Madam Speaker, we are going back a few years. Falconbridge and Inco were talking about merging together to become the largest nickel mining company in the world. The community was thrilled and excited. People were talking about it everywhere. We were going to create synergies in our community. We were going to take the big trucks off our main streets. These two large companies were going to work together to create a better community for all, and unfortunately, the government sat on its hands and that deal failed.
What did we get? We got Xstrata coming in and taking over Falconbridge, talking about all the great things it was going to do for our community, and then it laid off 686 workers and shut down mines, but kept the high grade mines open because they pretty much cost zero dollars to operate. Vale on the other side, again, Inco and Falconbridge could have been creating all of these synergies but instead, there was a year-long strike that not only affected 3,000 families, but affected the mining supply and services sector which is 17,000 families in our community, which then affected our broader community overall. Our entire community was suffering. If only we could have gone back four years and gotten the government to stop sitting on its hands.