Mr. Speaker, I understand that my friend, my hon. colleague, and I have our disagreements about how we can make our country prosperous by unleashing our natural resources. I want to unleash natural resources to help Quebeckers and to help the province of Quebec succeed in this country and this world. Their ports, their energy, their infrastructure and their industriousness are incredible and should play a bigger part in our country's self-reliance and sovereignty.
However, I also agree with our colleague about the smokescreen in Washington. It is interesting that the Prime Minister put up a strong front during the campaign about how he was going to challenge Donald Trump and achieve a trade deal, but within minutes he took a different position altogether. In fact he has conceded to the President and to the United States on tariffs, on investment in America and on everything the President really wants, but he is not driving toward concluding a deal. In fact he is weakening the Canadian position by not definitively delivering the resources this country needs to be independent of American leverage.
Canada wants a good partnership with the United States ultimately, and we will always focus on negotiating a good deal, but we can do so only from a position of strength.