Madam Speaker, I am honoured to share my time with the member for Battle River—Crowfoot.
How did we get here, to a point where Canada, a nation blessed with some of the world's most ethical oil and hardest-working people, cannot even get a pipeline within our own borders built without years of political trench warfare? For years the Liberal government has fuelled a culture war against Alberta and against Canada's energy workers. It has demonized the very people who power and heat our homes. It has demonized the Canadians who make it possible to have the smart phones, clothing and medical equipment every single member of the chamber uses daily.
There are pipelines beneath our feet right now in this city and this country. Petroleum is everywhere in this room, in the microphone I am speaking into and in the chairs we sit on, yet the Liberals pretend oil is some foreign enemy they play games with.
Worse still, they play games with indigenous communities and exploit first nations as a political tool. They talk endlessly about reconciliation, but what indigenous communities actually get from the Liberals is just more bureaucracy through the Indian Act, more mismanagement through entities like the negligent Indian Oil and Gas Canada office, and more trust monies locked away and controlled by Ottawa. It is all talk with zero structural change.
Standing up for first nations is not cynicism like the energy minister claims the motion represents, which is, by the way, their party's own very words. Asking the government to build trust by meeting its basic responsibilities as a government is not cynicism. The Liberals claim to honour free, prior and informed consent, but let us be honest: This is just more games and exploitation of indigenous communities by them. Liberals are using consultation as a political shield rather than building infrastructure that benefits all Canadians. This is just more games and exploitation.
When 111 out of 129 first nations actively participate in Trans Mountain, where are the Liberals to defend the 18 that do not participate? They do not care about the few who opposed it, because it is just politics of convenience for them. The Liberals have set up Alberta, first nations and British Columbia to fail from the start. The parliamentary secretary said yesterday that the next steps for this are the creation of a trilateral table with Alberta, B.C. and the federal government. Again there is no mention of first nations at that table, the same people he says need free, prior and informed consent.
The Liberals are not serious about respect. They are not serious about UNDRIP. They are not serious about any of that. They are not honest. They are just name-dropping first nations in their public statements, with no intention of bringing them to the decision-making table. Who is really dividing Canadians? The government has two faces, with a bipolar Bill C-5 pipeline policy one day and something completely different the next. It picks winners and losers based on politics, not prosperity.
The government sets up consultation as a political tool. Consultation as a constitutional duty does not need to be political games if backed by solid relationships built beforehand. Trust, reputation, responsibility, respect, honesty, humility and wisdom are how we build pipelines that last; we do not build them with endless promises that are never fulfilled even with the best of the government's brand of consultation.
Conservatives believe that Canada can move at the speed of ambition again. We saw it with natural gas infrastructure. In western Canada, 68 out of 72 first nations and Métis communities across three provinces have signed BCRs and community resolutions to buy critical national gas and petroleum infrastructure. This was done with great partnerships and relationships between the nations and the private sector, because when the right team is in place, Canadians get results. We should expect that same speed when it comes to approval, regulation and construction of pipelines.
Natural resources have been a cornerstone of my family for generations. My own great-grandfather, Chief Billy Morin the first, was there for Leduc No. 1 in the 1940s. He spoke about how oil and gas would fund education, housing, infrastructure and the building up of our community. He spoke about how true economic partnership reduces dependency. Our treaties commit to sharing resources and co-developing as a people thriving with one another, not being excluded from Canada's resource economy. Indigenous peoples want to uplift our communities through resource rights with integrity, respect for the land and water with a fair share of the benefits.
This is what seven-generation thinking means, not whatever the Minister of Finance uses for virtual signalling when he is speaking about indigenous communities. Traditional knowledge matters. Land and water stewardship matter. First nations are already demonstrating this every single day. They are not barriers; they are builders. This is reconciliation, not just more speeches.
However, the Liberal government is actively making our country weaker. While it blocks Canadian oil from reaching tidewater, the United States sails foreign-flag tankers just 12 nautical miles off our west coast. The U.S. gets the market, the jobs and the influence; Canada gets nothing but lectures.
We should be proud of our environmental excellence. Modern technology such as in-situ oil sands and SAGD extraction continues to reduce costs and emissions. We have world-leading spill prevention because of meaningful and real consultations, investments in technology and innovation, and trust built by our Canadian scientists, technicians and communities. Let us believe in them to get the job done and to do this right.
For Trans Mountain there were zero spills from marine shipping since operations began. Yes, TMX went from $4 billion to $30 billion-plus under the Liberal government, but what lessons were learned? Clearly none, because the government continues to pile on red tape, block procurement and stand in the way of major project success. The Major Projects Office is a joke about an endless and ineffective set of bureaucracies; it is a bottleneck disguised as a support system.
Canadians cannot afford the Prime Minister's distraction that delays a new oil pipeline to the Pacific coast.
Conservatives believe that unblocking and shipping a million barrels of oil to Asia a day at world prices will generate a stronger economy and take-home pay for our people, but Carney's, the Prime Minister's, Liberals, continue to stand in the way of all this, promising one thing to Alberta and another thing to “keep it in the ground”—