Mr. Speaker, as I said before question period, Bill C-5 is the opposite of inherent clarity and certainty. The Prime Minister and the minister both claim the projects that provincial and territorial premiers submit to federal politicians, who will then themselves determine whether they are in the national interest, will be approved within two years, except that there is not a single concrete timeline in this bill.
This is familiar because it is the same claim the Liberals made about Bill C-69, but they included much political interference and many tools for the commissioner or politicians to start, stop, extend and restart the reviews ad infinitum. There were no concrete timelines in Bill C-69 either, but in Bill C-5, the words “two years” literally do not exist.
Since the Liberals claim the bill is a reaction to U.S. energy dominance and economic threats so that they can start, just now, trying to make Canada stronger, they should also look at the U.S. timelines to make sure Canada can compete and beat the U.S. to approvals and to market. I am sorry to say that two years was definitely competitive with the IRA three years ago, when Conservatives first called for the Liberals to match it, and it still is overall, but the U.S. now has emergency permitting procedures that approve nuclear, oil and gas, mining and uranium projects on federal lands of between 16 and 28 days. Its overall regulatory process is also set to be expedited. If the Prime Minister says this is a crisis, he should match his action to this crisis.
Bill C-5 does not impose two-year timelines by law in Canada, but if policy decisions afterward do execute the two-year timetable Liberals promise, that may end up keeping Canada lagging behind anyway. I think it is safe to say that Liberals always and often do too little, too late. The process is entirely secretive; that means there is no clarity, timeline, certainty or trust in Bill C-5.
Indigenous leaders from all different perspectives are already raising concerns. I have to say that it was quite astounding to watch a colleague, one I admire very much, the former Enoch chief, Treaty 6 grand chief and current Conservative MP for Edmonton Northwest, question the minister about whether he understands and has consulted with indigenous rights holders. By the way, I come from Treaty 6 territory. The minister named important advocacy groups for indigenous people but quite obviously either did not know or could not affirm that he has consulted with actual rights holders and titleholders. Even though one of the factors is to advance the interests of indigenous peoples, he has not talked to them yet. He is a decision-maker, by his own law, and courts have been clear about the duty for decision-makers to be at the table with indigenous leaders and to make a dynamic effort to address and mitigate adverse impacts. I am not sure that the set-up of an indigenous advisory council will stand up to challenge. All Canadians should be concerned about this.
Meanwhile, Canadians wait, projects stay stalled in the queue, billions in investments sit idle and families lose out on good jobs because of Liberal delays, red tape and uncertainty. Bill C-5 does not fix the real problems; rather, it gives a way for a select, politically hand-picked list to circumvent all the laws and policies the Liberals previously, and elsewhere, argued are just critical and are the most crucial for the environment, economies, communities and indigenous people. These are laws that the Liberals howl about any time Conservatives dare to criticize, question or try to improve them. The list includes the Fisheries Act; the Indian Act; the International River Improvements Act; the National Capital Act; the Canadian Navigable Waters Act; the Migratory Birds Convention Act, 1994; section 98 of the Canada Transportation Act; the Canada Marine Act; division 3 of part 7 of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999; the Species at Risk Act; the Canadian Energy Regulator Act; the migratory bird sanctuary regulations; the Dominion water power regulations; wildlife area regulations; the metal and diamond mining effluent regulations; and the Liberals' own migratory bird regulations, 2022.
Let us be honest. If the Liberals now want to ignore these laws for their preferred projects, that confirms two things. First, these policies have stopped development for years. Second, even if the Liberals claim they will approve projects in two years, that claim matters only if the projects survive legal challenges after approval, so the proponents can build them on their own timeline and on their own dime.
What happens afterwards is also crucial. What happens when activists challenge the approvals and exemptions in court? From the list I just read, I dare say that there will be more than a few Canadian advocacy groups of all different kinds concerned about this plan. What happens when those approvals and exemptions are challenged? What happens when litigation and the weaponization of bylaws and laws from other provinces and other municipalities halt progress again? What will the Liberals do then? Will they attack their own laws or retreat and refuse to enforce federal jurisdiction, as they have done before, deliberately, to kill pipelines and other projects?
Bill C-5 raises more questions than answers, and Canadians deserve the truth. This bill sets up a process that will help a few and leave most behind.
On Wednesday, the natural resources minister said, “I think what we said is that we do not pick the projects.” However, he also said, “projects bubble up from consultations between the federal government, provincial government, indigenous peoples”. When I asked the same question again, about the ministers and cabinet as decision-makers, the minister said, “the politicians do not pick the projects.” However, it is clear from public communications after meetings with premiers that they are, and Bill C-5 clearly says:
If the Governor in Council is of the opinion that a project is in the national interest, the Governor in Council—
It is otherwise known as cabinet.
—may, on the recommendation of the Minister, by order, amend Schedule 1 to add the name of the project and a brief description of it, including the location where it is to be carried out.
Well, that language confirms that the minister plays a direct role and is the decision-maker. The minister can also remove projects from the list:
If the Governor in Council is of the opinion that a project named in Schedule 1 is no longer in the national interest, the Governor in Council may, on the recommendation of the Minister, by order, amend that Schedule to delete the name and the description of the project.
That is some certainty. Despite the minister's claims, Bill C-5 shows that political discretion, his discretion, decides which projects stay or go, which project people win and which lose. Already one wonders whether the responsible minister, after my engagement with him on Wednesday night, actually even knows what is being proposed in his own bill.
Again, there is a public list of major resource and infrastructure projects ready to go, real projects with real proponents that could be deemed in the national interest and fast-tracked immediately. The 28 mining and energy proposals sitting in front of the regulators could be fast-tracked right now.
It is also curious that one of the acts the Liberal government could decide to sidestep through Bill C-5 is the Conflict of Interest Act. Of course, the Prime Minister refused to disclose his own conflicts or where he paid his taxes, and his businesses preferred to invest in pipelines and energy in the U.S. and overseas, not in Canada. Already, this sure looks like the same scandal-plagued, backroom-dealing Liberals, does it not?
It should also concern all Canadians that the plan in Bill C-5 is for most of the specifics to be dealt with through policy and regulations afterwards, not transparently and clearly in the law: more inherent uncertainty. This bill also mixes public and private infrastructure, while the ministers will not give details about the projects. Canadians would be wise to consider the lack of distinction and whether the Liberals will continue their state corporate financing schemes that always put taxpayers at risk while insiders benefit.
Canadians do not want backroom deals. They want a system that works. They want government to clear the path for Canadian responsible resource development by Canadian workers with Canadian materials.
The Liberals also keep talking about the need for consensus on projects, and they mean especially for pipelines. However, neither they nor Bill C-5 defines what that involves. Is it consensus from the anti-pipeline environment and culture ministers? Is it consensus from half the anti-energy Liberals who are still in the Liberal cabinet while they try to sound like Conservatives and are actually diametrically opposed to what they have said and done for a decade? I mean, it is amazing they can stand here and look at us with straight faces and do that.
The Liberals claim they want consensus, but Canadians know they do not even have it in their own cabinet, and Bill C-5 sets out cabinet as the decision-makers. Is it consensus from all provinces, even though some have already said no before and are saying no again, even though interprovincial pipelines for export are indisputably federal jurisdiction?
The Liberal government previously failed to enforce federal jurisdiction and the rule of law, and let activists and other levels of government weaponize laws and bylaws against proponents that already had approval. That failure is exactly what forced the private sector proponent for TMX to abandon its attempts to build, because the federal government did not use its tools to give legal, political and jurisdictional certainty for the private sector proponent to go ahead, even after the government approved it after risking it, ended up buying it and then created a costly, delayed, nationalized project. It was a dangerous signal to all investors that Canada is a place where the private sector cannot build and government will always rely on taxpayers.
Are the Liberals aware that there is already a very strong consensus among everyday Canadians everywhere across the country that Canada needs more pipelines? It has been that way for a long time, but it is growing. It is higher than ever before. The latest data shows 79% of Canadians overall, and guess what. Of Quebeckers, 86% want more pipelines for national energy security and resilience. A supermajority of Canadians are in consensus, so it is time for the Liberals to stop delaying, dithering and dodging if they really mean all their suddenly new and plagiarized words about wanting Canada to be an energy superpower.
Canadians can be forgiven for skepticism about the broad categories for national interest projects that the premiers pushed the Prime Minister and ministers to agree on. On the western Arctic energy corridor, Conservatives have always fought for northerners to make decisions, to get more revenue from resource development and to increase Canada's defence and security capabilities in the north, but the Liberals banned unleashing Arctic energy unilaterally from a different country and indefinitely. They also imposed massive antidevelopment areas that keep northerners from benefiting from their own natural wealth in a place where there is a humanitarian, housing and food crisis and few opportunities for self-sufficiency that are not related to responsible resource development, if only the government would let them develop resources.
As for the eastern energy partnership, these exact Liberals used political interference, changing goalposts and conditions never seen before or since, to force the proponent, which had spent $1 billion, to abandon the nation-building pipeline that would have linked Canada economically and physically for self-sufficiency, self-reliance and national unity. They killed that east-to-west pipeline even though private investors offered to fund it entirely. The pipeline would have connected Canadian energy from coast to coast for self-sufficiency, and they interfered to kill it because of political pressure, even though it too was a proposal strictly in federal jurisdiction.
Why should anyone believe them now? Maybe what they actually mean is connecting power among the Atlantic provinces, to which Conservatives say that the natural resources committee told the government to build interties in 2017. It did not, and then it tried to study that all over again just a few months ago before Christmas. Do members know what my advice is? Why do the Liberals not just try to get the really simple things done first?
As for a critical minerals pathway, in 2022, these same Liberals announced a critical minerals strategy. How many new mines were approved from it? There were zero. For example, Canada still does not export a single teaspoon of lithium, none, while global demand rises and China dominates the global production value and supply chains. In 2024, lithium demand rose 30%, but Canada could not provide it because mines in Canada take up to 25 years from concept to being shovel-ready under the Liberals. Why should Canadians think that 2025's critical minerals pathway will be different?
Is the next stage nuclear? Premiers from all across the country have called nuclear critical to Canada's energy future. Conservatives agree, but the Liberals have still not given a straight answer. Do all nuclear projects qualify for investment tax credits to compete with the U.S., or will they only be accessible to a few, like SMRs and large-scale plants, which are also important?
If the Liberals are serious about one project, one review, why do they not fix the fundamental problem instead of the short-term Bill C-5 queue-jumping workaround? For nuclear, for which Canada has long been world-renowned and viewed as an expert by other countries, proposals already face two reviews: an impact assessment and a full review by the expert Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. Why?
Why can there not be a one project, one review process like Conservatives have always promoted to get things built? Why could the minister not say definitively that the existing nuclear proposals stalled in review right now are in the national interest? Canada cannot attract investment when the rules shift and are vague and politicized. Businesses and workers need clarity, not confusion and more questions.
With respect to infrastructure for trade diversification, the government cannot even get roads built, and the culture minister said he does not think Canada needs anymore anyway. The Webequie supply road project, the Marten Falls community access road and the northern road link project, all backed and co-owned by indigenous communities, which would unlock the Ring of Fire, remain locked in the regulator right now.
Therefore, forgive Conservatives for suggesting that government cannot unleash critical minerals if it cannot even get the roads built to develop and transport them, and those roads are the place to start. It is time to stop talking and start approving. Canadians deserve leadership that actually sets attractive, competitive investment conditions so the private sector can build. The track record of the Liberals is the opposite.
There are projects that promise not only billions for our economy but also jobs for our communities, paycheques for Canadians and revenue for governments for infrastructure programs. Let us talk about some of those numbers.
Here are some of the projects that have been killed by the Liberals. The Grassy Point LNG project had a loss of $10 billion. The West Coast Canada LNG project had a loss of $25 billion. The Aurora LNG project had a loss of $28 billion. The Prince Rupert LNG project had a loss of $11 billion. The Pacific NorthWest LNG project had a loss of $11 billion. The Kwispaa LNG project had a loss of $18 billion. The Énergie Saguenay LNG project lost $4 billion.
The Frontier oil sands mine project had a loss of $20.6 billion. The Aspen oil sands project lost $2.6 billion. The Dunkirk oil sands SAGD project had a loss of $2.4 billion. The Muskwa SAGD oil sands project had a loss of $800 million; the Carmon Creek oil sands project had a loss of $3 billion. The Frederick Brook shale project had a loss of $700 million. The Mackenzie Valley gas pipeline project had a loss of $16 billion. The energy east pipeline had a loss of $15.7 billion. The northern gateway pipeline had a loss of $7.9 billion.
These are just a few examples of the lost $670 billion in cancelled or suspended projects on the same Liberals' watch. How can the Liberals really pretend to play team Canada when they have done everything possible to hold Canada back, especially when half the cabinet ministers are exactly the same as the old ones?
The Liberals have claimed falsely there was no business case for these projects, except there obviously was to the private sector proponents ready to make major long-term investment and to all the countries who want more Canada. The Liberals have let Canada's competitors win, and they have made Canadians lose. It is not only allies that have surpassed Canada and profited from it because of the Liberals; it is also our adversaries and hostile imperialist regimes that have out-gamed and outpaced the west, while politicians here dithered, virtue signalled and imposed policies and laws that kill Canadian jobs, Canadian businesses, Canadian supply chains and have made Canada more expensive, more vulnerable and weak.
In March 2022, Latvia said it “would wholeheartedly support” Canadian LNG to cut reliance on Russia. In June 2022, Ukraine said it was seeking Canadian LNG. Years into Russia's invasion, Canada still has no east coast LNG exports because their opponents abandoned the three proposals just in the last couple of years in Atlantic Canada, probably in part because the Liberals kept saying there was no business case. Some confidence the Liberals had in Canada. Ten years of elbows down and resources in the ground made Canada a target, and Conservatives warned them all along.
In August 2022, Germany begged for Canadian LNG, but the Liberals rejected that ally. Then they made a deal with Qatar, which hides Hamas and gets to rake in billions of dollars and drive in the desert with fancy sports cars and Rolex watches, while Canadians' food prices become the highest in the G7, unemployment rates skyrocket and the Liberals' plan to ban internal combustion engines. In December 2022, Poland looked to Canada for LNG to diversify energy sources, obviously for its national security, but it got nothing. In January 2023, Japan formally requested Canadian LNG. The Liberals refused. In February 2023, one month later, Japan's ambassador said, “The world is waiting for Canada”. The Liberals keep it waiting.
In May 2023, South Korea wanted Canadian LNG. The Liberals did nothing. In March 2024, Greece's prime minister said it absolutely wanted Canada's LNG, but Liberals refused to grant export licences. In April 2024, Poland's president said it would, of course, buy Canadian LNG, if Liberals made it available. In May 2024, the Philippines expressed interest in Canadian LNG trade and investment. There was nothing from the Liberals. In November 2024, Taiwan wanted to buy and invest in Canadian LNG, for obvious security reasons and self-reliance in its region, which all Canadians should care about. The Liberals blocked it.
In February 2025, Canada refused Japan's LNG request, also with another obvious security implication. After Canada had refused Japan's LNG request in 2023, this is what happened in February 2025: the U.S. delivered a multi-trillion dollar LNG deal to Japan instead. Mexico has now flown past Canada for LNG exports, while the U.S. is the top in the world.
The Liberals started with 15 LNG proposals in 2015. Only three were approved, and only one is operational now. By the way, the one that is operational now was approved by the former Conservative government and then delayed, put through another review and put at risk by the Liberals. We all are lucky that the proponent hung in. The Liberals should not delay on approving its second phase.
During that time, during the loss of 15 LNG proposals in Canada, the U.S. approved 28, with 12 approved, 8 under construction and 8 operational right now. The U.S. is now the top exporter in the world of LNG. Canada should have been ahead of it and a key partner for North American energy and national security, but the Liberals held Canada back with a distinctly elbows-down approach, except against Canadians. They sure gave us one or two or ten.
The Prime Minister says it is elbows up against the United States, but year after year, the same Liberals handed the Americans trillions of dollars from Canada on a silver platter. The U.S. must remain Canada's top ally, with safe borders and integrated security, and it is our top ally, but there is no doubt that because of the Liberals, the U.S. is also our top competitor, as a result of damaging Canadian domestic policy.
Conservatives have always been the consistent advocates for certainty, clarity and competitive, fast approvals to make Canada strong, self-reliant and united, so of course we hope—
