Thank you very much.
It was terrific to be at Tenaris when they were making an announcement to expand that plant. Expanding that plant means jobs for people in your community. These are steelworkers—union-paid workers—and these are jobs. They're jobs in Canada.
Whether it is there or whether it is in Hamilton at Dofasco and ArcelorMittal, it is such an important sector that we must protect to create more opportunities for those jobs and those workers.
The 25% tariff on steel and aluminum is a direct response to the overcapacity that we are seeing and experiencing not only here in Canada but, indeed, globally. When I am at international fora like the OECD and we are presented with data that shares the overcapacity of steel on the global marketplace, in part because of deliberate policy for that overproduction or oversubsidization, it distorts the world and it distorts the trading system. We are taking action on those tariffs, and the 25% is going into effect tomorrow.
The other thing we did was implement “a country of melt and pour”, something the steel industry had been asking for so that, again, we have greater transparency about where the steel is coming from. That is another measure that will help support the Canadian steel industry.
I'm always pleased to work with you and with members of the steel caucus because of the strong voices directly connected to those companies that you do so much work to support.