44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 11, 2023 10:00AM
- May/11/23 1:34:26 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I wish to inform you that I will be sharing my time, if there is any left, with the member for Winnipeg North.
As the member for Gaspésie—Les Îles-de-la-Madeleine, immigration is so important to me and to the survival of my region that it was out of the question for me to participate in today's debate without discussing the realities of rural regions, and in particular the realities of the Gaspé and the Magdalen Islands.
The newcomers and temporary foreign workers in my riding have helped my region get through various crises. Without the temporary foreign worker program, the fish processing plants in my region would have closed their doors many years ago, as there would be no one to work there. For many years, immigrants and temporary foreign workers have enabled our communities to survive and thrive. Our newcomers learn French. When they arrive in our region, every spring, people are happy to see them.
With respect to renewable energy, in my riding, in the Gaspé, there is the largest wind turbine manufacturing plant in North America. Securing the development of this plant required welcoming a Filipino community. Expansion announcements were made and the plant practically doubled its production. More than 200 new Filipino workers were brought in, because the region does not have enough people for this kind of development. This goes to show how much businesses need immigrants. We need people who have received training, but we also need workers.
During my election campaigns, I went door-knocking. My colleagues from the Bloc may not realize what people in the regions are going through. They need to talk to entrepreneurs in the tourism or hospitality sector, among others. Every entrepreneur we met wanted to grow their business in the region, and they were prepared to invest in expanding their operations.
Some entrepreneurs cried as they were talking to me, because they were unable to develop their business, even though they had the ambition to do it. What was the hold-up? It was the labour shortage. During the election campaigns, they kept telling me that they could not go on for much longer, that they needed people to grow their business and take their place.
I know this scares the Bloc Québécois, but you cannot build on fear. In reality, we are all immigrants. Jacques Cartier arrived in the Gaspé and it was there that he met the indigenous communities.
When I was young, there were six elementary schools in my small village that served 700 children. Only one school remains, and it does not even have 70 students now. Will we ask 70 children to provide for an ageing population? The regions need immigrants.
When I was young, there were seven schools and now there is one. I do not see any reason why we could not build schools if we brought in immigrants.
The people who will come will work and ensure that our communities are vibrant. We will be able to populate and use our land. We talk about old-stock Quebeckers and I am one of them. Newcomers have never prevented us from continuing to speak French. I have never been afraid of that. I have not lost my culture. That is what the Bloc Québécois is trying to make us believe.
When we are proud of our culture, we promote it, we talk about it and we welcome newcomers and immigrants. We share our culture with them because we are strong enough to preserve that culture.
I will cede the remainder of my time to my collegue from Winnipeg North.
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- May/11/23 1:40:52 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for her passionate remarks on Quebec's regions.
The Bloc Québécois will take no lessons from her on our regions. Nearly all of us in the Bloc come from rural regions. I myself am extremely concerned about the labour shortage in the regions, particularly in Charlevoix, which is a tourist area. I am also our party's critic for fisheries and oceans, where there are also labour issues.
Can my colleague, who is the Minister of National Revenue, explain how, with a really large influx of immigrants to the regions, we are supposed to provide housing for all these newcomers? What hospital can care for them? Where will they go for child care and where will their children go to school ?
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- May/11/23 1:45:04 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I heard the response to the first question and I assure the member that she is still quite young.
More importantly, as I listened to her speech today, I really appreciated when she said that unless we are of indigenous descent we are all immigrants to this country.
This is a young country. It is only 175 years old. We have all come from different parts of the world. My parents did the same thing. I wonder if she would talk to the importance of continuing that to grow our population.
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- May/11/23 1:56:43 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, what I was trying to clearly demonstrate is the fact that the Conservative leader has absolutely no idea, in terms of immigration policy or the types of things that would really make a difference, and we see that. I really wish I had the time and wish we were allowed to ask the Conservative leader questions based on the speech he delivered. Not only was he wrong on so many fronts when he tried to say that our system is broken, when in fact we inherited a broken system, but he also used the opportunity of the Bloc's motion to talk about the immigration policy of the Conservative Party. There is no Conservative policy on immigration.
I think he understands, to a certain degree, some of those hot issues, but he has no idea how to deal with them. If we want to talk about immigrant credentials, we have to work with the provinces and different stakeholders. By telling people who are here today, or would-be immigrants, that they just have to write an exam and they will get the so-called blue seal, trying to make a comparison to the Red Seal, the Conservative leader is doing a huge disservice. He is trying to give the impression that the Conservatives would do a better job on immigration, when their record is the absolute opposite. That is the reality of the situation.
That is why I found it very difficult to be in my seat while the leader of the Conservative Party tried to explain a Conservative policy on immigration. The Conservative leader needs to go back to the drawing board. He really and truly needs to look at ways to contribute to the debate on immigration, because he failed on all accounts coming into this particular debate.
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- May/11/23 2:41:26 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his intervention.
When I think about immigration, I think about the labour shortage. What we need to make clear to all Quebeckers watching today is that Quebec has the authority to select immigrants.
What we are hearing across Quebec and in the regions is that there is a need for workers. When we make investments, for example in the GM plant that will be built in Bécancour, the mayors and officials of the RCMs tell us that they need skilled people.
That is how we will build Quebec and Canada.
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- May/11/23 4:29:02 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I take a look at the province of Manitoba, where our numbers of immigrants, on average, are probably about 3,000 a year. We more than tripled that number, and the way in which housing, at least, in part, is being dealt with, we need to recognize that it is not just Ottawa.
Ottawa needs to step up and show leadership, and we have done that through the national housing strategy, which has hundreds of millions, going into billions, of dollars supporting municipalities and the provincial governments. The provincial governments, municipalities and the other stakeholders, all of us, have to step up to the plate to work together to deal with this. All of us want to see an increase in immigration numbers because we see the benefits of a progressive immigration policy. It adds so much value to our economy and to our Canadian heritage.
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- May/11/23 4:30:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is important to recognize the importance of the contributions that immigrants make to our communities. In Manitoba, if it were not for immigration, our population would have declined. If it were not for immigration, many of the industries we have would not be there.
If someone takes a walk through any of our hospitals or care facilities, they will find people of Punjabi heritage, Filipino heritage and others, who make up the bulk of the workforce today. Whether it is in health care, the trucking industry or the trades, we will see it is often the immigration community fuelling the labour supply and ultimately contributing to our economy.
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- May/11/23 4:41:42 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we have witnessed a very ugly rise of xenophobia in Europe, which is the targeting of immigrants as though they were a threat to national identities. I heard my colleague talk about how Canada was going to be “swamped” with people coming in. I believe that was the term he used.
I think Canada has proven that we are different because, unlike Europe and the extremist fights happening there, we understand the importance of the different identities in this country. The fact that Quebec has the power to decide its own immigration policy is a reasonable thing. However, I would also say that in northern Ontario, we are more than willing to welcome the 450 million francophones out there who want to come and participate to build a just society. We are not going to say that they are outsiders, that they are a threat or that they are swamping our nation. Instead, we are going to say that our nation is built on the good will of people who come here with a desire to build a better country.
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- May/11/23 5:35:52 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I have a question that ties into meeting targets.
I have to say that I too am the daughter of immigrants. Like my colleague, I am very proud to be one. I know that immigration is an essential part of our country and that it contributes to building a better Canada.
They say they want to welcome more francophones in particular. In Canada, and more specifically in western Canada, we desperately need consular services to support these families.
Does my colleague agree that we need to ensure that these services are offered on the ground? Does the government need to invest in these services?
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- May/11/23 5:47:55 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am pleased that my hon. colleague from Saint-Jean said that we should take immigrants' interests into account. We should not resort to a utilitarian argument to speak on behalf of these people.
I am a Quebecker. If we want to ensure the vitality of the French language in Quebec and if we really want to put ourselves in the immigrants' shoes, we could ask the hundreds of thousands of francophone immigrants from West Africa and the Caribbean who would like to come to Quebec if they are ready to accept the conditions in Quebec and—
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- May/11/23 5:49:02 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, there are two things.
One of the problems with mass immigration is that when we try to look for top-notch people, we drain their countries of origin of the brains they need as much as we do.
The other thing is that we are talking about francophone immigration. That is great. We can welcome francophone immigrants. As I mentioned in my speech, however, the resources are not available. We are seeing that in Ontario right now, where there is a teacher shortage in French schools. If a francophone family moves here, but there are no staff at the French schools, what will happen? They will send their children to an English school, cancelling out the impact of francophone immigration.
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- May/11/23 6:02:59 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, as a Quebecker, I would like to thank my colleague. We definitely do not have the same point of view.
In my community, which is not that far from his, there are many francophones and many new immigrants from western Africa and Haiti. The percentage of these immigrants has increased significantly. Why are these people settling in Quebec? It is because they have the right to continue speaking French, living in French, going to school in French and seeing their family grow in French. These people play such a significant role in building the vibrant province and country I call home, and I believe that is a good thing.
I would like to hear my colleague's comments on that, because for me it is obvious.
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