Hon. Tom Hockin (Minister for Science and Minister of State (Small Businesses and Tourism)):

Madam Speaker, the hon. member never learns. He knows that about 15 per cent of the cost of most manufactured goods is labour. The rest is all sorts of other components.

Canada almost leads the world in our productivity, our competitiveness and our efficiency. He wants to denigrate Canadian competitiveness by saying that labour is everything. In fact in the automotive sector labour is about 15 per cent of the cost of the product.

I would ask my hon. friend why move to Mexico to get lower labour rates when in fact it is only 15 per cent of the cost of the product we are making. Stay in Canada where we are more efficient and everything else.

The hon. member wants to know what happened to the Liberals, why they were not there to vote on the NAFTA bill. I am not the Liberal Whip and I am not going to apply to be the Liberal Whip. I suggest the reason the Liberals were not there is they do not know where they stand on the NAFTA.

Hon. Tom Hockin (Minister for Science and Minister of State (Small Businesses and Tourism)):

Madam Speaker, I would say that high unemployment is a major regional problem in all industrialized countries, including Canada.

What we are doing is building this kind of confidence in the statistics that I have just noted. We are also doing things in a very pointed way regionally, lake our FED-NOR program, for example, in northern Ontario where over 4,000 jobs and over 400 businesses have been created in the last five years through that program. Our regional programs for economic diversification have also helped certain regions that are in difficulty.

I was asked a question about Cape Breton at the beginning of Question Period. Our support for Devco has been strong. Even when we are having to cut back subventions and contributions, we are maintaining our commitments to Devco.

Through our Aboriginal Economic Development Program, which all members of the House respect, we have created over 1,600 businesses on and off reserves. This is

May 14, 1993

Oral Questions

how we are trying to get at regional economic expansion as well as doing these large scale macro things which are building consumer confidence and business confidence, not at a level as high as we would like to see, but it is now positive.

Hon. Tom Hockin (Minister for Science and Minister of State (Small Businesses and Tourism)):

Madam Speaker, the hon. member speaks of high interest rates.

We have a prime rate now of 5.7 per cent, the lowest it has been in 30 years. If people are going to come to Parliament Hill and talk about historically high interest rates, there is something wrong with their arithmetic. They can talk about unemployment. I agree that unemployment is a problem in all industrialized countries, Canada included.

However I have to tell the hon. member the OECD and the IMF both forecast that Canada is going to lead the G-7 in growth in 1993 and 1994. They expect us to have the highest growth rate of employment.

We are winning the horse races with other industrialized countries. We can keep winning every race. It will never be enough for us until we get unemployment down to 4 per cent, 5 per cent or 6 per cent. We are doing the best job of any industrialized country and we are going to continue to keep the course so that we can create jobs. In

May 14, 1993

the 1980s, under this government, we were the largest creator of jobs per capita of any industrialized country.

Hon. Tom Hockin (Minister for Science and Minister of State (Small Businesses and Tourism)):

Madam Speaker, can the hon. member explain why General Motors is making increased investments in Windsor, why Ford is going to make a $2 billion expansion in Oakville and why Chrysler opened a third brand line a month ago in Windsor? Can the hon. member explain that?

Can the hon. member explain why we have increased our market share of automobile assembly in Canada within the North American market in the last three years?

Can the hon. member explain why our unit productivity has been growing in a very impressive way in the last three years? With the cost of capital, the cost of technology, the level of our management-85 per cent of the cost of a product-we are more competitive than the Mexicans. That is why people want to produce in Canada instead of Mexico.

When it comes to companies that are going to be hurt by NAFTA the member makes some hypothetical suggestions. I have to tell him that McCain foods has forecasted $25 million worth of exports into Mexico. In Nova Scotia Jacques White Foods, the same. In Quebec Roche and Company has signed a huge consulting contract for work in Mexico. We have Smith Industries in Ontario and Lagill Industries in Leamington which are going to expand into Mexico. These companies are looking forward to NAFTA being completed so that they can take advantage of these export opportunities.

Hon. Tom Hockin (Minister for Science and Minister of State (Small Businesses and Tourism)):

Madam Speaker, the question is asked in a slightly different context, but it is the same allegation we just heard and the answer is essentially the same.

Let me give him some employment statistics. Employment has increased in 10 of the last 12 months. I just finished talking two weeks ago with industry ministers across the G-7. Economies across the world are shrinking. Germany's economy shrunk last year. Britain's economy shrunk the year before.

What about Canada? Employment has increased in 10 of the last 12 months. Since August 151,000 full-time jobs have been created. These are real jobs that have been created. Plus the small business sector is creating net jobs.

Nobody believes that an 11.8 per cent unemployment rate is appropriate. We do not believe it is either, but when we compare our stewardship of the economy with governments in other industrialized countries, we have shown more job creation than any other country in the G-7.