Evidence of meeting #60 for Natural Resources in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was chair.
A video is available from Parliament.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP Burnaby—New Westminster, BC
Mr. Chair, if you would please allow New Democrats to speak, you can certainly have.... I'm sure Conservative members will have ample opportunity to follow up on the question.
On the pine beetle funding, I'm looking at the amount that was allocated—
NDP
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Leon Benoit
Mr. Julian, I have the floor, please. Order, Mr. Julian.
Monsieur Dupont, go ahead with the answer that you wanted to give. I think it's important. Witnesses are allowed to give their answer.
He certainly was not stalling for time.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Leon Benoit
Mr. Julian, allow the deputy minister to answer.
Go ahead, please, sir.
Deputy Minister, Department of Natural Resources
I'll take 15 seconds.
I just wanted to indicate that the $77 million is for Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, the crown corporation, which is now the nuclear laboratories. It is not a subsidy to a commercial enterprise.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP Burnaby—New Westminster, BC
Thank you. Mr. Chair.
If you'll allow me to continue my questions, on the pine beetle funding, you talked about the forestry funding overall. I'm looking for the overall—
Conservative
David Anderson Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
I think Mr. Julian needs to stay within the context of the supplementary estimates (B) that we're talking about today. If he's going to be asking questions about that, he needs to find that in this document somewhere. We'll be asking him to do that.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Leon Benoit
Mr. Julian, please do stick to the topic at hand, which is the supplementary estimates (B).
NDP
Peter Julian NDP Burnaby—New Westminster, BC
Yes, Mr. Chair.
As you know, the pine beetle funding and links to the Canadian forestry sector funding are extremely important.
What I would like to know, and I would appreciate your answer, is how much was allocated for pine beetle funding and how much was actually spent.
Deputy Minister, Department of Natural Resources
I'm afraid I don't have those numbers with me at the present time, so I will have to get back to the member. I apologize for that.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP Burnaby—New Westminster, BC
Thank you for that. If you could provide that to the committee, it would be much appreciated.
Now, my final question is around the clean energy funding, which as you know was for funding designed with ecoENERGY, to provide—
Conservative
David Anderson Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
Mr. Chair, the witnesses were asked to come here to speak to supplementary estimates (B), and I'm sure they've come prepared to speak to the estimates related to supplementary estimates (B).
Mr. Julian seems to be fishing through a number of years of documents and budgets. Perhaps he could stick to this document, and then they would be able to answer those questions.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Leon Benoit
Yes. Mr. Julian, I would appreciate it if you would stick to supplementary estimates (B) and subjects directly related to that.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP Burnaby—New Westminster, BC
Mr. Chair, if the Conservatives are going to play this kind of game, I think it is really unfortunate and irresponsible.
We have in the presentation a reference to the clean energy fund. Our invited guests made a presentation, and referenced the clean energy fund. As you know, I am following up on a question that was part of this presentation.
Now, are Conservatives going to continue to interrupt every time a member of the opposition asks a question, or are they going to show some respect for parliamentary accountability? I certainly hope they will, and will stop with these useless points of order.
Under the clean energy—
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Leon Benoit
By the way, Mr. Julian, that's a two-way street. When the chair calls for order, it's also important that you respect that.
Go ahead. You have one more question and then your time is up.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP Burnaby—New Westminster, BC
On the clean energy fund, you mentioned previously authorized moneys. To what extent was this money that was set aside for the refitting of Canadian households?
NDP
Deputy Minister, Department of Natural Resources
That's a different envelope altogether, sir. The clean energy fund was intended for other purposes. It was intended to fund research and development, to fund some demonstration programs, and to fund some carbon capture and storage demonstrations.