Mr. Speaker, the hon. member refers to edicts and decrees from the czar. What we are saying is that we are tired of secret, unaccountable tribunals telling us as elected representatives what we can do about our own future. Those are the real edicts and the real decrees the member should be concerned with.
More and more we are losing democracy and sovereignty to the hands of multinational corporations, which have the ability, under these so-called trade deals, to challenge environmental policies and to challenge our policies with respect to social programs, cultural programs and other programs. My colleague from Dartmouth can certainly speak eloquently to the concern that we have in the cultural sphere with issues like split run magazines and so on. That is the concern.
We are not saying that there is not an important role for rules in international trade. Of course there is, but we are saying that those rules should be set democratically by elected representatives of the people who consult with the communities they represent. They certainly should not be set by multinational corporations whose sole interest is the bottom line.