Mr. Speaker, we began to further address the challenges of putting in place a farm safety net program for Canadian farmers many months ago. Last fall as members know we added the AIDA program to that.
I am pleased to say that in the last few days applications from all of the provinces are coming in at a very good rate. I had a discussion with all of my provincial counterparts yesterday. They said that they are pleased with that, bar none, including the minister of agriculture from Saskatchewan and the minister of agriculture from Manitoba. They say that we will continue on course for 1998 and continue our other discussions—