Mr. Speaker, I came into the House today prepared to do battle, as it were, with the NDP and the idiocy of this particular motion that says that there is a problem and that we must address the problem.
There is no problem. The Government of Canada has absolutely no intention of entering into any agreement. As I said previously, through the International Boundary Waters Treaty Act, the Government of Canada prohibits the bulk removal of water from Canadian boundary water basins, including for the purpose of export.
The federal government's prohibition is both environmentally sound and consistent with Canada's international trade obligations. It builds on sound water management principles and the need to protect the integrity of Canada's watersheds.
The International Joint Commission has commended the Government of Canada for its action to prohibit bulk water removals.
In the case of the North American Free Trade Agreement, Canada, the United States and Mexico clarified, through a joint statement issued on December 2, 1993, that nothing in the agreement would oblige any NAFTA party to either exploit its water for commercial use or to begin exporting water in any form.
Water in its natural state is not a good and hence not subject to trade agreements. Tariff schedules do not define what is a good. They only determine what tariff applies to water that has been transformed into a good, that is bottled water.
The NAFTA has made all three partners more competitive by providing their firms with preferential access to markets and more than 431 million consumers.
An increasingly integrated market has stimulated capital flows, promoted the spread of technology and contributed to increasing productivity, higher wages, lower prices and more choices for consumers.
Canada's merchandise trade with its NAFTA partners has increased 122% since 1993, reaching $596.7 billion in 2006, accounting for 82.6% of Canada's total merchandise exports. The NAFTA has also had a positive impact on services and investment flows among the three countries.
Again I say to the NDP, on the question as to whether the Government of Canada is preparing to enter into negotiations to export its water into the United States, no. The Government of Canada has no intention of entering into negotiations on bulk water exports.
The NDP members subscribe to the wonderful theories about black helicopters and conspiracies because of a meeting that occurred somewhere. I think it was in Calgary or some such place. Of all things, the meeting was held behind closed doors and the press was not invited. People actually had a meeting to discuss bringing together the positive forces between Canada, the United States and Mexico under the NAFTA agreement and to bring together the synergism that occurs between those three nations, the economic, security and other issues that are common to those three nations. The NDP members continue to call this a conspiracy because, of all things, the meetings were held behind closed doors. I guess it just comes from the NDP members not having the capacity to ever form the Government of Canada.
The Liberals being the former government and our party being the current government, I do recognize that there are certain restrictions and constraints on any leader of any party that has the most members in the House. I also recognize that there are certain constrictions relating to the cabinet that he or she has chosen to form and the bureaucracy, the Privy Council Office and the Prime Minister's Office. However, that does not preclude any government from making choices as it sees fit to give direction. However, nonetheless, it is constrained by the terms and conditions of the agreements and the international treaties under which previous governments have entered.
Under those constraints, as I have already read, bulk water is not a commodity. It is not a merchandise.
I find it so unfortunate that the sincere and well-meaning people in my constituency, who I have listened to and talked to, are convinced that just because people make speeches, like some of the NDP speeches today in this House of Commons, no matter how badly informed those members are or how devoid of anything approaching fact they are, somehow we must listen.
In the speech by the member who spoke just before the last NDP member, her major concern was the fact that an American think tank said something, whatever it was that was said, and therefore it must be fact. That absolutely underscores my proposition that the conspiracy theory that the NDP are propagating here today is founded on absolutely nothing except fabrications around black helicopters.
If we were to follow, and heaven forbid that we would, what the NDP members are talking about, do they actually believe that when the NAFTA is opened for this issue the other parties that are covered under NAFTA would not open it up for one, two, five, fifty, one hundred or five thousand other amendments that they would want? Of course they would.
The worst thing in the world that could happen with the NAFTA, particularly frivolously, as this motion is, would be to open it up for a frivolous, vexatious, useless, needless motion like this and then open up the entire floodgate of debate, discussion and renegotiation and put us back into morass.
Whether we like it or not, the fact is that up to 80% of Canada's exports and imports occur under NAFTA. Whether we like that or we do not like that, that is a fact. We are talking about over half a trillion dollars a year of imports and exports. These people, under this motion, would open up a half a trillion dollars a year of trade among our sovereign nations and all the jobs that means and all the issues that means to our joint societies over this frivolous, needless, useless fabrication of an idea.
There is no problem. I would suggest that they might want to take a look at Yogi Berra's axiom, which is, “If it ain't broke, don't fix it”.
