It's a very good question, and I'm going to use a very specific example to answer, because we want to make sure we're trying to be constructive about what could help the relationship.
I often use the example of our methane plan. The Province of Saskatchewan has federal equivalency for methane. People don't really know that, but we do. We worked very hard for two years to negotiate with the federal government in good faith. We got equivalency. Our methane plan has been approved, as I say, and the federal government has signed off on it. The problem is that they don't share any data with us.
I, in my former role, raised this issue with Minister Wilkinson, and he said it made sense that ECCC should share data with us. We had a plan and we lowered methane by 50%. Minister Steven Guilbeault tweeted his congratulations, and we appreciated that, but it was like “Congratulations, Saskatchewan. You've lowered methane by 50%. Now we'll raise that reduction to 75%.”
However, we don't see any of the numbers. Are the models they're imposing on us from Texas or Alberta? We don't know. We get a portion of the data, but we don't get the full data. How can you not be cynical about a partnership in which you're not really partners because the numbers on which the new strictures being imposed are based are not being shared with you?
Therefore, to your question about whether the consultation is dysfunctional, I would say, based on that very real example, unfortunately, yes. We actually worked hard together to get to a point, and then the game is constantly changed. The numbers are constantly changed. The goals are always changed.
We worked hard to reduce methane, to the point where we were congratulated federally on our efforts. When we talk about Bill C-235, then, what are the new expectations going to be, and what strings are going to be attached, and how is it going to impact our sectors?