They want us to be able to get to the important work of dealing with Bill C-49 and Bill C-50.
Thank you.
Jonathan Wilkinson Liberal
This bill has received Royal Assent and is, or will soon become, law.
This is from the published bill. The Library of Parliament has also written a full legislative summary of the bill.
This enactment establishes an accountability, transparency and engagement framework to facilitate and promote economic growth, the creation of sustainable jobs and support for workers and communities in Canada in the shift to a net-zero economy. Accordingly, the enactment
(a) provides that the Governor in Council may designate a Minister for the purposes of the Act as well as specified Ministers;
(b) establishes a Sustainable Jobs Partnership Council to provide the Minister and the specified Ministers, through a process of social dialogue, with independent advice with respect to measures to foster the creation of sustainable jobs, measures to support workers, communities and regions in the shift to a net-zero economy and matters referred to it by the Minister;
(c) requires the tabling of a Sustainable Jobs Action Plan in each House of Parliament no later than 2026 and by the end of each subsequent period of five years;
(d) provides for the establishment of a Sustainable Jobs Secretariat to support the implementation of the Act; and
(e) provides for a review of the Act within ten years of its coming into force and by the end of each subsequent period of ten years.
All sorts of information on this bill is available at LEGISinfo, an excellent resource from the Library of Parliament. You can also read the full text of the bill.
Viviane LaPointe Liberal Sudbury, ON
Jeremy Patzer Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
How rude of me; my colleagues haven't had a chance yet. I'm sure we'll get to them soon.
As I was saying, Mr. Chair.... I was speaking to the subamendment. I was talking about energy and power generation in the communities of Ontario, particularly Sudbury, which is why I moved that common-sense subamendment about including a specific region of Ontario that will be part of this 28% of oil and gas used for the grid in Ontario.
Conservatives want the country to know that we care about the entire country. Just because I'm from Saskatchewan does not mean I don't care about the energy future of Ontario, Atlantic Canada, Quebec, British Columbia, Alberta, Manitoba and the territories. That's why the common-sense subamendment to a very strong, common-sense amendment was put forward.
Within that 28% of oil and gas for Ontario and rural Ontario.... Boy, that's 10,482 megawatts—a substantial amount of power generation out there, which will be impacted by what's going on with these bills. Bill C-50 will deal with that 28%, but if Bill C-69 is not addressed and dealt with first, there's no point in talking about Bill C-50 and what we're going to do with that 28%.
Francesco Sorbara Liberal Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON
On a point of order, through you, Chair, we are, to my understanding, dealing with a very specific subamendment at this point in time in the debate about bringing Bill C-49 and Bill C-50 to this committee for study, two pieces of legislation that are very important for Canadians.
I'm not too certain as to the member's comments. Are they with regard to this subamendment or are they with regard to something else?
I'm not seeing the connection there, Chair.
Jeremy Patzer Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
All these bills, Bill C-49, Bill C-50and Bill C-69, which is from a previous Parliament, obviously have a far-reaching impact across this country.
If I recall correctly, after I moved my subamendment, I was speaking to the types of witnesses we would need and the importance of them. I moved the subamendment because we need to hear from witnesses from all across the country.
Mr. Chair, I promised you earlier that I would talk about the good people from southeastern Saskatchewan—actually, south Saskatchewan, the southeast corner of my riding. Geographically it would just be the due south of Saskatchewan there in Coronach and Rockglen and Willow Bunch. It's a great part of the province, a great part of the country.
There are going to be witnesses coming from that region for sure, but, as you know, the reason we have the subamendment is to make sure we don't forget about other parts of the country that are going to be impacted potentially by Bill C-49 and Bill C-50 but also if we do not make changes to Bill C-69. We do know this is the “don't build anything” bill, as it's now become and as we've heard numerous times in committee, whether this committee or industry or environment or any other. Even in finance we hear that regularly. I think it's important that we make sure we address Bill C-69 with witnesses from all over.
I know some of my colleagues from Atlantic Canada are looking forward to bringing witnesses as well. They are obviously going to be bringing in multiple witnesses for multiple pieces of legislation, whether it's Bill C-49 or Bill C-69. I'm sure they will be very keenly interested in Bill C-50, because the fate of Bill C-49 is going to be tied to what happens with the just transition as well, since they are from part of the country that generates its electricity largely from coal and other means. They will also be disproportionately impacted by all the pieces of legislation we're talking about in the motion, the common-sense amendment and the subamendment.
I spoke a little bit about the jobs that are going to be impacted in Saskatchewan. I spoke a little bit about what's happening in Alberta as well, and in Atlantic Canada. I think it's important that we get a good list of witnesses.
Really, people are going to be concerned and talking at length, I would imagine, about the Supreme Court ruling.
Viviane LaPointe Liberal Sudbury, ON
Jeremy Patzer Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
Oh, thank you.
Mr. Chair, I was speaking about the fact that Saskatchewan relies on natural gas and coal for the majority of its baseload power right now. Interestingly enough, on their website for the Government of Saskatchewan—it actually lists this on the SaskPower portion of that website—you can go through and you can see where the province, within the previous 24 hours, got its energy from. You can see where all the kilowatt hours were produced and where they came from. Routinely, about 70% of that was drawn from natural gas and coal. The third highest would be hydro power there. We have a couple of hydro dams in Saskatchewan. Unfortunately, I don't know that we would actually be able to build and complete one single hydro dam in the amount of time that the government is trying to phase out fossil fuels.
We've heard about timelines for approvals. That's part of the problem with Bill C-69, and now we have the largely unconstitutional part with what the Supreme Court made their ruling on. There's also the practicality of what we are going to replace the generation of gas and coal with.
We look at how long it has taken for a few hydro projects around the country to be complete. We're talking decades. Yet the government has this plan that by 2035 there will not be any natural gas. Natural gas would be basically banned at that point in time. Coal is suppose to be gone by 2030. We're seeing some difficulty around the country in trying to get the reliability factor for wind and solar. We've seen the blocking of new technologies such as tidal power already. Now that wasn't in Saskatchewan where the tidal project was moved, of course. It's a landlocked province. I'm just speaking generally about around the country how that's going to work and how that's going to play out.
With wind and solar, solar regularly accounts for less than one per cent of the power usage and energy consumption in Saskatchewan. Wind is regularly less than 10%. It's regularly a single-digit number. Sometimes, it goes a little bit higher. Sometimes it's a little bit lower. Specifically, people are concerned about peak usage and peak demand, right?
Now, for those of you who don't follow the weather patterns of Saskatchewan, in the past week, it's been as cold as -15° already and -19° in some areas. I think it's important that people realize that this assertion that you can just throw a heat pump or two on and you'll be good in the middle of winter—I mean, already in October, most heat pumps wouldn't have worked in Saskatchewan. I think it's important that this be noted.
In fact, when I was driving home on Friday after flying home from Ottawa, one of the news talk radio shows in Saskatchewan had a conversation around heat pumps. There are people who do use them up at their cabins. The people who have them speak specifically to how that is a three-season solution, mainly because it can be used as an air conditioner in the summer. You might be able to get some warmth in late May or early May at the cabin. Certainly, September into October you can get a little bit of warmth out of it.
As I said, it's already been close to -20° in Saskatchewan. That's a common occurrence at this time of year. If you look at October, November, December, January, February, March and into April, the majority of the year, you're not even going to be able to use that as a source of heat in your home reliably.
I think that it's important to have that on the table. We talk about the issue of a supposedly just transition and where people are going to get their energy from to heat their homes, to do their laundry, to cool their homes, and we have those severe differences in our temperatures from summer to winter.
We can be in the plus mid-thirties or in the minus mid-thirties, and sometimes you can see that in a span of a week, depending on the time of year. It's important that people have reliable energy, reliable power.
That's why Bill C-49, Bill C-69 and Bill C-50 all need to be discussed, but it's also why Bill C-69 needs to be dealt with first: because Canada's strategic advantage over the last number of decades has been the affordable, reliable, sustainable energy sources that we have in this country.
There are many countries around the world that would be jealous and envious of the situation we have with our abundance in natural resources and also the diversity of ways in which we generate power and our energy. I think it would be important for us to make sure we keep that. Certainly, Bill C-69 has been a barrier to enabling that to continue, because our population continues to grow, which is always a good thing.... It's good to see our population growing, but it also means that we're going to need more energy.
It's interesting to note that it's not going to be very long before, in a province like Quebec, which has a very robust hydro-powered grid, demand is going to outgrow capacity. I'll give credit to Quebec. They do have one of the more robust energy...where's the specific phrase I had here for it? Its grid is one of the most extensive systems in North America. To their credit, that includes the Americans. Also to their credit, they have a very extensive system, but that doesn't change the fact that if we don't have the capacity we need to continue to grow our population, it becomes a problem. That's where Bill C-69 comes into play.
Certainly, the folks in Atlantic Canada want to see growth in their capacity to produce energy, to produce power, and that's why they want to see Bill C-69 dealt with and addressed, but because it's also tied in with Bill C-49, which is obviously the Atlantic accords, that is why we have a motion and an amendment before us here today.
When we talk about what's happened in other provinces.... For example, with the coal transition that supposedly happened, there were thousands of people who at the end of it were put out of work. They were not transitioned to new jobs. We've seen entire towns in Alberta decimated by that. Bill C-50 is the government's attempt at doing this across the entire country, which is why Conservatives talk about the hundreds of thousands of jobs that are going to be lost, eliminated, because we do have a model to go on that the government has tried.
We've heard in other committee studies about how, when there was a transition that was going to happen in fisheries, it just didn't work. Mr. Angus has talked about how workers have been left out in his riding when it comes to plants being shut down or mining projects being closed. I think it's important that this Bill C-69 that has been looming over our country for the last four or five years gets dealt with, gets addressed and gets prioritized.
Mr. Chair, when it comes to a potential subamendment, I think of one thing that would help to make the original motion work.
I'm just going to discuss this out loud here. I'm not officially moving anything. I just want to talk this out quickly. Some of the dates that are trying to be prescribed in this programming motion obviously are going to be problematic.
In order to make sure that this motion works, getting rid of those dates or bumping them down the calendar at least a little bit, for the flexibility of the committee to be able to properly and appropriately deal with the study—I'm just thinking out loud here—removing those dates is probably going to be best.
We want to make sure that we hear from Canadians, from employers, employees, and certainly we'll hear from the private sector unions. We're definitely going to hear from people who aren't in a union, because we have heard from many people that if we talk about what this just transition supposedly is going to do, it's going to drastically impact the work of folks who don't belong to a union.
When we talk about the indirect jobs, that number is huge as well. We have to make sure that it considers those folks.
That's part of why I think putting in rigid timelines in the programming motion is going to be problematic. It also is going to be a barrier to getting the proper ordering of the motion with the amendment in it that my colleague from Lakeland moved. It would be appropriate for us to look at removing that.
With that, Mr. Chair, I'm going to move a subamendment that in section 3, as it's been ordered by my colleague from Lakeland, there be a subamendment that we would remove the reference to the dates in paragraph (a).
Paragraph (a) would read, “That the minister and officials be invited to appear before the committee on Bill C-50”. We'll just leave that open-ended so that we have that flexibility as a committee. Then (b) would say, “That the minister and officials...”. I think we would have to remove (b) all together. Again, that's one that's prescribing. It's programming a set date for officials in there. We haven't even agreed to our witness list yet. We have to do that first before we can start putting dates in there for what point officials should appear.
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
On a point of order, Chair, it's now clear that the Conservatives will do anything to filibuster Bill C-50.
I had asked earlier about whether or not we have the resources until, I think you said, 2:30 p.m. Do we have resources to go beyond so that we can finally put an end to this filibuster and get back to the work that has been laid out in the motion?
Jeremy Patzer Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
Thank you, Chair.
I thank my colleague for her respectful intervention there.
No, I've been working toward.... I've been speaking off the motion and the amendment here. I think it would be important, Mr. Chair, that, first of all....
I'm working on a subamendment here, looking at the original motion. When we order Bill C-49 and Bill C-69 ahead of Bill C-50, obviously it will cause some issues, I think, with the original motion as it is. I'm just kind of working toward that subamendment that I think will be needed to address a few things here.
I just wanted to finish a thought I had about the impact on jobs in Saskatchewan. You know, 41% of our available generating capacity comes from gas, and 26% comes from coal. We're already looking at close to 70% of our energy capacity being gas and coal. Yes, we have the just transition legislation in front of the committee, but it still doesn't lay out a plan or a path to actually do something to replace that. It's just a plan to have a plan. That's essentially what that bill is.
I think this speaks to why the priority and the precedent should be given to Bill C-49 first and foremost, so that we can deal with that issue. If we're going to change the generating capacity in Saskatchewan, we need the regulatory certainty to be dealt with, which the government is trying to ignore in Bill C-69. If we don't deal with that, how will any provinces, for that matter, whether it be Saskatchewan or Alberta or whether it be the Maritimes, as we're seeing with the Atlantic accord, deal with that?
Bill C-69 clearly needs to be the priority for this committee. That is the point we have been trying to make all along here. I think it will be important to get to those bills first, to Bill C-49 and Bill C-69, ahead of Bill C-50.
Jeremy Patzer Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
Thank you very much, Chair. I do appreciate that.
I think this amendment is solid. We're trying to order Bill C-49 ahead of Bill C-50 with our amendment because of the at least 32 times that Bill C-69 is referenced in Bill C-49. Because the Supreme Court of Canada has provided a reference on the largely unconstitutional nature of Bill C-69 and since it is referenced in Bill C-49, that is why there is a priority by Conservatives to start with Bill C-49, but that would of course mean that we need to deal with the case of Bill C-69. The court specified that legislators had to find ways to answer to the reference—not maybe they should find ways, but they had to find ways.
We spent a big chunk of this meeting laying out the case as to why we need to do the order in this manner now that we have our amendment on. Again, it's of the utmost importance that we do it in this fashion because part of Bill C-50 talks about the jobs. This is a jobs bill. It's a just transition. It's going to kill jobs, but let's just say that the government somehow is able to be successful and transition people to jobs. They won't be, but the issue is that we have heard in this committee—I have been on other committees as well where we heard this—over and over again from the private sector, but also from the public sector, and perhaps even more importantly from indigenous leaders, that Bill C-69 is the single largest barrier to actually getting projects done of any kind of any type of energy, or any type of project they are trying to do whether it's traditional oil and gas, whether it's renewables, whether it's various projects, and we've heard it numerous times.
That speaks to the urgency as to why we need to address Bill C-69 and particularly as it pertains to Bill C-49, because this is obviously about jobs in Atlantic Canada and trying to deal with the energy situation there. It would absolutely be appropriate that we deal with Bill C-69 and the impact it has first and foremost.
There's a good note from the Supreme Court of Canada ruling that Parliament can enact impact assessment legislation to minimize risks that some major projects pose to the environment. However, “this scheme plainly overstepped the mark.” That's what the Supreme Court said. Moreover, “it is open to Parliament and the provincial legislatures to exercise their respective powers over the environment harmoniously, in the spirit of co-operative federalism.” That's another quote from the Supreme Court ruling.
The whole point about Bill C-69 was every single province, every single premier said there were issues, and the territorial leaders did too. It is important that is noted, that going all the way back to 2018-19 when this was debated, flags were raised over issues with this bill by members of Parliament. In particular, all three at this table on the Conservative side spoke to it. In fact, my colleague from Lakeland did multiple times, and the Premier of Saskatchewan, the Premier of Alberta, all the premiers spoke against the overreach of this. Particularly the Ontario premier very strongly stated on it.
It's important that this be considered as we look at the ordering of these bills. That is why the Conservatives have put this amendment forward, because we need to respect provincial jurisdiction, which is why the Provincial Court of Alberta made a ruling on Bill C-69, which of course the federal government challenged at the Supreme Court. We then saw the Supreme Court make its ruling in the reference case.
I would just like to note that all throughout the history of Canadian parliaments, any time the Supreme Court has made a reference ruling, Parliament—the government of the day—has decided to make the necessary changes to it.
For the certainty of communities and people who are looking for certainty going forward, I think it's extremely important that we address this first.
I'm going to read something from the Saskatchewan government. The first line here is, “5-2 Decision Finds That The Federal Government Overstepped Constitutional Authority And Should Be More 'Cooperative' With Provinces In The Future.”
The opening statement lays out the case as to why and how co-operative federalism is actually supposed to work. It clearly was not done in this case. The rest of the quote contains kind of no-brainer points. It reads:
Saskatchewan welcomes the Supreme Court of Canada's...ruling against the federal government's environmental Impact Assessment Act, formerly Bill C-69.
“This decision is nothing short of a constitutional tipping point and reasserts provinces' rights and primary jurisdiction over natural resources, the environment and power generation,” Justice Minister and Attorney General, Bronwyn Eyre said. “It should also force the federal government to reassess other areas of overreach, including capping oil and gas production and electrical generation. The IAA has stalled everything from Canadian highway and mine projects to LNG facilities and pipelines. It has thwarted investment, competitiveness and productivity across the country. This major decision will correct course.”
That last sentence, “This major decision will correct course”, is why our amendment has been moved. That's why we feel this bill needs to be done first.
I'll finish the article:
The IAA received royal assent in 2019. In 2022, the Alberta Court of Appeal (in a 4-1 majority) held that the IAA was unconstitutional, violated the division of powers between Ottawa and the provinces, and took a “wrecking ball” to exclusive provincial jurisdiction under Section 92 and 92A of the Constitution Act, 1867. The federal government appealed the decision to the [Supreme Court of Canada].
Last March, Saskatchewan was part of the constitutional intervention, along with seven other provinces, before Canada's top court, arguing that the IAA had exceeded federal jurisdiction.
The majority recognized that the IAA is a clear example of federal overreach. Specifically, the Supreme Court majority held that the IAA's designated projects scheme, by which the federal authorities could permanently put a project on hold was an “unconstitutional, arrogation of power by Parliament” and “clearly overstepped the mark.” The majority also found that the Act “grants the decision-maker a practically untrammelled power [of] regulated projects qua projects.”
In 2023, Saskatchewan passed the Saskatchewan First Act to [deal with] matters of provincial jurisdiction.
My own province has made it very clear where it stands on this case and on this point. We know all of the other provinces did as well when it came to the government tabling Bill C-69 back in 2018-19.
The fact that the Supreme Court has made its ruling kind of puts us in the position we're in now, where we have a largely unconstitutional bill impacting a lot of things that the government is trying work on—multiple pieces of legislation. It's not just Bill C-49 and Bill C-50. Other issues will arise if it is not dealt with and addressed.
Quite frankly, it is hamstringing the provinces to be able to proceed with projects. We heard about LNG. We heard about simply trying to get highways built or repaired.
I mentioned earlier that some of the first nations leaders were concerned about this as well because they're looking at timelines. They're looking at how there will be opportunity for self-determination, economic participation for their residents and economic reconciliation.
Many of them have earmarked and flagged natural resource projects and development and also renewables, which also gets to the point though of why we have a problem with Bill C-69. They have told us over and over again that even on the renewable side, Bill C-69 is a problem. It's not even just about this being the.... It was originally dubbed the “no more pipelines” bill. This is just a “no more energy” bill. That is what we have here in front of us.
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
I have a point of order.
I'm sorry. I don't want to belabour things in terms of resources.
If it's being translated, should we suspend for five minutes? That might give you a chance to see if we can get resources for longer than until 2:30. I think it's very important that we get Bill C-50 debated and back to the House. If it takes longer, then maybe we need to see if we can obtain more resources, but I leave that you, Mr. Chair, and to our wonderful clerk.
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
Let me finish. I don't believe it's in order, and it also leaves off Bill C-50, which was part of the amendment, so, in order to address this you have to—
Shannon Stubbs Conservative Lakeland, AB
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate that.
There was no harm, no foul on the headset and all of those things. It's just amazing. Even on Friday, I was in a call and forgot to unmute my mike. You'd think that this far in we would know these things, but here we are.
Again, colleagues, I hope I have made an effective case to you and all Canadians about the importance of this work and why we must put first things first in this common-sense approach to our scheduling for this committee, especially because it's so important to bring home affordability and combat the cost of living crisis the NDP-Liberals have caused. They've admitted this as of Friday, with their temporary sham of a relief of the carbon tax for only one area, which pits Canadians against each other. This is their MO. Obviously, all these things are interconnected, and they are extremely important. I agree.
As Conservatives, and as our leader Pierre Poilievre has always said, we want to accelerate both traditional and renewable energy development, exports and technology in Canada. We want light, green projects. We want to make Canada the supplier of choice for all kinds of energy sources and technologies for our allies around the world. We also want to bring home energy security and self-sufficiency, as well as affordable power and fuel bills, especially for people who have no other options, which is the case for many Canadians right across the country.
This is connected to Bill C-69, Bill C-49 and Bill C-50. They all work together. In different ways, they are going to hold back, roadblock and gatekeep both traditional and renewable energy development, which will cause a brain drain and limit innovation as well as entrepreneurial and private sector creativity in Canada—for which we are world-renowned—when it comes to developing the fuels of the future and continuing the energy transformation that has been going on for decades among oil and gas workers, energy developers and innovators in Canada. All of these things are extremely consequential. They certainly are to our ridings individually and to the entire country as the resource development-based economy and country we are, which we should be proud of.
I have an amendment to the NDP-Liberal programming motion that seeks to dictate all of the work unilaterally, complete with dates for our committee. Again, I note it's the opposite of the legislative way they brought these bills through in the first place. It still doesn't make any sense.
I move that, before the committee consider Bill C-50, the just transition....
You'll note there was only one committee witness who called it “sustainable jobs”. It was quite clear that when the NDP-Liberals put their documents out, they had done a last-minute copy and paste everywhere it said “just transition” to replace it with “sustainable jobs”. That's because Canadians didn't know what the just transition was, at first. Once they found out, they sure didn't like it. Of course, the NDP-Liberals are masters of words and words over action, and they tried to slip that in and pull the wool over everybody's eyes. I suggest that's not going to happen here, but we'll see.
To that end, I would like to propose an amendment to this programming motion by the costly coalition. Before the committee consider Bill C-50, that it, one, first undertake the following study on Bill C-69: Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), the committee undertake a study of the Supreme Court of Canada's ruling that Bill C-69, an act to enact the Impact Assessment Act and the Canadian Energy Regulator Act, to amend the Navigation Protection Act—
The Chair Liberal George Chahal
Yes. As mentioned, members do have the right to enter the room and leave the room, as many do, to follow the proceedings in the natural resources committee, because we're debating some.... Really, we're talking about some important topics and about an important motion on the floor, brought by Mr. Sorbara, on Bill C-50 and Bill C-49, which we're discussing today.
I want to make sure that Ms. Stubbs, because I think she was alluding to.... She might have an amendment or she might be wrapping up—I don't know—so others may get a chance to have the floor and others can debate. I know that others are eagerly waiting to get involved as well.
Ms. Stubbs, there are no more points of order. The floor is yours.
Shannon Stubbs Conservative Lakeland, AB
Thank you, Chair.
I appreciate so much your giving me the opportunity to do this. I know in your riding in Calgary, you represent many oil and gas workers and their families, and oil and gas businesses, so I'm sure that's why you also believe that this is a very critical and crucial discussion for the people that you represent.
We're both Albertans. I have been working on this file for a long time, and I worked on these policy issues long before I was elected, as you may know. I'm certainly very familiar with Calgarians, their values, their priorities, and their deep concern about all these bills, so thank you for this, despite all the interruptions which are delaying this point, for still giving me the time to address this. Thank you.
I do have an amendment, but as you can see, I feel it's my duty, given the delay on dealing effectively with Bill C-69 I really want to make sure I'm making the comprehensive case to Canadians and to all the members here why we certainly cannot support this scheduling motion as written, and as was just brought to this committee with no notice to any of us, and seeks to dictate every single aspect of the work and the timelines of what we do in this committee.
I hope I have already addressed why failing to deal with Bill C-69 is nuts and destructive to the country. The way that Bill C-69 is in Bill C-49 certainly will open it up to litigation and delays, which no person in Atlantic Canada or the premiers want. They want a clear, predictable regulatory environment for both offshore petroleum and offshore renewable energy. That's why they want the bill and they want the provincial ministers to have a say. They don't want this all just to be cooked up on the back door by the federal representatives. I hope I have explained why those two things are linked and why Bill C-49 has to come first.
Of course, according to the NDP-Liberals' own schedule under which they brought the bills through the House of Commons, which was Bill C-49 first and then Bill C-50.... Of course, the arguments about other ministers or other ministries aren't really relevant on any of them since Bill C-69 was a joint initiative by the environment and natural resources ministers. Bill C-49 was the same. Of course, Bill C-50, the just transition, which will be transition to poverty, was also brought forward jointly by the environment minister, the natural resources minister and the labour minister.
To the schedule which the NDP-Liberals have put on the table today to dictate every single aspect of the work of this committee, here are the problems.
For Bill C-50, we have this date.... No, this one is good. If we can get the minister....
Actually, the minister hasn't been here for a while, so I really appreciate that we do have this date for him to come. Of course, he should come for a whole bunch of other reasons so that's cool beans to me.
Let's go down here. We have the minister again. That's fine. We should have the minister in, obviously, as soon as possible as this motion does outline. Definitely.
Here's where we start getting into the problem. There are dates here that are tying us based on the other work that we have to do to ensure that all Canadians who will be impacted by all of these bills will be heard. They must be heard. In the House of Commons and committee, it is our job to demonstrate our diligence, to demonstrate accountability, to do the work that Canadians expect of us to pass legislation that, for example, won't be litigated until kingdom come and won't be declared to be unconstitutional five years later. We don't want to do that again. I'm sure we all agree. This is why it's so important that we do our jobs.
One can understand that even though parties, various groups and the government have been working behind the scenes—and they have; I mean that's how things get developed—for a year or two years on Bill C-49 and Bill C-50.... For Conservatives as the official opposition, of course, our tools are to litigate that and to do our due diligence in the House of Commons and in committee.
We in the official opposition—Conservatives—who also did gain more votes individually from individual Canadians in 2021 and in 2019, haven't been working on this in the back doors with NDP, Liberals and various other groups for one to two years.
The only thing we can do is fight for the ability to do our jobs on behalf of the common sense of common people who have sent us here. That's our job.
I hope that this helps explain why we can't possibly support this scheduling motion that is aiming to drive through and dictate every step of what we do next on this committee.
Viviane, you asked me if there was an amendment, and there is.
Let me get to it at long last, unless members are still unclear why I am making the case that Bill C-69 is so important and that Bill C-69 is in Bill C-49 and why Bill C-49 must come first and then we must do Bill C-50. Is anyone still questioning that?
Certainly, not to further delay, but I understand, Marc, that when you have the official opposition, who hasn't been included or involved in any of this work, and they're now really trying to do their jobs as members of Parliament, as the official opposition.... In my case it's as the vice-chair of this committee, as a shadow minister for natural resources. There are my colleagues representing the Saskatchewan riding, Manitoba riding; my colleague, Earl, who's been here, I think, the longest of any of us, and he represents an Alberta riding; and Mario, who needs to do his due diligence for his constituents.
I understand that my colleagues in the NDP-Liberals might find this inconvenient. They might be annoyed at this. I mean, this is democracy.
The Chair Liberal George Chahal
Thank you for the point of order, Ms. Lapointe.
Ms. Lapointe asked in her point of order if you have an amendment that you're bringing forward, Ms. Stubbs. If you do, I would like to hear it, but also the floor is yours to be able to provide your debate on these important bills, the motion by Mr. Sorbara that was brought forward on Bill C-50 and Bill C-49.
Through your debate, if you can allude to whether an amendment is coming, that would be great. The floor is yours.