Mr. Chair, I certainly thank the member for Peterborough for his excellent work on the finance committee in this House and for the people of Peterborough. He has been a tremendous advocate for those people in the great city and county of Peterborough as well.
I was surprised. The last part of the member's question was interesting. It was about the change in the NDP position. I am not quite sure what has happened, but the former finance critic, the member for Winnipeg North, who only a few months ago said:
[I am] convinced of the need for a national securities regulator—rather than the piecemeal provincial approach...Canada does not seem to have the tool box necessary to deal with corporate fraud.
I was not that surprised that the member for Winnipeg North took that position given the support of the National Union of Public and General Employees for the same idea and by CUPE, the Canadian Union of Public Employees, which said:
Canada's securities...regulators have a dismal record....Canadians have been embarrassed...that regulation and enforcement of securities crime in Canada is so weak--
We know that the Liberal Party supports a common securities regulator for Canada. Of course, we do on the government side of the House and for good reason. This is an economic union issue for Canada. We have relatively free flow of capital in the world today. In Canada we still have 13 securities regulators. This is inefficient, ineffective and, in fact, is a competitive disadvantage for Canada.
As the hon. member for Peterborough pointed out, two events have occurred in the last year that offer further support and reinforce the need for action on this agenda for a common securities regulator.
First of all, the issues related to non-bank backed asset-backed commercial paper where the entities were largely, if not solely, supposed to be regulated by provincial authorities in Canada. We regulate at the federal level the banks. We regulate substantially in the insurance sector, but we do not regulate in the securities sector. I think sometimes that is a surprise to many Canadians when they learn that we do not have a unity in terms of that regulation in Canada.
This is an issue with respect to what went on concerning non-bank backed asset-backed commercial paper. Also, the issue that was raised by my hon. friend from Peterborough has to do with neutral recognition of securities regulators around the world or free trade in securities.
Canada was taking a leading role on this issue in the G-7, not only within the G-7 but with other countries in the world including Australia and discussions with New Zealand and so on. This is a tremendous opportunity for Canada to take leadership with respect to mutual recognition of securities regulators and get a competitive advantage for Canada by taking that leading role.
Lo and behold, the SEC in the United States, because we have this plethora of securities regulators in Canada, decided to go ahead and have its initial negotiations preferring Australia over Canada despite the fact that we were the nation advocating the cause at the G-7. It is a great disappointment, quite frankly. I take no joy in this.
This is something that needs to be fixed and I look forward to discussing it further with my provincial and territorial colleagues over the next two days as we meet together in Montreal. Quite frankly, I think there is growing recognition among some of the provinces that this needs to be dealt with particularly in the area of enforcement.
When one looks at enforcement of securities regulation, money-laundering, anti-terrorist financing and so on, who is equipped to do that in Canada except the federal Government of Canada with the RCMP, CSIS, FINTRAC and so on. I hope we make some substantial progress going forward. I also look forward to receiving the report of the panel headed by the hon. Tom Hockin toward the end of this year. Then I look forward to moving forward on what is truly an important economic union issue for Canada.