Mr. Speaker, I would like to reassure the member that absolutely no deal or agreement has been made between the Conservative government and the Bloc Québécois. I will repeat what I just said. The Bloc Québécois is in favour of this bill because it updates the act that serves as the framework for the 1997 memorandum of agreement between the maritime provinces and the federal government. The protocol and the framework legislation were much more rigid.
We now have before us a situation where it is clear that the federal government is agreeing to compensate two provinces, Ontario and British Columbia, by removing the criterion of a loss of revenue of less than 5%, a criterion that Quebec did not meet. British Columbia and Ontario did not meet this criterion either.
We certainly believe that removing this criterion and modernizing the legislation will make it easier to reach an eventual agreement. We hope that Quebec and the federal government will reach an agreement as quickly as possible. However, there is no agreement in place and there is no guarantee that it will happen. The Bloc Québécois will continue to fight this battle in this House, in keeping with the unanimous resolution adopted by Quebec's National Assembly in February 2009.