Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the fact that the member's party has brought this motion to the floor of the House today, which I fully support.
When we had the SARS crisis, the government responded immediately to deal with the problem, and rightfully so. When Ontario had the 72 hour power outage, which created great havoc, a committee was struck immediately to deal with that serious tragedy.
Could the member explain to me why the Liberal government, which showed so much concern at the right time for different events, has yet to strike a committee of Canadians, Americans, politicians and industry on either side of the border to deal with this devastating problem? Why has the government done nothing when in other instances, such as SARS and the power outage, it was quick to react?
A lot of ranchers in my riding, and myself included, would say that it has been five months and there still is nothing but a lot of blah, blah, blah. By the time they get their forms filled in and make application to the department of the agriculture minister in Ottawa, they will be broke. Why does the government hesitate to jump on problems in this area? It was quick on others--