A former deputy prime minister of Canada sees the Trans Mountain expansion getting built and doubts that the federal Liberals bought the pipeline in order to shut down the project.

“I think they’ve already put everything in place to make it happen,” John Manley, now senior business advisor at Bennett Jones, told BNN Bloomberg Wednesday.

“I know there are rampant theories out there in parts of Canada that say [Trudeau’s government] bought the pipeline to shut it down,” he added. “That’s about as daft as I can think of. They could have shut it down without having to spend $4 billion on it. So I think this is going ahead.”

A Federal Court of Appeal decision last month allowed for six of the 12 legal challenges against the pipeline expansion project to go ahead. The decision called for court proceedings that will examine whether the federal government adequately consulted with Indigenous communities between August 2018 and June 2019.

The federal government bought the pipeline from Kinder Morgan Canada Ltd. for $4.5 billion last year after the company threatened to scrap the project over numerous legal and regulatory hurdles.

Despite doubts about the pipeline’s future, Finance Minister Bill Morneau reiterated his vow to move forward with the project during a Tuesday interview with BNN Bloomberg, a day after he was re-elected in his Toronto riding.

Manley noted there’s nothing left for Parliament to approve in regards to the project.

“This pipeline has been approved,” he said. “There are a few remaining legal hurdles that need to be dealt with, and those will not be dealt with in a Parliamentary forum, but in a court room.”