Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Like some of my colleagues, I would like to make a brief preliminary comment.
One of Canada's largest exports to the Indo‑Pacific region has long been bituminous coal, thermal coal. In 2021, the Liberal Party promised to end Canada's exports of this thermal coal. It's even in the Minister of Environment's mandate letter. The following year, thermal coal exports increased by 60%. That's eight times higher than our exports in 2018, when it is extremely polluting, and it violates all of our climate change commitments. I wanted to clarify that, because I find it absolutely inconsistent and contradictory. I'm all the more proud of Bill C‑383, introduced by my colleague from Victoria, Laurel Collins, who wants to put a legal end to the export of thermal coal while the Liberal government unfortunately continues to do so.
Mr. Vaillancourt, I very much appreciated your comments a little earlier on human rights, workers' rights and forced labour. You spoke at length, and rightly so, about the plight of the Uighur people. You also talked about the responsibilities of Canadian companies. If I have time, I'll come back to that.
The federal government is responsible for ensuring that our supply chains and subcontractors aren't involved in forced labour. In 2021, journalist Joël‑Denis Bellavance of La Presse revealed that contracts totalling $221 million had been awarded to a Malaysian company that, at the time, was suspected by the United States and the United Kingdom of using forced labour in its production.
How do you think the federal government could implement measures in this region of the world to avoid such situations when the federal government itself is not setting an example?