44th Parl. 1st Sess.
June 19, 2023 11:00AM
- Jun/19/23 11:31:54 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is an honour, as always, to speak on behalf of the people of Timmins—James Bay.
I have lost count of the number of times I have risen in this House to defend the principle of the supply management system we have for farming, because in debate after debate, we hear positive messages but we see it undermined continually in trade agreements. Supply management only works if the fundamental pillars are in place and intact.
There is a reason I think it is such an important system to preserve. We are not talking about subsidies. Our farmers do not need subsidies. They control a market that supplies milk to Canadians, and it is a system that works. In my region of Timmins—James Bay, particularly in the Témiscamingue and neighbouring Abitibi-Témiscamingue farming regions, dairy farmers are the backbone of our rural economy. We have lost pork producers to the boom and bust cycles of the pork market. Our cattle farmers always have to struggle. They have good years, but there are years when they are really impacted by what is being given out as payment for cattle being brought to the large slaughterhouses. The ability of dairy farmers to maintain their marketing control has been stable through the good times and bad times.
We have many cash crops in our region. When I was first elected, we had many smaller farms. In the northern Témiscamingue region, there are still family farms in smaller units, but it is getting harder and harder for them to maintain cash crops and compete with the larger corporate farms coming in. To maintain the finances of cash crop farms is more difficult.
Let us look at dairy farms. In our region, young families are able to farm. We have many young dairy farmers building barns and investing. These are major investments in the region, with new dairy farms up in Matheson, in the Timmins region. There is the Earlton and Englehart region, where dairy continues, in good times and in bad, to maintain the balance of the economy in rural northern Ontario.
This is a system that works. It is a system that does not hit the taxpayer up for subsidies. It is an efficient system. If we look at our neighbours in Wisconsin, the dairy farmers there really do not like the supply management system, yet we see massive problems with dumping because of overproduction. We do not have overproduction in Canada's dairy market, so this is an efficient use of farming.
It is really important that we maintain the defence of the dairy sector, because we always hear, as I just heard from my Conservative colleagues, about the false promises of globalization: that if we strip away any ability of a country to maintain regional and local economic vitality, we are somehow betraying the larger principle of globalization. Well, I would say to my Conservative colleagues to look around, because globalization has failed us, and every other country involved in it right now is making sure that their backyards and regions are protected. We are not asking for anything that is unfair in terms of protection. We are asking to maintain a system that works, a system that allows young family farms to maintain, grow and invest. It is a big principle for the New Democrats. We have always been supporters of the supply management system.
I will point out that what we have seen over the years with the corporatization of agriculture is that many local value-added operations have been threatened. Some of that is starting to change. Certainly in the Timmins region, which of course is more known for gold and copper mining than agriculture, we are seeing some really fascinating smaller specialty farms bringing food to markets in urban areas. The potential for young farmers to do that is exciting and something we did not think was possible 15 years ago. We thought we would have to get bigger and bigger, yet we see that niche farming is making inroads. I would encourage the government to support these niche markets through investments. We even see them in urban areas. People want to know where their food is coming from.
As global supply chains are becoming more challenged, we need the ability to have community gardens and community food. Having backyard chickens in Toronto is a great idea. We need to make our cities livable places that have animals and the ability to grow, not just monocrops, grass and concrete.
Going back to the role of dairy in our region, for many years we had the Thornloe Cheese plant, a very small local producer. It was owned by Parmalat, one of the biggest milk companies in the world. Parmalat had no interest in our region. It had no interest in the future of Thornloe. Then one day someone called me and said they were going to shut down Thornloe Cheese. What they wanted, what was valuable to Parmalat, was not the jobs in the region or the product. It was the quota. Parmalat wanted to take the quota away from our region and consolidate it into a much larger Parmalat plant elsewhere.
We met with dairy farmers in our region and asked if they were willing to give up the quota and give up the potential to maintain production. The dairy farmers, certainly in Timiskaming, who have shown a willingness to stand up many times to defend their interests, said they were not going to go along with it. We went back to Parmalat and said the deal was that it could leave but the quota would stay. Parmalat laughed at us, but we were intent and the quota stayed.
I encourage anyone who drives up Highway 11 to stop in at Thornloe Cheese. They will see the best selection of cheese anywhere, because what they did with the quota was diversify. People can go into restaurants in Toronto and get Thornloe Cheese. To build quota and get more access to quota in cheese, one has to do speciality cheeses, so Thornloe has specialized in all manner of cheeses. We have a great brand now of grass-fed butter, which is very popular with people who like to cook and people in urban areas.
It is essential that we maintain value-added production in Canada to supply markets that are emerging so that we are not relying on large container ships bringing cheap product from elsewhere and are empowering communities, empowering farming and empowering rural regions to be part of a sustained, long-term vision for the 21st-century economy. That is why supply management is so crucial. It is one of the foundational pillars of a sustainable rural economy. It does not have the booms and busts that we have seen in other sectors, and it gives opportunities to young farming families.
I do not know how many times I have spoken on supply management, but I will continue to speak for supply management. I will continue to speak for the farmers in our region, because they are fundamental to the fabric of our region and to our country.
The New Democrats will support this bill. We will support and continue to fight for supply management, and we will argue its importance with the ideologues who believe that globalization and free trade should be allowed to erase our local farms and replace them with whatever is coming in from wherever else. We can compete. We can hold our own. We are not asking for any handouts. We are asking to maintain the rural, regional and national right to make sure that our farming is sustainable.
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- Jun/19/23 12:46:15 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I certainly would never lecture the Speaker on how to do the excellent job he is doing, but I do believe all these references to the supply and confidence agreement have nothing to do with whatever it is she has been talking about. She is dragging this out needlessly. I would never tell the Speaker to ask her to get to the point, but I—
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Mr. Speaker, having spent my life in opposition, I do know that the one tool the opposition has is time. We have the time to speed things up and the time to slow things down. However, at the end of the day, time is about serving the Canadian people.
I see Bill C-42, which has the beneficial ownership registry. It is legislation to deal with Russian oligarchs. We could be debating that. Instead, we have been having to witness Conservatives with their long litany of whining, perceived slights and imagined microaggressions. It is always about them and their feelings. I get a feeling that European soccer teams might hire them over the summer to give them lessons on how to do the theatrics of lying on the grass and holding a knee.
Meanwhile, we have legislation to get done. We are staying until midnight, night after night. Instead of the Conservatives standing up for their constituents and talking about legislation that needs to get passed, they are talking about themselves, how bad they feel and how their feelings have been hurt.
I would ask the hon. member to give us a basic sense of the level of importance of getting this legislation through.
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- Jun/19/23 1:17:27 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I want to follow up on my concern earlier that instead of debate, we are seeing one long whinefest from the Conservatives about how their feelings have been hurt.
I will follow up on what the previous Conservative said, which I thought was very interesting. He did not want authoritarianism to come to Canada, yet the member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan invited to our Parliament one of the legislators who voted to bring the death penalty to LGBTQ people. Think about that for a moment. The Conservative Party is supporting those in authoritarian jurisdictions who would put to death people because of their sexual orientation. We learned about that at the same time that the Conservatives are putting out anti-gay hate mailings in an election. This is their election strategy.
I would like to ask my hon. colleague this. How important is it that Canada send a message to the world that, despite the efforts of the Conservative backbench, we will not go down the road of Uganda or any of the other authoritarian countries, like Russia, that are attacking LGBTQ rights, and that everybody's right to be who they are will be protected? That is actually the fundamental principle of freedom. We as New Democrats will fight for that any day of the week, regardless of what the Conservative backbench will do with their authoritarian friends.
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- Jun/19/23 1:22:07 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, I will concede that I got the pronoun wrong, and certainly the Conservatives noted that, but we will also note that the Conservative member did invite that person and that this person did vote for the death penalty. Anyone who plays with that kind of politics should be ashamed of themselves, and the rest of the record stands.
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- Jun/19/23 2:54:47 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, Attawapiskat is in a humanitarian crisis that has become worse year by year under the Liberal government. With overcrowded homes and unsafe drinking water, no matter what Attiwapiskat does to try to get ahead, it cannot, because it does not even have a proper land base to build houses.
The government calls the land of the Mushkegowuk Cree Crown land. It is treaty land, and the people of Attiwapiskat have a right to develop the land for their people.
What steps will the indigenous affairs minister take to work with Attiwapiskat on building a livable community that offers hope to the young?
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