Shelby Kramp-Neuman

Mr. Speaker, Thanks · 89 wordsbefore I start, I want to take this opportunity to acknowledge that, today, May 5, is Red Dress Day, when Canadians and our indigenous partners acknowledge, honour and learn about the epidemic of missing and murdered indigenous women and girls in Canada.¹ I would like to thank the advocates from coast to coast to coast for their advocacy and teaching on this matter. I would especially like to thank the member for Winnipeg Centre for her efforts in bringing the issue into the public consciousness and into this chamber.Thanks Procedure · 35 wordsI am happy to rise today to speak to the Bloc Québécois motion condemning the United States’ unfair and unjustifiable tariffs on Canada and, as the motion states, Quebec. I will lead with one comment.Procedure Claims · 55 wordsI was fairly certain that this motion, which was tabled the Friday prior to the government’s announcement yesterday, would be a castoff.² I suspect that the only questions and speeches we will hear from the government are about how the $1.5 billion announced yesterday is going to magically fix billions of dollars in lost tariffs.³ Procedure · 20 wordsHowever, I am happy for any opportunity to speak to the broader issue of the source of this malaise: tariffs.Procedure Claims · 16 wordsYes, the Liberals announced something. Granted, it took over one year, ⁴but the point still remains. Reasoning · 26 wordsThe issue here is that people do not want a handout. They do not want a band-aid. They want a deal, and patience is wearing thin. Thanks · 41 wordsBeing in constant conversation with the affected industries, I want to thank all members in this place for the pan-partisan support the affected industries and, more importantly, their workers have received from all parties in this place during this trade war.Thanks Reasoning · 28 wordsIt is always good to be reminded that although we may have differing views on the best path, generally speaking, this place has the same goals in mind. Claims · 163 wordsI have to imagine that the vast majority of members in this place have at one point or another met with local industries in their ridings that are part of the downstream from the three specific industries mentioned in the motion from my colleague from Joliette—Manawan: steel, copper and aluminum. Of course, these punitive tariffs affect far more than just these three industries, but they are by and large the major targets in this current trade war. The very unfortunate reality is that these protectionist attacks on Canadian workers are working.Unearned certainty The government has been extremely clear. It is the negotiator, and it does not want any help. Canadians may not know this, but this is in sharp contrast to previous trade negotiations with the U.S., when the previous government was more than happy to march hand in hand with the opposition down to Washington, where we remained a silent but willing partner to help the government do what was best for Canada. Reasoning · 27 wordsThat is the government’s prerogative, as is the self-described slow approach, but this brings pitfalls. However, given the Liberals’ current polling, the pitfalls are not for them. Claims · 57 wordsIt is no secret that the U.S. administration’s actions in this situation have broadly galvanized the average Canadian into a patriotic fever, granting a wide breadth to the current government and propelling the Liberals in the polls.Unearned certainty The voting public is, by and large, content with the Prime Minister’s approach. This is what the polls tell us. Procedure · 46 wordsI am not here to argue with the pollsters, but I am here to talk about the element that is never brought up in the various community Facebook groups or at the coffee tables of the nation, which is the unseen, unspoken victims of this approach.Procedure Claims · 178 wordsAccording to Statistics Canada, “iron and steel mills and ferro-alloy manufacturing (-19.1%) recorded its steepest decline since April 2020, coinciding with lower exports of steel products, ⁵as the US tariffs on Canadian steel imports doubled to 50% at the beginning of June.”⁶ To reiterate, the last time steel took this big a hit globally, trade shut down. The economic equivalent of the current U.S. tariffs on the Canadian industry is a once-in-a-century global pandemic, which brought global trade to its knees. This is the economic reality of Canadian trade. Pre-tariffs, 80% of exports went to the United States.⁷ Nearly $1 trillion in trade flowed annually across our borders.⁸ Now, hundreds of thousands of Canadians employed in the industry are affected in one way or another by trade between two of the longest and strongest allies the world has ever seen. The Prime Minister did not start this trade war, and his predecessor did not start this trade war, but he can end it. Every day this trade war drags on, it costs Canadians jobs and hammers our economy. The ask · 26 wordsI am not asking the Prime Minister to take any old deal. I am asking him to start negotiating for a serious resolution to this dispute. Reasoning · 13 wordsHe has the political capital to wait. Canadian workers and families do not. Thanks · 35 wordsI want to finish off by thanking the various industry associations, manufacturers, unions and workers for their work. They have tirelessly raised the various issues these unjustified and unfair tariffs have brought to their lives.Thanks Reasoning · 20 wordsThis is a massively convoluted and complex issue that requires pan‑partisan support on both sides of the border to resolve. Promise · 33 wordsI will again offer to the government my support, Vague promiseas well as that of my caucus colleagues, to collaborate and co‑operate with them in any way we can, whether at home or abroad. Reasoning · 41 wordsI mentioned earlier that there was a bit of good luck on the government side that this opposition day motion will give it the opportunity to highlight its recent announcement, but serendipity does not shine exclusively on the government members today. Claims · 52 wordsWhile I do not have the authority to sign off on billions of economic loans or a trade deal yet, we here in the opposition do have other tools at our disposal. To deflect from its failing trade talks, the government often touts the philosophy of controlling what we can at home, Anecdote · 6 wordsso I took that to heart.Anecdote Claims · 91 wordsFar too many representatives of these industry-critical organizations have told me that they feel left out and ignored by the government. They do not know what is going on in D.C. or in Ottawa and resort to rumours and speculation to field some sense of understanding. To be clear, this is coming not only from the mom-and-pop shops in Bancroft but also from national and international industry associations headquartered in Ottawa, Toronto, Montreal, New York and Washington. This is a sin being committed by administrations on both sides of the border. Promise · 44 wordsAs a result, next month, in conjunction with my colleagues from la belle nation de Québec, I am joining a series of round tables in numerous Quebec cities and towns that are directly affected by the tariffs on steel, aluminum, copper and softwood lumber. Anecdote · 56 wordsIt is my responsibility, and I am humbled to be invited to visit with Québécois workers and industry leaders up and down the St. Lawrence River, from major urban centres to humble regional industrial hubs, to talk to affected workers, en français, of the very real effects the U.S. tariffs have had on Canadian strategic resources.Anecdote Procedure · 8 wordsI want to finish with one final comment.Procedure Claims · 25 wordsFrustrations on both sides of the border are extremely clear, whether it is with our own administration or each other’s. I share many of them, Positioning · 21 wordsbut we must remember that the relationship between Canada and the United States is forged in fire and bounded by blood.Positioning Claims · 19 wordsIt is among, if it is not the, single strongest relationship between any two nations in the world today. Procedure · 29 wordsTo close, I want to selectively re-enter into Hansard something that was spoken in this very place 68 years ago by President Dwight D.⁹ Eisenhower when he addressed Parliament: ProcedureClaims · 75 words...change is the law of life and of relations between nations. When two great peoples such as ours, energetic and optimistic, live side by side in all the diversity that freedom offers, change is rapid and brings in its wake problems, sometimes frictions. ...by mutual respect, understanding and with good will we can find acceptable solutions to any problems which exist or may arise between us.... There must never be a final word between friends.