Mr. Speaker, the region my hon. colleague represents in Thompson and Churchill is very much similar to mine in Timmins—James Bay, having some of the largest gold, copper and diamond operations in the world. Therefore, we understand the value of a resource-based economy. However, when I talk to citizens in my riding and they once again hear of the attack on the waterways, this continual undermining of basic environmental standards on the waterways, they become angry because we have seen the damage in our regions. We have seen the lakes and fish habitats that have been destroyed over the years.
I ask my hon. colleague this. While the rest of the world is moving toward a sustainable notion of treating our resources as value-added but also understanding the importance and protection of the environment, why is it that we have a government that seems to be in the process of high-grading our natural environment to get as much as it can as quickly as it can, leaving the toxic residues, which we have fought over the last 100 years in the north to stop from happening?