November 26, 2004 - Debate on Throne Speech
Hon. Jim Rondeau (Minister of Industry, Economic Development and Mines): Mr. Deputy Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to speak on this wonderful Throne Speech, and I would like to draw all members' attention to the growing province, the wonderful optimism, the excitement that is happening within our province.
I know members opposite do not understand how different it is in the Manitoba we live in, but in 1999 when I got elected the first time in Assiniboia, it was a different province. I know Unicity Mall in the area was gone. I know there were many, many vacant buildings along Portage Avenue. I know the core of the city was basically fraught with very poor housing, people moving out, vacant buildings. There was all sorts of arson. Now I look out into my own area, I look into the Member for Kirkfield Park, the Leader of the Opposition's (Mr. Murray), area, and I see the area. I see a huge difference. I see Unicity Mall being built. I see six, I say six, senior citizens' buildings being built or that have been built. I see new optimism downtown where we have a new arena. We have new buildings. We have new hotels. We have Credit Union Central. We have the Mountain Equipment Co-op. We have a huge building boom that has taken place.
It is interesting to note how the members opposite talk about doom and gloom, but you look at the housing starts in Manitoba. They are up 18.6 percent, 18.6 percent. If you look at the public capital expenditure, it is up 14.4 percent. If you look at the urban housing starts, they are up 9.4 percent and they keep going up. We actually have a wonderful economy. The members opposite talk about doom and gloom. Let us give you some other statistics that you talk about our wonderful economy. You look at the business bankruptcy; yes, we have things going down. The business bankruptcy level is down almost 32 percent this year. We have the consumer bankruptcies down 11.7 percent again this year. This means we have an economic boom.
I know people across the way do not understand that growth in the economy. If you look at the difference between our economy, and when the members opposite, the Conservative Party, was in power, you do notice some change, and the changes are there are more people coming to Manitoba. There are more people staying in Manitoba and they are making more money and they are getting better jobs. We are not going to be the low-income, low-wage, low-skill jobs. We are developing our economy to be the high-income, high-wage jobs.
I want to take a few quotes that the members opposite I hope will read. If you are talking about the Royal Bank of Canada, we have the Royal Bank of Canada saying, "We have grown by just shy of $6,000 all of which are full-time which is a good gain." One percent probably understates the employment situation in the province because there is more income for full-time jobs than for part-time jobs. They said, "The bank expects Manitoba's economy to grow at 3.1 percent this year and 3.5 percent in 2005." They have said, "Anytime you can have growth between 3 percent and 5 percent, where BSE is still an issue, that is a very positive thing." That is the Royal Bank of Canada. I would suggest that you do that.
We also have companies that are showing a great deal of innovation. I would like to congratulate New Flyer which, with the government's assistance, has decided to grow. We actually have had New Flyer have a huge increase as far as their market share. They basically have a 70% market share in Manitoba. We in Manitoba are the bus manufacturers for North America. I would like to encourage the members opposite to have an optimistic view to look at what is happening in this economy. We are leaders in the hybrid bus fuel technologies. We are leaders in the hydrogen fuel technologies. We are building the bus for the future. In fact, New Flyer, has just received an award from California and other awards on how they are improving the system.
I would like to draw members opposite to some wonderful innovations that our government has introduced to the economy and industry. I would like to introduce them and I would offer the members opposite a tour of our new Composites Innovation Centre. This is a new innovation, where we are bringing together science and technology and having them work together to commercialize new inventions.
Because of that, we have Boeing, which is an important part of our economy, working on the new 7E7 Dreamliner which is a very, very innovative aircraft. What it will do is it will save fuel, it will be lighter, and it will create a huge amount of jobs. Technology is crucial to compete in the global economy and we are helping work with industry to develop that technology and commercialize it. It is nice to see that the composite innovation centre is being funded by 50 percent from our government and 50 percent from the federal government. We thank them for doing this because it will help us move forward the bus industry and the aircraft industry and others.
I want to talk a little bit about what is happening with our manufacturing. While you are giving doom and gloom, I would like to tell you some more facts about it. Our manufacturing shipments are up 10.2 percent; our total exports are up 9.4 percent; and construction work is up 8.2 percent. Weekly earnings, and I would like to draw members opposite, weekly earnings are up 4.9 percent, which is the highest in the country. So you want to look at the retail trade, which is up 7.6 percent, which is second-highest in the country. If you want to look at unemployment rate, second-best in the country. If you want to look at youth unemployment rate, it is one of the best in the country. We are doing well and we should be proud of our accomplishments.
The members opposite say we do not have a plan. Here is our plan, and I want you to pay attention because it is a simple plan even you can understand. First, what you do is you tie the education to the job market so that kids can go get the training. It is important to note that all the business groups, the Chamber of Commerce, CFB, the Manufacturers' Association have said their biggest challenge is to have a skilled workforce. Well, this government, under our watch, is assuring that they have a skilled workforce. We have dropped the tuition fees; we have maintained the tuition fees. We have brought back bursaries, which allows all kids to participate, and we have a huge increase in education.
We have improved the apprenticeship program. The members opposite ignored the base of our province, which is the apprenticeship system. What we have done is we have brought back and enhanced the apprenticeship system, so people can be the electricians, the plumbers, the skilled workers that we need as engines for our economic growth. We want to make sure that all people can participate and not just the few.
We brought back the ACCESS program, which provides the support, the hand up to people that all people can participate in the post-secondary school system. They get the supports so that they can be the people who build the economy in the North. Now we talk about some other things, so education is an important factor and that is the first part of our strategy and, actually, when you are looking at a skilled workforce and one that is competitive worldwide, that is what you need to do.
Second, building through research and innovation. I am pleased to let the members opposite know that we have been working with other organizations to build venture capital through the Western Life Sciences Fund, through other venture capital funds, because what you do is you build them and what happens is you create jobs.
Mr. Speaker in the Chair
A number of these venture capital funds have created the next commodity of importance, which is intellectual capital. If we are looking at competing around the world, we do not want to be like the members opposite, trying to create low-value jobs. We want to create the high-value-added jobs, the high school jobs that we can compete with everywhere. I think as you look at China's economy, you look at India's growing economy, what you want to do is make sure that your economy has the high-skill, high-value-added jobs, because we do not want to have just the low-value jobs. So we want to increase the educational jobs. We want to create venture capital for the intellectual growth of jobs and growth of industries within our province and within the country and the world.
* (12:10)
That is No. 2. We are working with the composites, with the other industries, to build their knowledge and move it forward. We are also creating the venture capital in multiple ways in co-operation with the private industry and public.
Next, what we want to do is look at affordable government. I look at some of the areas we have been dropping taxes. I find it passing strange that the members opposite always talk about decreasing taxes, but we are the first government in fifty years to drop the tax rate on corporations. We are the government that dropped the tax rate on corporations. Despite the rhetoric of members opposite saying that they are friends of business, we dropped the tax rate while they maintained it.
We have also dropped the tax rate for small businesses. When members opposite, when the Conservative government were the government, they talked about taxes, but did they do anything? No, they did not. We moved the small business tax rate from 8 percent to, this year, 4.5 percent. That is a tax drop, a real tax drop. So the members opposite talk about it; we do it. We are the doers in this system. We have also increased the threshold where the small business tax rate applies, so that helps small business. So we have done well.
Next, growing through immigration. It is nice to see how many people have come to our province in the last little while. We are working the Manitoba Immigration Council to expand foreign credentials and degrees to enable Canadians to work in their trained professions. We have increased the number of people coming into the province through the Business Immigration plan. We have expanded the farming immigration plan. We are working very hard to continue to bring foreign businesses to Manitoba through the Immigrant Investor plan.
I think what we have is a vision of growing the economy. We have a vision of growing people in the economy. It is really exciting to be in a government that cares and wants to build. The average immigration level has reached 7500 in 2004, a threefold increase from when the Conservatives where in government. It is growing the economy.
I know the members opposite might be surprised, but when you have an increasing population and you have higher incomes and you have better jobs, people stay in Manitoba. We have had more young people stay in Manitoba. There are over 1055 young people who came and stayed in this province more than last year. In other words we are growing the economy and we are getting people to stay. When members opposite were in government, young people fled, because there was no opportunity. We create the opportunity.
Let us look at the average weekly earnings. Manitoba is first in growth of earnings, with weekly earnings growing more than twice the national rate and providing an average pay increase of $1,560 annually. That is real growth.
The tax rate has actually gone down. Members opposite talked a good game, but we continually decreased the tax rate. We have increased the property tax credit. Members opposite decreased. They took away the property tax credit which helped the seniors, which helped the farmers, which helped the average person. They took that credit away. What we did was we instituted a property tax credit for seniors, which is about $800 now. We moved the property tax credit for seniors and people who own their own house from $250 to $400. We decreased the small business income tax and corporate tax. We are making this province affordable.
We are also looking at how we are going to increase our energy advantage. I am pleased to have attended the other day a wonderful announcement on wind energy. What we are doing is we are using the resources of this province in a public-private partnership to build an environmentally friendly energy alternative. We are working to build dams. We are the party, we are the government that builds dams. You are the government that stops the construction. We are the government that builds and has building cranes in urban Winnipeg. You are the government that has the fire trucks. We are going to grow our economy.
Some of the interesting things that I would like to point out that you need to know so that you can enjoy another 20 or 30 years of good NDP government. The mining investment community, and this is, again, an independent source, has rated Manitoba as the number one province to do mining in the country. What they have said is, we have the best regulations, we have the best investment climate, and we are number one in the country and number six in the world, if you really want to know.
That has been the change from when the members opposite were in charge of the economy. I have a number of letters that are congratulating us on our initiatives in mines.
I think that what you want to do is you want to look at where we are going to go. When they are talking about an economic plan, we have the education, we have investment, we have research and innovation, and we are working with the private sector. I would like to invite the members opposite to check the Web site. It is in the Web site, in the Department of Finance Web site. If you cannot find the Department of Finance Web site, go through the Department of Industry which has a link.
We are decided that we are going to work together to expand and have true hope in our province. We are building highways, we are investing in sewer and water projects, we are investing in universities and colleges. We just passed legislation to allow the City of Winnipeg to reduce business taxes. We have actually just introduced a new bill from the Minister of Finance (Mr. Selinger) that makes mortgages and redoing mortgages more efficient, cutting down bureaucracy.
We are working outside the city of Winnipeg with new developments in Brandon with the hospital there, with a $3-million investment in Westman Labs, redevelopment in the Keystone Centre. We are working on the wind farm. We are working with the BSE to establish slaughter capacity with BSE.
While the members opposite are busy screaming and braying at the wind, we are actually working with the industry to make sure that we have good economic expansion by having the slaughter capacity in this province where, again, the members opposite, when they were in government, slaughter capacity continued to decrease. We are increasing the slaughter capacity.
We are working in new northern training programs for Hydro. We have new nursing expansion. We are investing in the diversification and research in food products. We are working with immigrant investors, and we are trying to have a fair society.
What you need to know in democracy, and the members opposite might not understand, is when the economy grows, when the business economy grows, when things get better, we do not want just the top 5 percent to benefit. What we want to do is have the rising tide raise all ships. We want everyone to benefit from the wonderful economic climate in this province.
I am really encouraged by the economy. I notice that I have not gotten the critic opposite to ask me a question. It is hard to ask a question of the Minister responsible for Industry, Economic Development and Mines, when it is such great news. People should be applauding the great news.
I would like to explain to the people just one small point in our growth. In the last year of the Tory government, 1998, there were 535 000 people working. Here, in this year, there are 571 000 people working. That is a huge improvement. You can go through any statistic on any year, and there has been a huge improvement in employment and an increase in income.
* (12:20)
Finally, I want to close with one more quote, and here is the quote: "Canadian Business magazine's latest survey ranked the city as the second best in western Canada for commerce."
Variable operating costs, the cost of living, gross domestic product growth, employment, crime rate, Winnipeg was one of the best communities. Only Edmonton in fifth place was ranked ahead of Winnipeg in western Canada. Winnipeg is miles ahead of Toronto, Vancouver and even Calgary. Andy Holloway, a senior writer at Canadian Business, said in an interview yesterday, "In terms of operating costs, it still beats Edmonton." The Canadian Business survey included the country's 40 largest census metropolitan areas, plus Charlottetown. This shows we are heading in the right direction.
I am proud to be in a government that is building. I am proud to be in a government that considers all of its citizens, and I am proud to be an MLA in Assiniboia. Why I am proud to be in that area is because, in 1999, the community was suffering from huge economic depression. It was suffering from huge closures in stores and businesses, et cetera, and now I look out there and things are new. There is building going on. There is optimism. There are new play structures. There are new seniors' centres. There is new spirit. There is new activity. There is a new YMCA. There is a new Centennial Pool expansion. It is a wonderful, vibrant, optimistic community.
I would like the members opposite to open their eyes when they drive through our city. I would like to invite them to see what is going on, see the optimism and come on board to a wonderful, vibrant, growing province. Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.
|
