Honourable senators, I rise to speak to the report of the Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade on Bill C-282. We heard a great deal of debate on this yesterday, and I commend my colleagues for their passionate and articulate arguments. It is not my intention to rehash what was said yesterday, so I will be comparatively brief.

This report comes to us after a great deal of study in what I have to say was one of the more balanced studies I have had the pleasure of being a part of thus far in my seven years at the Senate.

I want to take this opportunity to first thank our committee leadership, staff and the sponsor and critic of this legislation who did an admirable job in seeing to it that it received appropriate review, all while dealing with more outside noise than many of us are accustomed to.

This report brings with it an important amendment and observation. On the former, I support Senator Harder’s amendment. As we heard, it would “de-risk” this legislation.

For reasons of which I will wait until third reading to elaborate on, I do not support this bill and think it will do more harm than good.

However, with this amendment, I believe some of those harms can be mitigated, at least in the short-term. It’s hard to argue that this amendment isn’t an appropriate step for the Senate to take. In my time here, this chamber hasn’t hesitated to amend legislation from the other place. I’ve seen a great deal of legislation sent back with amendments, both private member’s bills and government legislation. It’s wholly appropriate for this chamber to look at the bill before us and see areas for improvement. In fact, it’s our job, and that’s what this amendment does.

It improves this legislation by at least mitigating some of the damage it would do in the short-term, especially when it comes to the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement, or CUSMA, as our colleague Senator Coyle elaborated on quite well in her remarks yesterday.

This report also comes with an observation. As I was the one to bring this observation forward, I think it is quite appropriate. During our hearings, some of the more animated exchanges veered from the aims of this bill and instead turned to a debate around the policy of supply management. As this observation makes clear, whatever the fate of this legislation, the policy of supply management will remain unchanged.

If this bill passes, supply management will carry on as it did the day before. If this bill is defeated, our supply managed sectors will not be offered up at the trade table on a silver platter; no one is proposing that.

In our ensuing debate at third reading, it is crucial that we focus our thoughts and comments on whether this is a good piece of trade policy or not and that we will think about what such a step means for free trade and our Canadian economy as a whole — not just for our supply managed sectors, but also for the other 98% of our gross domestic product. This observation makes that clear.

Thank you colleagues, and I look forward to further discussion, debate and speaking at third reading.