Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for Mississauga—Brampton South for his question. Unfortunately, he is not going to like my response because I have to repeat the issue of the Liberal involvement in the softwood sellout. If the Liberal Party had chosen to work with the NDP, it would have been able to stop the softwood sellout.
The former Liberal minister crossed the floor with the original draft softwood sellout that came from the Liberal Party and brought it over to the Conservatives. I realize he was not a member of the trade committee at the time and that is unfortunate, but the Liberal trade committee members pushed with the Conservatives to get it through, despite the consequences. They wanted to get it through no matter how many thousands of jobs were lost, no matter how they compromised Canada's position.
We actually won in the Court of International Trade, so the Americans were obliged to pay every single penny back. We were a few months away from the finish line of winning every single cent back and unimpeded access to the American market, and the Conservatives, instead of saying, “We now have a court decision that gives every penny back, subject to one appeal”, blew it up and destroyed it because they simply did not understand the file. The Liberals on the trade committee helped get it through. Liberals in the Senate then adopted it, when they could have stopped it.
Unfortunately, I cannot give the answer the member is looking for. The results have been disastrous. Why did the Liberal Party not try to work with the NDP to stop this deplorable, reckless--