Mr. Speaker, again I agree that the government's direction might not be the right one, and that is why we need to make sure it goes to committee. However, we need Conservatives to be open-minded. Unfortunately, it has been very difficult to get an open-minded Conservative at committee.
The Conservatives see the summer coming, and they are trying to get as much under their belts as possible, but at what risk? We need to have proper debate on this bill. I can say that people have raised concerns.
According to Dominique Bernier of AmiEs de la Terre de Québec, this bill considerably weakens farmers' ancestral rights by forcing them to pay compensation to agro-industrial giants on the entirety of their harvest. However, the marketing of new crop varieties by the big breeders rests on a world heritage, the patient selection, over thousands of years, of crops by succeeding generations of farmers.
We heard from many witnesses on the changes that must be made to this bill, and when it is examined in committee, I hope that the Conservatives will listen to people's concerns and make the necessary improvements to the bill.