Local industry representatives from the Greater Victoria Chamber of Commerce, the Downtown Victoria Business Association, the Greater Victoria Harbour Authority, and the Vancouver Island Construction Association had a chance to put questions to a number of federal candidates.
At Spectrum Community School on Wednesday, April 17, candidates from the four major parties – Elizabeth May (Green Party), Grant Cool (Conservative Party), Laurel Collins (NDP), and Will Greaves (Liberal Party) – fielded questions on issues facing Vancouver Island residents.
Bruce Williams, CEO of the Greater Victoria Chamber of Commerce, brought up federal legislation limiting the number of foreign workers allowed in Canada, something that has caused staffing strain for a large number of local businesses that rely on foreign workers. He asked the panel if they would consider exemptions to temporary foreign workers restrictions for regions with low unemployment rates, like Greater Victoria.
Collins, running in the Victoria riding, said the Liberals "completely botched the file" regarding temporary foreign workers, and said she is open to exploring exemptions for the region.
"I have seen the impacts on families, on workers, on small businesses, and I know that businesses and workers here were surprised because I've been meeting with them, and many of them just feel like the rug was pulled out from underneath them," said Collins.
Cool, who's running in Esquimalt-Saanich-Sooke, gave a personal anecdote about his family's companies that had trouble finding pilots and marine crews, which caused a halt in their work. He said the Conservatives would target specific industries and regions to ensure that businesses and communities get the labour they need.
"All of the stuff that we talk about in terms of what we want to accomplish is just hopes and dreams. If we don't find a way to improve the performance of our economy in terms of our GDP, in terms of our productivity, none of this matters, because no government, regardless of whose it is, will have the capacity to meet any of these promises."
Rory Kulmala, CEO of the Vancouver Island Construction Association, said housing construction is one of the most urgent and complex issues facing the Capital Regional District.
"Despite several years of high levels of commitments on our national housing strategy, conditions for builders, renters, and prospective homeowners continue to worsen," he said, adding that the benchmark price for a single-family home in the region has more than doubled in the past decade.
Kulmala asked what measures the individual parties would implement to strengthen the accountability and effectiveness of the National Housing Strategy, support the delivery of more housing, and reduce the barriers that continue to stall construction in the region.
May, the Green Party co-leader running in the Saanich-Gulf Islands riding, argued that the lack of alignment between federal, provincial, and local government decision-making is hurting the Canadian economy. She said she would like to remove inter-provincial trade barriers, which she says will grow the economy by $200-$300 billion per year.
"I've been troubled for years by why it is that Canada doesn't seem to be able to act like a country, or even think like a country, and yet the 27 separate nation-states of the European Union manage to collaborate really well with 23 separate official languages," she said.
Greaves, who is running in the Victoria riding, said a Liberal government would start building and managing social housing for those who need it by creating a federal organization parallel to the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation to build social housing on federal land for those who need it most.
"Housing is at the absolute heart of our party's platform, and Mark Carney's vision [is] the change that Canada needs after this federal election," said Greaves. "The housing crisis in Canada at the moment is a classic example of market failure, and what it requires is government to step in and help provide housing to the folks who are being left out."
