Mr. Speaker, obviously I do not have a clue as to where the member is coming from with some of his ridiculous allegations and some of the rhetoric that he is coming up with.
Let us talk a little about the termination clause. He likes to act as though the agreement is only 18 months. Nothing could be further from the truth. The deal is seven to nine years very clearly.
Let us point out that he does not like this agreement. We know that because he is always telling us this, but he was always asking for a longer termination clause to get out of something that he did not even like, so none of that conversation ever made sense.
I also find it a little rich for him to always be saying that we should be supporting chapter 19, when he clearly heard that chapter 19 was never to apply to softwood lumber. Standing up and defending chapter 19 of NAFTA was a bit rich to hear coming from the NDP. Am I to assume that if any other free trade agreements come forward, we have his unconditional support on free trade now? I would like to have an answer to that question.
For many years this dispute has been going on, 24 years in total. The last lawsuit was five years ago. The hon. member is trying to mislead industry into thinking that if we just win this one last lawsuit, it will be all over, that we are going to have a great working relationship with the United States all of a sudden. That is not going to happen because the U.S. lumber coalition has told us no way, that if we do not have this deal, they will continue litigation for year after year. This is it. This is the last kick at the can. Because of our Prime Minister and our Minister of International Trade, we were able to secure a deal. Like the Prime Minister has always said, we can disagree with the Americans, but we do not always have to be disagreeable with them.
We have reached a deal that is in the best interests of Canadian industry. Over 90% of the industry is supporting this deal. All industry across the country will get 81% of the duties returned. All industry, 100% of the industry, will benefit from this agreement. Even the small percentage that did not sign on will reap the rewards of this agreement.
I ask the member to apply this to the union analogy. When 80% or 90% of union members vote in favour of what is in front of them, that other 10% is still going to get the benefits of that agreement. Maybe the hon. member needs to take a look at it from his own approach.