Mr. Speaker, there is no doubt that all Canadians should share the concern about contraband tobacco and keeping tobacco out of the hands of kids.
However, when we look at the record of both the Liberals and the Conservatives on this, probably the most effective thing that can be done is effective ports policing. When I talked to tobacco companies about this recently, they estimated that more than half of the contraband tobacco in our country came through the port of Vancouver from China and the fake was so good they even included excise stamps that looked legitimate.
In the 1990s, the Liberals eliminated the ports police in Vancouver and now the Conservatives have cut so far back on border services that my understanding is we do not check any containers coming into Vancouver unless we have a specific tip about a specific illegal substance being in that container.
Not providing resources has provided a much bigger loophole to drive contraband tobacco through than would have been the case before.