Thank you, Madam Chair.
Given that we dove into this study, let us go back to its source. People often say that ministers come and go, but that the public service remains.
I would like to understand the beginning of the process. We know that the previous government brought the number of protected lakes and rivers down from 30,000 to less than 100. There is probably no connection, but when we look at the map, we see that about 90% of the lakes and rivers that remained protected were in Conservative ridings.
Ms. Higgens, what were the criteria that made it possible to keep those 100 or so lakes and rivers?