Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his question. I do wish him and his family a very merry Christmas, and a happy and blessed new year.
Obviously, I believe all of us are entrusted and are called upon to be good stewards of the land and the earth. I have young children. I have one in grade 7, and a couple in college and university. I want to hand on to my children a better, cleaner and greener planet than what I found. However, I do not think the answer is found in virtue signals or in useless taxes that punish our own people and that do nothing to improve the environment.
We have had the carbon tax in this country now for over a decade and a half in some jurisdictions. I asked the environment commissioner of Canada if we had a metric that could tell us how much carbon has been reduced in Canada as a result of the implementation of the carbon tax. Do members know what he told me? He said that we have no such metric.
The landmark signature piece of legislation, the carbon tax that has punished us into poverty, has done nothing to affect the climate and has done everything to diminish the pocketbooks of Canadians. I think we need a better approach.