Discussion · Government Orders
Jean-Denis Garon Bloc Québécois
“I oppose this bill. It lets the government approve projects before environmental reviews are finished. Building projects like pipelines before we check them puts health, safety, and the environment at risk.”
“Madam Speaker, we can understand the need to sometimes conduct multiple simultaneous reviews to speed up projects, as long as the reviews are being done. However, that is not what we are seeing with this bill. Instead, the government can pre-approve a project, and the project can move forward while the reviews are being carried out, which means that a pipeline can be built even though the reviews have not been completed. That is crazy. How can the government tell us that it is important for reviews to be done more efficiently, while at the same time pre-approving projects that will cause significant harm to health, human safety and the environment, and allowing the project to go ahead without a review?”
Official Hansard
Madam Speaker, we can understand the need to sometimes conduct multiple simultaneous reviews to speed up projects, as long as the reviews are being done. However, that is not what we are seeing with this bill. Instead, the government can pre-approve a project, and the project can move forward while the reviews are being carried out, which means that a pipeline can be built even though the reviews have not been completed. That is crazy. How can the government tell us that it is important for reviews to be done more efficiently, while at the same time pre-approving projects that will cause significant harm to health, human safety and the environment, and allowing the project to go ahead without a review?