Mr. Speaker, I congratulate the parliamentary secretary, the member of Parliament for Don Valley West, and the former parliamentary secretary, the MP for Parkdale-High Park.
I suppose the Reform Party does not really understand exactly what the hon. member was talking about. I wanted to point out that the hon. member for Don Valley West was referring to the great business relationships that many Canadians have with Cuba.
I want to put on the record that when Canada was trying to manage its ocean resources through the United Nations, an organization called the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization was
formed. It was Cuba that joined with Canada. Cuba joined and the United States refused.
Canada had a crisis in its fishery on the nose and tail of the Grand Banks, which we all know about. An organization was formed made up of Japan, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and the European Community, every nation, but the United States refused to participate.
Cuba joined when Canada wanted to meet its responsibilities for conservation and each one of these times business relationships were struck up. When Canada wanted the scientific information from the oceans, the United States of America refused. Cuba is the only country on this side of the Atlantic where we have observers aboard all of its vessels. Just imagine, in international waters. Cuba volunteered and said it would put up the money for that scientific evaluation. The list goes on.
With the United Nations today there is a requirement that Canada must form an organization of all of the nations which exploit the ocean resources off the east coast of Canada in order to manage the resource. There are meetings every year in Halifax, Nova Scotia. What happened? The United States refused to belong. Cuba said yes and sends its representatives.
That is what the hon. member is talking about. It is all of these relationships that have been built up between companies, businesses and the scientific community. All of a sudden in my riding Cubana lands at Gander airport. Everybody who has developed a relationship with Cuba-which the Reform Party does not understand anything about-is now under the gun under the Helms-Burton legislation. That is what the hon. member is talking about. Perhaps he could further refer to his opinions regarding this matter.