Madam Speaker, since this is the first time I am speaking formally after coming back from the summer, I first want to send special congratulations to all our new pages in the House of Commons, those young people who come from across the country in order to help serve us in running the affairs of government. I am sure they will have a wonderful experience this year in the House of Commons. I look forward to working with them, as do all my colleagues in the House of Commons, in order to give them a wonderful experience while they are here.
Regarding Bill C-48, after consultation with my colleagues in Saskatchewan and Manitoba, although there is tentative support on an issue of this nature, we also have some very serious concerns, similar to those of my colleague in the Bloc Québécois.
Does the bill actually give us a level playing field across the country? I will be honest and say that I have not fully analyzed that aspect of the argument, but I will take under consideration the concerns of my colleague from the Bloc and I will study his notes and do further study in this regard.
We in the New Democratic Party are extremely supportive of the mining industry and know its value, especially in rural areas. As a person who lived in Watson Lake, Yukon for nine years, I knew the value to the economy of the Cassier asbestos mine and the Canada Tungsten mine. When those mines closed down for various reasons, we knew the economic impact it had on the small community of Watson Lake and, for that matter, the entire Yukon territory. We can extrapolate that to other mines throughout the country when they close down. A good example is in British Columbia at Tumbler Ridge and what happened to that community after the mine shut down. There are myriad reasons why they do shut down.
The issue of mine extraction and a fair taxation rate for the corporations and companies that do it is an extremely important one, especially for rural Canada. We know the aspect of the economy that it has for us. We know the role that it plays for people throughout the country. For example, in Nova Scotia we know the role that mining played in the development of Cape Breton and, for that matter, our country. It is something we should never lose sight of.
One of our concerns is this. If indeed the government is absolutely correct that further tax considerations, further tax reductions and further tax allowances are beneficial to those in the mining industry, then certainly that avenue should play to other sectors of our economy. We can cite many examples where the government has laid additional levies and additional taxes on other aspects of other areas of our economy and seemed to focus on this particular one. We would encourage the government to be at least a little consistent in its taxation policies.
Like my colleague from the Conservative Party, we also agree with having a regulatory framework that is more simplified and less bureaucratic and has less red tape so that everybody knows, right through from the applicant to the mining company to the environmentalist and to the community and the workers involved. If everyone could have clear instructions as to the direction we are taking in a particular area, what the costs are and what is involved in the entire process, I think that would be very helpful to move our economy along.
We have a few other questions in this regard. One is the concern about a mine shutting down. Who is responsible for the ultimate cleanup? These are questions that are still left unanswered. Although not specifically pointed to with this particular bill, these are issues that need to be addressed. We can look, for example, at the Taku watershed in northern British Columbia. The Tulsequah Chief mine, which shut down in the 1950s, is still leaking effluent into that watershed and still everyone is standing around wondering what we are going to do about it and how we fix it up.
We can look at Cape Breton and the effects of Devco mining and what has happened to the steel corporation there. In fact, one of the most polluted sites in all of North America is lying right in our backyard and we are still talking about how to clean it up and who will eventually pay for all these things.
When we discuss activities when it comes to royalties and costs in the mining sector, we should look at the overall picture from the start-up to the cleanup. I think if we were to do that we would have a fairer and more honest picture. The company would benefit and the community and the workers would benefit, but the environment would benefit as well, which is extremely important.
Another point is the concern we have in Nova Scotia: the perception that our natural gas and oil is just being taken away. In fact, not one drop of natural gas is being burned in Nova Scotia. It is all being burned in New England states.
Our industries have to compete with those industries in New England. It seems quite ironic that foreign companies would come in, set up shop, extract the natural gas and ship it down south.
In terms of the actual benefits to Nova Scotia, it could be argued that they are very few and far between. Yes, it is true that some of our workers have had employment. Yes, it is true that there has been investment in the province. Yes, it is true that it has helped the province in a very little way. But we can compare it with what natural gas and oil did for the province of Alberta. Many of us in Nova Scotia were saying quite clearly that we should have had equal benefits.
In fact our own premier has asked for equality and fairness on this file and is asking the federal government not to give us handouts. We are not a have not province. We are a province with a tremendous ability and those resources should be more controlled by the province. We should be able to maximize those benefits, similar to the province of Alberta.
I have always said, and I say this as a New Democrat tongue in cheek sometimes, that if we had had Peter Lougheed negotiating our natural gas contracts with the oil and natural gas companies, that I think we would have been much better off in terms of what benefit Nova Scotians would have received from their own resource.
We hope to have further debate on this at committee. We have many other questions that we need to ask. We need more clarification from the government on precisely how this goes along. We will also be consulting with our provincial colleagues throughout the country to hear their concerns as well.
