Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I won't read out all of proposed section 35.11(a)(b)(c)(d) and (e). You can see it's in front of you. I'm going to assume, given what Mr. Hardie mentioned previously, that it will apply to this one in terms of the committee that's going to be struck to look at this, in looking at the national committee to look at minimum protection standards. However, we're obviously anxious to see that happen now. I think we've had years where we've only been at 1% protection. The government is saying we're now at 5%. We'd like to know what minimum protection includes and the activities allowed. We would argue to include those subsections in 35.11 now. This amends the act to include a set of minimum protection standards for all proposed future MPAs and those prohibitions are oil and gas and mineral exploration and development, wind farms and tidal power, open net aquaculture, bottom trawling, and ocean dumping.
We've heard earlier that polling from WWF-Canada shows that 80% of Canadians believe that MPAs should not allow oil and gas activities, and that 87% believe MPAs should not allow bottom trawling. The recent public outcry over a proposal to allow oil and gas in the proposed Laurentian Channel MPA shows the depth of public support for oil-free MPAs. We're certainly arguing to listen to what the public is saying and include it now in Bill C-55