Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight at Adjournment Proceedings to pursue a question I asked the Minister of Finance back on December 4, 2025, about what was committed in the budget.
At page 348 in the budget, it very clearly states that a component of carbon capture, utilization and storage, known as “enhanced oil recovery”, would not qualify for investment tax credits.
For those who are watching and do not know what “enhanced oil recovery” is, it is basically using the fig leaf that we are somehow pulling carbon out of the atmosphere, keeping it stored and avoiding its global warming effect, which is somehow good for the climate. However, what they are really doing is using the pressure and the impact of shooting carbon dioxide under the surface to areas where the industry has not been able to access the oil that is still there. Therefore, enhanced oil recovery is not about carbon capture and storage; it is about increasing oil production.
Back when the budget was being drafted and before it was tabled on November 4, a clear case was made to the government not to add a new fossil fuel subsidy and to make it very clear. It is still there. The government did not use disappearing ink. It still says, at page 348 in the English version of the budget, that enhanced oil recovery is not eligible for investment tax credits.
The reason I asked the question of the Minister of Finance back on December 4, which was ironically exactly a month after the tabling of the budget, was due to the memorandum of understanding that had been executed with the Government of Alberta on November 27, which, amazingly, said exactly the opposite of the commitment made in the budget. I made the point in my question that some might call it a flip-flop, but a flip-flop is a sandal. This is a betrayal, because in the agreement with Danielle Smith of Alberta, the Government of Canada committed to provide exactly the subsidy it said it would not provide on page 348 of the budget.
My question was a financial question. We already had quite a stunning bottom-line number in this budget for the extent of the deficit, a $78-billion deficit, but when we throw more money at subsidies, what we do is increase our deficit because we add to what the government is spending more than to what it receives.
The Green Party has a very good record on the subject of deficits and trying to strike balance. Of all the parties in the last federal election, we submitted more proposals to the Parliamentary Budget Officer for review than any other party. We provided, chapter and verse, how the government could bring in more revenue and pay down the deficit faster without austerity, without cuts, without depriving our social safety net of the resources it needs to expand and to provide for the needs of Canadians.
These studies are still on the Parliamentary Budget Officer's website, should anyone want to check out how much money we would have raised with a financial transaction tax, how much money we would raise with a wealth tax, or how much we could get if we put Canada first and stopped allowing the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board to take Canada pension plan money and invest it in other countries.
I did not get an answer that day. The Minister of the Environment rose, but she did not give me an answer.
Therefore, what is the deficit now that the Liberals have betrayed the promise on enhanced oil recovery?