Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister, for coming today.
I want to confirm with you, Minister, that indeed Mr. Boyd did give some testimony, and one of his items of testimony was the grading of the Liberal performance over the last 13 years: he gave them a big, fat F. I also want to confirm that he was not aware of how Bill C-30 expands the government's powers, more particularly, that it includes indoor air and other things.
I've asked the clerk to send on to him the deck that gives him that information so he'll be better informed in the future.
Minister, I know we've talked several times, and you know I'm from the oil sands region. I've lived there for 38 years. I know it might be a bit of a surprise to you, but my children live there, they breathe the air, they drink the water, and all my friends and family are there. Even the oil sands workers themselves, their families are there, and we're very concerned about water and air quality across Canada.
In talking to them, which I've been doing for two or three years now, ever since I had this job, the biggest concern they have had is the mixed signals coming from the Liberal government. They've spent billions on scrubbers, they've spent billions on water monitoring and air monitoring, but they have had no clear signal. What they have wanted and what they have told me is they want to know where the government wants them to go in the future. So I applaud you, for the people of Fort McMurray and for the industries there, on your initiatives.
My first question is in relation to cleaning up the legacy of polluted sites that we have across the country. I know that initially one of the first announcements this government came out with was on the Sydney tar ponds cleanup, which is a great initiative, but we have tens of thousands of other sites across Canada like that. I'm wondering, since it does apply to so many Canadians and so many Canadians are worried about it, can you give us some idea if your initiatives are going to be including some segment of cleaning up sites across Canada, like you did more recently this month?