Bill C-69 (Historical)

An Act to enact the Impact Assessment Act and the Canadian Energy Regulator Act, to amend the Navigation Protection Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts

Part 1 enacts the Impact Assessment Act and repeals the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, 2012. Among other things, the Impact Assessment Act
(a) names the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada as the authority responsible for impact assessments;
(b) provides for a process for assessing the environmental, health, social and economic effects of designated projects with a view to preventing certain adverse effects and fostering sustainability;
(c) prohibits proponents, subject to certain conditions, from carrying out a designated project if the designated project is likely to cause certain environmental, health, social or economic effects, unless the Minister of the Environment or Governor in Council determines that those effects are in the public interest, taking into account the impacts on the rights of the Indigenous peoples of Canada, all effects that may be caused by the carrying out of the project, the extent to which the project contributes to sustainability and other factors;
(d) establishes a planning phase for a possible impact assessment of a designated project, which includes requirements to cooperate with and consult certain persons and entities and requirements with respect to public participation;
(e) authorizes the Minister to refer an impact assessment of a designated project to a review panel if he or she considers it in the public interest to do so, and requires that an impact assessment be referred to a review panel if the designated project includes physical activities that are regulated under the Nuclear Safety and Control Act, the Canadian Energy Regulator Act, the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Petroleum Resources Accord Implementation Act and the Canada–Newfoundland and Labrador Atlantic Accord Implementation Act;
(f) establishes time limits with respect to the planning phase, to impact assessments and to certain decisions, in order to ensure that impact assessments are conducted in a timely manner;
(g) provides for public participation and for funding to allow the public to participate in a meaningful manner;
(h) sets out the factors to be taken into account in conducting an impact assessment, including the impacts on the rights of the Indigenous peoples of Canada;
(i) provides for cooperation with certain jurisdictions, including Indigenous governing bodies, through the delegation of any part of an impact assessment, the joint establishment of a review panel or the substitution of another process for the impact assessment;
(j) provides for transparency in decision-making by requiring that the scientific and other information taken into account in an impact assessment, as well as the reasons for decisions, be made available to the public through a registry that is accessible via the Internet;
(k) provides that the Minister may set conditions, including with respect to mitigation measures, that must be implemented by the proponent of a designated project;
(l) provides for the assessment of cumulative effects of existing or future activities in a specific region through regional assessments and of federal policies, plans and programs, and of issues, that are relevant to the impact assessment of designated projects through strategic assessments; and
(m) sets out requirements for an assessment of environmental effects of non-designated projects that are on federal lands or that are to be carried out outside Canada.
Part 2 enacts the Canadian Energy Regulator Act, which establishes the Canadian Energy Regulator and sets out its composition, mandate and powers. The role of the Regulator is to regulate the exploitation, development and transportation of energy within Parliament’s jurisdiction.
The Canadian Energy Regulator Act, among other things,
(a) provides for the establishment of a Commission that is responsible for the adjudicative functions of the Regulator;
(b) ensures the safety and security of persons, energy facilities and abandoned facilities and the protection of property and the environment;
(c) provides for the regulation of pipelines, abandoned pipelines, and traffic, tolls and tariffs relating to the transmission of oil or gas through pipelines;
(d) provides for the regulation of international power lines and certain interprovincial power lines;
(e) provides for the regulation of renewable energy projects and power lines in Canada’s offshore;
(f) provides for the regulation of access to lands;
(g) provides for the regulation of the exportation of oil, gas and electricity and the interprovincial oil and gas trade; and
(h) sets out the process the Commission must follow before making, amending or revoking a declaration of a significant discovery or a commercial discovery under the Canada Oil and Gas Operations Act and the process for appealing a decision made by the Chief Conservation Officer or the Chief Safety Officer under that Act.
Part 2 also repeals the National Energy Board Act.
Part 3 amends the Navigation Protection Act to, among other things,
(a) rename it the Canadian Navigable Waters Act;
(b) provide a comprehensive definition of navigable water;
(c) require that, when making a decision under that Act, the Minister must consider any adverse effects that the decision may have on the rights of the Indigenous peoples of Canada;
(d) require that an owner apply for an approval for a major work in any navigable water if the work may interfere with navigation;
(e)  set out the factors that the Minister must consider when deciding whether to issue an approval;
(f) provide a process for addressing navigation-related concerns when an owner proposes to carry out a work in navigable waters that are not listed in the schedule;
(g) provide the Minister with powers to address obstructions in any navigable water;
(h) amend the criteria and process for adding a reference to a navigable water to the schedule;
(i) require that the Minister establish a registry; and
(j) provide for new measures for the administration and enforcement of the Act.
Part 4 makes consequential amendments to Acts of Parliament and regulations.

Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Atlantic Accord Implementation Act

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Madam Speaker, my hon. friend is right. Investors are looking at Bill C-49 and they are looking at Bill C-69. They see provisions in the bill before us that would give the very anti-resource Minister of Environment and the anti-resource Minister of Natural Resources power to arbitrarily kill projects, even after investors have invested billions. Who would invest billions into the country on any project knowing that at any time the same government that says it wants to phase out oil and gas can step in and kill a project on a whim for political gain?

This issue is no different, and we will continue to see a lack of investment in Canada while we have the current government in power.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Madam Speaker, that is an amusing question from the member for Winnipeg North. If we could hook up a windmill in front of him, his speaking time, I am sure, could power most of what the Liberals are proposing.

No one believes the Liberals have any intention of helping resource-developing provinces. Whether it is Bill C-50, which is going to have the emission cap and punish Newfoundland as well, Bill C-69, the no-new-pipeline bill, or banning ships off the B.C. coast, the Liberals have zero believability when they say they are there for resource-producing provinces. It is no different in this bill.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise to speak to Bill C-49. As I have mentioned in the House, I have had the pleasure of living across the country, from one side to the other, from Victoria to northern Alberta and even in Newfoundland for a while. Therefore, Bill C-49 hits a bit close for me, so I am very pleased to speak to it.

To sum up Newfoundland, I will tell members of an experience I had. One day in Edmonton, I was door knocking for the first campaign in 2015. A lot of Newfoundlanders live in my riding of Edmonton West, or as I call it, “Edmonton West Edmonton Mall”. A couple was in the garage. It was a hot day and the garage door was open. They were sitting having a beer inside their garage, and we started chatting. They said they were from Newfoundland, and I said I used to live in St. John's, so we started chatting. They invited me to have a beer, so I sat down with them. We had a nice beer together.

A couple of years later, during the horrible forest fires in Fort McMurray, where, of course, a lot of people from Newfoundland were living, the residents had to evacuate. This couple had taken in a couple from Fort McMurray, who also were Newfoundlanders. I was at an event one night at the Good Shepherd Church. It was a fundraising event. I ran into this couple, and they introduced me to this other couple who they were housing. They were complete strangers, but because they were Newfoundlanders, they were happy to take in this couple. We started chatting and they said they were from St. John's. I said that I used to live there and they asked where. I said I used to live on Bindon Place.

It turned out that they were my former neighbours. This couple lived in the lot right behind our house. Back then, if anyone has ever lived in St. John's, they would know it has very lovely winters with lots of snow. The first year I lived there, we had 22 feet of snow, a record amount of snow. It was not until June that I found out we actually had an eight-foot fence in our backyard. This couple was laughing about living behind us. I had to laugh because, at the time, we had this beautiful dog named Doonesbury. He was the world's greatest dog. He would wander on these huge snowbanks, from yard to yard because, of course, the snow was way above the fence. It turned out that he had often visited their yard to do his business, so it was years later that I had the opportunity to apologize for my dog.

There are a few things I would note about people from Newfoundland. They really never leave the rock. I worked in Fort McMurray for a while, and we had the largest club at the time, the Newfoundland club. When we would meet in Fort McMurray, they all had the same wish; they wanted to be able to go back home to work and to get good jobs, which of course were not available. That is why they were in Fort McMurray. When I lived in Newfoundland, every time I travelled to the mainland or away, usually to Nova Scotia where our regional office was, and then flew back to St. John's, I would land at about midnight at the airport, and there were always about 50 to 70 people, families holding up signs and welcoming back their family members, who were mostly coming from Alberta because of work. Since taking over this job nine years ago, I have probably returned to the Edmonton airport 300 to 400 times, and not once has anyone been waiting there for me with a sign. With Newfoundlanders, it was always like that. It was quite amazing.

It is a beautiful city. I enjoyed my time living there, although I cannot say the same about the weather with the massive amounts of snow. I remember that on the May long weekend, I was flying to Nova Scotia; I think it was May 21. The day before, in Halifax, there was a record high of 36°C. I was waiting in St. John's for my wife to come home with the car and drive me to the airport. We had a snowstorm, and she got the car stuck in the driveway in a snowbank. She walked in with our two kids, who were about one and two years old at the time. With tears streaming, she said that she was leaving me and was moving back to Victoria. That almost sums up the weather. However, I noticed a month later, in late June, that we were shovelling the snow in the driveway, and in the back of the house where there was sun, we were mowing the backyard. That is the weather in Newfoundland.

Everywhere I have lived, I have run into people from Newfoundland who want to get back to the rock, but they want good jobs. Bill C-49 I do not see delivering that. There are quite a few flaws in the bill. I want to go over some of them.

Clause 19 of Bill C-49 would open the door to more red tape and likely to delays. We have heard repeatedly about a lack of investment and productivity in this country. It takes 15 to 20 years to get a mine approval and years to get a housing approval. In Alberta, we see people not wanting to invest in the country because they know the red tape and the approval process make it so slow. Clause 19 is going to add to that and going to discourage investment. It would shift decision-making power and licence approvals to the federal and provincial ministers, while tripling the amount of time the decision can take.

The government often talks about how we need experts to make the decisions, yet this bill will take power away from experts and regulators and put it into the hands of the very partisan and biased natural resources minister. Can members imagine anyone who is involved in resource investment in this country looking at our current environment minister or natural resources minister and saying that Canada looks like a great place to invest in because they can trust their opinions? Of course not.

Clause 28 would give the federal minister, with the approval of the provincial minister, the power to outright ban drilling in certain areas and to even halt projects that are already approved and in progress. That sounds a bit like Kinder Morgan and Trans Mountain. That was approved, and it was going to spend billions of dollars just to find out that the government can retroactively change the rules. Who wants to invest in this environment? Who wants to create good jobs in this kind of an environment? If the bill were to pass with clause 28 as written, it would put an end to offshore petroleum drilling in Atlantic Canada, killing good-paying jobs for workers and further strengthening eastern Canada's dependence on foreign oil imports from dictatorships like Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

We have seen how the government treats resource projects in this country. Section 61 and 62 would invariably be abused by the government, and they would attach so many strings that approval for projects would become unfeasible. Does anyone remember energy east? We have TransCanada ready to spend billions of dollars so we can bring Alberta oil and Saskatchewan oil out east to get the eastern provinces off of U.S. oil and off of dictator oil. Instead, the government threw up so many roadblocks and changed the goalposts so many times, it ended up cancelling the project.

Section 61 and 62 would bring the unconstitutional Bill C-69 into the review process, allowing the minister to attach any conditions they see fit to an approval. Sections from the Impact Assessment Act, previously Bill C-69, also known as the no-new-pipeline bill, have been put into Bill C-49. On October 13, 2023, the Supreme Court ruled Bill C-69 largely unconstitutional. The federal government has not fixed those sections to date. If Bill C-49 is passed, as written, it would include 32 references to sections of Bill C-69 that the Supreme Court identified as unconstitutional.

Bill C-49 also includes the discretionary decision-making power of the minister and the entirety of the designated project scheme, both of which are unconstitutional, so components of Bill C-49 may also be unconstitutional. Section 64 of Bill C-69 was deemed unconstitutional, and is referenced throughout Bill C-49, which allows the minister to interfere in a project they think is in the public interest and create any conditions they deem necessary to which the project proponent must comply.

We, in Alberta, know full well what the government does to resource projects. We know full well how it works against resource projects. Of course, we had Bill C-50, the so-called just transition bill, which we called the unjust transition bill. It would be absolutely devastating to Alberta.

I want to give members some numbers the conference board put together. Bill C-50 would destroy 91,000 jobs in Alberta. That is a 58% increase in Alberta's jobless rate. There would be a decline in our GDP of almost 4%, and a 50% bigger hit than the 2008 financial crisis. Alberta revenue would be chopped up to $127 billion over 10 years. That is almost a 20% drop per year.

We see very clearly the Liberal government's intention toward our natural resources. It is kill the resources at all costs, send Canadians into poverty, hurt Alberta, hurt Newfoundland, and hurt resource-producing provinces, which is why we will not vote for Bill C-49.

[Tako Van Popta, Conservative, Langley—Aldergrove, BC]

Mr. Speaker, thank you for pointing that out.

Mr. Morneau said he had pointed out, on several occasions, to the Prime Minister that he had a focus on improving Canada's productivity. Mr. Morneau said, unfortunately, the Prime Minister was not interested in that. He was more interested in distributing wealth, rather than creating wealth.

I think that is one of the fundamental economic problems in Canada today. The person at the head, the Prime Minister, is not interested in these sorts of things. That is very evident with what we see in Bill C-49. There is no interest in talking about the things that drive our economy and that are going to improve our wealth and wealth for Atlantic Canadians.

What are the sorts of things that we can do to improve our productivity, our per capita GDP? We talked about investment already. Bill C-49, the old Bill C-69, scared investment away, and that needs to be reversed. The Conservative members are saying that we need to bring this bill back to committee. These are the sorts of things that we have to look for.

We also need to reduce red tape. That is another common-sense solution to Canada's lagging productivity. We need more innovation. We need to develop our natural resources.

I want to talk about something that is very important to my end of the country, the Pacific region, and that is liquid natural gas.

It was pointed out in earlier debates that Canada has an abundance of natural gas. That is how most western Canadians heat their homes and buildings, and it is used for a lot of our vehicles. Natural gas is much cleaner burning than coal or even oil.

The world wants it. How do we ship natural gas? We liquefy it, we put it into special containers and we ship it around the world. This is a proven technology, and Canada is ready and willing, but not able to do it because the Prime Minister has told other countries there is no business case for this. Unbelievable. He said there is no business case for liquid natural gas.

Other countries in the world, like the United States, for example, see that there is a business case. Where we dropped the ball, the Americans picked it up and they are supplying Europe with liquid natural gas, which is exactly what Canada should be doing. Our allies are asking for this kind of help. It is a perfect solution to their problems, to wean themselves off Russian natural gas, and it is a perfect opportunity for us to grow our economy and improve our productivity.

[Tako Van Popta, Conservative, Langley—Aldergrove, BC]

Mr. Speaker, tonight we are talking about Bill C-49, an act to amend the Newfoundland and Labrador Atlantic Accord. I am a member of Parliament from the other end of the country, the Pacific Coast, and it is a real honour for me to be joining in the debate about something that is so important to Canada. It goes to show that Canada really is a nation from sea to sea. I am from the other ocean, but it is wonderful to be here with my colleagues who are very knowledgeable about what happens on the Atlantic Coast. Listening to the speeches tonight, I have learned a lot about that part of my country.

Bill C-49 would impose, unfortunately, many of the Liberals' failed environmental assessment initiatives that have been ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of Canada for infringing on provincial jurisdiction. It was a real surprise for me, as I delved into this bill, to see that the Liberals would take the risk of incorporating a lot of the failed clauses of Bill C-69, which we call the “no more pipelines” bill, into this very important legislation about improving the economy of the Atlantic Coast, and I wonder why they would do that. The last thing that investment dollars and investment entrepreneurs want is risk. It has been pointed out before that this bill poses a political risk that is going to drive away investment. Here is a proof point that I think is really clear.

In 2022, there were five offshore land bids in Newfoundland and Labrador at a value of $238 million. If we move forward five months to May 30, 2023, about a year ago, when Bill C-49 was first introduced, which is not law yet. Business people read it and said that they did not want to take that risk, and in 2023, there were zero bids. That is just a really clear example of what happens when the government introduces legislation that does nothing more than introduce a lot of uncertainty into the mix.

If we take a look at what happened with the TMX pipeline, Kinder Morgan, which is a risk-taking company with very deep pockets. It was willing to take on the challenge of twinning the pipeline that had been in existence for 70 years with very little environmental risks involved. It started the project to twin that pipeline, which seemed like a very common-sense project to undertake, and it was, until the federal government started imposing environmental regulatory red tape that really did not do anything but slow down the project. Finally, Kinder Morgan said that it was out of there because It did not want that risk anymore. It is a business that wants to make money, and it could see that there was way too much risk there, so it pulled out. It was willing to walk away from its multibillion dollar investment at that point.

However, the Liberal federal government said that it needed that pipeline and that it could not let it go unfinished. It picked up the project for $5 billion, which was going to cost $7 billion altogether to complete it. In fact, the project is now finished, finally, but at a cost of $35 billion. The federal government is now saying it is for sale, but who is going to buy it? Certainly, not for $35 billion. That is what happens when government gets into business. It should just stay out of business and should let private enterprise do what it does best, which is to undertake projects that have a very good opportunity for earning a profit. I know “profit” is a bad word with the NDP-Liberal government, but let me assure members that private enterprise runs on profit. Profit drives innovation, competition, investment and creates wealth.

This is very important to Canada because our productivity numbers are lagging compared to our trading nations, and this has been pointed out on many occasions. It was recognized by the former Liberal minister of finance, Mr. Bill Morneau, in the book he wrote after he left government, after he was released from the Liberal Party's talking points. He said he had pointed out to the current Prime Minister that one of Canada's biggest economic challenges was its lagging productivity numbers.

Here is a nice, neat example of what exactly that means when compared to the United States. For every American worker who pumps in $100 into their economy, their Canadian counterpart, doing exactly the same kind of work, pumps $70 into Canada's GDP. We are 70% as productive as the United States. Does that mean that we do not work as hard? No, of course not. We are very hard-working and industrious people.

However, we do not have the tools, investment, creativity and tax fairness here in Canada. That is what is causing our productivity numbers to lag. That goes to the wealth of the nation. It goes to the wealth of individual people. This is what Mr. Morneau had pointed out to Mr. Trudeau on what he said were numerous occasions. He said—

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is always a pleasure to join debate in the House of Commons, even quite late on a Monday evening. We are discussing Bill C-49, a bill the government tabled to solve regulatory issues and bring them in line with other bills it had passed, in particular, the Impact Assessment Act, Bill C-69 of the 42nd Parliament.

The problem with Bill C-49, as well as the sudden urge to ensure its passage by invoking closure and using procedural tools to force a vote on it, is this: Since the time the government tabled the bill at first reading to bring existing environmental regulations into line with the other red tape it brought in with Bill C-69, significant portions of Bill C-69 were struck down in court.

The prudent action any government would take in this situation would be to remedy the portions of its existing red-tape regime that have been found to be unconstitutional. The government has been found to have trammelled the constitutional prerogatives of provinces. This is what the Supreme Court found in its review of Bill C-69. However, the government is persisting, through Bill C-49, in taking the same unconstitutional framework and applying it to offshore projects, both oil and gas drilling projects and future renewable energy projects, such as offshore wind production or perhaps tidal electrical generation.

On this side of the House, we are the party of energy. Canadians need reliable, affordable and abundant energy. That energy could come from any of a variety of sources. We support all forms of energy that can deliver on those basic points of affordability, availability and reliability. Different parts of the country are able to produce energy in different ways. The potential for offshore in its oil and gas potential has brought, in fairly recent memory, tremendous economic benefit to Newfoundland and Labrador. For the first half or more of my life, this was by far the poorest region in Canada, with the lowest per capita GDP. It is a part of the country that really suffered economically and had the lowest standards of living in Canada.

We have seen in a generation what energy production can do for that part of the world and how so many people from Newfoundland and Labrador have also helped build Alberta and its energy projects. In addition to that, there is tremendous potential for offshore renewable energy. However, taking this unconstitutional model from the government's earlier bill and applying it to projects offshore, renewable or non-renewable, is not going to give affordable, reliable and available energy for Canadians or create the export opportunities that an abundance of energy may give. This is a flawed approach.

One would think that the Liberals would not need the opposition to move an amendment that would seek to refer the bill back to committee where it could be studied further and amended to deal with the reality of the Supreme Court's decision on renewable energy. However, they have even made it muddier still by tabling, in the House, a budget implementation act that further confuses regulatory issues and compliance and congruity between these different acts, by tabling a bill that overlaps and attempts to do some of these things the bill before us would do.

One would think that the Liberals would hold back on the bill before us and call the BIA tonight, and it is confusing because it is numbered Bill C-69, but have that debate instead and move that bill along. I mean, I will vote against it and I hope that other members will too and so that we can bring the government down and get on with the carbon tax election. However, either way, whether the bill passes or not, surely that is a more prudent present step than forcing through Bill C-49, which has obvious constitutional and regulatory problems to it. So, if they will not do it for that reason, if they will not do it for compliance or get the order right with the BIA versus Bill C-49, at least recognize that the Supreme Court has already weighed in on the substance of the bill and found it unconstitutional. The bill belongs back at committee, or perhaps just not called at all.

The Liberals have tabled a lot of bills, and a lot of them do not go anywhere. In fact, over these last few weeks, they have tabled a number of bills that they have not called, and so I do not understand, in terms of the management of its legislative calendar, why suddenly the drive to call the bill before us.

We have seen the kind of red tape that this government has given Canadians. The Liberals have already hindered traditional and alternative energy development in Canada. Under Bill C-69, no projects get approved. It is the no-more-pipelines bill, and it is going to become the no-offshore-wind-development bill and the no-offshore-drilling bill. To top it all off, I understand from speaking to a number of Atlantic members of Parliament that they have also managed to upset the stability and the investment climate for the fishing industry, because they have not consulted those in the fishing industry who stand to be affected by the bill. This government is so consistent in its muddy, muddled approach to regulation and the creation of red tape. It is time for this government to maybe fire some gatekeepers instead of finding new ways to tie up Canadian businesses and scare away investment.

However, scaring away investment is exactly what these bills have done. Bill C-69 led to capital flight from this country. We have seen how Bill C-49, even its tabling, has also triggered capital flight from Atlantic Canada in terms of projects abandoned and the dearth of new applications for drilling or offshore projects in the wake of the bill. As my colleague for Calgary Nose Hill said earlier, Canada has become a country where political risk is driving away investment, because decision-makers, those who allocate capital, do not know from one year to the next just what this government is going to do. It piles on laws that do not stand up in court and then it is charging along here tonight by calling the bill before us and having a debate on it as if the Supreme Court decision did not happen. It happened, and it cannot be ignored. The bill was tabled before that decision, and it does not take that decision into account. It should be taken back to committee where maybe it can get sorted out, or it can just be held back and not called again.

The Liberals have so many other bills that they seem to want to get approved but have not called and have chosen instead to call Bill C-49. I would call on the government to get a hold of its legislative calendar, get a hold of its constitutional issues, and go back and fix the bill if it is going to call it again.

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I agree. At one point, I would have said that I do not understand what the government is doing, but after a while, one knows full well what they are doing. The Liberals and the NDP are antidevelopment. They are anti-Canadian jobs. They are doing everything they can to suppress investment in this country.

Look at what Bill C-49 would do. It is going to be caught up in the courts. There is going to be chaos and confusion. Look at Bill C-69 and what it has done to our natural resources sector. It has been devastating. It has been struck down in court. It will be the same thing here. The Liberal record after nine years is turning away investment in this country. We go through the laundry list and they keep saying they are proposing new ideas. It is the same failed approach that got us in this mess in the first place. It is time for a fresh start. Bill C-49 and their other efforts are not worth it.

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I agree with the member from the Bloc a little, and I am going to disagree with her a little as well.

I agree that this is a shoddy bill. The government has been warned. The Liberals and the NDP want to ram this through, and they have been reminded over and over again, including in some great speeches here tonight, of how this is going to end up in the courts, like Bill C-69. I agree with her on that. They are putting it through and they do not care. It is going to get stalled for years and they are going to blame everybody but themselves.

I find that I disagree with the Bloc, though, too. I agree a little more, if I could, about simplifying the environmental assessment process: one environmental assessment, federal or provincial. We do not need the double red tape taking years. The list goes on of the number of companies and projects that have been caught up in this.

The thing with the Bloc Québécois is that it wants to cancel, as an example, all offshore petroleum or the wonderful oil and gas sector, with a number of jobs in this country. The irony is that when we cancel a project here in Canada, what happens is that countries like Russia, Venezuela and other countries that do not give two hoots about emissions reductions are going to take up that limit. Trust me: They are not having the same conversations about conservation and good measures that we are having here in Canada.

The Bloc Québécois is saying these projects and paycheques belong in Canada, but it wants to export them around the world.

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise here in the House and have many of my colleagues join to listen as I contribute some points to the debate we are having here tonight, particularly on our Conservative amendment. Many would argue it would be common sense. I look forward to getting into that tonight a little bit more.

However, Mr. Speaker, you are from Nova Scotia. The legislation here impacts that province. It also impacts the great people of Newfoundland and Labrador. I had the honour to visit, a couple of weeks ago, the province. I had some great visits, travelling many miles, all the way from St. John's and Mount Pearl in the Avalon region, all the way across to Clarenville, Grand Falls, Windsor, Corner Brook, Deer Lake, Stephenville, Kippens, and all points in between. I think the debate here is timely tonight, as we talk about what the priorities are for the good people of Newfoundland and Labrador.

However, I want to give some breaking news here in the House tonight, if I could; breaking news that is fresh, hot off the press of some by-elections, a by-election that just took place in Newfoundland and Labrador. The Liberals love intruding into provincial jurisdiction on issues, although they should not. They get struck down by courts and we have these prolonged problems. I am going to bring in provincial jurisdiction here because in Newfoundland and Labrador, in that by-election tonight, in the riding of Baie Verte-Green Bay, the votes are in. It was a carbon tax by-election.

After nine years of the NDP-Liberal government, here is an interesting thing. Both of the PC and the Liberal candidates endorsed the Leader of the Opposition in Ottawa. The Prime Minister has become so toxic, even Liberals in Newfoundland and Labrador want nothing to do with him. The results are in tonight and it was very conclusive. The voter turnout in the by-election tonight in central Newfoundland was 57%. It was 15 points higher than it was in the last general election in that riding. It was a close riding in 2021. The Liberals got about 52%, the PCs got 47%. Tonight, the Conservative candidate who opposes the carbon tax got 80% of the vote.

Congratulations to Lin Paddock from Ottawa. I am thankful to him for fighting the carbon tax, fighting and standing up against the punitive measures that the Prime Minister and the NDP are imposing on his province.

That by-election followed, in Newfoundland and Labrador, a by-election that just took place about a month ago. Again, it was the same thing around central Newfoundland. There was a historically high voter turnout in that riding. It took a long-time Liberal riding and flipped it to the PCs; again, a carbon tax by-election. They are just building the momentum. If we go to Nova Scotia, in Pictou West, the minister of housing's own riding, right in that region, the PCs not only held that riding, but they drastically increased their vote share and the turnout there was very solid for a by-election.

There was another example, absolutely, in Preston only a short while ago. For the first time, in a long-time Liberal or NDP back-and-forth riding for the most part, there was a Conservative victory there as well, another carbon tax by-election.

I raise this point tonight because there is a theme developing in Atlantic Canada. It is going from Liberal to common-sense Conservative. Here is the thing that is interesting. It is building the momentum. The Prime Minister and the NDP and Liberals know they are extremely unpopular. They know that their plan for this country is more and more unpopular, the more Canadians learn about it. The priorities that they try to address are out of touch with the realities on the ground.

After giving colleagues these updates of these carbon tax by-elections in those respective provinces, I cannot wait for our carbon tax election here to take place all across Canada. Canadians are going to have their say. I think the turnout and the blue wave are going to be equal in every part of this country.

I want to talk about Bill C-49 here tonight. I do listen to what the member for Kingston and the Islands says, believe it or not. I have to because both he and the member for Winnipeg North speak quite a bit here in the chamber.

Just a few minutes ago, the member for Kingston and the Islands was trying to make this argument about the Constitution and how the Liberals listen to the Constitution, respect it and talking about their actions when it comes to their legislation and bills. This bill here, or more specifically, our Conservative amendment, actually just call it out for what it is, hypocrisy. It is saying one thing and doing the absolute opposite.

He goes on about how they do all this. Well, Bill C-49 has a lot of very similar provisions to Bill C-69, which has garnered a lot of attention when it comes to developing our natural resources and realizing our economic potential. It has done a lot of damage in every part of the country. It has turned away, turned down and cancelled investments by the hundreds of millions of dollars in this country. The thing about Bill C-69 was that, for months and for years, Liberal ministers would go out and say, “There is nothing wrong. The bill is constitutional. It is going to be upheld.” Well, the Supreme Court had its say, and guess what. It did not uphold it. The bill was struck down.

Now, moving forward, we have Bill C-49. Our Conservative amendment tonight is saying that we need to take this back to committee. There are serious flaws with what the government is trying to do because many of the same provisions that were struck down in Bill C-69 are embedded and repeated here in Bill C-49.

Mark my words. I am going to put it right here, in Hansard, in the blues and on video here tonight: This piece of legislation is going to be dithered and delayed for years. It is going to be challenged. Look at what happened with respect to Bill C-69. Liberals and then the New Democrats said, “Oh, it is all fine. Do not worry about it. The Conservatives are just talking negative about it.” The government ignored it, and guess what happened. It is the chaos coming around Bill C-69. The uncertainty, the lack of answers from that side and the lack of fixing the problem the Liberals were warned about in the first place are challenging the economic environment in our country. It is turning away investment. It is turning away projects that could be completed here at home, creating great Canadian paycheques. The Liberals are doing the exact same thing. Members could look and see that there are now the same inefficiencies that are here in the Impact Assessment Act, in sections 61, 62, 169 and 170. The list goes on about how they are constantly dithering and delaying.

If members do not want to take my word for it here with what I have said so far, let us just look at the number of projects already stalled under the Liberal-NDP government. The Liberals are blocking projects with red tape left, right and centre. Bill C-49 would only make it worse. There is Beaver Dam gold mine in Nova Scotia. It has been nine years, and it is still not done. Fifteen Mile Stream gold project is going to be a massive $123 million investment. After six years, that project, 95 kilometres northeast of Halifax, is still being delayed, and with three years extension, it is still not done. Then we have the Joyce Lake direct shipping iron ore project, which would be a $270-million investment in Newfoundland and Labrador. After 11 years, it is still waiting and not approved. There is Cape Ray gold and silver mine in Newfoundland and Labrador. It has been eight years, and it is still waiting and not going through. The list goes on and on. It is the definition of insanity.

I have said it before about the budget, and I will say the same thing about the Liberals' efforts to remove red tape and unleash the economic potential of this country. We have so many natural resources. We have so many jobs that could be created in this country, and what the Liberals have done time and time again, and what they are doing with Bill C-49, is causing legal nightmares. They are going to cause red tape nightmares for years to come, and it is Canadian workers in Newfoundland and Labrador and in Nova Scotia who are going to be hurt.

We are putting this amendment forward. We are opposing the constant red tape of the Liberals. After nine years, Canadians have had enough, and I do not blame them.

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his wealth of knowledge of history, not only in his province but also in this country.

It is probably not in the Standing Orders for me to do this, so I want to be careful, but I will make a bet or a wager. Several Conservative members have consistently stood up and made a case based on the government's history, based on Bill C-69 and based on many of the same provisions that are in Bill C-49, which we are dealing with. There is an amendment that would send the bill back to committee to fix some of what I think is going to be deemed unconstitutional, dragging the process out and creating an investment climate in this country that is going to go in the wrong direction.

I want to make sure one more time that my colleague can get on the record again, as the Liberals and the NDP seem to be blind to the idea that this could even happen. Can the member talk about what he predicts would happen in the future if the bill passes in its current form and does not go back to committee?

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Madam Speaker, I thank the member for Calgary Nose Hill for a pretty novel critique of the bill that we have in front of us and the amendment that has been put forward by her party. I have not followed this as closely as some, but it would seem that, if there were infringements into provincial jurisdiction, that premiers, such as the Premier of Nova Scotia and the Premier of Newfoundland, would be concerned about that. I would also note that my understanding is that the Supreme Court ruling ruled that Bill C-69 was unconstitutional as far as it infringes into areas of provincial jurisdiction, and that offshore, of course, is clearly a federal jurisdiction. When we talk about offshore projects, they do fall under federal jurisdiction.

However, my question is really around the timing, and the member noted the timing. The Supreme Court ruling came out in October of last year, and the bill before us was in committee starting in January. I did not follow the committee hearings as I have two other committees I have to track. I am curious if these arguments came up at committee, and if so, what the response was, particularly by government witnesses or department officials who appeared at committee. This is out of honest curiosity.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Madam Speaker, since I have some time this evening, as the spouse of a U.S. Army combat veteran and as the stepmother of someone who is currently active within the U.S. Army, I would like to extend my gratitude to the United States of America for its strong allyship towards our country. I do so as the United States observes Memorial Day today.

It is about to get technical in here. Are members ready?

My colleague from Provencher just noted that we are debating an amendment to Bill C-69. I want to read the amendment and then make arguments to colleagues in here, as well as potentially any legislative staff from affected departments who might be listening to this, on why I think the House should avail itself of the opportunity to accept this amendment and do what the amendment says it should do. The amendment reads:

Bill C-49, An Act to amend the Canada—Newfoundland and Labrador Atlantic Accord Implementation Act and the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Petroleum Resources Accord Implementation Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts, be not now read a third time, but be referred back to the Standing Committee on Natural Resources for the purpose of reconsidering Clauses 61, 62, 169, and 170 with the view to prevent uncertainty and a lack of clarity caused by the inclusion of similar provisions contained in Bill C-69, An Act to enact the Impact Assessment Act and the Canadian Energy Regulator Act, to amend the Navigation Protection Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts, which would insert unanticipated conditions and requirements beyond existing legislation and regulations...

The reason Conservative members have put the amendment forward is that a substantive part of Bill C-49, which this amendment refers to, contains sections of Bill C-69, which were deemed largely unconstitutional.

There is something I do not think anyone has raised in debate in this place, as to why this amendment should go forward. Bill C-49, the substantive bill, was tabled on May 30, 2023. The Supreme Court ruling on the relevant sections in Bill C-49, which could be impacted by the relevant sections in Bill C-69, happened in October of last year.

Something else happened since this was put forward. The government tabled the budget implementation act, which we have been debating. In the budget implementation act, on page 552 through page 577, there are amendments to Bill C-69, the Impact Assessment Act, that the government says are in response to the Supreme Court ruling, in an attempt to bring that piece of legislation into alignment with the Supreme Court's decision. The district I represent is in Alberta. The Government of Alberta does not think that the amendments will be constitutional.

However, there is a problem. Everyone needs to consider supporting the amendment for this reason: Although the amendments to the Impact Assessment Act are in the budget implementation act, I cannot find any coordinating or harmonizing amendments between those amendments and what is in Bill C-49. There is a problem with that. Let us put all the debate on the topic aside for a minute. If the budget implementation act is rammed through without our going back and reconsidering the clauses that are in Bill C-49, what is going to happen to the bill? Everybody should do the math on this. It is going to be unconstitutional.

What happens in that circumstance, where there has not been a harmonization of one set of amendments to another? What happens to anybody who is looking at potentially investing in these projects? What would they say? They would say that this is a huge risk and that it is going to be held up in litigation. Therefore, this is the reason the House should support the amendment.

Everybody should put their feelings on the topic of the bill aside and think about House procedure for a second. Unless the bill goes back to committee to consider harmonizing two things, we are going to be in a battle. These things are, first, whether the bill actually captures the spirit of what is in the budget implementation act and, second, whether the provinces deem it constitutional. The government is going to be in a battle over this, and that is antithetical to what the bill is supposed to do, which is to attract investment in these projects.

What has happened here, I think, is that the government members did not think that the Supreme Court was going to rule against the government; that is why they tabled Bill C-49 in May 2023 with the same type of language that was deemed unconstitutional in the original bill, Bill C-69. However, the Liberals are now trying to fast-track the bill through the House of Commons without its going back to committee to consider that harmonization, and that is a huge problem. At the very least, the government members should be doing a technical briefing to show how the amendments they have proposed in the budget implementation bill would impact the relevant sections that are mentioned in the amendment. That is the bare minimum that they should be doing. I am not sure about anyone else in here, but I did not get the invitation to that briefing. I do not think it happened, because I do not think that the Liberals have actually done this work.

Therefore, the rationale that I just set out here is poor planning on the part of the minister. Beyond that, the reason I would like to implore some of my colleagues from the Bloc, perhaps the NDP and perhaps even members of the Liberal Party is that the minister and their parliamentary secretary should never have let it get to this stage. This is a failure in their parliamentary affairs component. Beyond that, there is another component, which is that now we are going to gear up for another fight with the provinces. This is not just about Alberta; we know that all the provinces had concerns with Bill C-69.

In fact, in debate on the Bloc opposition motion earlier this week, Bloc members talked about the fact that they wanted clarity on ensuring that the government was not going to reach into the jurisdictional area of Quebec and of other provinces. I want to read to members a statement from the government of my province of Alberta on what was in the budget implementation bill. This is the statement, titled “Impact Assessment Act remains unconstitutional: Joint Statement”:

Premier Danielle Smith, Minister of Environment and Protected Areas Rebecca Schulz and Minister of Justice Mickey Amery issued the following statement on the federal government’s amendments to the Impact Assessment Act:

Alberta has completed its review of the federal government’s recently tabled amendments to the Impact Assessment Act.

For colleagues who are following along, that is what is in the budget implementation bill. It starts on page 552; that is what they are referring to in the statement. The statement continues:

Even with these amendments, the act is still unconstitutional.

The [federal] Minister of Environment and Climate Change...still has the ability to meddle in projects that are within provincial jurisdiction.

That is how they are describing the amendments. They do not find that constitutionality. It continues:

This will put projects [and they list a bunch of different resource projects and highways] at risk.... This is simply unacceptable and Alberta, when it comes to intra-provincial projects, will not recognize the Impact Assessment Act as valid law.

The situation could have been avoided if, following Alberta’s Supreme Court victory, the federal government agreed to meaningfully consult with the province, rather than sending vague letters and blank templates. The federal government did not even inform Alberta when they were tabling these amendments in the House of Commons.

This failure to work collaboratively with Alberta is a choice made by [the] Prime Minister...and [the environment minister].

Choices have consequences. Alberta has won in court twice in the past year and we are ready to win again.

We are not at a point or a juncture in our nation's history where we can afford to be purposefully and knowingly picking battles with the provinces when our economy is barely sputtering along on life support.

We need investment into major natural resource projects. We need clarity in this type of legislation. We do not need more fights with the provinces.

What I see here is a hot mess that has not been adequately vetted by the parliamentary affairs people of the minister, and it has clearly not gone through cabinet with this type of scrutiny. When I was a cabinet minister, one of the things I always thought about when considering proposals for new legislation was how it would impact other areas of proposed legislation so that we would not get into harmonization issues that would create instability for investment.

That is exactly what we have here. Again, I know that people have issues with the Alberta energy sector. Members can park all of that for a second and put that aside. If this was the Government of Quebec or any other province, I would still feel the same way because it is counterproductive for the government to ram legislation forward knowing that there is going to be a fight on their hands, particularly when the province likely has a valid case.

I will just back it up to explain why this amendment to send it back to committee should be supported. If Bill C-49 is sent back to committee, it could be reviewed very quickly in coordination with the amendments that are in the budget implementation bill to ask if they harmonize. Does one equal the other?

We can argue whether or not they are good amendments, but the reality is that I do not think that exercise, in and of itself, has happened in any substantive way. Certainly, Parliament has not had the opportunity to do that, which is crazy. It is actually crazy that these are changing. If people have never sat around a board table, if they have never evaluated political risk in terms of making a major capital investment, this is the exact type of instability that people look at and say, “No, the capital is not going there.”

Number one, Parliament should have the right to scrutinize whether or not these major pieces of regulatory changes actually harmonize with one another. Number two, to the case that my colleagues from the Bloc just made, we should be discussing whether or not they are good.

The budget implementation bill is also being rammed through the House of Commons by the Liberals and the NDP. This is a major substantive piece of legislation. There are so many other pieces in here that there is no possible way that the finance committee is going to be able to get into the granular details of this component of the legislation to see if they harmonize with each other.

I am looking for colleagues that are on the finance committee here. Are they going to have time to do this? No, of course not. It is not going to happen. That is a huge problem. By not having this happen, it is basically sending a message to the entire legal community and the entire investment community that we do not know what we are doing. We need to just back it up and take it to committee.

The last reason this exercise would be good is that it would be an opportunity to do meaningful consultation with the provinces on this very topic. Here we have a very heated statement from the premier and the environment minister of one of the top grossing economies in the province, and they are saying that the government did not talk to them. Instead, they sent “vague letters and blank templates.” Do members know what vague letters and blank templates say to the investment community? They say, “Do not invest here.”

There needs to be meaningful consultation with the provinces. Again, it should not be one province or another. Particularly if my colleagues from the Bloc are going to argue for provincial sovereignty within the area of their jurisdiction, then the principle of meaningful consultation with every province should apply. If this went back to committee, it would give an opportunity for meaningful consultation with the provinces on the areas where there needs to be harmonization and discussion, so that we do not end up in another protracted constitutional battle. This is what our job is.

The last thing I want to emphasize is that the clauses the amendment refers to are not minor clauses. It is not like the short title of the bill. These are substantive clauses that were already found unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of Canada. Clause 62 deals with “The Regulator may, on application containing any information required by the Regulator or prescribed, issue an authorization with respect to each work or activity proposed to be carried out in relation to an offshore renewable energy project.” These are substantive clauses that I am not satisfied, as a parliamentarian, are harmonized.

Often when I stand here in this place and talk about stuff like this, I feel like Cassandra, that Greek myth of the woman who is doomed to know the future and nobody believes her. I want to be proven wrong on this, but if we do not walk this back to committee and sort this out, I guarantee members that there will be a constitutional challenge on both of these bills, there will be less investment, and this is going to end up in the Supreme Court anyway. Why would we not just do our job as parliamentarians and get it right to begin with? That makes a lot of sense to me.

This does not have to take a lot of time. I mean, this is what parliamentary committees are for. It should be to consider these exact things. We should be getting the officials who wrote the relevant segments in the BIA into committee to ask, “Hey, do these jive with each other? Show me how. Walk me through this.” That would also give opportunity for the provinces to have input, and then consider it in clause by clause.

Now, why is getting this right so important? It is because the bureaucrats should not run Parliament. That is our job, right? What I have seen here is a lack when ministers do not do these sorts of things. Right now, the minister should be reaching out to party leaders or House leaders and saying, “Hey, you know what? Let's go do a quick study on this. Let's get this right.” However, what is happening is the ideologically rigid idea that we have to ram this through. I think that comes up through the bureaucracy because they are just not on top of parliamentary affairs, and procedure matters. The rule matters. At the end of the day, one of our key functions as members of Parliament is holding the government to account on technical things like this. When we do not show the public that we have the capacity to do this, they do not want to invest here. They do not have faith in us as parliamentarians.

That is why this amendment is common sense. We have gotten it to a certain point of debate in the House. There's various viewpoints on the subject matter and the outcomes, but at the end of the day, there is a legitimate Supreme Court ruling that Parliament needs to consider in the implementation of this bill, which may not have been considered.

If we do not do this, and this does end up in a fight with the provinces, and this does end up in a Supreme Court fight, and we do chase investment away, what does that mean? It means that our economy continues to shrink. It means that we are not getting on top of renewable energy projects. It means that we are not developing the economy at all, and we cannot afford to do that.

Our country is broke right now, right? We cannot afford to make mistakes, or allow the government to make mistakes like this, and that is why we have to support amendments for additional legislative scrutiny, which is exactly what this amendment is calling for. It is very neutrally worded. It is not even referring to the whole bill. It is referring to the specific clauses that could be impacted by the Supreme Court ruling on Bill C-69.

I ask members to please let sanity prevail. Let us take the bill back to committee. Let us show the legal and investment community that Parliament is serious, that we can do something that resembles work, and let us get this right.

[Ted Falk, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

Madam Speaker, it is a privilege to rise in the House and speak to Bill C-49, an act to amend the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Atlantic Accord Implementation Act and the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Petroleum Resources Accord Implementation Act, which also makes consequential amendments to other acts.

One cannot say much for the government, but it sure knows how to write a catchy little title, does it not? Personally, I would have opted for something more straightforward, like “Bill C-49, the confuse, delay and deter investment in Canada act”. I agree that it is a bit too on the nose, especially for the Liberal government, plus, I think that it has already used that one several times over.

Bill C-49 would build on the existing petroleum regulatory scheme to establish a new regulatory scheme for offshore renewable energy projects in Newfoundland and Labrador and Nova Scotia, through their respective accord acts.

I want to be clear. As Conservatives, we are not opposed to this legislation in principle. Despite the nonsense that we so often get from others in the House, Conservatives are not opposed to renewable energy. We are actually in favour of protecting the environment. In fact, to that end, I would remind members of the House of the numerous occasions when Conservatives have called out the Liberal government over its policies regarding pollution. One of its very first acts when they formed government in 2015 was to allow the City of Montreal to dump 8 billion litres of raw sewage into the St. Lawrence River. There was no price on pollution there. Conservatives have called out the government on sending our garbage overseas. There are lots of different examples. The difference here, though, is that when it comes to environmental protection, Conservatives are driven by pragmatism and not by fear.

We love our planet, the good creation that God has blessed us with, and we recognize, as does, I think, any rational person, regardless of creed, that we have a responsibility to be good stewards and to preserve it for future generations. However, rather than give in to alarmism and ideologically motivated climate extremism that we see from many others in this chamber, we recognise that the role that Canada plays in overall emissions and pollution is globally very minor.

If one would take every car off the road, shut down every factory, shut down our entire energy sector, solar panel every roof, heat pump every house, “veganize” every kid and “diaperize” every cow, we would have reduced global emissions by a whopping 1.5% because 98.5% of the problem, or at least the perceived problem, would still exist in other countries. Moreover, the so-called green policies of this and other western governments do nothing to stop climate change but are, in fact, a smoke-and-mirrors job to help governments and wealthy investors get even richer. They do that off the backs of not only the shrinking middle class but also the poorest and the most vulnerable people on our planet.

That being the case, I am always shocked to see the NDP giving the government its full-throated support on these exploitive and unjust policies. Rather than giving in to climate alarmism and enacting these policies that really just make global billionaires and Liberal insiders richer and make everyone else poorer, Conservatives believe in measured, common-sense environmental protections that actually address pollution in proportion to Canada's role in creating it and that protect our beautiful planet. I think that is the common-sense approach, and I think common-sense Canadians agree.

Secondly, we do not entirely oppose this legislation in principle because the provinces are largely in favour of it. The affected premiers, Premier Furey in Newfoundland, Premier Higgs in New Brunswick and Premier Houston in Nova Scotia, of which the latter two are both Conservative, by the way, have all expressed their support for this bill's overarching aims, and we want to respect that.

Unlike the Liberal government, Conservatives respect the Constitution. We recognize that some things are provincial jurisdiction, and as much as we at times would like to meddle, it is not the federal government's job to do so: work in partnership, yes; but dictate, no. I am sure the majority of our premiers are very excited for that wonderful day next fall when that kind of relationship can and will exist again.

However, in the meantime, the question of constitutionality is where this bill falls short. Conservatives agree that there are economic, social and net environmental benefits to promoting alternative or, in some cases, transformational energy sources. We believe government should allow for arm's-length regulatory processes to ensure safe and environmentally responsible development of these resource, including in our coastal waters.

That is all good, but here is the problem. The bill makes these decisions subject to the environmental Impact Assessment Act, also known as Bill C-69. This creates two problems. Number one is that the Supreme Court has ruled that Bill C-69 is unconstitutional; that is a problem. Number two, the fact remains that any relationship between the two bills will lead to inevitable delays because there are going to be court challenges.

Bill C-49 directly references clauses 61 to 64 of Bill C-69, which are precisely the clauses that have been ruled unconstitutional. I don't know, but maybe if the Liberals had bothered to read paragraph 163 of the majority Supreme Court of Canada decision, they could have avoided this type of blunder, or maybe it is intentional. However, Bill C-49 has also incorporated the Minister of Environment's proposed decision-making scheme into several clauses. Given that this decision-making power and the entirety of the designated project scheme are also unconstitutional components of Bill C-49, they are likely to be ruled, or at least challenged, as unconstitutional as well.

It is inevitable that, in its current form, Bill C-49 will be challenged in the courts, and we have said this throughout the committee study and throughout all the debates. The bill is not watertight. We have tried to amend this legislation so that we could work together on it. The Liberals have always complained that Conservatives will not work with them, yet here we have tried, but the Liberals would not hear any of it. It is part of the Liberals' agenda; they want to control.

In the meantime, while these delays are taking place, what happens to the traditional energy sector jobs in the region? Mining, oil and gas account for 31%, or approximately one-third, of Newfoundland and Labrador's GDP. This bill, as it is, could end traditional petroleum drilling in Atlantic Canada. What happens to those economies? We already had, in Bill C-55, a provision where a fisheries minister can unilaterally designate a section of ocean as a development-prohibited area, an MPA, a marine-protected area. Now, the government sneaks in provisions in clauses 28 and 137 of this bill, allowing for cabinet to end offshore drilling and, for that matter, even renewable projects.

Even if we give the government the benefit of the doubt, which we should not because it has a proven track record over the last nine years of trying to destroy everything in our energy sector, and even if we ignore the unconstitutionality of this bill, this legislation is still deeply flawed. Like with our traditional energy sector and resources, which we absolutely still need if we want to invest in our success and in our renewable sector or any other sector, there needs to be clarity and efficiency, and right now we have neither. This bill would impose uncertainty and would extend timelines that, regardless of court challenges, could and would hinder the development of that sector.

It takes 1,605 days. That is almost four and a half years, and that is about what it takes to get an approval done. That is ridiculous. Imagine someone wanting to start a small business, willing to invest millions of dollars in a community, to create jobs and to spur the economy, and the government comes along and says that it would be great, that it would love to have them do that and that they could start in four years. They would not come.

The bill also comes with royal recommendation. It would require some level of federal funding, but no specific funding has been allocated. Therefore, now, on a separate piece of legislation that will need to be tabled, debated, studied and passed before this thing can get rolling, again, we are going to see uncertainty and delays, but it is going to take another bill to actually implement this.

There are questions over the consultation requirements with indigenous peoples, and again, we have learned that this is almost a guarantee of court challenges, equalling more delays and more uncertainty. We need to have a reasonable and a responsible regulatory framework in place, but too often what the government gives us are gatekeepers, folks who just want to delay and to create confusion so that nothing ever gets done.

Ideologically motivated decisions, as more and more authority would wind up with the minister, is what we can expect from the bill. Unlike the NDP and Liberals who roadblock, make traditional energy more expensive, and drive out new opportunities, Conservatives are committed to getting rid of the gatekeepers. We will reduce approval timelines and remove unnecessary, restrictive red tape and taxes so companies can and will invest in Canada, and major energy products can actually get built in Canada again.

When we look back at how the government has handled past energy projects, we just have to shake our head. We have to look no further back than the TMX. Kinder Morgan had the wonderful idea of expanding the pipeline. We needed an additional pipeline that would run to the west coast, to bring it to tidal water, so we could export more of our energy. What happened with that? The government had its initial approval through the National Energy Board. Then, of course, it was challenged, and a further delay of two years was added. That brought up the cost by another $2 billion. The initial cost of the TMX was pegged at $5.4 billion, and the two-year delay brought it up to $7.4 billion. Then along came Bill C-69, which just put more uncertainty into the whole equation.

Kinder Morgan threw up its arms, went to the government and asked it to buy the pipeline. Kinder Morgan could not get it done because there was going to be way too much going on for the company to accomplish that. The government said it was going to be an energy hero and buy the TMX, the expanded pipeline project, and get it done. The government paid $4.5 billion to Kinder Morgan to buy the rights for the pipeline. In addition to that, the government was committed to spending another $7.4 billion in constructing the pipeline. That would have been a cost of $12 billion.

That is what the government told us at the time: “For $12 billion, we got ourselves a pipeline. The Government of Canada is going to be in the energy business. We are going to be claiming all of these royalties from energy companies. This is a good deal for Canadians.” Guess what? That was in 2019. We are in 2024. The pipeline has now cost $34 billion. From the original estimate, before there were any delays, it should have been a $10-billion project. Now it is a $34-billion project. That is an additional $24 billion of cost into the TMX pipeline.

Who else but a Liberal government could screw up things so badly as to increase construction costs by 500%? That is right. Members do not have the answer either. I cannot figure it out. Who else could do that? The government says it is due to construction costs. It says it is due to unforeseen terrain. Is the government kidding me? It did not know where the pipeline was going? Liberals should give their head a shake, because they knew all along that the pipeline would have to cross the Rockies and make its way down to the west coast, yet that is what they are blaming some of the costs on.

The government is also attributing some of the delays and cost increases to inflation in contractor expenses and construction costs. I know that. I am in the heavy construction business myself and understand that costs have gone up probably 50% in the last five years, but 500%? I would only dream of being able to charge those kinds of numbers. Who got rich in this scheme? Who got rich building the TMX pipeline? To go from $12 billion to $34 billion without explanation, there is something wonderfully wrong with that.

The NDP has put a motion forward at the natural resource committee right now, exactly where Bill C-49 was discussed, for it to be a priority of the committee to study the TMX pipeline, to find out what went wrong and how the government could end up with a $34-billion pipeline. Only a Liberal government could do that. I think that is what the study will clearly show, that somebody has gotten rich here and that something is way offside.

Bill C-69 created the kind of uncertainty such that a company like Kinder Morgan took its $4.5 billion, marched it south of the border and used the $4.5 billion to invest in an environment that was more friendly and more conducive to energy projects.

The member for Vaughan—Woodbridge stated that the Netherlands, Germany and Japan have been begging for cleaner energy. What he neglected to say is that they have been begging for LNG, liquefied natural gas. Our government has turned them down. There was an opportunity to develop LNG projects. There were 18 of them on the drawing board when the Liberal government came into power, and not one of them has been completed to the point where it is exporting any liquefied natural gas.

In the meantime, we have turned away all kinds of opportunities for Canadians, the Canadian taxpayer and the Canadian citizen, to benefit from receiving royalties from the sale of our LNG. We could have created thousands and thousands of jobs, and we could have solidified our economy and many of the communities that have suffered. However, no, we let the opportunity pass and instead are trying to convince them they can buy renewable energy from our wind turbines that hopefully will produce hydrogen gas that they can put into storage and ship over to some of the economies begging for our cleaner energy.

We will have to actually wait and see whether that happens, because so far today, we are way behind the eight ball when it comes to actually being able to export any energy. Countries have been begging for energy, and instead we actually continue to import energy from dictators and despots from the Middle East and from places like Venezuela. We keep bringing their oil here, and that is the oil fuelling our economy when it could be our own natural resources fuelling our economy. We could be keeping the wealth right here in Canada, and we have not been doing that.

Bill C-49 is another tool the government can take full advantage of to continue to stress out our existing oil and gas economies not only in Atlantic Canada but also in Saskatchewan, Manitoba and of course Alberta. We agree with Bill C-49 in principle because the premiers want it, and what the premiers think it would do for them is allow them to develop renewable energies in coastal waters.

While we were in committee, many witnesses were there, and many witnesses were not there. Most notably, the testimony we were not able to properly process as a committee was testimony from lobster harvesters and from fishers in the area who would be affected. The bill would provide the government, by decree of the minister, the ability to declare the MPAs, the marine protected areas, which would in fact sterilize fishing opportunities and lobster harvesting opportunities. A significant portion of Atlantic Canada's economic benefit, economic revenue, is from those two industries. They are closely related; they are under the fishing umbrella, I suppose, in the fisheries, but the two industries are very concerned there would not be adequate protection for their resources.

We all know that lobsters and fish like to hang around shelves. As well, we know that is where the turbines that the proponents are talking about are also going to be constructed, because that is the closest place to a solid base that they can be built. The least amount of construction is in areas where there is a shelf, and we know that is where the fishing is often very good.

Bill C-49 is a flawed piece of legislation. It references Bill C-69several times. Bill C-69 has been proven unconstitutional, and we tried to argue that at committee. We need to take Bill C-49 back to committee and fix it. We are in support of the bill, but let us fix it. Let us not have something that is not going to be constitutionally compliant. I would urge the government to continue to do that; let us fix the bill where we know it is not watertight, and let us make it right.

Third Reading

[Brad Vis, Conservative, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, BC]

Madam Speaker, when Bill C-69 was in the House a few Parliaments ago, the Mining Association of Canada came out very strongly in favour of the bill. I questioned the Mining Association of Canada in advance of the 2019 election as to why it would support this legislation. It has since rescinded its support for the approach taken by the NDP-Liberal government. It did that primarily because what the unconstitutional Bill C-69 does, and by extension its provisions in Bill C-49, is provide opportunities for the minister to make unilateral decisions that would create a level of uncertainty that most Canadian and foreign capital companies that want to invest in Canada are not willing to take a risk on.

What we need to do, and what this bill has shown us, is that we need to provide certainty. We do need to have strong environmental reviews, but that needs to be coupled with a degree of certainty to allow investment.

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

Madam Speaker, what Bill C-49 would do, which the member articulated very well, is bring the no capital bill, Bill C-69, into offshore energy in Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. To give an example, every summer, as the member for Avalon would know, the Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board puts out a call for exploratory licences, and every summer it gets applications. This past summer, four weeks after this bill was tabled in the House, how many applications did Newfoundland get? It got zero, because of the provisions in this bill already on the IAA, which is driving capital into the Gulf of Mexico, where all of those capital investments went.

I would like the member to tell us a bit about the experience he has had with how the IAA elements, the environmental review elements, of Bill C-69, which are now in this bill, have shut down jobs in his part of the world.