Debates of May 10th, 2021

Economic Relationship between Canada and the United States

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Madam Speaker, last year, we saw what happened with rail blockades. There was a shortage of propane in Quebec because of it. If this pipeline is shut down, there is an obvious risk of that happening, once again, where there will be a massive shortage.

If this pipeline shuts down, what is going to happen in the short term and medium term to the supplies and critical needs of people in Quebec?

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC]

Madam Speaker, I asked almost all the witnesses and experts we heard from during this study about the impact on Quebec.

Unfortunately, no one seemed to have studied or researched the issue. Obviously, there could be shortages, even though we know that there are sources of supply.

In the short term, as we wait for the energy transition, the Bloc Québécois hopes that the line will remain open, but not just under any condition. We must ensure that the line is safe. If it is not, we must ensure that the necessary upgrades are made. The right to safety is not a luxury.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Madam Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for South Okanagan—West Kootenay.

I am pleased to respond to this report. It is important to recognize the good work done on it, but there is no doubt we are here not by accident but by design. The design has been to ignore the environment, to ignore the concerns of the people of the state of Michigan, to ignore the realities of aging infrastructure and to not be up front about the true cost of it in our economic business model.

I represent Windsor West. I was a member of council starting in 1997, representing the Detroit River, and have been a member federally since 2002. I can say that our relationship with the United States is one that is always complex and always involved. What is clear is that it is moving faster—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Order. The hon. member for Lévis—Lotbinière on a point of order.

[Jacques Gourde, Conservative, Lévis—Lotbinière, QC]

Madam Speaker, could you please ask my colleague to turn down his microphone? There is no interpretation.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

There seems to be an issue with the hon. member's microphone, if he could lower his boom a bit more.

The hon. member for Windsor West can continue.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Madam Speaker, I will repeat that we are here for a reason. It is by design. It is designed for us not to take our aging infrastructure, in the oil and gas industry in particular, for granted while we focus on the new economy and sustainable energy.

As the vice-chair of the Canada-United States Inter-Parliamentary association, and as the NDP critic for industry and the Great Lakes, I have seen that the United States has decided to move farther than Canada has on the environment. Often through the Democratic movement, but even under the Republicans, the U.S. has certainly had more strenuous environmental practices than our side has had over here.

We are faced now with a crisis that has come about over the last number of months not by accident, but by ignoring what has been taking place. We have not even learned anything during this process. Regarding Line 5 and its connection to the Great Lakes, Governor Whitmer has been clear on this for a long time, as she has on her concern about the Great Lakes and the environmental effects. There is no doubt that Enbridge, with its previous indiscretion at Kalamazoo, has broken trust in many respects. It was not just that one incident. There were many other places.

The pinnacle of the debate happening at the moment is that the budget that was just tabled and discussed did not even include the words “Great Lakes”. The United States are putting billions of dollars into protecting the Great Lakes, with a governor expressing concerns about a refurbished pipeline. The pipeline is something we believe is important and needs to be refurbished because of our connection to it and our dependency on it, as well as because of our lack of a commitment to develop alternatives to it. However, the government did not even mention the Great Lakes in the budget once. How is that possible, when members of Congress and the Senate have specifically written to the government asking about putting money together to work on the Great Lakes' environmental sustainability? The U.S. is putting billions of dollars into it.

The International Joint Commission of the Great Lakes binational treaty is one of the best in the world. It deals with water and the environment. It needs stronger legislation to allow it to do even better work. It is a part of the international agreements that we have and is something to be proud of, regarding our sharing some of the most important freshwater in the world, yet there is no mention of it in the budget. No one cared enough to throw a bone, so to speak, to the Governor of Michigan or to the other environmental concerns being expressed here. With all those billions of dollars being spent, there was no specific commitment to, or even a mention of, the Great Lakes.

Given that I am on the front lines of the Detroit River here, I can tell colleagues that there is incredible interest and opportunity to improve the environment, the ecosystem and energy alternatives. Detroit, Michigan, has spent over $10 billion on electric vehicles, other types of energy efficiencies and a new age of automotive production. Meanwhile, throughout Canada over the last four or five years, we have seen a paltry $6 billion spent not on greenfield sites, but on the refurbishment of plants. These refurbishments have come about because of collective bargaining opportunities from Unifor. We can thank Jerry Dias and the rest of the bargaining committee for opening the door for those types of investments. At the same time, in Detroit, Ohio and Indiana they have been receiving billions of dollars for their electrification and manufacturing industries.

The Prime Minister famously said in London, Ontario, that we had to transition out of manufacturing. We did that, and have seen how that served us through COVID in vaccine production, innovation and a response for alternatives. We are behind, and we are behind for a reason. We have decided to basically skate for many, many years. I have seen this in the House of Commons. In terms of signed agreements, whether the Kyoto agreement or others, Canada continually misses its targets. However, right in our lap, across the lake, a series of environmental movements are taking place for the citizens of Michigan. All we had to do was to engage our councils and trade offices. We have the connections and the people on the ground here who understand what is taking place. They understand that the governor and the commitment to shut down Line 5 have been front and centre, in many respects, for a long time. What did we do in response? We are just going to try to lobby what we can. We did not even offer something back in return.

We are now going to have to rely upon using tactics like invoking an international treaty on pipelines versus being a co-operative partner to improve the environment we share. We always talk about offsets. Why would the government not, at the very least, do an offset for the state of Michigan to show some support for, and the importance of, the Great Lakes system that we share, whether it be its fisheries or ecosystems? I am still fighting for a national urban park on a piece of property the Windsor port owns. The port is staffed by the citizens of our country. It wants millions of taxpayer dollars or it is going to bulldoze it.

I had an event in Windsor before COVID on building a national urban park. Members of the Michigan Department of Environment came in full regalia to be part of it. Representatives of the federal department came to a public meeting in the city of Windsor. They crossed the border because our ecosystems are tied together: the wildlife, the fish, the fauna and 110 different endangered species. For eight years, I have been fighting for the protection of that property. For the last number of years, I have been fighting the federal government to transfer this piece of property to the Ministry of the Environment instead of it having bulldozed, and there has still been no commitment for that.

In all of this, we do not even throw a bone to Michigan's concerns. We do not give the State any recognition that its concerns are valid, and they are. Let us look at Kalamazoo. How can we have a serious debate about this issue but not look at the consequences of what took place in Kalamazoo and at least give a nod that this has some serious issues?

Having said that, the government is back on the particular position that we are going to have to rely upon an international agreement or some arm-twisting from Washington on the State of Michigan, with us offering it nothing. It is a terrible proposition. There is no offset from us. There is nothing other than us trying to put ourselves in a strong position because of international agreements and obligations. As opposed to this, we could have gotten in front of this with some improvements and suggestions. Who is going to pay for this at the end of the day, if Line 5 closes? It will be the working people: The people doing the heavy lifting and hard work that is necessary every day to run our economy as we try to transition. We should transition, but we still need Line 5 for farms, the auto sector, manufacturing, gas for our cars, airports and all of those things.

One of the first things I did when I came to Parliament was table a motion for a petroleum monitoring agency to ensure consumer accountability. It was something that was put in place once before, but was never funded. What is the backup plan right now to protect consumers from being hosed by the industry if there is speculation or a potential reduction of service products such as oil, gas, propane and so forth? There will be no protection for them because the Competition Bureau does not have the capability to provide it.

Individuals across Ontario, and in other places eventually as well, will be completely vulnerable to the oil and gas industry and some of the pricing issues we have seen in the past. They have had to be dragged front and centre, but it has taken a long time. It has been expensive for a lot of people, and we still do not even have the basic supports or decency to provide reporting mechanisms that will protect consumers. We have no plan for that either.

Our plan going forward is not going to be anything significant or anything that will grant faith or some type of good gesture to the State of Michigan about this. That is what is backwards about this debate we have been having. It has been total neglect from the government. Let us look at infrastructure in the Windsor-Detroit region. I started working on a new border crossing and my first public meeting was in 1998. The Gordie Howe International Bridge is finally being built, but the infrastructure that supports this, and 38% of the Canadian economy, is about 100 years old. There is a tunnel for cars and trucks, a bridge and another tunnel for trains.

We are here for a reason. We have been on borrowed time, and if we do not do anything about it and address the issues from the State of Michigan, then all we can do is rely on arm-twisting. That is not being a good neighbour.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Madam Speaker, the member is on point about the realities of the economic and environmental perspectives of this particular project, but I cannot help but be slightly cynical to think that the reason we are having this discussion right now is because the Conservatives are adamant about not talking about Bill C-19.

Can the member comment on how important he thinks it would be to have a discussion about a piece of legislation that is required to be in place in the event there is an election during a pandemic?

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Madam Speaker, we are here to speak about Line 5. Of course, preparation for an election and a debate about it is important, but where is the member and his government with regard to recognizing and providing some supports to Michigan.

I spent a lot of my time talking about it. Why are the Great Lakes not mentioned in the budget? How atrocious is that. How disrespectful is it to the state of Michigan and to the environmental movement there. Where are some of the extra supports against the political leverage taking place by respecting some of their concerns and partnering where they have asked for that?

Why has the government not even responded to the senators and Congress. They have asked the Canadian government for support, to at least put in our percentage of rehabilitation of the Great Lakes. This is a missed opportunity. We still do not see the government doing that. The government could do it tomorrow. It could come forward and say it made mistake by leaving the Great Lakes out of some of its economic formula. Maybe that would alleviate some of the tension.

[Greg McLean, Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Madam Speaker, first, I want to tell the member very clearly that I agree with him 100% that what has happened here is total neglect of the file by the government, which is why we are raising it in the House of Commons today, two days before the deadline is going to be imposed by the Governor of Michigan. She stated that publicly. I am straight on point with the hon. member.

I do want to ask about some of things he raised, including ignoring aging infrastructure. This is a pipeline company that has committed over $600 million to build a tunnel under this very strait, yet it has been thwarted. It cannot even get a phone call returned from the Governor of Michigan about how to mitigate it. As well, all kinds of processes are being added into it to build that pipeline.

Is this really recognized? It seems to me that it is actually doing something to mitigate the environmental concerns of the state of Michigan, but they are getting no ears on the other side.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Madam Speaker, quite simply, it is so late in the day. I have seen the program and what has been offered, and its abysmal record with Kalamazoo flies in the face of everything.

It should have been on bended knee to the State of Michigan about Kalamazoo, and it was not. All we have to do is talk to the NGOs of different organizations about the irreparable harm it did to the environment. It has zero credibility. It needed partners to actually bolster its credibility with guarantees that go beyond just the immediacy.

That is the problem. The pattern of behaviour has just been atrocious. It is no wonder we are in the situation we are right now.

[Lindsay Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Madam Speaker, earlier today, I asked the hon. member for Winnipeg North about jobs, job losses and about the preparations the Liberals were making for people if Line 5 was lost. He said that, on faith, it would all work out.

Could the hon. member comment on that as well as on the NDP's plans in regard to a national manufacturing strategy and what that could do for southwestern Ontario and the jobs impacted by the loss of Line 5?

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Madam Speaker, I worry, because right now we have the Province of Ontario finally negotiating with Michigan. That was after I had been asking for months for the federal government to step in and do similar programs as were done for COVID assistance for our travellers. The federal government is absent from that. It could have played a central role. We have seen Manitoba, North Dakota, Alberta and Montana. I asked the government a question in the House of Commons today and it was totally ignored. There was nothing near an answer to what I asked. I am concerned.

We do need a manufacturing strategy. We never should have abandoned manufacturing. It is a point of national security. It is a point of pride. With the innovation taking place, it is a missed opportunity.

I am a little worried right now because Ontario is negotiating with Michigan to get people vaccinated. Every vaccine we get over there means somebody over here gets a vaccine sooner. At the same time, our federal government is doing this, and it will not even throw them a bone.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Madam Speaker, I would really like to thank the member for Windsor West for sharing his time with me. He is such a strong voice for the people of southwestern Ontario and he knows the effects that shutting down Line 5 will have on the thousands of workers in that part of Canada. He knows how serious this is for the environment of the Great Lakes. He knows Michigan because it is just across the river from his home.

Today, we are talking about Enbridge Line 5 again, this time through a concurrence debate on a report from the Special Committee on the Economic Relationship between Canada and the United States. While almost everyone in the House is concerned about Michigan's threat to shut down the pipeline, and I am happy to talk about why the NDP is concerned about the Line 5 situation, we did just have an emergency debate on Line 5 only four days ago, on Thursday night. I will reiterate today a lot of the points I made on Thursday.

I will start by saying, again, that this is a very different debate to the ones around expansion pipelines such as Keystone XL and the Trans Mountain expansion. These pipelines are expansion projects designed solely to increase the amount of raw bitumen exported from Canada at a time when world demand has flatlined and the climate crisis requires that it decline steeply in the future. Even the Canada Energy Regulator, the former National Energy Board, has reported that Keystone XL and the Trans Mountain expansion are not needed and that the Alberta oil sector will never be producing enough oil to need them.

Line 5 is a different story. This is a debate about the impending closure of a pipeline that brings western Canadian oil to eastern Canada, creating Canadian jobs. This is about maintaining the status quo and maintaining those jobs in the industrial heartland of Canada. The one similarity between this and the other pipeline debates is that at the heart of it, there is credible environmental concern.

Line 5 is an Enbridge pipeline that transports crude oil and natural gas liquids from Alberta through Michigan to refineries and other facilities in Ontario and Quebec. It is capable of carrying 540,000 barrels of oil per day. A similar pipeline, a sort of sister pipeline in the Enbridge system, Line 6B, also serves these markets with 667,000 barrels of oil per day.

Line 5 was built 68 years ago, and the Michigan section operates under an easement granted by that state. In November, the Governor of Michigan announced that she was revoking the easement for the pipeline through Michigan effective May 12, this Wednesday, two days from now. The governor cited permit violations and environmental concerns, especially regarding the section that travels through the Straits of Mackinac between Lake Michigan and Lake Huron. For its part, Enbridge has proposed to enclose the underwater section in a tunnel to protect it from future accidents and has obtained some of the permits necessary to carry out that work.

What will the impact be if the pipeline is shut down? About 4,900 jobs in Sarnia directly rely on the supply of crude oil that Line 5 now supplies. One of the products those plants in Sarnia produces is jet fuel that supplies large airports such as Toronto Pearson Airport. The oil not diverted in Sarnia is carried onto refineries in Quebec. Therefore, the impact could be huge.

There is some debate on how alternate supplies could mitigate these impacts. Pearson airport has stated in a recent article in the National Post that it is not too worried about a shutdown of Line 5 as it has diversified its sources of jet fuel. The Suncor refinery in Quebec said it made arrangements to get its crude oil from another pipeline. Industries in Sarnia may be able to get some crude oil from increased flow in Line 6B, since it managed that way when Line 6B was ruptured in 2010. Then it got alternate supplies through Line 5.

It is clear that the petrochemical sector in Sarnia could be facing significant shortages that would have to be made up through transport by rail and truck. That is not an ideal situation and one that could result in direct loss of jobs in the Sarnia industrial complex and indirect job losses throughout the region. Therefore, we need to have a strategy to keep Line 5 going and protect those jobs. That strategy goes through convincing Michigan that it is in all our interests to keep Line 5 operating.

What are the environmental risks that Michigan is citing in its decision to cancel this easement? One of the largest inland oil spills in U.S. history happened with the other Enbridge pipeline in Michigan, Line 6B, which also goes to Sarnia via Michigan, but goes around the south end of Lake Michigan instead of crossing under the Straits of Mackinac.

In 2010, Line 6B ruptured and sent about 20,000 barrels of bitumen into the Kalamazoo River just east of Battle Creek, Michigan. The spill contaminated over 50 kilometres of the river, took five years to clean up, and admittedly it probably never will be fully cleaned up. Line 5 itself has suffered a number of leaks over the years. Therefore, the people of Michigan are very well aware of what could happen.

The minister has always said that this is a demonstrably safe pipeline. I think the people of Michigan would tend to disagree. They have pointed out numerous violations of the original easement agreement, including the design of the support systems and the pipeline at the bottom of the Straits of Mackinac. Recent assessments show that the underwater part of the pipeline is suffering from thinning walls and other stressors. A 2017 risk assessment found that a leak of Line 5 in the straits would contaminate about 1,000 kilometres of shoreline of the Great Lakes.

We need to protect the Great Lakes ecosystem and the thousands of jobs in Ontario and Quebec. The federal government needs to have a plan that would do both.

The Governor of Michigan made an election promise to shut down Line 5, so it should be no surprise that she is doubling down on this threat. If we are to solve the problem through diplomatic means, and everyone agrees this would be best, we will have to prove to the State of Michigan and everyone else who cares about the environment that Line 5 will not have a history similar to Line 6B.

We must point out the economic impacts this closure would have on Michigan itself. Michigan and the neighbouring states of Ohio and Pennsylvania also receive some of the fuels carried through Line 5, including over half of Michigan's propane supplies. Enbridge is counting on the 1977 transit pipelines treaty if talks fail, and right now it does seem that both sides are very far apart. We may see this stuck in the courts for a long time.

This pipeline dispute is very different from the others we have debated in Canada over the past decade or more. It is an existing pipeline that supplies oil to Canadian industry and maintains good jobs. It is an integral part of the economies of Ontario and Quebec.

We will be using oil and gas over the next three decades, albeit in declining amounts, as we transition to zero emissions by 2050. We will be using crude oil as a feedstock in our manufacturing sectors for years to come. Line 5 is an important delivery mechanism for those purposes.

This dispute has been a wake-up call. The public, both in Canada and the United States, is increasingly unwilling to accept the environmental risks associated with pipelines and the climate impacts of burning fossil fuels.

We in the NDP, and I think everyone in the House, are concerned about workers in the oil and gas sector, whether they work in Alberta or the industrial cities of Ontario and Quebec. We need a plan, not just empty promises, to provide good jobs for these workers over the coming decades. We need programs that will allow these workers to move on to jobs in building retrofits, electrification, electric vehicle manufacture, renewable electricity, batter technology and the myriad of other sectors that will provide good employment for decades to come. We need government programs to provide those jobs to prove to workers we are serious about helping them.

Getting this done will require strong public sector leadership that the Liberals and Conservatives have so far been unwilling to even discuss. While this transition takes place, we need to protect the thousands of jobs that Line 5 provides and we need to protect the ecosystem of the Great Lakes. The federal government must have a clear and effective plan to do both.

[Warren Steinley, Conservative, Regina—Lewvan, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to ask a question of the hon. member. I listened intently to his speech and I would note one thing he said, which is that Line 5 is different because it sends western oil to eastern refineries to make fuel and help heat homes. However, he does not agree with building capacity or the expansion of pipelines in western Canada to export oil.

Does he not think those two could exist in the same reality? The more prosperous western Canada is the more clean and environmentally friendly oil we can produce to ship to our allies and export around the world with lower emissions. Canada has the most environmentally friendly oil in the world. I would like to have the member's comments on this. I enjoyed listening to his speech when he said that Line 5 was important, but is it not equally as important to create prosperity in western Canada?

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I agree. The oil and gas sector has created prosperity over the past decades, and I think all Canadians appreciate that. The fact is that there are more than 20 oil sands projects on the books now that have all the permits ready to go but are not moving ahead. They are not moving ahead because they do not have the investment behind them. The world investment banks are moving away from the oil sector. They do not want to get involved in new projects that will take decades to amortize. They are interested in other opportunities in the energy sector, but not in new oil projects. That is why it would be difficult to—

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

We will go to the next question.

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Saanich—Gulf Islands.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to turn to reflections, since we have been talking about this for some time now. We are, as a society, incredibly negligent when it comes to fossil fuel products and understanding what is in a pipeline or what is on a train. I will ask my colleague this, because I know he is rigorous.

The Kalamazoo, Michigan spill was the first time that anyone realized that diluted bitumen would separate at a spill, that the diluent would float. That was what alerted people that there was a spill: people in the neighbourhoods began to get sick from the smell of the diluent, while the bitumen sank. In the case of Lac-Mégantic, we did not know that Bakken shale would blow up and should never be on a train, and yet simplistically minded folks say that oil is safer in the pipeline because a train once blew up.

I would just ask my hon. colleague for any comments on understanding the products we are talking about.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would agree with the member for Saanich—Gulf Islands that people do not talk about the difference between these products and how they react in an accident, whether it is a train wreck or an oil spill, and whether the oil spill is on land versus water. I remember that when I first got to Parliament, we were still debating in Parliament whether bitumen sank or not. It obviously sank in Kalamazoo, and that is why it took so long to even get the basic cleanup that it got.

A colleague of mine has recently completed some studies in the experimental lakes program in northwestern Ontario, which actually took bitumen and saw what it did. Yes, these things do different things. Again, I hear constantly the Liberals and the Conservatives—

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

We will try to get one more quick question in there.

The hon. member for Windsor West.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, was it not odd, in terms of negotiating, that Canada did not deal anything to the State of Michigan during the budget? We did not even mention the Great Lakes. If we were really concerned about the political position the governor was in and the concerns and priorities she had, how could we not have followed through by the request of Congress and the Senate to actually do something for the Great Lakes?

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberals have been saying for the past six years that the environment and the economy go hand in hand, yet, time and again, I have seen quite the opposite. The economy always comes first with them, and the environment has always taken a back seat. People have to realize very quickly that we cannot have a strong economy without a clean environment and without a real plan for that, and that means making those investments into environmental protection and environmental cleanup.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise today to enter into debate on this concurrence motion.

However, before I go any further, I want to recognize the fact that this is National Nurses Week throughout our country, and we have so much to be grateful for, for the nurses out there on the front lines right now, particularly over the last 15 months or so. The incredible work they do is truly remarkable. We have asked so much of them during regular times, and more recently the demands that are being put on nurses throughout the country are truly remarkable, but they rise to the challenge and they are there to take care of Canadians.

This morning I got my first shot of the AstraZeneca vaccine at a clinic not too far from here, which was so well run. I walked in, went through the check-in and got to a gentleman by the name of Renault, who was administering the shot. He told me that he had worked at that clinic for 30 years and came out of retirement in order to help with administering vaccine shots. Nothing, in my opinion, is more patriotic than somebody who rises to the call of that profession once in retirement in order to come back and take care of Canadians. Indeed, I want to extend a huge thanks to all the nurses and frontline workers out there who are taking care of us and keeping us safe.

We are here today to talk about this concurrence motion. I find it very interesting that we are having this discussion in light of the fact that the Conservatives knew that what we wanted to talk about today was Bill C-19, which is proposed legislation on how we would deal with an election during a pandemic. It is a piece of legislation that was crafted in response to the Chief Electoral Officer, who pointed out that, as we are in a minority Parliament, there is always a chance of an election coming up at any moment and maybe it is a good idea to have some plans in place in the event that it does happen. Despite the fact that nobody might want an election, we do know that in minority governments elections can happen, and it is really not controlled by any one particular party, because there is no majority.

One of the fascinating things about what the Conservatives have done today is that they have taken a really interesting route in bringing forward this concurrence motion. We had an emergency debate on this issue last week. We stayed here until midnight debating the issue. The Conservatives did not offer anything, did not offer any solutions and did not talk about the recommendations that came from the committee, which I will talk about. All they did was sit on the other side of the House and criticize the government.

The role of the opposition, believe it or not, is not just to criticize, but to actually try to improve upon policy and push the government to do better. Now, I do not know how much experience Conservative members have in trying to encourage people to do things, but I can tell members that there are different approaches that one might take. For example, when I want my four-year-old to do something for me and to work with me on something, if he takes the approach of yelling and screaming at me and telling me how horrible of a parent I am, it might not be the best approach if he is genuinely trying to get something out of me. Likewise, I can say that the opposition members, if their strategy to encourage the government to do better is just to yell and scream at it all day long, they are certainly delivering on their—

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

The hon. member for Battle River—Crowfoot on a point of order.

[Damien Kurek, Conservative, Battle River—Crowfoot, AB]

Mr. Speaker, as much as I appreciate the diatribe coming from the member opposite, I fail to see the relevance, which is a point he often brings up in the House. I fail to see the relevance and how this relates to the report that is being discussed in the House currently. Certainly, he is talking at length about how Conservatives somehow are not contributing to the conversation. I find it ironic that he would speak at length about that, which has very little relevance to the report before the House that is to be discussed at this moment.

I think it would be a fitting reminder to the member for Kingston and the Islands that when rising to speak on a subject, it should be related to the point at hand.