Thank you, Mr. Chair.
We're in unprecedented territory for this committee in that we've exhausted the available points of order and that I, having had the floor, have been allowed to continue to have the floor by you, the chair. These are some noteworthy developments, given the recent history of the natural resources committee.
I will respond to what obviously was not a point of order from my colleague opposite, Ms. Dabrusin, who objected to my use of the term "December 4" on the basis that it is, in her view, not December 4. I was referring to a motion before the House. In the House, as on the rest of the planet, it is undisputably December 4. At least it is in most. I think the time zones line up right about now, and it is, in fact, the case more or less everywhere.
She said it's October 30 in this room because we are continuing a previous meeting. Her point, I think, was to try to get out there the allegation that this is some lengthy filibuster process or something. I would just remind everyone of how we got here and where we're at. This has not been the sustained process of Conservatives making arguments about the motion before the committee. It's quite the contrary. Actually, what we've seen at this committee, over the last month or so, is consistent objections to the complete miscarriage of process because we had a situation in which one member had the floor and then was arbitrarily deprived of the floor. This was a matter that was discussed, extensively, over multiple sessions of this committee that went on for a number of weeks. It was not a matter of debating the motion in those exchanges, it was a matter of asserting the privileges of members of Parliament, the right of members to be able to speak and raise their concern before the committee.
I think anyone would find, if they reviewed the discussion that took place in those instances, that, in fact, the vast majority of the speaking being done was by the NDP-Liberal coalition. I think it is clear if you say, whose talking is taking the time, that, in fact, over the last month, most of it has been Ms. Dabrusin and Mr. Angus. I think that's fairly clear, although Conservatives were trying to get the floor to try to raise specific comments about this legislation, the important issues that it raises and the debates that need to take place around it. We were in a situation where it was Liberal and NDP members speaking, raising points of order, interrupting, not allowing members to have the floor, that was clearly the cause of this process having continued such that, formally speaking, we are in a committee meeting that began on October 30, although it's been suspended and scheduled under the circumstances, relatively sparsely by the chair.
All of these things are things that are beyond the control of Conservative members. We have sought to put some specific points of concern on the record and we have been snowed in by interruptions, points of order and flagrant violations of the rules. I think the worst was when, on multiple occasions, Mr. Angus used flagrantly unparliamentary language and was allowed to do so by the chair, even when points of order were raised at that time. This is what brings us to this point where Conservatives are looking for an opportunity to set the agenda of the committee in a responsible way and to speak to our concerns in the process about aspects of this government's agenda, an agenda that aims to shut down highly productive parts of our economy and force workers who are working in those highly productive parts of the economy to no longer be able to work in those sectors.
In terms of the doublespeak associated with the phrase, "just transition", I think, by now, it is extremely clear to workers and to everyone who follows these discussions that when the government says, "just transition," what they mean is to shut down critical industries in our economy.
The effect of this is likely to push those jobs overseas and to leave Canadian workers with very few options, but maybe under this rhetoric of just transition to offer them welfare payments.
The folks who are working hard in the energy sector, who are benefiting from energy-related extraction and manufacturing, are not looking to be transitioned to government benefits. They're looking to have the opportunity to continue to work in their field, which is a growth field globally. The Canadian energy sector is leading the world in terms of improvements in environmental performance, and this is why Conservatives strongly oppose the absurd doublespeak associated with the government's so-call “just transition” agenda.
It becomes so clear to workers that this rhetoric is aimed at shutting down jobs. In fact the labour minister admitted in the House that he no longer likes using the term “just transition”, because workers don't like it. Quite strikingly, he admitted as much. Yes, they don't like the term, but they also don't like the substance of it. The government, in trying to change the verbiage they use to describe their agenda without changing the substance of the agenda, hasn't fooled anyone before, and it's not going to fool anyone now.
The fact is that the Liberal-NDP coalition has been consistent in not standing up for workers.
We want to hear from workers at this committee. This is what we have been saying from the beginning. We want to be able to have hearings in a—