Mr. Speaker, the member for Churchill and the member for Malpeque gave excellent speeches on this motion. Taxpayers are already on the hook for costs as a result of the closing of these six prison farms. Evidently the cost of replacing the milk that the prison farms produce in Ontario alone to 11 facilities is pegged at around $990,000. I assume that would be on an annual basis.
Prison farms also have a very valuable role to play in the Kingston area because there is a slaughterhouse and it is the only one between Montreal and Toronto. Many farmers in that area are concerned that they will lose the slaughterhouse facility. There are many ramifications that the government has not considered in taking on this measure, totally a wrong-headed measure and a measure that hopefully we can reverse once we get rid of the government.