Thank you, Mr. Trost.
Because, Mr. Trost, you referred to the fact that I live in Alberta, I am going to speak to this issue too. I do that rarely as chair, but I am going to.
I want to say that I have spoken to--I'll be general--the top politicians in Alberta about this very issue on several occasions. It's not like this has just come to the floor now. It's been years and years that this has all been talked about and worked on.
There are several refineries being built in Alberta. We're building new projects to upgrade this material, to add value to it, as fast as we possibly can. The fact is that if we're going to do proper environmental studies, with the shortage of workers, with the shortage of companies to build these plants and so on, we're doing all we can to upgrade. It's not like there aren't new upgrading refineries being built in Alberta and being put in place. There are. The fact is that we can't do it all.
These pipelines could move any kind of product. They could move the refined products, and they could move the raw bitumen with some additives down to the various markets in the United States. The reason that's happening...and it has been carefully considered. It has been debated in the Alberta legislature again and again. It has been debated in industry in Alberta. It has been debated amongst the Alberta and Saskatchewan public. The reality is that we simply can't keep all of the jobs. We don't have people to work, and we can't develop the projects to upgrade fast enough. So that's the first thing I wanted to mention.
The second thing is the point that Mr. Trost touched on. Many of the jobs for building all of the pipelines, the jobs for building the upgrading facilities that are being built—and there are several new ones, with probably more than a dozen major upgraders being build right now—are in Ontario and Quebec. It's not just workers coming into Alberta; the jobs, the manufacturing being done to build these plants that are being built, and to build these pipelines, are in central Canada.
So if we're going to start interfering in projects like this, we are going to cause job losses—we being the committee, if we decide to do this—and those job losses are going to be in central Canada as well, every bit as much.
The final point I'm going to make is I wonder how our Bloc friends would feel if this committee were trying to stop a project that had gone through years of a proper process for approval. If this were a hydro project in Quebec, how would our Bloc colleagues feel about that? I think they would be really upset, and I can fully understand that. I would be extremely upset if I were in their position.
I think it's important that we consider all of these things before we go ahead.
I'll just carry on with the list now.
Madame DeBellefeuille.