Mr. Speaker, the remarks by my NDP colleague lead me to say the following. He is supporting a motion by the member for Saint John, who is a Progressive Conservative and does not usually think like a member of the NDP and vice versa. On this subject, however, be they from the west, British Columbia, the maritimes or Quebec, the members of the opposition parties are in agreement.
It is a rare thing to have a consensus among all the unions of the various regions of Canada and the members of the Canadian shipbuilders association, which represents the nine biggest shipyards in Canada.
As the NDP often takes stands on the number of jobs or employee rights, I have a question for my colleague. Did he notice, as I did, in thoroughly examining the shipyards issue, that none of the unions involved in shipbuilding, for the past four or five years, can be claimed to be protecting its collective agreements at all cost? Did he see the same thing?
The collective agreements are now very flexible. Workers have agreed to make considerable sacrifices, for example the ones in Lévis and the other shipyards I have visited. Studies show that members of the United Auto Workers, who are in the eastern shipyards especially, have pointed out—and the member for Trois-Rivières did too—that salaries and collective agreements are not the issue. In this case, the workers cannot be blamed for the situation.
I want to know whether the member shares this position, whether he has seen what I have in terms of the effort put out by the workers in Canada's shipyards.