Mr. Speaker, in the mid-1970s when I was an RCMP officer, I was stationed in Fort St. James and saw the outbreak of the pine beetle in one of the provincial parks in British Columbia. I remember that some of the people I knew said to forestry personnel that we should burn that portion of the park to try to destroy the pine beetle before it spread.
Because it was a park, that was not allowed and over the 35 years that I lived and worked in British Columbia, I watched the pine beetle spread right across that province, destroying close to 16 million hectares of B.C. forests. The pine beetle is an epidemic. I then watched this summer as B.C. burnt up because of the dead forests caused by the pine beetle. It was sad to see a place where I spent so many years of my life and worked from one corner to the other burn up.
Now, over the last three years since I was in government, I have watched the pine beetle move from British Columbia into Jasper National Park. I was very concerned when I heard they were in the park, and I watched them defile Mount Robson. Within a year they slowly moved toward the town site of Jasper. Within the next year I saw them move past the town site toward the eastern entrance of the park. I have brought this to the attention of a number of different officials within the current government, and when we were in government.
Jasper Park has turned brown from one end to the other. The trees are dead or dying. The people who work in Jasper Park, lodge owners, and townspeople fear for the safety of their community because of the dead pine trees all around the town of Jasper. There are roads that are maybe 25 feet wide with high and dead pine trees near some of the lodges. If a fire started, people would not be able to get out of there.
For two years I have called on the Minister of Environment and Climate Change to develop an action plan to stop the spread of pine beetles in the park. We are still waiting for a response.
We saw in the last couple of years the pine beetle moving from Jasper Park into the forest sector of Alberta's foothills, and it is spreading. We have been keeping them under control. The forestry companies and the Province of Alberta's forestry department have been working feverishly, culling the trees infested by the pine beetle. However, the pine beetles are rampant. We treated about 40,000 trees last year and this year there are over 540,000 trees with pine beetles, and they are spreading rapidly.
Last Friday, I brought this issue up for the fourth time in two years in question period. That does not include the other times I have brought it up in debates both here and while I was a member of the environment committee. I have also written letters to the Minister of Environment. In May 2016, the parliamentary secretary said he would be willing to sit down with me to discuss this issue. That has never happened.
In June this year, the minister said in the House that she looked forward to discussing it further, but I have continued to repeatedly bring up the pine beetle issue because there has been no talk and no action. Our environment is at stake and tens of thousands of jobs are at risk.