Mr. Speaker, Bill C-29 would prohibit the importation of the manganese-based
gasoline additive methylcyclopentadienyl manganese tricarbonyl, a chemical expression that sounds complicated but is sometimes more straightforward than the government's logic.
When the people of my riding chose a young person to represent them in this House, I think they were fully aware of the fact that one of the benefits of electing young politicians is to be able to plan ahead, 30 years ahead maybe.
The environment is an issue very close to my heart because decisions made today might have disastrous effects 30 years down the road. I hope that I will still be around in 30 years. There is a fairly good chance of that. At least, I hope so.
Carbon monoxide emissions must be reduced to an absolute minimum. Studies show that there is a gasoline additive that helps reduce by up to 20 per cent these carbon monoxide emissions which are so harmful to our environment and to our health.
This additive is manganese, or MMT if you prefer. Even those who oppose the use of MMT agree that using this substance helps cut carbon monoxide emissions by approximately 5 per cent.
So, if we try to understand the reasoning of the Liberal government, something not always easy to do, it agrees and even seeks to let our atmosphere get polluted even more than it already is. Once again, the government wants the public to believe that the environment a priority. However, this bill is proof that it is really not the case.
When I talk about the environment, I always feel a twinge of sorrow because, in spite of what some may claim, the current situation is not pretty. There are problems with the ozone layer in the north, and the smog is everywhere in the south. Our water is highly polluted. We can no longer drink the water of our lakes and, in some places, we cannot even swim or fish any more. Clear-cutting is also a widespread phenomenon.
Recently, the Minister of Human Resources Development said I was a frustrated young person. He was right, because it is not always easy for an environmentalist to speak in this House.
Indeed, I am somewhat frustrated because the previous generations were a bit careless and now we have to pay the price. With bills like this one, it is hard to say: "Yes, we know what is going on and this is where we are headed". I feel this bill is a step backward. It is disappointing.
Hubert Reeves said: "The universe gives rise to complexity. Complexity gives rise to efficiency, but does efficiency make sense?" Looking at all the pollution created worldwide, I think that efficiency does not necessarily make sense.
Unfortunately, a lot remains to be done in the environmental sector. I sometimes have the impression that we have been mistaken in a number of areas, but the time has now come to take concrete action, and I think it is still taking too long. There is a tendency to stick one's head in the sand, to try to show that things are just fine.
I cannot overlook the fact that last week I heard a very influential minister in the government saying that things were going well in Canada. It is unbelievable, when we know that the unemployment rate is over 10 per cent, that young people are fed up. Even when they graduate with a university degree, there are almost no jobs. Canada has the highest rate of suicide in the world. The debt is over $600 billion, but things are going well. It is too bad, but it is an indication of where we are headed.
I see that some members of this House are reacting, and I am glad, because they should. You will tell me that you find me rather pessimistic, but what I want to be is realistic. The bottom line is that I was recently reading in a Quebec publication that 50 species disappear every day worldwide. The bottom line is that we are destroying the habitats of these species every day, by destroying our soil, our waterways and our air. The bottom line is that it is the air we breathe that we are talking about today.
When all is said and done, what must be understood is that this will probably have repercussions 20 years from now. The food chain being what it is, when something happens to the smallest components, the effect continues on up the chain. When I speak of the smallest components, I am speaking of species that many people have still never heard of today. Unfortunately, ecologists are still misunderstood.
When Galileo said the earth was round, people laughed at him for years. Many ecologists today are raising the alarm and there are still too many people on this planet laughing at them, and at the rate things are going, I am very worried. When we see that countries like those in Asia are modernizing and that soon everyone will have his own car, as we do here, I think we should be worried. But let us limit ourselves to the smaller picture.
I said earlier that the fringe elements and ecologists are misunderstood. Which reminds me a little of the plan for sovereignty. When all is said and done, it is about taking a different route, a new route, which is something that scares people or for which they are not yet ready. It takes several years before people can support this kind of thing. But the environment is an issue that has to be settled now. It takes concrete action.
There are still fringe elements, as I said before. The other day I heard someone in my riding saying we should not eat meat more than once a day. This is the kind of thing even I have trouble with. But we must listen to the environmentalists. I think there is hope. I know I seem rather pessimistic, but I am not that pessimistic. I would say I am a realist and a reasonable person. I am an optimist, but I do not want to bury my head in the sand. I want to face the facts. I want to see the kind of problems we have, but I also realize
that good work is being done today, which gives me hope for the future.
I will first give an example from my riding, and I will then look at all this globally. Not long ago this year, we stopped the practice of log drives, which were polluting our rivers to a tremendous extent. The Péribonka river which flows along the north side of my riding may be developed for tourism in a dozen years or so. We would even be able to swim in the river. In my riding we also have a ZIP committee, Zone d'intervention prioritaire, which is supposed to raise public awareness of environmental problems. A river flows near my town, and I hope that someday we will be able to swim or fish in the river. I know I am talking about just one river in my riding, but it is not the only one. I have travelled across Canada, and there is pollution everywhere.
I have further cause for hope. The Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean region is a laboratory for sustainable development. You can see progress has been made. There are people who opposed plans to develop the Chamouchouane, a river in my riding, which we decided to keep in its natural state-one of the few rivers in Quebec where that is the case.
We even have town councillors involved in politics, and I am thinking of one in particular, Gérald Scullion, of the Town of Alma. He is probably the first "green" councillor in Quebec to be involved in the "negawatts" project of Métabetchouan. A village decided to set up the "negawatts" project. It decided to raise public awareness, and all energy savings would be reinvested. This project is headed by Mr. Paradis from Lac-Saint-Jean. At the regional level, I think we should pay tribute to these attempts to build a better world.
Of course there is all the recycling as well. Whether we like it or not, we are increasingly seeing blue boxes next to the garbage cans. There is also the electric car, which is quietly making its way. In fact, not long ago a research centre was set up in the riding of the hon. member for Laurentides. These projects give me cause for hope. And there are of course movements like Greenpeace.
Slowly but surely, we can come up for air. Except that when you do come up for air and go to Parliament and see what is going on-They try to act like environmentalists, although direct action, which was one of my slogans when I entered politics, is what makes lobbying a powerful force.
The government says it is going to be more environmentally conscious by replacing MMT with ethanol. In fact, when I did my research for this speech, I found there were no specific studies that said that ethanol was safer for the environment. Well, perhaps in the combustion process, ethanol leaves fewer residues in the air, but look at all the consequences. When you grow corn, which is used to manufacture ethanol, you have the whole ethanol production process. That is the problem. That is where we see that in the end, we lose out.
Actually, all this is pretty useless since we have no studies on the subject, and this bill is taking us down an uncertain path. We can no longer afford to play around with the environment. There is too much at stake, and this worries me. When I an ordinary bill like this one, it is just one of many things people can do. Much remains to be done.
In concluding, I will say that what saddens me is these short term policies. There is no long term view. Everything is short term. People build big stacks so the smoke will go to the village next door. It is really too bad, but that is how some people still think.
In concluding, I would like to say the following: We do not inherit the earth from our parents, we borrow it from our children.
