Mr. Speaker, earlier I listened to the member's speech. He brought forward his experience in the Manitoba legislature, and I thank for that.
I have witnessed this in the past six years since being elected as a member of Parliament. Some programs, as I have said before, have been thrust upon the private market. I do not want to mislead anyone by thinking this is the wrong way to go in all general circumstances. In certain cases, we talk about public-private partnerships. Some of them have effective measures and some work substantially in many areas. However, the problem is the oversight and enforcement involved, or lack thereof. Even if that element is put upon the private sector, we could run into some problems as the member pointed out.
Private inspectors in rural areas have to travel and that costs money. They have to stay overnight in hotels, which costs money. All these costs, one after another, are thrown at the consumer.
I go back to the example about applying for rebates to make homes more energy efficient. The problem was with the inspectors. The government said that the inspectors would only cost a couple of hundred dollars. It was more than that in rural areas. People had to pay for the inspector's gas mileage and they had to pay for the hotel if the inspector had to stay overnight. They were lucky enough to share these costs with other people, but it became that much more complicated. The private sector decided the price. Let us face it, when it comes to setting the prices, inspectors will charge whatever the market will bear. Therefore, that makes its way up the scale. It was harder for people with low incomes to avail themselves of the program because they could not afford the inspection process.
I bring that up as an example only because we may have the same situation. I know the Conservatives scoff at the idea, but I hope they bear this in mind. It could become a problem for the consumers in the near future. I hope they will come up with suggestions to change the legislation so we protect the consumers from being gouged in more ways than just one.