Mr. Speaker, I am quite surprised to find myself speaking tonight at this late hour. But I believe that this matter is important. While we are talking about oil prices tonight, some people are still wondering how they will manage to reimburse the debts they incurred paying their oil bills last winter. With the help of organizations in Sherbrooke which help the poorest people, sometimes elders, sometimes single-parent families, I was able to see that some people were not even able to get oil because companies required a minimum purchase of $200. Some people who only had $50 or $60 to spend gathered a group to finally get some oil delivered to them.
The problem goes beyond the ability of the Conservatives to understand. We are in a situation with a fundamental problem. The problem is oil. Obviously, we would like to pay as little for it as possible. At the same time, we would rather use as little of it as possible, given the effect on the environment. In 2008, we must admit that we are caught—squeezed between the economic and environmental realities. This results from a laissez-faire attitude. For decades, governments were unable to foresee what is happening today. Who is paying the highest price? The poorest people are.
A wealthy person who owns an SUV will probably keep that SUV, even if the price of gas goes up to $2 or $2.50 a litre. However, Mr. So-and-So who works because he has to, earning just minimum wage, must drive to where he works, which is unfortunately 40 km from home. That means 80 km a day. With the rising price of oil, even if he works 40 hours a week at $8 or $9 an hour, he will have to pay to go to work. When he goes to get his groceries, he will notice that the cost of food has also gone up because oil is more expensive, which increases transportation and delivery costs.
At the end of the day, it is ordinary citizens who pay at every level. Even the Government of Quebec has told us that, as the price of oil rises, Quebec is getting poorer. It costs the Government of Quebec more to run everything it has to run using oil, despite the additional tax dollars it tries to obtain. Who will pay? Once again, it is the citizens who must pay. In the end, everyone pays, except the Conservative government's friends, the oil companies and their shareholders of course, who are pocketing huge amounts of cash.
The Conservative government's philosophy is to leave things to market forces. But who determines the market forces in the petroleum industry? Everyone knows that oil extraction is becoming more and more costly. However, the price of oil is also on the rise. As a result, the gap and the profit margin are quickly increasing, and that is how fortunes and billions of dollars in profits are being made.
The petroleum industry overall includes extraction, refining and distribution. If the Competition Bureau were ever to examine how the system operates, it would tell us that, just because the oil companies walk together hand in hand, it does not necessarily mean they are in bed together. But one would have to be a little naive not to think so. We do not usually see Esso, Shell and Ultramar representatives sitting down together to break bread and set prices or, as we heard earlier, to determine market forces. But, in the end, who decides that a barrel costs $110? Some considerations are mere technicalities and often arbitrary.
If the wind blows a little too hard in some parts of the world, the price goes up. If the Arab countries decide to cut production, the price goes up. Some may say that they would have to be crazy—and they really are—to not take advantage of the situation. But those who profit from the situation pass the bill along to the less fortunate.
As I said earlier, the problem is also knowing what we are doing. We spoke briefly about the Competition Bureau earlier. The Bureau is familiar with everything the oil industry does, including extraction, refining and distribution. In 2002, the price of a barrel was $26; in 2007, the average price was $71; now, between January and April, the price of a barrel went up to $111 or even $121. Whether the price of a barrel is $26 or $121, the cost of refining should be about the same. However, the oil companies make money because extraction is so lucrative. Then they can get a reasonable price for refining.
Thus, if the cost of extraction is low, the cost of refining increases. That is what happened in 2005. I remember very well that the price of a barrel was about $75 and the price of gas was $1.25 a litre. Not too long ago, we saw prices of $111, $112, $115, and now close to $121 per barrel. A litre of gas cost about $1 at the start, but a barrel of oil was about $100. So the prices do not correspond. The companies blame it on the stock that they had or did not have, or that they should have had, but did not think to set aside.
We are dependent on the appetite of the oil companies. The government must accept that there will be failure. None of this was thought about in advance. It was left to its own devices. Furthermore, today, the Conservative government is effectively granting tax breaks that are almost unimaginable under the circumstances.
At one point, under the Liberals, the price of heating oil went up. That is when the idea of a GST refund, $125 I think it was, came about. Everyone got $125, even those who had electric heating. The refund was intended to mitigate the price of heating oil. It made no sense. It was obvious that there was no real desire to deal with a serious problem. Untold numbers of people suffered because of that, whether they used oil heating or had to drive to their minimum-wage jobs.
At the same time, there is the issue of pollution. Some will argue, of course, that raising the price of gasoline to $2.50 a litre would certainly cause a significant reduction, but some people would go bankrupt. Moreover, any inflation associated with this is passed on to the consumer, and that often affects basic necessities.
My message tonight is primarily directed to those who, more often than not, have no voice and cannot make themselves heard. I can assure them that several of us, especially on this side of the House, care greatly about the people who are experiencing affronts which we could not describe without using unparliamentary language. Some people may not have a voice, but we are acting on their behalf. As their spokespersons, we have to do something. There is a genuine need to assist the most disadvantaged. As I said earlier, there are people who still have no idea how they will manage to pay the bills for last winter.
We know well enough that what the oil companies do is raise their prices as much as possible and then lower them just before the holidays. People may travel a bit less, but those who only have this part of the year to recharge their batteries, after having been exploited by the oil companies all year—especially during winter—can at least relax and go to the lower St. Lawrence or elsewhere to have a good time for a bit, enjoy life and, above all, forget about federal policies and the government in power today. The government is doing everything right for the oil companies. Essentially, it is the government that is benefiting the most right now.
I have not spoken about the other facet of this topic: the more use increases, the more greenhouse gas emissions increase. The government has never planned on getting too involved in energy efficiency. These same people who had a hard time paying for their heating oil are often forced to move into accommodation or housing that has almost zero energy efficiency.
The increase in the cost of oil and the energy inefficiency of their home means that their costs double. The federal Conservative government, which is profiting from all of these oil revenues, must put into place effective energy efficiency programs, effective with a capital E.
My colleague has reminded me that almost all of the Conservative speeches this evening did not talk about the real problems. They talked about the Liberals' possible plan to introduce a carbon tax. They have reached an unprecedented level of incompetence. It is true that this party was inexperienced. It is not at all like the Progressive Conservative Party of a few years ago. In my opinion, the only thing they will have in common is their next budget deficit because the Conservatives do not know how to manage. At one point, we had the Canadian Alliance and at another we had the Reform Party. However, I believe that of late the party is taking its cue from certain ministers. Experience and effectiveness are not its strengths.
We are dealing with a fundamental problem and action has to be taken. I quickly touched on the Competition Bureau and my colleagues spoke about it a fair amount. We also mentioned the monitoring agency because it is possible to monitor oil companies. I spoke a little about the distribution of activities. It would also be possible to require oil companies to separate their various activities so that extraction would be carried out by a company distinct from the one responsible for refining or the other that handles distribution. In that way, there would be three areas of activity subject to public scrutiny of competition.
How is it possible that one oil company is not more efficient than another in terms of extraction? Why is one oil company not more efficient than another when it comes to refining? Why is one company not more efficient than another in terms of distribution? These are three areas of activity where there could be competition, competitiveness and more efficiency, including the energy efficiency that I mentioned.
Today, we perhaps wanted to emphasize—at least I hope so—that the government can show some initiative and that this can be the end of the party that the oil companies and their shareholders have been having for many years. We must ensure that the oil companies make their fair contribution. Tax revenues are being lost, resulting in the impoverishment of individuals and of our communities. Quebec is also becoming poorer. It has a deficit. It is importing so much oil and the cost is so outrageous that Quebec has a trade deficit.
In addition, there is the issue of equalization. I think that the Conservatives were not quite sure what that was all about when they first took office. They have totally distorted it. The provinces will end up getting only 50% of their oil revenues, but that is lucky just the same, because at first the Conservatives wanted to take everything away.
On the one hand, for those provinces which are fortunate enough, or perhaps that is unfortunate, to have oil within their jurisdiction, the capacity to raise revenues is not even factored into the calculation of equalization payments, which makes Quebec even poorer. On the other hand, Quebec's revenues from electricity are included. Again, the provinces benefit from revenues depending on the oil companies established within their jurisdictions while Quebec has been paying for its electricity from day one. We will recall that, since 1970, big oil has benefited from approximately $70 billion in subsidies. Quebec, however, did not get one red cent when it started up its hydroelectric operations. Quebec paid an average of 25% of that $70 billion, but no one in Canada contributed to the development of hydroelectric power in Quebec.
One day or another, Quebec will also have oil and gas, it is almost certain. I dare hope—I am not sure I will still be around to see it—that Quebec will make very little use of oil. And when it is used, I hope the benefits from oil could also be used to offset all the negative aspects of using it.
Where do all these millions and billions of dollars generated by oil go today? Most of this money goes into the pockets of the shareholders, the oil companies, and, of course, the government to pay for a few whims through its policies that help its friends. This money should be used mainly for cleaning up the damage caused by greenhouse gases, but that is not what the government is doing.
The government thinks it has come up with a good solution: bury the greenhouse gases. Imagine the effort it will take to offset the production of greenhouse gases when it would be so simple to implement a host of ways to use renewable energies and clean energies, and to offset greenhouse gases and purify our planet as much as possible. We know that the air is important and that global warming is just as important. We are already seeing the harmful effects global warming is having on nature. It will necessarily have an impact on human activity.
We could go on like this for a long time. However, we have to remember who is suffering the most from this situation. We have to implement policies to at least give them the hope of seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, so that they too can enjoy life a little—not as much as the oil companies, we are not asking for that much because no one knows what to do with that much money. It is the responsibility of all governments to think about sharing the wealth and not leaving everything to the simple market rules of supply and demand, where the strongest survive and the weak perish.
I am appealing to any compassion that is left in Conservatives, any remaining capacity to innovate and to implement programs that would allow everyone's life to get better and better in Quebec and Canada.
