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Decentralized Democracy

House Hansard - 73

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 17, 2022 10:00AM
Context: House Hansard - 73 - May/17/22
Mr. Greg McLean (Calgary Centre, CPC)
  • May/17/22 10:39:05 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague in the NDP for putting forward this motion, and I appreciate the subsidiary of the Liberal Party actually putting forward a motion we can address here in the House of Commons. I would like to ask the member about some of the numbers. She talked about $8.6 billion being provided by the government in subsidies, yet there is no tangibility of that $8.6 billion actually flowing through the government's accounts. I know that EDC provides some loans: Loans are not gifts, and are market-based from EDC at this point in time. I have been searching for the actual subsidies provided to this industry and have found virtually none to an industry that provided over $20 billion in 2021, so I would love it if she would do that. I am going to put a definition on here. Would the member entertain a definition for what an inefficient fossil fuel, or any subsidy is, to this motion? Would she entertain that going forward so we can compare apples to apples?
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Context: House Hansard - 73 - May/17/22
Mr. Charlie Angus
  • May/17/22 10:53:30 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, the Liberals did promise, in 2019, to get rid of fossil fuel subsidies, and then they amended it to say “inefficient”. Well, “inefficient” means anything they want it to, such as the $570 million the government gave to the methane cleanup, and we have no proof that the money was actually spent on dealing with methane. The issue here, in terms of Putin's war, has certainly exacerbated the price of oil. It has created a crisis, and that has to be addressed. However, we were told the government was going to have an electric vehicle plan. We do not even have a plan to get the charging stations. Canadians across Canada would love to buy an electric vehicle, but if they cannot plug it in, what are they going to do? I am looking at the budget, and I see more support for oil and gas than I see for the clean energy alternatives.
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Context: House Hansard - 73 - May/17/22
Mr. Greg McLean
  • May/17/22 11:57:47 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, 4. Inefficient allocation of government resources shall not be applied to programming that aims to attain societal objectives beyond the aim of sourcing safe, secure, affordable energy for Canadians; specifically, programming applied for scientific advancements in environmental technologies to better the outcomes of energy sources that are by design inefficient, particularly at the early stages of development, which is when government action through programming is most importantly applied to derive better societal outcomes. It is an amendment that is meant to allow the government the ability to fund these new environmental technologies that are always more expensive for industry at the front end and actually continue to kind of compare a base level about what the subsidy is in this industry versus these other industries where the government is shovelling money out the door right now, to try and say this is more important for us than others. I am hoping—
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