Mr. Speaker, at this time Canadians are very much united in grief with the United States and are determined to help bring the criminals of the recent terrible atrocity to justice. In the midst of that kind of outpouring of unity with our American friends, neighbours and relatives, we do realistically find ourselves with some bilateral problems that have to be addressed.
My hon. colleague, the member for Cumberland--Colchester, has been very determined in highlighting these questions and raising these concerns.
Canada is acting on several fronts to try and resolve this unfortunate dispute. As he noted, it rears its ugly head every five years and Canada has to reprove its case. As you know, Mr. Speaker, since you represent a riding with tremendous lumber interests, we reprove the fact that we do not subsidize our softwood lumber, that in fact everything on our side is being done above board.
We call upon our American friends and neighbours to respect the desire for free trade in softwood lumber.
We are acting on several fronts, at the WTO, at NAFTA. As my colleague has mentioned, discussions are going on in Toronto today and over the next couple of days between Canadian and American officials to try and find the root causes of this problem, to find a solution outside litigation. We hope that will be the case.
As my colleague knows, the Prime Minister has personally raised this issue with President Bush. Just before the atrocity in Washington, the Minister for International Trade was there to speak personally with Mr. Zoellick and Mr. Evans. We will continue to move in every possible way to try and resolve this issue as amicably and as quickly as we can.