Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his question and his reminder. Both were extremely important.
The missile defence shield project of the U.S. administration will be very costly. I would simply point out that the technology is not up to par. Many experts have agreed that the costs would be huge. And as I said earlier, the missile defence shield will be useful not necessarily to protect the United States but rather, with all the billions of dollars invested in that project, to ensure the technological predominance of the U.S. military industry. That is quite obvious.
What would be the impact on Canada? What would be the nature of such an impact, if there is to be one? The offset could be quite harmful in terms of foreign policy.
However, I just want to add—and that is why the hon. member's question was so interesting—that several experts recently said that, where the relationship between Canada and the United States is concerned, if Canada thinks that by yielding on some of the U.S. security concerns it can score points on trade issues, such as softwood lumber or mad cow disease, it is wrong, because those decisions are not made by the same people. The U.S. administration, whether at the Pentagon or in the White House, is responsible, of course, for defence decisions. But it does not have a say on trade issues, which are more closely related to what is being done in Congress.
In the process, we have to be careful not to be conciliatory to the point of losing sight of the interests of our citizens, our democracy and the freedom enjoyed by all Quebeckers and Canadians, just in the hope of quickly coming to an agreement on some trade issues. That would be a huge, a terrible mistake.
I thank my colleague for giving me the opportunity to make these comments.