Mr. Speaker, the bill is quite remarkable because although it is ostensibly the budget implementation act, about one-third of the bill is focused on gutting our environmental protections.
Just as the previous speaker indicated, the hon. minister's priority is about getting oil out of the ground and getting it out of the country as quickly as possible.
If the minister's goal is simply to hasten the approval of pipelines and to make sure that his colleagues in the oil and gas sector advance their businesses as quickly as possible, regardless of the wishes of local communities, why did he not recommend excluding the environmental provisions from the bill and putting them in a separate bill, so that we could property debate and adequately scrutinize them and make a proper decision on behalf of Canadian interests to protect our environment?