Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for the question. She raises a number of very relevant points some of which I would like to touch on.
I understand that where my colleague is coming from is that the government has shown a tendency to interfere in a number of provincial jurisdictions where it is just not welcome. At the end of the day it does not make sense for the federal government to interfere in areas which are clearly within provincial jurisdiction.
A case in point is that of education. Education is something that belongs in the provincial realm. Except for maybe post-secondary education, the federal government really has no direct role in interfering with the provinces unless the provinces want to participate in a particular program. For instance if the province of Quebec wanted to do something about post-secondary education with the federal government and it was more Quebec's idea than that of the federal government, then maybe they might go ahead and do that, but education is something that belongs to the provinces.
Another case in point is Quebec's right to self-determination. Clearly Quebec's right to self-determination and the unity issue of this country is a political decision. It is not a legal decision. There is no reason for the government to privatize the political process and send this issue to the supreme court.
If the hon. member has concerns about federal interference in provincial areas, I understand where she is coming from because there are times when the federal government interferes in areas where it does not belong. That said, I fundamentally believe the environment is an area of shared jurisdiction.
The hon. member touched on a couple of points. One of the things I would like to comment on is that this is the first piece of environmental legislation of any note that the government has brought forth since being elected on October 25, 1993. Bravo. It is a good piece of legislation because we first brought it in back in 1988. The only piece of legislation the government has actually brought forth was to update a solid piece of legislation which our party first introduced in 1988.
The hon. member raised some questions and concerns with respect to enforcement of environmental regulations. There are 100 clauses in the legislation which refer to enforcement but the federal government does not allocate the resources to have enforcements in the first place. If the hon. member is concerned that it is really nice that we have this legislation but we are not going to enforce it, I think at the end of the day the federal government is required to send the resources to the provinces to ensure that the environmental regulations are actually carried out.
As to the other points the hon. member brought forth, perhaps I could catch up with her at a later time to finish this conversation to permit other questions in the House.