Mr. Speaker, I congratulate my colleague for her excellent presentation.
I would like to go back to something that was discussed by one of our colleagues in a previous speech and that is the discretionary power that this bill would grant the minister to reduce the absolute liability to below the $1 billion limit in the event of an oil spill, accident involving pipelines that transport gas, and so forth.
I would like my colleague to tell us about the negative effects that this kind of provision could have on the objective of this bill. I believe that this is another way for the Conservative government to please its friends in the oil and gas industry, to keep from scaring them too much and to avoid making lobbyists nervous. I would like to hear more from my colleague about this.