Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I also have to strongly oppose the prejudice that is built into this motion. No agreement that I've ever been involved in would have had a respectable outcome if one had gone into it taking an intransigent position and saying, “This has failed; now let's talk.” That isn't the way you operate.
To say there are profound changes.... This agreement has been improved. In any international agreement--for those of us who actually believe in international agreements as a fundamental future for this country, and I realize that some people around this table don't believe in trade--these changes are for the better.
The U.S. or Canada could have opted out of this with only 12 months, prior to these improvements. Now we have a three-year basis, plus a year in which the party can say they want to opt out. So that's four times better than what we had. This agreement continues to improve things for the industry.
There are comments coming out around this table about how everybody's opposed to this. I just met with the natural resources minister from Alberta on the weekend. His industry is supportive of this. So we're hearing a lot of things that aren't exactly factual.