Madam Speaker, hundreds of thousands of oil field workers have lost their jobs in the last five years, and that has impacted their families. More than half a million more Canadians and their families are nervously watching during a pandemic as their government continues to act nonsensically toward their industry, seemingly indifferent to global realities or the effect its inaction will have on the families, lives, futures and health of Canadians.
These Canadians, bewildered by the insouciance of the Liberal government, are questioning, in ways they have never questioned before, the way this country makes decisions. These workers and this industry, which collectively contributed over $200 billion to Canadian social and economic development over the past decade and contributed to the world's environmental advancements, are now having their concerns swept aside. At this time this industry's prosperity, and a transparent and open democracy, such as Canada has been, are paramount for how the world emerges from a great pandemic. We need something better.
We see in this field the government choose, by both its actions and inactions, to be to the benefit of other countries that do not meet the standards to which we aspire, or in the this government's case, to which we pretend to aspire.