Madam Speaker, it is amusing to see the Conservatives and the Liberals bickering about which party is the bigger champion of free trade.
Let us not forget that in both cases, it is all the same. When the Liberals are in power, they negotiate free trade agreements, and the same is true of the Conservatives. If you ask me, their bickering is pretty pointless.
Both parties have something else in common, which distinguishes them from the NDP: they do not seem to care much about the quality and content of those agreements. In the debate between those two parties, there is a lot more discussion about the number of trade agreements concluded and much less about the impact those agreements are having.
It is important to remember that we need to study the effects of free trade agreements. The repercussions must lead to a much more specific vision. For instance, there has been some talk of the human rights aspect and the vision for the economy. For an agreement like the TPP, neither of the parties conducted any studies to examine how it would affect our economy.
I wonder whether my colleague could share his thoughts on the importance of seeing free trade agreements as a contract that we, as parliamentarians, must examine carefully in order to analyze all the clauses and provisions. Of course that includes all the fine print, which is often overlooked.