Mr. Speaker, the point is well taken. This has not come up at the last minute. As a matter of fact, in the last Parliament, there was a national exit strategy with proposed funding of some $275 million.
Members will know that governments come and go, but the bureaucracy, particularly the departments, stays the same. The departments are still committed to it, but we would have to study this and find out. It is still there that there should be an exit strategy, but what is clear, since the government voted against this motion at committee and is speaking against it here in debate, is that the government has no interest whatsoever in introducing a tobacco exit strategy for these producers. It has no interest whatsoever.
It means that the producers should be concerned, because the money is not going to be there, the priority is not there, and the government has not started on it. Even when we raise it for a brief period of some three hours, the government has made it very clear that tobacco producers are on their own. Municipalities with tobacco producers are on their own. Provinces need not worry because the federal government is not going to come to them for any sharing of money. They are on their own.
I am not sure that Canadians will feel comfortable with a government which feels that people should just keep their money and take care of themselves, a government that does not care if they have a problem.