Actually, Mr. Speaker, the source of my information is largely from the province of Manitoba. It is not coming out of North Dakota at all.
I meant to say this during my speech but unfortunately ran out of time. The province of Manitoba is of a different political stripe than I am, but it has been fighting this battle by itself. The state of Minnesota of course has been cooperating with it recently and I believe the state of Iowa stepped in to help as well.
However, in the original court case that went on in North Dakota, which was referred to the Supreme Court, in a joint submission between the state of Minnesota and the province of Manitoba, the Government of Canada was not there to help.
We need to look at the real facts here. The facts are that there was an opportunity when there was a reference to the IJC offered back in 2002. The Liberals sat on their hands instead of doing what was right, instead of going ahead and making sure that we were able to get everything done to take care of the needs of Manitoba, the needs of people in my riding, the needs of my fishermen and my tourist businesses.
We needed to have that referral, but the answer was no. Canada went for the gusto instead of going and getting what we actually needed done at that time. We could have derailed the whole project back in 2002. Now we are sitting here, without any opportunity. The horse is out of the chute, we are riding and I do not think we are going to make the eight seconds.