Thank you, Madam Chair.
I want to take a few minutes as part of my presentation to make sure that members around this table are informed as to the crisis happening on the Prairies today. Unfortunately, of the official members of this committee, my colleague is the most westerly of the members, besides Ms. Block and me. I think it's important that everybody understands what the Prairies are going through today.
We've had a fall where half of the harvest is under snow. Only in the last couple of days are farmers back on the field and able to harvest. Then they'll have the problem of trying to ship by rail to get their product to market because it's not a product that is going to be of high quality.
Then, we have the situation with what's called the “price differential” in our oil. I want to put this in perspective so that everyone around this table understands it. Brent oil, or the world price, is trading at somewhere around $80 a barrel. U.S. West Texas oil is trading at somewhere around $70 a barrel. Alberta oil, and to a degree Saskatchewan oil, is trading today at $20 a barrel. There is a $50-per-barrel differential that the U.S. is taking, because we only have one market, which is the United States, through Keystone pipeline and others.
I want to put that in perspective. What does that work out to? In Canada, we, as Canadians, are missing out on one new school a day and one new hospital a week because we are not getting a good price for our natural resources.
Let me put it in another perspective for those who are very familiar with the Ontario economy. Let's say that a car is built in Mr. Oliver's riding of Oakville, and it sells for $70,000. When it's shipped across the border to the United States, the Americans say thank you very much and we'll give you $20,000 for it. We wouldn't stand for that if that happened to the auto industry, but that's what's happening on the Prairies today.
I'd like to direct a question to our guest from Prince Rupert.
One of the options that I believe is underutilized is the Prince Rupert port. Under the former Conservative government, the northern gateway pipeline was approved, and had construction started, it would have been at the point of almost flowing oil through your port today.
Are you underutilized in Prince Rupert? Do you have the capacity to bring more oil through your port for the Asian markets?