Mr. Speaker, I applaud the government's confident and aggressive trade initiative. Trade barriers limit growth, productivity and prosperity, while reducing overall employment.
In 2007, shortly after Alberta and B.C. established a trade investment and labour mobility agreement, I proposed a more sweeping national plan entitled “Completing Confederation” for the government's consideration. Picking up on this important and still outstanding initiative, a coalition of business groups has written the Minister of Industry highlighting that barriers between Canada's provinces continue, even as we celebrate the Canada-Europe free trade agreement.
Will the minister engage his provincial counterparts and seek to end these ill-conceived interprovincial trade barriers?