Mr. Chair, the hon. minister is creating straw men when he seems to suggest that there are still those who are deeply critical of free trade. I think there is no doubt that as a society we recognize the benefits of free trade. We know that it leads to economic advancement, and so on and so forth. But what is important, at least from my point of view as a Liberal, is that we have intelligent and strategic free trade.
That brings me to an issue about which I would like to ask the member: the issue of the municipal water services sector under these negotiations. As we have heard, European companies would like to have access to our municipal water services sector. They would like to bid on public-private partnerships as some municipalities decide to go that route.
However, many municipalities are concerned that they will be forced to accept bids from foreign water services companies such as Veolia and Suez, and so on, and that when these companies win a bid and start managing a water filtration plant, for example, a drinking water plant and things go awry, as things have indeed done if one looks at what happened in Atlanta in 2003, it will be very difficult for these municipalities to exercise their sovereignty, to exercise democratic control and break contracts with these huge foreign water services companies. They are very concerned that this will lead to problems for them.
I have noted that the United States, even though it is a free trading nation, even though it believes deeply in free trade, would never open its water services sector to that kind of foreign competition.
So I would like to ask the minister why he thinks it is a good idea for Canada to do that when the United States will not.