Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca for the very interesting speech he made, which had both an historical and an international aspect to it.
I was a bit amazed to hear him applaud the statements made by the Minister of International Trade and say that Canada is big, beautiful, strong, nice, fast, etc. He must have used a dictionary of synonyms to come up with all these nice qualities for the Minister of International Trade and the government. By the way, the minister is indeed very nice, but the comments made by the Reform member do need to be toned down a bit.
If the American bill was so disgusting and so totally unacceptable to Canada, as the hon. member put it, can he tell us why the Canadian government waited seven months before introducing Bill C-54? That is how long it took.
So, my first question concerns the delay. Is the hon. member pleased with the "speedy" intervention of the government, with this seven months delay, since the U.S. government introduced the Helms-Burton law back in March?
I also have a second question for my Reform colleague. He also praised the government for following in the wake of the European Union, instead of using the power it was granted on July 29, as I said earlier, and showing some leadership by appealing to a panel under NAFTA. Why is my Reform colleague so glad to see the Canadian government following in the wake of the European Union now, in October, when the government could have challenged the U.S. bill back in July through a NAFTA panel?
So, the two questions I have are very simple. First, why is the hon. member so glad that it took seven months? Second, why is he so glad that we are following in the tracks of the European Union?