Mr. Speaker, I certainly thank my hon. colleague for his comments and his question.
As he so ably put it, the government was faced with a horrendous problem, the smuggling problem in Canada. As I said in my column, 70 per cent of it had been identified as coming through the native reserves in central Canada. What I advocated then and what I still advocate is we have to get tough with law breakers no matter who they are and no matter where they are in our country.
I felt then as I do now that a dual approach is needed of raising the export tax enough to take away the incentive as well as clamping down on smugglers wherever they may be, even if it were to cause bloodshed. If we have laws on our books but are not prepared to enforce them, then what good are they?
This government developed a national strategy with this legislation to address primarily a central Canada problem. Certainly we did not see the same problem in western Canada. If it had been there those governments would have reduced their cigarette taxes as well and they have not, except by a minimal amount.
We have to get tough with the smugglers instead of sending them a clear message that we will compete with them for their own customers by lowering the costs. If we follow this train of thought through where does it lead? Other things are smuggled into the country. Are we going to address them in the same manner? That is ridiculous.