Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to my hon. friend's speech, even that final quote.
Worker displacement, research and development, innovation, a fisheries transition initiative: these are all things that the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador was asking for, and these are all things that we are perfectly willing to work with the province together for on this fund. We have committed to this fund and we have budgeted for this fund. Even in the letter the hon. member just cited and all throughout our correspondence with the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, all of which was released by the previous premier, it says “up to $400 million”—“up to”.
We have referenced some of the various initiatives that could be funded under the fund, but there is not a person in this place who would say that a compensation fund should be accessed without some measure of impact. We have committed to being flexible in how that looks and how we measure the impact. For example, we have not tied a specific loss of a job to funding for that specific loss, but we have said that there has to be a measurement of impact. We have said that publicly and with the premier.
I was pleased that the Prime Minister met with Premier Davis, but he was very clear that for a compensation fund, there has to be a measure of loss. The hon. member is a lawyer, and he would know this. We as a government, through the CETA, have negotiated compensation funds with both the pharmaceutical and dairy sectors, but there has to be a measure of loss.
Does the hon. member honestly believe that there could be an expectation of a $400 million compensation fund with no way to measure that compensation? That is what we are talking about here today. CETA is tremendous for Newfoundland and Labrador, and this fund is there in case there is any impact whatsoever on the province as a result of giving up minimum processing requirements.