Mr. Speaker, one of the advantages of possibly being the last speaker on this opposition day motion is that I get to do a recap of the day's debate. I have been here for several hours and have heard what many member on all sides of the House have said.
One of the sad things is that if Motion No. 14 had been amended, as the opposition had wanted it to be, we would be speaking about the Trans Mountain pipeline late into the evening, until midnight. We could have made many more points, and we could have heard many more Liberal MPs speak to how much they like the pipeline. Also, possibly more B.C. Liberal MPs could have spoken to the advantages of the Trans Mountain pipeline and Kinder Morgan.
However, it also gives me an advantage. I do have a Yiddish proverb that I found in one of my books that I wanted to use. I think it speaks very much to the Liberal government position on this. It is, “Don't ask questions about fairy tales.” I have a lot of questions to ask today. There are a lot of fairy tales on the government side about what they are actually doing.
The main fairy tale that the Liberal government continues to flog is that the Trans Mountain NEB approval means construction of the pipeline and all the jobs that come with it. It is essentially saying that the government has approved it, and the jobs have appeared out of thin air and are here.
The construction is the actual place where a lot of blue-collar workers, a lot of working people from Alberta, British Columbia, and all over Canada will get the income, and can use that income generated through their labour to provide for their families. It is not the dollars that matter, it is what can be done with those dollars that matters. The fairy tale is that the government has actually done something, has produced something, has helped someone, when it has not.
Approval is an expression of moral support. In this case, the NEB gave its approval. The government did approve it after vast amounts of evidence was provided to the fact that it was in the national interest.
What we are asking the Liberals to do is to walk the walk, do something, do more than what they are doing now. We do not want them to just talk. I fully expect the members on the Liberal side to vote for the motion. It is such a reasonable motion before the House. It will test the will of Parliament. It will see where Parliament is at. It will ensure that every single member of this House supports a project that is in the national interest.
What we want is confirmation of continued government support. We want to know that the Prime Minister will actually travel to British Columbia and advocate for this project, like he has advocated for other public policy initiatives that he has supported. We want to see other members, especially members from British Columbia, advocating for a pipeline that is in the national interest too. Alberta members would be more than pleased to do so as well. We have done so in the past.
The promotion of the project is also the promotion of the process that led to its approval. By voting for this motion, we are basically voting to confirm both, that the construction of the pipelines by private companies is in the national interest, and that it produces a good that allows another good to flow through it. It also provides an opportunity to confirm that the approval process was the right one, especially with what we see with the B.C. Green Party and B.C. NDP. What they are proposing is an immediate halt to any opportunity that this pipeline has of being built. The tens of thousands of jobs that come with it are absolutely at risk. The agreement says, “immediately employ every tool available to the new government to stop the expansion of the Kinder Morgan pipeline, the seven-fold increase in tanker traffic on our coast, and the transportation of raw bitumen through our province..”.
That is what the new coalition of political parties intends to do in British Columbia. We know that they are supported by a great many voters. There is a coalition of voters who actually voted for the federal Liberals in the 2015 election that support them. In great part, that support they received was on the broken promises that they would somehow no longer approve pipelines or grind everything to a halt. That was the greatest fear in Alberta, that the main industry that workers and families in Alberta rely on for the income that generates prosperity and the high incomes we enjoy would be taken away.
Alberta is landlocked. It is something that we all recognize, just as is Saskatchewan. Our only opportunity for export is through other provinces or through the United States. We would think that we could count on the federal government and our brothers and sisters in another province to allow us to export a product that generates so much wealth and opportunity.
The NEB approval and the Liberal government's news releases and carefully scripted speeches are not worth the paper they are written on, if they allow the political enemies of this pipeline to oppose it regardless of jurisdiction or the evidence.
It undermines the entire Canadian regulatory process. If we can do it on this matter, we can do it on anything else. If the provincial government, for any reason can oppose it, in whatever avenue it is done, then it undermines the entire Canadian regulatory process.
British Columbia has yet to issue dozens of permits to build and operate the pipeline. I think that is key. We focus a lot on the construction of the pipeline, but there is also the maintenance and the operation of it over time. We are talking about the doubling of the capacity of the line essentially.
What do investors into the Trans Mountain IPO think right now? We know that the company's share value is going down, but what are they supposed to think? What can they expect from the government? What type of signal does it send to the market when we are basically saying a provincial government, with allies I have mentioned who backed the present Liberal government in the previous election, is going to be actively now opposing it on the ground, whether it is through legal avenues, regulatory avenues, or permitting avenues, which are fully within the control of the British Columbia government?
Can they count on the words, from the heart out, from the Prime Minister? Is that the least they can count on? Is that all they will receive? Or will they receive actual help on the ground? I wonder. It is one of those fairy tales.
This pipelines and the tens of thousands of direct and indirect jobs it creates are for the general advantage of Canada. I ask myself, are the 17 Liberal MPs from British Columbia going to fight for these tens of thousands of jobs in British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, throughout all of Canada? Will they fight for them? Will they stand up to be counted?
An article in today's Financial Post spoke about the potential mess that might be left to the Prime Minister. It says, “Already, there is lots of talk in Alberta about retaliation involving obstructing passage of trains from the Port of Vancouver to the rest of Canada through Alberta, or of B.C. gas moving through Alberta to U.S. markets.”
This is what happens when we have a lack of leadership from the federal government, when we have everyday people, everyday families, starting to pressure their government in these jurisdictional fights, pressuring them to block our goods, each other's goods. As a country, we do well when we are not 10 islands but when we are one island working together. The government has pitted different regions of the country against each other. We know that the Prime Minister travels to different parts of the country, saying different things in French and in English to different audiences. He simply does not want to bear the political consequences of the promises he made in the last election.
I think that is wrong. What we say in Alberta and Calgary, and the nice words we share about pipelines and energy industry, we should do equally in this House. Many members have done it, on both sides. I have heard that all day today. However, a vote in this House should mean something as well. If Parliament expresses its will, the Prime Minister should act on it, should actually go and promote the project. Being in government is not just about making the easy decisions. It is making the hard decisions and then actually following up on them. It is not enough to just do a bit of talk; one has to do a bit of walk as well. I do not see that.
I know many members have spoken about this before, about the previous government's record on pipelines, but we know this: pipelines were approved. To recount the comments made by the member for Edmonton Centre who said that no pipelines have been approved to tidewater, every single pipeline I mentioned to him, the Alida to Cromer oil pipeline capacity expansion, TMX Anchor oil pipeline loop, the Cochin oil pipeline, the Keystone oil pipeline, the Bakken, the Line 9D, Edmonton to Hardisty oil, all led to tidewater. It is part of a system, and it needs to be approved.
I am looking to the government, to these members of the government caucus, to walk the walk and to talk the talk.