Mr. Speaker, in 1997, when I was Minister of Human Resources Development, I received a mandate to negotiate parental leave. I tried to resolve this issue in 1997. If it has taken so long, it is perhaps because, in 1997, the Quebec government did not make budget decisions that would have allowed Quebec to implement a parental leave program.
If the Quebec government wants to provide a more generous program, we encourage it to do so. The Canadian government is a strong believer in this federalism which is a kind of race toward better programs, where the experience of one jurisdiction will benefit other jurisdictions.
We are delighted with this. This is what happened in 1997. We were completely open-minded, and we made a generous financial offer to the Quebec government, but Mr. Landry did not want to allow Ms. Marois to allocate the necessary additional funds to implement such a program.