Mr. Speaker, with regard to the Dow AgroSciences LLC case against the government, and this came up I believe on August 25, 2008, I had a look at one of the articles by Meg Sears, who is an investigator for the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario. I thought it would be interesting to have the member's comment on her conclusion with regard to the matter now before the House in this report. She says:
The Dow challenge to the regulation of 2,4-D by Quebec directly challenges Canadians' ability to take precautionary measures to protect health and the environment. Trade agreement should bring signatories to higher levels of protection, not the opposite--
She goes on, but I think we can get the gist of her concern here. She concludes by saying:
I urge the Government of Canada to defend the rights of all levels of government to enact precautionary measures to protect health and the environment, and to ensure that NAFTA puts Canadians' health before multinational corporate profits.
For the layperson, I think that really capsulizes the issues now before us, and it does not surprise me that the majority of the Standing Committee on International Trade wants to defend the rights of Quebec in this matter.
What does concern me, however, is that the government does not support protecting the health rights before corporate profit. This is very disturbing to me. I am sure it is very disturbing to Canadians and I would hope that the member could maybe try to explain why the government has taken a position contrary to the majority of the committee.