Mr. Speaker, one of the exciting things about this trade agreement is that it strengthens our relationship with a key partner in the Pacific, Japan.
Japan has a great need for a secure supply of energy. It imports the vast majority of its energy resources, much of it coming from the Middle East through the South China Sea. In particular, strengthening our energy relationship with Japan presents a great opportunity for deepening our economic and other relationship with Japan.
So much of the potential of this trade agreement to increase our commercial ties with Asia depends on our ability to get our resources to market. Specifically, we have seen, over the summer, the failure of the government when it comes to actually proceeding with a pipeline it had promised and that would have allowed us to do better at accessing Asian markets for our energy resources.
Could the member explain to me why the government decided to buy the pipeline with no plan to actually get it built? Given that we are in support of this trade agreement, what is the government's plan to actually proceed with the critical infrastructure for getting our energy resources to the west coast that would allow us to benefit from some of these opportunities?