Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question.
Clearly we cannot ask an industry to invest in its competitors.
We have to come up with long-term solutions. Our society is enormously dependent on the oil industry. The money that we pay and that makes the profits of the large oil companies could be used to create an energy network much more in tune with sustainable development.
It is very hard to ask an oil company to invest willingly in any particular sector. The government has to play a regulatory role. So we have to make sure the companies pay enough taxes, which will then be distributed according to the common good and common sense, so that the final result is acceptable.
This in no way means denying the right to make a profit or preventing a company from being profitable. The market is very special, the product is unique and the organization of the refining market requires us to alter our approach. The President of the United States, whom I do not see eye to eye with on a great many topics, has himself realized the need for action in this sector.
Mr. Dodge, the Governor of the Bank of Canada, recently spoke to the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology about the value of the dollar. According to him, the rise in the price of gas and oil has an impact on the rise in the value of the dollar.
This is the type of situation that it is essential the government try to harness, instead of letting the market operate freely. The current consequence is that a two-speed economy is developing. The energy economy, which is going well, and the manufacturing economy in Quebec and Ontario, which is going very badly. Jobs are being created in the west to study energy, but it is not the people who had jobs in Quebec and Ontario who are benefiting. You do not move someone 45 years of age from Montmagny to Edmonton in the blink of an eye. You do not turn him into an oil industry worker. There are choices of which territory to occupy and choices of which economy to develop right across Canada.
These choices require that the government play a responsible role, that it have the means to intervene, that it promote the point of view of our fellow citizens, and that the benefits of economic successes be felt across the country. I am not saying that there are not any effects right now, but in my opinion there are not enough. This is why the government should look at the suggestions we made so that this market can be controlled and really put to the use of the economy and the citizens of Canada and Quebec.