Madam Speaker, the member brought up the Liberal-NDP coalition. Normally, I would say that there is a Conservative coalition with the Bloc Québécois, but not even on this issue does the Bloc agree with the Conservatives. As a matter of fact, every other party that is represented in this House agrees that putting a price on pollution is the right thing to do.
The member said that the question was not answered during the debate or during question period when he asked, but it actually was. It goes to the heart of what the member neglected to mention in his speech and, indeed, what Conservatives continually neglect to mention. The answer was this:
...as much as the Conservatives would like to deny it, climate change is real. What else is real? Those cheques that are arriving in people's mailboxes beginning April 14. In my home province of Manitoba, people will receive $250 a quarter, over $1,000 a month.
The interesting thing is that I would have thought that when the member was getting towards the end of his question, he would have said that I would have come back with some line on the rebate. However, he did not even do that. He should have been able to predict that I was going to do that. Instead, he said something about how I was going to try to justify that this stops wildfires or whatnot.
No, what I have been saying all along, and what we have been saying all along, and what the Conservatives have missed all along is the fact that people are getting money back. This rebate has always been there. The whole point of the price on pollution was not to put money into the general revenues, as the member said. The point of the price on pollution, or the carbon tax, as Conservatives like to call it, is to put a price mechanism on carbon, to put a price on pollution. In that way, people have to actually make a choice. In making that choice, they might be incentivized not to pollute and, instead, to try to find an option that does not pollute as much.
Again, I would remind the member that I will answer the question the same way that the parliamentary secretary did during question period. This is to say that Conservatives continually neglect the fact that there is a rebate that comes back, because it does not suit their narrative. However, it actually is a reality.