Mr. Speaker, the member opposite talks about a market-based solution. Is he aware that it will require about $1.6 billion in federal funding to reconfigure the land mass to accommodate this project, if it is even conceivably possible?
Putting that aside, we have consulted in the city of Toronto for three years on this issue. There have been more than 25 reports put on the table at city council. City council has had five opportunities to approve this and not once has it ever done so. There was an election held in which a promise was made to protect the tripartite agreement. There was one party in that election that promised to open the tripartite agreement and expand the airport regardless of cost, and that was the party opposite. That party received zero seats in the election and less than 10% of the vote in the precinct surrounding this airport. There was no public support for the position advocated by that party.
We talk about the need to support Bombardier. When the city of Toronto came forward, with the support of the Province of Ontario, to purchase Bombardier streetcars in Thunder Bay and to facilitate the expansion of the transit system in this city, the member, Mr. Baird at the time, told the city in rude and juvenile language that I cannot recite because it barred to do so in Parliament, to get lost, that there was no basis to support Bombardier and build a transit system in Toronto.
If economic development and the health of Bombardier are central to this argument, why did the party opposite refuse to support the city of Toronto's request to buy Bombardier streetcars for the city of Toronto?