Agriculture Committee on June 19th, 2023

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, John Barlow]

I appreciate that. Thank you.

Mr. Lemaire, you talked about the timing of this, but you obviously have a member who has raised some concerns.

Could these concerns be addressed in the regulations as it goes to the Canada Gazette? All of us have talked about how many years we've dealt with this type of legislation to get it so close to moving on. Can some of those concerns raised by Mr. Wiseman be addressed in the regulation and the further framework of the bill itself rather than delaying this any further?

[Ron Lemaire]

I think that's an excellent point. That was my point relative to the timing and landing strip that we have. It's not one year. Looking at legislation and regulation, we do have time. We don't have five years, but there is a window, like I said, of two years or maybe a bit longer.

The key we have to remember is, yes, potentially within regulation, we can address it, but we need to ensure that we do not handicap ourselves and remove the potential reciprocity with the U.S. In doing so, it would be a detriment to the entire supply chain that exports.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, John Barlow]

Thank you very much.

Thank you to both of our witnesses for your testimony today. I appreciate your coming.

We will now suspend the meeting for about five or six minutes as we transition to in camera.

[Proceedings continue in camera]