Mr. Speaker, again the minister just attacked the notion that a west-to-east pipeline needs an environmental assessment and local and aboriginal consultations. The minister said it “isn’t the time to diss a major project”, earlier today and just repeated the same thing here. However, demanding blind support for a pipeline risks losing the social licence needed in the U.S. to secure approval for Keystone XL.
Does Canada really want to say to the world that even voicing the importance of environmental assessment is a “diss”, or will the government clarify to the world right now that it agrees that honest environmental assessment is important?