Mr. Speaker, I compliment the Bloc member on his speech. He described many of the problems Quebec has in the same terms that I would describe the problems in British Columbia. Half of the $11 billion trade in Canadian wood comes from British Columbia.
In addition to what the member said, it seems to me, though, that the main problem is simply the inability of Americans to want to compete with us on fair ground and the inability of the Canadian government to handle a consistent and well thought out trade position.
I think of the farming communities that we represented on the streets in Ottawa yesterday. Their lifeblood is being drained away trying to compete against subsidies. I think of the dumping of apples in British Columbia. I think of the recent Brazilian meat kerfuffle and a poorly thought out position by the Canadian government.
Canada has perhaps the highest efficiency lumber mills in the world. These mills do not only put out a train car of lumber a day. Medium size mills put out a trainload of lumber and know the value of every stick on the train as well.
We are told that we have difficulty with stumpage. This lie is being propagated by those who do not wish to compete on a fair playing field. There is no advantage in stumpages for our producers.
We have long roads over high mountains and deep swamps. We have the high costs of getting the raw materials to our mills. We have a situation now where mills are faced with an unfortunate choice because the weight restrictions are already on roads in British Columbia. The mills have yards full of logs and the unfortunate choice of having to mill them at a loss or leaving them stacked in the mill yards and swallowing the costs of getting them there. No one is making money in this regard.
I call upon the government to think about what it is doing and to understand that the issue is competition. It is hard to compete against people who benefit. It is not hard to understand how they avoid wanting to compete when the duties that Canada pays go as cash into their pockets.
In conclusion, what specific proposals would the member have for Quebec? They may be reminiscent of what we would need in British Columbia. What specific proposals would he have for the federal government as it talks to our U.S. trading partners about the issue?