Mr. Speaker, on November 3, I asked a question in the following words:
It is not just the forest workers in Nanaimo—Alberni who are suffering from the iniquitous imposition of countervailing duties. In Abitibi, Mauricie, Beauce and Bois-Francs, too, people are waiting for a fair and equitable settlement. The Liberals have the distrust and disdain of the Americans. Today, their partisan choice will cost exporters dearly.
When, in fact, is the government going to return the overpayment to softwood lumber producers?
I asked that question on behalf of the forest workers in Abitibi, in Mauricie and in Beauce, as well as on behalf of the workers in Nanaimo--Alberni and on Vancouver Island who also have been hit hard by the softwood lumber problem.
This softwood lumber dispute has been going on longer than anyone can imagine. People are upset, and rightly so, with the action the government says it is taking because we do not see action and we do not see resolution.
People are upset by the Liberal government's anti-American comments coming down which certainly have not helped in solving the issue, especially the derogatory remarks made by the former Prime Minister's director of communications and by the member for Mississauga—Erindale, and with cabinet ministers brandishing their partisan support for the candidate who did not win in the U.S. election.
Concerns have been raised in the business community on the effects these outbursts have had on Canada-U.S. relations. Tom d'Aquino, president of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, said that our relationship was contaminated by Liberal anti-Americanism.
Perrin Beatty, president of the Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters Association, noted that Canada does $1 million a minute worth of business. He has better things to do with his time than try to explain to his American customers that the Liberal Party sentiment does not represent the rest of Canada.
We are concerned that not only has foot-dragging been a problem, but we have a real big problem now because we have tariffs, countervailing duties, anti-dumping duties that have cost our industry over $4 billion, $4.1 billion now, that are not being returned.
Because the government was asleep at the switch we missed a prime opportunity. Under chapter 19 of NAFTA we had the right to confront that Byrd amendment when it came in, that law in the U.S. which really has been sabotaging the dispute resolution process and allowing the Americans to hold our countervailing duties hostage. Those moneys should be coming back to our industry after the rulings we have already had under NAFTA, but because the government failed to act on the Byrd amendment, we are in this position now where they are holding some $4 billion of our industry's money.
Workers in our communities have been hurt hard. The government is making noises about getting some of that money back. There is $17 million that we could perhaps get back in tariffs on other products. The minister is making noises about trying to secure the $4 billion through putting tariffs on other U.S. products coming into Canada. In a sense it is going to hurt our own industry and our own people to get this money back.
We want to know what the government is going to do to get these tariffs back. Furthermore, I want to state that we have paid a terrible price in our communities because of this failure to adequately address this agreement. We have workers now who are basically unemployed. We have the Franklin River division in Port Alberni down. We have the Sproat Lake division that has recently closed down. There were another 200 workers there. We have another 200 workers in a pulp mill threatened; that is not directly related to this but it is in the same community.
Our communities have been hit hard. They want to know when this is going to be resolved and they would like some action on behalf of the government.