle, which the government had to overcome and should have overcome before all of these glorious announcements, manifests itself. This conflict between the federal government and Newfoundland and Labrador is just the latest example.
The second thing I would like to emphasize is something I spoke about a bit earlier when citing my colleague. This dispute speaks so profoundly to way in which the government has failed at one of the essential tasks of statesmanship, and that is relationship building, relationship building with the provinces, one of the central jobs of Ottawa, and relationship building with our partners in the world.
I have a somewhat homey metaphor. I am a mother and I have three kids. Nowadays in classrooms kids do not sit in desks by themselves; the desks are put together in a group. Modern pedagogy understands that the way to accomplish big jobs in the world is through teamwork. Therefore, my 10-year-old daughter sits around a group of tables with other kids. She is already being taught that teamwork is essential. That lesson seems to be lost on the other side of the House.
It is not just in elementary school. During the winter break, I had the privilege of visiting the University of Windsor and seeing its magnificent new engineering department. In its beautiful modern new lecture halls, the students do not sit in seats one by one separated from one another; they sit grouped around tables. Again, teamwork is the key to success in the modern economy. This is an approach that the government is either unable to carry out, or simply does not understand how essential it is.
It is particularly important when it comes to trade. Trade, after all, is about partnerships and relationships. We see the breakdown here when it comes to the relationship between the federal government and Labrador and Newfoundland, but that is far from the only trade relationship that has been dangerously eroded. It is shocking to me to note that in fact our biggest trade and economic relationship, what should be the bedrock international relationship for any Canadian government, the relationship with the United States, has also fallen prey to this my way or the highway bullying approach of the government. We see the evidence of that failure at relationship building and statesmanship in issues like the fact that the Keystone pipeline has not been approved, that it has become a huge and contentious issue in U.S. politics and that there is a huge fight over the port at Prince Rupert.
This unnecessary fight between the federal government and Newfoundland and Labrador is really just a manifestation of a broader failure on many fronts and of these two very characteristic flaws of the government.
What is particularly troubling to me and my colleagues is that the support of Newfoundland and Labrador for CETA was earned in part by a promise from the Government of Canada to help the industry adjust to the abolition of minimum processing requirements. Is it not elementary that a government should honour its promises? Sadly, that is not what we are seeing.
I would like to quote some comments from representatives of Newfoundland and Labrador. In the St. John's newspaper, The Telegram, Minister Darin King said that if it could not get a deal with Ottawa with the Minister of International Trade, Newfoundland and Labrador planned to take this dispute over the head of the Canadian government to Brussels. Here is what he said to The Telegram:
Our plan would be to go into the EU — Brussels — and meet with member states and members of the union to outline our position and to seek support from them....We want a resolution. We want to put this to bed because we recognize that CETA is good for the country and good for our province, and we want to put this deal to bed and move forward and get on with things.
Imagine how Canada would look, how ridiculous our international position would appear, if we had warring Canadian factions travelling to Brussels to present contradictory positions.
That is not how a well-managed country is run. That is not the way we get a good deal from our counterparties. This is particularly dangerous. This dispute flaring up within our own family, in public, in the House, comes at a particularly dangerous moment. As I sure members know, at this moment, the CETA deal, which we strongly support and believe is really important to the Canadian economy, is facing new objections and pressures from some of the key European Union players. There have been voices raised against it in France and, particularly, in Germany. At a time when support is fraying, this is not a time for us to fail to get our ducks in a row at home and to fail to have unity, to break promises within the Canadian families. I am disappointed to say that this is what is happening.
Trade deals are an area where, like so much economic policy, timing matters and delaying costs people real money. This is not an issue where the government has the luxury of fighting interpersonal battles or ideological battles. To delay is to take money out of the pockets of hard-working Canadians. We have had a very clear and stark example of that reality very recently, and that is in our trade with South Korea.
The United States, the EU and even Australia got to a trade deal with Korea ahead of us. We are delighted that a deal has finally been done, but because of that delay during that period, Canadian exporters lost 30% of market share. Experts calculate that this was a loss of about $8 billion. That is a lot of money, which simply through delay, was effectively taken out of the pockets of hard-working Canadian business people. We really need to focus on timing. We need to get beyond the rhetoric and get this deal done, not have fighting at home.
I am getting increasingly concerned about CETA. Last week, I met with many business people whose businesses depend directly upon this deal getting done. They are worried that we have not completed the deal, despite multiple announcements.
There is a very real reason to be worried. If we cannot resolve our disputes at home and get the deal done, it will be in real jeopardy.
As members know, the United States is now negotiating its own trade deal with Europe. This is a huge political issue in Europe, indeed, an issue which raises concerns at a much higher, much more emotional level than the deal with Canada. It is essential for us to get our deal done, to get it signed, to get it out the door before the debate around the negotiations with the U.S. really becomes a central political focus in Europe.
It is also essential for us to get this done, to resolve our disputes at home, because the EU negotiators will not have time for us forever. They will not be able to focus on internal Canadian squabbles forever, on possible visits this month from officials from Newfoundland and Labrador to Brussels. Their focus will be shifting to the U.S. deal. It is absolutely incumbent upon the government to resolve this dispute and to get the deal done.
Why does the Liberal Party feel so strongly about the importance of trade, of getting deals done, of getting access to market for Canadian producers? Eighty per cent of our economy is dependent, directly or indirectly, upon trade. That is huge. Our dependence on having effective relationships and effective access to international markets is particularly great today. As 2015 has dawned, we have seen a global economy looking much less rosy than we were hearing from the other side of the House all last year.
We are entering a global economic environment of unexpectedly falling commodity prices, including low oil prices, which is a very serious issue for the Canadian economy, as everyone from the Bank of Canada to TD have said. There is another really big issue out there that is shadowing our economy. It is the issue of what Larry Summers, the former secretary of the U.S. Treasury, likes to call “secular stagnation”. This is the idea that the western industrialized economies might currently be stuck in a period of low growth.
I am very sad to say that because of the short-sighted ideological thinking of the government, because of its all-eggs-in-one-basket play in the oil sector, Canada is unprepared for these rocky international waters. At a time like this, more than ever we simply cannot afford to be fighting amongst ourselves, to have these embarrassing unprofessional fights between a provincial government and the federal one over a trade deal that we desperately need to conclude. We need to get it done. It is really not acceptable, in fact it is incredibly dangerous, for our country to be stalled in this space with Newfoundland and Labrador's really objecting and talking about a trust betrayed.
I would like to tell the House what some of the leaders from Newfoundland and Labrador, in their own words, had to say. Premier Paul Davis said, “We’re at a crossroads where the federal government has changed the rules.”
That, to me, goes to the heart of the issue here, that in the midst of this incredibly important, much bally-hooed, and incredibly complex deal that is central to our economy, the government dropped the ball on this key federal-provincial relationship and had the temerity to change the rules half way through. That is not statesmanship. That is not grown-up management of a country, of an economy, and of a trade negotiation.
Darin King, Newfoundland and Labrador's business minister, said, “The federal government’s failure to honour the terms of this fund is jeopardizing CETA for all industries, economic sectors, and indeed all Canadian and European Union citizens.”
He had it exactly right. We all want this deal done. The government had the privilege of negotiating the deal not just with the EU, but also with our Canadian provincial partners. It has simply dropped the ball. It is being accused by its partners of failing in what is a key duty of a federal government, to be trustworthy and to keep its word.
Finally, I want to quote the intergovernmental affairs minister, Keith Hutchings, who said:
We've got to be able to hold fast to those items that we negotiated. It's a much bigger issue. Once we go down that road of giving the authority to the federal government and saying, “Well, you can negotiate something, but once it gets to the final stages you can pull back and say no, that's fine.” As a government we can't approve of that.
What is really at stake here is probably the most fundamental issue of leadership and governance. That is integrity. It is trust. The real issue is the economy is at stake. A trade deal is at stake. Even more crucially, the government's ability to be trusted by Canadians is at stake. That is why I am delighted we have the opportunity to debate this in the House today. I hope the government will see the light.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-02-02 13:22 [p.10900]
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Mr. Speaker, the hon. member has an important point. I very much agree with him that this hits the fundamental issue of trust and transparency.
A lot of our discussion today feels as if it were some kind of cheap detective novel or divorce case, a he-said versus she-said issue, as we parse exactly what the email did and did not contain and what the intentions of the different parties were. That is not the way a healthy federation works. There should not be this sort of fight between a federal government and the provinces if the government has a good, healthy, trust-based relationships with them. This is essential for Canada to function.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-02-02 13:24 [p.10900]
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Mr. Speaker, with all due respect, the quote cited by the hon. member misses the point. There is no dispute between the federal government and Newfoundland and Labrador about the overall benefits of CETA. Indeed, there is no dispute between the party opposite and my own about the overall benefits of CETA. We believe that it is essential for Canada to have a trade deal with the European Union. Our only disappointment is that there seem to be a lot more announcements and big, expensive parties than actual done deals.
When it comes to the conduct of the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, my concern is that we are hearing from the elected representatives of that province in the clearest most direct and most aggrieved terms that they feel betrayed by the federal government. I think the people who need to come to the table today and fix this relationship are the members opposite and the federal government.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-02-02 13:27 [p.10900]
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Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his excellent question. As many in the House know, he has a long-standing and deep interest and expertise in all of Canada's waterways.
I raised the issue of Prince Rupert precisely because it is symptomatic of the high-handed, my-way-or-the-highway conduct of the current government, which we are again seeing manifested in this dispute with Newfoundland and Labrador. As my hon. colleague rightly points out, we have an excellent diplomatic service and an excellent ambassador in the United States. However, his hands are tied because the only message he is allowed to deliver is, “We're going to do it my way.” That kind of behaviour, those kinds of ideological blinders, and that kind of rhetoric is not working in our relationship with the United States and, I am sad to say, it is not working in Ottawa's relationship with the provinces. It is time for a change.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-02-02 13:29 [p.10901]
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Mr. Speaker, the history that my hon. colleague cites has provided ample proof of why Canada's provinces today do not feel they have a counterparty in Ottawa that wants to work with them, that wants to co-operate with them, and even whose written word can be trusted.
It is absurd and embarrassing that we in the House are reduced to parsing emails and letters between a province and the federal government to try to prove what exactly was meant. That shows a complete breakdown of the relationship.
That relationship is the core of what we are talking about today. It is a duty of the federal Government of Canada to have good, productive, effective relationships with the provinces, particularly when it comes to presenting a united Canadian front and negotiating trade deals. I am sorry to say that the government has failed in doing that.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-01-28 14:46 [p.10735]
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Mr. Speaker, Canada is united in support of democratic Ukraine, but Canada's actions must match our rhetoric. Sergey Chemezov is a close friend of Putin's from their days in the KGB and he is now the chief of a leading Russian defence company. He has been sanctioned by the U.S. and Europe, but he is not on Canada's list. Igor Sechin, another member of Putin's inner circle sanctioned by the U.S., is still welcome in Canada too.
Could the Minister of Foreign Affairs explain why these two close Putin comrades are banned by our allies, but not by Canada?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-01-27 16:12 [p.10707]
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Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for York West.
Thank you for giving me this opportunity to participate in this important debate, Mr. Speaker.
It is the fundamental responsibility of the federal government to instill a sense of confidence in the economy. This is why we need a budget now. This delay is causing uncertainty in the markets and in the minds of Canadians. The Prime Minister has put all his eggs in one basket and now, when economic growth is slowing down and oil prices are falling, it is obvious that he has no plan B. Last week, the Bank of Canada acted, but the Prime Minister is improvising as he goes along, cancelling meetings with our leading trading partners and allies and delaying the introduction of the budget.
By delaying the tabling of the budget, the Prime Minister has thrown up his hands and admitted he has no plan B. Canada’s economic prosperity is at stake, but the Prime Minister is asking middle-class families to make even more sacrifices so that the wealthiest members of our society can get billions of dollars in tax cuts.
Who is the Prime Minister working for these days? His main priority during this difficult period is to protect the gift of more than $2 billion that he gave to the Canadians who need it the least. The Conservatives should start by reversing course on the income-splitting plan, which will cost the government $2 billion a year, and is a tax cut for the middle class that will mainly benefit the wealthiest families in Canada.
During the 2011 election campaign, the Prime Minister promised that when the budget was balanced, his government would let families split their incomes for tax purposes, up to a maximum of $50,000. On October 30, 2014, the government announced a slightly modified plan offering families a theoretical tax credit for income splitting that could reach up to $2,000. This means that 85% of Canadian households will not benefit from income splitting, among them single-parent families, parents with similar incomes and families that have no children under 18. In most cases, the $2,000 maximum benefit will be paid to households where only one person is earning an income, where that income is higher than $100,000 a year.
This program will cost the government $2.4 billion over the 2014-15 fiscal year, and $2 billion a year over the following years.
We need leadership with an intelligent plan to expand our economy in all sectors and in all regions, for all Canadians. The Liberal Party’s priority is clear: we have to improve the security and prosperity of middle-class Canadians who have not seen a decent increase in their incomes for 30 years. Canadian families deserve to have a real and fair chance to succeed.
In its economic vision, this government has failed to take into account what has always made Canada a prosperous country: diversity, balance and partnership among regions and economic sectors.
Canada’s strength should not depend on one thing or one place. It comes from the diversity of its population and the diversity of its economy. Yes, we need the strength of western Canada, but we also need the strength of eastern Canada, the strength of northern Canada and the strength of central Canada.
I would like to thank my colleagues, and particularly the francophone members, for having to listen to my bad French, and I hope it was understandable.
I will continue in English. I thank members for their tolerance. As an anglophone MP representing an anglophone riding, I do apologize for murdering the language of Balzac, but it is important to try. Balzac, by the way, had a Ukrainian wife, so I feel especially close to him.
One of my favourite commentators on the economy is Warren Buffett. In his 2001 letter to shareholders, he had this great line, “Only when the tide goes out do you discover who's been swimming naked.”
In Canada, the tide has gone out. That is what has happened to the government. Now that we see that there is no tide, it is not that pretty. The economic tide that flattered Canada's relative economic performance consisted primarily of two things: high commodity prices, and the fact that Canada alone, of the G7 countries, avoided the financial crisis, thanks, it might be worth noting, to the very wise and prudent decisions, against the conventional wisdom, of the Liberal government to maintain tough banking regulation.
That tide has now gone out because, first of all, the high commodity prices that flattered our economic performance have collapsed, particularly of oil, and the financial crisis that devastated the other G7 countries and really flattered Canada's relative economic performance has now started to abate and is not hitting the other G7 countries so badly.
Particularly in relative terms, we are seeing the true reality of Canada's economic performance and the true reality of the government's economic stewardship. What we are seeing is a government that has failed to understand the central economic challenge of our generation, which is that of adjusting to the new realities of the 21st century economy, the realities of an economy in the age of a technology revolution and globalization.
What is happening in this 21st century economy is a relentless hollowing out of the middle class. We are seeing middle class wages, over the past 30 years, stagnate at the same time that wages and wealth at the very top are increasing.
The government, for years, has been in denial about this. In fact, when the leader of the Liberal Party first started talking about the hollowed-out middle-class, we were met with derision and denial. It is now becoming a truth universally acknowledged that this issue of income inequality and the hollowed out middle class is the central economic challenge, and we have to address it.
I am just going to read a final quote from the World Economic Forum in Davos, not generally seen as a hotbed of pinkos or Communists. This is what they have to say about income inequality:
Across rich and poor countries alike, this inequality is fuelling conflict, corroding democracies and damaging growth itself. Not long ago those who worried about inequality were accused of partaking in the politics of envy. In the past year this concern officially became mainstream as voices from the Pope to Christine Lagarde...cautioned of its impacts. The mounting consensus: left unchecked, economic inequality will set back the fight against poverty and threaten global stability.
Instead of pushing against these economic forces, the government, particularly with its imprudent and unfair income-splitting plan, is exacerbating them. That is why we support the opposition motion.
Let us have a budget. Come clean. The tide is out. We want to see what the government guys have.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-01-27 16:23 [p.10709]
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Mr. Speaker, the question of the gender impact of income splitting is an excellent one. One of our big concerns with income splitting should be the fairness issue, particularly at a time when we are discovering that the fiscal constraints are greater than we thought. To be giving a tax break to the Canadians who need it least is absolutely unconscionable. It not only makes bad economic sense, it is also just wrong.
The gender impact is significant too. Income splitting discourages married women from entering the workforce. As a working married mother, I think that is something that our economic policy should not be ideologically slanted toward. Countries like Sweden and provinces like Quebec have found that if we do the opposite, if we have economic policies that encourage maximum female labour force participation, there is a measurable improvement in GDP and in tax take.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-01-27 16:26 [p.10709]
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Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member opposite for his question but I disagree 100% with the premise.
All of the calculations show that income splitting would disproportionately benefit Canadians at the very top of the income distribution. This benefit would go to the 15% of Canadians who least need it. Therefore, as a matter of economic fairness, income splitting is a really bad idea.
As a matter of sound economic policy it is a really bad idea too, because what we are learning about economic policy is that if we do not focus on growing the middle class, we will have slowing economic growth. If the middle class does not have the income to purchase, we have an economy that is stalled. An economic policy like income splitting that benefits the top is a policy that also has an adverse impact on GDP.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-01-26 14:41 [p.10580]
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Mr. Speaker, last week the Bank of Canada said that low oil prices will “weigh significantly on the Canadian economy.” The bank acted on its grave concerns by lowering rates to an astonishing 0.75%, yet the Minister of Finance has the gall to pretend, as he has done today, that the Canadian economy is in “a good space”. His actions belie his own words. Why else would he delay the budget?
When will the Conservatives come clean with Canadians and present a plan to stimulate growth and create jobs rather than cling to their imprudent and expensive tax cuts for the Canadians who need them the least?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-12-08 14:40 [p.10298]
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Mr. Speaker, government delays in finalizing CETA are putting the agreement at risk. Last month, France's national assembly and senate both passed non-binding anti-CETA motions. This weekend, the leader of the NDP poured fuel on the fire, attacking this essential agreement at a socialist conference in Paris.
Could the minister tell the House exactly what the government is doing to get this deal done, and when this much ballyhooed agreement will finally be completed?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-11-27 14:39 [p.9903]
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Mr. Speaker, the European Union and Ukraine have signed an association agreement that takes effect January 1, 2016. In the meantime, Europe has already eliminated most tariffs for Ukraine, a form of help equal to $635 million in aid.
Canada and Ukraine are seeking a free trade agreement, but trade negotiations take a long time. Given the strong cross-party support for Ukraine in this House, will the government match the EU's unilateral zero-tariff regime for Ukrainian businesses until our deal is done?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-11-19 14:08 [p.9532]
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When I awoke
Before the dawn, amid their sleep I heard
My sons ...weep and ask
For bread.
Mr. Speaker, that is Dante's description of hell. That hell of starving children is what Stalin and his regime created in Ukraine in 1932 and 1933. This Holodomor was a deliberate genocide, designed to break the Ukrainian nation and to impose collectivization on a farming society renowned for its industriousness and powerful sense of community. One of the horrors of the Holodomor was that Moscow flatly denied its murderous campaign. Far too many people, for far too long, believed that lie.
Walter Duranty, The New York Times journalist who won a Pulitzer prize for his reporting from the Soviet Union, wrote:
Conditions are bad, but there is no famine.... But—to put it brutally—you can't make an omelet without breaking eggs.
Today, we are again hearing Orwellian doublespeak from a Kremlin that has invaded Ukraine. That makes its doubly important for the House to recognize the Holodomor as an act of genocide and to remember its victims. Vichna im pamiat.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-11-18 14:37 [p.9465]
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Mr. Speaker, many young Canadians have given up looking for full-time work in the face of stagnant wages and a dire job market. According to the Canadian Federation of Students, 300,000 young Canadians are actually working for free. When we add together discouraged young job seekers who are forced to work part time and unpaid interns, we get an unemployment and underemployment rate of almost 28%. That is shameful.
Why does the government have no plan for our lost generation of young Canadians?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-11-05 14:46 [p.9214]
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Mr. Speaker, according to the Bank of Canada, 200,000 young Canadians cannot get work. The situation is so dire, economists are joking that our central bank is following a grim new indicator: the kids living in their parents' basements index. In fact, it is so hard to get a job today that young people are being advised to work for free. This is our lost generation.
How can the government justify giving a tax break to wealthy boomers, while leaving Canada's young adults behind?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-11-04 14:43 [p.9177]
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Mr. Speaker, the Governor of the Bank of Canada warns that we are facing a low or zero-growth jobs recovery. He said that over 900,000 Canadians are trapped in part-time jobs and 200,000 young Canadians cannot get work at all. Governor Poloz is “pretty sure these kids have not taken early retirement”. He said that we need policies such as investment in infrastructure to boost growth.
Why is the government hamstringing its own capacity to act with an income splitting plan that offers no benefit to 86% of Canadians?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-11-03 14:42 [p.9088]
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Mr. Speaker, in an email last week referring to the Conservative plan for income splitting, the member for Durham said, “As a father of two amazing young children, I cannot tell you how excited I am.”
There are a lot of proud parents of amazing kids in Canada, but very few—
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-11-03 14:42 [p.9088]
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Mr. Speaker, I am using my big girl voice.
There are a lot of amazing kids in Canada, and their parents are proud of them, but very few of those parents are paid $180,000 a year, as the parliamentary secretary is.
How can he justify a policy which helps his family, but leaves behind 86% of Canadians?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-10-29 14:08 [p.8916]
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Mr. Speaker, October is Brain Tumour Awareness Month in Canada.
Brain tumours are an indiscriminate form of cancer, and increasingly one of the most deadly. In the last decade, the mortality rate for a child diagnosed with a brain tumour has surpassed all other forms of childhood cancer. There is no clear explanation why.
One reason we cannot answer this question is that there is no central system in Canada that tracks brain tumour statistics.
Seven years ago, in this House, a motion was passed that called for the creation of a national registry to count and classify every brain tumour in the country, but a registry has not been created. Shockingly, Canadian doctors and researchers must rely on statistics from the United States to estimate incidence rates in Canada. Without this data, provinces and territories are unable to properly judge who needs care, resulting in unequal access to drugs and treatment for patients. We can and must do better.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-10-29 14:43 [p.8922]
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Mr. Speaker, notwithstanding the minister's talking points, the Parliamentary Budget Officer's numbers do not lie. The story they tell is that the government's EI tax credit will cost taxpayers $550 million to create a paltry 800 jobs, at a ridiculous cost of $700,000 per position.
Economists warn that this flawed measure also creates a perverse incentive to reduce employment. Why will the government not scrap this wasteful plan and instead adopt the Liberal policy, which would create a substantial number of jobs for Canadians?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-10-28 12:02 [p.8859]
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Mr. Speaker, I thank the parliamentary secretary for his remarks. I particularly endorse his point that opening up Canadian trade to Asia and opening up Asia to the Canadian economy is absolutely essential.
As the House knows, the really big deal, which would cover 40% of the world's economy, is the TPP. I would be very interested in the member's views on how those talks are going. If, as some observers fear, it looks as though they are getting bogged down, does the hon. member believe that Canada should be pursuing its bilateral talks with Japan more energetically?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-10-27 16:16 [p.8820]
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Mr. Speaker, I would like to assure the hon. member from the official opposition that the Liberals support not only free trade but also child care, so we are with him there. I think that this is a week when it is terrific that we are talking about a bill that has almost all-party support.
The hon. member from the official opposition has spoken very eloquently about the importance of this deal in terms of opening up Asia to Canada. I would like to hear his assessment of how the really big deal opening up Asia, the TPP, is going.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-10-27 16:22 [p.8821]
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Mr. Speaker, I would like to begin by reiterating that the Liberal Party supports free trade, and we are pleased to support this deal.
This is just the third day the House has been sitting since the terrible events of last Wednesday. It is very appropriate and fitting that on this day we are debating a measure that has the support of the three main parties in the House and that in the discussion we have heard about the tremendously powerful impact Canada's diverse population brings to the country.
We have heard a lot of members speaking eloquently about Korean Canadians and how the connections they have with Korea have been so important in building this deal and in building connections with that country. This is a week when all members of the House should be talking in the most forceful possible terms about Canada's strength in our diversity and Canada's strength in our pluralism. I am pleased that this Korean free trade deal has given us an opportunity to do that.
Coming to the deal itself, I am going to speak about our position on free trade and why we believe that free trade is so important, particularly for Canada. I am going to talk about why we support this specific deal with Korea. I am also going to talk about our concerns and about what we feel has gone wrong and could have been done better. Then I am going to speak about what our trade agenda going forward should be.
I would like to start by talking about free trade and why it is so important for Canada and is such a centrepiece of the Liberal economic program.
We are living in a time when the middle class is hollowed out, when the middle-class is getting hammered. That is something the Liberals have recognized and have been talking about. There is a lot of resonance among Canadians when we raise those issues. One of the ironies of an age like our own, when the middle class is suffering, is that national support for free trade can weaken and we can have the rise of protectionist sentiment. I am therefore absolutely delighted to represent a party that is strongly in favour of free trade.
I am also really delighted to be standing in the House and talking about a free trade deal that has such cross-party support. To have national unity around free trade will be an essential strength of Canada going forward. If we can maintain that, it will provide a competitive advantage for the Canadian economy.
Why is trade so important? Why is it central to Canada's economic success in the 21st century?
Canada is geographically vast. It goes from coast to coast to coast. The reality is that by GDP, Canada has only the 11th largest economy in the world. We are just not big enough to exist, grow, and prosper without being maximally open to the world economy.
Exports to date account for 30% of our GDP, and one in five jobs are linked to exports. The only way the Canadian middle class can grow is for the Canadian economy to become ever more global, for more Canadian businesses to be more competitive and doing more business in the world economy.
That is particularly true when it comes to the emerging markets of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. These are places where the middle class is rising up out of poverty, where there is growing consumer demand, and where there are attractive demographics. As a country, Canada has to be poised to sell into those markets. If we fail to do that, our own middle class will be squeezed and will falter. For Canada, there can really be no economic policy more important than a strong, aggressive, forward-moving, forward-looking trade policy. I am sad to report that the reality is that when it comes to trade in the world economy, if we look past the government's rhetoric, Canada is falling behind.
I would like to draw the House's attention to an important and thorough report produced this year by the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, a business group to which we pay a lot of attention.
This is a group that has a network of over 450 chambers of commerce and boards of trade, and it represents 200,000 business of all sizes and sectors in the economy, in all regions of the country. These people are important. We need to listen to what they are saying about what is happening to the Canadian economy.
I am afraid that when it comes to trade, the Canadian Chamber of Commerce is very worried. The title of its report says it all. It is called “Turning it Around: How to Restore Canada's Trade Success”. Here is what the Chamber of Commerce has to say about how we are doing. It agrees with the Liberals. It says:
International trade is one of the fastest and most effective ways for Canadian businesses to grow.... However, the increase in exports and outward investment has been slow in recent years, and diversification to emerging economies has been limited.
As we have just been discussing, emerging economies are the essential places for us to be going.
Looking deeper into the report, the chamber did a very important calculation in talking about what is actually happening to Canadian trade. I would like to quote it. It said:
Despite more firms looking abroad, Canada is lagging its peers according to several measures.
Yes. That is right. We are, as the report says, falling behind when it comes to our international trading position. The report goes on to say:
Over the past decade, the value of exports has increased at only a modest pace.
What is really interesting about this report is that the authors backed out increased commodity prices when they took a look at Canada's trading position. When we do that calculation, we see a picture of how we are doing on trade that is not at all pretty. Here is what the chamber said about backing out the price premiums we had been experiencing in energy, mineral, and agricultural commodities:
If these price increases are excluded, the volume of merchandise exports shipped in 2012 was actually five per cent lower than in 2000 despite a 57 per cent increase in trade worldwide.
What has actually been happening is that the world gets that trade is important. Globalization is not just a trendy word; it is the world's economic reality, and the reality is that Canada is falling behind. This trend is reflected in the trade numbers. In August, economists were predicting a $1.6-billion trade surplus. Instead, Canada recorded a $610-million trade deficit. These are worrying numbers, and there needs to be a lot more urgency on this file.
I would also point to an issue we heard addressed in question period today, which is falling commodity prices. Warren Buffett, the renowned investor, likes to say that when the tide goes out, we see who is swimming without their trunks on. I am worried that high commodity prices for the Canadian economy have been like a high tide that has obscured a lot of problems, nowhere more so than in trade. As those commodity prices fall, we need to be really worried about what they are going to show is happening in trade.
Turning now to Korea, we agree with our colleagues from the government and the official opposition that this is an important deal, and we share their urgency about getting this finalized by or before January 1. It is important to Canadian businesses, it is important to Canadian exporters, it is important to the people who work in those industries, and it is therefore very important to the Liberal Party.
Korea is Canada's seventh-largest trade partner. In 2013, we did $10.8 billion of trade between us.
Korea is an attractive partner to us, because it is a democracy. This is a country that is a real technology leader, including, as we have heard, in green energy. It is a country that is very culturally innovative. I think we can learn a lot of lessons from Korea about being a global cultural leader, even if we are not one of the big powers. It is an economy that is very attractive to Canada's agri-food industry, to our aerospace industry, and to our spirits industry, so we are very much in favour of this deal.
Having said that, I would be remiss in my responsibilities if I did not point out some of the problems we have with it. The biggest concern we have with this Korea free trade deal is that it is late.
The United States economy, with which we are most closely connected, ratified its trade agreement with Korea in 2011, and the agreement went into effect in 2012. Korea's trade deal with the EU has been provisionally in force since July 2011.
This delay is not just about some kind of theoretical competition over whose date is first. The delay in getting the Korea deal done has had direct and meaningful impacts on Canadian exporters. The global economy is extremely competitive. Businesses know it. Canadian businesses are suffering, and they have been let down, when it comes to Korea trade, by the government. We have lost 30% market share in Korea, more than $1 billion, because we have been slower to come to a deal.
We heard the parliamentary secretary to the minister waxing lyrical about the Korean affection for Canadian lobster, and Koreans should indeed be enthusiastic about eating Canadian lobster. I know that everyone in the House is. However, the government should be apologizing to Canada's lobster industry for putting it at a disadvantage.
I want to read a quote, from The Globe and Mail, from Stewart Lamont, managing director of Nova Scotia's Tangier Lobster Co. Ltd. He said, “The Americans are two and a half years ahead of us, but better late than never.”
That is really the story of this agreement. We are supporting the deal. We are glad it is happening, but this is a story not of triumph but of better late than never.
I would like to point out that our negotiations with Korea began in 2005. The Americans started talking to the Koreans in 2006 and to the EU in 2007. Despite starting negotiations sooner, we have concluded the deal later, and that is something that has had a measurable impact on the bottom line of Canadian exporters.
We need to get this deal done by January 1, but everyone in the House should be aware that the slowness of getting a deal done means that Canadian companies have to run extra fast. They have to claw back that lost export position in the Korean market, and that is going to be very hard work for them.
What we hear when it comes to the reasons for Canada falling behind and this deal having been done behind the U.S. and behind the EU, despite the fact that negotiations began sooner, is that it had a lot to do with the top-down, hyper-controlled approach to issues we see from the government when it comes to the domestic agenda. The Korean deal is more evidence that this approach, which is rejected by so many Canadians now at home, also slows down our relationship with our international partners.
There is support from us. There is support from the official opposition for this deal. I am very pleased that there is that support. It is urgent that we lose no more time getting this deal finalized by or before January 1.
We would be derelict in our duty if we were not aware that this deal has come late. It is better late than never, but it would have been much better had it not been late to begin with.
This deal is particularly significant, because it is our first deal in Asia. It is really important, going forward, that we not allow the mistake of falling behind to happen in our future deals. I am going to talk in a moment about those other deals and the approach Canada needs to take.
However, before doing that, I would like to also urge the government to release a study the department did on the economic impact of the Canada-Korea free trade deal. This study has been requested by many stakeholders, and their access to information requests for this study were very keen, particularly given the fact that the deal is due, we hope, to be finally confirmed by the end of the year.
We call on the government to release this study of its economic impact. Now is the time for us to have that information and to talk about it. It should be made public. Given that the agreement is being supported by both the Liberals and the official opposition, I can really see no reason why the government is not coming out publicly with that more detailed information.
When it comes to the trade agenda going forward, the really big issue on the agenda and what we really need to focus on is TPP. This is an agreement which will touch on 40% of the world economy. In current economic conditions, when a lot of economists are concerned that we are suffering from secular stagnation, that the whole world economy has moved into a new low-growth paradigm, TPP could not be more essential. This could be one of the few levers that we have to get the global economy going. It is essential for Canada and it is essential for the world.
These comprehensive TPP talks started in 2008. Canada, I am sad to say, did not join until 2012. I am afraid we see the pattern with Korea being repeated here. We are slow to come to the table. We really have to focus. We are seeing something wonderful, a tremendous competitive advantage in our country, which is real support across the political spectrum for the Korea deal, for trade with Asia, for trade with the world. It is absolutely incumbent on the government to use that strong political support for free trade, to be an active and energetic partner in the TPP talks to get them going.
Negotiations actually are going on right now. They happened over the weekend in Australia on TPP. I urge the government to be a more active participant in those talks. I am sad to say that when we speak to our trading partners, our international partners, they say that something which we have seen in Canada's relationship in multilateral institutions around the world is, I am afraid, being repeated in TPP.
Canada used to have a reputation as one of the world's most effective multilateralists, as a country that was good at working in a group, at working with others, at getting deals done, at leading deals. However, when it comes to TPP, I am afraid that the reports we are hearing is that Canada is missing in action, Canada is not playing a leadership role and in fact that Canada is frustrating our trading partners.
That really cannot continue. This is an essential deal and we need Canada to be a leading voice. We cannot have a repeat of what we have seen with Korea, which is a policy that is widely supported across the House by so many people, yet actual delivery for the Canadian economy, for Canadian business has been delayed at a cost.
Again, I want to return to this number because it is not just about rhetoric. It has been at a cost of more than $1 billion. Let us think of how valuable those billion dollars could be if they were in the Canadian economy right now.
TPP is the big one. Even as we support the Korea deal and opening up of the Asian markets in this way, I want us to focus on that. I want us to be absolutely energetic, be leaders in those negotiations.
More general, it is absolutely essential that Canada be energetic, that Canada be in the lead when it comes to opening up those emerging markets about which the chamber of commerce spoke. I would like to pay particular attention to Africa.
Finally, yesterday was parliamentary elections in the Ukraine. The results look very promising for Ukrainian democracy and for Ukraine's move toward a pro-reform, pro-European attitude. We heard recently Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko address the House and call for a free trade deal. Let us not be behind on that. Europe has already opened up its markets to Ukrainian goods. Let us do that, too.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-10-27 16:42 [p.8823]
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Mr. Speaker, on a day when we should be supporting and cheering the cross-party support for this free trade agreement, that was the kind of rather mean-spirited question I would expect more to hear from the government side of the House.
I will say what I would have said had the question been from the government side of the House, which is that it is neither the responsibility of the government nor of the official opposition to decide how the Liberal Party deploys the resources of its members. For now, we are a small party, but we will not be for long. There are a lot of duties for all of us to cover. It has been our collective decision to have one of my very talented colleagues serve on the committee. We work very closely together.
If the hon. member from the official opposition would like to speak about positions that are difficult to understand, perhaps he would like to let this House know why the NDP, which has been so opposed to free trade deals historically, has decided to turn tail when it comes to Korea. That is the right decision, but I wish it had come sooner.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-10-27 16:45 [p.8824]
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Mr. Speaker, my colleague has indeed focused on what is our chief criticism of this deal, which is that it has come late at a great cost to Canadian businesses, Canadian exporters and Canadian jobs. As to what the reasons are, I can only speculate, but I would suggest two reasons.
One is something that we see all too often with the government, which is a mismatch between rhetoric and action. There is a lot of rhetoric on trade, but we have not actually seen that when it comes to this Korean deal and we certainly are not seeing it when it comes to TPP.
The second reason, which is something that we have been learning when we talk to stakeholders and particularly when we talk to our other partners in multilateral institutions, is that the top-down rigidly authoritarian approach to government, which we see first-hand domestically, carries through when it comes to how Canada behaves in its international dealings, and that slows things down.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-10-27 16:47 [p.8824]
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Mr. Speaker, the member opposite has been in the House longer than I, but I would like to point out to him that when it comes to parliamentary procedure, it is not our tradition to directly address other members.
I have heard this before and was I expecting to hear it again from the government benches. For the record, I really want to protest strenuously. A majority government has a lot of prerogatives in a Westminster system like our own, but it cannot decide what members of the Liberal Party do and which committees they serve on. It is absolutely unfair and slanderous quite frankly for the government to have suggested, as it has, that somehow I am derelict in my duty by not serving on trade committee. I want to say that for the record.
We are talking specifically about Korea. Canada is behind the U.S. and the EU, both of which began negotiating after we did, and this has cost Canadians more than $1 billion. We have lost 30% of our position. These facts speak for themselves.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-10-27 16:50 [p.8824]
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Mr. Speaker, the Liberal Party strongly believes in protecting the working people of Canada. That is why we are such strong supporters of free trade. In the 21st century, Canada's economy is only the 11th in the world when it comes to GDP and cannot survive or grow without free trade.
The hon. member's question gives me an opportunity to return to the non-partisan spirit with which I began my remarks and which is really important today. We have undergone a big trauma recently and it is a wonderful thing that we have cross-party support for free trade.
I hope the hon. member will agree with me that while all of us advocate for different policies, I am sure everyone in the House supports the working people of Canada.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-10-27 18:07 [p.8835]
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Mr. Speaker, the member opposite concluded his remarks by saying that he hopes we will be supporting the Korean free trade deal. As I hope he has heard from our previous remarks, we certainly will be. The Korean deal is important and I think is widely supported in this House, partly because it is an important opening for Canada into Asia.
I would love to hear the member's view on the TPP talks, which are the very essential next step, and whether he has a view on when we might expect those talks to be concluded.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-10-21 15:02 [p.8661]
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Mr. Speaker, today in Dnipropetrovsk, Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko urgently called for the OSCE mission that is monitoring the ceasefire in eastern Ukraine to be enlarged. Speaking on Friday, Italian foreign minister Federica Mogherini said that Italy, France, and Germany are willing to send drones and military personnel to operate them, but Canada was not on her list.
Why is Canada, with its special relationship with Ukraine, not participating in this essential expansion of the OSCE monitoring mission?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-10-06 14:57 [p.8280]
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Mr. Speaker, over the past week, half a dozen Ukrainian soldiers and a Red Cross worker have been killed in the Donbass, despite the alleged ceasefire there. Germany and France are talking with the OSCE about deploying armed forces to help monitor that ceasefire.
There is cross-party support for Ukraine in the House and Canada has particular influence there. Will Canada therefore be joining Germany and France in further supporting the OSCE peacekeeping and monitoring mission?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-10-03 11:51 [p.8223]
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Mr. Speaker, an IMF report this week confirms what Liberals have been saying for months, “in countries with infrastructure needs, the time is right for an infrastructure push”.
My constituents in Toronto Centre do not need the IMF to tell them that Canada has an urgent infrastructure deficit.
The good news is that IMF has confirmed that thanks to our low interest rates, infrastructure investments are an excellent way to deliver growth without “increasing the debt-to-GDP ratio”.
When will the government take this sound advice and invest more in infrastructure?
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