Okay, I think we can talk about it.
Temporary foreign workers is a big issue. Changes that were brought forward make it so that as of April 1, workers that have been here five or ten years are going to be leaving, so we're going to have quite a big labour shortage here in Canada.
Last year I brought up the issue because in my province, in Quebec, we had about $53 million in losses because of problems with temporary foreign workers.
This is a program that obviously has a lot of problems and it needs to be worked on. I know that some members could probably argue that this isn't the right place to bring it up, but we are talking about agriculture and we are talking about trade barriers and problems and we want to make sure that these companies are able to thrive.
In some of your remarks you said that we have lost American multinational companies and they've moved their production out of Canada. More than 150 food plants have closed their doors, so the trade deficit has soared up to $7 billion.
I was just wondering if you could maybe talk to us about problems that your members have with temporary foreign workers, and solutions, because I don't think these people who have worked in Canada for seven or ten years are temporary. They have a lot of expertise and it takes a long time to train them and they become experts in their field.
Maybe you could elaborate on the importance of this program and how it is important for maybe the agriculture committee to look at.