Madam Chair, I was at the same meeting as the minister in Quebec City recently, and what the people in attendance were also asking for was, once again, loans and loan guarantees.
Although sustainable development and environmental protection have become imperative and the more enlightened among us know that we must focus on renewable energy, the Conservatives continue to focus on traditional sectors that are major polluters. Since Canada draws some of its wealth from the highly polluting oil sands, the government is reluctant to follow the lead of countries that are entering the 21st century. Quite the opposite is true in Quebec. Along with Norway, Quebec is the only industrialized society in which oil is not the primary energy source.
Instead of pitting economic growth against environmental protection, as successive federal governments have always done so well, it is time to give sustainable development the stimulus it needs. Solutions related to sustainable development abound. For instance, a business from my riding, the Coopérative forestière Haut Plan Vert in Lac-des-Aigles, recently appeared before my colleagues and me on the Standing Committee on Natural Resources. The company's goal is to revive rural communities by redeveloping abandoned agricultural lands in order to produce energy that the community can use to meet its own needs. What a great project. There is no shortage of great ideas like this one. The problem is that there is not enough money to carry out such projects.
Under these circumstances, how can the minister explain that out of $1 billion earmarked for the clean energy fund, $800 million was allocated to carbon capture and storage projects in western Canada?