Natural Resources Committee on Nov. 24th, 2025

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Duguid]

We're going to move on to Mr. Danko for six minutes.

[John-Paul Danko, Liberal, Hamilton West—Ancaster—Dundas, ON]

Thank you, Chair, and welcome, Minister, to the natural resources committee.

Critical minerals have been a big focus of the Prime Minister, a big focus of the budget and a significant focus of this committee as well. Many projects of national interest involve developing critical minerals. This committee has heard that critical minerals are essential for Canada to maintain our leadership role in a global transition to an electric future.

My first question is, how will our investment in critical minerals enable a better future for Canadians?

[Tim Hodgson, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

I'll go back to the reality we find ourselves in today.

As the Prime Minister said, we are in a “hinge moment”. We are in a moment of economic rupture when, for whatever reason, the United States has decided to change the way the world trades. It has decided to charge for access to its market. This is a very difficult time for many countries in the world that are faced with this challenge. It is a particularly difficult time for Canada, given that we are the most integrated economy in the world with the United States.

I know all of you watched the exchange between President Trump and President Zelenskyy, where it was explained to President Zelenskyy that he had no cards and that he needed to do the bidding of the United States at that point. I have been relentlessly focused on how we make sure that Canada never finds itself in that situation. That causes me to turn to critical minerals.

We are in a global reality today in which we are shifting from the post-Bretton Woods order and the fall of the Berlin Wall, when we had one unipolar world, to a much more dangerous world in which we have major countries, which are not democratic, seeking to assert their political will on the world.

Some of those actors have sought to corner the market in the production of critical minerals and the processing of critical minerals. That became very apparent in the last six months, particularly when one country chose to put export controls on a number of critical minerals, and that was fundamentally affecting the ability of many of our allies' economies to operate.

There is a critical point of vulnerability for the west right now. The great news for Canada is that while all of our G7 allies are short of critical minerals and don't have those critical minerals, we have them. If we develop them responsibly, it gives us a great set of cards—I go back to that. It gives us a set of cards that we need to play to get the trade deals we want with the rest of the world. That's why critical minerals are so important. They're important for the transition to net zero in 2050, because we can't get there without the critical minerals to power that transition. However, they're really important for the geopolitical reality we find ourselves in as Canadians. That's why we are spending so much time on this.

Our Prime Minister has actually taken a lead in that. I would point out to the committee that it was in the summer at the Kananaskis G7 that Canada put up its hand and said, “We will address this challenge in supply chains. Canada will take the lead and develop what's called the critical minerals buying alliance, or the buyers club.” Canada worked tirelessly from the summer to the time of the G7 energy ministers' meeting at the end of October. I won't take credit for it, but my colleagues here worked incredibly hard. We announced 26 transactions with our allies. Nine different countries, every G7 ally, put money into Canadian mines and Canadian processing facilities, so we can provide those resources to both Canada and our allies.

That puts cards in our hands. I would point out that the Americans were investing in some of those. It gives us cards when we are negotiating in this challenging environment so that we can deal with the 15% we talked about a minute ago.

They want our critical minerals. We will use those cards to extract the best deal that we can for Canada.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Duguid]

Thank you, Minister. That's your time.

Mr. Simard, you have six minutes.

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Before I begin, I just want to make sure that the minister is on the right channel and that he can hear the soft voice of the interpreters rather than my gruff one.

Is that the case?

[Tim Hodgson, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

It is not as eloquent as yours, Mario, but I can hear it.

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Thank you very much.

Thank you for being here, minister.

When I was looking over the headlines from the past few days, I saw an article about you, the Prime Minister and the Clerk of the Privy Council, Mr. Sabia.

When it comes to the pipeline between Alberta and British Columbia, I get the feeling that the government is the proponent of that project. I want to state that plainly. I'm a bit on edge about this because once bitten, twice shy. I lived through the whole Trans Mountain expansion project in which the government invested $34 billion.

My question is simple. Can you guarantee today that the federal government will not be the proponent of this new pipeline?

[Tim Hodgson, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

Thank you for your question. My French is not very good, so I will respond in English.

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

That's fine. Thank you.

[Tim Hodgson, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

Thank you.

The Alberta government has said it would like to be a proponent. It is working on a project. It has said it will bring it in the spring of 2026. I do not know what it will bring. It has not shared that with me at this point. When it comes, it will be evaluated in the same way any other project would be evaluated, just as a project would be evaluated in Quebec.

I will be clear. The Prime Minister has given us a KPI, a key performance indicator. The goal of the major project is to attract $500 billion of private sector capital. That is the goal. When we attract that kind of private sector capital, it creates new jobs, new opportunities and new careers for the people who may well be displaced by the trade war.

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Let me explain why I am asking you that and tell you what my main concern is. I have had meetings with you and with people in the mining sector. I know that you're a numbers guy. That was clear in our meetings. You are very familiar with the economics behind projects.

I am looking at Canada's major oil sands players and producers, which include the Pathways Alliance, Canadian Natural, Synovus, Imperial and Suncor. They account for 80% of oil sands development, but 60% of these companies are owned by American interests.

I am therefore having a hard time seeing how the government can say that we need to develop infrastructure to wean ourselves off the American market because of the tariff war, while still preparing to invest taxpayer money in setting up infrastructure that will serve American interests.

From 2021 to 2024, these oil companies made record profits of $131 billion. When we look at how these amounts were distributed, $79.7 billion, or nearly $80 billion, left Canada, went abroad and was not invested here. If we do a quick calculation, that is $6 out of every $10 that is going to the United States.

I can't understand how we can build a pipeline using taxpayer money only to allow foreign companies to repatriate the profits to the United States. That is what concerns me.

[Tim Hodgson, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

Thank you for the compliments.

Let's go through some facts and figures, given the world we find ourselves in. We need cards. The United States consumes 20 million barrels of oil a day. They claim they're an energy superpower. They produce 12. You can do the math. They are a large net importer of oil.

We are a huge net exporter of oil. We produce five million barrels a day and send them four. We are the largest supplier to the United States.

That gives us cards. If you look at the reserve life of the U.S. oil reserves, it's about seven years. That's pretty short. When you look at Canada's reserves, it's about 98 years. That's pretty good. We have cards.

We need to be able to sell those resources to other people.

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

I understand. You have a powerful argument, minister, but so do I. Even if we own these resources, at the end of the day, they are still mostly in the hands of American companies. What is more, most of the profits are going to the United States.

What I am seeing, and what I have seen in recent years, is that we paid $34 billion for pipeline infrastructure. The government paid for that pipeline and the profits went to the United States. That is what people are concerned about today when they hear about a pipeline project.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Duguid]

Please give a short response.

[Tim Hodgson, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

I would point out the royalties paid on that oil to provincial governments. The income taxes paid to provincial governments and the federal government are some of the biggest single sources of revenue to governments in this country. They are important if we are going to build an independent, secure and sovereign economy in this difficult world.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Duguid]

Thank you both.

We'll go to our second round of questions, and we're going to start with Mr. Tochor for five minutes.

[Corey Tochor, Conservative, Saskatoon—University, SK]

You promised a “Canada Strong”, elbows-up platform. Do you remember that? However, before the dust had even settled on the election, a multi-year, multi-billion dollar contract was awarded to U.S. companies, allowing Americans to carry out a corporate raid on our strategic nuclear research assets at CNL. Did you approve this transaction?

[Tim Hodgson, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

That characterization of the contract is completely inaccurate. The—

[Corey Tochor, Conservative, Saskatoon—University, SK]

Minister, we'll try something else. If it's not that, will you undertake to provide the committee with dates of every time you were briefed about this decision and any memos you received explaining it?

[Tim Hodgson, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

The way this works is that there is an RFP issued—

[Corey Tochor, Conservative, Saskatoon—University, SK]

I understand about the contract. We'll get back to that.

However, will you provide this committee with those documents, yes or no?

[Tim Hodgson, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

Those documents are done by an independent agency. It is not the purview of this committee—

[Corey Tochor, Conservative, Saskatoon—University, SK]

However, you approved this transaction.

[Tim Hodgson, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

Let me reiterate. The—

[Corey Tochor, Conservative, Saskatoon—University, SK]

That's okay. Let's move on to the other question.