The Hon. the Speaker pro tempore: Honourable senators, I wish to draw your attention to the presence in the gallery of participants in the Parliamentary Officers’ Study Program.

On behalf of all honourable senators, I welcome you to the Senate of Canada.

Senator Woo: If I could just elaborate on your point with a half question, I hope that same committee will be able to clarify that there is no form of child pornography that is acceptable. I see you are nodding in agreement with that. Thank you.

Senator McCallum: Thank you. After I left the residential school, I always attributed my accomplishments to residential schools because that’s how we were taught. At one point in my life, I realized that it wasn’t the residential school that provided this — it was my community, my family and the elders in my community.

I was at home until the age of five, and the parenting that I experienced was very positive: I was never hit. I was taught the values of sharing, tradition, hospitality, respect for people, as well as for the land, and the intersectionality of the web of life. I learned all of that before the age of five. I had my language, the tatsu language. I knew that I belonged to myself.

[Editor’s Note: Senator McCallum spoke in an Indigenous language.]

I owned my body. I owned my thoughts. There was much laughter and joy and skipping and running through the forest.

Imagine when I entered the residential school in that big steel building that it was so rigid. I didn’t speak English. I remember being strapped. The first time I was strapped, I didn’t understand what I had done wrong because I didn’t know the rules. I didn’t understand English. I was strapped in front of all the students; I had to take down my pants. When you experience violence more and more, you start to shut down. The self-determination I had learned was taken away because they wanted blind obedience.

You learned to shut down your emotions and your critical thinking because that was not encouraged. Creativity and curiosity were both a no-no. You learned to develop a new sense in terms of gauging the environment you were in. Your aim was not to grow but to prevent corporal punishment, so your senses started to dictate that. You started to notice the tone of voice and anger.

There was no grounding because the rules would change depending on the mood of the supervisor. One of them would take the girls’ heads and bang them together — in front of all of us. She would do this to the older girls. This behaviour was modelled, and it silenced me in many ways.

In the classroom, I was hit with a yardstick because I didn’t know the answer to a question. I was hit on my hands and head during piano lessons just because I hit the wrong note. You learned that you’re imperfect and bad. The physical abuse made me compliant and informed the relationships that I was to have. The older boys were forced to get switches for the boys and hit them, with the supervisors looking on.

We brought that violence into our communities. The churches, of course, were very active in the community.

When you look at the high rates of violence, whether it’s intimate partner violence or corporal punishment inflicted on children, it brings home the violence and anger, which stays with you for a lifetime. I am 70 today, and I’m still dealing with the trauma.

This issue was something that I had to deal with. I’m glad I did, and I’m glad I shared it with you. It is only when people know what the system has done to us that we can start to make changes, and start to understand the changes that need to be made; we can begin to understand why we have over‑incarceration in the corrections system, much of which is due to violence.

I visited the Stony Mountain Institution in Manitoba and spoke to the people there. When I spoke to advocates, they stated that children in care today are still experiencing corporal punishment; it’s ongoing.

That is why I said that work needs to be done — other than simply repealing this act. What is it that you hope will come out of it? Is it a national study so that all Canadians are involved?

Part of the way in which I will engage in reconciliation with my family — I never hit my children, by the way — never. I knew how much it hurt, and I was not going to do that. We are going to start Cree classes with my family and my grandchildren, and make certain that my grandchildren will not experience what we had to endure. This is looking at the next seven generations. My ancestors did this for me seven generations ago. All of us are living ancestors. We do what is right for the next few generations.

Thank you for listening. I thank you from my heart.

Senator Yussuff: Honourable senators, I rise today to speak to Bill S-244, dealing with the creation of the employment insurance council. I want to first, of course, thank Senator Bellemare, who is not here today, for the work she has done on this bill and for her efforts to promote social dialogue in the Employment Insurance system, or EI, to make it more fair, effective and accountable to its stakeholders.

Guy Ryder, the former director-general of the International Labour Organization, or ILO, and a good friend of mine, has said that social dialogue was, is and will remain the key to forge the future of work.

The world of work as we know it is undergoing transformative change for a whole host of reasons. From crises like COVID to climate change to changes in our economy and the labour markets through technological advances such as AI, the world of work is rapidly changing. This creates challenges for workers, employers and policy-makers like governments.

If we are to overcome these challenges, either in our labour markets in general or specifically with programs such as EI, we will need governments, employers and employees to better and more effectively organize in our collective actions. Strong social dialogue, of course, will be essential to this goal.

Only solutions that are widely shared and underpinned by successful social dialogue will be truly effective and equitable for all. That is because social dialogue builds not only trust but ownership and accountability by the stakeholders involved.

Colleagues, there are many academic studies, research reports and evidence that support the positive economic effects and effective efforts of social dialogue processes, such as what this bill, of course, proposes for workers, businesses and governments. Today, I will focus my comments not on the research but, instead, on my experiences of what effective social dialogue and tripartism mean to working people and how creating a formal employment insurance council could play a positive role in ensuring an EI system that is more accountable, responsible and sustainable for all stakeholders.

Senators, how can we have an effective solution to complex problems we face if we do not talk to one another? How do we trust each other if there is no formal process to help build relationships? You cannot be effective without relationships, and you cannot have effective relationships without trust. That is the heart of this bill.

Effective social dialogue is not just a theory. It is a real tool that can produce real and practical results. I would like to take a few minutes to talk about some real-world experience of the power of social dialogue to produce real and practical solutions that benefit workers, employers and, equally, government.

One example, of course, is the Canada Labour Code Part II. Late in 1999, there was a very broad consultation with employers, government and workers about reforming the Canada Labour Code Part II because of the changes that had been occurring, of course, in the real world of work. It did take an exhaustive amount of time, but the outcome was unanimous consent by workers, employers and government that these changes would bring positive results for workers and the country, but equally they were supported by employers.

As a result of the hard collaborative work that was done under the labour department, the subsequent result was that legislation was passed unanimously both by the House and by the Senate. Of course, those impacts are still having transformative change to workers’ lives today in this country at the national level.

Most recently, of course, employers, workers, unions and governments embarked on dealing with the issue of harassment and violence in the workplace. As a result of this work, C190 was the convention initiated at the ILO. This was led by the Canadian government. It was co-chaired by the workers’ representative, my former colleague Marie Clarke Walker, and by employers on the employers’ side. There was an exhaustive amount of work that took place at the ILO. The convention was finally passed by the ILO, and earlier this year Canada finally adopted the convention. What this brings into clear perspective for all of us is that when you collaborate and work together, you can achieve great things.

Now, this is a very small convention, but I know it will have a lasting impact on the men and women whose lives have been disrupted by harassment and violence in the workplace. Now there is an international standard as a result of that.

I will use one country as an example. In Germany, all changes that occur when it comes to the economy are done in a tripartite manner. Workers and employers sit down. They deliberate. They argue. They, of course, work with government to achieve the common objective. Very few people would argue the German economy is not performing to its full extent. What is achieved? Collaboration — they do not always agree, but for the most part, they recognize they have to work together if they are going to succeed in a competitive world. No matter how well they can do things, if they do not have collaboration and cooperation, they can’t continue to be an effective economy in the world.

I would also note that in our own country, in the 1980s — not so long ago — Canada wanted to enhance business and labour partnerships for human resources development in specific industry sectors. To achieve this goal, they created an innovative tripartite approach to industrial relations — sector councils. Over 30 sector councils were created in the following decades to foster joint dialogue and action on training, worker participation, job creation and other sector concerns.

Sector councils were eliminated in 2013 by the previous government, and I think it was a tremendous loss to our country because those opportunities for workers, employers and government to come together were no longer there. We talk at each other, but we do not talk to each other to build a collaboration.

In conclusion, colleagues, there is no question that creating an institutional social dialogue structure like the bill proposes will have a positive effect for workers, employers and government. Simply put, more opportunity for dialogue is better than less. Trust cannot be built between stakeholders when you do not talk to one another. Ownership in the system does not happen if stakeholders feel as though their opinions and solutions are not being heard. Colleagues, the success of my past career representing workers was dependent upon having meaningful social dialogue, either formal or informal, to represent their interests in finding practical and real solutions that make sense for all parties.

The Employment Insurance — EI — system is an employer and worker system that must have the trust of these two groups to be effective. The simple fact is that the workers pay half the premium and the employer pays the other half. That trust can only be created if they feel their views are being heard, and for that to happen, we need an institutional process like what this bill proposes to ensure it does.

I believe Bill S-244 will strengthen and not weaken the Employment Insurance system because it will help better our understanding of the problem and produce more innovative and practical solutions in our EI system from social partnerships that fund it and who are most impacted by it. It will also create stronger accountability and more equitable and fairer outcomes for workers and employers — a goal I think we all share.

That is why I urge colleagues to support this bill, and hopefully we can get it to committee and make it a reality for workers and employers in this country.

Thank you so much.

Senator Plett: He’s got another assistant.

Senator Batters: It is in the budget implementation act, but what about the actual budgeting? That’s what I am wondering about. Is it in the budget that we had more recently, or will it be in an upcoming budget?

The last question that I have on this is as follows: I have previously heard much talk about the 11 million Canadians, or something like that, who will be eligible for this, but what is the actual income threshold that will be applicable to this measure?

Senator Gold: Thank you for the question. I will have to look into that. As you correctly point out, the incentives are not in this bill. This bill is about two things: It is about getting money into the hands of 11 million low-income and moderate-income Canadians as quickly as possible in order to help them with rising costs, and, of course, getting money to the provinces and territories dedicated to health care. Whether these measures and others will appear in other bills, if they are to appear, I will have to make inquiries and get back to you on it.

Senator Gold: Once again, thank you for sharing what has been made public, but you’ll understand that some things are not yet public and I’m not in a position to share them. This shows that the government is serious not only about the principle, but also about making it work on the ground.

I’m confident that once the full details of the bill are released, Canadians will see a more robust system than what’s in place now.

[English]

Senator Plett: We won’t need time allocation. We’ll move it ahead.

Senator Tannas: I would.

Senator Ataullahjan: Senator Gold, I have asked three former Liberal immigration ministers and the current minister, Minister Fraser, when the visa office would be shifted back to Islamabad. Pakistan, at one time, was not considered a safe country. However, most of our allies have their embassies open. It has become a family station again. Canada continues to have an office in Abu Dhabi, which adds to the wait times.

I have brought up the issue to the current immigration minister, Minister Fraser. The response I always get is, “We are aware of the issue. It has been brought to our attention.”

If the Liberal government is aware of the issue, why is it not acting on it? Why is it not attempting to fix the problem?

Senator Batters: Thank you. So it sounds like it’s $4.5 billion. If there is something else, can you please let us know? Also, I’m wondering if that cost was already included in the budget that the Trudeau government just presented, or if this cost is yet to be included in a budget.

Senator Tannas: Those are very good questions. There is not a similar bill like this in the Senate, as you mentioned. There isn’t one in the House of Commons because they defeated it, so it has been tossed.

Again, the principles that brought me to my position were, first, what the success chance is. I think it is zero. I think we are wasting our time with the bill. There may be some merit in having young people come to a committee and talk about it. We could do that with a study. We could perhaps put out a document that the House of Commons could read and maybe reconsider.

But we also have the issue of this prior question. We could get it all the way over there, spend all the committee time, listen to all these folks, raise their hopes that this bill will be passed and just have it dismissed. That’s the likely outcome. The prior question is something that’s pretty clear.

Third, we have a limited amount of time where the committees can do their work. And we’re running out of time, I suggest, certainly in this session of Parliament. Maybe there will be prorogation. Maybe there will be an election. Who knows? But we are all getting a sense that we are running out of time in this Parliament.

I think we have to be mindful of what we spend our time on. It is for those reasons that I am making the recommendation.

Senator Tannas: Thank you for the question, Senator McCallum. I’m not arguing that there is anything other than common sense preventing us from pressing ahead. We could pass this bill through second reading. We could consider it at third. Let’s say we pass it; that does not get the bill passed.

So if it is an academic exercise to go through, if that’s what the idea is, I suggest we do a committee study rather than a bill that will be dead on arrival in the House of Commons.

Senator Lankin: I am channelling former Senator Fraser at this particular moment. With a report like this one, which is looking for budgetary funds, she would always ask how much you are looking for. I will ask you that, but I will also ask this question: As we continue to talk about carbon footprints, and as we talk about challenges in terms of fiscal expenditures and reining in spending, why is it necessary for your committee to travel? Why couldn’t a series of appropriately established meetings be done over Zoom or some such function?

Senator Lankin: I am channelling former Senator Fraser at this particular moment. With a report like this one, which is looking for budgetary funds, she would always ask how much you are looking for. I will ask you that, but I will also ask this question: As we continue to talk about carbon footprints, and as we talk about challenges in terms of fiscal expenditures and reining in spending, why is it necessary for your committee to travel? Why couldn’t a series of appropriately established meetings be done over Zoom or some such function?

Senator Klyne: Thank you for the question. It is a good and valid question and one that we asked ourselves. The primary reason for the in-person format is that with these committees, it is very sensitive material they are dealing with in terms of internal audits and so on and so forth. They don’t keep public records on these things. Therefore, we can’t review or watch what they are doing. We will probably have some very confidential discussions with them face to face, during which they will share some information with us in that regard. So it is important to do that face to face.

They have a lot of lessons learned. They’ve been operating for 10 years now, and they will fully admit that the first few years were very difficult years. We would like to garner those lessons learned and bring them back, and make sure that we don’t make the same mistakes.

The budget? No, unfortunately, I don’t have that number with me. It was in the report, and I gave the report away — $167,000. Thank you.

Senator Gold: Thank you for the question. Once again, it is an important question. Unfortunately, I don’t have enough information to give you a proper answer.

Senator Gold: Thank you for the question. Once again, it is an important question. Unfortunately, I don’t have enough information to give you a proper answer.

I believe the government has demonstrated in many ways that it is quite convinced of the importance and need to eliminate discrimination in all areas.

I will inquire with the government and get back to you with an answer.

Senator Plett: No, you are not. You are way beyond that.

Senator Yussuff: I had the privilege in my past life of working with the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, mostly around urban issues that were very important to Aboriginal people who live in urban environments. I have to say we had a very productive relationship dealing with some of the real challenges that urban Aboriginal people face in this country, such as housing, social issues and what have you.

I do appreciate the point that you are making here today in your remarks. Maybe you could elaborate for those who are not aware of the significant work that goes on in this country in regard to their advocacy, especially in the context of the urban challenges that Aboriginal people face in this country.

Senator McPhedran: Thank you very much. There is currently no same bill in the Senate. Did you think about the fact that a number of comments on different bills in this chamber recently have been about the importance of the independence of the Senate to be able to have its discussions, to conduct its studies as senators see fit and not to be dictated by what’s happening in the other place — I shouldn’t say “dictated” but unnecessarily influenced by what’s happening in the other place?

I am trying to understand why you would emphasize that here when I think in the past I’ve heard you argue strongly for the independence of the Senate.

A corollary to that question is this: How is it you think it’s a good idea for the Senate not to listen to the young people who want to come and be heard by us as part of second reading? Why would we shut them down? Why would we shut them out?