Transport Committee on May 1st, 2012

[Ed Holder, Conservative, London West, ON]

How lucky am I?

Thank you, Chair.

I would direct this, if I may, to Mr. Pascoe, please.

In your earlier testimony, you talked about the great focus on natural gas and about the big opportunities being there, and I'm a little confused. It may well have been either Mr. Sullivan or Mr. Coderre who brought this up. Where I'm somewhat confused is that I thought you indicated in your testimony that you thought it would be cheaper in the long term with greater usage, and then I thought I heard you kind of equivocate—or it might have been someone else who may have suggested that in fact it may not be the case.

But I'd like to get your best sense of it, because of the great focus today on natural gas and the emphasis that both of you place on the importance of it. Frankly, we're not going to run out, not in our lifetime or my kids' or my grandkids' lifetimes.

But having said that, it is another way to move our vehicles. What's your sense, Mr. Pascoe, of the longer term cost of natural gas with increased usage at the retail level?

[David Pascoe]

I'm not sure.... It must have been somebody else who equivocated.

I think it's a cheap fuel now, and I expect it to remain inexpensive. Certainly, the laws of economics will prevail with supply and demand. We're seeing supply increasing faster than the demand today. If we were to accelerate demand to the extent that it exceeded supply, the price would go up, but ultimately it becomes an alternative to fossil fuels. It becomes a new opportunity in the mix, and I think we should use it.

[Ed Holder, Conservative, London West, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Thank you.

Before we move on, I want to thank our guests for being here today. I'm sorry, but we do have a motion that we have to deal with. Thank you. It was very insightful and I'm sure you'll hear from us in the future. We thank you for your time today.

I'm going to take a quick thirty seconds to let our guests leave the table and then we'll come back and deal with the motion.

We will now entertain the motion from Ms. Morin. I understand that everybody has a copy of it. I will open the floor for Ms. Morin, please.

[Isabelle Morin, NDP, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Here is the motion:

That, pursuant to Standing Order 111.(1), the committee invite Mark Wright, the appointee to the board of directors of the Thunder Bay Port Authority, Jennifer Clarke, the appointee to the board of directors of the Prince Rupert Port Authority, Gary Valcour, the appointee to the board of directors of the Oshawa Harbour Commission, Colin Watson, the appointee to the Toronto Port Authority, Jean-Sébastien Harvey, the appointee to the Saguenay Port Authority, Elmer Derrick, the appointee to the board of directors of the Prince Rupert Port Authority, Éric Dupont, the appointee to the board of directors of the Quebec Port Authority and Pierre Rivard, the appointee to the board of directors of the Quebec Port Authority to appear before the committee prior to May 31, 2012.

My reason for making this motion is that we have discovered that the candidates nominated by the government have a lot of ties with the Conservatives. I am not including people who have been nominated for a second time, because it would be too easy for the Conservatives to tell us that the reason is that they gained experience in their previous mandates.

I will start with Jennifer Brunsdale Clarke, who gave $700 to the riding association in Abbotsford in 2010, $364 to the association in Burnaby—Douglas in 2009 and $600 to the association in Vancouver Quadra in 2007 and again in 2008.

Among the large donors are some presidents of Conservative riding associations. There is Gary Valcour, former president of the Conservative riding association in Whitby—Oshawa. There is also the secretary of the Conservative riding association in Jonquière—Alma, who also donated to the Conservatives in past years.

Pierre Rivard is also mentioned a lot. He was the lawyer when Josée Verner, who is a senator now, sought to…

I will say this in English because I have it written down here in English.

Pierre Rivard was the lawyer who filed the request, on behalf of then Minister Josée Verner, seeking to question the subpoena to appear in court regarding a business partner suing her communications company.

There are a lot of conflicts of interest in these appointments. The Conservative government based its recent campaigns on transparency and open government. The task of members of Parliament is to make sure that good decisions are made. If the government has nothing to hide, it will allow the committee to do its work and it will bring those people in so that we can ask them questions. That is why I am making this motion.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Thank you.

The motion has been tabled. I will advise the committee that we don't have a lot of time, but I'll open the floor now for discussion.

Go ahead, Ms. Chow.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Chair, if the government has nothing to hide, there's absolutely nothing wrong in bringing forward these eight appointees.

I'm particularly interested in Gary Valcour, because I want to ask whether he wants to work with the mayor of Oshawa and others, because the people of Oshawa are very against the refinery plant. I want to ask Mr. Valcour whether he has the experience to mediate between what the citizens want and what some of the folks who donate a great deal of funding to the Conservatives, such as Tim O'Connor, want. He wants to build this ethanol plant and wants the federal government, with taxpayers' money, to subsidize such a plant.

So there are lots of questions there.

I'm very interested in asking Mr. Elmer Derrick about his approval of the gas pipeline in his area, even though the majority of the chiefs and leaders in the area are very much against it. What vision does he have for Prince Rupert and the port authority there. What kind of vision does he have for Prince Rupert? Jennifer Clarke is also a big donor to the Conservatives. How do both of them see Prince Rupert? It happens to be a huge port and is a port that certainly can expand. I'm slightly concerned about the size. Does it need to be bigger, with tankers getting bigger? Would Prince Rupert be able to deal with the increasing size of these new tankers that want to come in?

With Prince Rupert, especially, quite a lot of grain is transferred there through CN or CP. What kind of experience are they having in terms of the delivery. Is it on time?

These are all the folks that will be dealing with these port authorities. Under our committee's mandate, we have every right to talk to them about their qualifications and the visions they have for the port authorities they will be serving on or are serving on now. I think it's useful for us to connect with them.

Several are in the Québec Port Authority. Éric Dupont, Pierre Rivard, and a previous failed Conservative candidate, I believe, were appointed there. So there are three. We didn't get that last one, but certainly we should talk to these two and get their vision of what the Quebec port should be. What's the first-year plan and the five-year plan for the Quebec port?

We have eight appointees to these boards, these port authorities. My colleague has documented their relationships with the Conservative Party. They may be very qualified people, but let's talk to them.

Mr. Chair....

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

I have no one else on the list, so I'm going to call the motion.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Are there any other speakers, though?

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

No one has acknowledged.

The question on the motion is on the floor. A recorded vote has been requested by Ms. Chow.

(Motion negatived: nays 6; yeas 5)

The meeting is adjourned.