Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate my colleague from Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie for giving such a great speech on the importance of protecting the environment.
I wonder if he could tell us more about the budget implementation bill before us, which has not yet passed third reading. Hidden in that bill is a part that deals with environmental assessments. Of course the bill was drafted before the incident in the Gulf of Mexico. In light of what we have seen so far, this is due to some complicity within the government, a failure to obey the law, or perhaps some political influences.
The budget implementation bill would allow the environment minister to decide whether environmental assessments should be conducted or not, and I wonder if this is not somewhat dangerous. Could the member comment on this?