Mr. Chair, I thank the member for his question.
First, we continue to make progress in line with the budget and the basic timeline. This is important.
To add a few details to what Deputy Speaker d'Entremont provided, the excavation for the main Parliament welcome centre is completed. We've now installed well more than half of the geothermal wells at the ground level of the Parliament welcome centre, and that's progressing well.
The interior excavation and removal of hazardous material is well over 95% competed. At this point, more than 25 million pounds of asbestos-containing material has been removed from the building.
Mr. d'Entremont mentioned the progress on the masonry. The north side is complete, and progress is being made on the east side. Work is now starting on the west side. We're on schedule.
We're now into the most technically challenging part of the project, really the critical path of the project, which is the excavation underneath the Centre Block so that the Parliament welcome centre and the Centre Block can become one facility. To be able to accomplish that is very challenging, because the Centre Block can really only move about five millimetres during the construction. We have to excavate under that. That includes putting the Centre Block on essentially a base of about 800 piles or stilts. That will allow us to do the base isolation for the seismic retrofit for the building as well.
To be able to take away the rock beneath the building, we need to have these piles in place and replace the floor slab at the bottom of the Centre Block. It's very technically challenging, but it's progressing well. Of the 800 piles, we now have over 250 of those installed. The replacement of the level one slab is progressing well. That will allow us to move on to that next stage.
I could perhaps indicate a couple of other things. The heritage restoration work has already begun. As you well know, there are about 22,000 heritage assets within the building. They range from single items like the linen ceiling of the House of Commons chamber to the 53 bells in the Peace Tower or the 35,000 marble tiles in the building—a broad range of heritage assets, each with a conservation strategy.
The restoration and conservation of the stained glass is progressing very well. Of the 53 bells, 22 are in Holland currently being restored. On the heritage lighting, the restoration of that is proceeding very well, as well as the woodwork. Of what you could call a three-phase project, phase one is essentially complete. Phase two is well under way. Phase three is in the future—that's putting in all the new systems, elevators, mechanical, electrical and the final fit-up.
The project is proceeding well, and, as we are here today, decision-making is the key to helping ensure that it continues to proceed well.
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Mr. Rob Wright: Those are really decisions that the House of Commons takes, at the end of the day, but I can kind of add the colour commentary that lessons learned for the West Block are really being integrated. While it's very true that every one of these projects is a challenge of space and how to allocate that space, I would say that core parliamentary operations are being prioritized in the allocation of space, whether that's providing additional space for the lobbies so that the chamber can function more effectively as more members come online or very much prioritizing offices for members of Parliament in comparison with the administration.