Mr. Speaker, let me clarify a couple of things.
A parliamentary secretary in the House does what he is told on the government side. This particular individual is here trying to defend on behalf of the government the whole Nisga'a agreement. It is quite irrelevant to me if there is a motion on the table as to a certain aspect of the Nisga'a agreement. I am trying to address something very specific.
It is not just a question of whether it is the auditor general involved in this. That is what I said originally. My colleague from Delta—South Richmond commissioned a private firm to do it. I would suggest to the government that it commission, and ought to have commissioned, several private firms to undertake a cost effective analysis on this thing.
It is not a matter of just going to the auditor general and saying it has a variance of 5%. Does the member know what a variance of 5% on one billion dollars is? It is a lot of money to the Canadian taxpayer.
The premise I am trying to get across to the hon. member and those few Liberals who are here listening is that there is much money involved in this. They should not just assess what some bureaucrats are telling them that this is what it is going to cost because they want this to be put into place. They should not just assess and take the word of the auditor general.
The government should commission a number of organizations. It has time. We have managed to get this thing deferred until the fall. Over the summer, why does it not commission two separate firms to make a cost effective analysis of this? If there is such a large discrepancy, which I am charging today there is, then it should halt the process, re-evaluate it and look at it not just from the social aspect of it, not just from any other aspect of it, but look at it as well from the fiscal cost of it.
This is going to cost British Columbians and all Canadians a great deal of money. The effects of it down the road will cost British Columbians and all other Canadians, by virtue of other land claims, a great deal more money. There is a lot at stake here. It is not just a one day debate that we happened to have called for in the House of Commons. The government has time. Why not do it?