Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and thank you to the witnesses for being present with us today.
Of course, the news coming from our American counterparts in the United States is deeply troubling. It's an attack on our industries. It's an attack on our workers. It's an attack on the ability to have a strong North America. It's deeply concerning to New Democrats and to unions right across this country, and it's something that I think we as Canadians have to take seriously.
As we heard already, the witnesses have provided their dismay in relation to the fact that a trade dispute that originated before I was even born, in 1982, is now persisting. It's a kind of conflict that continues to persist since 1982. For example, in the period between 2004 and 2009, we had already, at that point, lost almost 10,000 direct and indirect jobs within our forestry sector.
I can only imagine the dismay workers feel right across this country, knowing that we have decades of inaction now related to the very extraordinary exception related to free trade in lumber to the United States.
Mr. Bromley, I take your statements quite seriously in relation to the fact that this has been an ongoing issue. It was an issue in the last free trade agreement we signed. It was an issue before the last free trade agreement. It's an issue again today. The hyper-exceptionality based on this one fact, this Crown lands issue with the United States, calling it a great big subsidy for all of our industries here, is their problem. Since 1982, this has been something they've said was unfair. It's something that I think we as Canadians take great pride in, in terms of how we organize our land and natural resources towards public good, towards ensuring that our public coffers actually benefit from the sale of our great natural resources here in North America, here in Canada. I think that's something the Americans just simply don't understand.
I think we need to have a very strong approach, a united approach, that addresses some of the very original issues related to this very large trade dispute, and we should continue now to build on some of the arguments that are already present to Canadians. We know, for example, what Mr. Donald Trump wants. It's like a scary movie, this guy. We've watched this scary movie before. He was the president once already. The great advantage we as Canadians have today is the fact that in this scary movie we know when the jumps are. We know when the scary parts of this film are going to take place. We knew these tariffs were going to come. We knew that southern conservatives would try to do this. We should have had the ability to organize our labour, organize our management, and organize our industries towards a better outcome.
Some of the recommendations made by United Steelworkers, for example, on a liquidity fund to shore up some of the very serious issues of being unable to access capital could be met. That's something we could do today. We could do that right now to shore up some of our industries and prevent any job losses.
Mr. Bromley, with the recent news of Trump's plan to impose a 25% tariff on all Canadian exports.... I take your point, which is that we aren't even certain whether or not it's 25% plus the existing 14%, which would bring us above that. That's something the Prime Minister should have asked in his phone call and something he should ask today.
What does this actually mean for the union members of United Steelworkers? I'm sure they're very worried right now. What are their fears? What are you hearing from the shop floor, from our brothers and sisters who are working so diligently while under a very serious threat?