Mr. Speaker, I appreciate that question also. As the hon. member will probably realize, Snowflake is one of the best known smuggling ports in Manitoba. I do not think that it is the price of the American product that really has caused this underground economy.
It is the taxation on these products that has made it so lucrative. It is not just cigarettes in Manitoba. Liquor smuggling is twice as bad I would say as the cigarettes. If we look at the statistics which tell us that 90 per cent of liquor sold in hotels or restaurants could be smuggled, we start wondering what is next.
Another issue that we are addressing right now is gasoline. As the hon. member will know the drive across the border to fill up your tank is very lucrative or has been. With regard to farm production costs, it would make a lot more sense to take the tax off of gasoline so we could import our gasoline that we exported out of the country at probably two-thirds of the cost of what we are paying today.
This is what I have been trying to point out. I do not think the cost of the products is really the big issue here. It is the overtaxation of these products. A lot of these products we produce in Canada, export them to the United States and then smuggle them back in because of the taxation problem.