Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to an issue that is very timely, very critical. I feel strongly about the issue.
Coming from the province of Manitoba, I would like to start my remarks by pointing out that I have some personal knowledge and background of how striking it can be when people get seized of the issue of moving water around on a grand scale in terms of moving water from one basin to another.
As a carpenter working on hydro projects, I personally witnessed the diversion of the Nelson, Churchill and Burntwood River systems to feed water to power hydro electric dams and the devastation that caused, certainly the flooding of the area, et cetera, they had to reclaim to create this great reservoir and the impact it had on aboriginal communities. I think of that first and foremost as we deal with this subject.
I want to share a story with the House because it points to the absolute fixation generations have had on moving water around in a grand scheme. Another reason I raise Manitoba as an example is that the current Premier of Manitoba is an engineer by trade. His engineering thesis was on an idea to use nuclear blasts to blow up the Red River Valley to divert the water from Lake Winnipeg and reverse its flow, as unbelievable as that sounds, to sell the water to the States.
This is recent history. We are talking the mid-1960s. People were seized with the issue. People in universities were playing with ideas that today sound almost comical. They are ridiculous. Serious people were dealing with the idea of moving our water around, never mind the impact on the environment or on future generations.
Contrary to what Brian Mulroney said in 1986, I believe Canada's water is not for sale. I believe our freshwater is a public trust and not a private commodity.
Last May the foreign affairs minister of the current government promised to take measures to protect Canadian water after a public outcry greeted the news that companies were on the brink of exporting bulk water to foreign markets. We were anxiously awaiting measures that might satisfy the fear of Canadians in this regard and nothing has been forthcoming. It is all the more timely that the NDP used its opposition motion today to raise this critical issue.
A drain on our freshwater is a drain on the public trust. This generation of Canadians has been charged with the responsibility to care for this precious commodity. I use that term not in the marketing aspect. It is a commodity, as the previous speaker pointed out, that is more precious than any dollar value we could possibly put on it, given the nature of the health implications of access to free water for any successful community.
Increasing water scarcity and the world-wide destruction of the health of the aquatic ecosystem are creating a global water crisis. It is not overstating it to point out that virtually every country of the world, especially the developing nations, are seized with the issue of access to freshwater as a primary concern.
It is not only the developing nations. Obviously the main pressure on Canada is our partner to the south, our main trading partner, which has serious water problems. It should come as no surprise to us that the Americans are very interested in any idea that might help them to alleviate these problems.
The Colorado River runs dry before it hits the ocean. One of the great water systems of North America is being so taxed and resources are being siphoned out to such a degree that it no longer reaches the ocean. There is such a screaming demand as the population booms in California that the Americans are willing to entertain any idea no matter how ridiculous it may seem to Canadians to get access to something we have an adequate supply of at least currently.
When I lived in British Columbia I remember one of the ideas of Wacky Bennett, another premier under whom I have lived who had some questionable ideas about water. This was Wacky Senior, the original Wacky who wanted—this is wacky in itself—to flood the Skagit valley. He wanted to divert rivers to flood the Skagit Valley. Those members who have been to B.C. would know what a massive undertaking that would be, to divert huge river systems down that valley again into the United States and ultimately to the insatiable market of California.
These ideas keep springing up. This is what is truly worrisome to most Canadians. Often free marketers, often right wing governments, will do almost anything to make water a marketable commodity. It is very much a worry of ours when we heard the Minister of International Trade say: “Today's water will be tomorrow's oil”.
Any time we allow ourselves to think along those lines we are leaving ourselves open to the many people who would like to see water become a real trading commodity and would like to build it into free trade agreements, somehow have a default mechanism or some kind of tied selling mechanism. If we buy into the aspects of a trade agreement that we want and are interested in, we are also going to be tied into some aspect of having to share our water, maybe in a way far beyond whatever we wished or contemplated.
I would think the two examples I pointed out would be disastrous for the well-being of North Americans, using nuclear blasts to blast out the Red River Valley and divert Lake Winnipeg and then flood the Skagit Valley. Those are only two schemes. All throughout history we have been hearing these ideas, recent history certainly.
In 1959 there was an idea put forward by T.W. Kierans of Sudbury called the GRAND project, the great replenishment and northern development canal. His idea was that the rivers feeding James Bay would be dammed up and a series of pumps would then lift the river flow upstream and over the great east-west divide and from there into the Great Lakes.
On that kind of massive restructuring, how could we contemplate being so arrogant as to use the technology that we now have to irreversibly change the flow of water, the great divide? Imagine the impact on the ecosystem. We talk about environmental impact studies. We have never thought of anything on that grand a scale.
In 1964 General McNaughton, chair of the Canadian section of the international joint commission, talked about the North American Water and Power Alliance plan, which again is to flood the Rocky Mountain trench.
Now we have people wanting to flood the Skagit Valley and flood the Rocky Mountain trench and turn it into a giant reservoir for North America, again to divert water to the U.S. and Mexico.
Is it any wonder with ideas like this being floated by credible people, by knowledgeable scientists of the era, Canadians are now forming alliances to try to protect ourselves from those very ideas?
As we speak today the Council of Canadians is in Ottawa speaking to this very issue, voicing its concern that water is to be the next marketable commodity and we are going to be somehow tied through free trade agreements to a relationship that we are not comfortable with and not ready for dealing with water.
Look at the way our free trade agreements tie us into heating fuel, for instance. There are clauses in the NAFTA and in the FTA that if we run short of heating fuel domestically, we are tied to selling at the same rate we are selling it currently to our partners to the south. We are very fearful of similar things coming along to do with water.
There are a few things we must keep in mind. There is a global water crisis. There are corporate water giants eager to use water as a for profit basis to serve the world's needs and our government has not done anything to clearly state what our policy is to be on the international trade of bulk water or the diversion of water from one basin to another.
I hope this opposition day motion is dealt with favourably from all sides of the House. We can feel comfortable that as we form new trade alliances water will not be one of those marketable commodities that we would forfeit.