As I said earlier, my basis for this project is twofold. One is, we must spend public money more wisely. Right now, we know we are committed to spending some $2.4 billion over the next 40 years on a ferry or an icebreaker, or a freight vessel from Quebec to service the region.
What we should be doing, and this is what Norway did...Norway looked at the different parts of its country and asked why it was spending $10 million a year on a ferry when it could spend $100 million and there'd never be a ferry. After 20 years, there would never be a public cent required to service that much improved transportation link.
I'll give you a couple of broad strokes. In the 1970s and 1980s, we had a railway in Newfoundland. We came into Confederation with a railway, but of course, the railway wasn't the most efficient way of transporting goods from one community to another, so we traded the railway for the Trans-Canada Highway across the island of Newfoundland.
In 1996, when I was in government, we looked at the coastal marine service in Labrador, serving some 45 communities. It was costing a fortune for the Government of Canada, so we made a deal to take responsibility for the marine service. We took the money and put it into building the Trans-Labrador Highway.
Now it's time to take the straits ferry, the icebreakers and the Quebec freight vessels and make the deal to put in the subsea road tunnel. You will then complete that efficient national transportation system. Proverbially, it will be the last spike in joining Canada from sea to sea to sea.