Madam Speaker, it is really unfortunate that the hon. member for Cumberland—Colchester does not recognize a dead end sign when he sees one. In fact, he has not recognized this dead end sign and he smacked right into it a couple of times.
As the minister has stated to the hon. member on this very issue, under the Constitution of Canada the responsibility for provincial highways, including highway 104 in Nova Scotia, falls under provincial jurisdiction.
Transport Canada's only involvement in highway 104 is to match, as the hon. member has stated, dollar for dollar, $55 million with the province. That, for the hon. member's information, is $27.5 million each.
The highway 104 western alignment project is one of a few projects funded through the Transport Canada-Nova Scotia strategic highway improvement program agreement signed in 1993. This agreement makes provisions for both the federal government and the province to each set aside about $70 million for a total of $140 million for highway improvements in Nova Scotia.
I want to repeat for the hon. member, and it is important for the hon. member to recognize this, that this is where Transport Canada's involvement in the highway 104 project ends. The province of Nova Scotia is the responsible authority for this project. It is the province that decides on the alignment, the design, the construction standards, the tendering process and how to finance the construction costs of the provincial system.
Nova Scotia chose to use a public-private partnership concept, and good for it, as a means to construct and finance highway 104 and agreed to allow the developer to charge tolls to the users of the new highway. The federal government is neither a party to nor responsible for Nova Scotia's public-private agreement with the developer. As I stated earlier, the government's only involvement—