Mr. Speaker, once again I am listening with fascination to this concurrence debate the Liberals are bringing forward.
If people back home were listening, they would be thinking that this is an emergency debate to respond to the fact that a couple of Conservative members are running for leadership on the question of supply management.
We did not end up having any emergency debate when Martha Hall Findlay, the trade critic for the Liberal Party, campaigned extensively to destroy supply management. John Manley, a long-time Liberal, has been outspoken on supply management.
In fact, we had a debate here just recently in the House. It was on a very clear question of whether we were going to support the dairy industry in dealing with diafiltered milk, and the Liberals voted against it.
What we are seeing here is an attempt to sort of change the clock and create the impression that the Liberals actually support the dairy industry. What we have heard from them this morning is how much they love cows, how much they love their neighbourhoods, and how much they love all the people who put food on our tables, but we are not hearing a single thing from them about committing to standing up for the dairy industry as it is being undermined by the international trade agreements the Liberals are signing.
I come from farm country, and we have large diary and cattle interests. If I went to a farmers meeting and told them how much I loved them, and expected them to love me back, they would put the run on me. They would ask what I was doing for the industry, because they are the backbone of the region.
We see the Liberals standing up promoting their love for farming, without doing anything to respond to the issue of the undermining of supply management, and trying to change the channel on the fact that they voted against supporting farmers. Why are they wasting our time in the House with this useless debate?