Mr. Speaker, I have a petition signed by hundreds of citizens from northern Ontario. The petitioners are very frustrated with the way the government completely blew the negotiations between Falconbridge and Inco, which would have emerged into a Canadian super giant.
The government rubber stamped corporate raider Xstrata and now we see the results. There has been the shutdown of mines in Sudbury. The copper refining capacity and zinc refining capacity is being shut down in Ontario. There has been no net benefit to Canadians from this corporate raider.
Frustrated communities in the mining belt call for changes to the Investment Canada Act so we can see the kinds of commitments these foreign takeovers will be subject to, if any, and that they will be open and transparent so we can learn from the debacle of Falconbridge and Inco, which is now being seen in the mining industry as the Tories' modern equivalent of the Avro Arrow.
We need to learn lessons from this debacle under the Conservative government, which is what the citizens of northern Ontario say, so it will not be repeated in other industries that are opened up to foreign takeovers.