Mr. Speaker, if the hon. member had been paying attention at the standing committee when I was there not too many weeks ago, I explained very clearly that this was one of the approaches we were taking in the agriculture policy framework we were developing with the provinces to regionalize the country. If we ever get into the unfortunate situation of a foreign animal disease outbreak or tuberculosis, we will be able to regionalize it and continue to have the free status that we have at the present time.
In the House of Commons on March 15th, 2002. See this statement in context.