Thank you for the question.
I would be very concerned, given the price, the steep price, we paid for very little result in these further negotiations, as I said before. The one thing to note about this agreement with the United States is that it did not require any congressional approval. There was some consultation with Congress. It didn't require state governments to make any new commitments beyond what they had already done in 1994. To gain secure access to some of the markets where, say, Buy American preferences are currently applied, as Monsieur Laurin was saying, such as mass transit or highway construction, which have been excluded for decades, I think Canada would have to pay an extremely high price.
Basically, I think it's totally unrealistic to expect to make significant inroads, particularly in the current context, when Buy American policies have never been more popular.
I just want to say that I actually hear some common ground in the positions here. They are in areas where our major trading partners are clearly using procurement as an important tool for local economic development. Why shouldn't Canada and our provinces be doing that as well? In my case, I think it's an intelligent policy that can contribute to our international competitiveness. Others may believe that it's a way to increase our bargaining leverage in future negotiations.