A message for Canadian trade unionists as well as for the working class of Canada, for all workers, is that we have set up a union collective, which is a minority within all of the unions of the country. However, we have opened up more and more areas, more and more spaces, to the extent that we see that information that is taken outside of the country is being twisted, and this is done by the leaders of working centres. I'm talking about the leaders, because not all Colombian workers think the way they do, that as a result of Colombia's violating human rights and labour rights, it's not worthy of a free trade agreement.
These voices to the effect that the Colombian workers do not want the free trade agreement do not represent the great majority of workers of the country, who meet in small and medium-sized businesses, who don't have an opportunity to be unionized, who are not represented every year in order to define a minimum wage, because they're a minority that participate a minority of unorganized workers.
As my colleague Walter was saying, out of the 18 million of us in the working force in the country, only 800,000 are organized. Of the 800,000, we represent only 10%, but we have been growing stronger in the country. We have had sufficient moral authority in order to be able to say that not all Colombian workers are against the free trade agreement. On the contrary, the great majority feel that we need a free trade agreement.
This is a brotherly voice. It's in solidarity. This is a message that we send to Canadian workers who are duly represented through you, members of Parliament. We hope for that cooperation, we hope for that approval, which is very necessary for our country so that we can advance with development plans, so that we can create jobs, which is what we need. Because of all these problems with our neighbours we really need to export our products beyond our borders, with the support of the international community.