Mr. Speaker, my colleague made several statements in his opening remarks today. He made comments about government moving away from environmental policy and unloading responsibility for the environment, this being a contradictory position, and greenhouse gas emission regulations. I find all of his comments very interesting as he comes from a party that all but abdicated its responsibility to look at policy that would improve environmental quality in Canada.
Since the member opened the door about greenhouse gas emission regulations this evening, I would like to remind him first and foremost that when talking about environmental policy credibility in the House of Commons, it was actually his government when it was in office that failed miserably in putting forward any sort of plan to regulate greenhouse gas emissions in our country.
The data that we are starting to see through our emissions trends report, which shows the decoupling of greenhouse gas emission growth with economic growth, is very positive. It has occurred under our government's tenure. That is why we have chosen to look at a sector-by-sector regulatory approach for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
The member also has to recognize that natural resource production and the rules that govern that are primarily the focus of provincial jurisdiction. Our government has done an excellent job with programs such as the chemical management plan. We assessed thousands of chemicals in the country. We have come up with ways to ensure that Canadians have safe drinking water and so on. We also understand that this is primarily an area of provincial responsibility.
We will continue on the path of ensuring that Canadians have a healthy and safe environment through our other regulatory portfolios.