Mr. Speaker, it is the usual refrain. It is the second time I have presented a bill about oxygenation of gasoline. The government always congratulates me and tells me what a wonderful measure it is but decides against it.
What I would point out to the government is that by 2010, when the federal program, which is not legislated, by the way, will come into force, we will be producing 500 million litres of ethanol blend gasoline. What I will explain to the parliamentary secretary, who pointed out MTBE, is that I am not talking about MTBE. I am just saying that this bill was based on the Minnesota model, which in four years has produced 869 million litres of oxygenated gasoline through ethanol. That is in four years only.
Now in 2003, the United States produces 7 billion litres of ethanol; that is since 1990. It has 1.3 million Ford cars with 85% ethanol blend, while we only have 26 in Canada. Legislation in 28 states in the United States has proven that legislation pushes forward the agenda.
I agree that my timetable might have been short and I would have been quite prepared to change it if the bill had been made votable. I listened to my colleague from the Canadian Alliance who said that it was not very significant anyway. I will just tell him that Japan has legislated 10% ethanol blend gasoline by 2008 and it will reduce its target.