text: Mr. Speaker, on one hand, hearing people criticizing the Bloc Québécois always makes me laugh, but democracy has spoken also in Quebec.
  On the other hand, in the riding of Oshawa, GM manufactures pick-up trucks called Sierra and Silverado. Given that income tax and GST cuts, I want to know what answer this wonderful government will give to the 1,000 workers who will lose their jobs by Christmas in the member's riding. What excuse will they be able to give them?
  Mr. Speaker, again, I do not take advice from that Bloc member for anything with regard to my constituents.
  I feel bad and the government feels bad when there is a reorganization of manufacturing. In Oshawa, while there is a 1,200 worker layoff at the truck plant, I remind her that there is actually a 14.1% increase in truck sales in Canada.
  The difficulty we have is the Canadian government can do what it needs to for the Canadian economy. We cannot worry about other economies. Much of the problems in manufacturing right now are due to the problems in the American economy. The U.S. economy is struggling right now while ours remains strong.
  As I said, we have record unemployment rates. We are paying down debt. We have just lowered taxation to the lowest that will be in the G-7. The purpose of that is, and what the Bloc does not understand because the Bloc only wants to raise taxes, Canada is a global player and we are trying to compete with global companies to attract business to our country. By continuing to raise taxes, as members of the Bloc Québécois would like to do to pay for some of their radical programs, it will push manufacturers away. The reason we have the lowest unemployment rate now is because the government is doing the right things for Quebeckers and the right things for all Canadians.
  Mr. Speaker, the member for Oshawa did not talk about the feebate program. Right now, as his constituents are being laid off, their tax dollars are being paid into a feebate program that is sending money to South Korea, Japan and other parts of the world. His constituents are subsidizing auto jobs, which are taking jobs away from Canadians, and he has done nothing to stop it.
  The member has also not addressed the fact that we still do not have a TPC program for the automotive industry. Quebec and Ontario have one for the aerospace industry, but nothing for the automotive industry.
  My last point is really interesting when we hear the rhetoric that has come out of the member's speech. He mentioned that 21 out of 22 recommendations from the industry committee have been taken care of. I sat on that committee. He said the number one recommendation had been fulfilled, but it was not. It is fraud to suggest that it has happened. The recommendation was quite specific. It was for a five year capital cost reduction allowance plus a review for another five years. That is very important when it comes to the third, fourth and fifth year of investment.
  How can that member get up in this chamber in front of his constituents and say that was delivered when it was not?
  Mr. Speaker, it is obvious the member for Windsor West is very angry, and I can understand why he is angry.
  He was on the industry committee. That committee provided a report containing 22 unanimous recommendations. Guess what. The member's leader made him vote against them in the last budget. I would be upset too if I had no credibility with my constituents.
  Let me talk about the capital cost allowance. We addressed that. As the Minister of Finance has stated quite clearly, there is room in the future to address these things even further.
  The member is not addressing the fact that we have just spent $33 billion on our infrastructure program, which includes $400 million for the Windsor-Detroit border right in his own constituency. What did that NDP member do? He voted against that. He voted against $500 million for labour retraining that would help the people laid off in his constituency. He voted against the creation of an older workers' program. He voted against our science and technology strategy. I have been to Windsor to see the record investments that we have made in research and development. The member voted against that too.
  There is no credibility coming from the NDP members. They are like the Bloc. They can strategize about anything, but we are the government that is actually taking action on these things.
  --specifically including a program to support businesses that wish to update their production facilities, a series of investments and tax measures to support research and development...a review of the trade laws to better protect our companies against unfair competition--
  My question to the parliamentary secretary is this. Is this not exactly what we are doing? Why is the Bloc Québécois trying to bring this forward? Those members should be celebrating and thanking the government for moving on these items instead of saying that we are not doing anything when we are actually doing something. Could the parliamentary secretary comment on that item?
  What he said in his comment is exactly true. We are already addressing the things in the Bloc's motion. This is the tragedy for Quebec right now. The Bloc Québécois does not do its homework. Those members have no ability to deliver anything for Quebec. Even when they have the opportunity to criticize, they are criticizing things that we have already done. This just further shows the irrelevance of the people of Quebec to the Bloc Québécois.
  The member for Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques. We only have one minute for the question and answer.
  Mr. Speaker, I will be very brief, because I only have one comment to make. It will not be necessary to respond, but I want to make my comment.
  First, all the people here in this House were elected legitimately. There are no first-class or second-class members of Parliament.
  Second, a government member should have the intellectual rigour not to twist the facts by telling us about the absolutely extraordinary employment rate in Canada, when some people in the regions have problems and, because of this crisis, are in an extremely precarious situation. Consequently, let us at least respect the fact that these people are suffering.
  Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and perhaps I could reply with a comment. All members here are duly elected. When people vote in a member, they expect the member to do his or her homework and to best represent his or her constituents.
  As I said, and as the hon. member for Burlington pointed out, we are already taking action on the things that the Bloc has mentioned.
  It is my duty to rise today to address the situation in the manufacturing and forestry sectors. In my country, Quebec, these sectors are going through a serious crisis. In my area and in my riding of Gatineau, in the Outaouais region, we can feel their pain.
  At the Domtar plant located in Gatineau, in the Outaouais region, there are only 70 active workers remaining to provide electric, steam and sewer services to the neighbouring Kruger plant. At the end of October, 180 out of the 250 Domtar employees were laid off. They were producing coated paper for magazines.
  The union and the revitalization committee are continuing to work relentlessly to get this federal government to help the plant keep its machinery operational, so that an eventual buyer can take over and restart production, and thus, give back jobs to the papermakers who were cut loose last month. They are asking that the federal government help that plant as it did the Davie shipbuilding plant in Lauzon, near Quebec City, in the early 2000s, by keeping the machinery up to standard. That was successful over there, and the Davie Shipyard was revitalized. We wish the same for Domtar in Gatineau.
  Incidentally, the Minister of Industry will meet later today with union representatives from that plant, namely Gene Hartley and Gérard Carrière, as well as myself. We will try to enlist the support of the current government in our efforts, as the workers from Davie, in Lauzon, did. I cannot imagine the Domtar plant in Gatineau shutting down completely. The 400 employees of the Kruger plant, also in Gatineau, which depends on the three services Domtar continues to provide, might also fall victim to the current crisis in the paper industry.
  I think of the Bowater plant, located in my riding. This paper plant employed 1,450 workers in 1991. Today, there are only 425. Last March, 171 papermakers were laid off. As Gaston Carrière, union leader and president of Local 142 of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada, pointed out, in February 2007, the multinational announced to the employees operating machine No. 3 that the machine would be temporarily idled for 30 days. One week before production was to resume, Bowater announced that machine No. 3 would be idled indefinitely.
  At a press conference in June 2007, Mr. Carrière said he saw employees with 25 to 30 years of service in tears. In this case, the Conservative government's program for older workers did not pay a single cent to those individuals. It is a trumped-up program whose criteria are so strict that one would have to live on Saturn to access it.
  That is the current state of the manufacturing and forestry crisis. It is extremely difficult for the workers who have been affected, as well as their family and community. The Bloc Québécois would like to play an active role in boosting these industrial sectors. This is why I support the motion put forth by my colleague, the Bloc Québécois' industry critic, the hon. member for Trois-Rivières:
  Like the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology, the Bloc Québécois believes that by taking no action, the Conservative Party is part of the problem, not part of the solution.
  Here are some solutions the Bloc Québécois has come up with: support the workers hit by the crisis; create an income support program for older workers, to enable workers aged 55 to 64 who cannot be retrained and who are victims of massive layoffs to bridge the gap between employment insurance and their pension fund; make substantial improvements in the employment insurance program by increasing the accessibility period by five weeks for all regions, regardless of the unemployment rate; raise the benefit rate from 55% to 60% and base the benefit calculation on the best 12 weeks; eliminate the waiting period and reduce the minimum number of insurable hours required to qualify for benefits to 360; create financial tools to encourage companies to invest and modernize, such as a program of loans and loan guarantees to help companies modernize. These loans, which would be made available to companies at the market rate for financially healthy companies, would be especially useful to companies in financial difficulty that cannot easily borrow on private markets or have to pay a risk premium, which adds to their interest charges.
  Introducing this program would mean lower interest rates for companies that are investing. While the higher dollar should let companies renew their production equipment at a low cost, they simply do not have the ready cash to invest.
  As well, companies need better tax support for research, development and innovation. The government needs to expand the types of eligible expenses by including the costs of obtaining patents or the costs of training employees who are working on innovative projects.
  The Research and Development Tax Credit must be made refundable so that businesses will benefit from it even though they are at the development stage and do not make any profit.
  A program must be established to provide support for the production of energy and ethanol fuels using forest waste. Besides contributing to the reduction of greenhouse gases, such a program would allow forest-dependent businesses to have additional revenue coming from the sale of energy and to spend less for petroleum fuel.
  Fixed greenhouse gas reduction targets must quickly be set in order for a carbon credit exchange market to be established. I would like to point out that aluminum smelters and forest-dependent businesses have made important efforts to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions.
  Let us also think about modernizing the trade legislation to better protect businesses against unfair competition. The Canadian antidumping legislation goes back to the Cold War era and is completely outdated in the present context, particularly as we face the competition from China. It is urgent to get the Canadian trade legislation up to par with other industrialized countries, especially the United States and the European Union countries. The member for Terrebonne—Blainville has in fact introduced Bill C-411 for the benefit of all Quebecers and Canadians.