Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague from Outremont for sharing his time with me today.
Madam Speaker, I want to thank the member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley for bringing forward this very important opposition day motion.
This has certainly been an issue with the NDP for 40 years. We were very happy to hear that, although they are Johnny-come-latelies, the Liberals and the Bloc are now willing to join with us on something that the NDP has been fighting for.
It is important to note that it was the Dave Barrett NDP government back in 1972, freshly elected as the first NDP government in British Columbia, that pushed for this moratorium and was able to succeed in pushing the federal government at the time to announce it. However, what we have seen subsequently, and what the member from Skeena—Bulkley Valley said so eloquently earlier, are Liberal and Conservative governments trying to undermine that moratorium.
The reality is that in looking at the impact of just one accident, the Exxon Valdez, over 20 years later we are still talking about nearly 2,000 species that have not fully recovered. We talk about the fact that the environment continues to be impacted a generation after that accident.
We then have to wonder what the Conservatives are thinking in trying to bring hundreds of ships that are monster tankers, twice as large as the Exxon Valdez, to the B.C. coast. It is absolutely absurd that anyone would contemplate something that could be so destructive to the B.C. economy, whether we are talking about tourism, the fisheries, or other industries within our natural resources. To contemplate that a government would seriously consider bringing monster tankers to the coast is something that defies reason.
What we have heard so far from Conservative speakers in this House is that they are very clearly contemplating this incredibly risky, imprudent action. That is why it is so important that the member from Skeena—Bulkley Valley has brought this forward today. Of course, NDP members in this House will all be standing together to vote for this motion and to push the government to introduce legislation.
In a very real sense, we talk about B.C.'s alienation from the Conservatives, which is so manifest to the Conservative Party itself that it is refusing to call a byelection in Prince George—Peace River. It is doing a great disrespect to the people in northern British Columbia, since other byelections have been held. However, the Conservative Party has been holding off on Prince George—Peace River for the simple reason that it knows there is going to be a backlash for a whole number of reasons that I will get into in a moment. We have been saying all along to hold that byelection, but it is refusing to do so.
Why would that be?
Part of it is the broken promises. British Columbians remember, of course, that when the Conservative Party was running for election it said it would provide support on leaky condos. That was a promise to British Columbians that it promptly betrayed after forming government.
We also have the pine beetle epidemic and the fact that this government continues to use smoke and mirrors in announcing funds but never paying out. In fact, some estimates have been that only 10% to 20% of the pine beetle funding has actually been paid out to support the communities across British Columbia that have been impacted by this epidemic.
The Conservative government keeps churning around money that it is not willing to pay out, even though it is certainly willing to pay out tens of billions of dollars to their friends on Bay Street, to the banking industry and to the big energy industry.
Of course, we have seen the Conservative government's lack of action with the collapse of the salmon fishery. We do have a fourth year of the cycle that took place this year that continues to maintain a healthy fishery's return of sockeye salmon, but we have not seen any substantial increase in resources allocated to rebuild the fisheries in British Columbia.
Those are broken promises, but I think it is more important to talk about the pending third strike against the Conservatives in B.C.
The first strike was the softwood lumber sellout. In this corner of the House, the NDP was the only party who actually read the agreement, spoke out about the agreement and knew that it would cost thousands upon thousands of B.C. jobs. Yet Conservatives from B.C. helped to push something through that was enormously destructive to our softwood lumber industry.
It is well documented. If we go back in Hansard, we will see New Democrats speaking up against that. The Liberals and the Bloc, sadly, supported this Conservative initiative. What happened is exactly what we predicted: the loss of tens of thousands of jobs in British Columbia and a permanent restructuring that has led to massive raw log exports. So British Columbia logs are now fuelling jobs in the United States, thanks to the Conservatives.
The second strike is even more reprehensible; that is, forcing the HST on British Columbians. That is why, as I mentioned earlier, the Conservatives are so scared to call a byelection in Prince George--Peace River. They simply know that what was a solid Conservative riding is not anymore, because in the Peace River region particularly--
I hear some Conservatives denouncing Peace River people and Prince George people. I would say, do not show contempt for people from Prince George and Peace River, because those individuals, those British Columbians, have the right to parliamentary representation. They have the right to call for a byelection, as many residents of that area have. It is simply disrespectful to British Columbians in northern B.C. that the government refuses to hold a byelection there, even though it wanted to hold byelections in Ontario and in Manitoba.
Of course, the HST is--