Response to Question - February 4th, 2004

Hon. Scott Brison (Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister (Canada-U.S.), Lib.): Madam Chair, I want to commend the hon. member for Huron—Bruce for his interventions tonight. This is an important debate for farmers and families in Kings—Hants and, in fact, for all Canadians. It is great to see the non-partisan spirit of cooperation here tonight as we are addressing a very important issue.

President Bush's statement in Monterrey and his recognition that this is a Canada-U.S. issue and not specifically a Canadian issue, but that it is an integrated industry, and that because of the fact that it is an integrated industry, Canadian and U.S. administrations, the public service and the industry have to work together to find a way to address this issue and then to jointly work together to defend our integrated industry around the world, I thought was very positive. It is also positive to see the cooperation at the public service level and the fact that the U.S. agencies have upgraded their standards to match Canadian standards.

That being the case, particularly in an election year in the U.S., there is a great deal of fear that this will be politicized more and more in the coming months at the congressional level.

While we are seeing great progress at the administration level between the Prime Minister and the president on this issue, I would appreciate the hon. member's feedback on the importance of dialogue between Canadian and U.S. legislators and between parliamentarians and congressional representatives in the coming months, and the fact that it ought to be a multi-partisan effort between Canadian and U.S. legislators in the coming months. That is something that is a priority for myself in my role but it is also one that I would appreciate the hon. member's feedback on as someone who is very involved in this issue.

Mr. Paul Steckle (Huron-Bruce, Lib.): Madam Chair, I think my hon. colleague's question is very much in order and very appropriate given the circumstances of the past 24 months or so in this country and the attitudes that have prevailed between the countries both north and south. It is important.

The Prime Minister has taken the initiative already by indicating that there needs to be greater dialogue between not only the leaders but from a committee standpoint. The Americans have an agriculture committee and we have an all party committee. This goes across all party lines. As Canadians we need to identify the kinds of concerns we have because, basically, Canadian farmers are not much different than American farmers and Canadian politicians are not that much different either for that matter.

Sometimes it is pretty hard to separate the science and the politics but I think we need to go beyond all of those things. I do not believe that one cow, either an American cow or a Canadian cow, should cause us to close our borders. In an integrated industry we need transparency and we need identification, and Canada has done very well in doing that. In fact, the Americans are looking at us as the model to follow in terms of how we do that, particularly in the way they did their peer review work.