Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to stand and talk about Bill C-8 this afternoon, as well as on Monday afternoon.
There has been a lot of divisiveness in the House over the last couple of days and a lot of torqued-up rhetoric. I would like to start off with a story about someone I believe we could all call a true Canadian hero.
In Pense, Saskatchewan, on Monday night, we had a terrible blizzard. My wife and kids went to hockey practice in Pense. We live in a small town called Grand Coulee. The storm came in. It was a terrible blizzard, and there was a whiteout. There were five, six or seven vehicles in a ditch. One of those people was Shannon St. Onge. She was stuck. She had no idea where she was going. She was coming back from Regina. She was in the vehicle for 14 hours.
Through the power of social media, she went on a chat line with local Pense people, and Andre Bouvier answered the call. It was -30°C that night. He went out to start his tractor. He is farmer out by Pense. The tractor would not start. This 80-year-old man got dressed, got a flashlight and walked, in zero visibility, a mile and found four or five vehicles in the ditch. He took these scared people, walked them back home to his farmyard and let them spend the night. They spent that night telling stories and laughing, instead of being scared in their vehicles.
I think we could all agree that Andre Bouvier represents the best of Canada. When asked why he would risk his life for someone he did not even know, he said, “When there is something to be done, you just have to go out and do it, if you can.” Andre Bouvier, that was very well done, and we applaud you.
I was so happy to see my wife and kids, because that night after hockey practice the weather was very bad. They jumped into a vehicle with my friend, and they hit a ditch. They spent eight and a half hours in a truck in the middle of a whiteout because they were also unable to get home. A good friend of mine, Dan, and his partner, Amy, drove 45 minutes, when the drive usually takes two minutes, to pull them out of the ditch and make sure they got home. I thank Dan and Amy very much for that.
One of the things about this job is that when we are away from our families, we sometimes feel pretty useless when we cannot help our families in certain situations. The appreciation I have for my friends and family back home when situations like this come up cannot be overstated. That is why we are able to do this job in those very difficult situations.
To bring this decorum back to the House, I think we all can see what it means to be Canadian. I am very happy that we still have people who are willing to go out of their way to help those in need. That is something we can all learn from. When I have time to put comments on the record about Bill C-8, I will be talking about the fuel tax surcharge and some of the carbon tax issues that the Saskatchewan economy will face when it comes to agriculture and mining. Also, there is the fact that the government just picked the number of a 30% reduction in fertilizer emissions out of a hat. I will talk about how much that is going to affect some of the agriculture industries in Saskatchewan.
Everyone, please go home, have a good weekend and hug your families. I look forward to seeing everyone back here on Monday.