Thanks very much, Mr. Chair.
I'd just like to come back to the proposed amendment. I thank the government for putting forward the amendment. Our reading of it is that it doesn't exactly constitute an amendment. It's rather a wholesale substitution of the government's amendment for the amendment on the table. So we don't see it at face value, as an amendment, as opposed to a substitution.
I think it's important for people looking at this preambular section to remember that it's just that; it's a preambular section. It talks about, “Whereas the Government of Canada is committed”. It doesn't ask the Government of Canada to be bound; it talks about the Government of Canada being committed to having fuel consumption standards that meet or exceed international best practices.
It's sort of like when the United States said they were committed to putting a man on the moon, or, for example, in the government's own budget, the title of which was “Aspire”--aspire to a better country, aspire to a better economy, aspire to a better environment. I thought that was the gist of the speech I heard from the Minister of Finance just last week. I think in that spirit, this is what we're putting forward here--that it is, as Mr. Bigras rightly points out, about saying that we're going to acknowledge that environmental standards are now a major driving, competitive force. If we want to be leading, we've got to get out front.
From the meetings I've had, Mr. Chair, and the witnesses I've heard from, from labour and from motor vehicle manufacturers, they also aspire to be in first place, and I think this reflects it well.
In conclusion, I don't accept the amendment--I'll close with this, Mr. Chair, if we're not there--and I want to raise it with the government just in case there's been a change in policy. The government uses language in the amendment that's put forward. It talks about the Government of Canada seeking to achieve sustainable development. I'm very pleased--I should think most parliamentarians are--to see that, given that one of the first acts of the government, when it got elected, was to change the wording in the enabling legislation at the Natural Resources Canada department and to remove the notion of sustainable development, replacing it with the words “responsible development”, to eliminate the social equity provisions of the classic sustainable development definition.
So I'm glad to see the government has shifted gears and recognizes that sustainable development is something we are bound to as a nation state, and I'm glad to see it reflected here. Maybe they can go back and amend the NRCan Act at the same time.
Thank you.