Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for Anjou-Rivière-des-Prairies for his question.
It is obvious that politics has an impact on the economy. Indeed, I mentioned at the beginning of my speech that the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance had partly justified the introduction of this bill by the government by putting it in the context of some sort of globalization.
He spoke of global issues to justify that the bill is written in such a way as to regulate or influence securities throughout Canada and to insure that Canada has a single voice among other nations with
regard to securities regulation, in order to avoid negative impacts from outside the country.
If we, in Quebec, are not careful, the arguments of globalization, of competitiveness, of the need for the economy to adapt to the global context will be presented every time that the government wants to make Canada stronger, more visible, more efficient and more aggressive at the international level, bacause to be strong, efficient and aggressive, we must speak with one voice.
Faced with this reality, Canada wants to speak with one single voice. However, Canada forgets that there is a major voice in Canada, albeit a minority voice, as my colleague has remarked; there is Quebec's voice, which has represented a nation, a people, since the beginning of the Canadian Confederation. This voice has always made itself heard. Today, considering the globalization of economies and the fact that Quebec feels somewhat threatened by this globalization from the economic viewpoint, and not only from the viewpoint of its culture and its language, the economic argument becomes an important one for nationalists in Quebec.
In the past, we wanted to achieve sovereignty in order to maintain our language and our culture. That is fine, and that is still the most important reason, at least as far as I am concerned. However, in the last ten years or so, we have come to realize that the economic argument is gaining increasing importance. Quebecers realize that they too must speak with one single voice if they want their people, their nation, to continue developing in a global context.
I agree with the representatives of Canadian federalism that, in the global context, we must speak out loud and clear, with a single voice, and that timing is a major consideration. It is also one of the reasons why sovereignists in Quebec have been saying for many years that sovereignty should not be achieved only to preserve our language and our culture, but also to give Quebec the economic health and vitality it needs to maintain its place in the international community.
I thank my colleague for his question. It allows me to demonstrate, although I recognize the merit of our federalist colleagues' arguments from a Canadian viewpoint, that the sovereignists' arguments are also of an economic nature. I hope that some day, in a newly defined partnership with Canada, we will be able to accommodate both sides so that both Canada and Quebec can get what they want economically as well as play a leading role in the world economy.