Mr. Speaker, to the hon. member for Capilano-Howe Sound, Switzerland is much smaller than Canada. It is not as diverse in geography and population and it does have a very different economic outlook and economy.
My point to the hon. member regards economic development which we are talking about today, and not the development of new countries. In economic development Canada has acted as a unified country to serve all the regions, to serve them as equitably and as fairly as we can.
In Atlantic Canada, there is the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, better known as ACOA. It helps to sustain some of the industries which cannot take on new technologies, new markets, new global competition without a little assistance. Let me give an example of what happened during the first week of May in my home town of Truro, Nova Scotia.
I attended a sod turning ceremony at Intertape Polymer Group Inc. The head office of Polymer is in Montreal. It has a plant in Nova Scotia where it manufactures synthetic fibres, plastic tape for the backing of carpets, polysac bags, even large sacks for bales of hay. This high tech company markets globally. As I said, the head office is in Montreal and there are five branches of that plant in Virginia, Florida, Louisiana, Montreal and Truro.
The company was looking at expansion. We, through ACOA, gave $1.4 million to Polymer to expand in Truro and the parent plant put in $15 million, for more than $16 million of investment in my home town. This investment created 45 new jobs for more than a total of 300 jobs in Truro, not Louisiana. We got ACOA funding as a stimulus and the parent company put the additional money in because that was where the best investment was for the best growth in exports from our ports to global markets throughout the world.
That is the advantage of regional economic development. That is a success story of long term jobs, sustainable jobs and a sustainable economy in the Atlantic region that we appreciate and love Canada for. That is what economic development is all about.
I hope the hon. member for Capilano-Howe Sound appreciates where we are coming from.