Mr. Speaker, I thank all of my colleagues for their submissions on this very important issue. I thank the Alliance members, the NDP members, the Bloc members, members of the backbench and the Liberal caucus for their remarks as well.
It is too bad that we have to come to the House of Commons to make a case for a project that is very basic and vital to the development of one of North America's oldest and most beautiful cities. However we have to come here because of the inaction of government. We have to come here because politicians make promises during election campaigns that they have absolutely no intention of ever keeping.
It is getting all too common that this type of politics is infiltrating the country. People stand and make promises. They have no intention of ever keeping them. They want to get through a couple of weeks or months in an election campaign. They hope the public will have a very short memory and that it will all go away.
The public does not forget. We cannot let the industry minister forget the promises he has made to the people in St. John's to get this project moving. This project deserves to be moved along. Some 120 million litres of raw sewage a day is going into one of the most beautiful harbours in the world. If we do the mathematics, 43 billion litres of raw sewage per year go into St. John's harbour. Is it any wonder that in 1994 the environmental watchdog, the Sierra club, gave this project an F and in 1999 downgraded it even further to an F-minus? I do not know how much further it can go than that.
I want to make a comment about the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Industry who came here with a prepared text today. I am really surprised that he did not even run the remarks by his boss before he came here, saying that we could take advantage of the Canada-Newfoundland infrastructure program to fund the project.
There is only $50 million from the federal government over a five year period. There are hundreds of small municipalities for that $50 million over five years or $10 million a year. The Minister of Industry himself has indicated that we cannot apply under that program to have St. John's harbour cleaned up. It has to be a separate side agreement.
Let me say to the other Newfoundland member, the member for Humber—St. Barbe—Baie Verte, who said that since we have $60 million committed to it now why would we not proceed. We cannot proceed. There is an agreement involving the municipalities of Mount Pearl, Paradise, St. John's and the provincial government and it cannot kick in until the federal government comes up with its share of the funding.
It is conceivable to say that the project will never move ahead unless the federal government comes up with its share of the money for the project.
I want to compliment the people who do so much work on this from year to year and who do not get discouraged. The city of St. John's has been working very hard on it, along with the mayor. There are the ACAP people who put their backs into it on a daily basis as well and try to keep it in the public eye. They are the people we should be complimenting for the work they have put into it, not the politicians.
If the Minister of Industry has any feeling that getting the money would somehow give some credit to me or the member of the Alliance or NDP for the very limited submissions we have made, he can forget about it. That is not the case at all. Making money available for this project would be saying thanks to the people who have made such a difference, people like the mayor of the city of St. John's, the people on the St. John's city council and the ACAP people. They are the people who deserve the real credit for the effort that has gone into this so far.
I sincerely hope that the Minister of Industry is back in his office somewhere listening to this and will take it into account, into consideration, step up to the plate and make money available for what is a very good project.