Impact Assessment Act  Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for her question. Indeed, it is very important to work in partnership with indigenous peoples. This is clearly the number one concern in my mandate letter, and I have taken this very seriously. We worked together with indigenous peoples in drafting this bill, and we visited the communities.

Impact Assessment Act  Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague. I try hard to speak French. I am from Hamilton. My father is Irish and decided that the four McKenna children would go to a French-language school. I therefore thank my father for making that decision. I always try to learn more French and not to make mistakes.

Impact Assessment Act  Madam Speaker, I am very happy to say that we are going to do what the opposition party member wants to do. We have very clear criteria guiding our decision-making. Obviously, we need clear criteria, and we need to look at how major projects impact the environment. Climate change is real, and we have to consider greenhouse gas emissions.

Impact Assessment Act  Madam Speaker, this is a very important piece of legislation. We understand that we need to get this right. The committee process is extraordinarily important. I have said I am happy to appear before a committee. The committee also needs to hear from witnesses. There needs to be clause-by-clause.

Impact Assessment Act  Madam Speaker, throughout the process we heard from a variety of different groups. As I have said, we heard from industry, offshore boards, and also from environmentalists, provinces, and indigenous peoples. What we heard was the importance of bringing coherence. We need to have a single agency, the impact assessment agency, that leads the assessment of major projects.

Impact Assessment Act  Madam Speaker, to be clear, we provided copies of the bill to the opposition lobby immediately after the bill was tabled. That met our parliamentary obligations. We were also very pleased that members of the opposition were able to attend a briefing, which was over an hour and 15 minutes.

Impact Assessment Act  Madam Speaker, this is absolutely not an omnibus bill. This brings together four pieces of legislation that are interconnected. We cannot look at how we are going to protect our environment and our fisheries, make sure that we work in partnership with indigenous people, and also ensure that good projects go ahead without bringing coherence.

Impact Assessment Act  Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to be the one who is introducing this legislation. The environment and the economy go together. I am pleased that I am a strong woman in doing that. I am also pleased that we have a gender-based analysis so that, for any major project that goes ahead, we need to have a gender-based analysis.

Impact Assessment Act  Madam Speaker, our government knows how important it is to establish better rules for reviewing environmental processes to protect this country's environment, fish, and waterways, restore public confidence, respect indigenous rights, strengthen our economy, and attract investment.

Impact Assessment Act  Madam Speaker, these better rules are based on 14 months of engagement. This was engagement with provinces and territories, with indigenous peoples, with businesses, with environmental groups, and with companies across the country. We understand how important it is to get this right.

Impact Assessment Act  Madam Speaker, as I said, I am very pleased that we are bringing forward better rules for reviewing major projects. That is not just pipelines. That is hydro projects. That is mines. We know that we need to be doing better. In terms of getting resources to market, we also appreciate the importance of that.

Impact Assessment Act  Madam Speaker, I absolutely agree that this bill is of critical importance. It is really important that we rebuild trust for lost protections when it comes to our environment, fish, and waterways. We need to make sure that we engage with indigenous peoples. We also need to make sure that we attract investment.

Impact Assessment Act  Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the member opposite for her long-standing commitment to the environment. We think we can do better with environmental assessments. With due respect, I agree that environmental assessments are not about just transparency but are about making sure we have transparency as a precondition of trust.

Impact Assessment Act  Mr. Speaker, I really appreciate my colleague's hard work. We have a great committee, which he is part of, and I am looking forward to the debate that goes on there. First of all, I have always said, no drama, no surprises. This is one of my basic principles. We have been working on this legislation for 14 months.

Impact Assessment Act  Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for the question. All our decisions certainly have to respect our environmental and climate change obligations. We have negotiated with the provinces and territories a made-in-Canada plan to fight climate change and we must ensure that every project falls in line with that plan.