Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for this very relevant question. This is another issue that we have to tackle. This is what I mean by franchising. We will not have jobs, but only consolation prizes, because we do not get the intellectual property. They are going to tell us that other contracts are coming and that we have to look at it as a whole. I totally disagree. We have to look at it one piece of equipment at a time: Deal or no deal.
It is just like the television show Deal or no deal. As far as I am concerned, it should have been “No deal”. We only get some consolation prizes. This is the first time I have seen us being forced to accept a consolation prize. It might not be your experience, but it is the first time that I see us settling for the consolation prize.
The government has given up its power and told foreign companies, “You take care of it and we will thank you for giving us peanuts”. That is so nice. It is so worthwhile.
The industry will work well once we have the intellectual property. I do not want any consolation prizes. I want to make sure that we can have regeneration models that will give us the tools we need to achieve our full potential across the country.
The reason we have an aerospace industry is that a government, which was our government back then, made some decisions. Remember what happened in Jean Chrétien's day, in 1974. The Challenger went to Canadair. It was normal, it was fine. Political decisions were made because a minister of Industry took a stand and said that from then on the aerospace industry would be important for us.
I look at what the Conservatives are doing now and I remember the Avro Arrow project under Mr. Diefenbaker, when we abandoned the technology.
We gave it all back and now we will once more be at the mercy of others. What a great foreign policy!