Mr. Speaker, let us talk about safety.
Half of all Quebeckers get their drinking water from the St. Lawrence, and a number of them are calling on the federal government to ensure that it has the capacity to deal with a major oil spill caused by one of the supertankers leaving Sorel-Tracy. What is more, the environment commissioner seriously doubts that Transport Canada and the Coast Guard are equipped to handle such a spill.
How could the government authorize such a significant increase in tanker traffic on the St. Lawrence, when, by all accounts, it is not prepared to deal with a major oil spill?