moved:

That, in the opinion of the House, the Prime Minister of Canada should hold annual First Ministers' Conferences.

Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the Liberal caucus, I am pleased to rise in the House to support one of the commitments made by my leader, the member for Papineau. This is a very simple and obvious commitment completely removed from partisanship. I invite all members of all parties to get behind this commitment by voting for the following motion:

That, in the opinion of the House, the Prime Minister of Canada should hold annual First Ministers' Conferences.

As I said, I am pleased to speak in favour of this motion because it is very clear to me that it has become necessary; however, I am not pleased that it has become necessary. It should not be necessary. It was not necessary under any of the prime ministers before this one.

Since Laurier, all prime ministers of Canada have felt the need to meet with their provincial and territorial counterparts regularly. They met as a group and also held bilateral meetings. It just made sense. It makes sense for any civilized federation. It makes sense to everyone but the Prime Minister.

In 1906, Prime Minister Laurier called the first joint meeting of premiers and the prime minister. As time went by, these meetings became a regular occurrence. In 2003, the premiers formed the Council of the Federation. The council generally meets twice a year. Unlike traditional first ministers' conferences, where the prime minister invites the premiers, the provinces play the lead role in council meetings, which are coordinated by a provincially funded secretariat.

The Council of the Federation has met 23 times since the member of Parliament for Calgary Southwest became Prime Minister. The Prime Minister has not met his colleagues as a group since January 2009. It is the longest such gap between first ministers meetings in 97 years.

The provincial and territorial premiers are criticizing this affront to the smooth operation of our federation, and rightly so. Meetings between the federal and provincial governments in Canada are almost always complicated. They have caused a lot of headaches for many politicians. They have not always led to successful outcomes. However, they often do, and I am confident in saying that, overall, these meetings have been positive for Canadians.

The Kelowna accord, which was signed with first nation, Métis, and Inuit peoples in 2006, was one of the great success stories of these federal-provincial-territorial negotiations. The current government refused to honour that agreement. One can only imagine the progress that could have been made had the Kelowna accord become a reality.

Another success story was the 2004 health accord, a joint action plan with a 10-year funding commitment. Unfortunately, the current government ignored the joint plan and unilaterally refused to extend the funding agreement.

Those are the results of the current Prime Minister's unwillingness to collaborate on a joint project. Much of the blame for the problems with the health care system and the poor living conditions of aboriginal people in Canada can be attributed to the current Prime Minister's unwillingness to work with the provinces and territories.

The provincial and territorial premiers are not the only ones the Prime Minister is ignoring. He does not appear to be any more inclined to meet with his NAFTA counterparts. The entire country is suffering because this Prime Minister does not know how to work collegially with others.

If the Prime Minister had a greater sense of collegiality, he would understand what a federation is. He would therefore avoid wasting so much of Canadians' time, money and energy on ventures that undermine the very foundation of our country's federative nature. A sad example of such waste is the pointless and botched Senate reform saga.

The Prime Minister has spent eight years attempting to achieve fundamental Senate reform, despite the Liberal opposition and literally every expert telling him that he needed to work with the provinces to change the nature of our Senate. In April 2014, the Supreme Court ruled that the Liberals and the experts were correct. Shamefully, the Prime Minister blamed the Chief Justice for this predictable fiasco, when he had only himself to blame for that monumental waste of time and money.

Is he that ignorant of our institutions, or is it plain contempt? A simple, frank, face-to-face meeting between the Prime Minister and his constitutional colleagues could have avoided that debacle.

This is not just about a constitutional principle or a principle of federalism. The absence of first ministers' meetings is having tangible negative consequences for Canadians. Let us look at what is happening right now.

As oil prices and the dollar fall, as our economy faces uncertainty, it is the responsibility of the Prime Minister of Canada to meet with the premiers and develop a united plan. Under such circumstances, a Liberal government would hold a first ministers' conference.

Because they know how important it is to work together, the premiers will meet tomorrow, a few blocks away from Parliament Hill. Regrettably, they have no scheduled meeting with the Prime Minister in the foreseeable future.

This is not a symbolic issue. Our federation faces real and significant challenges, from infrastructure renewal to retirement income security and climate change. These challenges can only be tackled successfully if all levels of government are sitting around the same table.

By refusing to meet his constitutional partners around the same table, the Prime Minister shirks his constitutional responsibility. By refusing to pull together the strengths of our federation, he fails all Canadians.

Why does the Prime Minister refuse to live up to his responsibility? Considering the huge challenges we are facing, why does he refuse to bring together the premiers of Canada's provinces and territories in order to work toward solutions that benefit all Canadians?

One has to wonder why the Prime Minister would choose to postpone tabling his budget unilaterally with no consultation with his constitutional colleagues. Most provinces and territories typically table their budgets in April or May of each year, having had the opportunity to see what the federal budget has in store and fine-tune their own budgets accordingly. By delaying the budget until April at the earliest, the federal government has deprived the provinces of that opportunity at a very critical time for all of them.

Regrettably, the Prime Minister's lack of collegiality and understanding of what the federation means does not stop there. Here are a few more ways in which the Prime Minister is hurting Canadians in all provinces and territories.

On infrastructure, the 10-year new Building Canada fund, announced in budget 2013, is heavily back-end loaded; until after 2019, very little money will be available to the provinces and municipalities to help them tackle their urgent infrastructure challenges, stimulate the economy, and create jobs. This is wrong. A first ministers' conference would help clarify the needs and establish priorities.

On pensions, the Government of Ontario is currently creating its own version of the Canada pension plan. It is expected to phase in on January 1, 2017.

Other provinces are considering following along. The lack of federal leadership is leading to a patchwork of public pension systems that will act as a barrier to labour mobility in Canada. This should not be allowed to happen. There are much better options, which the Prime Minister might discover should he agree to sit down with his colleagues.

For instance, the Prince Edward Island finance minister, Wes Sheridan, has proposed an expansion of the Canada pension plan that would target the segment of the middle class that Jim Flaherty himself said was not saving enough for retirement.

With respect to old age security, while in Davos, Switzerland, the Prime Minister announced by surprise that the qualifying age for old age security would be raised from 65 to 67. Not only will that unnecessary measure penalize Canadian seniors, particularly the less well off, but it will also have a big impact on the provinces, since many Canadians between 65 and 67 years old will be left to rely on provincially funded social assistance in the absence of old age security.

With respect to refugees, in April 2012, the federal government announced it would no longer provide money to the provinces for the cost of refugee claimants' health care, a cruel measure, as the Federal Court said. Some provinces have decided to deliver this essential service on their own.

With respect to manpower training, in budget 2013 the federal government announced it would cut the transfers to provinces under labour market development agreements. It simply expected the provinces to contribute their own money to its new unilateral Canada job grant. It took years to sort out a half-baked solution to this mess, which a good first ministers' conference, held at the outset, would have avoided.

With respect to climate change, in the absence of federal leadership, some provinces have taken the lead on Canada's efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. While this has led to some positive results, the absence of federal leadership has prevented much better results from happening for Canada.

The comprehensive economic and trade agreement, CETA, is particularly outrageous. The Province of Newfoundland and Labrador gave its approval to CETA after the federal government agreed to provide $270 million toward a $400 million transition fund for its seafood canning industry. Once the agreement was signed, the federal government changed its mind. It is now telling the province that the money was for demonstrable losses in that industry after the agreement was in force. This has resulted in the province signalling a willingness to rescind its support for the agreement, thus breaking our federation's united front on this needed agreement.

In the 18 years I have been actively following federal-provincial relations in this House, never have I witnessed such blatant betrayal of a federal government's commitment toward a province. The letter exchange makes it crystal clear that the federal trade minister did concede that there would be a transition fund to help not only the displaced workers but the whole industry. The expression “demonstrated loss” is nowhere to be seen in the trade minister's letters. This is a pure invention.

The good functioning of a federation requires negotiating in good faith and living up to commitments. The federal government should not retroactively invent conditions that were not in the written agreement between ministers. Premiers, like all Canadians, need a prime minister they can trust.

It is because the Prime Minister is so often unable to live up to his commitments and stick to his words that he does not want to meet his colleagues all together? A lack of trust may be the real issue here.

However esoteric federal-provincial relationships might appear to many Canadians, all Canadians want their leaders, especially their Prime Minister, to be trustworthy. Sure, a first ministers' conference agenda might include many other items, such as interprovincial trade barriers, energy policy, pipelines and so on, but I think I have made my point clear.

The leader of the Liberal Party has committed to inviting all of the provincial premiers to an annual first ministers' meeting. Today more than ever, that is the right thing to do. This is why I invite all my colleagues to support the following motion:

That, in the opinion of the House, the Prime Minister of Canada should hold annual First Ministers' Conferences.

Stéphane Dion

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