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House Hansard - 245

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
November 2, 2023 10:00AM
Context: House Hansard - 245 - Nov/2/23
Mr. Greg McLean (Calgary Centre, CPC)
  • Nov/2/23 6:57:57 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, today I rise in the House to ask a question I asked in this House just last week about the Impact Assessment Act and the Supreme Court's ruling that overturned the federal government's move on the Impact Assessment Act, Bill C-69. The government moved ahead despite everybody it could possibly consult with, including opposition parties, every provincial legislature, 100 first nation bands across Canada and many other parties, saying the Impact Assessment Act as written was unconstitutional and treaded on their rights. So many rights are expressed in legislation, yet this was ignored for so long. The Government of Alberta was backed by nine provincial governments at various points in time throughout the process. It took four years because the reference case took two years to go through the appeal court system and then almost another two years to get to the Supreme Court of Canada. It was four years of lost economic activity and, effectively, constitutional strife in Canada. That is a long time. How many projects were held up in Canada in that time? It was hundreds of billions of dollars in projects. Right now, 42 projects have not received an environmental assessment. About half of them are under the old regime, the one before the Impact Assessment Act, called the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, which was passed by the previous government and effectively allowed a whole bunch of environmental assessments to be done. What amazed me was the response I got from the parliamentary secretary for housing when I asked a question about the federal government's involvement in this. He said at that point in time that the previous government's legislation got nothing done and had a gutted process. We cannot have it both ways. I cannot say how many times I hear from the other side of the House that they have their cake and eat it too and that the old legislation they tried to fix did not get anything done and yet was gutless. We cannot have both those things at the same time, but that is the continued narrative I hear on this all the time. It bewilders me to some degree, because it contradicts itself in so many ways, but he said that. This was supposed to deal with the fact that the Impact Assessment Act had to go back and get corrected as quickly as possible. Getting it corrected as quickly as possible would bring forward economic activity in Canada so we can get something done in this country again, including in all the provinces across Canada. This has to happen. I think about all the economic activity that has been held up because of the uncertainty created by the Impact Assessment Act and how it has affected so many project proponents across Canada. It is an embarrassment. It is an international embarrassment too that so much capital, including Canadian investments, is being deployed elsewhere and not here in Canada. That includes the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board. This is a travesty. We need to get over it as quickly as possible. How do we do that? We could put forward legislation that is constitutional very quickly; stop sitting on our hands; take some lessons from some environmental advocates, environmental experts and constitutional experts; and listen to what they are saying: Stay in our lane, abide by our jurisdiction and get some proper legislation we can abide by in this country.
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Context: House Hansard - 245 - Nov/2/23
Mr. Greg McLean
  • Nov/2/23 7:05:09 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my colleague's input on the matter, although, again, he is picking and choosing where he gets to take his facts on this. Think about the greenhouse gas pricing act that happened at the Supreme Court just two years ago. In fact, at that point in time, the government did not consider that reference an opinion; it took it as if it were actually the law of the land. Now, the government is saying that it was just the opinion of the Supreme Court of Canada, that it will work with it, and that it accepts that as confirmation, of course, that the federal government has the right to work in this realm. That is exactly what it said. However, the federal government can do that only in its lane. Effectively, 11 sections of the bill, out of 168 sections, are where the government actually has a lane. The Supreme Court does want the federal government to go back and refine that. That is what the government seems to be ignoring at this point in time. The best thing to do is to be surgical about this, amputate most of the bill, as people say, and go forward with making things capable of being built in Canada so we have an economy in this country again.
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