Madam Speaker, I agree with the concerns my friend has raised.
These freighters may look pretty sitting out there in English Bay riding high at anchor, but they are costing prairie farmers a lot of money when they are not moving. That is the problem. The government just does not get it.
A couple of years ago during the winter we had huge problems with the shipment of grain. The rail lines were not operating properly. The money was not there although taxes were high. The government is simply ignoring the very critical transportation problem on the west coast.
Sooner or later we will wake up one day and the grain will be going south of the border, in which case we will be short a huge number of jobs in western Canada and a lot of money. A lot of people will be out of work. We simply do not need that. We need action from the government on this very critical issue.