Advantage Canada is fabulous. It's just too slow. Finance has it right in its direction. Your government has it right in its direction. But what we're facing is a marketplace that's moving much faster than Advantage Canada is. We're in a terrible global bloodbath in which everybody is trying to take everybody else's job. And now our largest customer is heading to a recession. Our currency relative to our largest customer has gone up 36%. And we're moving at a measured pace towards the right place, but we have to go faster. It's not that you're doing the wrong thing; you're doing too little of it.
The Finance officials who are saying that we're going to be insulated, that it's all going to be fine, are depending on the petro-dollar, and that's not a good place for a country to go. Let's enjoy every penny we can get from oil and gas, but let's not become completely dependent on it. That's a fundamental economic mistake.
We're saying yes to Advantage Canada, but we're saying yes, please, let's get at it at a much faster pace. Let's not pretend that we are insulated. Let's not pretend that our current well-being is our birthright. Let's realize that, just as industry has to work really hard and fast to adapt to a high dollar, the government's business climate policy has to work just as hard and just as fast.
When we close a mill and put all these people out of work, we want to see you doing something just as painful to government finances. There's no way for us to sit still, wait, and hope that we can do it at a slow pace. We've been suffering pain and working really hard. You're doing the right thing, you're just doing it as if the world was unfolding at a stately pace. And it's moving at a vicious pace.