Mr. Speaker, I am extremely grateful to my colleague from Joliette for his support for this motion, but more importantly for the excellent lesson he has given us today so that we are able to understand the situation properly. We have been listening to one of our most valuable spokespeople, who is in fact the international trade critic. In that capacity, he went to Hong Kong in the middle of the election campaign to defend the interests of the agricultural producers of Quebec.
I would like to put this question to my colleague from Joliette, who talked about being isolated. On November 22 of last year, when the Bloc Québécois motion affirming that no compromise should be made regarding supply management was passed, I think that Canada was isolated. In Hong Kong, in front of all the other WTO member countries, Canada was the only one to offer a vigorous defence of supply management, thanks to the Bloc Québécois motion. My colleague was there and I would like him to tell me about it. I can say that during the election campaign we received very positive messages from our agricultural producers in this regard.
How is being isolated, being the only one taking a position, a position of weakness? Today, as we speak, right now in June, that motion is still in effect and carries weight with the other countries. All we did was put our foot down and say that we were adamant about protecting our system. In fact, as my colleague said, the other countries do this when it comes to other issues, or on agricultural questions, but based on how they operate.
The Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food should not be expressing any concern about the possibility that we will some day find ourselves the only ones who want to protect a system. On the contrary, we must not react to this with fear. We must put our foot down, show some backbone and defend the supply management system as the dairy producers of Quebec are asking be done.