Mr. Speaker, this issue has been the dominant issue in the Windsor-Detroit corridor since September 11, 2001. There is just no other issue at the same level of concern for the residents of Windsor and Essex County.
To answer directly the question that is being asked, I do not see an inherent conflict between the interests of the residents and businesses in the city of Windsor and the county of Essex and the international trade that moves within our municipal jurisdiction across that border in both directions.
What has happened is that the determination on the part of the U.S. government to place--I understand this and I am very careful about using these words--as an absolute its security above all other considerations has developed to such an extreme that it is imperilling the economic health of the region, and not just on the Canadian side of the border but on both sides of the border.
We have had studies done by the chambers of commerce on both sides showing losses, on an annual basis since September 11, on the Canadian side running between $5 billion and $7 billion annually to the general economy in southwestern Ontario, and losses of as much as $10 billion to the economy in the adjoining states on the American side, in Michigan, Ohio and Indiana.
I want to point something out. I can recall this and I am taking some pride in saying, “I told you so”. The big problem was that the American side was not putting money directly into the border services. On the Canadian side we had, if I can use this figure, 10 booths open and allowing traffic to move onto the Canadian side, and only 4 or 6 operating on the American side.
To show how effective this has been, the American side just recently opened four additional booths. They were operating at full capacity as of September of this year and for the first time in three years we have not had consistent backups at the border. It was a relatively simple solution. It is not the end of it, because we need another border crossing and there is no question of that in my mind. But there were some simple solutions and that was one of them. The mayor has more.
You are signalling me, Mr. Speaker, to stop talking. I will leave it at that.