Madam Speaker, I am pleased to answer the question raised by my colleague. Of course, the Bloc Quebecois agreed 100 per cent with the cancellation of the helicopter contract, except that it was only half done. Not only should they have cancelled the helicopter contract but they also should have recovered the money that was to be invested in it and put it in an industrial conversion fund. I blame the government for not doing that part of the job. It was only half done.
This second part could have redirected all the money to be saved on the manufacture and purchase of the helicopters-over $5 billion. If this $5 or $6 billion had been invested in converting military companies, we could have stopped the hemorrhage that is going on right now.
I take the example of the Expro plant in my riding. It makes powder and shells. Not so long ago, the Expro plant had over a thousand workers, but with the end of the cold war, Expro's orders from the defence department dropped drastically. Now this plant has only 400 employees. I give you this example because I know that plant particularly well, since it is in my riding, but the same danger threatens some 60,000 workers in these military plants throughout Quebec, over 60,000 if we consider all of Canada.
The Liberals only did half the job when they cancelled the helicopter contract because they did not take the money that should have come back to them and invest it in industrial conversion.
There was a second part to the question, but I spent so much time on the first that I forgot the second. I do not know if my colleague-Oh yes! It has come back to me, Madam Speaker.
The whole issue of industrial conversion should probably be discussed by the defence committee and I hope that we will not have to discuss it as well in the joint committee that you want to set up, because that would further prolong the debate-there would be no end to it. Workers in our factories are now waiting for a conversion program before they are unemployed. That is the threat hanging over us.