Committees of the House  Too dumb to get it. That has been the message of the government.

Committees of the House  Mr. Speaker, I made sure I did not call anyone in particular a buzzard. I was referring to the general term. Would I call it a murder of crows or a flock but perhaps flock is not correct? I will not use that expression a second time, as long as I got it in the first two times I will be pleased.

Committees of the House  Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise to discuss this issue today. I think it is a very important issue and I thank my colleague from the Bloc for bringing this forward today. When we are talking about a commitment that was made to museums, we have to place it in context of the political rollout that has happened with these cuts.

Committees of the House  Mr. Speaker, I listened to my hon. colleague's speech. It says in the good book to make yes mean yes and no mean no, so I would like a fairly straightforward answer. When the President of the Treasury Board described the cuts, he said they were going after wasteful, inefficient programs that were completely out of touch with average Canadians.

Committees of the House  Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague has been a strong fighter for cultural issues in the House. We have sat together in the heritage committee, in which the issues of museums have been discussed for a number of years. It is my very clear understanding that the work on the issues toward new museum policy has been done, as has the input into it.

Canadian Heritage  Mr. Speaker, The Globe and Mail is reporting that the PMO has instructed our diplomats not to use the word “culture”. Instead, they have been given the bizarre instructions to use the phrase “acts of public diplomacy”. Culture is a multi-billion dollar a year business in films, books and magazines.

Softwood Lumber Products Export Charge Act, 2006  Mr.Speaker, what we have is a court decision that these tariffs were illegal and this government comes into this House and asks the members of Parliament to stand and vote on a new tariff to replace an illegal tariff that would add even more to that tariff. The government then puts in a predatory clause to go after the companies that continue to stand up for their legal rights and collect even more tariffs.

Softwood Lumber Products Export Charge Act, 2006  Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to my colleague's dissertation and I share his concern about other industrial sectors across Canada being undermined by the government if we see the template for softwood being utilized. What strikes me about this agreement was the necessity for haste.

Points of Order  Mr. Speaker, when I was asking the defence minister about his decision to axe the security rescue initiative fund, he said that I was making outrageous accusations that could not be verified. He doubted the veracity of the document I was referring to. I would like to table that document for the House because I think it is important.

National Defence  Mr. Speaker, this past week emergency response teams from Ontario were shocked to learn that the Minister of National Defence had axed support for the search and rescue initiative in Ontario. This program is vital for providing our emergency teams the tools they need. Get this: he axed the funds for Ontario because the submission was a single day late even though the defence department knew that Ontario's Queen's Park had been shut down by a virus on that day.

National Defence  Mr. Speaker, far be it from me to expect the minister to take my word for it. I will quote Mr. Julian Fantino, who wrote the minister two days ago. I ask members to listen to what Mr. Fantino says about this program under this minister's watch. He talks about “the lack of flexibility and understanding” and the “conflicting directions”.

Liberal Leadership Campaign  Mr. Speaker, we are learning today from the media that the ballots are being counted again from super weekend in Quebec. Let us see how super it was. In the last convention the Liberal Party claimed 500,000 members. Now the party is claiming 200,000 members. The fascinating thing is when we look at the details in that story that only 10% of Liberals in Quebec even bothered to come out and support.

Softwood Lumber Products Export Charge Act, 2006  Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for pointing this out. It is a very interesting question because we were looking at the final stages, the final two legal hurdles. We have won in every court dispute. We have the legal precedents behind us. Our Prime Minister said we were looking at seven more years of litigation.

Softwood Lumber Products Export Charge Act, 2006  Mr. Speaker, the consultation process was very clear. This is a government that said to the United States, “Look, we want a quick and dirty deal. What do we have to do?” and the United States said, “Here, sign this”. That was the end of consultation. We asked the industry, where were they?

Softwood Lumber Products Export Charge Act, 2006  Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to represent the New Democratic Party and the people of Timmins—James Bay who are very dependent on forestry products and the forestry industry for the economic viability of our region. I am pleased to be speaking on their behalf on this bill. The House of Commons is somewhat like a surreal theatre because we have on any given day, on any given number of bills, 300 people in the House, half of whom act like Chicken Little, that the sky is falling, and the other half who say life has never been better.