Madam Speaker, Adjournment Proceedings are where we debate unsatisfactory responses to questions raised in question period, and tonight I rise to follow up on a question asked on June 14. That day, I asked two questions of the Minister of Environment and Climate Change. The questions were about the suppression of his department's information proving that the carbon tax costs the Canadian economy $30 billion in lost GDP.
When I raised the first of these two questions last week, it degenerated into quite a spectacle. The parliamentary secretary accused me of some kind of bait-and-switch in his opening remarks and of not debating the question submitted. So, for added clarity, this was the question that I am looking for a better response on. On June 14, I asked:
the government only does the right thing when it gets caught. The Liberals only disclosed the information because Conservatives forced them to. The NDP–Liberal government put a gag order on the Parliamentary Budget Officer because it did not want Canadians to know the economic cost of the carbon tax. Per capita GDP is falling and the carbon tax makes life more expensive, proving that this Prime Minister is not worth the cost.
The...minister has misled Canadians by hiding the truth. When will he resign?
That is the question I asked, that is the question I submitted for debate tonight, and it really is a reasonable question. Misleading Parliament and misleading Canadians is a serious matter. Any minister caught misleading Parliament must correct the record at the earliest opportunity, and any minister who deliberately misleads the House should resign. The minister appears to have sat on important information, withheld it from an officer of Parliament and abused the access to information system to prevent it from being released. So, my question remains: Will he resign?
However, last week, something really extraordinary happened. The minister's parliamentary secretary accused the Alberta industry of using “Canada as an exhaust pipe”. I cannot imagine anything more demeaning to the hundreds of thousands of Canadians who work in the Canadian energy industry, and who supply Canadians with safe, reliable and what should be affordable energy. It dismisses the industry and the regulations with which it complies, the billions of dollars of taxes that it pays and the equalization formula, which comes into play where Alberta finances much of the rest of the country's economic development, health and other transfers. It is a matter of how this government treats this industry.
For decades, Canadians from every part of Canada have come to Alberta in search of, and finding, good, high-paying jobs with great prospects for long, fulfilling careers that can sustain families. The workers, and these jobs, provide the energy for our country. So, it is arrogance with which this government, and particularly the member for Milton, look down their nose at the Canadian energy industry, which was palpable and on full display last week.
However, back to the follow-up question that is tonight's debate. The government thought it was laughable that Conservatives were demanding accountability from a government that tried to fudge its data and refused to turn over a report that undermined its core narrative on the carbon tax, and that somehow Canadians are better off—