Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  May I answer the previous question?

Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  I think you spoke to a question about distribution. Who wins and who loses is not just a question of adding up big numbers and seeing which is the biggest. Canadians are divided into all kinds of different groups, including consumers and people who work at workplaces that are aff

Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  I read a quote that I think said $80 to $90.

Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  No.

Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  Sure. I know the story in the States the best. Back in the thirties, there was concern.... Certain individuals were seen to have taken positions in wheat and things like that, which was suspected of driving the price out of whack. It's not just that the price went high; it's the

Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  In terms of learning from speculative bubbles in the past.... When bubbles are inflating, it is always argued that you can't do anything to defy that sort of market, that you can't stand in the way of that sort of tsunami of activity. And then after it bursts, everyone wrings the

Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  To the extent that we regulate our own domestic financial markets, we have the capacity to put in whatever speed bumps we might like. The difficulty is that the financial market players in Canada will ask why they should do business in Canada if they can go elsewhere and not face

Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  We are in a bit of a fix in the sense that you, as elected officials in Canada, have very little to say about regulatory policies taking place in the United States, which are so influential in this. So I would encourage you to encourage the Government of Canada to make it known t

Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  Certainly the concern is that these are decisions that have repercussions far into the future. So if, for example, you over-invested in oil today, let's say, and under-invested in manufacturing, and you did that for as long as an oil bubble lasts—I don't know how long that is—the

Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  I've used your time. Why don't you go?

Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  When the price of oil is relatively high, this encourages investment. Investment in oil is a long-term proposition. You can't suddenly reverse investment made in enhancing the supply of oil. These are big, lumpy investments that will extend far into the future. In response to the

Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  Yes, we get to play the game of whose study is the right study.

Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  That's the game you're all playing, right ?

Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  It's not a fun game to play, because they're highly technical, and to excavate the technical methodology to figure out whether you think a study was done the right way with the right data, or whether something has changed since the.... It is laborious, to say nothing of the other

Subcommittee on Oil and Gas and Other Energy Prices committee  Yes, I'd like to speak to that question. I don't know about this particular example in your riding, but what I think is interesting as an illustration is that it would appear, from your story, that people got together and started questioning whether the price was reasonable and