Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to see the continued support of the member and his colleagues on this important matter. His colleagues who serve on the health committee have done great work on the bill, in advancing it and in making sure that it meets its intended purposes. Witnesses appeared before the committee and they were questioned thoroughly, I can assure the member and the House.
One of the things which I think is important, and perhaps the member recognizes this and could give us an example, is our competitiveness and competitors in the food industry, be they producers, transformers or manufacturers of final products. We have a joint process and work in harmony with the United States, which makes sense because, as the member mentioned, the U.S. is our primary trading partner. We do evaluation of new pest control products together. It makes sense rather than both countries doing it independently and going through our own processes. We have a harmonized process.
Under our current regulations after that process determines its safety, we go through the regulatory amendment process to get the maximum level residue in our regulations. Those regulations have to be gazetted. We have to hear from the public. We have to have the second round of consultations. Then there is approval at the end by Treasury Board. This process can take a couple of years.
These intramarketing agreements permit after the science has been done and after the harmonized evaluation process has determined that it is safe, that they can be put on the market, but the process still continues. They are still gazetted, the maximum levels. The public can have a second round of comments and there can be further considerations.
Would the member not agree that this is a better way for our industry to participate and compete with our American trading partners and make sure that the safety of Canadians continues to be protected in a very transparent fashion?