Mr. Speaker, instead of advancing sustainable development, Canada is once again being mocked internationally for its attempts to ruin all progress toward environmental protection. Canada's negotiators in Rio received the fossil award for their all-out efforts to gut a text calling for the elimination of fossil fuel subsidies.
The Conservatives have said—and still say—that they were in favour of eliminating these subsidies, but, as usual, they are saying one thing and doing the opposite.
How can the minister justify maintaining these subsidies?