Those are your words. I do not dare say that.
We have had many problems with this corporation and we will have more because the minister does not have enough courage to bring it under this bill. He did not speak to his colleague to say how important it was to introduce this concept in the bill. No, he preferred to say nothing. If nothing is said, the matter is not discussed. However we must look at all the problems that occurred abroad and that brought us shame in Canada.
Companies have embarrassed us by exploiting and polluting other countries. They are not satisfied with polluting here, they go and pollute elsewhere. We have to ask ourselves where all of this is headed.
Clause 8 provides for the creation of the position of federal environmental assessment co-ordinator. This shows clearly that the federal government decides and wants to insinuate itself into the Quebec environmental assessment process. It is because the federal government intends to act in Quebec's area of jurisdiction that it has to create the position of co-ordinator.
With whom does it intend to coordinate? With itself? We have seen in many other bills how it overlaps with itself: fisheries and oceans overlaps with heritage and with environment in the creation of areas of protection for this and that.
The government is creating a co-ordinator, and therefore co-ordination, position, because it will have something to coordinate and it will have to co-ordinate with the provinces. The government will present itself as the big brother, the all powerful, the one with the billions, money coming out of its ears, the one wanting to impose the law of money, of power, of the many on the little provinces, which will have to comply. It will say to them “If you do not comply, you will not get this. If you do not do this, you will not have that”. This will be a position that could be dangerous for bargaining.
If the federal government stuck to its own areas of jurisdiction, co-ordination would not be required, but because it wants to create a system that will enable it to tramp over other jurisdictions, it needs a co-ordinator position to ensure that if it spies some way in which it can meddle in the affairs of others, it will do so at will and with pleasure.
Initially the provincial governments, including Quebec and Alberta, were the leaders. They criticized the Canadian legislation and demanded major changes that would have made it possible for provincial processes to be used in place of federal assessments but there were few federal concessions.
The bill appears to introduce discrimination between the promoters of projects associated with federal authorities and those that are not. For example, a partially federally funded project would be covered by the law but as soon as the federal level is not involved, another system kicks in.
My colleague was very eloquent in his treatment of this. We saw earlier in this House someone from the province of Quebec, the hon. member for Anjou—Rivière-des-Prairies to be precise, who was president of the BAPE in Quebec—at least I believe he was. Our colleague, the chair of the standing committee on heritage, used to be minister of environment in the Bourassa government. A number of Liberal members in this House are former Quebec MLAs, for instance the hon. member for Westmount—Ville-Marie. The member for Papineau—Saint-Denis was not a member of the national assembly but he was very close to the government and worked for Mr. Ryan, so he was very much up to date on everything that was going on within that magnificent government that did something very significant for the environment. These are not innocents; they are very much up to date on events.
I can tell the House that I will go to bed even sadder tonight knowing that they are not capable of knowledge transfer. What they learned in Quebec they cannot make use of here for the benefit of Canada, and that I profoundly regret.