Mr. Speaker, earlier this morning I had a chance to ask the member for Red Deer a question about the government's motivation behind the appointment and I would like to follow up on that.
I talked earlier about how the government has a history of manipulation in so many areas. Apart from Senate reform, patronage appointments and its latest involvement in the Gomery inquiry, it has manipulated the environment file in many ways. After eight years of discussions, it still does not have a plan on the Kyoto file. We talked about carbon sequestration and how it has basically manipulated that away from the farmers and agricultural areas. We hope we can get that back so people in rural areas can actually benefit from Kyoto in some way.
The government has also manipulated the budget. I had a chance to be at the environment committee meeting just before the break.The member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley was very vocal about his concern that the government was trying to manipulate the environmental file by using the budget.
I also have a concern that the qualifications of this gentleman do not seem to be adequate at all. We have been told that he has no academic or professional experience in this area. His predecessor, who was an ADM in the Quebec government, had been involved with environmental issues for 35 years and was a member of the round table before he was appointed as chair.
There are also some questions about Mr. Murray's decision making and judgment abilities. The government was told that patronage appointments should not be attending conventions and that kind of thing but Mr. Murray had the poor judgment to show up at the Liberal convention in the spring of 2005. He also made a number of policy blunders as mayor.
I am interested to know if the member feels that the government is using the weakness of the candidate to further manipulate the environment file, which it has been so successful at manipulating in the past.