Debates of Feb. 12th, 2026

Opposition Motion—Automotive Strategy

[Tamara Jansen, Conservative, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

Mr. Speaker, after years of failed EV mandates, to the tune of $52 billion in subsidies from Canadian taxpayers, the government now wants to spend another $2.3 billion to boost the sales of cars that Canada does not build. The fact is that nearly all previous rebates went to vehicles manufactured outside Canada.

If the goal is to strengthen our auto sector, why is subsidy money going to support American factories instead of Canadian workers? How will this help the 5,000 families who have lost their jobs in the auto sector?

[Harb Gill, Conservative, Windsor West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, this is not going to help anybody except Mr. Trump and Trump's America. It is not going to help Canadians. It is not going to help the workers who have been laid off, and there are more than 5,000. There are other workers. I mentioned the Can Art extrusion company in Windsor, which laid off 250 people because it did not have work anymore.

There are multiple companies like that, which have lost employees or laid off people because they do not have the ability to keep them as a result of these mandates.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, I understand we are leading 4-0 in the big game today. We are truly team Canada, as we can see from the beautiful jersey right behind me.

Imagine if we could be team Canada when it comes to automotive purchases and production. Imagine the satisfaction someone would have if they drove their new car off the lot knowing that not only did they get a great price for a great automobile so they can do their full-time job as a chauffeur taking their kids to their hockey games, but that every penny from their purchase went to support Canadian workers, to put food on the tables of Canadian families, to buy Canadian steel, Canadian aluminum, Canadian plastic and Canadian-assembled automobiles.

That is the mission. That is how we make our country affordable, safe and strong. We must reindustrialize our country. We must unleash the production of steel, aluminum, plastic, minerals and other production for which we should have a massive natural advantage.

Then and only then, Canadian paycheques would grow. Then and only then, Canada would be affordable and autonomous. Then and only then, would we restore the industrial powerhouse that used to characterize the Canadian economy. We have a plan as Conservatives to bring about that industrial powerhouse and the affordable made-in-Canada vehicles I just described.

It is a plan for quick permits, low-cost energy and low taxes, a plan to make this the biggest and most open economy anywhere in the world in which to produce, to make, to fix, to move, to dig and to deliver for Canadian consumers. We have the resources and the workforce that no other country can match, yet after 10 years of the Liberal government, we have had the worst economic growth in the G7, the worst productivity and the worst investment track record. Five hundred billion dollars of net investment has fled our country for the United States of America, as Liberal taxes and anti-development policies drive investors stampeding out of our country.

Automotive production under the Liberal government has fallen by half, from roughly 2.2 million cars a year to 1.2 million. All of that happened while the present-day Liberal finance minister was actually the industry minister. The new government looks an awful lot like the old government.

The Liberal Prime Minister promised that he would be different. Here we are, a year later, and what do we have? There have been grand speeches, announcements and signing ceremonies of unenforceable declarations. It is all an illusion. Look at the results.

He promised to negotiate a win with the U.S. by July 21. There is still no win, still no deal and still no jobs. He promised that we would have the strongest growth in the G7. Our economy is now shrinking, according to Bloomberg. He promised affordable food, but grocery prices are now rising faster in Canada than in any other G7 country. Real GDP in automotive manufacturing fell by 10% in November. He promised auto jobs. He has lost 5,000 of them. In fact, manufacturing is down 37,000 jobs since he took office promising to make Canada strong, and 5,000 of those jobs are in automotive production. We have seen 3,000 job losses in Brampton, where I had the the honour of standing in the rain with the great Unifor workers who were locked out of their facility; 1,200 at the GM CAMI plant; 500 at GM's plant in Oshawa; and 725 at Paccar in Quebec.

We can blame President Trump's unfair tariffs, and we do, but the question is this: What are we doing about what we can control? As the Prime Minister said, and he is right on this point, no one can control what President Trump does or says. I agree with the Prime Minister. What we can control is what we do on this side of the border.

Here is what the Prime Minister's response is. He wants to take $2.3 billion away from Canadian taxpayers, including Canadian auto workers, and spend it on a subsidy that goes exclusively to foreign-made, especially American-made, cars. While President Trump tariffs our automobile sector, the Liberal Prime Minister subsidizes the American auto sector.

Let us be very clear. Liberals are claiming that somehow the rebates will be used for Canadian automobiles. Here are the facts: In 2023, under the previous Liberal EV rebate program, which was pretty much the same as the one we have now, 99% of the subsidies went to foreign-made EVs: 31% went to the U.S., 25% to China, 19% to Japan, 16% to South Korea and 1% to Canada. Let us be clear: Only 1% of EVs purchased in Canada are made in Canada, and that is after $52 billion of taxpayer subsidies for the EV supply chain. It does not seem to matter how much Liberal governments throw away in handouts and subsidies; they cannot turn those dollars into enough production to satisfy even a tiny fraction of the Canadian marketplace.

Liberals say that is the present, but we should look to the future. That too is an illusion. Here is the reality: EV purchases are in free fall. Between December 2024 and November 2025, the market share of EVs in Canada plummeted almost by half, from 18% to 11%. Canadians are buying vastly fewer electric vehicles. In dollar terms, the sales have decreased in that period of time by 37%. That is absolute free fall. In fact, the reality is that if someone were trying to predict the future, and I do not believe that governments are able to do that, and simply based on the trajectory, it is clear that electric vehicles are not on track at this time to overtake the market. They are not even close.

Our Conservative approach would allow the free market to decide which vehicles get purchased. It lets consumers choose what they want to buy. We know that they will be biased in favour of the lowest price and the highest quality, and those vehicles happen to be, in many cases, Canadian-made internal combustion vehicles. That is the reality, and we have a plan to make sure that the maximum amount of content in those vehicles is made by our Canadian workers. We are going to reindustrialize Canada. We are going to make this into an industrial powerhouse, and we are going to make it possible for someone to buy a car and know it goes to Canadians.

It drives me crazy to think of the laid-off auto worker who is looking at their severance right now and sees 50% is gone in tax, knowing that their tax dollars will subsidize the very American-made vehicles that were made in the country that tariffed him out of a job. He does not have to live like that; we have a plan.

We will unleash Canadian production. We will take the GST off Canadian-made automobiles, saving people $2,500 on a Canadian car. This would include, for example, the Chrysler Pacifica, the Chrysler Grand Caravan, the Dodge Charger, the Toyota RAV4, the Lexus NX, the Honda Civic, the CR-V, numerous Ford products, the Chevy Silverado and many more. We would get rid of the industrial carbon tax on Canadian steel, aluminum and plastic to make cars with Canadian steel. We would get rid of the capital gains tax on reinvestments in Canadian auto plants. We would end the new Liberal fuel tax so that we can move our parts around more quickly and economically, because low-cost energy is the key to reindustrializing our country.

These are solutions. They are positive ideas to make Canada an incredible industrial powerhouse, where patriotic Canadians can save money and save jobs at the same time and where team Canada not only wins out on the ice but wins at the auto dealership, wins on our streets and wins in our factories.

I say, “Canada first and Canada always.”

[Karim Bardeesy, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Industry]

Mr. Speaker, our auto strategy associates itself with the stronger emissions standards that are prevailing in California and in Europe, and it is part of a strategy that will decrease our dependence on internal combustion engines and increase our adoption of electrification. This strategy is good for the environment and good for the climate. Not in the motion but in the debate, we now hear that the Conservatives are opposed to California-style emissions standards. That, incidentally, is the position of the U.S. administration, which is now saying it does not want any emissions standards whatsoever.

My question to the Leader of the Opposition is this: Is he in support of California-style, European-style and Canadian emissions standards, or no emissions standards?

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Battle River—Crowfoot, AB]

Mr. Speaker, we are in favour of Canada, and that means low-cost energy. I do not want high-priced European or Californian taxes on consumers and industry. That is how jobs get killed. That is how people are made poor.

Europe is rapidly running away from the radical net-zero agenda that the member just talked about. The Germans tried it and are having to reverse themselves completely because they are being shut down. In the United Kingdom, they realized that high-priced electricity, because of these same radical net-zero policies that the Prime Minister has embraced and written about, are impoverishing the working class and deindustrializing society.

We do not want any of these foreign policies he wants to impose. We want a Canadian policy to reindustrialize and make Canada affordable and autonomous.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I note that in the last point of the motion, point (c), the Leader of the Opposition is calling for a tax cut for GM factory workers who have lost their jobs. That is very generous of him, but how could someone who claims to advocate for Canada and work for everyone not think of the Paccar workers, who also lost their jobs? Why did he not include them in his motion? In Sainte-Thérèse, 700 people lost their jobs. That is my first question.

Here is my second question for the Leader of the Opposition. Alberta produces oil and Quebec produces electricity. Quebec is the leading market for EVs in Canada. Does he understand that his motion is an attack on the electrification of transportation, that Quebeckers are fond of electricity, that they are fond of electric vehicles, and that, basically, he is attacking Quebec?

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Battle River—Crowfoot, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his question, but not for his research, because he made a mistake.

We did not say that workers who lost their jobs would not have to pay the usual taxes. What we said was that the taxes should not be taken off at the beginning of the year, because then those workers will be forced to wait a year before getting a refund.

The problem with a one-time payment when a worker loses their job is that it puts them in a very high tax bracket. They lose half the money and have to wait 14 months to get a refund. Why not let the workers keep that money and pay the taxes on it later when they have a job? That is my first point.

My second point is that the member has lost touch with the regions of Quebec, where people like trucks that run on gas and diesel. We support Quebec consumers. We believe that they can decide for themselves, without subsidizing American vehicles.

[Harb Gill, Conservative, Windsor West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, workers in Windsor, Canada's automotive capital, are being hit by unjustified U.S. tariffs, while Liberal subsidies and Canadian tax dollars are paying for American-built cars. Investment is leaving Canada.

Can the Leader of the Opposition explain how a Canada-first Conservative plan for ending subsidies of foreign-made vehicles and cutting the GST on Canadian-built cars would protect Canadian jobs, Windsor jobs, and keep investment here in our country?

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Battle River—Crowfoot, AB]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, nobody has done more to champion turning Canada into an industrial superpower than the member for Windsor West. Every day, in every way, he fights for our auto workers, and we owe him a debt of gratitude.

I am informed that since my speech began, team Canada has gone to 5-0. Apparently there is some momentum here, and I hope that the government will get out of the way and let that momentum turn into results. We are going to take the taxes off Canadian-made automobiles, so that they are affordable and our country is autonomous.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will be—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am only at the part about sharing my time, and they are already heckling me.

I will be sharing my time today with the member for Oakville West.

I cannot help but wonder what is going on in the political party over there with its members being so hell-bent on disassociating themselves from the reality of the world we are in and the fact that our car industries are converting, changing and evolving.

I want to propose something to members. I want them to imagine for a second that EVs are already the norm. I want them to pretend for a second that gas vehicles do not exist and that there are only EVs.

I ask members to picture this: Every morning they wake up, their car has been plugged in and it has a full battery. When they drive around, there is no noise, no fumes and no rumbling traffic. The streets and the air are cleaner, and kids walking to school can breathe cleaner air as a result of this.

Members can think about it for a second. Everybody is driving EVs, and there is very little maintenance required. We are not getting oil changes, changing or adjusting timing belts, or dealing with transmission failures. We also have an energy source that is stable and affordable. This is the world we are living in, my imaginary world, for a second.

I now want members to imagine that I am going to pitch why we should transition from EVs to gas vehicles. This is my pitch: For starters, there would be no charging when we wake up in the morning. We might wake up and the car is empty, so we have to find a gas station somewhere to fill it up, where we are pulling a hose out of a gas tank and pumping flammable fuel into our vehicle.

Also, I want members to think about the maintenance involved. Instead of an EV, which has literally no maintenance, we suddenly have a vehicle that has hundreds of moving parts. There is an engine that, thousands of times a minute, is having little miniature explosions in it to drive the engine. This is my pitch to members.

In addition to that, every once in a while, every 5,000 kilometres or 10,000 kilometres, we are going to need to get an oil change. We are going to have to periodically get a new spark plug. We are going to need to have belts, pumps and filters changed. Everything is going to have to be changed. In addition to this, the vehicles are louder and make more noise on our streets. By the way, there is going to be this pipe at the back of the vehicle that spews out toxic gases for all of us to breathe in. This is my pitch to move away from EVs.

There is also the cost argument of the fuel. Rather than that stable, predictable cost of electricity, we are going to have to pay for our fuel based on global prices that are set by global influences. In addition to that, we are going to spend thousands of dollars in repairs and changes. The budgets are going to be completely unpredictable.

My point is that, if I were to stand here to try to pitch to members why we should move away from EVs to gas vehicles, it would be absolutely absurd, yet this is the place we find ourselves in. We find ourselves in a place where we have a political party that, for most measures, used to be fairly progressive as it related to the environment and embracing change and that seems to have only adopted one thing from that former party, and that is the word “Conservative”.

All the Conservatives want to do is conserve and make sure that we cannot evolve or transition at all. There is something called the innovation curve, which is basically a bell curve that will tell us at what point in various different technologies we are currently at. At the beginning of the curve is the 0% to 2% range. People who buy into a new innovation at the bottom of that curve are called innovators. These are the people who have the resources to buy certain technologies because they enjoy it and they like the technologies. They are the innovators.

Next to them, in the 2% to 10% range, are the early adopters. These are the people who do not have quite the same resources the innovators have, but they are still very interested in the technology. They might be motivated from not only an economic perspective, but also a social perspective.

After that, on the innovation curve, we get to the early majority. This is when that new technology has penetrated the market between 10% and 40%. This is when things start to really kick off. The actual chasm point is about 7.5%, which is considered the tipping point. At that point, it is just a matter of going through the innovation curve.

After that, in the range of 40% to 70%, we have the late majority. The late majority are the people who reluctantly buy on, realizing, “Okay, yes, this is going to be more affordable, so I'm going to buy it.” They do not really want the technology, but they do accept that the rest of the world is embracing it.

At the end of that, when we finally get to market penetration of 70% to 100%, there are what are called the laggards. These are the people who would still be using a rotary phone today if they could, but they have to use a touch-tone phone because the world evolved around them and there is no choice. The laggards are the Conservatives. These are the people who absolutely refuse to embrace the technological change.

Right now, one in five cars sold in the world is an electric vehicle. That means that, along the innovation curve, we are currently at 20%, which is well into the early majority. We are well past the tipping point, and we will not come back from this.

Do we want to be at the forefront of what is going on, or do we want to be laggards like the Conservatives? Do we want to just wait until we have absolutely no choice but to embrace the technology the rest of the world has already concluded is the only path forward?

My position on this is that we have the opportunity to be at that forefront. We have the opportunity to have some of that investment happening right in our country, so that we can be outputting that to the rest of the world, exporting it instead of just importing it.

I know that the argument from the Conservatives is going to be that there are very few cars, and only one or two in Canada are EVs. They are going to come up with all these red herrings, like they always do, as though they are trying to somehow conserve, as in the name of their political party, this idea that it is impossible to evolve and it is impossible for things to change. We have the opportunity to be able to do this, to be at the forefront and participate in the change of vehicle that is inevitably coming.

We are well past the tipping point. This is not a matter of if; this is a matter of when. Electric vehicles are soon going to be the norm—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I hear the members laughing right now. Whether or not they want to get on board and drive one of those vehicles does not matter because at the end of the day, they will be in one. It may not be tomorrow. It may not be a year from now. It may not be five years from now, but I guarantee that eventually every Conservative will drive one.

I have been driving electric vehicles since 2011. I drive a Ford F-150 Lightning, and I park it here. I have put 112,000 kilometres on it, and I have never once brought it in for servicing. The electromagnetic motors drive the vehicle. I do not have an engine. I do not have fuel. I do not have explosions happening to move the vehicle. This is all the stuff I talked about earlier, and this is the reality.

I really hope that we can get to a point when Conservatives can finally start to realize that the world around them is changing, and whether or not they want to participate in it is quite irrelevant because it is going to change. Our perspective is that we want to be at the forefront of that. We invite Conservatives to join us.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciated my hon. friend from Kingston and the Islands' call for Canada to be in the forefront.

We are too late to be in the forefront, but like the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands, I drive a plug-in, a hybrid. For those who talk about range anxiety and not having enough charging stations, this is a good step.

A hybrid is not as expensive as a full electric, and I can use the three-prong plug in friends' garages when I park while I am visiting. I rent, and the landlord agreed to let me plug it in there. It has an adapter. It is very versatile. I agree with the hon. member: I do not have servicing problems or battery issues either.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is extremely rare that, when a government member speaks, the first question goes to the Green Party. That, I think, is a symbol of the Conservatives being afraid to ask me a question.

Nonetheless, I will address the member's point. She is absolutely correct about the transition. As a matter of fact, my wife did not want to go fully electric for the same reason of range anxiety. What did she do? She got a hybrid plug-in, and now she is at the point where she is ready to trade it in to get a full electric vehicle because she realizes that the range anxiety, by and large, is something that is driven by the oil industry, which is trying to prevent people from buying EVs.

[The Deputy Speaker, Tom Kmiec]

I would just remind all members that the Speaker, or chair occupant, still retains the right to recognize whomever they wish.

With that being said, we will continue with questions and comments. The hon. member for Dufferin—Caledon.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I know this member likes to raise his voice a lot, shout a lot and feign indignation at a whole bunch of things, but I have a serious question, which I have asked in question period over almost two weeks now, and I have not received anything that even resembles an answer. I suspect I will not get one now, but I will try again.

We are in the middle of a trade war with Donald Trump and the United States. He has said that he wants to take every single Canadian auto manufacturing job and bring it to the United States. To do that, he has put in punishing tariffs, which are accomplishing some of that. Why would the Liberals' strategy include one penny for American-made EVs when there are tariffs on our cars? The auto workers who I have talked to find that absolutely disgusting.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member is being disingenuous when he starts off by criticizing me personally. The way I read it is that he does not have anything concrete to bring to this debate, but I will answer his question.

If the member listened to my speech and everything I said, he would have heard me make it very clear that we are in a transition. We are all going to be building only electric cars eventually. That is the reality, whether that member wants to pontificate about what is happening right now and try to conserve everything that exists in the auto industry, or whether he is willing to look towards the future.

In my opinion, the real question is, where is the future? I would encourage the member to start looking to where the future is. When we are at a place where one in five cars being sold is an EV, it is pretty clear to me where we are going to end up.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I rarely do this, but I really want to congratulate the member opposite on his speech. He is generally not my favourite member because I find his speeches overly partisan. However, today, I am truly impressed because he really dotted the i's and crossed the t's and told the truth about electric vehicles.

Since he is now such a straight talker, today, I would like to know if he is willing to admit or state that his government's decision to end the subsidies for zero-emission electric vehicles in 2025 was a disaster.

Is the fact that it has been reinstated today not proof of this?

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I feel compelled to just accept that compliment and sit down. I do not think I have received one like that from the Bloc before. I genuinely appreciate it.

If the member is looking for an ally to always push the government to do more in terms of subsidies, he will find one in me. I will always encourage our government, or any government for that matter, even the provincial Conservative government, to do more for the EV industry, whether that is through subsidies or through different forms of incentives for people to buy EVs. Personally, that is certainly my position.

[Sima Acan, Liberal, Oakville West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to participate in this debate today.

As we all know, times are changing, and in that uncertain world, the government is focused on what we can control. As part of Canada's new industrial strategy, we are transforming our economy with a diversification of trade partnerships as we work to catalyze growth with massive new levels of investment.

For over 100 years, Canada's automotive industry has underpinned advanced manufacturing, driven innovation and supported hundreds of thousands of well-paying jobs across the country, including in Oakville. It is as important as ever that we take action to maintain and improve Canada's automotive sector. In fact, we have a unique opportunity to do so.

That is why, on February 5, I was proud to join the Prime Minister as he launched a new strategy to transform Canada's automotive industry. Recognizing that the future of the automotive industry is electrified and connected, the government is prioritizing the development of the full value chain for next-generation vehicles. Within five years, EV sales are projected to reach nearly 40% of global car sales. It is important that Canada is among those at the forefront of that evolution.

While repealing the electric vehicle availability standard will allow manufacturers to use new technologies as they respond to consumer preferences to grow domestic demand for EVs, they must become more affordable for working Canadians. That is why the government will launch a five-year, $2.3-billion EV affordability program that will offer purchase or lease incentives up to $5,000 for battery electric and fuel cell EVs, and up to $2,500 for plug-in hybrids with a final transaction value of up to $50,000 on cars made by countries that Canada has free trade agreements with. To support the Canadian automotive industry, this $50,000 cap will not apply to Canadian-made EVs and plug-in hybrids.

The government will also enhance, through the auto strategy, the national EV charging network, through investments of $1.5 billion, including investments in my riding of Oakville West. These will, through the charging and hydrogen refuelling infrastructure initiative, make it convenient for drivers to charge their cars no matter where they are.

To accelerate investments in Canada's automotive manufacturing sector, the government will also allocate $3 billion from the strategic response fund and up to $100 million from the regional tariff response initiative to help the auto industry adapt, grow and diversify. We will also take advantage of the productivity superdeduction and reduce corporate tax rates for zero-emission technology manufacturers to encourage investments in clean technologies and EVs as well as strengthen Canada's automotive remission framework to reward companies that build in Canada.

The government will also establish a comprehensive trade regime that strengthens the auto sector through new partnerships. For example, Canada recently deepened its strategic partnership with the Republic of Korea by signing a memorandum of understanding to strengthen Canadian-Korean industrial collaboration for future mobility. The recently announced new relationship with China aims to drive new Chinese joint venture investment in Canada and allow for a fixed volume of Chinese EV imports into the Canadian market. Although countertariffs on auto imports from the United States will be maintained, the government will continue to advance its auto strategy within an integrated North American automotive industry.

By making strategic investments and solidifying trade partnerships, Canada is positioning itself as a global leader in vehicle electrification, autonomous and self-driving technologies, and the battery supply chains that will power the future of mobility.

I would also like to mention the help we will provide to the auto workers who will build the vehicles amid short-term uncertainty. To protect Canadian auto workers and businesses from immediate pressures while helping bridge them to the future, the government will provide support to employees through a new work-sharing grant, preventing layoffs and supporting worker retention so that businesses can plan for the future. In addition, up to 66,000 workers across Canada, including affected auto workers, will receive employment assistance and re-skilling support as part of a $570-million investment.

These strategic decisions and generational investments aim to build a strong Canadian auto sector, where Canadian workers build the cars of the future. Backed by a world-class workforce, globally recognized parts suppliers and leading-edge research and development, Canada's automotive sector is building the vehicles for today, and it will help build the vehicles of tomorrow.

[Philip Lawrence, Conservative, Northumberland—Clarke, ON]

Mr. Speaker, we have asked this question a number of times, and we have yet to receive a response. It is a serious question. Currently, 99% of the EVs that will receive the subsidy from the government are made elsewhere than in Canada. At what point will it get to 5% or 10%?

[Sima Acan, Liberal, Oakville West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, when it comes to the subsidy, the information given by the opposition is always inaccurate.

We are subsidizing Canadian consumers and protecting Canadian jobs in an integrated North American supply chain that supports hundreds of thousands of jobs in the Canadian market and the Canadian manufacturing sector. Our strategic strength is in Canadian manufacturing, securing investments in Canada and ensuring we remain competitive and leaders in this industry.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Mr. Speaker, this government bought a pipeline that cost $34 billion. Over the past 10 years, budget after budget, it has provided funding to oil companies, most of which are American-owned. Now, it is proposing a subsidy costing a paltry $2.3 billion over five years.

Does my colleague think this is enough, given that Canada used to hold itself out as a champion in the fight against climate change?