Mr. Speaker, I do not think it would take a lot of intelligence to realize we do not start studying something which means the demise of our own economy and of our own constituents. The member talked about what he believes to be the fact that somehow the Quebec people have no say in monetary policy. I would like to point out the obvious. Some of the directors of the Bank of Canada come from the province of Quebec and Quebec does have a say in how we arrive at monetary policy.
We deal in foreign exchange relationships all the time. As a matter of fact I was surprised to learn the other day that the largest flow of American dollars outside of the United States is not in Canada but in the Soviet Union. People are using the American dollar as a source of foreign exchange in world denominated currency. That does not mean we have to be part of that hegemony of the American system. In fact foreign exchange conversion is quite healthy and quite easily done.
A lot of countries thought the American dollar was so wonderful that they were going to peg themselves to the American dollar and this would create stability within their own economies. We do not have to think back further than Southeast Asia and the Indonesian crisis and so forth and of countries which were unable to make it. Brazil just devalued its currency. Countries could not maintain that support level because it was artificial.
The reality is that if countries cannot adjust the foreign exchange rate domestically, someone will do it for them by the loss of jobs, by high interest rates. It would be a brutal and costly tool to inflict on their own population.