Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I've spoken to Francis about this a bit, and he may have adjusted it and tried to be flexible, given the discussion, but I find unfortunately the motion a little nonsensical. I'm not really sure what I'd be voting for if I voted for the motion.
My concerns are severalfold. I know the government is keen to get back to SARA. I'd also like to get back to SARA, but frankly, I would prefer that we first of all deal with the draft report on the oil sands and water. The reason for that is, as far as I understand, and as Monsieur Bigras said, it is our understanding that we have finished our hearings and all we are waiting for is our very capable staff to complete their drafting of the document.
Since that date when we finished those hearings, way back last summer, the economy has picked up in Alberta and approvals of further oil sands activities are steamrolling ahead. I think there is very important timeliness in our report; I think it's incumbent upon us as committee members to be expediting, getting any recommendations that we may agree on, based on the testimony we've heard to date, and getting that into the hopper, into the government for consideration.
As I recall, Mr. Warawa quite some time ago, when we were deliberating what we would hear and what we would not hear on that topic, was very keen to discuss carbon capture and sequestration. We decided to kind of sidebar that as another avenue to go into. I would not be averse to the suggestion that at some date this committee actually take on the discussion of carbon capture and sequestration, including looking at the potential impact on water resources. Because the main testing and potential use in this country right now for carbon capture and sequestration, and for the United States and China, is for coal-fired power, I would prefer the discussion on that technology not just be restricted to the tar sands. I don't think that will allow us the proper ambit by talking about that technology and the potential impact on groundwater, surface water, and so forth.
I appreciate Mr. Scarpaleggia's curiosity on this. I would instead encourage, leading into our discussion potentially on CCS, that the committee obtain or perhaps the library staff could help us to get the report, and simply begin the background reading.
My second concern would be that as Graham Thomson is a journalist, he has been roundly criticized that he can't actually attest to the findings in this paper, and he has defended it by saying it's a compilation of what a broad array of experts have said in that area. So I can foresee getting into the problem of him relaying what's in his report, and then we may say, well, we'd like to hear from some of those experts who are in the report, and on and on and on it goes.
I would rather that we had the opportunity to sit down as a committee and map out what we might like to discuss and what kinds of experts and background materials and testimony and so forth we would like on this discussion. I think clearly the government is strongly behind that as almost its singular technology right now. I think it's incumbent upon this committee to seriously start delving into looking at that.
I am not in favour of delaying a report getting out, and I'm very strongly in favour of making that our first and foremost activity. I'm hopeful that within, say, two meetings we can complete our review and agreement or disagreement on that final report and we can get back to SARA expeditiously and give it the time it deserves.
I understand the interest in Mr. Graham's report, but there are a lot of other reports that are coming out as well that potentially we could review. I would rather that those are focused on a broader discussion of CCS and the various uses that could be made across Canada.
