Mr. Speaker, I think our society has suffered, and in fact is still suffering, from the negative effects of neo-liberalism. People believed that simply opening up trade would solve all the problems. People thought poverty would disappear with open markets. People believed that products would suddenly be much better. We know that, in reality, that is not how it works. We have seen it in the past and we must remember that.
We have some concrete examples from before globalization. Here, at the beginning of the 20th century, workers, people who were worried about their own environment, fought hard battles just to obtain the slightest protection. They earned those things, which improved our quality of life.
I think it is important to learn from the current example of the toys. This is the obvious factor to consider: if a toy is dangerous for our children, we want to ban that kind of toy.
There is another, less obvious factor, which is not as much of a concern for us, because it affects us less. The person at the other end of the production line making those goods probably earns $1 an hour and works in terrible conditions that might even pose a danger to his or her health.
In the months and years to come, we will have to develop the control mechanisms identified around the world to guarantee the quality of products. Quebec and Canadian businesses and workers are ready to compete against the entire world as long as the playing field is level. If not, the environment will suffer and we will be moving away from the desired results. We lower the bar when we allow people to manufacture goods with inadequate consideration for the environment and for inadequate wages. As a result, our citizens who fought for decent wages and decent working conditions are forced to accept unacceptable working conditions.
We have to try to reverse this trend. We have to find original approaches, such as this bill, for dealing with hazardous goods. But we must also give some consideration to labour relations and working conditions of people all over the world.
This affects our families and our daily lives. However, we have to have the same consideration for an individual who, thousands of kilometres away, is forced to work for wretched wages because in Canada we drink their coffee and eat bananas produced elsewhere because we want to pay as little as possible for these goods.
We will have to move from a free trade system to a fair market, and that should become the rule in international agreements. We have work to do on that front.
As the saying goes, you have to eat an elephant one bite at a time. We have taken a step in the area of hazardous goods. In the months and years to come, we should be open to the idea of additional legislation to protect our working conditions.