Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of the Environment.
The operation carried out this summer to raise the Irving Whale will cost taxpayers in Quebec and Canada over $31 million.
At a time when the federal government is slashing health care, education and unemployment insurance, is it not absurd to take $31 million out of taxpayers' pockets to clean up the damage done by the multi-billion-dollar Irving corporation and, to add insult to injury, to give them back the Irving Whale, which they are thinking of using again? Will the Liberal government make Irving pay for the operation, yes or no?