Now that we have proceeded with the two amendments, clause 13 does look a little bit different. However, other than the last amendment, which I think significantly changed the decision-making capabilities of the minister, unfortunately, should this law come to pass by basically making him a handboy to the Commissioner of the Environment, seeking their approval to actually make a decision on law, which doesn't make much sense to me.... The commissioner can always advise. The commissioner's job is to look at things, departmental objectives, and basically audit the environment department, but this is a severe change from what's currently happening.
In general, my concerns with clause 13 are not so much that it's a problem with engaging the grassroots. Ms. Duncan did allude to the fact that the Conservatives are a grassroots party. We are a grassroots party, Mr. Chair. We just had a congress in Edmonton to discuss policies. We're going to have a convention, hopefully this spring. Of course grassroots conventions are an affront to the other political parties across from us, so I would imagine a federal election would probably be a good strategy on their part to derail us from actually being able to conduct our grassroots policy meetings this spring. But I won't get into that in a closed-door meeting, because it doesn't do any good.