Madam Chair, since this is the first time I have had the opportunity to rise in the House since the October 21 federal election, I would like to take a moment to thank the people of Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères for once again placing their trust in me.
Before I talk in-depth about the issues, I first want to speak more generally about the supplementary estimates. There are things missing there that should normally be included. First, there is the compensation for our supply managed farmers. We have been talking about it for several months. A few days before a byelection, the Prime Minister went to Lac-Saint-Jean to tell our farmers that he would not open breaches in supply management. A few weeks after the election, we learned that more concessions would be made.
In fact, every international trade agreement, whether we are talking about the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement, CETA, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, TPP, or the new NAFTA, included breaches in supply management. For a government that claims to protect supply management, this is not a strong showing. Compensation has always been promised, but it is still difficult to obtain. We were told it was in the budget, but there was no funding. Now, we are being told that the money will be here by the end of the year, but when we look at the votes, we see that there is still no money for supply-managed producers.
Could the minister explain why there is no money in the supplementary estimates to compensate farmers?