Environment committee  If you consider the timing of the political landscape, there are about six jurisdictions that will be going into election mode, so we'll see. I haven't seen the proposed agenda yet, but it will be interesting to see . I would point out as well, just to give you a broader sense

Environment committee  Absolutely. Politically, it is one of the thorniest issues for jurisdictions, for sure. In Canada, in Alberta and the Northwest Territories for example, we have different approaches to many things. We came to a table and over a period of three or three and a half years came to w

Environment committee  Yes.

Environment committee  The federal government has a long history with water in the north. There are quality and quantity indicators that they measure at the border and at different sites—they have different sites in Alberta—as does Alberta. Now that we are doing aquatic ecosystem management through t

Environment committee  With regard to the oil sands, in the past there was considerable controversy about the quality of the information, its impartiality, and its validity, so the federal government stepped in. I believe Mr. Baird was the environment minister at the time, and he committed to setting u

Environment committee  Mr. Chairman, may I just add a quick comment since I sit on the CCME as a minister?

Environment committee  Thank you. I just want to point out the function of the CCME and the frustration. I've now been an environment minister for nine years. We meet once a year for a day, chaired by the federal government, and it's very, very difficult. I sit on a number of these other kinds of boar

Environment committee  It's about $60 million.

Environment committee  Yes.

Environment committee  Right now, none, because we don't have any active exploration going on.

Environment committee  There have been to Conoco and Husky, but with the drop in oil prices a lot of plans were reviewed. There were some licences, but the business decision has been not to proceed.

Environment committee  No. I mean we're continuing to do work. We're going to change the regulations and we want to institute best practices. We're working on the groundwater. We're working on a lot of environmental and wildlife issues, making sure that we have our thinking clear because there is a lot

Environment committee  We are doing everything we can to ensure that there's full disclosure. I've met with the oil companies along with other ministers and raised the issue that we're going insist on that. There's not a large pushback from the industry or the folks who were around the table. They know

Environment committee  We pulled together from across the country some of the best water people we could find. There was lots of interest from various NGOs. For example, one of the big ones was the Rosenberg Foundation, which is an international water-based foundation. We had the local groups, and all

Environment committee  We think we still have some of the best water in the world, and we want to keep it that way. It's important for us to get our thinking clear and have these agreements. The world is becoming.... There is a lot of activity to the south of us, as Mr. Bevington pointed out. The Canad