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House Hansard - 268

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
December 14, 2023 10:00AM
Context: House Hansard - 268 - Dec/14/23
Mr. Irek Kusmierczyk
  • Dec/14/23 1:50:34 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, as I was saying, to understand the significance of the battery plant investment and to understand the importance of the partnership with labour and the importance of the bargaining table, we have to understand the road that my community has travelled these last 10 years. It was a hard road. Eight years ago, when the Conservatives were in power, Windsor had an unemployment rate of 11.2%. Unemployment for young people was in the high twenties. Families were leaving Windsor for Alberta to find work in the oil sands. Under the Conservatives, Canada lost 300,000 manufacturing jobs. Of course, our community was ground zero for that devastation. I remember those days. I remember the shuttered storefronts, the empty downtown, the “for sale” signs everywhere and the not-for-profits and charitable organizations struggling because they could not find volunteers because the donations had dried up. The Leader of the Opposition also remembers because he was the employment minister at the time, or as I like to call him, the minister of unemployment. The battery plant that our Liberal government delivered, together with unions, workers and industry, is the single most important investment in the history of our community, with 2,500 full-time jobs for workers, 2,500 Canadian, local, unionized workers. It is our future. It is our hope. It is powered by strong unions. It is powered by strong workers. It is powered by—
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