Mr. Speaker, as I have said on a number of occasions, I am strongly at odds with the Government of Canada and its position of what it has defined as a clean energy superpower. Worldwide, including the International Energy Agency, countries are called upon to take a two-pronged path out of the recession and address climate change, and that is to move toward cleaner and more renewable sources of power and to energy efficiency.
Clearly this government thinks that the pathway to an energy superpower is to continue to subsidize fossil fuels. Yes, it has invested billions of dollars in what it defines as clean energy, but that has been nuclear and coal-fired power. The billions of dollars the government has put into this were to subsidize coal-fired power plants so that they could potentially meet their standards and at the same time not continue the programs for home energy retrofits.
There was a bit of a stretching of the truth. Yes, the government continues to put forward money, but as of a year ago no new families could apply to participate in this program. In fact, the program essentially ended a year ago for most of the families in Canada.