Mr. Speaker, I might start by offering some thoughts from some of the people who were present at the committee. They had the same difficulties as the member had in wrestling with this most difficult question with regard to the boundaries and the requested change for the boundaries.
Basically it boils down to one thing only, a request from a mining company. It is simply that. I put a question to one of the witnesses who came forward in trying to find a solution that might be somewhat flexible and workable. The question I asked was is there any reason other than pure economics or the money generated from this mine in the park to move forward on this or change the boundaries. The answer was no. It was pure and simple mining.
There are three main points why the government cannot support this motion. The first one is the integrity of the park. The integrity of the park or the ecosystem within is extremely delicate and the boundaries of the park, agreed on some years ago, need to be maintained not just for our generation but for future generations. To allow a chunk of land, some hundreds of thousands of acres, to be severed off for purely economic reasons, this government can simply not support that.
The second reason is the animals within, the calving groups of the bluenose caribou. They do shift but, as I mentioned earlier, the ecosystems are extremely delicate and to take up several hundred thousand acres of the mating or calving grounds of these animals is simply not appropriate. These animals play a huge role in the overall diet of the native people within that area.
My third reason is economics. This process has been going on for 20 years. It has involved all parties. The agreement was put in place I believe in 1996 and due to some new ways of testing for mineral resources in the latter part of 1996-97, a mining company found deposits within the national park itself.
This is not contingent on the mining process moving forward. Only 20% of the total find is within the national park. What they are asking for is to mine that 20%, to compromise that very delicate ecosystem and to compromise the bluenose caribou.
It was for no other reason than economics.
This government and certainly all parties were having a difficult job with it because they certainly do not want to appear as if they are not supportive of the economics and the native people moving forward and having job opportunities from mining.
That is why I bring to the House's attention that it is only 20% and it is important to understand that. Based on the testing this is not the number one site for exploration. This was the third site on the priority list for exploration and thereby is not simply the only place they are pursuing.
The government simply cannot support this for the reasons mentioned. It is an extremely difficult thing but when one looks at these three reasons it becomes very simple.