Again, Mr. Speaker, the hon. member wants to lead off in a misleading way on 31 years, so I will come back to my original statement about the 31 sitting days that this agreement was tabled in the House. Why did the NDP and the Liberals shy away from debate? They had ample opportunity to debate this. They wanted to draw this out and make something more of it than it actually was. That ruse simply did not work.
As I said before, our government signed this agreement to help protect the interests of Canadian investors, particularly Canadian investors in China. I would point out that our government has brought transparency to the treaty process by tabling it in the House of Commons. It should be very clear that it was not the Conservative Party that chose not to debate it. It was the Conservative Party that chose to table it. It was the NDP that chose not to debate it in the House of Commons for the country to hear.
This is very similar to the other 24 investment treaties we signed with key trade and investment partners. It establishes clear rules for Canadian businesses when they are investing abroad.