Mr. Speaker, the parliamentary secretary used disingenuousness, bordering on dishonesty. He read a phrase without giving the second part of the sentence. When he said, and it is very true, that water in its natural state is not a good under NAFTA, he left out the second part of the sentence, which is that once it is treated as a good it does fall under NAFTA.
That is the unbelievable attempt by the Conservatives to try to mix up a debate that they clearly do not understand.
This is something that Liberals took no action on, and now we see the Conservatives, in the most disingenuous way possible, trying to pretend that because it is in a natural state now they do not need to worry about the fact that once water exports starts we cannot stop them and foreign investors are actually entitled to compensation from Canadian taxpayers. They clearly do not understand the issue.
They throw around black helicopters, which seems to be an obsession on the Conservative side of the House. I do not understand it and I do not think anyone watching here today would understand it either so I will leave that point aside. However, I will go back to NAFTA.
Statistics Canada says very clearly that since the signing of the Canada-U.S. free trade agreement in 1989, 80% of Canadian families are actually earning less in real terms. Yesterday, thousands of laid off workers who have lost their jobs came before Parliament Hill.
My question is very simple. What is it about the Conservatives that they do not understand simple issues like water exports, job losses and the fact that their economic policies have failed and most Canadian families are doing worse now than they were 18 years ago?