Madam Speaker, I am pleased to share my time today with my friend and colleague from Louis-Saint-Laurent.
Canadians do not ask for much. They really do not. We are honest, hard-working, polite people. At a minimum what Canadians expect is peace, order and good government.
Over the last 14 days, we have seen anything but that. We have seen a situation turn into a national crisis, with railway blockades right across the country affecting the movement of goods and people. VIA Rail, as we know, has cancelled its train service to the better part of eastern Canada for the last seven days. Since it made that announcement, there has been a significant impact on the movement of people.
As CN has cancelled its entire rail system and the movement of goods, it is having a devastating effect on our economy. We are hearing that millions and millions of dollars are being lost every day within the supply chain. The agriculture community has not been able to get its products to market. The Canadian Chamber of Commerce, the manufacturing association and the Canadian Federation of Agriculture have all said that this situation needs to be resolved.
However, it is very difficult to resolve, when we look at the history of this situation. Over the last four and a half years, the government has become weak and the Prime Minister has become weak and complicit. We have an activist government that has fed into the very situation that is going on across this country today. It should come as no surprise that we are seeing activists act out because of the weakness and complicity of the Prime Minister over the last four and a half years. He is doublespeaking almost everywhere he goes, saying one thing to one group and another thing to another group, saying one thing in one part of the province and something else in a different part of this country.
We have heard a lot of discussion today, and we have been debating this for the better part of two and a half hours, so I want to remind the House what the motion is all about. It is not about a certain individual; it is about a group that is using this situation as a lightning rod, a template, for not just the insurrection that is going on today but the potential of future insurrection in this country. This group is using it as a template, and we are simply asking the House to denounce what is going on and stand up for the Wet'suwet'en people.
The motion says, “That the House stand in solidarity with every elected band council on the Coastal GasLink route—”