Mr. Speaker, the NDP is sensitive to concerns of competitiveness, but the question is how we measure those things and how we define those things.
What we saw with the previous government, of which the member was a supporter, was that the answer was always another tax cut, more deregulation, more privatization of services. It is a theme. We are seeing it in Manitoba under a Conservative government. We see it in Ontario under a Conservative government. Where there are Conservative governments, that is what we see. We see big corporate tax cuts, deregulation and privatization. That is not a way to protect the interests of Canadians.
When government is making policy and devising regulation, competitiveness has to be one of the concerns. However, it cannot be just asking corporate Canada to go out and regulate itself and expect that there will be optimal outcomes for Canadians. That is not the way it works.
I was at a presentation for the Day of Mourning in Winnipeg on Friday, and we heard about the early days of bringing in a factories act in Manitoba. Many of the same arguments were heard then, that there could not be a six-day workweek because that would hurt competitiveness, that kids under 16 could not be banned from working because it would not be competitive with other jurisdictions.
Progress was not made by ceding ground to those companies. Progress was made by making rules that were fair, that considered competitiveness as an important consideration but not the only one, and by implementing and enforcing those regulations.