44th Parl. 1st Sess.
June 8, 2023 10:00AM
- Jun/8/23 8:58:38 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I know that about a year ago, several CN workers were on strike. They were signal and communications workers. These workers deal with a lot of safety issues and were concerned about their own safety and the safety of their comrades. The fatigue that a lot of train operators talk about was one of their key concerns, and they went on strike to fight for it. They had to fight for their own safety.
I know that the national supply chain task force report from last year had six recommendations about worker safety. The Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities had four recommendations on safety. None of those are in this bill.
I would like to hear the member's response and reaction to that.
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Madam Speaker, I am certainly pleased to speak to Bill C-33. As I speak here from northern Ontario, where we have one of the most beautiful sunsets, there is a very disturbing sunset, a surreal and unreal sunset, because we are watching our lands up here burn.
I mention that because I live right beside the railway tracks of the Ontario Northland Railway, at mileage 104 of the rail line. In the middle of the night and sometimes in the morning, the house shakes as the railcars go by. They are carrying sulfuric acid tanker cars from the smelter at Noranda.
The issue of rail safety is fundamental to the communities I represent. If one of those trains goes over, we are talking about an ecological disaster. We are talking about a disaster that could take the lives of many people.
The issue of rail safety is something that I have heard debated time and time again. I remember as a young MP, when I was first elected, Bill Blaikie standing in the House and warning the Liberal government at that time that if it allowed rail companies like CP and CN to self-police for safety, it would cost lives. We have lost over 60 workers in 20 years on the rail lines.
Forty-seven people were incinerated in Lac-Mégantic in one of the most horrific tragedies in memory. We would think that would make for a serious overhaul of the transportation system in the country. When I look at Bill C-33, I say, okay, we are ready to take it to committee to look at it to improve it, but it falls short in so many key areas. It falls short on addressing the concerns of municipalities, indigenous communities and workers, and it does not implement the recommendations made by the national supply chain task force report, nor the standing committee on transport's recommendations on rail safety. Serious concerns remain with respect to rail safety, yet the Liberals chose not to act on a single recommendation from the transport committee's 2021 report on rail safety. We need to do better.
On the issue of the port authorities, we saw how the myth of globalization blew apart like dust in the pandemic and Canadians were left with serious supply chain issues. We have to address how supply chains work, and our ports play a huge role in that. The capacity has challenges, and container traffic is expected to grow. What is the plan for that? There is a total lack of data. It restricts collaboration and is creating inefficient supply chain decision-making in infrastructure investment.
The issue we see in terms of who sits on these port authorities is huge. They have been pork-barrel dumping grounds for political hacks and friends for decades. We need labour representation on the port authority and the board of directors.
The Canada Marine Act provides representation for other stakeholders, including the prairie provinces and local governments, but we feel strongly that subclause 101(2) of Bill C-33 should be amended to include labour representation in a similar way to make sure that we have more accountability for the people who work on the ports. That also includes the need to start addressing the reports on greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets. We have to start dealing with the climate crisis before us.
I would like to speak, from a more personal sense, of the connection of the railway to who we are in the north.
My mother's family were Cape Bretoners or they came out of the Ottawa Valley. Back in the day, there were two choices: They worked in the mines or they worked on the railways. My grandfather, Joe MacNeil, went underground at the McIntyre mine and broke his back. Many of his brothers, uncles and cousins went to work on the rail lines. They said the Ontario rail line back in the day was more wild than bar rooms, and I think those bar cars certainly were, but this was how we travelled.
I grew up on those rail lines. My great uncles were conductors on the Ontario Northland on the night train. We saw how Brian Mulroney attacked public trains and cut the Northlander night train.
Then we saw Kathleen Wynne's government go after it and shut the Northlander down, and it left people without access to public transportation in the north, leaving them on our highways, which have really become death traps for travellers. Anybody who has travelled Highway 11 or Highway 17 in the winter knows knows about the seriously dangerous conditions that are not being addressed at the federal or provincial levels, and there has been a huge push to ensure that we have proper rail service restored to the north. It is something I have fought for, for years, and I want to see it restored.
We have had promises of the Northlander coming back, and these trains are vital links to communities. I would certainly invite my colleagues to travel on the Polar Bear Express, which leaves out of Cochrane. Once in Cochrane, it will take them to beautiful Moosonee and Moose Factory.
It is not just the links we have in terms of family; these are economic links. How do we tell European tourists who come to Canada and say they want to visit James Bay that they have to drive nine or 10 hours on a highway before they can catch a train? It just does not make sense.
Having grown up on a rail line and having had family working on the rail lines, I am very partial to rail, but I also understand that we need to put in place the basic safety standards that will make sure we can move forward in terms of overall safety and overall efficiency while getting traffic off the highways. Particularly in a time of climate crisis, the rail lines can do that, but we need to have properly maintained rail services. We can no longer allow company police and corporate risk management to address safety or accidents. That has been a failure, and it is a continuing failure.
In terms of the port authority issues, we really need to look at different approaches for the small and large ports, and we are going to push for that as New Democrats. Small ports and large ports are fundamentally different bodies. Having three separate advisory committees in small ports is an excessive administrative burden, but in smaller port authorities we could establish a single community advisory committee. It would have to have representation from the first nations and from local communities, as well as from labour, to make sure that the small port authorities were empowered to do the work they are supposed to do.
We need to have, as well, clarification regarding labour disputes. Section 107.1(1) would give the minister the authority to take extraordinary measures related to ports when there is deemed to be a “risk” to “national economic security”, but this has been used by government and by the companies to hammer down on their obligation to do fair negotiations. Our workers on the rail lines deserve to be able to negotiate. They deserve to be able to have fair wages, and we need to make sure that labour disputes are handled in a proper manner and that the government is not just using a threat to national economic security to cut down the ability of rail workers to have proper representation when it comes to wages, safety and other rights they have.
I am more than willing to take questions. I will be here all week, as usual, and it is always an honour to speak.
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- Jun/8/23 9:25:57 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, there is a primary purpose to the legislation, which has taken a while to come forward and get to this stage only because of all the consultations that were required, since several acts would be changed through this bill.
The member highlights the importance of the issue of safety, and that is a driving force in terms of the reason we have the legislation, along with the issue of economic development. The member also made reference to a family background, and I think if we take a look at our rail lines, we would see that there are a lot of families that have grown up within that industry.
I guess I would ask the member to what degree he feels the legislation is good to go, at least into the committee stage. Does the member have any specific thoughts in regard to amendments at this point?
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- Jun/8/23 9:29:50 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I want to thank my hon. colleague from Timmins—James Bay for making a number of excellent points about this legislation. From my point of view, coming from another part of the country, one important part of this legislation that needs clarification is what it needs in terms of protecting the Salish Sea from the use of our area as free parking for freighters that are backed up out of the port of Vancouver.
I am also very concerned about rail safety, very concerned about the appalling record of the privatized large freight-moving trains in this country and the callous disregard for worker safety.
I would like to ask the hon. member to expand on that point.
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- Jun/8/23 10:10:57 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, when situations occurred, just like the member has mentioned, at the airports and when tragedies occurred, like Lac-Mégantic, I know that many of the Conservative Quebec members had called upon the government to increase safety and take on other measures. There were many calls from the opposition benches to do more, when it came to making sure that our airports, which are independently operated at this point, worked efficiently.
I want to know from the member why his intention is to oppose this legislation, which would allow for more safety measures and would allow us to address some of the concerns the Conservatives propose.
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Mr. Speaker, I guess the member was not listening.
None of the concerns she just raised would actually be addressed by Bill C-33. No one, other than my colleague from Mégantic—L'Érable, has actually spoken more about safety. I was on the transportation committee when we introduced the rail safety report that was referred to in debate. This piece of legislation was actually the first report as I joined the committee, and it had started in the previous Parliament. None of those recommendations have been acted upon in this legislation. The supply chain task force started in January 2022. It had a report on October 6, 2022, eight months ago, with 13 immediate recommendations, the first of which was to deal with port congestion. None of those have happened. It is a big failure of the government.
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Mr. Speaker, I heard the member talk about red tape, and part of my fear when the Conservatives talk about less government and less red tape are the impacts that would have on occupational health and safety, the safety of the actual rails themselves.
We will recall that in 2015, it was the Conservative government that passed Bill C-52, which also amended the Railway Safety Act. Clause 17 of that bill repealed the definition of “fatigue science” concerning railway safety management systems. Between 1993 and 2014, the Transportation Safety Board attributed 22 railway incidents to fatigue as a factor or a source of risk. That is an average of one incident per year. Between 2015 and 2017, seven incidents occurred. That is an average of 2.33 incidents a year. Since the removal of fatigue science in the Railway Safety Act, we have more than doubled Canada's incidents of fatigue-related accidents in the railway industry.
Would my friend from Flamborough—Glanbrook, who I know to be a reasonable man, correct the mistake of the transport committee's recommendations to address worker fatigue and ensure that railway employee safety is part of Canada's Railway Safety Act?
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- Jun/8/23 10:31:43 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I understand there are lots of other issues with this bill and wanting to change some things within committee is key.
One of the things I am concerned about is the safety of workers not being accounted for within this piece of legislation. About a year ago, I was talking to folks from IBEW, workers on CN, who put their very jobs on the line because they were so concerned with the safety of their work on the rail line.
The national supply chain task force talked about rail safety for workers, the exhaustion levels they face and the fatigue. They made recommendations that are not in this bill. The transportation committee made several recommendations that are not in this bill.
Could the member talk about the workers' safety and the importance of that? I would really love to hear his thoughts on that.
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- Jun/8/23 10:32:45 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am in full agreement. Worker safety is number one. Safety is always number one for any company, and I applaud any company that has a good safety record.
This bill does not do enough. As I said, it needs a major rethink. It needs to go back to the drawing board. That is one of the issues that needs to be addressed.
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Mr. Speaker, first of all, I want to say in reference to the individuals who lost their lives that my heart certainly goes out to their families. I cannot imagine what the families have been through.
What we are talking about here today is this piece of legislation and there are a lot of misses by this legislation. We are talking about Bill C-33. Certainly, in my intervention I mentioned a few times that this legislation should have been about safety and economic stability. Instead, this legislation is about corporate governance and control by the government to insert itself at the board table of port authorities. That is really one of the biggest focuses of this piece of legislation.
There is a real miss here with where this legislation could have gone and that is really unfortunate.
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Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her speech.
The Conservative members from Quebec, specifically the member for Mégantic—L'Érable, are calling for additional rail safety measures.
Does my colleague not see that Bill C-33 includes a safety and security framework that would make it possible for the people of Mégantic to have their bypass?
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- Jun/8/23 11:17:41 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, there are some good pieces in this legislation. Some in there deal with safety, but there is a lot more that could have been done. That is where the real miss is with this piece of legislation. There are some parts that do help in some way.
There have been years and years of consultation, as well as eight years of the Liberal government. To come with this piece of legislation that really has so many gaps is really a miss and it is really unfortunate.
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- Jun/8/23 11:31:36 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, a lot of people are often surprised to hear that, in my downtown riding of Spadina—Fort York, we also have a port. We had a scare recently because the port authority also includes, within its domain, Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport, and there was a bomb scare. One of the challenges right now, with the different jurisdictions, is being able to put together an emergency management plan. I heard this yesterday when I was in the riding, at a meeting with the Bathurst Quay neighbourhood.
I am curious to hear my colleague's thoughts on how, perhaps, the government could do better in working with other orders of government to ensure and protect the safety of every community that is home to a port, railroad and so on.
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