Bill C-264

An Act to repeal certain restrictions on shipping

This enactment repeals the Oil Tanker Moratorium Act .

An Act to Repeal Certain Restrictions on Shipping

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise and address the House on the important issue of Canada's natural resources and how those resources can be of great value to all Canadians. If we really want to take a look at how the Government of Canada has been addressing that issue, we have to understand just how important collaborative federalism is, meaning that Ottawa works with our provinces and other stakeholders on doing the things we are doing in order to build that stronger and healthier economy.

When we take a look at the legislation before us today, we should also take a look at what has been happening since 1972. We had a great deal of commitment to our environment even back then, including from industries and different stakeholders, including the provinces, indigenous community leaders or the federal government, and an understanding of the dangers of such things as oil spills and protecting the B.C. coastline. It is important that we continue to look at ways to encourage and support that collaborative approach in building a stronger and healthier Canada. It is something the Prime Minister and this government have strived to achieve since the last federal election when Canadians made the decision to elect a new Prime Minister. This is a government that understands the importance of building an economy that works for all Canadians and the benefits of doing so, and in working with other provinces.

British Columbia just had an election, as we all know, and I congratulate the new Premier-elect, Lorne Doerkson, on his election. I listened very attentively to what he had to say; there were a lot of common links with what the Prime Minister of Canada has been talking about. We will see that not only are there concerns about the environment, but there are also concerns in regards to how we can actually build that stronger Canada and the important role that British Columbia plays in that.

The week before, we saw the people of Alberta, an overwhelming majority, understanding the value of Canada as a federal system and the potential that Alberta, B.C. and every province in Canada has. The way we achieve that potential is to ensure that we have the Prime Minister , ministers, the government as a whole, and I would even extend that to every member of the House of Commons, contributing towards a co-operative federalism that ensures every Canadian and every region of the country benefits. That is what we should be attempting to achieve.

However, a great deal of the legislation before us deals with rhetoric. The Conservative opposition's approach to oil and the development of our natural resources, which is to say full steam ahead, that we do not care what the indigenous people of Canada have to say and would not even listen to what provincial governments have to say. Whether individuals advocate for a healthier environment or a healthier economy, the Conservatives like to think that the Conservative spin is going to resolve the issues.

I have heard the leader of the Conservative Party talk about dealing with clearing the way and getting pipelines built to the B.C. coast, at times completely ignoring indigenous interests and just saying they should build anyway. However, as a government, I believe there is a responsibility of consultation, both morally and legally, that needs to take place. That is what I mean by collaborative approach. It does not mean that it is not going to happen.

In fact, take a look at Stephen Harper. What did Prime Minister Stephen Harper actually accomplish when it came to building pipelines to tidewater? Absolutely nothing. There was not even an inch of pipeline built in the direction of the west coast. It was not until the current leader and Prime Minister Stephen Harper left office a few years later where we started to actually see action on that front. That is the reality. That is a fact.

Since the last federal election, the Prime Minister has made a commitment to Canadians that we are going to build, and build Canada strong, that means taking a look at our natural resources and other things across the nation, and how it is that we are going to advance that build. That is why we brought forward not one, but two pieces of legislation dealing with things such as one Canadian economy. Canadians want that, they expect that, and the federal government has delivered that. Now we continue to encourage co-operation among the provinces to continue to take down barriers that prevent trade between our provinces. Part of trade is dealing with pipelines and dealing with the mobility of labour. They are so very important to our nation.

Take a look at the projects. Here we are dealing a great deal in the bill that is being proposed by the Conservatives today, with the Province of British Columbia. I will remind members from across the way that the single greatest expenditure between government and the private sector was LNG phase one, under the government of Justin Trudeau. Some 18 months later, we now have an agreement to push forward with LNG phase two. We are talking about billions of dollars of investment that is going to generate billions in terms of future revenue for the federal government, while working with an NDP government in B.C. and a Conservative government in Alberta. In other words, it is a team Canada approach. The political stripe is secondary. What is important is that it be in the interest of Canadians. I believe we have demonstrated that time and time again.

I can talk about B.C. as I just did. I can talk about the MOU in Alberta. I can talk about the copper mine in Saskatchewan. I can talk about the port of Churchill in Manitoba and nuclear energy in Ontario. I can talk about the port of Montreal and the expansion there, energy expansion in Atlantic Canada and the list goes on. I can talk about how it is we are using natural resource development and enticing investors to come to Canada as the Prime Minister hosted them back in Toronto, where we saw half trillion dollars, which was previously unheard of.

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Crowfoot, AB]

Madam Speaker, in 2015, the northern gateway pipeline was a conditionally approved 525,000 barrel per day link between the Alberta oil sands and the Pacific coast. In the 2015 election, the Liberals campaigned against this project. They were aided and abetted heavily by environmentalist NGOs, many foreign-funded, that opposed that project. Their then leader, Justin Trudeau, his campaign manager and many of his candidates were vehemently opposed to the northern gateway pipeline.

This is what happened in 2015. A pipeline was conditionally approved and the Liberals opposed it. When they formed their government, they failed to champion this approved pipeline. They failed to take any steps to work with anybody toward ensuring that conditions could be met or that the opposition could be worked with to ensure its construction, and they killed it by a ministerial order in the fall of 2016, about 10 years ago. Then they brought in Bill C-48 to ensure that no pipeline could ever be built to the northwest coast. That is the track record of the government. They are opposed to northern shipping because they oppose a pipeline and the increased production to fill the pipeline.

The northern route is the best route to world markets. It is the closest way to world prices. It is the least number of shipping days to get to Asian markets. It is the way that Canada could get off the differential with the existing bottlenecks that cause Canadians to take a discount on our prices. Getting to Asian markets, world markets and world prices is how Canada can diversify its trade relationships with Canada's most valuable commodity, by far the biggest source of export revenue and contribution to the Canadian economy.

I heard as recently as last week in debate in this House that they claim there was never any shipping traffic and Bill C-48 was just codifying a long-existing de facto ban. That is all nonsense. They deliberately banned shipping traffic with this bill. Bill C-48 prohibits the loading and unloading of tankers off the northwest coast of British Columbia and this bill today would repeal that decision.

Let us face it and admit to ourselves that Bill C-48 never had anything to do with environmental policy, certainly not with maritime environmental policy. It had everything to do with ensuring that the northern gateway pipeline would never be built and that the expansion of the oil sands to fill the pipeline would not happen. That was the agenda. We need to go back to that time and hear some of the things members said in this place. We need to hear what Prime Minister Trudeau said when he appeared at the industry committee, I think in 2021, under questioning from the opposition leader. He doubled down, said he supported it and thought it was the right decision to kill northern gateway. He did not say it was because the Liberals did not want shipping traffic off the northwest coast. It was because they did not believe in the project and did not want a northern pipeline. It was not about safety. It was about their opposition to pipelines and the oil and gas industry. So many of the members of the Liberal government and caucus are quite clearly on the record about this.

The current Minister of the Environment, on her MP web page, gave herself credit for opposing an expansion of the oil sands. This is not something we dug up deep from the history of the Internet. This is live while she is Minister of the Environment. I questioned her about it at the natural resources committee. I was actually surprised that the Liberals did not have it taken down within the hour when it was aired publicly. It took months before they took it down. We have the Minister of the Environment who proudly opposes an expansion of the oil sands, and today they would have us think that they are aggressively moving forward to ensure that we have an expansion of our exports and that we become an energy superpower.

In order to do that, we would have to export far more oil and gas and energy products than we currently do. We would need two or three northern gateways. We would need a doubling of TMX. We would need Keystone XL to be built. We would need an eastern pipeline to Sarnia or all the way to Saint John. These are the things that an energy superpower would need. The most efficient way to get our exports to world markets would be to allow the shipping traffic that is currently banned by this law.

If the northern gateway pipeline had been built at 525,000 barrels a day, at today's world prices, that would be nearly $20 billion a year in revenue. Think of the taxation base for public services. Think of all the high-paying jobs. Think of what we would have today economically if that pipeline and other pipelines had been built, if the Liberals had championed Keystone XL to ensure its construction or had not chased TransCanada Energy out of Canada. It literally had to change its name and moved all of its investment activity to Mexico and the United States.

The Liberals have an opportunity today. They can stand up and vote for this bill, although we will probably not have the vote today but this week. They can declare whether they want to actually undertake the steps necessary to allow Canada to become an energy superpower. They can repeal Bill C-48, which was calculated to restrict the expansion of the oil sands and our exports. They have a chance to do that now.

There is today a private sector proponent that wishes to ship 250,000 barrels a day from Prince Rupert, which is the closest port to, and has the fewest number of shipping days from, Asian markets. This proponent would need a repeal of Bill C-48. The Liberals have a chance, with this bill, to be on the side of Canadian jobs, of Canadian export diversification and of getting us out of our dependence on the United States as an export destination. They have the chance to do it with this bill, and it will be really interesting to see if they will undertake a concrete step in furtherance of the objectives they sometimes talk about.

The Liberals speak of Canada as an energy superpower yet have not repealed Bill C-69, which is the “no more pipelines” bill. They will need to support Bill C-264 to remove the shipping ban. These things have to be done. They cannot just say the words “energy superpower”. They will have to change the laws the government passed that prevent Canada from reaching its potential as an energy superpower. This is an important step. Bill C-5, which we supported, gives the Liberals the power to exempt people from the law, but that is not the way to go. They need to change the laws that actually prevent the activity.

I want to thank the member for Calgary Signal Hill for bringing this bill to the House. I want to thank my friend James Cumming for his attempt in an earlier Parliament to strip away Bill C-48. It is a long-time policy of the Conservatives to repeal this ban, which is all about reducing Canada's export potential of oil and gas.

[Branden Leslie, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Madam Speaker, earlier this month, the Prime Minister announced that Canada would pursue another oil pipeline to the Pacific coast. I agree that Canada should be selling more of its energy to the world, but I have one question: If more oil tankers can be part of a responsible national project on the south coast of B.C., why is the answer automatically “no” when somebody proposes a project farther north? This is what Bill C-264 asks us to reconsider.

Let me be clear. I do not want oil splashing up on a beach or destroying an ecosystem; nobody does. We can disagree about how best to protect the environment without pretending that one side cares about it and the other side does not.

We ought to be honest about this law, including where it came from. In 2016, Justin Trudeau announced that his government would reject the northern gateway pipeline and introduced a tanker ban for northern B.C. His stated reason was environmental protection. What does the law actually do? It prohibits tankers carrying more than 12,500 metric tonnes of crude oil or certain persistent oils from loading, unloading or stopping at ports and marine installations along the northern B.C. coast. It does not ban every tanker passing offshore, though. It prevents the development of a large crude oil export terminal using those ports.

There is an important difference, because oil tankers did not vanish from the Pacific coast when this law was passed. Let us consider Alaska. American tankers have long carried crude oil to destinations farther south, including Washington state. They travel offshore, west of a voluntary tanker exclusion zone established back in 1985. We need to look at the broader picture. We recognize that marine shipping carries risks, and we manage some of those risks through routes, rules and emergency preparedness. Meanwhile, a company proposing a northern export terminal faces a ban regardless of what safeguards it might offer.

We manage oil shipping elsewhere. Tankers operate on the St. Lawrence and around Newfoundland. They load Canadian crude oil at Westridge in Burnaby. In the second quarter of this year alone, Trans Mountain reported that 82 vessels were loaded at that terminal. Those waters are not all alike, but that is exactly why we have experts, navigational assessments and environmental reviews. The risks of a particular project ought to be assessed where it would actually operate.

This brings me back to the Pacific link project, the new pipeline that was announced. It is proposed to follow a southern route to an export terminal at Roberts Bank outside of the northern moratorium area. It has not been built or finally approved. The federal government says it could carry another million barrels of oil a day toward customers in Asia. I am glad the Liberal government finally recognizes that more buyers for Canadian energy would be a good thing. We have depended heavily on the American market, and we should not put all of our eggs in one basket, nor should we be effectively donating billions of dollars to the United States by selling to it at a discount when higher world prices are available.

However, we cannot keep assuming that every new pipeline to the Pacific should end up along some variation of the same southern corridor. There are communities, mountains, already very busy ports and environmental concerns along those routes too. Sometimes, using an existing corridor will be the sensible option. Sometimes, it may not be. Why would we decide today that future engineers, investors and communities would not even be allowed to put another northern option on the table?

Here is what really bothers me about the tanker ban: It substitutes a blanket political decision for the hard work of judging individual proposals as they come in. Let us think about how ridiculous that is. A company could come forward with a proposal that uses the safest tankers available, the latest navigation technology, tugboats to escort every vessel and an emergency response system that goes well beyond anything required today. It could offer to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on additional safety measures and demonstrate that it can meet every environmental standard we can throw at it. What would the federal government say? “Sorry, we are not interested.”

It does not matter how safe a company can make it, how much technology has improved or what precautions it is prepared to take. The answer was decided back in 2019, and the government is not even going to consider the question. This is the absurdity of this ban in a nutshell. The government did not set a higher environmental standard for companies to meet. It decided that no matter how much companies invest, how safe the technology becomes or how strong environmental protections are, nothing will ever be good enough. They are not being given a tough test to pass. They are being told they are not even allowed to take the test.

That strikes me as a rather strange way to govern. We regulate plenty of activities that carry serious risks. Pipelines, railways, ports, factories and even the driving of cars all operate under rules designed to prevent accidents and limit their consequences. We do not simply assume that every project is safe. We demand evidence, impose conditions and, when necessary, refuse permission. At the very minimum, we should at least examine what is being proposed.

There is something else worth remembering. Back in 2013, Stephen Harper's Conservative government launched a major effort to improve tanker safety in Canada. It increased tanker inspections, expanded aerial and satellite monitoring, improved our ability to respond to spills and brought in tougher rules for facilities handling oil. These were not just promises. The measures were put into practice, and Transport Canada's own evaluation later confirmed that they helped improve marine safety. The Harper government also recognized that preventing spills was only part of the equation. It changed the law to make sure that if something did go wrong, the people responsible would be held financially accountable.

In 2014, the government proposed removing the compensation limit on Canada's ship-source oil pollution fund. The principle was simple: If a tanker causes a spill, the people who suffer the losses should be compensated and the polluter should pay. Further changes were passed in 2018, removing the compensation ceiling on the fund and clarifying the rules for certain economic losses. Today, that fund can provide compensation for claims without a fixed overall limit for each incident.

Over the years, we have built a system designed to prevent accidents, respond when they happen and hold those responsible for them financially accountable. Rather than simply banning certain tanker operations outright, should we not be asking whether those protections can be made even stronger? If the existing rules are not good enough for northern B.C., let us identify what is missing.

Do we need more tugboats escorting tankers? Do we need better equipment stationed across the coastline? Do we need restrictions on sailing during dangerous weather, perhaps, or tougher financial requirements for companies that want to operate there? If a company wants to build a terminal and ship oil through those waters, it should have to demonstrate that it can operate responsibly. It should be prepared to invest in the necessary safety measures and take financial responsibility if something goes wrong.

That brings us back to Bill C-264. Passing this legislation would not approve a single new pipeline or tanker terminal. It would not give an oil company permission to do whatever it wants, and it would not remove Canada's other marine safety or environmental laws. It would simply repeal the existing tanker moratorium, allowing future proposals to be considered under the other laws and approval processes that apply to it. Those reviews should be rigorous. If a proposed project cannot meet the required environmental standards, it should not be approved. If the risks are simply too great, the answer should be no. Surely we should be willing to examine the evidence before making that decision.

The Prime Minister keeps telling us that he wants to make this country an energy superpower. I would ask him this: How can we seriously talk about opening new markets while maintaining a law that rules out an entire region of potential export opportunities before anyone could even put forward a proposal?

We cannot assume that every future pipeline to the Pacific Ocean should have to squeeze into the same southern corridor, nor should we assume that every proposal for a northern terminal would be suitable. We should be making those decisions based on actual proposals. I do not believe that protecting the environment and developing our natural resources must be competing objectives. We should, in fact, be able to walk and chew gum. I think it is perfectly reasonable to take another look at whether the tanker ban still makes any sense. That is why I will be supporting Bill C-264.

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Madam Speaker, before I start, I want to acknowledge my colleagues who are proudly wearing the poppy as we begin the annual poppy campaign to remember those who gave their lives and fought for our values and freedom.

This is my annual reminder. This year is the second year that I have the honour of serving as the honorary president of the poppy campaign in my riding of Drummond. The poppy is worn over the heart, above any other medal or pin. The member pin that many of us wear must be worn below the poppy. I repeat this every year. I think that these details are important for veterans and for those who care about matters of protocol.

Before I begin my speech on Bill C-264, I would like to congratulate the new Quebec minister of natural resources and forests, Nathalie Bisaillon, on her appointment. Ms. Bisaillon is also the MNA for the new riding of Marie-Lacoste-Gérin-Lajoie, part of which is located in the federal riding of Drummond, which I have had the honour of representing since 2019. I welcome Nathalie Bisaillon to her role as MNA and minister. I will be very pleased and honoured to work with her on both regional and national files.

We are here today to talk about Bill C-264, an act to repeal certain restrictions on shipping, which seeks to completely do away with the Oil Tanker Moratorium Act. The first thing we need to know is that we are only debating this bill today because the Prime Minister himself committed in his memorandum of understanding with Alberta to adjusting the oil tanker moratorium should a new bitumen pipeline between Alberta and British Columbia ever move forward.

In an effort to protect so-called Canadian national unity and look like Captain Canada to the United States, the Prime Minister opened the door to abandoning the moratorium that protects marine diversity in British Columbia.

Unsurprisingly, the Conservatives have thrown themselves headlong into this. If the Liberals think that Bill C-264 is a trap, they are quite right. The problem is that it is a trap they themselves set when they signed the MOU with Alberta in November 2025.

The bill we are debating today deals with regulating vessels carrying crude oil or persistent oil to or from ports and maritime facilities located along British Columbia's north coast. These substances are considered “persistent” because, if they end up in the environment or marine ecosystems, they remain there for a long time. As the term suggests, they can persist for decades, and communities end up stuck with them.

The issue at hand, therefore, is the risk of oil spills along the coast of British Columbia, specifically in the waters extending from the Alaskan border to the northern mainland coast opposite the northern tip of Vancouver Island.

The moratorium exists because British Columbia's north coast is considered to be one of the most productive and least disturbed temperate marine ecosystems on the planet. An oil spill would pose a direct threat to marine biodiversity and to the many species that depend on this coastline.

The Great Bear Sea is a 102,000-square-kilometre marine area extending from the northern tip of Vancouver Island to the Alaskan border. It is one of the richest marine ecosystems in the world. Home to species and habitats like the migrating humpback whale, orcas, sea otters, seabirds, salmon, ancient glass sponge reefs, kelp forests and seagrass meadows, it is simply a treasure.

Crude oil and persistent oil have been slowly degrading these ecosystems for decades. In their efforts to ideologically support increased shipments of Canadian oil sands exports, the Conservatives want to remove any potential obstacle to their industry's development, regardless of the ecological risk or damage posed to precious marine ecosystems like the ones I just mentioned.

The current moratorium, however, applies only to northern British Colombia, whereas current exports are located in the south and are therefore unaffected by the moratorium. What, then, are they trying to accomplish?

Bill C‑48 was tabled in Parliament on May 12, 2017. The bill was introduced by the late Marc Garneau, Minister of Transportation at the time, and was studied during the 42nd Parliament. It was passed and received royal assent in June 2019.

The regulation of marine shipping is part of Canada's oceans protection plan and its broader commitment to protecting 30% of oceans by 2030 pursuant to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity and the commitments that were made in Montreal in 2022 at COP15.

The Oil Tanker Moratorium Act imposes a moratorium on tankers carrying more than 12,500 metric tons of crude oil from stopping along the northern coast of British Columbia. Vessels carrying cargoes of less than 12,500 metric tonnes are permitted in the moratorium area. The act includes an enforcement and sanctions regime that includes charges and fines of up to $5 million, depending on the seriousness of the offence.

It is important to understand that this moratorium was added to the voluntary tanker exclusion zone that has been in place since 1985 and that was negotiated with the United States. Oil tankers travelling from Alaska to Washington were required to sail west of the zone. What is more, since this was a voluntary exclusion zone, it was never introduced into legislation. The Canadian government has been talking about a tanker moratorium off the coast of British Columbia since 1972. Before Bill C-48 was passed in 2019, the legal status of the moratorium was a source of debate and confusion, so the moratorium resolved a legal and historic ambiguity and helped to ensure the protection of B.C.'s northern coast.

Why lift the oil tanker ban? What would be the point of that? When the Prime Minister ventured to suggest lifting the oil tanker ban in November 2025, his decision was harshly criticized by the British Columbia government. The new government that just took office this weekend will likely have a different attitude. It completely changes the situation, but it will not necessarily make things any easier, because the first nations also strongly oppose that decision. The next few months in particular will likely be full of heated discussions.

The Prime Minister's Alberta escapade has been viewed as a sign that the government has abandoned its commitment to protecting nature. The message from British Columbia and first nations has been clear. Protecting the environment on B.C.'s north coast does not hinder the economy, but rather helps it grow. The rapid expansion of the oil sands industry and increased exports in the 1990s were bound to lead to more marine transportation and put more pressure on marine ecosystems. The Trans Mountain expansion tripled the existing pipeline capacity and added an extra 590,000 barrels a day of shipping capacity.

In fact, it was Justin Trudeau who claimed that the goal of his pipeline, funded by $35 billion or $40 billion dollars in public funds, was to diversify export markets, but the vast majority of exports go to the United States. The United States remains the primary destination for Canadian crude oil. That country received 93.8% of all Canadian crude oil exports from May 2024 to April 2025. Of Canada's total crude oil exports to the United States, 92.8% flow through the existing pipeline network. I think this is all show and no substance.

Why do I bring up the removal of the oil tanker moratorium? It is because challenging the moratorium on oil tankers helps fuel the dream of the Conservatives, and the neo-conservatives who now sit on the Liberal benches, to build new pipelines. That is why, in the Canada-Alberta memorandum of understanding, alongside the Prime Minister's pledge to increase Alberta's oil and gas production to meet Canada's export targets, there is already a proposal to amend the moratorium on oil tankers. It states the following:

If an Alberta bitumen pipeline is ultimately approved under the Building Canada Act and provides opportunities for indigenous co-ownership and shared economic benefits, Canada confirms that it will enable the export of bitumen from a deep-water port to Asian markets, including if necessary through an appropriate adjustment to the Oil Tanker Moratorium Act.

This sentence is still on the Prime Minister's website even today. The reason we are here today debating Bill C‑264, which proposes to tear apart an entire piece of legislation against the wishes of first nations and against the wishes of the government then in power in British Columbia, is that the Prime Minister himself launched the debate and invited us to join him in that. Once again, we can agree that the new government now in power in British Columbia may not object quite so strenuously. The Prime Minister of Canada opened the door and the Conservatives walked right in. In doing so, he is continuing to destroy his own political party's weak environmental record.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to address the House this morning and to express my strong support for Bill C-264. This is a bill that would finally repeal the Liberal tanker ban. This is an opportunity to talk about pipeline policy in this country and to call out the slipperiness of the Liberal government.

It is clear that over the last 10 years, the Conservative opposition has won the public debate on pipelines. There is certainly very strong public support for the construction of pipelines and other major national energy projects, and this creates the conditions in which the government faces a political imperative to try to pretend to be more supportive of energy infrastructure projects than it has been in the past. However, while we have won the public debate around the construction of pipelines and other major energy infrastructure, the government continues to obstruct, at a policy level, actual progress on these issues. We have won the public debate, but we have not won the policy battle. That is what Bill C-264 tries to do: complete policy work that certainly reflects the public demand for these kinds of projects to go forward.

To understand, though, how the government says one thing and does another when it comes to pipelines, I think it is important to dig into the history. If we look at the history over the last 10 or 15 years as it relates to pipelines, the government has done everything possible to obstruct pipelines and major energy infrastructure from going forward. It has also tried to do so indirectly. Those who are familiar with crime films will recognize the phrase “make it look like an accident.” The government has tried to kill pipelines and make it look like an accident.

Let us talk about where we were in 2015 when Justin Trudeau became prime minister. Looking back at the record of the Harper government, in 2015, four major pipelines were constructed and a fifth had been approved, the northern gateway project. The Liberals promised in the 2015 election to kill the northern gateway pipeline. They did two things: first, they killed it directly; and second, they legislated to prohibit energy exports from the northern coast of B.C. This was designed, or intended, to kill the northern gateway project and the opportunities associated with it. This was a decision of the government to kill that project in two ways: first, to kill it directly; and second, to legislate to prevent those energy exports.

The Liberal government subsequently passed Bill C-69, adding additional challenges and barriers for pipeline construction, and killed the energy east pipeline. It did so by applying conditions to it that had never been applied previously to other development projects. Even then, the government wanted to say it was a private sector decision to kill the energy east pipeline. It changed the game by piling impossible conditions on the project and then said, “Oh, too bad. The proponents killed it.” This is part of the “kill major infrastructure projects and make it look like an accident” approach of the government, which is to apply legislative and other policy barriers that make it very difficult, if not impossible, for these kinds of projects to move forward.

Now we have a different Prime Minister, who has written extensively, in a negative way, about the development of our energy resources, but now that he is Prime Minister, he wants people to think that he is maybe more supportive of these developments. The simple thing he could do is repeal the antidevelopment rules that were put in place by his predecessor. If the Prime Minister is really different from Justin Trudeau, he could simply repeal Bill C-69 and Bill C-48. These are two major anti-energy bills that his predecessor put forward. In particular, he could repeal Bill C-48, which is the bill regarding the tanker exclusion zone. That is the bill that Bill C-264, which we are debating today, would repeal. If the Prime Minister is sincere about getting pipelines built, he could simply vote in favour of this bill, or he could have moved to repeal Bill C-48 earlier.

However, the approach the Liberal government has taken has not been, notably, to repeal the barriers that were put in place by his predecessor to prevent energy development. Instead, the Liberals brought us Bill C-5, which was the option for the government to approve, in exceptional circumstances, that some projects would not be subject to the rules that apply to every other project.

Instead of simply removing the barriers that prevent development, they created a process in which those barriers that prevent development from moving forward are still in place, but if someone wants to build a project, they could go, cap in hand, to the government to ask It would refer them to this Major Projects Office. That will look at the project, and it will be designated and reviewed by various panels. Maybe at the end of it, they might get exceptional treatment for one project, even though the barriers would remain in place for all the other projects.

If we could build major projects with red tape, the government would be all over it, because that is what it has been building: more and more red tape. They try to make it look like the Liberals are really trying, that they are going to add more offices, say that people can send their project here, refer it over here, and then this panel will take a look at it. Then maybe at the end of the day, they might create exemptions to the framework that was designed to prevent these projects from going forward.

Conservatives have a much simpler solution, which is to get rid of the red tape and get rid of the laws that prevent these major projects from going forward so that we can build things again.

This is what I think the public wants. The public wants major energy projects to go forward. We saw great news out of British Columbia. It is a strong endorsement by the voters of British Columbia for a government that is committed to creating jobs and building opportunity. There is a government now in British Columbia that sees how we can prosper together as a country instead of trying to make B.C. the barrier to exports that the previous NDP government wanted it to be. We see in that result, and in the expression of voters across the country, a desire for these kinds of projects to move forward.

The government is slippery and savvy politically. The government knows it does not want to challenge directly this desire for major projects to go forward, so instead, it is just trying to make it look really difficult. The government wants to leave in place these barriers. It wants to add on red tape. It wants to promise that it might allow workarounds in certain situations if things are designated as such.

The simple thing that the government can and should do to make it so much easier for major projects in energy, pipelines and other major projects, to go forward, is vote for Bill C-264. It would not add more laws. It would repeal a previous law that was put in place to block development. This is going to be a clear test for the government on Wednesday. When we vote on Bill C-264, we will see whether individual members of the government from energy-producing regions, as well as members from other regions, are prepared to vote in favour of a bill that would clear away red tape and create opportunities for major projects to go forward, or if they will vote to leave that red tape in place as an excuse to say they would like to, but it is just really difficult. It is really difficult because we have a law that makes it difficult.

The building of major infrastructure could happen much more easily if we had not had governments for 11 years that tried to prevent it from happening. Let us underline that it is the same people.

[An hon. member]

You guys have to get over Trudeau.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, the member for Winnipeg North, who is heckling me right now, has been here for a long time. He is not new. He voted for all these measures. In fact, I asked the Liberal member for Calgary Confederation, who is new, when he was first elected, if he would have voted in favour of C-48, and he said yes, and he is from Calgary. It is the same group of people, and in the cases where there are newer members, they profess to think the same way as the previous ones.

The member said we are talking too much about Trudeau. I would be very happy to turn the page on the disastrous years of Justin Trudeau. Does the member know how we can turn the page on the disastrous record of Justin Trudeau? We can vote in favour of this bill, which would repeal a centrepiece part of Justin Trudeau's radical antidevelopment agenda.

The Prime Minister can show he is different on Wednesday by voting in favour of Bill C-264. If he were to vote in favour of Bill C-264, I will say that maybe there is some real change, to coin a phrase, but if he were to vote for the Justin Trudeau policy on Wednesday, we will have to conclude that they are doubling down on the same energy policy.

Yes, they are trying to nuance it in the communications in light of the fact that we have won the public debate on this issue, but they have not really changed. Again, we will see in the vote on Wednesday.

[Andrew Scheer, Conservative, Regina—Qu'Appelle, SK]

Madam Speaker, I cannot help but violently agree with my colleague's summation of the best way to turn the page on Justin Trudeau. It is amazing how the Liberals have forgotten that he ever existed, as if they were not here, all along the way, voting in favour of all the terrible policies that caused so much hardship, not just for western Canada and the energy sector, but also for Canadians from coast to coast.

We have had the massive inflation crisis, the crime crisis, the drug crisis and, of course, the energy crisis, where Canada has been forced to discount its natural resources because, thanks to Liberal policies, Canada no longer has an ability to get oil to growing markets in Asia where it would pay a premium for what Canada is selling. This would be a wonderful opportunity to show sincere commitment to change by undoing Liberal policies.

My colleague used the analogy of crime TV shows and movies, and of making something look like an accident. There is another theme in those types of movies where there are elements of a criminal underworld and the mobsters who run protection rackets. They come by someone's shop and throw a brick through the window. They then come back the next day and say, “Hey, we can make sure that nobody throws bricks through your windows.”

That is what the Liberals have done with energy policy. They have thrown bricks through the ability of private sector proponents of projects to get things built. They then come along, after billions of dollars have left Canada for other jurisdictions and, after Canadian energy companies choose to invest in South America, Asia, Africa and even in the Middle East, they say, “Hey, if you work with us, if you jump through new hoops and new hurdles, and allow the government to take ownership positions in energy projects, then you can get something built.” That is what we have seen with the MOU that was imposed on Alberta, forcing the Government of Alberta to agree to an industrial carbon tax and to paying billions of dollars of costs into the pathways project. That is completely unnecessary.

We now see a major development in the energy sector that Canada could take advantage of. Strathcona Resources pitches 250,000 barrels of oil per day on an export route to Asia. That is wonderful news. A private sector company is using its own money, not taxpayers' money, to push a project that would allow new exports to Asian markets, getting around the U.S. discount that Canadian producers have to face. There is only one thing standing in the way, and that is Bill C-48, the Liberal shipping ban. For people who have not heard about this before, the ban is a Liberal law that was brought in under the Trudeau government. It was voted for by all the members I see across the way who were there at the time, and it imposed a ban on Canadian energy being shipped off the west coast. This ban does not apply to U.S. tankers. U.S. tankers can come down from Alaska and take inland routes into U.S. refineries in the northwestern United States. This ban only applies to the loading of Canadian energy on Canadian ships leaving Canadian ports. It is a completely self-imposed double standard that means that no oil can flow through that northern route.

Why is that important? That northern route is closer to Asia. It is cheaper to ship through that northern route because it is a shorter distance. It is also a deeper water port. Right now, in order to handle the potential expansion of TMX and a southern route in the Vancouver port, they are going to have to dredge along the Second Narrows Bridge because they cannot load the tankers to full capacity. They would be too low and those tankers would not be able to go through that particular waterway. That is not a problem in the northern route. That northern route is already a deep water port.

This is a perfect example of the government causing a problem. This is hallmark Liberal politics. The Liberal policy causes a problem. The Liberal policies cause Canadian energy companies to abandon Canadian projects and to move Canadian dollars offshore to invest in other places. What is the solution to bad Liberal policy? It is more Liberal policy, more hoops and hurdles, bigger bureaucracies, and more red tape.

The Conservatives have a different approach. We believe we should treat the root cause of the problem. The root cause of the problem right now in the energy sector is not a lack of demand, a lack of expertise or even a lack of capital, since there are Canadian companies with lots of money to invest. It is a lack of confidence in being able to get anything built after 10 years of Liberal policies killing things and blocking things. We now live in a world where private sector investors would rather build pipelines in war zones than in Canada. They would rather deal with bombs and bullets than with bureaucracy. The Liberal solution is to come along and say that we have a new complicated scheme, a new Major Projects Office and new lists and new hurdles. The government is going to take an ownership share, with all the distorting effects that would have, and that is the only way forward.

Conservatives believe that, if we were to treat the root cause of the problem, which is to repeal bad Liberal policies, the bill we are debating today would be a huge step along that road. Let us lift the moratorium on Canadian shipping, put Canadian producers and exporters on a level playing field and get our resources to market.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Alexandra Mendès), Alexandra Mendes]

The hon. member for Calgary Signal Hill has five minutes for his right of reply.

[David McKenzie, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

Madam Speaker, it is an honour, as always, to rise in the House to speak on behalf of the residents of Calgary Signal Hill.

Bill C-264 puts a tremendous opportunity before the House, which is to get rid of one more of the anti-energy, antidevelopment laws, which were put in place by the Trudeau Liberal government, that remain on the books today and continue to hamper and hinder economic development and business in Canada.

First of all, I want to note that the MOU, the memorandum of understanding, between the federal government and the provincial government of Alberta, which was entered into in late 2025, just about a year ago, states that it would “enable the export of bitumen from a strategic deep-water port to Asian markets, including if necessary through an appropriate adjustment to the Oil Tanker Moratorium Act.”

That makes clear the position of the government. Let us not go halfway, but all the way. Let us get rid of a law that has no purpose at all in environmental protection, in safety or in maritime shipping issues, but has simply been put in place to keep Alberta oil in the ground.

There are several red herrings, if members can pardon the limited pun, in the waters today in respect of this debate.

First, the oil tanker ban, Bill C-48, is somehow a logical extension of the voluntary exclusion zone that exists off Canada's west coast and applies to U.S. tanker traffic. Roughly five supertankers a week transit from Valdez, Alaska, to U.S. ports on the southern western coast of the United States. Those tankers stay offshore by agreement. This tanker ban, Bill C-48, covers only interior waters that those tankers do not transit on any regular basis.

Second, on indigenous participation, one of the members opposite has suggested over the course of the debate on this bill that Conservatives do not care about indigenous consultation. It is quite the opposite. Under the last Conservative government of Stephen Harper, the Eagle Spirit Energy project was well-developed. That was an indigenous-owned pipeline that would have put in place the opportunity to transport Alberta crude oil to the west coast. That project died with Bill C-48 and other anti-energy Liberal laws.

I believe in reconciliation, and true reconciliation comes from working together, particularly as economic partners. There is no effort on the part of this side of the House to limit that consultation and those processes to develop partnerships that would allow economic prosperity for all.

Third, with respect to the red herrings is the environment and safety, it has been suggested that we want to cut corners. Nothing could be further from the truth. I am as concerned about environmental protection as any other Canadian. Let me note something from a former Liberal MP, Ms. Martha Hall Findlay, who was pretty succinct on this subject in respect of shipping risk. She stated, “There are risks associated with any kind of transportation with any goods, and not all of them are with oil tankers. All that singling out one part of one coast did was prevent more oil and gas from being produced that could be shipped off that coast”.

Our west coast shipping industry, and indeed the Canadian maritime shipping industry writ large, is safe, capable and world-class. Perhaps the members opposite forming government at this point in time do not have confidence in that industry, but I certainly do. The ability for our industry to ship and ship safely is extensive.

Last, I want to quote from Greg Ebel, the CEO of Enbridge, Canada's largest crude oil shipper. He said, “The tanker ban is a great example of how things will have to change to allow our country to maximize its economic potential. Let markets and real demand guide routes and capacities while government focuses on enabling the conditions for success”. I could not agree more.

As my friends on this side of the House have made clear, Bill C-48 has never been about protecting the environment. It has never been about safety. It is only about keeping oil in the ground. It must be repealed.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Alexandra Mendès), Alexandra Mendes]

The question is on the motion.

If a member participating in person wishes that the motion be carried or carried on division, or if a member of a recognized party participating in person wishes to request a recorded division, I would invite them to rise and indicate it to the Chair.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, I would request a recorded division.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Alexandra Mendès), Alexandra Mendes]

Pursuant to Standing Order 93, the division stands deferred until Wednesday, October 28, at the expiry of the time provided for Oral Questions.