Archive for November, 2010

One of the greatest strengths of the Canadian economy is its integration with the U.S. economy. Ironically, this integration with our good neighbours south of the border is also one of our economic weaknesses.

When the U.S. economy falters, Canada takes a major hit. That is why even before the U.S. entered a recession, your Conservative government was working to diversify the Canadian economy through a series of trade deals.

For example, these trade deals include agreements with Peru, Columbia, the European Free Trade Association and several small countries.

Our Government is also negotiating trade deals with the European Union and India as well. These two markets account for about one quarter of the world’s population.

These two trading blocs represent a massive number of customers for Canadian business.

And that is good news for Canada’s bottom line

I’m Brad Trost, your Member of Parliament in Saskatoon-Humboldt. You can call my office in Saskatoon at 975-6133 or drop by our two offices to visit: Saskatoon Monday-Friday or Humboldt Tuesday and Wednesday. I always appreciate your feedback.

One of my duties in the House of Commons is to serve as a vice-chair of the Canada-U.S. Inter-Parliamentary Group. Therefore, I was very interested in the recent midterm elections in the U.S. and how they will affect Canada.

The newly elected Republicans are generally more supportive of free trade with Canada. However, the new Congress is not going to be automatically easier for Canada to deal with on trade issues.

Most American congressmen rarely think about Canada when it comes to trade policy. Generally, when American congressmen deal with trade issues, they tend to think about China or Mexico and forget all about Canada.

That’s why the work that MPs from all parties do to foster one-on-one relationships with American congressman is so important. We build relationships and educate them as to the importance of Canada to the American economy.  We do this work to protect Canadian jobs, Canadian business and Canadian trade.

I’m Brad Trost, your Member of Parliament in Saskatoon-Humboldt. You can call my office in Saskatoon at 975-6133 or drop by our two offices to visit: Saskatoon Monday-Friday or Humboldt Tuesday and Wednesday. I always appreciate your feedback.

Roxanne`s Law is a Private Members’ Bill in the House of Commons named for Roxanne Fernando. Roxanne was a young, 24 year old Filipino immigrant to Canada who was murdered in Winnipeg for refusing her boyfriend’s repeated demands to have an abortion.

This legislation (which was crafted to permit both pro-life and pro-choice supporters to vote for it) would make it a criminal offence to coerce a woman to have an abortion.

Now critics have argued that we already have laws on assault, intimidation, etc. and that this legislation would be largely redundant.  But critics fail to recognize that one purpose of Roxanne’s law is to provide protection for those more vulnerable; a category that surely applies to pregnant women.

Roxanne`s law is a good piece of legislation, and it needs to be passed. It should be supported on its own merits, regardless of how one feels about the broader abortion debate.

I’m Brad Trost your Member of Parliament in Saskatoon-Humboldt.  You can call my office in Saskatoon at 975-6133 or drop by our two offices to visit: Saskatoon Monday-Friday or Humboldt Tuesday and Wednesday. I always appreciate your feedback.

On Remembrance Day, we take time to honour those Canadians who paid the ultimate sacrifice for our country. We take time to remember those brave men and women who fought for Canada in wars past and present.

Honouring those who died in service of our nation is the predominate reason we mark November 11th. However, there is another reason we commemorate Remembrance Day.  

We commemorate Remembrance Day to change the future. For by remembering the past, we can change the future. By learning from the past, we can prevent war and tyranny; we can preserve our freedoms in better, wiser ways than those who came before us.

Our Veterans have given so much to defend our values, our freedoms and our way of life. The best way we can honour them is to ensure that the sacrifice made by their fallen comrades has not been in vain.

I’m Brad Trost, your Member of Parliament in Saskatoon-Humboldt. You can call my office in Saskatoon at 975-6133 or drop by our two offices to visit: Saskatoon Monday-Friday or Humboldt Tuesday and Wednesday. I always appreciate your feedback.

Over the past year, your Conservative government has helped fund an incredible number of community infrastructure projects.

Many of these projects (road, water, sewer repair; hockey rink upgrades, for example) had a March 31st completion date. There have been calls to extend this deadline. To be fair to all the communities that applied for these infrastructure grants, it would be very difficult to change the deadline.  Well, I’m happy to report that almost all the projects are coming in on time and should be finished before March 31st.

Our local contractors and municipal administrators have done a fantastic job to complete these infrastructure projects. Your Conservative government supplied $47 billion in federal stimulus across Canada, including monies to the RMs, towns and cities of Saskatchewan.

Auditor General of Canada Sheila Fraser’s report (released on Oct. 26) called the federal government’s launch of these infrastructure projects “a huge undertaking” that “was well-managed.”

I’m Brad Trost, your Member of Parliament in Saskatoon-Humboldt. You can call my office in Saskatoon at 975-6133 or drop by our two offices to visit: Saskatoon Monday-Friday or Humboldt Tuesday and Wednesday. I always appreciate your feedback.