Mr. Speaker, the short answer, of course, is when our government put together the Canada-Europe free trade agreement, we also put together a package that not only ensured the continuation of supply management for the benefit of those agricultural producers but also gave other opportunities to other agricultural producers.
I am not so sure that the supply-managed sector is content that they are as protected under the current government as they were under us, but we will have to wait and see, and hope for the best.
I just want to make a general observation about agriculture and supply management. I never actually found, in all my discussions with trade ministers from over 50 countries, with the exception of one, a guy who was a former trade negotiator, that they were concerned about agriculture. Agriculture is a sensitivity in every single country except for Singapore. They all have their own agricultural sector that is not unlike ours, with their own sensitivities and their own concerns. Of course if there is a highly visible sector, making known that they are concerned, then trade negotiators jump on that issue.
Supply management is something that troubles trade negotiators. It does not trouble politicians. That is why we felt confident and comfortable all the way through in saying that we would protect the future of supply management. We assured that that was indeed the case in the agreement, whether the compensatory aspects for the very small increase in exports of supply-managed products in Canada are adequate. I know that our government had the full support from the sector with what we arrived at. Whether they can count on that with the new government, I am not so sure.