Madam Speaker, I was here when members opposite spoke, and a member from Calgary, in reference to the Canada Infrastructure Bank, used the word “boondoggle”, saying it is nothing more than that. He also used the words “slush fund”, and he amplified those words. The member was very clear in what he believes.
The reason I raise that is that I really do not believe that the Conservative caucus as a whole is aware of the many investments that the Canada Infrastructure Bank has made. What the Conservatives are aware of is the political spin that is coming from their leader's office and the back room. On the political spin, there are a couple of words that they have needed to use in this debate: the Canada Infrastructure Bank is a bad thing, the Conservative Party would get rid of it, and the Canada Infrastructure Bank has not completed anything. Therefore, we get Conservative members standing up and believing what they have been told. There is a problem with that.
Members do not have to believe me directly. They can do a simple Google search of the Canada Infrastructure Bank and they will get a very good sense of its valuable role. Anyone who is going to be following the debate today on a Canada Infrastructure Bank can make sure that they consider doing a bit of research on their own. They would find that the Conservative Party is completely and absolutely out of touch on this issue. It makes no sense whatsoever.
One of my colleagues provided me a sheet here, just to give members a bit of a sense of what there is. There are actually 11 projects dealing with public transit today. I made reference to one of them being in Brampton, and it is a significant project.
There are eight projects dealing with clean power. Let us think about the Darlington small module reactor. Darlington is a wonderful community in the province of Ontario. The website states that, at a cost of $970 million, “Once built, the [small modular reactor] will reduce carbon emissions by an average of 740 kilotonnes annually between 2029 and 2050...The 300-megawatt SMR will provide enough electricity to power 300,000 homes.” I do not know exactly how many homes Winnipeg has, but I would suggest that would be close to half. That would be 300,000 homes being powered, and the Conservative Party says that the Canada Infrastructure Bank is doing nothing. This is just one project in a community.
I look to my colleagues and even members of the New Democratic Party and the Bloc. Before they position themselves in any way that would show any sort of support to the Conservative Party on this issue, would they please look at the projects that are there? This is an environmentally sound project that would be to the benefit of 300,000 homes, and in the long term, these are the types of projects. I made reference to the buses in Brampton because I remember seeing the video on it, and I was really impressed.
The point is that it does not take very much to get a very good sense of exactly what the Canada Infrastructure Bank is investing in. The bottom line is that we are talking about close to $27 billion, most of which is not the Government of Canada's money.