Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to participate in the debate on Bill C-45.
I want to focus a little on the environmental impacts of various provisions, but I want to start with what concerns me to a great deal.
The bill is supposed to be all about creating jobs and generating prosperity. In fact, anybody who has been able to obtain some information from the government, which it is loath to releasing, any of the experts, the PBO for example, on the impact of the provisions of the budget bill that was brought down last spring has estimated we would be looking at nearly 100,000 jobs lost as a direct result of the implementation of this particular bill.
Not only that, the government would be making widespread wholesale changes to environmental protections that exist in various legislation, such as the Canadian Environmental Assessment Review Act, the Fisheries Act, the Navigable Waters Act. A number of pieces of legislation that provide oversight for projects, for development, for activity throughout the country, will be removed and that causes considerable concern.
Listening to members opposite talk about the bridge over the Detroit River or other projects, I hearken back to the Sydney tar ponds. I heard today in the news that the last contract has been awarded for the cleanup of the tar ponds in Sydney.
The tar ponds is a notable environmental spot that resulted from steel making over more than 100 years in Sydney, in Cape Breton. Government after government felt that it was sufficient to make steel to create jobs to do whatever we wanted to do with the environment, to get rid of waste, to spoil the earth, the air and the water. Rivers were completely ruined and covered up as a result of what the steel making process did.
Nearly $500 million of taxpayer money was taken, not the people who actually made off like bandits as a result of the opportunity to make steel in Cape Breton over those 100-and-some-odd years. It was the taxpayers who ended up paying as a result of the fact that government after government, both federally and provincially, failed to provide the oversight.
It feels to me like we are going back to the future. We are rolling back the clock in our country. The government has decided that it wants to export oil and bitumen and it will see those pipelines built, over as many water courses as needs to happen, as quickly as possible, without any oversight. That causes me and members on this side some considerable concern.
Not only does the government bring in this second omnibus bill, which we are going to be forced, with one set of votes, to vote on, rumour has it that it is going to break off some of the provisions in the bill and send them to committee, but we still are going be faced with one bill that we will be voting for or against at the end of the day.
As a result of public pressure, the government is going to allow for greater discussion. However, it is clear that the Conservatives have no intention of making any changes to the bill. That is why members on this side continue to move motions to try to get the government to split off some important aspects of the bill.
One issue that is particularly burdensome and troublesome with the bill is the change, in fact the removal of the Navigable Waters Protection Act. Canada has over 32,000 lakes and rivers, and under this proposed budget bill only 97 lakes and 62 rivers are identified as significant. Why is that important? I heard a member opposite a moment ago say that the changes made to this act were important for farmers so they could plow over ditches in their field. It has nothing to do with ditches. That was the first budget bill last spring when that was allowed to happen; it allowed developers and others to get bulldozers and plow over the ditches.
This has to do with lakes and rivers. It is going to leave thousands of waterways without protection. Conservatives are even walking away from the majority of Canada's 37 designated Canadian heritage rivers. That means that a couple of heritage rivers in Nova Scotia, one of them being the Margaree, which is part of Margaree-Lake Ainslie River system, where Atlantic salmon and trout flourish in incredibly pristine water, could potentially be allowed to have roads, bridges or other projects that interfere with this river and this watershed without the requirement for permits.
It is the same thing for the Shelburne River, which begins in the Tobeatic wilderness park. It is part of the Mersey River system. It is an important river system for the Mi'kmaw. It has been used for millennia, and now it is no longer under protection. The government does not seem to understand how important these rivers, lakes and the environment are to Canadians. Our job on this side is to make those points and to bring that information to the attention of Canadians. As I indicated earlier, we are going to do that by continuing to move motions to try to split off various portions of the bill, so not only do they get proper debate, but they get an opportunity to have a vote.
My time is nearly over. I want to move a motion. I would like to seek unanimous consent to move the following motion: That notwithstanding any standing order or usual practice of the House, clauses 173 to 178 related to changes to the fisheries act be removed from Bill C-45, a second act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 29, 2012 and other measures and do compose Bill C-47; that Bill C-47 be entitled “an act to amend the fisheries act and the jobs, growth and long-term prosperity act; that bill C-47 be deemed read a first time and be printed; that the order for second reading of the said bill provide for the referral to the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans; that Bill C-45 retain the status on the order paper that it had prior to the adoption of this order; that Bill C-45 be reprinted as amended; and that the law clerk and parliamentary counsel be authorized to make any technical changes or corrections as may be necessary to give effect to this motion.
I am proposing this motion as indicated so we will have the opportunity, not only to discuss the changes being proposed, debate them and hear witnesses, but to have an opportunity to vote on these specific amendments. I, therefore, request said unanimous consent.