Environment

This past week in the House of Commons, the issue of the Environment took centre stage. With the release of the International Panel on Climate Change’s report, the world’s scientists expressed their ‘unequivocal’ view that the climate is changing because of human activities. Effects will continue to deepen unless and until we can bring down our greenhouse gas emissions.

In 2005, the Kyoto Protocol to fight climate change came into effect. As a signatory under Prime Minister Jean Chretien, Canada and 167 other countries are committed to reducing their greenhouse gas emissions by specific amounts in the short term (2008-2012). It is my number one priority as Opposition Critic for the Environment to ensure the minority Conservative government honours this commitment.

The Prime Minister Led the Battle Against Kyoto

I was deeply disturbed, then, to find that the Prime Minister led a much more active campaign against Kyoto than we previously knew. In a fundraising letter that he wrote as Leader of the Opposition, Stephen Harper stated that:

“Kyoto is essentially a socialist scheme to suck money out of wealth producing nations.”

“The battle of Kyoto [is] our campaign to block the job-killing, economy-destroying Kyoto Accord.”

“THERE ARE NO CANADIAN WINNERS UNDER THE KYOTO ACCORD.”

“We will go to the wall to stop that [Kyoto] legislation.”

These are extraordinary statements. But when this letter was made public last week, ultra-conservative American commentator Rush Limbaugh was quick to defend these statements, saying “He’s right, and now he’s Prime Minister of Canada.”

Even more troubling, as recently as December the Prime Minister has continued to refer to ‘so-called greenhouse gases’, implying that they may not have an effect on climate change.

Environmental Accountability

Liberal Members of Parliament asked the Prime Minister 18 times last week to clarify the government’s plan to fight climate change. Each time the question was met with rhetoric. There is no plan right now. There are ad hoc announcements in the far corners of the country re-gifting parts of our 2005 Project Green action plan to fight climate change – from which $5.6 billion was cut in the first Conservative budget.

Environment Minister John Baird flew to Paris for meetings near the IPCC conference and speaking to the CBC French network expressed his “great surprise” to learn that human activity was behind climate change. As the Minister of Energy in the provincial Cabinet of Premier Harris, Mr. Baird led the premier’s own crusade against Kyoto for several years.

With a busy roster of Environment Committee and C-30 legislative committee meetings planned for the next few weeks, I will continue to fight to keep Canada in Kyoto and reduce our greenhouse gas emissions.