Mr. Speaker, first I will give my thoughts on the high Canadian dollar.
A lot of exporters have been concerned about the high Canadian dollar but the high Canadian dollar has produced opportunities for importers as well. It has reduced the consumer's cost for electronics and a lot of other goods they buy. It has transferred jobs, perhaps to a degree, although I am not sure to what degree, from one sector of the economy to the other.
We cannot automatically assume that just because one sector of the economy is suffering that the entire economy is suffering. In fact, it is not. Things are still going pretty well in Canada. A lot of opinions have been expressed in the financial papers indicating that Canada's economy is doing really well compared to the United States despite the high dollar.
At the moment, retail stores are full of people buying stuff. It is a consumer environment right now. Prices on some goods are lower than they have been in a long time. That has a spinoff into the rest of the marketplace in terms of servicing equipment when it breaks down, redecorating homes, buying lamp fixtures, carpets. There are all sorts of ways that filters down into other parts of the economy. It also lowers the cost of equipment that manufacturers have to bring in to produce their product.
I used the example of my friend who manufactures special paint drying machines for the automotive industry. A lot of the components that he uses actually come in from other countries. Although his export market had to be adjusted, the cost of the base products coming in has gone down and he has been able to bring his prices down slightly, and that has offset the high Canadian dollar.
I do not think the impact is always as bad as people think. It is a much more complex situation than one can sum up in one or two sentences.